Part 18 (1/2)
He now went up to her and kissed her, to please her:
”So you see, I must find Papa before seven o'clock, or he'll be angry,”
he said, keeping to the point.
”Well, shall we go round to the Witte together?” asked Paul.
”Oh, Uncle, that would be awfully good of you!”
”But I can't take you in, old chap!”
”No, Uncle, I'll wait outside, if you'll just look for Papa and tell him I want to speak to him.”
”About a house you've taken for him!”
”No, don't be silly, Uncle.”
”Good-bye, Constance; good-bye, Mamma: I'm going with my Nephew Addie ... to the Witte!”
And Paul stood up, choking with laughter, while Addie, afraid of missing his father, urged him to hurry.
”But, my dear,” asked Mrs. van Lowe, ”does your boy always take the law into his own hands like that?”
”Oh, Mamma, he is such a help to us!”
”But what a way to bring him up! That's not a boy of thirteen!”
”He is a very uncommon child. Where should we be if he didn't help us.”
”So you think Van der Welcke will take the house near the Woods?”
”I'm sure of it!... And I'm quite sure too that, if Addie hadn't interfered, in another six months we should still be at the hotel!”
Next day, Van der Welcke, Constance and Addie went to have one more look at the house near the Woods.
And the house was taken, on a five years' lease.
CHAPTER XIII
While Constance went in and out of the shops, on her numberless errands, Paul never left her side:
”You see,” he said, glad to have some one to listen to him for the first time in his life, ”what I call human wretchedness is not confined to the social question, but exists everywhere, everywhere.... Look around you, in the street. It's raining; and people are walking under dripping umbrellas. Look at those women in front of us: wet skirts; muddy shoes, worn at heel, splas.h.i.+ng through the puddles: that is human wretchedness.... Look at that man over there: fat stomach; squinting eyes; gouty fingers clutching a shabby umbrella-handle: that is human wretchedness.... Everything that is ugly, squalid, muddy, drab, abnormal from any one point of view is human wretchedness.... Look at all those shops, where you buy--or don't buy--trashy manufactured things that have blood clinging to them, things which you are now pretending that you need for your house: that is human wretchedness.... It's all ugly; and the trail of a morbid civilization shows through it all.... Look around you, at those big, lying letters, those gaudy posters: that is human wretchedness. One cheats the other; and the whole thing has become such a matter of system that n.o.body is really taken in. It's the same with politics and religion as with a pound of sugar or a box of throat-lozenges. It is all humbug and all human wretchedness. And it drags on, piecemeal, through any average human life. It is all squalid, vulgar, insincere, selfish, ugly and full of human wretchedness. You think me a pessimist? Far from it. I am an idealist: in my own mind, I see everything in a rosy light. My power of imagination is so strong that I see everything white and gold and blue, like the marble statues of ancient temples, with their blue sky and golden sun. But, when I take leave of my imagination, then I see that everything is human wretchedness: wars; politics; the fat stomach of our friend yonder; the rain; and those pots and pans which you're wanting for your kitchen. All life, high and low, general and individual, in the ma.s.ses and in the cla.s.ses, is squalid, ugly, insincere and full of human wretchedness.
Look at that creature over there. What a miserable object: she is knock-kneed; her nose is a yard long; and the reason why she's in this filthy street is absurd! You think I don't know what I'm talking about, but I do. You never see anything beautiful except at the theatre, or in a book, or in a picture or an etching ... or in a great writer taking up his pen in defence of some outcast, as Zola did. But even then there is very little; and I at once see the human wretchedness through it all: the pose, the affectation--even that of soberness--the ambition to succeed, or to imitate some one or other. No one has a pure thought for purity's sake ... except a fellow like Zola. There's no beauty anywhere.
Have you ever noticed, in a train, or in a tram-car, or at a theatre, all those stupid, ugly faces, those crooked bodies, either too fat or too thin, one with a blink--like this--another with a squint--like that--this one with little hairs in his ears and that one with hands that make you sick. I don't know if you understand me; but all of this, with politics and the social question and those swarms of fat stomachs like our friend's just now: all of this is what I call human wretchedness.... I may write a book about it some day; but perhaps my book itself would be merely human wretchedness....”
In the meantime, he had been following his sister into three shops, one after the other, and she had managed to make her purchases in between his philosophizings. Whenever he saw his chance, he went on speaking, walking aslant beside her and talking into her ear, constantly having to move off the narrow pavements of the Hoogstraat and Veenestraat, losing her for a moment, because they were separated by a couple of carriages going at a foot-pace, but soon catching her up again. And he never lost the thread of his thoughts: