Delphi Collected Works of W. Somerset Maugham (Illustrated)

by William Somerset Maugham

  Though it was late he felt too excited to sleep and, going out, made his way into the boulevard and walked towards the light. This led him to the station; and the square in front of it, vivid with arc-lamps, noisy with the yellow trams that seemed to cross it in all directions, made him laugh aloud with joy. There were cafes all round, and by chance, thirsty and eager to get a nearer sight of the crowd, Philip installed himself at a little table outside the Cafe de Versailles. Every other table was taken, for it was a fine night; and Philip looked curiously at the people, here little family groups, there a knot of men with odd-shaped hats and beards talking loudly and gesticulating; next to him were two men who looked like painters with women who Philip hoped were not their lawful wives; behind him he heard Americans loudly arguing on art. His soul was thrilled. He sat till very late, tired out but too happy to move, and when at last he went to bed he was wide awake; he listened to the manifold noise of Paris.

  Next day about tea-time he made his way to the Lion de Belfort, and in a new street that led out of the Boulevard Raspail found Mrs. Otter. She was an insignificant woman of thirty, with a provincial air and a deliberately lady-like manner; she introduced him to her mother. He discovered presently that she had been studying in Paris for three years and later that she was separated from her husband. She had in her small drawing-room one or two portraits which she had painted, and to Philip’s inexperience they seemed extremely accomplished.

  “I wonder if I shall ever be able to paint as well as that,” he said to her.

  “Oh, I expect so,” she replied, not without self-satisfaction. “You can’t expect to do everything all at once, of course.”

  She was very kind. She gave him the address of a shop where he could get a portfolio, drawing-paper, and charcoal.

  “I shall be going to Amitrano’s about nine tomorrow, and if you’ll be there then I’ll see that you get a good place and all that sort of thing.”

  She asked him what he wanted to do, and Philip felt that he should not let her see how vague he was about the whole matter.

  “Well, first I want to learn to draw,” he said.

  “I’m so glad to hear you say that. People always want to do things in such a hurry. I never touched oils till I’d been here for two years, and look at the result.”

  She gave a glance at the portrait of her mother, a sticky piece of painting that hung over the piano.

  “And if I were you, I would be very careful about the people you get to know. I wouldn’t mix myself up with any foreigners. I’m very careful myself.”

  Philip thanked her for the suggestion, but it seemed to him odd. He did not know that he particularly wanted to be careful.

  “We live just as we would if we were in England,” said Mrs. Otter’s mother, who till then had spoken little. “When we came here we brought all our own furniture over.”

  Philip looked round the room. It was filled with a massive suite, and at the window were the same sort of white lace curtains which Aunt Louisa put up at the vicarage in summer. The piano was draped in Liberty silk and so was the chimney-piece. Mrs. Otter followed his wandering eye.

  “In the evening when we close the shutters one might really feel one was in England.”

  “And we have our meals just as if we were at home,” added her mother. “A meat breakfast in the morning and dinner in the middle of the day.”

  When he left Mrs. Otter Philip went to buy drawing materials; and next morning at the stroke of nine, trying to seem self-assured, he presented himself at the school. Mrs. Otter was already there, and she came forward with a friendly smile. He had been anxious about the reception he would have as a nouveau, for he had read a good deal of the rough joking to which a newcomer was exposed at some of the studios; but Mrs. Otter had reassured him.

  “Oh, there’s nothing like that here,” she said. “You see, about half our students are ladies, and they set a tone to the place.”

  The studio was large and bare, with gray walls, on which were pinned the studies that had received prizes. A model was sitting in a chair with a loose wrap thrown over her, and about a dozen men and women were standing about, some talking and others still working on their sketch. It was the first rest of the model.

  “You’d better not try anything too difficult at first,” said Mrs. Otter.

  “Put your easel here. You’ll find that’s the easiest pose.”

  Philip placed an easel where she indicated, and Mrs. Otter introduced him to a young woman who sat next to him.

  “Mr. Carey — Miss Price. Mr. Carey’s never studied before, you won’t mind helping him a little just at first will you?” Then she turned to the model. “La Pose.”

  The model threw aside the paper she had been reading, La Petite Republique, and sulkily, throwing off her gown, got on to the stand. She stood, squarely on both feet with her hands clasped behind her head.

  “It’s a stupid pose,” said Miss Price. “I can’t imagine why they chose it.”

  When Philip entered, the people in the studio had looked at him curiously, and the model gave him an indifferent glance, but now they ceased to pay attention to him. Philip, with his beautiful sheet of paper in front of him, stared awkwardly at the model. He did not know how to begin. He had never seen a naked woman before. She was not young and her breasts were shrivelled. She had colourless, fair hair that fell over her forehead untidily, and her face was covered with large freckles. He glanced at Miss Price’s work. She had only been working on it two days, and it looked as though she had had trouble; her paper was in a mess from constant rubbing out, and to Philip’s eyes the figure looked strangely distorted.

  “I should have thought I could do as well as that,” he said to himself.

