Of Human Bondage - W. Somerset Maugham (best fiction books to read .TXT) 📗

of stout on the table, and ’Erb poured Philip out a glass. He wanted to give him the lion’s share of the beefsteak, but Philip insisted that they should share alike. It was a sunny room with two windows that reached to the floor; it had been the parlour of a house which at one time was if not fashionable at least respectable: it might have been inhabited fifty years before by a well-to-do tradesman or an officer on half pay. ’Erb had been a football player before he married, and there were photographs on the wall of various teams in self-conscious attitudes, with neatly plastered hair, the captain seated proudly in the middle holding a cup. There were other signs of prosperity: photographs of the relations of ’Erb and his wife in Sunday clothes; on the chimneypiece an elaborate arrangement of shells stuck on a miniature rock; and on each side mugs, “A present from Southend” in Gothic letters, with pictures of a pier and a parade on them. ’Erb was something of a character; he was a nonunion man and expressed himself with indignation at the efforts of the union to force him to join. The union wasn’t no good to him, he never found no difficulty in getting work, and there was good wages for anyone as ’ad a head on his shoulders and wasn’t above puttin’ ’is ’and to anything as come ’is way. Polly was timorous. If she was ’im she’d join the union, the last time there was a strike she was expectin’ ’im to be brought back in an ambulance every time he went out. She turned to Philip.

“He’s that obstinate, there’s no doing anything with ’im.”

“Well, what I say is, it’s a free country, and I won’t be dictated to.”

“It’s no good saying it’s a free country,” said Polly, “that won’t prevent ’em bashin’ your ’ead in if they get the chanst.”

When they had finished Philip passed his pouch over to ’Erb and they lit their pipes; then he got up, for a “call” might be waiting for him at his rooms, and shook hands. He saw that it had given them pleasure that he shared their meal, and they saw that he had thoroughly enjoyed it.

“Well, goodbye, sir,” said ’Erb, “and I ’ope we shall ’ave as nice a doctor next time the missus disgraces ’erself.”

“Go on with you, ’Erb,” she retorted. “ ’Ow d’you know there’s going to be a next time?”

CXIV

The three weeks which the appointment lasted drew to an end. Philip had attended sixty-two cases, and he was tired out. When he came home about ten o’clock on his last night he hoped with all his heart that he would not be called out again. He had not had a whole night’s rest for ten days. The case which he had just come from was horrible. He had been fetched by a huge, burly man, the worse for liquor, and taken to a room in an evil-smelling court, which was filthier than any he had seen: it was a tiny attic; most of the space was taken up by a wooden bed, with a canopy of dirty red hangings, and the ceiling was so low that Philip could touch it with the tips of his fingers; with the solitary candle that afforded what light there was he went over it, frizzling up the bugs that crawled upon it. The woman was a blowsy creature of middle age, who had had a long succession of stillborn children. It was a story that Philip was not unaccustomed to: the husband had been a soldier in India; the legislation forced upon that country by the prudery of the English public had given a free run to the most distressing of all diseases; the innocent suffered. Yawning, Philip undressed and took a bath, then shook his clothes over the water and watched the animals that fell out wriggling. He was just going to get into bed when there was a knock at the door, and the hospital porter brought him a card.

“Curse you,” said Philip. “You’re the last person I wanted to see tonight. Who’s brought it?”

“I think it’s the ’usband, sir. Shall I tell him to wait?”

Philip looked at the address, saw that the street was familiar to him, and told the porter that he would find his own way. He dressed himself and in five minutes, with his black bag in his hand, stepped into the street. A man, whom he could not see in the darkness, came up to him, and said he was the husband.

“I thought I’d better wait, sir,” he said. “It’s a pretty rough neighbour’ood, and them not knowing who you was.”

Philip laughed.

“Bless your heart, they all know the doctor, I’ve been in some damned sight rougher places than Waver Street.”

It was quite true. The black bag was a passport through wretched alleys and down foul-smelling courts into which a policeman was not ready to venture by himself. Once or twice a little group of men had looked at Philip curiously as he passed; he heard a mutter of observations and then one say:

“It’s the ’orspital doctor.”

As he went by one or two of them said: “Good night, sir.”

“We shall ’ave to step out if you don’t mind, sir,” said the man who accompanied him now. “They told me there was no time to lose.”

“Why did you leave it so late?” asked Philip, as he quickened his pace.

He glanced at the fellow as they passed a lamppost.

“You look awfully young,” he said.

“I’m turned eighteen, sir.”

He was fair, and he had not a hair on his face, he looked no more than a boy; he was short, but thick set.

“You’re young to be married,” said Philip.

“We ’ad to.”

“How much d’you earn?”

“Sixteen, sir.”

Sixteen shillings a week was not much to keep a wife and child on. The room the couple lived in showed that their poverty was extreme. It was a fair size,