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diff --git a/13883-h/13883-h.htm b/13883-h/13883-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7358297 --- /dev/null +++ b/13883-h/13883-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,10734 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Tree of Heaven, by May Sinclair</title> +<style type="text/css"> + <!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; } + blockquote {text-align: justify; + margin-left: 15%; + margin-right: 15%;} + IMG { + BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; + BORDER-TOP: 0px; + BORDER-LEFT: 0px; + BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px } + .loc { TEXT-ALIGN: right; + margin-left: 15%; + margin-right: 15%;} + + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; } + HR { width: 33%; } + hr.full { width: 100%; + height: 5px; } + a:link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + link {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:visited {color:blue; + text-decoration:none} + a:hover {color:red} + pre {font-size: 8pt; + margin-left: 10%; } + // --> +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13883 ***</div> +<h1>The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Tree of Heaven, by May Sinclair</h1> +<hr class="full" noshade> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE<br> +TREE OF HEAVEN</h1> +<br> +<h4>BY</h4> +<h3>MAY SINCLAIR</h3> +<h5>Author of<br> +<i>The Belfry</i>, <i>The Three Sisters</i>, etc.</h5> +<br> +<h4>1918</h4> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<center><b>Contents</b><br> +<br> +<a href="#PART_I">Part 1</a>: [<a href="#I">1</a>] [<a href= +"#II">2</a>] [<a href="#III">3</a>] [<a href="#IV">4</a>] [<a href= +"#V">5</a>] [<a href="#VI">6</a>] [<a href="#VII">7</a>] [<a href= +"#VIII">8</a>] [<a href="#IX">9</a>] [<a href="#X">10</a>]<br> +<a href="#PART_II">Part 2</a>: [<a href="#XI">11</a>] [<a href= +"#XII">12</a>] [<a href="#XIII">13</a>] [<a href="#XIV">14</a>] +[<a href="#XV">15</a>] [<a href="#XVI">16</a>] [<a href= +"#XVII">17</a>]<br> +<a href="#PART_III">Part 3</a>: [<a href="#XVIII">18</a>] [<a href= +"#XIX">19</a>] [<a href="#XX">20</a>] [<a href="#XXI">21</a>] +[<a href="#XXII">22</a>] [<a href="#XXIII">23</a>] [<a href= +"#XXIV">24</a>]</center> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE TREE OF HEAVEN</h1> +<h2><a name="PART_I">PART I</a></h2> +<h3><i>PEACE</i></h3> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="I"></a>I</h2> +<br> +<p>Frances Harrison was sitting out in the garden under the tree +that her husband called an ash-tree, and that the people down in +her part of the country called a tree of Heaven.</p> +<p>It was warm under the tree, and Frances might have gone to sleep +there and wasted an hour out of the afternoon, if it hadn't been +for the children.</p> +<p>Dorothy, Michael and Nicholas were going to a party, and Nicky +was excited. She could hear Old Nanna talking to Michael and +telling him to be a good boy. She could hear young Mary-Nanna +singing to Baby John. Baby John was too young himself to go to +parties; so to make up for that he was riding furiously on +Mary-Nanna's knee to the tune of the "Bumpetty-Bumpetty Major!"</p> +<p>It was Nicky's first party. That was why he was excited.</p> +<p>He had asked her for the third time what it would be like; and +for the third time she had told him. There would be dancing and a +Magic Lantern, and a Funny Man, and a Big White Cake covered with +sugar icing and Rosalind's name on it in pink sugar letters and +eight little pink wax candles burning on the top for Rosalind's +birthday. Nicky's eyes shone as she told him.</p> +<p>Dorothy, who was nine years old, laughed at Nicky.</p> +<p>"Look at Nicky," she said, "how excited he is!"</p> +<p>And every time she laughed at him his mother kissed him.</p> +<p>"I don't care," said Nicky. "I don't care if I am becited!"</p> +<p>And for the fifth time he asked, "When will it be time to +go?"</p> +<p>"Not for another hour and a half, my sweetheart."</p> +<p>"How long," said Nicky, "is an hour and a half?"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Frances had a tranquil nature and she never worried. But as she +sat under her tree of Heaven a thought came that made a faint +illusion of worry for her mind. She had forgotten to ask Grannie +and Auntie Louie and Auntie Emmeline and Auntie Edie to tea.</p> +<p>She had come to think of them like that in relation to her +children rather than to her or to each other.</p> +<p>It was a Tuesday, and they had not been there since Friday. +Perhaps, she thought, I'd better send over for them now. Especially +as it's such a beautiful afternoon. Supposing I sent Michael?</p> +<p>And yet, supposing Anthony came home early? He was always kind +to her people, but that was the very reason why she oughtn't to let +them spoil a beautiful afternoon for him. It could not be said that +any of them was amusing.</p> +<p>She could still hear Mary-Nanna singing her song about the +Bumpetty-Bumpetty Major. She could still hear Old Nanna talking to +Michael and telling him to be a good boy. That could only end in +Michael being naughty. To avert naughtiness or any other disaster +from her children was the end of Frances's existence.</p> +<p>So she called Michael to come to her. He came, running like a +little dog, obediently.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Michael was glad that he had been sent across the Heath to +Grannie's house with a message. It made him feel big and brave. +Besides, it would put off the moment when Mary-Nanna would come for +him, to make him ready for the party. He was not sure that he +wanted to go to it.</p> +<p>Michael did not much like going to Grannie's house either. In +all the rooms there was a queer dark-greenness and creepiness. It +smelt of bird-cages and elder bushes and of Grandpapa's funeral. +And when you had seen Auntie Edie's Senegal wax-bills, and the +stuffed fish, and the inside of Auntie Louie's type-writer there +was nothing else to see.</p> +<p>His mother said that Grandpapa's funeral was all over, and that +the green creepiness came from the green creepers. But Michael knew +it didn't. She only said things like that to make you feel nice and +comfy when you were going to bed. Michael knew very well that they +had put Grandpapa into the drawing-room and locked the door so that +the funeral men shouldn't get at him and take him away too soon. +And Auntie Louie had kept the key in her pocket.</p> +<p>Funerals meant taking people away.</p> +<p>Old Nanna wouldn't let him talk about it; but Mary-Nanna had +told him that was what funerals meant. All the same, as he went up +the flagged path, he took care not to look through the black panes +of the window where the elder bush was, lest he should see +Grandpapa's coffin standing in the place where the big table used +to be, and Grandpapa lying inside it wrapped in a white sheet.</p> +<p>Michael's message was that Mummy sent her love, and would +Grannie and Auntie Louie and Auntie Emmeline and Auntie Edie come +to tea? She was going to have tea in the garden, and would they +please come early? As early as possible. That was the part he was +not to forget.</p> +<p>The queer thing was that when Michael went to see Grannie and +the Aunties in Grannie's house he saw four old women. They wore +black dresses that smelt sometimes of something sweet and sometimes +like your fingers when you get ink on them. The Aunties looked +cross; and Auntie Emmeline smelt as if she had been crying. He +thought that perhaps they had not been able to stop crying since +Grandpapa's funeral. He thought that was why Auntie Louie's nose +was red and shiny and Auntie Edie's eyelids had pink edges instead +of lashes. In Grannie's house they never let you do anything. They +never did anything themselves. They never wanted to do anything; +not even to talk. He thought it was because they knew that +Grandpapa was still there all the time.</p> +<p>But outside it the Aunties were not so very old. They rode +bicycles. And when they came to Michael's Father's house they +forgot all about Grandpapa's funeral and ran about and played +tennis like Michael's mother and Mrs. Jervis, and they talked a +lot.</p> +<p>Michael's mother was Grannie's child. To see how she could be a +child you had only to think of her in her nightgown with her long +brown hair plaited in a pigtail hanging down her back and tied with +a blue ribbon. But he couldn't see how the three Aunties could be +Grannie's other children. They were bigger than Grannie and they +had grey hair. Grannie was a little thing; she was white and dry; +and she had hair like hay. Besides, she hardly ever took any notice +of them except to make a face at Auntie Emmeline or Auntie Edie now +and then. She did it with her head a little on one side, pushing +out her underlip and drawing it back again.</p> +<p>Grannie interested Michael; but more when he thought about her +than when she was actually there. She stood for him as the mark and +measure of past time. To understand how old Grannie was you had to +think backwards; this way: Once there was a time when there was no +Michael; but there was Mummy and there was Daddy. And once there +was a time when there was no Mummy and no Daddy; but there was +Grannie and there was Grandpapa. Now there was no Grandpapa. But he +couldn't think back far enough to get to the time when there was no +Grannie.</p> +<p>Michael thought that being Grannie must feel like being God.</p> +<p>Before he came to the black window pane and the elder bush he +had to run down the slopes and jump the gullies on his side of the +Heath, and cross the West Road, and climb the other slope to +Grannie's side. And it was not till you got to the row of elms on +Judge's Walk that you had to go carefully because of the +funeral.</p> +<p>He stood there on the ridge of the Walk and looked back to his +own side. There were other houses there; but he knew his father's +house by the tree of Heaven in the garden.