Five Tales | Page 8

gratitude. She would soon have given herself to him--that one! He had
never gone there again! And to this day he did not know why he had

abstained; to this day he did not know whether he were glad or sorry
not to have plucked that rose. He must surely have been very different
then! Queer business, life--queer, queer business!--to go through it
never knowing what you would do next. Ah! to be like Keith, steady,
buttoned-up in success; a brass pot, a pillar of society! Once, as a boy,
he had been within an ace of killing Keith, for sneering at him. Once in
Southern Italy he had been near killing a driver who was flogging his
horse. And now, that darkfaced, swinish bully who had ruined the girl
he had grown to love--he had done it! Killed him! Killed a man!
He who did not want to hurt a fly. The chemist's window comforted
him with the sudden thought that he had at home that which made him
safe, in case they should arrest him. He would never again go out
without some of those little white tablets sewn into the lining of his
coat. Restful, even exhilarating thought! They said a man should not
take his own life. Let them taste horror--those glib citizens! Let them
live as that girl had lived, as millions lived all the world over, under
their canting dogmas! A man might rather even take his life than watch
their cursed inhumanities.
He went into the chemist's for a bromide; and, while the man was
mixing it, stood resting one foot like a tired horse. The "life" he had
squeezed out of that fellow! After all, a billion living creatures gave up
life each day, had it squeezed out of them, mostly. And perhaps not one
a day deserved death so much as that loathly fellow. Life! a
breath--aflame! Nothing! Why, then, this icy clutching at his heart?
The chemist brought the draught.
"Not sleeping, sir?"
"No."
The man's eyes seemed to say: 'Yes! Burning the candle at both ends- I
know!' Odd life, a chemist's; pills and powders all day long, to hold the
machinery of men together! Devilish odd trade!
In going out he caught the reflection of his face in a mirror; it seemed
too good altogether for a man who had committed murder. There was a
sort of brightness underneath, an amiability lurking about its shadows;
how--how could it be the face of a man who had done what he had
done? His head felt lighter now, his feet lighter; he walked rapidly
again.
Curious feeling of relief and oppression all at once! Frightful--to long

for company, for talk, for distraction; and--to be afraid of it! The
girl--the girl and Keith were now the only persons who would not give
him that feeling of dread. And, of those two--Keith was not...! Who
could consort with one who was never wrong, a successful, righteous
fellow; a chap built so that he knew nothing about himself, wanted to
know nothing, a chap all solid actions? To be a quicksand swallowing
up one's own resolutions was bad enough! But to be like Keith--all
willpower, marching along, treading down his own feelings and
weaknesses! No! One could not make a comrade of a man like Keith,
even if he were one's brother? The only creature in all the world was
the girl. She alone knew and felt what he was feeling; would put up
with him and love him whatever he did, or was done to him. He
stopped and took shelter in a doorway, to light a cigarette. He had
suddenly a fearful wish to pass the archway where he had placed the
body; a fearful wish that had no sense, no end in view, no anything; just
an insensate craving to see the dark place again. He crossed Borrow
Street to the little lane. There was only one person visible, a man on the
far side with his shoulders hunched against the wind; a short, dark
figure which crossed and came towards him in the flickering lamplight.
What a face! Yellow, ravaged, clothed almost to the eyes in a stubbly
greyish growth of beard, with blackish teeth, and haunting bloodshot
eyes. And what a figure of rags--one shoulder higher than the other,
one leg a little lame, and thin! A surge of feeling came up in Laurence
for this creature, more unfortunate than himself. There were lower
depths than his!
"Well, brother," he said, "you don't look too prosperous!"
The smile which gleamed out on the man's face seemed as unlikely as a
smile on a scarecrow.
"Prosperity doesn't come my way," he said in a rusty voice. "I'm a
failure--always been a failure. And yet you wouldn't think it, would
you?--I was