Of Human Bondage - W. Somerset Maugham [348]
He glanced quickly at Sally, he wondered what she was thinking, and then looked away again.
“I was going to ask you to marry me,” he said.
“I thought p’raps you might, but I shouldn’t have liked to stand in your way.”
“You wouldn’t have done that.”
“How about your travels, Spain and all that?”
“How d’you know I want to travel?”
“I ought to know something about it. I’ve heard you and Dad talk about it till you were blue in the face.”
“I don’t care a damn about all that.” He paused for an instant and then spoke in a low, hoarse whisper. “I don’t want to leave you! I can’t leave you.”
She did not answer. He could not tell what she thought.
“I wonder if you’ll marry me, Sally.”
She did not move and there was no flicker of emotion on her face, but she did not look at him when she answered:
“If you like.”
“Don’t you want to?”
“Oh, of course I’d like to have a house of my own, and it’s about time I was settling down.”
He smiled a little. He knew her pretty well by now, and her manner did not surprise him.
“But don’t you want to marry me?”
“There’s no one else I would marry.”
“Then that settles it.”
“Mother and Dad will be surprised, won’t they?”
“I’m so happy.”
“I want my lunch,” she said.
“Dear!”
He smiled and took her hand and pressed it. They got up and walked out of the gallery. They stood for a moment at the balustrade and looked at Trafalgar Square. Cabs and omnibuses hurried to and fro, and crowds passed, hastening in every direction, and the sun was shining.
AFTERWORD
We certainly get to know Philip Carey, whose story is told here in Of Human Bondage. In fact, I think we know him better than we know a lot of our neighbors and friends because we travel a journey with him from when we first meet him as an anxious little boy. Naturally, right away we care what happens to him, hoping against hope that his loving mother will not die, or that his cold and awkward uncle will find common ground with the eager child. When Philip believes literally all that he is told about the power of prayer and then prays so earnestly that God will cure his club foot, there cannot be a reader who does not hope for a miracle too. It isn’t a very big thing, after all, and it would make poor little Philip so happy! (And Philip is so sure it will happen; after all, God had cured the lepers and the blind.)
Just when we get over the fact that there is going to be no cure this time come Philip’s first tentative friendships. School is torture, and our poor Carey (they all called each other by their surnames in those days) is friendless and very lonely at first. Then joy of joys, he finds a pal. Rose is a normal, uncomplicated fellow who is happy to laugh and joke and walk with Carey through the complexities of school life. But Carey puts too much into the friendship, and Rose eventually tires of him being overpossessive and moody, and moves on to other friends.
This is the point, quite early on in the story, when we are all irrevocably bonded to Philip Carey. Part of us wants to shake him and tell him to wake up to reality. Part of us wants to put our arms around his thin, shaking shoulders and stroke him until he is calm. But it all bodes badly for the future. If Philip can’t handle a simple boyhood friendship, then what on earth is going to happen when he comes across love?
And so it goes throughout the novel. As I read, I ached for Philip not to drift too much through life without a rudder. As if he were a real person, I pleaded with him to reconsider the career he was slipping into without any thought to