Somerset Maugham - The Collected Works of W. Somerset Maugham (33 Works in One Edition)

“Well, I don’t know what I can do for you. I can’t help thinking that if you wait a little things will get better.”

“I can’t wait any longer. I’ve waited too long. I’m losing my whole life.”

“Why don’t you go away for a few months, and then you can see? Miss Ley is going to Italy for the winter as usual, isn’t she? Upon my word, I think it would do you good to go too.”

“I don’t mind what I do so long as I can get away. I’m suffering too much.”

“Have you thought that Edward will miss you?” asked Dr. Ramsay, gravely.

“No, he won’t. Good heavens, don’t you think I know him by now? I know him through and through. And he’s callous, and selfish, and stupid. And he’s making me like himself.... Oh, Dr. Ramsay, please help me.”

“Does Miss Ley know?” asked the doctor, remembering what she had told him on her visit to Court Leys.

“No, I’m sure she doesn’t. She thinks we adore one another. And I don’t want her to know. I’m such a coward now. Years ago I never cared a straw for what any one in the world thought of me; but my spirit is utterly broken. Oh, get me away from here, Dr. Ramsay, get me away.”

She burst into tears, weeping as she had been long unaccustomed to do; she was utterly exhausted after the outburst of all that for years she had kept hid.

“I’m still so young, and I almost feel an old woman. Sometimes I should like to lie down and die, and have done with it all.”

A month later Bertha was in Rome. But at first she was hardly able to realise the change in her condition. Her life at Court Leys had impressed itself upon her with such ghastly distinctness that she could not imagine its cessation. She was like a prisoner so long immured that freedom dazes him, and he looks for his chains, and cannot understand that he is free.

The relief was so great that Bertha could not believe it true, and she lived in fear that her vision would be disturbed, and that she would find herself again within the prison walls of Court Leys. It was a dream that she wandered in sunlit places, where the air was scented with violets and with roses. The people were unreal, the models lounging on the steps of the Piazza di Spagna, the ragged urchins, quaintly costumed and importunate, the silver speech that caressed the air. How could she believe that life was true when it gave blue sky and sunshine, so that the heart thrilled with joy; when it gave rest, and peace, and the most delightful idleness? Real life was gloomy and strenuous; its setting a Georgian mansion, surrounded by desolate, wind-swept fields. In real life every one was very virtuous and very dull; the ten commandments hedged one round with the menace of hell-fire and eternal damnation, a dungeon more terrible because it had not walls, nor bars and bolts.

But beyond these gloomy stones with their harsh Thou shalt not is a land of fragrance and of light, where the sunbeams send the blood running gaily through the veins; where the flowers give their perfume freely to the air, in token that riches must be spent and virtue must be squandered; where the amorets flutter here and there on the spring breezes, unknowing whither they go, uncaring. It is a land of olive trees and of pleasant shade, and the sea kisses the shore gently to show the youths how they must kiss the maidens. There dark eyes flash lambently, telling the traveller he need not fear, since love may be had for the asking. Blood is warm, and hands linger with grateful pressure in hands, and red lips ask for the kisses that are so sweet to give. There the flesh and the spirit walk side by side, and each is well satisfied with the other. Ah, give me the sunshine of this blissful country, and a garden of roses, and the murmur of a pleasant brook; give me a shady bank, and wine, and books, and the coral lips of Amaryllis, and I will live in complete felicity—for at least ten days.

To Bertha the life in Rome seemed like a play. Miss Leys left her much freedom, and she wandered alone in strange places. She went often to the market and spent the morning among the booths, looking at a thousand things she did not want to buy; she fingered rich silks and antique bits of silver, smiling at the compliments of a friendly dealer. The people bustled around her, talking volubly, intensely alive, and yet, in her inability to understand that what she saw was true, they seemed but puppets. She went to the galleries, to the Sistine Chapel or to the Stanze of Raphael; and, lacking the hurry of the tourist and his sense of duty, she would spend a whole morning in front of one picture, or in a corner of some old church, weaving with the sight before her the fantasies of her imagination.

And when she felt the need of her fellow-men, Bertha went to the Pincio and mingled with the throng that listened to the band. But the Franciscan monk in his brown cowl, standing apart, was a figure of some romantic play; and the soldiers in gay uniforms, the Bersaglieri with the bold cock’s feathers in their hats, were the chorus of a comic opera. And there were black-robed priests, some old and fat, taking the sun and smoking cigarettes, at peace with themselves and with the world; others young and restless, the flesh unsubdued shining out of their dark eyes. And every one seemed as happy as the children who romped and scampered with merry cries.

But gradually the shadows of the past fell away and Bertha was able more consciously to appreciate the beauty and the life that surrounded her. And knowing it transitory she set herself to enjoy it as best she could. Care and youth are with difficulty yoked together, and merciful time wraps in oblivion the most gruesome misery. Bertha stretched out her arms to embrace the wonders of the living world, and she put away the dreadful thought that it must end so quickly. In the spring she spent long hours in the gardens that surround the city, where the remains of ancient Rome mingled exotically with the half tropical luxuriance, and called forth new and subtle emotions. The flowers grew in the sarcophagi with a wild exuberance, wantoning, it seemed, in mockery of the tomb from which they sprang. Death is hideous, but life is always triumphant; the rose and the hyacinth arise from man’s decay; and the dissolution of man is but the signal of other birth: and the world goes on, beautiful and ever new, revelling in its vigour.

Bertha went to the Villa Medici and sat where she could watch the light glowing on the mellow façade of the old palace, and Syrinx peeping between the reeds: the students saw her and asked who was the beautiful woman who sat so long and so unconscious of the eyes that looked at her. She went to the Villa Doria-Pamphili, majestic and pompous, the fitting summer-house of princes in gorgeous clothes, of bishops and of cardinals. And the ruins of the Palatine with its cypress trees sent her thought back and back, and she pictured to herself the glory of bygone power.

But the wildest garden of all, the garden of the Mattei, pleased her best. Here were a greater fertility and a greater abandonment; the distance and the difficulty of access kept strangers away, and Bertha could wander through it as if it were her own. She thought she had never enjoyed such exquisite moments as were given her by its solitude and its silence. Sometimes a troop of scarlet seminarists sauntered along the grass-grown avenues, vivid colour against the verdure.

Then she went home, tired and happy, and sat at her open window and watched the dying sun. The sun set over St. Peter’s, and the mighty cathedral was transfigured into a temple of fire and gold; the dome was radiant, formed no longer of solid stones, but of light and sunshine—it was the crown of a palace of Hyperion. Then, as the sun fell to the horizon, St. Peter’s stood out in darkness, stood out in majestic profile against the splendour of heaven.