No More Learning

He heard a shocked squeal from the tarts behind.
Turning, he saw with horror that Gordon had up-ended the bottle and was drinking from
it.

‘Hi! Gordon! ’

He sprang towards him and forced his arm down. A gout of wine went down Gordon’s
collar.

‘For God’s sake be careful! You don’t want the police to get hold of you, do you? ’

‘I want a drink,’ complained Gordon.

‘But dash it! You can’t start drinking here. ’

‘Take me to a pub,’ said Gordon.

Ravelston rubbed his nose helplessly. ‘Oh, God! I suppose that’s better than drinking on
the pavement. Come on, we’ll go to a pub. You shall have your drink there. ’

Gordon recorked his bottle carefully. Ravelston shepherded him across the circus,
Gordon clinging to his arm, but not for support, for his legs were still quite steady. They
halted on the island, then managed to find a gap in the traffic and went down the
Haymarket.


In the pub the air seemed wet with beer. It was all a mist of beer shot through with the
sickly tang of whisky. Along the bar a press of men seethed, downing with Faustlike



eagerness their last drinks before eleven should sound its knell. Gordon slid easily
through the crowd. He was not in a mood to worry about a few jostlings and elbowings.
In a moment he had fetched up at the bar between a stout commercial traveller drinking
Guinness and a tall, lean, decayed major type of man with droopy moustaches, whose
entire conversation seemed to consist of ‘What ho! ’ and ‘What, what! ’ Gordon threw half
a crown on to the beer-wet bar.

‘A quart of bitter, please! ’

‘No quart pots here! ’ cried the harassed bannaid, measuring pegs of whisky with one eye
on the clock.

‘Quart pots on the top shelf, Effie! ’ shouted the landlord over his shoulder, from the other
side of the bar.

The barmaid hauled the beer-handle three times hurriedly. The monstrous glass pot was
set before him. He lifted it. What a weight! A pint of pure water weighs a pound and a
quarter. Down with it! Swish — gurgle! A long, long sup of beer flowed gratefully down
his gullet. He paused for breath, and felt a little sickish. Come on, now for another.
Swish — gurgle! It almost choked him this time. But stick it out, stick it out! Through the
cascade of beer that poured down his throat and seemed to drown his ears he heard the
landlord’s shout: ‘Last orders, gentlemen, please! ’ For a moment he removed his face
from the pot, gasped, and got his breath back. Now for the last. Swish — gurgle! A-a-ah!
Gordon set down the pot. Emptied in three gulps — not bad. He clattered it on the bar.

‘Hi! Give me the other half of that — quick! ’

‘What ho! ’ said the major.

‘Coming it a bit, aren’t you? ’ said the commercial traveller.

Ravelston, farther down the bar and hemmed in by several men, saw what Gordon was
doing. He called to him, ‘Hi, Gordon! ’, frowned and shook his head, too shy to say in
front of everybody, ‘Don’t drink any more. ’ Gordon settled himself on his legs. He was
still steady, but consciously steady. His head seemed to have swollen to an immense size,
his whole body had the same horrible, swollen, fiery feeling as before. Languidly he



lifted the refilled beerpot. He did not want it now. Its smell nauseated him. It was just a
hateful, pale yellow, sickly-tasting liquid. Like urine, almost! That bucketful of stuff to
be forced down into his bursting guts — horrible! But come on, no flinching! What else
are we here for? Down with it! Here she is so near my nose. So tip her up and down she
goes. Swish — gurgle!

In the same moment something dreadful happened. His gullet had shut up of its own
accord, or the beer had missed his mouth. It was pouring all over him, a tidal wave of
beer. He was drowning in beer like lay-brother Peter in the Ingoldsby Legends. Help! He
tried to shout, choked, and let fall the beer-pot. There was a flurry all round him. People
were leaping aside to avoid the jet of beer. Crash! went the pot. Gordon stood rocking.
Men, bottles, mirrors were going round and round. He was falling, losing consciousness.
But dimly visible before him was a black upright shape, sole point of stability in a reeling
world — the beer-handle. He clutched it, swung, held tight. Ravelston started towards him.

The bannaid leaned indignantly over the bar. The roundabout world slowed down and
stopped. Gordon’s brain was quite clear.

‘Here! What are you hanging on to the beer-handle for? ’

‘All over my bloody trousers! ’ cried the commercial traveller.