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The garden stood on a high, flat promontory jutting out into the +Heath. A brown brick wall with buttresses, strong like +fortifications on a breastwork, enclosed it on three sides. From +the flagged terrace at the bottom of the garden you looked down, +through the tops of the birch-trees that rose against the rampart, +over the wild places of the Heath. There was another flagged +terrace at the other end of the garden. The house rose sheer from +its pavement, brown brick like the wall, and flat-fronted, with the +white wings of its storm shutters spread open, row on row. It +barred the promontory from the mainland. And at the back of it, +beyond its kitchen garden and its courtyard, a fringe of Heath +still parted it from the hill road that went from "Jack Straw's +Castle" to "The Bull and Bush." You reached it by a lane that led +from the road to the Heath.</p> +<p>The house belonged to the Heath and the open country. It was +aware of nothing but the Heath and the open country between it and +Harrow on the Hill. It had the air of all the old houses of +Hampstead, the wonderful air of not acknowledging the existence of +Bank Holidays. It was lifted up high above the town; shut in; +utterly secluded.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Anthony Harrison considered that he had done well when he +acquired West End House for his wife Frances, and for his children, +Dorothea, Michael, Nicholas and John.</p> +<p>Frances had said that, if he was thinking of her, he needn't buy +a big place, because she didn't want one. But he might buy it for +the children if he liked. Anthony had said that she had no idea of +what she mightn't want, once she began to give her mind to it, and +that he would like to think of her living in it after he was gone. +Not that he had any intention of going; he was only thirty-six (not +much older than Frances) and incurably healthy. But since his +wife's attention had become absorbed in the children--to the +exclusion of every other interest--he was always trying to harrow +her by the suggestion. And Frances only laughed at him and told him +that he was a silly old thing, and that he needn't think he was +going to get round her that way.</p> +<p>There was no other way open for Anthony; unless he were to go +bankrupt or get pneumonia or peritonitis. Frances would have been +the first to acknowledge that illness or misfortune constituted a +claim. And the only things he ever did get were loud, explosive +colds in his head which made him a mark for derision. His business +was so sound that not even a revolution or a European war could +shake it. And his appearance was incompatible with his pretensions +to pathos.</p> +<p>It would have paid him better to have been small and weedy, or +lamentably fat, or to have had a bald place coming, or crow's feet +pointing to grey hairs; for then there might have been a chance for +him. But Anthony's body was well made, slender and tall. He had +blue eyes and black-brown hair, and the look of an amiable hawk, +alert, fiercely benevolent. Frances couldn't see any pathos in the +kind of figure she happened to admire most, the only kind she would +have tolerated in a husband. And if she <i>had</i> seen any pathos +in it she wouldn't have married it. Pathos, she said, was all very +well in a father, or a brother, or a friend, but in choosing a +husband you had to think of your children; and she had wanted boys +that would look like Michael and Nicholas and John.</p> +<p>"Don't you mean," Anthony had said, "boys that will look like +me?"</p> +<p>"I mean," she had answered, "exactly what I say. You needn't be +so arrogant."</p> +<p><i>Her</i> arrogance had been beyond all bearing since John, the +third son, had been born.</p> +<p>And it was Frances, after all, who had made him buy West End +House for her own reasons. Both the day nursery and the night +nursery had windows to the south. It was the kind of house she had +always dreamed of living in, and of Michael, or Nicky living in +after she and Anthony were gone. It was not more than seven +minutes' walk from the bottom of the lane to the house where her +people lived. She had to think about the old people when the poor +dears had come up to London in order to be thought about. And it +had white storm shutters and a tree of Heaven in the garden.</p> +<p>And, because they had both decided that they would have that +house whatever happened, they began to argue and to tease each +other. Anthony had said it was all right, only the tree of Heaven +wasn't a tree of Heaven; it was a common ash. He was one of the +biggest timber merchants in the country and he ought to know. +Frances said she mightn't know much, but she did know that was the +kind of tree the people down in her part of the country called a +tree of Heaven. Anthony said he couldn't help that. It didn't +matter what they called it. It was a common ash.</p> +<p>Then she told him he had no poetry in his composition. She had +always dreamed of having a tree of Heaven in her garden; and he was +destroying her dream. He replied that he didn't want to destroy her +dream, but the tree really <i>was</i> an ash. You could tell by the +bark, and by the leaves and by the number and the shape of the +leaflets. And anyhow, that was the first he'd heard about her +dream.</p> +<p>"You don't know," said Frances, "what goes on inside me."</p> +<p>She said that if any of the children developed an imagination he +needn't think <i>he</i> had anything to do with it.</p> +<p>"I shan't," said Anthony. "I wouldn't have anything to do with +it if I could. Facts are good enough for me. The children must be +brought up to realize facts."</p> +<p>An ash-tree was a fact and a tree of Heaven was a fancy; unless +by any chance she meant <i>ailanthus glandulosa</i>. (He knew she +didn't.) If she wanted to know, the buds of the ash were black like +ebony. The buds of the tree of Heaven were rose-red, like--like bad +mahogany. Wait till the spring and look at the buds.</p> +<p>Frances waited till the spring and looked at the buds, and, sure +enough, they were black like ebony.</p> +<p>Anthony also said that if they were choosing a house for the +children, it was no earthly use to think about the old people. For +the old people would go and the children would remain.</p> +<p>As if to show how right he was, Grandpapa had died early in that +summer of 'ninety-five, one month after they had moved into West +End House. That still left Grannie and Auntie Louie and Auntie +Emmeline and Auntie Edie for Anthony to look after.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>She was thinking of them now. She hoped that they would come +early in time to see the children. She also hoped that they would +go early, so that she and Anthony might have their three sets of +tennis before dinner in peace.</p> +<p>There would be no peace if Louie and Edie wanted to play too. +The one thing that Anthony could not stand was people wanting to do +things they couldn't do, and spoiling them for those who could. He +used to say that the sight of Louie anywhere near the tennis court +put him off his stroke.</p> +<p>Again, the faint illusion of worry was created by the thought +that this dreadful thing might happen, that Louie and Edie might +want to play and that Anthony would be put off his stroke and be +annoyed, and that his annoyance, his just and legitimate annoyance, +would spoil the perfection of the afternoon. And as she played with +the illusion it made more real her tranquillity, her incredible +content.</p> +<p>Her hands were busy now putting decorative stitches into a frock +for John. She had pushed aside a novel by George Moore and a volume +of Ibsen's plays. She disliked Ibsen and disapproved of George +Moore. Her firm, tight little character defended itself against +every form of intellectual disturbance. A copy of the <i>Times</i> +had fallen from her lap to her feet. Jane, the cat, had found it +there, and, purring loudly, had trodden it down into a bed, and now +lay on it, asleep. Frances had informed herself of the affairs of +the nation.</p> +<p>At the bottom of her mind was the conviction (profound, because +unconscious) that the affairs of the nation were not to be compared +for interest with her own affairs, and an attitude of +condescension, as if she honoured the <i>Times</i> by reading it +and the nation by informing herself of its affairs; also the very +distinct impression that evening papers were more attractive than +morning papers. She would have admitted that they owed their +attraction to the circumstance that Anthony brought them home with +him in his pocket, and that in the evening she was not obliged to +inform herself of what might be happening. Anthony was certain to +inform her.</p> +<p>Not that anything ever did happen. Except strikes; and even +then, no sooner did the features of the strike begin to get +dramatic than they were instantly submerged in the flood of +conversation that was let loose over them. Mrs. Anthony pitied the +poor editors and reporters while Parliament was sitting. She saw +them as rather silly, violent and desperate men, yet pathetic in +their silliness, violence and desperation, snatching at divorces, +and breach of promise cases, and fires in paraffin shops, as +drowning men snatch at straws.</p> +<p>Her imagination refused to picture any end to this state of +things. There would just be more speeches and more strikes, and +still more speeches, going on for ever and ever at home; while +foreign affairs and the British Empire went on for ever and ever +too, with no connection between the two lines of sequence, and no +likeness, except that both somehow went on and on.</p> +<p>That was Anthony's view of England's parliament and of her +imperial policy; and it was Mrs. Anthony's. Politics, Anthony said, +had become static; and he assured Frances that there was no +likelihood that they would ever become dynamic again--ever.</p> +<p>Anthony's view of politics was Mrs. Anthony's view of life.