New Grub Street [180]
beings, and were meant to enjoy life very quietly. As we can't enjoy, we just suffer quietly, that's all. By-the-bye, I want to talk about a difficulty in one of the Fragments of Euripides. Did you ever go through the Fragments?'
This made a diversion for half an hour. Then Reardon returned to his former line of thought.
'As I was entering patients yesterday, there came up to the table a tall, good-looking, very quiet girl, poorly dressed, but as neat as could be. She gave me her name, then I asked "Occupation?" She said at once, "I'm unfortunate, sir." I couldn't help looking up at her in surprise; I had taken it for granted she was a dressmaker or something of the kind. And, do you know, I never felt so strong an impulse to shake hands, to show sympathy, and even respect, in some way. I should have liked to say, "Why, I am unfortunate, too!" such a good, patient face she had.'
'I distrust such appearances,' said Biffen in his quality of realist.
'Well, so do I, as a rule. But in this case they were convincing. And there was no need whatever for her to make such a declaration; she might just as well have said anything else; it's the merest form. I shall always hear her voice saying, "I'm unfortunate, sir." She made me feel what a mistake it was for me to marry such a girl as Amy. I ought to have looked about for some simple, kind-hearted work-girl; that was the kind of wife indicated for me by circumstances. If I had earned a hundred a year she would have thought we were well-to-do. I should have been an authority to her on everything under the sun--and above it. No ambition would have unsettled her. We should have lived in a couple of poor rooms somewhere, and--we should have loved each other.'
'What a shameless idealist you are!' said Biffen, shaking his head. 'Let me sketch the true issue of such a marriage. To begin with, the girl would have married you in firm persuasion that you were a "gentleman" in temporary difficulties, and that before long you would have plenty of money to dispose of. Disappointed in this hope, she would have grown sharp-tempered, querulous, selfish. All your endeavours to make her understand you would only have resulted in widening the impassable gulf. She would have misconstrued your every sentence, found food for suspicion in every harmless joke, tormented you with the vulgarest forms of jealousy. The effect upon your nature would have been degrading. In the end, you must have abandoned every effort to raise her to your own level, and either have sunk to hers or made a rupture. Who doesn't know the story of such attempts? I myself ten years ago, was on the point of committing such a folly, but, Heaven be praised! an accident saved me.'
'You never told me that story.'
'And don't care to now. I prefer to forget it.'
'Well, you can judge for yourself but not for me. Of course I might have chosen the wrong girl, but I am supposing that I had been fortunate. In any case there would have been a much better chance than in the marriage that I made.'
'Your marriage was sensible enough, and a few years hence you will be a happy man again.'
'You seriously think Amy will come back to me?'
'Of course I do.'
'Upon my word, I don't know that I desire it.'
'Because you are in a strangely unhealthy state.'
'I rather think I regard the matter more sanely than ever yet. I am quite free from sexual bias. I can see that Amy was not my fit intellectual companion, and all emotion at the thought of her has gone from me. The word "love" is a weariness to me. If only our idiotic laws permitted us to break the legal bond, how glad both of us would be!'
'You are depressed and anaemic. Get yourself in flesh, and view things like a man of this world.'
'But don't you think it the best thing that can happen to a man if he outgrows passion?'
'In certain circumstances, no doubt.'
'In all and any. The best moments of life are those when we contemplate beauty in the purely artistic spirit--objectively. I have had such moments in Greece and Italy; times when I was a free
This made a diversion for half an hour. Then Reardon returned to his former line of thought.
'As I was entering patients yesterday, there came up to the table a tall, good-looking, very quiet girl, poorly dressed, but as neat as could be. She gave me her name, then I asked "Occupation?" She said at once, "I'm unfortunate, sir." I couldn't help looking up at her in surprise; I had taken it for granted she was a dressmaker or something of the kind. And, do you know, I never felt so strong an impulse to shake hands, to show sympathy, and even respect, in some way. I should have liked to say, "Why, I am unfortunate, too!" such a good, patient face she had.'
'I distrust such appearances,' said Biffen in his quality of realist.
'Well, so do I, as a rule. But in this case they were convincing. And there was no need whatever for her to make such a declaration; she might just as well have said anything else; it's the merest form. I shall always hear her voice saying, "I'm unfortunate, sir." She made me feel what a mistake it was for me to marry such a girl as Amy. I ought to have looked about for some simple, kind-hearted work-girl; that was the kind of wife indicated for me by circumstances. If I had earned a hundred a year she would have thought we were well-to-do. I should have been an authority to her on everything under the sun--and above it. No ambition would have unsettled her. We should have lived in a couple of poor rooms somewhere, and--we should have loved each other.'
'What a shameless idealist you are!' said Biffen, shaking his head. 'Let me sketch the true issue of such a marriage. To begin with, the girl would have married you in firm persuasion that you were a "gentleman" in temporary difficulties, and that before long you would have plenty of money to dispose of. Disappointed in this hope, she would have grown sharp-tempered, querulous, selfish. All your endeavours to make her understand you would only have resulted in widening the impassable gulf. She would have misconstrued your every sentence, found food for suspicion in every harmless joke, tormented you with the vulgarest forms of jealousy. The effect upon your nature would have been degrading. In the end, you must have abandoned every effort to raise her to your own level, and either have sunk to hers or made a rupture. Who doesn't know the story of such attempts? I myself ten years ago, was on the point of committing such a folly, but, Heaven be praised! an accident saved me.'
'You never told me that story.'
'And don't care to now. I prefer to forget it.'
'Well, you can judge for yourself but not for me. Of course I might have chosen the wrong girl, but I am supposing that I had been fortunate. In any case there would have been a much better chance than in the marriage that I made.'
'Your marriage was sensible enough, and a few years hence you will be a happy man again.'
'You seriously think Amy will come back to me?'
'Of course I do.'
'Upon my word, I don't know that I desire it.'
'Because you are in a strangely unhealthy state.'
'I rather think I regard the matter more sanely than ever yet. I am quite free from sexual bias. I can see that Amy was not my fit intellectual companion, and all emotion at the thought of her has gone from me. The word "love" is a weariness to me. If only our idiotic laws permitted us to break the legal bond, how glad both of us would be!'
'You are depressed and anaemic. Get yourself in flesh, and view things like a man of this world.'
'But don't you think it the best thing that can happen to a man if he outgrows passion?'
'In certain circumstances, no doubt.'
'In all and any. The best moments of life are those when we contemplate beauty in the purely artistic spirit--objectively. I have had such moments in Greece and Italy; times when I was a free