The Ealing train came in, and John was swept in with a tight mass of people through the middle doors of a smoking carriage. The atmosphere was a suffocating mixture of hot breath and evil tobacco-smoke. The carriage was packed. Men and women stood jammed together like troops in a communication-trench. Here and there a clerk stood up with a sheepish mumble and a sallow woman sank thankfully into his seat. John stared with increasing resentment at the rows of men who did not get up—tired labourers in corduroy trousers who sat on in unmoved contentment, or gross men with cigars who screened themselves behind evening papers, pretending they did not notice the standing women.
The train stopped, and there was a fierce squeezing and struggling at the doors. A man behind John remembered suddenly that he wanted to get out, and began with much heaving and imprecation to hew a passage, treading violently on John’s ankle. But by now there were more people surging inwards, clinging precariously to the fringe of the mob. The train rushed on, and the man was left within it, cursing feebly. John felt glad, maliciously, ridiculously glad. But when he looked again at the sedentary gross men, the placid labourers, and at the short, pale women swaying in the centre he became righteously furious with the evil manners of the men. He felt that he would like to address them, curse them about it—that fat one with the insolent leer and the cap all cock-eye, especially; he would say loudly at the next station, “Why don’t you give one of these ladies your seat?” Then the man would have to get up, would stand shamed before the world, while some grateful female—that nurse there—took his seat. Perhaps all the others would follow.
Or perhaps it would happen quite differently. The man would not hear, or pretend not to hear; and he, John, would have to repeat his remark, losing greatly in dramatic force. And everyone would stare at him, as if he were a madman! Or the man would surrender his seat with a sweet smile and an apology, “Very sorry, I didn’t see”; and then the fools of women would refuse to take the seat. They would all say they were getting out at the next station; they would all simper and deprecate and behave like lunatics. The man would hover with a self-righteous, ingratiating smirk and sit down again. And John Egerton would look a fool. No—it couldn’t be done. What cowards men were!
A very hot and spotty man breathed disgustingly in John’s face; unable to move his body, he turned his head away to the left. On that side stood a robust young woman, with hatpins menacingly projecting from a red straw hat. Her head rocked as the train jolted: the cherries on her hat bobbed ridiculously, the naked hatpin-points swung backwards and forwards in front of John’s eye. He turned back to the disgusting breath of the spotty man.
At Earl’s Court the crowd melted a little; there were no seats, but there was room to breathe—room to stand by oneself, free from pressure of strange bodies. At Baron’s Court he crept into a seat. At Hammersmith a noisy mob of shopgirls and hobbledehoys surged in, and he surrendered his seat to a young woman, who was munching something. She sat down with a giggle and took her sister on her lap. Together they eyed him, with whispered jocularities. Only two more stations.
The lights were out now. The train ran out through the daylight on to a high embankment, past an interminable series of dingy houses. There was more air. The filthy smoke eddied out of the narrow windows. The train rocked enormously—a bad piece of line. Looking down the car from his place by the door, John saw through the haze an interminable vista of uniform right hands fiercely clinging to uniform straps, of right arms uniformly crooked, of bowed heads uniformly bent over evening papers, of endless backs uniformly enduring and dull. And as the train gave a lurch, all the elbows swung out together towards the windows, and all the bodies bent outward like willows in the wind, and all the heads were lifted together in a mute and uniform protest. It was all like some fantastic physical drill. Then he fell into the weary stupor of the habitual Underground traveller, listening semiconsciously to the insane chatter of the chuckling girls. Ravenscourt Park shot by unnoticed. The train ran on forever.
Stooping suddenly, he saw the familiar letters of Stamford Brook dashing past at an astonishing speed. Surely—surely the train was stopping. The porters’ room—the ticket collector—the passenger-shelter—the Safety First pictures—the advertisement of What Ho!—the other name-board of the station—the whole station—shot maddeningly past. The train rushed on to the intolerable remoteness of Turnham Green. Hell! John Egerton uttered an audible groan of vexation. Two nonstop trains running! It was unpardonable. He had not even thought to look at the nonstop labels on the train at Charing Cross. It was too bad. Another matter for the letter to the Company! The women looked at his scowling face and giggled again, whispering behind their hands.
From Turnham Green you might walk home; but it took nearly twenty minutes. Or if you were lucky you caught a train quickly back to