</p> +<p>Nothing ever really happened. Things did not change; they +endured; they went on. At least everything that really mattered +endured and went on. So that everything that really mattered +could--if you were given to looking forward--be foreseen. A +strike--a really bad one--might conceivably affect Anthony's +business, for a time; but not all the strikes in the world, not all +the silly speeches, not all the meddling and muddling of +politicians could ever touch one of those enduring things.</p> +<p>Frances believed in permanence because, in secret, she abhorred +the thought of change. And she abhorred the thought of change +because, at thirty-three, she had got all the things she wanted. +But only for the last ten years out of the thirty-three. Before +that (before she was Mrs. Anthony), wanting things, letting it be +known that you wanted them, had meant not getting them. So that it +was incredible how she had contrived to get them all. She had not +yet left off being surprised at her own happiness. It was not like +things you take for granted and are not aware of. Frances was +profoundly aware of it. Her happiness was a solid, tangible thing. +She knew where it resided, and what it was made of, and what terms +she held it on. It depended on her; on her truth, her love, her +loyalty; it was of the nature of a trust. But there was no illusion +about it. It was the reality.</p> +<p>She denied that she was arrogant, for she had not taken one of +them for granted, not even Dorothy; though a little arrogance might +have been excusable in a woman who had borne three sons and only +one daughter before she was thirty-two. Whereas Grannie's +achievement had been four daughters, four superfluous women, of +whom Anthony had married one and supported three.</p> +<p>To be sure there was Maurice. But he was worse than superfluous, +considering that most of the time Anthony was supporting Maurice, +too.</p> +<p>She had only known one serious anxiety--lest her flesh and blood +should harbour any of the blood and flesh left over after Morrie +was made. She had married Anthony to drive out Morrie from the +bodies and souls of her children. She meant that, through her and +Anthony, Morrie should go, and Dorothea, Michael, Nicholas and John +should remain.</p> +<p>As Frances looked at the four children, her mouth tightened +itself so as to undo the ruinous adoration of her eyes. She loved +their slender bodies, their pure, candid faces, their thick, +straight hair that parted solidly from the brush, clean-cut and +shining like sheets of polished metal, brown for Dorothy, +black-brown for Nicholas, red gold for Michael and white gold for +John. She was glad that they were all made like that; slender and +clear and hard, and that their very hair was a thing of clean +surfaces and definite edges. She disliked the blurred outlines of +fatness and fuzziness and fluffiness. The bright solidity of their +forms helped her to her adored illusion, the illusion of their +childhood as going on, lasting for ever and ever.</p> +<p>They would be the nicest looking children at Mrs. Jervis's +party. They would stand out solid from the fluffiness and fuzziness +and fatness of the others. She saw people looking at them. She +heard them saying: "Who are the two little boys in brown +linen?"--"They are Michael and Nicholas Harrison." The Funny Man +came and said: "Hello! I didn't expect to see you here!" It was +Michael and Nicholas he didn't expect to see; and the noise in the +room was Nicky's darling laughter.</p> +<p>Music played. Michael and Nicholas danced to the music. It was +Michael's body and Nicky's that kept for her the pattern of the +dance, their feet that beat out its measure. Sitting under the tree +of Heaven Frances could see Mrs. Jervis's party. It shimmered and +clustered in a visionary space between the tree and the border of +blue larkspurs on the other side of the lawn. The firm figures of +Michael and Nicholas and Dorothy held it together, kept it from +being shattered amongst the steep blue spires of the larkspurs. +When it was all over they would still hold it together, so that +people would know that it had really happened and remember having +been there. They might even remember that Rosalind had had a +birthday.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Frances had just bestowed this life after death on Mrs. Jervis's +party when she heard Michael saying he didn't want to go to it.</p> +<p>He had no idea why he didn't want to go except that he +didn't.</p> +<p>"What'?" said Frances. "Not when Nicky and Dorothy are +going?"</p> +<p>He shook his head. He was mournful and serious.</p> +<p>"And there's going to be a Magic Lantern"--</p> +<p>"I know."</p> +<p>"And a Funny Man"--</p> +<p>"I know."</p> +<p>"And a Big White Cake with sugar icing and Rosalind's name on it +in pink letters, and eight candles--"</p> +<p>"I know, Mummy." Michael's under lip began to shake.</p> +<p>"I thought it was only little baby boys that were silly and +shy."</p> +<p>Michael was not prepared to contest the statement. He saw it was +the sort of thing that in the circumstances she was bound to say. +All the same his under lip would have gone on shaking if he hadn't +stopped it.</p> +<p>"I thought you were a big boy," said Frances.</p> +<p>"So I <i>was</i>, yesterday. To-day isn't yesterday, Mummy."</p> +<p>"If John--John was asked to a beautiful party <i>he</i> wouldn't +be afraid to go."</p> +<p>As soon as Michael's under lip had stopped shaking his eyelids +began. You couldn't stop your eyelids.</p> +<p>"It's not <i>afraid</i>, exactly," he said.</p> +<p>"What is it, then?"</p> +<p>"It's sort--sort of forgetting things."</p> +<p>"What things?"</p> +<p>"I don't know, Mummy. I think--it's pieces of me that I want to +remember. At a party I can't feel all of myself at once--like I do +now."</p> +<p>She loved his strange thoughts as she loved his strange beauty, +his reddish yellow hair, his light hazel eyes that were not hers +and not Anthony's.</p> +<p>"What will you do, sweetheart, all afternoon, without Nicky and +Dorothy and Mary-Nanna?"</p> +<p>"I don't want Nicky and Dorothy and Mary-Nanna. I want Myself. I +want to play with Myself."</p> +<p>She thought: "Why shouldn't he? What right have I to say these +things to him and make him cry, and send him to stupid parties that +he doesn't want to go to? After all, he's only a little boy."</p> +<p>She thought of Michael, who was seven, as if he were younger +than Nicholas, who was only five.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicky was different. You could never tell what Michael would +take it into his head to think. You could never tell what Nicky +would take it into his head to do. There was no guile in Michael. +But sometimes there was guile in Nicky. Frances was always on the +look out for Nicky's guile.</p> +<p>So when Michael remarked that Grannie and the Aunties would be +there immediately and Nicky said, "Mummy, I think my ear is going +to ache," her answer was--"You won't have to stay more than a +minute, darling."</p> +<p>For Nicky lived in perpetual fear that his Auntie Louie might +kiss at him.</p> +<p>Dorothy saw her mother's profound misapprehension and she +hastened to put it right.</p> +<p>"It isn't Auntie Louie, Mummy. His ear is really aching."</p> +<p>And still Frances went on smiling. She knew, and Nicky knew +that, if a little boy could establish the fact of earache, he was +absolved from all social and family obligations for as long as his +affliction lasted. He wouldn't have to stand still and pretend he +liked it while he was being kissed at.</p> +<p>Frances kept her mouth shut when she smiled, as if she were +trying not to. It was her upper lip that got the better of her. The +fine, thin edges of it quivered and twitched and curled. You would +have said the very down was sensitive to her thought's secret and +iniquitous play. Her smile mocked other people's solemnities, her +husband's solemnity, and the solemnity (no doubt inherited) of her +son Michael; it mocked the demureness and the gravity of her +face.</p> +<p>She had brought her face close to Nicky's; and it was as if her +mouth had eyes in it to see if there were guile in him.</p> +<p>"Are you a little humbug?" she said.</p> +<p>Nicky loved his mother's face. It never got excited or did silly +things like other people's faces. It never got red and shiny like +Auntie Louie's face, or hot and rough like Auntie Emmeline's, or +wet and mizzly like Auntie Edie's. The softness and whiteness and +dryness of his mother's face were delightful to Nicky. So was her +hair. It was cold, with a funny sort of coldness that made your +fingers tingle when you touched it; and it smelt like the taste of +Brazil nuts.</p> +<p>Frances saw the likeness of her smile quiver on Nicky's upper +lip. It broke and became Nicky's smile that bared his little teeth +and curled up the corners of his blue eyes. (His blue eyes and +black brown hair were Anthony's.) It wasn't reasonable to suppose +that Nicky had earache when he could smile like that.</p> +<p>"I'm afraid," she said, "you're a little humbug. Run to the +terrace and see if Grannie and the Aunties are coming."</p> +<p>He ran. It was half a child's run and half a full-grown +boy's.</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Anthony addressed her daughter.</p> +<p>"Why did you say his ear's aching when it isn't?"</p> +<p>"Because," said Dorothy, "it <i>is</i> aching."</p> +<p>She was polite and exquisite and obstinate, like Anthony.</p> +<p>"Nicky ought to know his own ear best. Go and tell him he's not +to stand on the top of the wall. And if they're coming wave to +them, to show you're glad to see them."</p> +<p>"But--Mummy--I'm not."</p> +<p>She knew it was dreadful before she said it. But she had warded +off reproof by nuzzling against her mother's cheek as it tried to +turn away from her. She saw her mother's upper lip moving, +twitching. The sensitive down stirred on it like a dark smudge, a +dust that quivered. Her own mouth, pushed forward, searching, the +mouth of a nuzzling puppy, remained grave and tender. She was +earnest and imperturbable in her truthfulness. "Whether you're glad +or not you must go," said Frances. She meant to be obeyed.