‘What am I hanging on to the beer-handle for? ’

‘YES! What are you hanging on to the beer-handle for? ’

Gordon swung himself sideways. The elongated face of the major peered down at him,
with wet moustaches drooping.

‘She says, “What am I hanging on to the beer-handle for? ”’

‘What ho! What? ’

Ravelston had forced his way between several men and reached him. He put a strong arm
round Gordon’s waist and hoisted him to his feet.



‘Stand up, for God’s sake! You’re drunk. ’


‘Drunk? ’ said Gordon.

Everyone was laughing at them. Ravelston’s pale face flushed.

‘Two and three those mugs cost,’ said the barmaid bitterly.

‘And what about my bloody trousers? ’ said the commercial traveller.

‘I’ll pay for the mug,’ said Ravelston. He did so. ‘Now come on out of it. You’re drunk. ’

He began to shepherd Gordon towards the door, one ann round his shoulder, the other
holding the Chianti bottle, which he had taken from him earlier. Gordon freed himself.
He could walk with perfect steadiness. He said in a dignified manner:

‘Drunk did you say I was? ’

Ravelston took his ann again. ‘Yes, I’m afraid you are. Decidedly. ’

‘Swan swam across the sea, well swam swan,’ said Gordon.

‘Gordon, you ARE drunk. The sooner you’re in bed the better. ’

‘First cast out the beam that is in thine own eye before thou castest out the mote that is in
thy brother’s,’ said Gordon.

Ravelston had got him out on to the pavement by this time. ‘We’d better get hold of a
taxi,’ he said, looking up and down the street.

There seemed to be no taxis about, however. The people were streaming noisily out of
the pub, which was on the point of closing. Gordon felt better in the open air. His brain
had never been clearer. The red satanic gleam of a Neon light, somewhere in the distance,
put a new and brilliant idea into his head. He plucked at Ravelston’s arm.


‘Ravelston! I say, Ravelston! ’



‘What? ’


‘Let’s pick up a couple of tarts. ’

In spite of Gordon’s drunken state, Ravelston was scandalized. ‘My dear old chap! You
can’t do that kind of thing. ’

‘Don’t be so damned upper-class. Why not? ’

‘But how could you, dash it! After you’ve just said good night to Rosemary — a really
charming girl like that! ’

‘At night all cats are grey,’ said Gordon, with the feeling that he voiced a profound and
cynical wisdom.

Ravelston decided to ignore this remark. ‘We’d better walk up to Piccadilly Circus,’ he
said. ‘There’ll be plenty of taxis there. ’

The theatres were emptying. Crowds of people and streams of cars flowed to and fro in
the frightful corpse-light. Gordon’s brain was marvellously clear. He knew what folly and
evil he had committed and was about to commit. And yet after all it hardly seemed to
matter. He saw as something far, far away, like something seen through the wrong end of
the telescope, his thirty years, his wasted life, the blank future, Julia’s five pounds,
Rosemary. He said with a sort of philosophic interest:

‘Look at the Neon lights! Look at those awful blue ones over the rubber shop. When I see
those lights I know that I’m a damned soul. ’

‘Quite,’ said Ravelston, who was not listening. ‘Ah, there’s a taxi! ’ He signalled. ‘Damn!
He didn’t see me. Wait here a second. ’

He left Gordon by the Tube station and hurried across the street. For a little while
Gordon’s mind receded into blankness. Then he was aware of two hard yet youthful
faces, like the faces of young predatory animals, that had come close up to his own. They
had blackened eye-brows and hats that were like vulgarer versions of Rosemary’s. He



was exchanging badinage with them. This seemed to him to have been going on for
several minutes.

‘Hullo, Dora! Hullo, Barbara! (He knew their names, it seemed. ) And how are you? And
how’s old England’s winding-sheet? ’

‘Oo — haven’t you got a cheek, just! ’

‘And what are you up to at this time of night? ’

‘Oo — jes’ strolling around. ’

‘Like a lion, seeking whom he may devour? ’

‘Oo — you haven’t half got a cheek! Hasn’t he got a cheek, Barbara? You HAVE got a
cheek! ’

Ravelston had caught the taxi and brought it round to where Gordon was standing. He
stepped out, saw Gordon between the two girls, and stood aghast.

‘Gordon! Oh, my God! What the devil have you been doing? ’

‘Let me introduce you. Dora and Barbara,’ said Gordon.

