Page 272 - of-human-bondage-

Philip’s entire fortune amounted to no more than eighteen-
hundred pounds. He hesitated.
Then it chanced that one day Mr. Goodworthy asked him
suddenly if he would like to go to Paris. The firm did the ac-
counts for a hotel in the Faubourg St. Honore, which was
owned by an English company, and twice a year Mr. Good-
worthy and a clerk went over. The clerk who generally went
happened to be ill, and a press of work prevented any of the
others from getting away. Mr. Goodworthy thought of Phil-
ip because he could best be spared, and his articles gave him
some claim upon a job which was one of the pleasures of the
business. Philip was delighted.
‘You’ll ‘ave to work all day,’ said Mr. Goodworthy, ‘but we
get our evenings to ourselves, and Paris is Paris.’ He smiled
in a knowing way. ‘They do us very well at the hotel, and they
give us all our meals, so it don’t cost one anything. That’s the
way I like going to Paris, at other people’s expense.’
When they arrived at Calais and Philip saw the crowd of
gesticulating porters his heart leaped.
‘This is the real thing,’ he said to himself.
He was all eyes as the train sped through the country;
he adored the sand dunes, their colour seemed to him more
lovely than anything he had ever seen; and he was enchant-
ed with the canals and the long lines of poplars. When they
got out of the Gare du Nord, and trundled along the cobbled
streets in a ramshackle, noisy cab, it seemed to him that he
was breathing a new air so intoxicating that he could hard-
ly restrain himself from shouting aloud. They were met at
the door of the hotel by the manager, a stout, pleasant man,

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