</p> +<p>Dorothy went. Her body was obedient. For as yet she had her +mother's body and her face, her blunted oval, the straight nose +with the fine, tilted nostrils, her brown eyes, her solid hair, +brown on the top and light underneath, and on the curve of the roll +above her little ears. Frances had watched the appearance of those +details with an anxiety that would have surprised her if she had +been aware of it. She wanted to see herself in the bodies of her +sons and in the mind of her daughter. But Dorothy had her father's +mind. You couldn't move it. What she had said once she stuck to for +ever, like Anthony to his ash-tree. As if sticking to a thing for +ever could make it right once. And Dorothy had formed the habit of +actually being right, like Anthony, nine times out of ten. Frances +foresaw that this persistence, this unreasoning rectitude, might, +in time, become annoying in a daughter. There were moments when she +was almost perturbed by the presence of this small, mysterious +organism, mixed up of her body and her husband's mind.</p> +<p>But in secret she admired her daughter's candour, her +downrightness and straightforwardness, her disdain of conventions +and hypocrisies. Frances was not glad, she knew she was not glad, +any more than Dorothy was glad, to see her mother and her sisters. +She only pretended. In secret she was afraid of every moment she +would have to live with them. She had lived with them too long. She +foresaw what would happen this afternoon, how they would look, what +they would say and do, and with what gestures. It would be like the +telling, for the thirteenth time, of a dull story that you know +every word of.</p> +<p>She thought she had sent them a kind message. But she knew she +had only asked them to come early in order that they might go early +and leave her to her happiness.</p> +<p>She went down to the terrace wall where Michael and Nicky and +Dorothy were watching for them. She was impatient, and she thought +that she wanted to see them coming. But she only wanted to see if +they were coming early. It struck her that this was sad.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Small and distant, the four black figures moved on the slope +under the Judges' Walk; four spots of black that crawled on the +sallow grass and the yellow clay of the Heath.</p> +<p>"How little they look," Michael said.</p> +<p>Their littleness and their distance made them harmless, made +them pathetic. Frances was sorry that she was not glad. That was +the difference between her and Dorothy, that she was sorry and +always would be sorry for not being what she ought to be; and +Dorothy never would be sorry for being what she was. She seemed to +be saying, already, in her clearness and hardness, "What I am I am, +and you can't change me." The utmost you could wring from her was +that she couldn't help it.</p> +<p>Frances's sorrow was almost unbearable when the four women in +black came nearer, when she saw them climbing the slope below the +garden and the lane.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="II"></a>II</h2> +<br> +<p>Grannie took a long time crossing the lawn from the door in the +lane to the tree of Heaven.</p> +<p>She came first. Her daughters followed, forced to her slow pace, +advancing with an air of imperfect cohesion, of not really +belonging to each other, as if they had been strangers associated +by some accident. It had grown on them in their efforts to carry +off the embarrassment of appearing as an eternal trio. Auntie Louie +carried it off best. Sharp and rigid, Auntie Louie's figure never +lent itself to any group. But for her black gown she really might +not have belonged.</p> +<p>Mrs. Fleming went slowly, not because she was old, for she was +only sixty, but because, though she said, and thought, that she was +wrapped up in Frances and her children, she was still absorbed, +fascinated by her sacred sense of bereavement. She moved as if +hypnotized by her own sorrow.</p> +<p>To her three unmarried daughters she behaved with a sort of +mystic hostility, a holy detachment and displeasure, as if she +suspected them of getting over it, or of wanting to get over it if +they could. But to her one married daughter and to her +grand-children she was soft and gentle. So that, when they happened +to be all together, her moods changed so rapidly that she seemed a +creature of unaccountable caprice. One minute her small, white, dry +face quivered with softness and gentleness, and the next it +stiffened, or twitched with the inimical, disapproving look it had +for Louie and Emmeline and Edith.</p> +<p>The children lifted up their pure, impassive faces to be kissed +at. Old Nanna brought Baby John and put him on his grandmother's +knee. Dorothy and Nicholas went off with Mary-Nanna to the party. +Michael forgot all about playing with himself. He stayed where he +was, drawn by the spectacle of Grannie and the Aunties. Grannie was +clucking and chuckling to Baby John as she had clucked and chuckled +to her own babies long ago. Her under lip made itself wide and +full; it worked with an in and out movement very funny and +interesting to Michael. The movement meant that Grannie chuckled +under protest of memories that were sacred to Grandpapa.</p> +<p>"Tchoo--tchoo--tchoo--tchoo! Chuckaboo! Beautiful boy!" said +Grannie.</p> +<p>Auntie Louie looked at her youngest nephew. She smiled her +downward, sagging smile, wrung from a virginity sadder than +Grannie's grief. She spoke to Baby John.</p> +<p>"You really are rather a nice boy," Auntie Louie said.</p> +<p>But Edie, the youngest Auntie, was kneeling on the grass before +him, bringing her face close to his. Baby John's new and flawless +face was cruel to Auntie Edie's. So was his look of dignity and +wisdom.</p> +<p>"Oh, she says you're only rather nice," said Auntie Edie. "And +you're the beautifullest, sweetest, darlingest that ever was. +Wasn't she a nasty Auntie Louie? Ten little pink toes. And +<i>there</i> he goes. Five little tootsies to each of his +footsies."</p> +<p>She hid herself behind the <i>Times</i> disturbing Jane.</p> +<p>"Where's John-John?" she cried. "Where's he gone to? Can anybody +tell me where to find John-John? Where's John-John? +Peep-<i>bo</i>--there he is! John-John, look at Auntie Edie. Oh, he +won't pay any attention to poor me."</p> +<p>Baby John was playing earnestly with Grannie's watch-chain.</p> +<p>"You might leave the child alone," said Grannie. "Can't you see +he doesn't want you?"</p> +<p>Auntie Edie made a little pouting face, like a scolded, pathetic +child. Nobody ever did want Auntie Edie.</p> +<p>And all the time Auntie Emmy was talking to Frances very loud +and fast.</p> +<p>"Frances, I do think your garden's too beautiful for words. How +clever of you to think of clearing away the old flower-beds. I hate +flower-beds on a lawn. Yet I don't suppose I should have had the +strength of mind to get rid of them if it bad been me."</p> +<p>As she talked Auntie Emmy opened her eyes very wide; her +eyebrows jerked, the left one leaping up above the right; she +thrust out her chin at you and her long, inquiring nose. Her thin +face was the play of agitated nerve-strings that pulled it thus +into perpetual, restless movements; and she made vague gestures +with her large, bony hands. Her tongue went tick-tack, like a +clock. Anthony said you-could hear Emmy's tongue striking the roof +of her-mouth all thee time.</p> +<p>"And putting those delphiniums all together like that--Massing +the blues. Anthony? I <i>do</i> think Anthony has perfect taste. I +adore delphiniums."</p> +<p>Auntie Emmy was behaving as if neither Michael nor Baby John was +there.</p> +<p>"Don't you think John-John's too beautiful for words?" said +Frances. "Don't you like him a little bit too?"</p> +<p>Auntie Emmy winced as if Frances had flicked something in her +face.</p> +<p>"Of course I like him too. Why shouldn't I?"</p> +<p>"I don't think you <i>do</i>, Auntie Emmy," Michael said.</p> +<p>Auntie Emmy considered him as for the first time.</p> +<p>"What do you know about it?" she said.</p> +<p>"I can tell by the funny things your face does."</p> +<p>"I thought," said Frances, "you wanted to play by yourself."</p> +<p>"So I do," said Michael.</p> +<p>"Well then, go and play."</p> +<p>He went and to a heavenly place that he knew of. But as he +played with Himself there he thought: "Auntie Emmy doesn't tell the +truth. I think it is because she isn't happy."</p> +<p>Michael kept his best things to himself.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"I suppose you're happy," said Grannie, "now you've got the poor +child sent away."</p> +<p>Auntie Emmy raised her eyebrows and spread out her hands, as +much as to say she was helpless under her mother's stupidity.</p> +<p>"He'd have been sent away anyhow," said Frances. "It isn't good +for him to hang about listening to grown-up conversation."</p> +<p>It was her part to keep the peace between her mother and her +sisters.</p> +<p>"It seems to me," said Auntie Louie, "that you began it +yourself."</p> +<p>When a situation became uncomfortable, Auntie Louie always put +her word in and made it worse. She never would let Frances keep the +peace.</p> +<p>Frances knew what Louie meant--that she was always flinging her +babies in Emmy's face at those moments when the sight of other +people's babies was too much for Emmy. She could never be prepared +for Emmy's moments.</p> +<p>"It's all very well," Auntie Louie went on; "but I should like +to hear of somebody admiring Dorothy. I don't see where Dorothy +comes in."</p> +<p>Dorothy was supposed, by the two Nannas, to be Auntie Louie's +favourite. If you taxed her with it she was indignant and declared +that she was sure she wasn't.