  He began on the head, thinking that he would work slowly downwards, but, he could not understand why, he found it infinitely more difficult to draw a head from the model than to draw one from his imagination. He got into difficulties. He glanced at Miss Price. She was working with vehement gravity. Her brow was wrinkled with eagerness, and there was an anxious look in her eyes. It was hot in the studio, and drops of sweat stood on her forehead. She was a girl of twenty-six, with a great deal of dull gold hair; it was handsome hair, but it was carelessly done, dragged back from her forehead and tied in a hurried knot. She had a large face, with broad, flat features and small eyes; her skin was pasty, with a singular unhealthiness of tone, and there was no colour in the cheeks. She had an unwashed air and you could not help wondering if she slept in her clothes. She was serious and silent. When the next pause came, she stepped back to look at her work.

  “I don’t know why I’m having so much bother,” she said. “But I mean to get it right.” She turned to Philip. “How are you getting on?”

  “Not at all,” he answered, with a rueful smile.

  She looked at what he had done.

  “You can’t expect to do anything that way. You must take measurements. And you must square out your paper.”

  She showed him rapidly how to set about the business. Philip was impressed by her earnestness, but repelled by her want of charm. He was grateful for the hints she gave him and set to work again. Meanwhile other people had come in, mostly men, for the women always arrived first, and the studio for the time of year (it was early yet) was fairly full. Presently there came in a young man with thin, black hair, an enormous nose, and a face so long that it reminded you of a horse. He sat down next to Philip and nodded across him to Miss Price.

  “You’re very late,” she said. “Are you only just up?”

  “It was such a splendid day, I thought I’d lie in bed and think how beautiful it was out.”

  Philip smiled, but Miss Price took the remark seriously.

  “That seems a funny thing to do, I should have thought it would be more to the point to get up and enjoy it.”

  “The way of the humorist is very hard,” said the young man gravely.

  He did not seem inclined to work. He looked at his canvas; he was working
in colour, and had sketched in the day before the model who was posing. He turned to Philip.

  “Have you just come out from England?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you find your way to Amitrano’s?”

  “It was the only school I knew of.”

  “I hope you haven’t come with the idea that you will learn anything here which will be of the smallest use to you.”

  “It’s the best school in Paris,” said Miss Price. “It’s the only one where they take art seriously.”

  “Should art be taken seriously?” the young man asked; and since Miss Price replied only with a scornful shrug, he added: “But the point is, all schools are bad. They are academical, obviously. Why this is less injurious than most is that the teaching is more incompetent than elsewhere. Because you learn nothing….”

  “But why d’you come here then?” interrupted Philip.

  “I see the better course, but do not follow it. Miss Price, who is cultured, will remember the Latin of that.”

  “I wish you would leave me out of your conversation, Mr. Clutton,” said

  Miss Price brusquely.

  “The only way to learn to paint,” he went on, imperturbable, “is to take a studio, hire a model, and just fight it out for yourself.”

  “That seems a simple thing to do,” said Philip.

  “It only needs money,” replied Clutton.

  He began to paint, and Philip looked at him from the corner of his eye. He was long and desperately thin; his huge bones seemed to protrude from his body; his elbows were so sharp that they appeared to jut out through the arms of his shabby coat. His trousers were frayed at the bottom, and on each of his boots was a clumsy patch. Miss Price got up and went over to Philip’s easel.

  “If Mr. Clutton will hold his tongue for a moment, I’ll just help you a little,” she said.

  “Miss Price dislikes me because I have humour,” said Clutton, looking meditatively at his canvas, “but she detests me because I have genius.”

  He spoke with solemnity, and his colossal, misshapen nose made what he said very quaint. Philip was obliged to laugh, but Miss Price grew darkly red with anger.

  “You’re the only person who has ever accused you of genius.”

  “Also I am the only person whose opinion is of the least value to me.”

  Miss Price began to criticise what Philip had done. She talked glibly of anatomy and construction, planes and lines, and of much else which Philip did not understand. She had been at the studio a long time and knew the main points which the masters insisted upon, but though she could show what was wrong with Philip’s work she could not tell him how to put it right.

  “It’s awfully kind of you to take so much trouble with me,” said Philip.

  “Oh, it’s nothing,” she answered, flushing awkwardly. “People did the same for me when I first came, I’d do it for anyone.”

  “Miss Price wants to indicate that she is giving you the advantage of her knowledge from a sense of duty rather than on account of any charms of your person,” said Clutton.

  Miss Price gave him a furious look, and went back to her own drawing. The clock struck twelve, and the model with a cry of relief stepped down from the stand.

  Miss Price gathered up her things.

  “Some of us go to Gravier’s for lunch,” she said to Philip, with a look at

  Clutton. “I always go home myself.”

  “I’ll take you to Gravier’s if you like,” said Clutton.

  Philip thanked him and made ready to go. On his way out Mrs. Otter asked him how he had been getting on.

  “Did Fanny Price help you?” she asked. “I put you there because I know she can do it if she likes. She’s a disagreeable, ill-natured girl, and she can’t draw herself at all, but she knows the ropes, and she can be useful to a newcomer if she cares to take the trouble.”

