Chapter XLVII

by William Somerset Maugham

　　I have tried to put some connection into the various thingsCaptain Nichols told me about Strickland, and I here set themdown in the best order I can. They made one another'sacquaintance during the latter part of the winter following mylast meeting with Strickland in Paris. How he had passed theintervening months I do not know, but life must have been veryhard, for Captain Nichols saw him first in the Asile de Nuit.There was a strike at Marseilles at the time, and Strickland,having come to the end of his resources, had apparently foundit impossible to earn the small sum he needed to keep body andsoul together.The Asile de Nuit is a large stone building where pauper andvagabond may get a bed for a week, provided their papers arein order and they can persuade the friars in charge that theyare workingmen. Captain Nichols noticed Strickland for hissize and his singular appearance among the crowd that waitedfor the doors to open; they waited listlessly, some walking toand fro, some leaning against the wall, and others seated onthe curb with their feet in the gutter; and when they filedinto the office he heard the monk who read his papers addresshim in English. But he did not have a chance to speak to him,since, as he entered the common-room, a monk came in with ahuge Bible in his arms, mounted a pulpit which was at the endof the room, and began the service which the wretched outcastshad to endure as the price of their lodging. He andStrickland were assigned to different rooms, and when, thrownout of bed at five in the morning by a stalwart monk, he had madehis bed and washed his face, Strickland had already disappeared.Captain Nichols wandered about the streets for an hour ofbitter cold, and then made his way to the Place Victor Gelu,where the sailor-men are wont to congregate. Dozing againstthe pedestal of a statue, he saw Strickland again.He gave him a kick to awaken him."Come and have breakfast, mate," he said."Go to hell," answered Strickland.I recognised my friend's limited vocabulary, and I prepared toregard Captain Nichols as a trustworthy witness."Busted?" asked the Captain."Blast you," answered Strickland."Come along with me. I'll get you some breakfast."After a moment's hesitation, Strickland scrambled to his feet,and together they went to the Bouchee de Pain, where thehungry are given a wedge of bread, which they must eat thereand then, for it is forbidden to take it away; and then to theCuillere de Soupe, where for a week, at eleven and four,you may get a bowl of thin, salt soup. The two buildings areplaced far apart, so that only the starving should be temptedto make use of them. So they had breakfast, and so began thequeer companionship of Charles Strickland and Captain Nichols.They must have spent something like four months at Marseillesin one another's society. Their career was devoid of adventure,if by adventure you mean unexpected or thrilling incident,for their days were occupied in the pursuit of enoughmoney to get a night's lodging and such food as would staythe pangs of hunger. But I wish I could give here the pictures,coloured and racy, which Captain Nichols' vivid narrativeoffered to the imagination. His account of their discoveriesin the low life of a seaport town would have made acharming book, and in the various characters that came theirway the student might easily have found matter for a verycomplete dictionary of rogues. But I must content myself witha few paragraphs. I received the impression of a life intenseand brutal, savage, multicoloured, and vivacious. It made theMarseilles that I knew, gesticulating and sunny, with itscomfortable hotels and its restaurants crowded with the well-to-do,tame and commonplace. I envied men who had seen with theirown eyes the sights that Captain Nichols described.When the doors of the Asile de Nuit were closed to them,Strickland and Captain Nichols sought the hospitality of Tough Bill.This was the master of a sailors' boarding-house, a hugemulatto with a heavy fist, who gave the stranded marinerfood and shelter till he found him a berth. They lived withhim a month, sleeping with a dozen others, Swedes, negroes,Brazilians, on the floor of the two bare rooms in his housewhich he assigned to his charges; and every day they went withhim to the Place Victor Gelu, whither came ships' captains insearch of a man. He was married to an American woman, obeseand slatternly, fallen to this pass by Heaven knows whatprocess of degradation, and every day the boarders took it inturns to help her with the housework. Captain Nichols lookedupon it as a smart piece of work on Strickland's part that hehad got out of this by painting a portrait of Tough Bill.Tough Bill not only paid for the canvas, colours, and brushes,but gave Strickland a pound of smuggled tobacco into thebargain. For all I know, this picture may still adorn theparlour of the tumbledown little house somewhere near theQuai de la Joliette, and I suppose it could now be sold forfifteen hundred pounds. Strickland's idea was to ship on somevessel bound for Australia or New Zealand, and from there make hisway to Samoa or Tahiti. I do not know how he had come uponthe notion of going to the South Seas, though I remember thathis imagination had long been haunted by an island, all greenand sunny, encircled by a sea more blue than is found inNorthern latitudes. I suppose that he clung to CaptainNichols because he was acquainted with those parts, and it wasCaptain Nichols who persuaded him that he would be morecomfortable in Tahiti."You see, Tahiti's French," he explained to me. "And theFrench aren't so damned technical."I thought I saw his point.Strickland had no papers, but that was not a matter todisconcert Tough Bill when he saw a profit (he took the firstmonth's wages of the sailor for whom he found a berth), and heprovided