For a moment Ravelston looked almost angry. As a matter of fact, Ravelston was
incapable of being properly angry.
Upset, pained, embarrassed — yes; but not angry. He
stepped forward with a miserable effort not to notice the two girls’ existence. Once he
noticed them the game was up. He took Gordon by the arm and would have bundled him
into the taxi.

‘Come on, Gordon, for God’s sake! Here’s the taxi. We’ll go straight home and put you
to bed. ’

Dora caught Gordon’s other arm and hauled him out of reach as though he had been a
stolen handbag.


‘What bloody business is it of yours? ’ she cried ferociously.



‘You don’t want to insult these two ladies, I hope? ’ said Gordon.


Ravelston faltered, stepped back, rubbed his nose. It was a moment to be Finn; but
Ravelston had never in his life been firm. He looked from Dora to Gordon, from Gordon
to Barbara. That was fatal. Once he had looked them in the face he was lost. Oh, God!
What could he do? They were human beings — he couldn’t insult them. The same instinct
that sent his hand into his pocket at the very sight of a beggar made him helpless at this
moment. The poor, wretched girls! He hadn’t the heart to send them packing into the
night. Suddenly he realized that he would have to go through with this abominable
adventure into which Gordon had led him. For the first time in his life he was let in for
going home with a tart.

‘But dash it all! ’ he said feebly.

‘Allons-y,’ said Gordon.

The taximan had taken his direction at a nod from Dora. Gordon slumped into the corner
seat and seemed immediately to sink into some immense abyss from which he rose again
more gradually and with only partial consciousness of what he had been doing. He was
gliding smoothly through darkness starred with lights. Or were the lights moving and he
stationary? It was like being on the ocean bottom, among the luminous, gliding fishes.
The fancy returned to him that he was a damned soul in hell. The landscape in hell would
be just like this. Ravines of cold evil-coloured fire, with darkness all above. But in hell
there would be tonnent. Was this torment? He strove to classify his sensations. The
momentary lapse into unconsciousness had left him weak, sick, shaken; his forehead
seemed to be splitting. He put out a hand. It encountered a knee, a garter, and a small soft
hand which sought mechanically for his. He became aware that Ravelston, sitting
opposite, was tapping his toe urgently and nervously.

‘Gordon! Gordon! Wake up! ’

‘What? ’

‘Gordon! Oh, damn! Causons en francais. Qu’est-ce que tu as fait? Crois-tu que je veux
coucher avec une sale — oh, damnation! ’



‘Oo-parley-voo francey! ’ squealed the girls.


Gordon was mildly amused. Do Ravelston good, he thought. A parlour Socialist going
home with a tart! The first genuinely proletarian action of his life. As though aware of
this thought, Ravelston subsided into his comer in silent misery, sitting as far away from
Barbara as possible. The taxi drew up at a hotel in a side-street; a dreadful, shoddy, low
place it was. The ‘hotel’ sign over the door looked skew-eyed. The windows were almost
dark, but the sound of singing, boozy and dreary, trickled from within. Gordon staggered
out of the taxi and felt for Dora’s arm. Give us a hand, Dora. Mind the step. What ho!

A smallish, darkish, smelly hallway, lino-carpeted, mean, uncared-for, and somehow
impermanent. From a room somewhere on the left the singing swelled, mournful as a
church organ. A cross-eyed, evil-looking chambermaid appeared from nowhere. She and
Dora seemed to know one another. What a mug! No competition there. From the room on
the left a single voice took up the song with would-be facetious emphasis:

‘The man that kisses a pretty girl And goes and tells his mother, Ought to have his lips
cut off, Ought to — ’

It tailed away, full of the ineffable, undisguisable sadness of debauchery. A very young
voice it sounded. The voice of some poor boy who in his heart only wanted to be at home
with his mother and sisters, playing hunt-the-slipper. There was a party of young fools in
there, on the razzle with whisky and girls. The tune reminded Gordon. He turned to
Ravelston as he came in, Barbara following.

‘Where’s my Chianti? ’ he said.

Ravelston gave him the bottle. His face looked pale, harassed, hunted, almost. With
guilty restless movements he kept himself apart from Barbara. He could not touch her or
even look at her, and yet to escape was beyond him. His eyes sought Gordon’s. ‘For the
love of God can’t we get out of it somehow? ’ they signalled. Gordon frowned at him.
Stick it out! No flinching! He took Dora’s ann again. Come on, Dora! Now for those
stairs. Ah! Wait a moment.



