Page:Fear by W. Somerset Maugham.djvu/1



WAS staying a night with him on the road. The mission stood on a little hill just outside the gates of a populous city. The first thing I noticed about him was the difference of his taste. The missionary's house as a rule is furnished in a style which is almost an outrage to decency. The parlor, with its air of an unused room, is papered with a gaudy paper; and on the wall hang texts, engravings of sentimental pictures, "The Soul's Awakening" and Luke Filde's "The Doctor"; or, if the missionary has been long in the country, congratulatory scrolls on stiff red paper. There is a Brussels carpet on the floor, rocking-chairs if the household is American, and a stiff arm-chair on each side of the fireplace if it is English. There is a sofa which is so placed that nobody sits on it, and by the grim look of it few can want to. There are lace curtains at the windows. Here and there are occasional tables on which are photographs, and what-nots with modern porcelain on them. The dining-room has an appearance of more use, but almost the whole of it is taken up by a large table, and when you sit at it you are crowded into the fireplace. But in Mr. Wingrove's study there were books from floor to ceiling, a table littered with papers, curtains of a rich green stuff, and over the fireplace a Tibetan banner. There was a row of Tibetan Buddhas on the chimney-piece.

"I don't know how it is, but you've got just the feeling of college rooms about the place," I said as I looked about the study.

"Do you think so?" he answered soberly. "I was a tutor at Oriel for some time."

He was a man of nearly fifty, I should think, tall and well covered, though not stout, with gray hair, cut very short, and a reddish face. One imagined that he must be a jovial man, fond of laughter, an easy talker and a good fellow; but bis eyes disconcerted you. They were grave and unsmiling; they had a look that I could only describe as harassed. I wondered if I had fallen upon him at an inconvenient moment when his mind was taken up with irksome matters; yet somehow I felt that this was not a passing expression, but a settled one rather, and I could not understand it. He had just that look of anxiety which you see in certain forms of heart disease. He chatted about one thing and another, then he said:

"I hear my wife come in. Shall we go into the drawing-room?"

He led me in, and introduced me to a thin little woman, with gold-rimmed spectacles and a shy manner. It was plain that she belonged to a different class from her husband. Mr. Wingrove was a gentleman, though it was evident that his wife was not a lady. She had a common intonation. The drawing-room was furnished in a way I had 712