  On the way down the street Clutton said to him:

  “You’ve made an impression on Fanny Price. You’d better look out.”

  Philip laughed. He had never seen anyone on whom he wished less to make an impression. They came to the cheap little restaurant at which several of the students ate, and Clutton sat down at a table at which three or four men were already seated. For a franc, they got an egg, a plate of meat, cheese, and a small bottle of wine. Coffee was extra. They sat on the pavement, and yellow trams passed up and down the boulevard with a ceaseless ringing of bells.

  “By the way, what’s your name?” said Clutton, as they took their seats.

  “Carey.”

  “Allow me to introduce an old and trusted friend, Carey by name,” said

  Clutton gravely. “Mr. Flanagan, Mr. Lawson.”

  They laughed and went on with their conversation. They talked of a thousand things, and they all talked at once. No one paid the smallest attention to anyone else. They talked of the places they had been to in the summer, of studios, of the various schools; they mentioned names which were unfamiliar to Philip, Monet, Manet, Renoir, Pissarro, Degas. Philip listened with all his ears, and though he felt a little out of it, his heart leaped with exultation. The time flew. When Clutton got up he said:

  “I expect you’ll find me here this evening if you care to come. You’ll find this about the best place for getting dyspepsia at the lowest cost in the Quarter.”

  XLI

  Philip walked down the Boulevard du Montparnasse. It was not at all like the Paris he had seen in the spring during his visit to do the accounts of the Hotel St. Georges — he thought already of that part of his life with a shudder — but reminded him of what he thought a provincial town must be. There was an easy-going air about it, and a sunny spaciousness which invited the mind to day-dreaming. The trimness of the trees, the vivid whiteness of the houses, the breadth, were very agreeable; and he felt himself already thoroughly at home. He sauntered along, staring at the people; there seemed an elegance about the most ordinary, workmen with their broad red sashes and their wide trousers, little soldiers in dingy, charming uniforms. He came presently to the Avenue de l’Observatoire, and he gave a sigh of pleasure at the magnificent, yet so graceful, vista. He came to the gardens of the Luxembourg: children were playing, nurses with long ribbons walked slowly two by two, busy men passed through with satchels under their arms, youths strangely dressed. The scene was formal and dainty; nature was arranged and ordered, but so exquisitely, that nature unordered and unarranged seemed barbaric. Philip was enchanted. It excited him to stand on that spot of which he had read so much; it was classic ground to him; and he felt the awe and the delight which some old don might feel when for the first time he looked on the smiling plain of Sparta.

  As he wandered he chanced to see Miss Price sitting by herself on a bench. He hesitated, for he did not at that moment want to see anyone, and her uncouth way seemed out of place amid the happiness he felt around him; but he had divined her sensitiveness to affront, and since she had seen him thought it would be polite to speak to her.

  “What are you doing here?” she said, as he came up.

  “Enjoying myself. Aren’t you?”

  “Oh, I come here every day from four to five. I don’t think one does any good if one works straight through.”

  “May I sit down for a minute?” he said.

  “If you want to.”

  “That doesn’t sound very cordial,” he laughed.

  “I’m not much of a one for saying pretty things.”

  Philip, a little disconcerted, was silent as he lit a cigarette.

  “Did Clutton say anything about my work?” she asked suddenly.

  “No, I don’t think he did,” said Philip.

  “He’s no good, you know. He thinks he’s a genius, but he isn’t. He’s too lazy, for one thing. Genius is an infinite capacity for taking pains. The only thing is to peg away. If one only makes up one’s mind badly enough to do a thing one can’t help doing it.”

  She spoke with a passionate strenuousness which was rather striking. She wor
e a sailor hat of black straw, a white blouse which was not quite clean, and a brown skirt. She had no gloves on, and her hands wanted washing. She was so unattractive that Philip wished he had not begun to talk to her. He could not make out whether she wanted him to stay or go.

  “I’ll do anything I can for you,” she said all at once, without reference to anything that had gone before. “I know how hard it is.”

  “Thank you very much,” said Philip, then in a moment: “Won’t you come and have tea with me somewhere?”

  She looked at him quickly and flushed. When she reddened her pasty skin acquired a curiously mottled look, like strawberries and cream that had gone bad.

  “No, thanks. What d’you think I want tea for? I’ve only just had lunch.”

  “I thought it would pass the time,” said Philip.

  “If you find it long you needn’t bother about me, you know. I don’t mind being left alone.”

  At that moment two men passed, in brown velveteens, enormous trousers, and basque caps. They were young, but both wore beards.

  “I say, are those art-students?” said Philip. “They might have stepped out of the Vie de Boheme.”

  “They’re Americans,” said Miss Price scornfully. “Frenchmen haven’t worn things like that for thirty years, but the Americans from the Far West buy those clothes and have themselves photographed the day after they arrive in Paris. That’s about as near to art as they ever get. But it doesn’t matter to them, they’ve all got money.”