Sinister Street by Compton Mackenzie (great books to read TXT) 📕

it was told within the narrowest confines of the most rigid form. There was not in this narrative one illegitimate device to excite an easy compassion in the reader: it was literature of a quality marmoreal, and it moved as only stone can move. The death of Manon in the wilderness haunted him even as he sat here: almost he too could have prostrated himself in humiliation before this tragedy.

“There is no story like it,” said Michael to the sleek river. N’exigez point de moi que je vous décrive mes sentiments, ni que je vous rapporte mes dernières expressions. And it was bought by an undergraduate for half a crown because he wanted to stare like the peasant-folk. C’est une douzaine de filles de joie. How really promising that illustration must have looked: how the coin must have itched in his pocket: how carefully he must have weighed the slimness of the book against his modesty: how easy it had been to conceal behind those magazines.

But he could not sit here any longer reconstructing the shamefaced curiosity of a dull young freshman, nor even, with so much to arrange this last morning, could he continue to brood upon the woes of the Chevalier des Grieux and Manon Lescaut. It was time to go and rouse Lonsdale. Lonsdale had slept long enough in those ground-floor rooms of his where on the first day of the first term the inextricable Porcher had arranged his wine. It did not take long to drag Lonsdale out of bed.

“You slack devil, I’ve not been to bed at all,” said Michael.

“More silly ass you,” Lonsdale yawned. “Now don’t annoy me while I’m dressing with your impressions of the sunrise.” Michael watched him eat his breakfast, while he slowly and with the troublesome aid of his eyeglass managed to focus once again the world.

“I was going to tell you something deuced interesting about myself when you buzzed off this morning. You’ve heard of Queenie Molyneux⁠—well, Queenie⁠ ⁠…”

“Wait a bit,” Michael interrupted. “I haven’t heard of Queenie Molyneux.”

“Why, she’s in the Pink Quartette.”

Michael still looked blank, and Lonsdale adjusting his eyeglass looked at him in amazement.

“The Pink Quartette in My Mistake.”

“Oh, that rotten musical comedy,” said Michael. “I haven’t seen it.”

Lonsdale shook his head in despair, and the monocle tinkled down upon his plate. When he had wiped it clean of marmalade, he asked Michael in a compassionate voice if he never went to the theater, and with a sigh returned to the subject of Queenie.

“It’s the most extraordinary piece of luck. A girl that everyone in town has been running after falls in love with me. Now the question is, what ought I to do? I can’t afford to keep her, and I’m not cad enough to let somebody else keep her, and use the third latchkey. My dear old chap, I don’t mind telling you I’m in the deuce of a fix.”

“Are you very much in love with her?” Michael asked.

“Of course I am. You don’t get Queenies chucked at your head like turnips. Of course I’m frightfully keen.”

“Why don’t you marry her?” Michael asked.

“What? Marry her? You don’t seem to understand who I’m talking about. Queenie Molyneux! She’s in the Pink Quartette in My Mistake.”

“Well?”

“Well, I can’t marry a chorus-girl.”

“Other people have,” said Michael.

“Well, yes, but⁠—er⁠—you know, Queenie has rather a reputation. I shouldn’t be the first.”

“The problem’s too hard for me,” said Michael.

In his heart he would have liked to push Manon Lescaut into Lonsdale’s hands and bid him read that for counsel. But he could not help laughing to himself at the notion of Lonsdale wrestling with the moral of Manon Lescaut, and if the impulse had ever reached his full consciousness, it died on the instant.

“Of course, if this motorcar business is any good,” Lonsdale was saying, “I might be able in a year or two to compete with elderly financiers. But my advice to you⁠ ⁠…”

“You asked for my advice,” said Michael, with a smile.

“I know I did. I know I did. But as you haven’t ever been to see My Mistake⁠—the most absolutely successful musical comedy for years⁠—why, my dear fellow, I’ve been thirty-eight times!⁠ ⁠… and my advice to you is ‘avoid actresses.’ Oh, yes, I know it’s difficult, I know, I know.”

Lonsdale shook his head so often that the monocle fell on the floor, and his wisdom was speechless until he could find it again.

Michael left him soon afterward, feeling rather sadly that the horizon before him was clouding over with feminine forms. Alan would soon be engaged to his sister. It was delightful, of course, but in one way it already placed a barrier between their perfect intercourse. Maurice would obviously soon be thinking of nothing but women. Already even up at Oxford a great deal of his attention had been turned in that direction: and now Lonsdale had Queenie. This swift severance from youth by all his friends, this preoccupation with womanhood was likely to be depressing, thought Michael, unless himself also fell in love. That was very improbable, however. Love filled him with fear. The Abbé Prévost that morning had expressed for him in art the quintessence of what he knew with sharp prevision love for him would mean. He felt a dread of leaving Oxford that quite overshadowed his regret. Here was shelter⁠—why had he not shaped his career to stay forever in this cold peace? And, after all, why should he not? He was independent. Why should he enter the world and call down upon himself such troubles and torments as had vexed his youth in London? From the standpoint of moral experience he had a right to stay here: and yet it would be desolate to stay here without a vital reason, merely to grow old on the fringe of the university. Could he have been a Fellow, it would have been different: but to vegetate, to dream, to linger without any power of art to