Part 6 (1/2)

A man is standing pasting together bags made of old newspaper.

”I would like to see Mr. Christie,” I said.

”That's me!” replied the man.

”Indeed!” Well, my name was so-and-so. I had taken the liberty of sending him an application, I did not know if it had been of any use.

He repeated my name a couple of times and commenced to laugh.

”Well now, you shall see,” he said, taking my letter out of his breast-pocket, ”if you will just be good enough to see how you deal with dates, sir. You dated your letter 1848,” and the man roared with laughter.

”Yes, that was rather a mistake,” I said, abashed--a distraction, a want of thought; I admitted it.

”You see I must have a man who, as a matter of fact, makes no mistakes in figures,” said he. ”I regret it, your handwriting is clear, and I like your letter, too, but--”

I waited a while; this could not possibly be the man's final say. He busied himself again with the bags.

”Yes, it was a pity,” I said; ”really an awful pity, but of course it would not occur again; and, after all, surely this little error could not have rendered me quite unfit to keep books?”

”No, I didn't say that,” he answered, ”but in the meantime it had so much weight with me that I decided at once upon another man.”

”So the place is filled?”

”Yes.”

”A--h, well, then there's nothing more to be said about it!”

”No! I'm sorry, but--”

”Good-evening!” said I.

Fury welled up in me, blazing with brutal strength. I fetched my parcel from the entry, set my teeth together, jostled against the peaceful folk on the footpath, and never once asked their pardon.

As one man stopped and set me to rights rather sharply for my behaviour, I turned round and screamed a single meaningless word in his ear, clenched my fist right under his nose, and stumbled on, hardened by a blind rage that I could not control.

He called a policeman, and I desired nothing better than to have one between my hands just for one moment. I slackened my pace intentionally in order to give him an opportunity of overtaking me; but he did not come. Was there now any reason whatever that absolutely every one of one's most earnest and most persevering efforts should fail? Why, too, had I written 1848? In what way did that infernal date concern me? Here I was going about starving, so that my entrails wriggle together in me like worms, and it was, as far as I knew, not decreed in the book of fate that anything in the shape of food would turn up later on in the day.

I was becoming mentally and physically more and more prostrate; I was letting myself down each day to less and less honest actions, so that I lied on each day without blus.h.i.+ng, cheated poor people out of their rent, struggled with the meanest thoughts of making away with other men's blankets--all without remorse or p.r.i.c.k of conscience.

Foul places began to gather in my inner being, black spores which spread more and more. And up in Heaven G.o.d Almighty sat and kept a watchful eye on me, and took heed that _my_ destruction proceeded in accordance with all the rules of art, uniformly and gradually, without a break in the measure.

But in the abysses of h.e.l.l the angriest devils bristled with range because it lasted such a long time until I committed a mortal sin, an unpardonable offence for which G.o.d in His justice must cast me--down....

I quickened my pace, hurried faster and faster, turned suddenly to the left and found myself, excited and angry, in a light ornate doorway. I did not pause, not for one second, but the whole peculiar ornamentation of the entrance struck on my perception in a flash; every detail of the decoration and the tiling of the floor stood clear on my mental vision as I sprang up the stairs. I rang violently on the second floor. Why should I stop exactly on the second floor? And why just seize hold of this bell which was some little way from the stairs?

A young lady in a grey gown with black tr.i.m.m.i.n.g came out and opened the door. She looked for a moment in astonishment at me, then shook her head and said:

”No, we have not got anything today,” and she made a feint to close the door.

What induced me to thrust myself in this creature's way? She took me without further ado for a beggar.