Her arm round his waist, supporting him, Dora drew him aside. Down the darkish, smelly
stairs a young woman came mincingly, buttoning on a glove; after her a bald, middle-
aged man in evening clothes, black overcoat, and white silk muffler, his opera hat in his
hand. He walked past them with small mean mouth tightened, pretending not to see them.
A family man, by the guilty look in his eye. Gordon watched the gaslight gleam on the
back of his bald head. His predecessor. In the same bed, probably. The mantle of Elisha.
Now then, Dora, up we go! Ah, these stairs! Difficilis ascensus Averni. That’s right, here
we are! ‘Mind the step,’ said Dora. They were on the landing. Black and white lino like a
chessboard. White-painted doors. A smell of slops and a fainter smell of stale linen.

We this way, you that. At the other door Ravelston halted, his fingers on the handle. He
could not — no, he COULD not do it. He could not enter that dreadful room. For the last
time his eyes, like those of a dog about to be whipped, turned upon Gordon. ‘Must I,
must I? ’ his eyes said. Gordon eyed him sternly. Stick it out, Regulus! March to your
doom! Atqui sciebat quae sibi Barbara. It is a far, far more proletarian thing that you do.
And then with startling suddenness Ravelston’ s face cleared. An expression of relief,
almost of joy, stole over it. A wonderful thought had occurred to him. After all, you could
always pay the girl without actually doing anything! Thank God! He set his shoulders,
plucked up courage, went in. The door shut.

So here we are. A mean, dreadful room. Lino on the floor, gas-fire, huge double bed with
sheets vaguely dingy. Over the bed a framed coloured picture from La Vie Parisienne. A
mistake, that. Sometimes the originals don’t compare so well. And, by Jove! on the
bamboo table by the window, positively an aspidistra! Hast thou found me, O mine
enemy? But come here, Dora. Let’s have a look at you.

He seemed to be lying on the bed. He could not see very well. Her youthful, rapacious
face, with blackened eyebrows, leaned over him as he sprawled there.

‘How about my present? ’ she demanded, half wheedling, half menacing.

Never mind that now. To work! Come here. Not a bad mouth. Come here. Come closer.
Ah!



No. No use. Impossible. The will but not the way. The spirit is willing but the flesh is
weak. Try again. No. The booze, it must be. See Macbeth. One last try. No, no use. Not
this evening. I’m afraid.

All right, Dora, don’t you worry. You’ll get your two quid all right. We aren’t paying by
results.

He made a clumsy gesture. ‘Here, give us that bottle. That bottle off the dressing-table. ’

Dora brought it. Ah, that’s better. That at least doesn’t fail. With hands that had swollen
to monstrous size he up-ended the Chianti bottle. The wine flowed down his throat, bitter
and choking, and some of it went up his nose. It overwhelmed him. He was slipping,
sliding, falling off the bed. His head met the floor. His legs were still on the bed. For a
while he lay in this position. Is this the way to live? Down below the youthful voices
were still mournfully singing:

‘For tonight we’ll merry be, For tonight we’ll merry be, For tonight we’ll merry be-e-e —
Tomorrow we’ll be so-ober! ’


Chapter 9

And, by Jove, tomorrow we WERE sober!

Gordon emerged from some long, sickly dream to the consciousness that the books in the
lending library were the wrong way up. They were all lying on their sides. Moreover, for
some reason their backs had turned white — white and shiny, like porcelain.

He opened his eyes a little wider and moved an arm. Small rivulets of pain, seemingly
touched off by the movement, shot through his body at unexpected places — down the
calves of his legs, for instance, and up both sides of his head. He perceived that he was
lying on his side, with a hard smooth pillow under his cheek and a coarse blanket
scratching his chin and pushing its hairs into his mouth. Apart from the minor pains that



stabbed him every time he moved, there was a large, dull sort of pain which was not
localized but which seemed to hover all over him.

Suddenly he flung off the blanket and sat up. He was in a police cell. At this moment a
frightful spasm of nausea overcame him. Dimly perceiving a W. C. in the comer, he crept
towards it and was violently sick, three or four times.

After that, for several minutes, he was in agonizing pain. He could scarcely stand on his
feet, his head throbbed as though it were going to burst, and the light seemed like some
scalding white liquid pouring into his brain through the sockets of his eyes.