The Moon and Sixpence, W. Somerset Maugham [beach books .txt] 📗

kept his kind, foolish eyes fixed on mine. They were full of tears.

“I don’t think I understand,” I said.

“Strickland can’t work with anyone else in the studio.”

“Damn it all, it’s your studio. That’s his lookout.”

He looked at me pitifully. His lips were trembling.

“What happened?” I asked, rather sharply.

He hesitated and flushed. He glanced unhappily at one of the pictures on the wall.

“He wouldn’t let me go on painting. He told me to get out.”

“But why didn’t you tell him to go to hell?”

“He turned me out. I couldn’t very well struggle with him. He threw my hat after me, and locked the door.”

I was furious with Strickland, and was indignant with myself, because Dirk Stroeve cut such an absurd figure that I felt inclined to laugh.

“But what did your wife say?”

“She’d gone out to do the marketing.”

“Is he going to let her in?”

“I don’t know.”

I gazed at Stroeve with perplexity. He stood like a schoolboy with whom a master is finding fault.

“Shall I get rid of Strickland for you?” I asked.

He gave a little start, and his shining face grew very red.

“No. You’d better not do anything.”

He nodded to me and walked away. It was clear that for some reason he did not want to discuss the matter. I did not understand.

XXVIII

The explanation came a week later. It was about ten o’clock at night; I had been dining by myself at a restaurant, and having returned to my small apartment, was sitting in my parlour, reading I heard the cracked tinkling of the bell, and, going into the corridor, opened the door. Stroeve stood before me.

“Can I come in?” he asked.

In the dimness of the landing I could not see him very well, but there was something in his voice that surprised me. I knew he was of abstemious habit or I should have thought he had been drinking. I led the way into my sitting room and asked him to sit down.

“Thank God I’ve found you,” he said.

“What’s the matter?” I asked in astonishment at his vehemence.

I was able now to see him well. As a rule he was neat in his person, but now his clothes were in disorder. He looked suddenly bedraggled. I was convinced he had been drinking, and I smiled. I was on the point of chaffing him on his state.

“I didn’t know where to go,” he burst out. “I came here earlier, but you weren’t in.”

“I dined late,” I said.

I changed my mind: it was not liquor that had driven him to this obvious desperation. His face, usually so rosy, was now strangely mottled. His hands trembled.

“Has anything happened?” I asked.

“My wife has left me.”

He could hardly get the words out. He gave a little gasp, and the tears began to trickle down his round cheeks. I did not know what to say. My first thought was that she had come to the end of her forbearance with his infatuation for Strickland, and, goaded by the latter’s cynical behaviour, had insisted that he should be turned out. I knew her capable of temper, for all the calmness of her manner; and if Stroeve still refused, she might easily have flung out of the studio with vows never to return. But the little man was so distressed that I could not smile.

“My dear fellow, don’t be unhappy. She’ll come back. You mustn’t take very seriously what women say when they’re in a passion.”

“You don’t understand. She’s in love with Strickland.”

“What!” I was startled at this, but the idea had no sooner taken possession of me than I saw it was absurd. “How can you be so silly? You don’t mean to say you’re jealous of Strickland?” I almost laughed. “You know very well that she can’t bear the sight of him.”

“You don’t understand,” he moaned.

“You’re an hysterical ass,” I said a little impatiently. “Let me give you a whisky-and-soda, and you’ll feel better.”

I supposed that for some reason or other⁠—and Heaven knows what ingenuity men exercise to torment themselves⁠—Dirk had got it into his head that his wife cared for Strickland, and with his genius for blundering he might quite well have offended her so that, to anger him, perhaps, she had taken pains to foster his suspicion.

“Look here,” I said, “let’s go back to your studio. If you’ve made a fool of yourself you must eat humble pie. Your wife doesn’t strike me as the sort of woman to bear malice.”

“How can I go back to the studio?” he said wearily. “They’re there. I’ve left it to them.”

“Then it’s not your wife who’s left you; it’s you who’ve left your wife.”

“For God’s sake don’t talk to me like that.”

Still I could not take him seriously. I did not for a moment believe what he had told me. But he was in very real distress.

“Well, you’ve come here to talk to me about it. You’d better tell me the whole story.”

“This afternoon I couldn’t stand it any more. I went to Strickland and told him I thought he was quite well enough to go back to his own place. I wanted the studio myself.”

“No one but Strickland would have needed telling,” I said. “What did he say?”

“He laughed a little; you know how he laughs, not as though he were amused, but as though you were a damned fool, and said he’d go at once. He began to put his things together. You remember I fetched from his room what I thought he needed, and he asked Blanche for a piece of paper and some string to make a parcel.”

Stroeve stopped, gasping, and I thought he was going to faint. This was not at all the story I had expected him to tell me.

“She was very pale, but she brought the paper and the string. He didn’t say anything. He made the parcel and he whistled a tune. He took no notice of either of us. His eyes had an ironic smile in them. My heart was like lead.