</p> +<p>And again Frances knew what Louie meant--that she loved her +three sons, Michael and Nicholas and John, with passion, and her +one daughter, Dorothea, with critical affection. That was the sort +of thing that Louie was always saying and thinking about people, +and nobody ever paid the slightest attention to what Louie said or +thought. Frances told herself that if there was one emotion that +she was more free from than another it was sex jealousy.</p> +<p>The proof of it, which she offered now, was that she had given +up Dorothy to Anthony. It was natural that he should care most for +the little girl.</p> +<p>Louie said that was easy--when she knew perfectly well that +Anthony didn't. Like Frances he cared most for his three sons. She +was leaving Dorothy to Anthony so that Anthony might leave Michael +and Nicholas to her.</p> +<p>"You might just as well say," Frances said, "that I'm in love +with John-John. Poor little Don-Don!"</p> +<p>"I might," said Louie, "just as well."</p> +<p>Grannie said she was sure she didn't understand what they were +talking about and that Louie had some very queer ideas in her +head.</p> +<p>"Louie," she said, "knows more than I do."</p> +<p>Frances thought: Was Grannie really stupid? Was she really +innocent? Was she not, rather, clever, chock-full of the secret +wisdom and the secret cruelty of sex?</p> +<p>Frances was afraid of her thoughts. They came to her not like +thoughts, but like quick rushes of her blood, partly confusing her. +She did not like that.</p> +<p>She thought: Supposing Grannie knew all the time that Emmy was +unhappy, and took a perverse pleasure in her knowledge? Supposing +she was not really soft and gentle? She could be soft and gentle to +her, because of her children and because of Anthony. She respected +Anthony because he was well-off and efficient and successful, and +had supported her ever since Grandpapa had gone bankrupt. She was +proud of Frances because she was Anthony's wife, who had had three +sons and only one daughter.</p> +<p>Grannie behaved as if her grandchildren were her own children, +as if she had borne three Sons and only one daughter, instead of +four daughters and only one son. Still, Frances was the vehicle of +flesh and blood that carried on her flesh and blood in Michael and +Nicholas and John. She respected Frances.</p> +<p>But Frances could remember a time when she had been unmarried +like her sisters, and when Grannie had turned on her, too, that +look that was half contempt and half hostility or displeasure. +Grannie had not wanted her to marry Anthony, any more than she +would have wanted Louie or Emmeline or Edith to marry anybody, +supposing anybody had wanted to marry them. And Frances and Anthony +had defied her. They had insisted on marrying each other. Frances +knew that if there had been no Anthony, her mother would have +despised her in secret, as in secret she despised Emmeline and +Edith. She despised them more than Louie, because, poor things, +they wanted, palpably, to be married, whereas Louie didn't, or said +she didn't. In her own way, Louie had defied her mother. She had +bought a type-writer and a bicycle with her own earnings, and by +partially supporting herself she had defied Anthony, the male +benefactor, Louie's manner intimated that there was nothing Frances +had that she wanted. She had resources in herself, and Frances had +none.</p> +<p>Frances persuaded herself that she admired and respected Louie. +She knew that she, Frances, was only admired and respected because +she had succeeded where her three sisters had failed. She was even +afraid that, in moments of exasperation, Grannie used her and +Anthony and the children to punish Emmy and Edie for their failure. +The least she could do was to stand between them and Grannie.</p> +<p>It was possible that if Grannie had been allowed to ignore them +and give her whole attention to Frances or Michael or Baby John, +she could have contrived to be soft and gentle for an afternoon. +But neither Louie nor Emmeline, nor even Edith, would consent to be +ignored. They refused to knuckle under, to give in. Theirs was a +perpetual struggle to achieve an individuality in the teeth of +circumstances that had denied them any. Frances acknowledged that +they were right, that in the same circumstances she would have done +the same.</p> +<p>In their different ways and by different methods they claimed +attention. They claimed it incessantly, Louie, the eldest, by an +attitude of assurance and superiority so stiff and hard that it +seemed invulnerable; Emmy by sudden jerky enthusiasms, exaltations, +intensities; Edie by an exaggerated animation, a false excitement. +Edie would drop from a childish merriment to a childish pathos, +when she would call herself "Poor me," and demand pity for being +tired, for missing a train, for cold feet, for hair coming +down.</p> +<p>There would be still more animation, and still more enthusiasm +when Anthony came home.</p> +<p>Frances prided herself on her power of foreseeing things. She +foresaw that Anthony would come home early for his game. She +foresaw the funny, nervous agony of his face when he appeared on +the terrace and caught sight of Grannie and the three Aunties, and +the elaborate and exquisite politeness with which he would conceal +from them his emotion. She foresaw that she would say to Annie, +"When the master comes tell him we're having tea in the garden, +under the tree of--under the ash-tree" (for after all, he was the +master, and discipline must be maintained). She foresaw the very +gestures of his entrance, the ironically solemn bow that he would +make to her, far-off, from the terrace; she even foresaw the kind +of joke that, for the life of him, he would not be able to help +making. She was so made that she could live happily in this world +of small, foreseen things.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="III"></a>III</h2> +<br> +<p>And it all happened as she had foreseen.</p> +<p>Anthony came home early, because it was a fine afternoon. He +made the kind of joke that calamity always forced from him, by some +perversion of his instincts.</p> +<p>"When is an ash-tree not an ash-tree? When it's a tree of +Heaven."</p> +<p>He was exquisitely polite to Grannie and the Aunties, and his +manner to Frances, which she openly complained of, was, he said, +what a woman brought on herself when she reserved her passion for +her children, her sentiment for trees of Heaven, and her mockery +for her devoted husband.</p> +<p>"I suppose we can have some tennis <i>now</i>," said Auntie +Louie.</p> +<p>"Certainly," said Anthony, "we can, and we shall." He tried not +to look at Frances.</p> +<p>And Auntie Edie became automatically animated.</p> +<p>"I can't serve for nuts, but I can run. Who's going to play with +<i>me</i>?"</p> +<p>"I am," said Anthony. He was perfect.</p> +<p>The game of tennis had an unholy and terrible attraction for +Auntie Louie and Auntie Edie. Neither of them could play. But, +whereas Auntie Louie thought that she could play and took tennis +seriously, Auntie Edie knew that she couldn't and took it as a +joke.</p> +<p>Auntie Louie stood tall and rigid and immovable. She planted +herself, like a man, close up to the net, where Anthony wanted to +be, and where he should have been; but Auntie Louie said she was no +good if you put her to play back; she couldn't be expected to take +every ball he missed.</p> +<p>When Auntie Louie called out "Play!" she meant to send a nervous +shudder through her opponents, shattering their morale. She went +through all the gestures of an annihilating service that for some +reason never happened. She said the net was too low and that +spoiled her eye. And when she missed her return it was because +Anthony had looked at her and put her off. Still Aunt Louie's +attitude had this advantage that it kept her quiet in one place +where Anthony could dance round and round her.</p> +<p>But Auntie Edie played in little nervous runs and slides and +rushes; she flung herself, with screams of excitement, against the +ball, her partner and the net; and she brandished her racket in a +dangerous manner. The oftener she missed the funnier it was to +Auntie Edie. She had been pretty when she was young, and seventeen +years ago her cries and tumbles and collisions had been judged +amusing; and Auntie Edie thought they were amusing still. Anthony +had never had the heart to undeceive her. So that when Anthony was +there Auntie Edie still went about setting a standard of gaiety for +other people to live up to; and still she was astonished that they +never did, that other people had no sense of humour.</p> +<p>Therefore Frances was glad when Anthony told her that he had +asked Mr. Parsons, the children's tutor, and young Norris and young +Vereker from the office to come round for tennis at six, and that +dinner must be put off till half-past eight.</p> +<p>All was well. The evening would be sacred to Anthony and the +young men. The illusion of worry passed, and Frances's real world +of happiness stood firm.</p> +<p>And as Frances's mind, being a thoroughly healthy mind, refused +to entertain any dreary possibility for long together, so it was +simply unable to foresee downright calamity, even when it had been +pointed out to her. For instance, that Nicky should really have +chosen the day of the party for an earache, the worst earache he +had ever had.</p> +<p>He appeared at tea-time, carried in Mary-Nanna's arms, and with +his head tied up in one of Mr. Jervis's cricket scarves. As he +approached his family he tried hard not to look pathetic.</p> +<p>And at the sight of her little son her whole brilliant world of +happiness was shattered around Frances.</p> +<p>"Nicky darling," she said, "why <i>didn't</i> you tell me it was +really aching?"</p> +<p>"I didn't know," said Nicky.</p> +<p>He never did know the precise degree of pain that distinguished +the beginning of a genuine earache from that of a sham one, and he +felt that to palm off a sham earache on his mother for a real one, +was somehow a sneaky thing to do. And while his ear went on +stabbing him, Nicky did his best to explain.