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and the food is execrable. But the ruin of their fortunes is
my advantage.’
Cronshaw had before him a glass of absinthe. It was near-
ly three years since they had met, and Philip was shocked
by the change in his appearance. He had been rather corpu-
lent, but now he had a dried-up, yellow look: the skin of his
neck was loose and winkled; his clothes hung about him as
though they had been bought for someone else; and his col-
lar, three or four sizes too large, added to the slatternliness
of his appearance. His hands trembled continually. Philip
remembered the handwriting which scrawled over the page
with shapeless, haphazard letters. Cronshaw was evidently
very ill.
‘I eat little these days,’ he said. ‘I’m very sick in the morn-
ing. I’m just having some soup for my dinner, and then I
shall have a bit of cheese.’
Philip’s glance unconsciously went to the absinthe, and
Cronshaw, seeing it, gave him the quizzical look with which
he reproved the admonitions of common sense.
‘You have diagnosed my case, and you think it’s very
wrong of me to drink absinthe.’
‘You’ve evidently got cirrhosis of the liver,’ said Philip.
‘Evidently.’
He looked at Philip in the way which had formerly had
the power of making him feel incredibly narrow. It seemed
to point out that what he was thinking was distressingly
obvious; and when you have agreed with the obvious what
more is there to say? Philip changed the topic.
‘When are you going back to Paris?’

Of Human Bondage