Strickland with those of an English stoker who hadprovidentially died on his hands. But both Captain Nicholsand Strickland were bound East, and it chanced that the onlyopportunities for signing on were with ships sailing West.Twice Strickland refused a berth on tramps sailing for theUnited States, and once on a collier going to Newcastle.Tough Bill had no patience with an obstinacy which could onlyresult in loss to himself, and on the last occasion he flungboth Strickland and Captain Nichols out of his house withoutmore ado. They found themselves once more adrift.Tough Bill's fare was seldom extravagant, and you rose fromhis table almost as hungry as you sat down, but for some daysthey had good reason to regret it. They learned what hunger was.The Cuillere de Soupe and the Asile de Nuit were bothclosed to them, and their only sustenance was the wedge ofbread which the Bouchee de Pain provided. They slept wherethey could, sometimes in an empty truck on a siding near thestation, sometimes in a cart behind a warehouse; but it wasbitterly cold, and after an hour or two of uneasy dozing theywould tramp the streets again. What they felt the lack ofmost bitterly was tobacco, and Captain Nichols, for his part,could not do without it; he took to hunting the "Can o' Beer,"for cigarette-ends and the butt-end of cigars which thepromenaders of the night before had thrown away."I've tasted worse smoking mixtures in a pipe," he added,with a philosophic shrug of his shoulders, as he took a coupleof cigars from the case I offered him, putting one in his mouthand the other in his pocket.Now and then they made a bit of money. Sometimes a mailsteamer would come in, and Captain Nichols, having scrapedacquaintance with the timekeeper, would succeed in getting thepair of them a job as stevedores. When it was an English boat,they would dodge into the forecastle and get a heartybreakfast from the crew. They took the risk of runningagainst one of the ship's officers and being hustled down thegangway with the toe of a boot to speed their going."There's no harm in a kick in the hindquarters when yourbelly's full," said Captain Nichols, "and personally I nevertake it in bad part. An officer's got to think about discipline."I had a lively picture of Captain Nichols flying headlong downa narrow gangway before the uplifted foot of an angry mate,and, like a true Englishman, rejoicing in the spirit of theMercantile Marine.There were often odd jobs to be got about the fish-market.Once they each of them earned a franc by loading trucks withinnumerable boxes of oranges that had been dumped down on the quay.One day they had a stroke of luck: one of the boarding-mastersgot a contract to paint a tramp that had come infrom Madagascar round the Cape of Good Hope, and they spentseveral days on a plank hanging over the side, covering therusty hull with paint. It was a situation that must haveappealed to Strickland's sardonic humour. I asked CaptainNichols how he bore himself during these hardships."Never knew him say a cross word," answered the Captain."He'd be a bit surly sometimes, but when we hadn't had a bitesince morning, and we hadn't even got the price of a lie downat the Chink's, he'd be as lively as a cricket."I was not surprised at this. Strickland was just the man torise superior to circumstances, when they were such as tooccasion despondency in most; but whether this was due toequanimity of soul or to contradictoriness it would bedifficult to say.The Chink's Head was a name the beach-combers gave to awretched inn off the Rue Bouterie, kept by a one-eyed Chinaman,where for six sous you could sleep in a cot and forthree on the floor. Here they made friends with others in asdesperate condition as themselves, and when they werepenniless and the night was bitter cold, they were glad toborrow from anyone who had earned a stray franc during the daythe price of a roof over their heads. They were not niggardly,these tramps, and he who had money did not hesitateto share it among the rest. They belonged to all thecountries in the world, but this was no bar to good-fellowship;for they felt themselves freemen of a country whosefrontiers include them all, the great country of Cockaine."But I guess Strickland was an ugly customer when he was roused,"said Captain Nichols, reflectively. "One day we raninto Tough Bill in the Place, and he asked Charlie for thepapers he'd given him.""`You'd better come and take them if you want them,' says Charlie."He was a powerful fellow, Tough Bill, but he didn't quitelike the look of Charlie, so he began cursing him. He calledhim pretty near every name he could lay hands on, and whenTough Bill began cursing it was worth listening to him.Well, Charlie stuck it for a bit, then he stepped forward and hejust said: `Get out, you bloody swine.' It wasn't so muchwhat he said, but the way he said it. Tough Bill never spokeanother word; you could see him go yellow, and he walked awayas if he'd remembered he had a date."Strickland, according to Captain Nichols, did not use exactlythe words I have given, but since this book is meant forfamily reading I have thought it better, at the expense oftruth, to put into his mouth expressions familiar to thedomestic circle.Now, Tough Bill was not the man to put up with humiliation atthe hands of a common sailor. His power depended on his prestige,and first one, then another, of the sailors who lived inhis house told them that he had sworn to do Strickland in.One night Captain Nichols and Strickland were sitting in oneof the bars of the Rue Bouterie. The Rue Bouterie is a narrowstreet of one-storeyed houses, each house consisting of butone room; they are like the booths in a crowded fair or thecages of animals in a circus. At every door you see a woman.Some lean lazily against the side-posts, humming to themselvesor calling to the passer-by in a