</p> +<p>"You see, I never know whether it's aching or whether it's only +going to ache. It began a little, teeny bit when the Funny Man made +me laugh. And I didn't see the Magic Lantern, and I didn't have any +of Rosalind's cake. It came on when I was biting the sugar off. And +it was aching in both ears at once. It was," said Nicky, "a jolly +sell for me."</p> +<p>At that moment Nicky's earache jabbed upwards at his eyelids and +cut them, and shook tears out of them. But Nicky's mouth refused to +take any part in the performance, though he let his father carry +him upstairs. And, as he lay on the big bed in his mother's room, +he said he thought he could bear it if he had Jane-Pussy to lie +beside him, and his steam-engine.</p> +<p>Anthony went back into the garden to fetch Jane. He spent an +hour looking for her, wandering in utter misery through the house +and through the courtyard and stables and the kitchen garden. He +looked for Jane in the hothouse and the cucumber frames, and under +the rhubarb, and on the scullery roof, and in the water butt. It +was just possible that on a day of complete calamity Jane should +have slithered off the scullery roof into the water-butt. The least +he could do was to find Jane, since Nicky wanted her.</p> +<p>And in the end it turned out that Jane had been captured in her +sleep, treacherously, by Auntie Emmy. And she had escaped, maddened +with terror of the large, nervous, incessantly caressing hands. She +had climbed into the highest branch of the tree of Heaven, and +crouched there, glaring, unhappy.</p> +<p>"Damn the cat!" said Anthony to himself. (It was not Jane he +meant.)</p> +<p>He was distressed, irritated, absurdly upset, because he would +have to go back to Nicky without Jane, because he couldn't get +Nicky what he wanted.</p> +<p>In that moment Anthony loved Nicky more than any of them. He +loved him almost more than Frances. Nicky's earache ruined the fine +day.</p> +<p>He confided in young Vereker. "I wouldn't bother," he said, "if +the little chap wasn't so plucky about it."</p> +<p>"Quite so, sir," said young Vereker.</p> +<p>It was young Mr. Vereker who found Jane, who eventually +recaptured her. Young Mr. Vereker made himself glorious by climbing +up, at the risk of his neck and in his new white flannels, into the +high branches of the tree of Heaven, to bring Jane down.</p> +<p>And when Anthony thanked him he said, "Don't mention it, sir. +It's only a trifle," though it was, as Mr. Norris said, palpable +that the flannels were ruined. Still, if he hadn't found that +confounded cat, they would never, humanly speaking, have had their +tennis.</p> +<p>The Aunties did not see Mr. Vereker climbing into the tree of +Heaven. They did not see him playing with Mr. Parsons and Anthony +and Mr. Norris. For as soon as the three young men appeared, and +Emmeline and Edith began to be interested and emphatic, Grannie +said that as they wouldn't see anything more of Frances and the +children, it was no good staying any longer, and they'd better be +getting back. It was as if she knew that they were going to enjoy +themselves and was determined to prevent it.</p> +<p>Frances went with them to the bottom of the lane. She stood +there till the black figures had passed, one by one, through the +white posts on to the Heath, till, in the distance, they became +small again and harmless and pathetic.</p> +<p>Then she went back to her room where Nicky lay in the big +bed.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicky lay in the big bed with Jane on one side of him and his +steam-engine on the other, and a bag of hot salt against each ear. +Now and then a thin wall of sleep slid between him and his +earache.</p> +<p>Frances sat by the open window and looked out into the garden +where Anthony and Norris played, quietly yet fiercely, against +Vereker and Parsons. Frances loved the smell of fresh grass that +the balls and the men's feet struck from the lawn; she loved the +men's voices subdued to Nicky's sleep, and the sound of their +padding feet, the thud of the balls on the turf, the smacking and +thwacking of the rackets. She loved every movement of Anthony's +handsome, energetic body; she loved the quick, supple bodies of the +young men, the tense poise and earnest activity of their +adolescence. But it was not Vereker or Parsons or Norris that she +loved or that she saw. It was Michael, Nicholas and John whose +adolescence was foreshadowed in those athletic forms wearing white +flannels; Michael, Nicky and John, in white flannels, playing +fiercely. When young Vereker drew himself to his full height, when +his young body showed lean and slender as he raised his arms for +his smashing service, it was not young Vereker, but Michael, +serious and beautiful. When young Parsons leaped high into the air +and thus returned Anthony's facetious sky-scraper on the volley, +that was Nicky. When young Norris turned and ran at the top of his +speed, and overtook the ball on its rebound from the base line +where young Vereker had planted it, when, as by a miracle, he sent +it backwards over his own head, paralysing Vereker and Parsons with +sheer astonishment, that was John.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Her vision passed. She was leaning over Nicky now, Nicky so +small in the big bed. Nicky had moaned.</p> +<p>"Does it count if I make that little noise, Mummy? It sort of +lets the pain out."</p> +<p>"No, my lamb, it doesn't count. Is the pain very bad?"</p> +<p>"Yes, Mummy, awful. It's going faster and faster. And it bizzes. +And when it doesn't bizz, it thumps." He paused--"I +think--p'raps--I could bear it better if I sat on your knee."</p> +<p>Frances thought she could bear it better too. It would be good +for Nicky that he should grow into beautiful adolescence and a +perfect manhood; but it was better for her that he should be a baby +still, that she should have him on her knee and hold him close to +her; that she should feel his adorable body press quivering against +her body, and the heat of his earache penetrating her cool flesh. +For now she was lost to herself and utterly absorbed in Nicky. And +her agony became a sort of ecstasy, as if, actually, she bore his +pain.</p> +<p>It was Anthony who could not stand it. Anthony had come in on +his way to his dressing-room. As he looked at Nicky his handsome, +hawk-like face was drawn with a dreadful, yearning, ineffectual +pity. Frances had discovered that her husband could both be and +look pathetic. He had wanted her to be sorry for him and she was +sorry for him, because his male pity was all agony; there was no +ecstasy in it of any sort at all. Nicky was far more her flesh and +blood than he was Anthony's.</p> +<p>Nicky stirred in his mother's lap. He raised his head. And when +he saw that queer look on his father's face he smiled at it. He had +to make the smile himself, for it refused to come of its own +accord. He made it carefully, so that it shouldn't hurt him. But he +made it so well that it hurt Frances and Anthony.</p> +<p>"I never saw a child bear pain as Nicky does," Frances said in +her pride.</p> +<p>"If he can bear it, <i>I</i> can't," said Anthony. And he +stalked into his dressing-room and shut the door on himself.</p> +<p>"Daddy minds more than you do," said Frances.</p> +<p>At that Nicky sat up. His eyes glittered and his cheeks burned +with the fever of his earache.</p> +<p>"I don't mind," he said. "Really and truly I don't mind. I don't +care if my ear <i>does</i> ache.</p> +<p>"It's my eyes is crying, not me."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>At nine o'clock, when they were all sitting down to dinner, +Nicky sent for his father and mother. Something had happened.</p> +<p>Crackers, he said, had been going off in his ears, and they hurt +most awfully. And when it had done cracking his earache had gone +away. And Dorothy had brought him a trumpet from Rosalind's party +and Michael a tin train. And Michael had given him the train and he +wouldn't take the trumpet instead. Oughtn't Michael to have had the +trumpet?</p> +<p>And when they left him, tucked up in his cot in the night +nursery, he called them back again.</p> +<p>"It was a jolly sell for me, wasn't it?" said Nicky. And he +laughed.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="IV"></a>IV</h2> +<br> +<p>It seemed that Nicky would always be like that. Whatever +happened, and something was generally happening to him, he didn't +care. When he scaled the plaster flower-pot on the terrace, and it +gave way under his assault and threw him down the steps on to the +gravel walk, he picked himself up, displaying a forehead that was a +red abrasion filled in with yellow gravel and the grey dust of the +smashed flower-pot, and said "I don't care. I liked it," before +anybody had time to pity him. When Mary-Nanna stepped on his train +and broke the tender, he said "It's all right. I don't care. I +shall make another." It was no use Grannie saying, "Don't care came +to a bad end"; Nicky made it evident that a bad end would be life's +last challenge not to care. No accident, however unforeseen, would +ever take him at a disadvantage.</p> +<p>Two years passed and he was just the same.</p> +<p>Frances and Anthony agreed behind his back that Nicky was +adorable.</p> +<p>But his peculiar attitude to misfortune became embarrassing when +you had to punish him. Nicky could break the back of any punishment +by first admitting that it was a good idea and then thinking of a +better one when it was too late. It was a good idea not letting him +have any cake for tea after he had tested the resilience of the new +tyres on his father's bicycle with a penknife; but, Nicky said, it +would have been more to the purpose if they had taken his +steam-engine from him for a week.</p> +<p>"You didn't think of that, did you, Mummy? I thought of it," +said Nicky.</p> +<p>Once he ran away over the West Heath, and got into the Leg of +Mutton Pond, and would have been drowned if a total stranger hadn't +gone in after him and pulled him out. That time Nicky was sent to +bed at four o'clock in the afternoon. At seven, when his mother +came to tuck him up and say Good-night, she found him sitting up, +smiling and ready.</p> +<p>"Mummy," he said, "I think I ought to tell you. It isn't a bit +of good sending me to bed."</p> +<p>"I should have thought it was, myself," said Frances. She almost +suspected Nicky of insincerity.</p> +<p>"So it would have been," he assented, "if I didn't 'vent things. +You see, I just lie still 'venting things all the time. I've +'vented three things since tea: a thing to make Daddy's bikesickle +stand still with Daddy on it; a thing to squeeze corks out of +bottles; and a thing to make my steam-engine go faster. That isn't +a punishment, is it, Mummy?"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>They said that Nicky would grow out of it. But two more years +passed and Nicky was still the same.</p> +<p>And yet he was not the same. And Dorothy, and Michael and John +were not the same.</p> +<p>For the awful thing about your children was that they were +always dying. Yes, dying. The baby Nicky was dead. The child +Dorothy was dead and in her place was a strange big girl. The child +Michael was dead and in his place was a strange big boy. And +Frances mourned over the passing of each age. You could no more +bring back that unique loveliness of two years old, of five years +old, of seven, than you could bring back the dead. Even John-John +was not a baby any more; he spoke another language and had other +feelings; he had no particular affection for his mother's knee. +Frances knew that all this dying was to give place to a more +wonderful and a stronger life. But it was not the same life; and +she wanted to have all their lives about her, enduring, going on, +at the same time. She did not yet know that the mother of babies +and the mother of boys and girls must die if the mother of men and +women is to be born.</p> +<p>Thoughts came to Frances now that troubled her tranquillity.</p> +<p>Supposing, after all, the children shouldn't grow up as she +wanted them to?</p> +<p>There was Nicky. She could do nothing with him; she could make +no impression on him.</p> +<p>There was Michael. She couldn't make him out. He loved them, and +showed that he loved them; but it was by caresses, by beautiful +words, by rare, extravagant acts of renunciation, inconsistent with +his self-will; not by anything solid and continuous. There was a +softness in Michael that distressed and a hardness that perplexed +her. You could make an impression on Michael--far too easily--and +the impression stayed. You couldn't obliterate it. Michael's memory +was terrible. And he had secret ways. He was growing more and more +sensitive, more and more wrapped up in Himself. Supposing Michael +became a morbid egoist, like Anthony's brother, Bartholomew?</p> +<p>And there was Dorothy. She went her own way more than ever, with +the absolute conviction that it was the right way. Nothing could +turn her. At thirteen her body was no longer obedient. Dorothy was +not going to be her mother's companion, or her father's, either; +she was Rosalind Jervis's companion. She seemed to care more about +little fat, fluffy Rosalind than about any of them except Nicky. +Dorothy was interested in Michael; she respected his queer +thoughts. It was as if she recognized some power in him that could +beat her somewhere some day, and was humble before a thing her +cleverness had failed to understand. But it was Nicky that she +adored, not Michael; and she was bad for Nicky. She encouraged his +naughtiness because it amused her.</p> +<p>Frances foresaw that a time would come, a little later, when +Nicky and Dorothy would be companions, not Nicky and his +mother.</p> +<p>In the evenings, coming home from the golf-links, Frances and +Anthony discussed their children.</p> +<p>Frances said, "You can't make any impression on Nicky. There +seems to be no way that you can get at him."</p> +<p>Anthony thought there was a way. It was a way he had not tried +yet, that he did not want to try. But, if he could only bring +himself to it, he judged that he could make a distinct +impression.</p> +<p>"What the young rascal wants is a thorough good spanking," said +Anthony.</p> +<p>Nicky said so too.</p> +<p>The first time he got it Nicky's criticism was that it wasn't a +bad idea if his father could have pulled it off all right. But he +said, "It's no good if you do it through the cloth. And it's no +good unless you <i>want</i> to hurt me, Daddy. And you don't want. +And even if you did want, badly enough to try and hurt, supposing +you spanked ever so hard, you couldn't hurt as much as my earache. +And I can bear that."</p> +<p>"He's top dog again, you see," said Frances, not without a +secret satisfaction.</p> +<p>"Oh, is he?" said Anthony. "I don't propose to be downed by +Nicky."</p> +<p>Every instinct in him revolted against spanking Nicky. But when +Williams, the groom, showed him a graze on each knee of the pony he +had bought for Frances and the children, Anthony determined that, +this time, Nicky should have a serious spanking.</p> +<p>"Which of them took Roger out?"</p> +<p>"I'm sure I don't know, sir," said Williams.</p> +<p>But Anthony knew. He lay in wait for Nicky by the door that led +from the stable yard into the kitchen garden.</p> +<p>Nicky was in the strawberry bed.</p> +<p>"Was it you who took Roger out this afternoon?"</p> +<p>Nicky did not answer promptly. His mouth was still full of +strawberries.</p> +<p>"What if I did?" he said at last, after manifest reflection.</p> +<p>"If you did? Why, you let him down on Golders Hill and cut his +knees."</p> +<p>"Holly Mount," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"Holly Mount or Golders Hill, it's all the same to you, you +young monkey."</p> +<p>"It isn't, Daddy. Holly Mount's much the worst. It's an awful +hill."</p> +<p>"That," said Anthony, "is why you're forbidden to ride down it. +You've <i>got</i> to be spanked for this, Nicky."</p> +<p>"Have I? All right. Don't look so unhappy, Daddy."</p> +<p>Anthony did much better this time. Nicky (though he shook with +laughter) owned it very handsomely. And Anthony had handicapped +himself again by doing it through the cloth. He drew the line at +shaming Nicky. (Yet--<i>could</i> you have shamed his indomitable +impudence?)</p> +<p>But he had done it. He had done it ruthlessly, while the +strawberries were still wet on Nicky's mouth.</p> +<p>And when it was all over Michael, looking for his father, came +into the school-room where these things happened. He said he was +awfully sorry, but he'd taken Roger out, and Roger had gone down on +his knees and cut himself.</p> +<p>No, it wasn't on Holly Mount, it was at the turn of the road on +the hill past the "Spaniards."</p> +<p>Anthony paid no attention to Michael. He turned on Michael's +brother.</p> +<p>"Nicky, what did you do it for?"</p> +<p>"For a rag, of course. I knew you'd feel such a jolly fool when +you found it wasn't me."</p> +<p>"You see, Daddy," he explained later, "you might have known I +wouldn't have let Roger down. But wasn't it a ripping sell?"</p> +<p>"What are you to do," said Anthony, "with a boy like that?"</p> +<p>Frances had an inspiration. "Do nothing," she said. Her +tranquillity refused to be troubled for long together.</p> +<p>"Nicky's right. It's no good trying to punish him. After all, +<i>why</i> punish Nicky? It isn't as if he was really naughty. He +never does unkind things, or mean things. And he's truthful."</p> +<p>"Horribly truthful. They all are," said Anthony.</p> +<p>"Well, then, what does Nicky do?"</p> +<p>"He does dangerous things."</p> +<p>"He forgets."</p> +<p>"Nothing more dangerous than forgetting. We must punish him to +make him remember."</p> +<p>"But it doesn't make him remember. It only makes him think us +fools."</p> +<p>"You know what it means?" said Anthony. "We shall have to send +him to school."</p> +<p>"Not yet," said Frances.</p> +<p>School was the thing in the future that she dreaded. Nicky was +only nine, and they were all getting on well with Mt. Parsons. +Anthony knew that to send Nicky to school now would be punishing +Frances, not Nicky. The little fiend would only grin in their faces +if they told him he was going to school.</p> +<p>It was no use trying to make impressions on Nicky. He was as +hard as nails. He would never feel things.</p> +<p>Perhaps, Frances thought, it was just as well.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="V"></a>V</h2> +<br> +<p>"I do think it was nice of Jane," said Nicky, "to have +Jerry."</p> +<p>"And I do think it was nice of me," said Dorothy, "to give him +to you."</p> +<p>Jane was Dorothy's cat; therefore her kittens were +Dorothy's.</p> +<p>"I wouldn't have given him to just anybody."</p> +<p>"I know," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"I might have kept him. He's the nicest kitten Jane ever +had."</p> +<p>"I know," said Nicky. "It <i>was</i> nice of you."</p> +<p>"I might want him back again."</p> +<p>"I--know."</p> +<p>Nicky was quiet and serious, almost humble, as if he went in the +fear of losing Jerry. Nobody but Jerry and Dorothy saw Nicky in +that mood.</p> +<p>Not that he was really afraid. Nothing could take Jerry from +him. If Dorothy could have taken him back again she wouldn't have, +not even if she had really wanted him. Dorothy wasn't cruel, and +she was only ragging.</p> +<p>But certainly he was Jane's nicest kitten. Jane was +half-Persian, white with untidy tabby patterns on her. Jerry was +black all over. Whatever attitude he took, his tight, short fur +kept the outlines of his figure firm and clear, whether he arched +his back and jumped sideways, or rolled himself into a cushion, or +squatted with haunches spread and paws doubled in under his breast, +or sat bolt upright with his four legs straight like pillars, and +his tail curled about his feet. Jerry's coat shone like black +looking-glass, and the top of his head smelt sweet, like a dove's +breast.</p> +<p>And he had yellow eyes. Mary-Nanna said they would turn green +some day. But Nicky didn't believe it. Mary-Nanna was only ragging. +Jerry's eyes would always be yellow.