raucous voice, and somelistlessly read. They are French. Italian, Spanish,Japanese, coloured; some are fat and some are thin; and underthe thick paint on their faces, the heavy smears on theireyebrows, and the scarlet of their lips, you see the lines ofage and the scars of dissipation. Some wear black shifts andflesh-coloured stockings; some with curly hair, dyed yellow,are dressed like little girls in short muslin frocks.Through the open door you see a red-tiled floor, a large wooden bed,and on a deal table a ewer and a basin. A motley crowdsaunters along the streets -- Lascars off a P. and O., blondNorthmen from a Swedish barque, Japanese from a man-of-war,English sailors, Spaniards, pleasant-looking fellows from aFrench cruiser, negroes off an American tramp. By day it ismerely sordid, but at night, lit only by the lamps in thelittle huts, the street has a sinister beauty. The hideouslust that pervades the air is oppressive and horrible, and yetthere is something mysterious in the sight which haunts andtroubles you. You feel I know not what primitive force whichrepels and yet fascinates you. Here all the decencies ofcivilisation are swept away, and you feel that men are face toface with a sombre reality. There is an atmosphere that is atonce intense and tragic.In the bar in which Strickland and Nichols sat a mechanicalpiano was loudly grinding out dance music. Round the roompeople were sitting at table, here half a dozen sailorsuproariously drunk, there a group of soldiers; and in themiddle, crowded together, couples were dancing. Beardedsailors with brown faces and large horny hands clasped theirpartners in a tight embrace. The women wore nothing but a shift.Now and then two sailors would get up and dance together.The noise was deafening. People were singing, shouting,laughing; and when a man gave a long kiss to thegirl sitting on his knees, cat-calls from the English sailorsincreased the din. The air was heavy with the dust beaten upby the heavy boots of the men, and gray with smoke. It wasvery hot. Behind the bar was seated a woman nursing her baby.The waiter, an undersized youth with a flat, spotty face,hurried to and fro carrying a tray laden with glasses of beer.In a little while Tough Bill, accompanied by two huge negroes,came in, and it was easy to see that he was already threeparts drunk. He was looking for trouble. He lurched againsta table at which three soldiers were sitting and knocked overa glass of beer. There was an angry altercation, and theowner of the bar stepped forward and ordered Tough Bill to go.He was a hefty fellow, in the habit of standing no nonsensefrom his customers, and Tough Bill hesitated. The landlordwas not a man he cared to tackle, for the police were on his side,and with an oath he turned on his heel. Suddenly hecaught sight of Strickland. He rolled up to him. He did not speak.He gathered the spittle in his mouth and spat full inStrickland's face. Strickland seized his glass and flung itat him. The dancers stopped suddenly still. There was aninstant of complete silence, but when Tough Bill threw himselfon Strickland the lust of battle seized them all, and in amoment there was a confused scrimmage. Tables wereoverturned, glasses crashed to the ground. There was ahellish row. The women scattered to the door and behind the bar.Passers-by surged in from the street. You heard cursesin every tongue the sound of blows, cries; and in the middleof the room a dozen men were fighting with all their might.On a sudden the police rushed in, and everyone who could madefor the door. When the bar was more or less cleared, ToughBill was lying insensible on the floor with a great gash inhis head. Captain Nichols dragged Strickland, bleeding from awound in his arm, his clothes in rags, into the street.His own face was covered with blood from a blow on the nose."I guess you'd better get out of Marseilles before Tough Billcomes out of hospital," he said to Strickland, when they hadgot back to the Chink's Head and were cleaning themselves."This beats cock-fighting," said Strickland.I could see his sardonic smile.Captain Nichols was anxious. He knew Tough Bill's vindictiveness.Strickland had downed the mulatto twice, and the mulatto,sober, was a man to be reckoned with. He would bidehis time stealthily. He would be in no hurry, but onenight Strickland would get a knife-thrust in his back, and ina day or two the corpse of a nameless beach-comber would befished out of the dirty water of the harbour. Nichols wentnext evening to Tough Bill's house and made enquiries. He wasin hospital still, but his wife, who had been to see him, saidhe was swearing hard to kill Strickland when they let him out.A week passed."That's what I always say," reflected Captain Nichols,"when you hurt a man, hurt him bad. It gives you a bit oftime to look about and think what you'll do next."Then Strickland had a bit of luck. A ship bound for Australiahad sent to the Sailors' Home for a stoker in place of one whohad thrown himself overboard off Gibraltar in an attack ofdelirium tremens."You double down to the harbour, my lad," said the Captain toStrickland, "and sign on. You've got your papers."Strickland set off at once, and that was the last CaptainNichols saw of him. The ship was only in port for six hours,and in the evening Captain Nichols watched the vanishing smokefrom her funnels as she ploughed East through the wintry sea.I have narrated all this as best I could, because I like thecontrast of these episodes with the life that I had seenStrickland live in Ashley Gardens when he was occupied withstocks and shares; but I am aware that Captain Nichols was anoutrageous liar, and I dare say there is not a word of truthin anything he told me. I should not be surprised to learnthat he had never seen Strickland in his life, and owed hisknowledge of Marseilles to the pages of a magazine.