</p> +<p>Mr. Parsons declared that Nicky sat for whole hours meditating +on Jerry, as if in this way he could make him last longer.</p> +<p>Jerry's life was wonderful to Nicky. Once he was so small that +his body covered hardly the palm of your hand; you could see his +skin; it felt soft and weak through the thin fur, sleeked flat and +wet where Jane had licked it. His eyes were buttoned up tight. Then +they opened. He crawled feebly on the floor after Jane, or hung on +to her little breasts, pressing out the milk with his clever paws. +Then Jerry got older. Sometimes he went mad and became a bat or a +bird, and flew up the drawing-room curtains as if his legs were +wings.</p> +<p>Nicky said that Jerry could turn himself into anything he +pleased; a hawk, an owl, a dove, a Himalayan bear, a snake, a +flying squirrel, a monkey, a rabbit, a panther, and a little black +lamb of God.</p> +<p>Jerry was a cat now; he was two years old.</p> +<p>Jerry's fixed idea seemed to be that he was a very young cat, +and that he must be nursed continually, and that nobody but Nicky +must nurse him. Mr. Parsons found that Nicky made surprising +progress in his Latin and Greek that year. What had baffled Mr. +Parsons up till now had been Nicky's incapacity for sitting still. +But he would sit still enough when Jerry was on his knee, pressed +tight between the edge of the desk and Nicky's stomach, so that +knowledge entered into Nicky through Jerry when there was no other +way.</p> +<p>Nicky would even sit still in the open air to watch Jerry as he +stalked bees in the grass, or played by himself, over and over +again, his own enchanted game. He always played it in the same way. +He started from the same clump in the border, to run in one long +careening curve across the grass; at the same spot in the lawn he +bounded sideways and gave the same little barking grunt and dashed +off into the bushes. When you tried to catch him midway he stood on +his hind legs and bowed to you slantwise, waving his forepaws, or +rushed like lightning up the tree of Heaven, and climbed into the +highest branches and clung there, looking down at you. His yellow +eyes shone through the green leaves; they quivered; they played; +they mocked you with some challenge, some charm, secret and divine +and savage.</p> +<p>"The soul of Nicky is in that cat," Frances said.</p> +<p>Jerry knew that he was Nicky's cat. When other people caught him +he scrabbled over their shoulders with his claws and got away from +them. When Nicky caught him he lay quiet and heavy in his arms, +pressing down and spreading his soft body. Nicky's sense of touch +had been hardened by violent impacts and collisions, by experiments +with jack-knives and saws and chisels and gouges, and by struggling +with the material of his everlasting inventions. Through communion +with Jerry it became tender and sensitive again. It delighted in +the cat's throbbing purr and the thrill of his feet, as Jerry, +serious and earnest, padded down his bed on Nicky's knee.</p> +<p>"I like him best, though," said Nicky, "when he's sleepy and at +the same time bitesome."</p> +<p>"You mustn't let him bite you," Frances said.</p> +<p>"I don't mind," said Nicky. "He wouldn't do it if he didn't like +me."</p> +<p>Jerry had dropped off to sleep with his jaws closing drowsily on +Nicky's arm. When it moved his hind legs kicked at it and tore.</p> +<p>"He's dreaming when he does that," said Nicky. "He thinks he's a +panther and I'm buffaloes."</p> +<p>Mr. Parsons laughed at him. "Nicky and his cat!" he said. Nicky +didn't care. Mr. Parsons was always ragging him.</p> +<p>The tutor preferred dogs himself. He couldn't afford any of the +expensive breeds; but that summer he was taking care of a Russian +wolfhound for a friend of his. When Mr. Parsons ran with Michael +and Nicky round the Heath, the great borzoi ran before them with +long leaps, head downwards, setting an impossible pace. Michael and +Dorothy adored Boris openly. Nicky, out of loyalty to Jerry, +stifled a secret admiration. For Mr. Parsons held that a devotion +to a cat was incompatible with a proper feeling for a dog, whence +Nicky had inferred that any feeling for a dog must do violence to +the nobler passion.</p> +<p>Mr. Parsons tried to wean Nicky from what he pretended to regard +as his unmanly weakness. "Wait, Nicky," he said, "till you've got a +dog of your own."</p> +<p>"I don't want a dog of my own," said Nicky. "I don't want +anything but Jerry." Boris, he said, was not clever, like Jerry. He +had a silly face.</p> +<p>"Think so?" said Mr. Parsons. "Look at his jaws. They could +break Jerry's back with one snap."</p> +<p>"<i>Could</i> he, Daddy?"</p> +<p>They were at tea on the lawn, and Boris had gone to sleep under +Mr. Parsons' legs with his long muzzle on his forepaws.</p> +<p>"He could," said Anthony, "if he caught him."</p> +<p>"But he couldn't catch him. Jerry'd be up a tree before Boris +could look at him."</p> +<p>"If you want Jerry to shin up trees you must keep his weight +down."</p> +<p>Nicky laughed. He knew that Boris could never catch Jerry. His +father was only ragging him.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicky was in the schoolroom, bowed over his desk. He was doing +an imposition, the second aorist of the abominable verb [Greek: +erchomai], written out five and twenty times. (Luckily he could do +the last fifteen times from memory.)</p> +<p>Nicky had been arguing with Mr. Parsons. Mr. Parsons had said +that the second aorist of [Greek: erchomai] was not [Greek: +êrchon].</p> +<p>Nicky had said, "I can't help it. If it's not [Greek: +êrchon] it ought to be."</p> +<p>Mr. Parsons had replied: "The verb [Greek: erchomai] is +irregular." And Nicky had retorted, in effect, that no verb had any +business to be as irregular as all that. Mr. Parsons had then +suggested that Nicky might know more about the business of +irregular verbs if he wrote out the second aorist of [Greek: +erchomai] five and twenty times after tea. As it was a particularly +fine afternoon, an imposition was, Nicky admitted, a score for Mr. +Parsons and a jolly good sell for <i>him</i>.</p> +<p>Mr. Parsons had not allowed him to have Jerry on his knee, or +even in the room; and this, Nicky owned further, was but just. It +wouldn't have been nearly so good a punishment if he had had Jerry +with him.</p> +<p>Nicky, bowed over his desk, struggled for the perfect legibility +which Mr. Parsons had insisted on, as otherwise the imposition +would do him more harm than good. He was in for it, and the thing +must be done honourably if it was done at all. He had only looked +out of the windows twice to make sure that Boris was asleep under +Mr. Parsons' legs. And once he had left the room to see where Jerry +was. He had found him in the kitchen garden, sitting on a bed of +fresh-grown mustard and cress, ruining it. He sat like a lamb, his +forepaws crossed, his head tilted slightly backwards. His yellow +eyes gazed at Nicky with a sweet and mournful innocence.</p> +<p>Nicky did not hear the voices in the garden.</p> +<p>"I'm awfully sorry, sir," Mr. Parsons was saying. "I can't think +how it could have happened." Mr. Parsons' voice was thick and his +face was very red. "I could have sworn the door was shut."</p> +<p>"Johnnie opened it," said Anthony. He seemed to have caught, +suddenly, one of his bad colds and to be giving it to Mr. Parsons. +They were both in their shirtsleeves, and Anthony carried something +in his arms which he had covered with his coat.</p> +<p>The borzoi stood in front of them. His face had a look of +foolish ecstasy. He stared at Mr. Parsons, and as he stared he +panted. There was a red smear on his white breast; his open jaws +still dripped a pink slaver. It sprayed the ground in front of +them, jerked out with his panting.</p> +<p>"Get away, you damned brute," said Mr. Parsons.</p> +<p>Boris abashed himself; he stretched out his fore legs towards +Mr. Parsons, shook his raised haunches, lifted up his great +saw-like muzzle, and rolled into one monstrous cry a bark, a howl, +a yawn.</p> +<p>Nicky heard it, and he looked out of the schoolroom window. He +saw the red smear on the white curly breast. He saw his father in +his shirt sleeves, carrying something in his arms that he had +covered with his coat.</p> +<p>Under the tree of Heaven Dorothy and Michael, crouching close +against their mother, cried quietly. Frances was crying, too; for +it was she who would have to tell Nicky.</p> +<p>Dorothy tried to console him.</p> +<p>"Jerry's eyes would have turned green, if he had lived, Nicky. +They would, really."</p> +<p>"I wouldn't have minded. They'd have been Jerry's eyes."</p> +<p>"But he wouldn't have looked like Jerry."</p> +<p>"I wouldn't have cared what he looked like. He'd have +<i>been</i> Jerry."</p> +<p>"I'll give you Jane, Nicky, and all the kittens she ever has, if +that would make up."</p> +<p>"It wouldn't. You don't seem to understand that it's Jerry I +want. I wish you wouldn't talk about him."</p> +<p>"Very well," said Dorothy, "I won't."</p> +<p>Then Grannie tried. She recommended a holy resignation. God, she +said, had given Jerry to Nicky, and God had taken him away.</p> +<p>"He didn't give him me, and he'd no right to take him. Dorothy +wouldn't have done it. She was only ragging. But when God does +things," said Nicky savagely, "it isn't a rag."</p> +<p>He hated Grannie, and he hated Mr. Parsons, and he hated God. +But he loved Dorothy who had given him Jerry.</p> +<p>Night after night Frances held him in her arms at bed-time while +Nicky said the same thing. "If--if I could stop seeing him. But I +keep on seeing him. When he sat on the mustard and cress. And when +he bit me with his sleep-bites. And when he looked at me out of the +tree of Heaven. Then I hear that little barking grunt he used to +make when he was playing with himself--when he dashed off into the +bushes.</p> +<p>"And I can't <i>bear</i> it."</p> +<p>Night after night Nicky cried himself to sleep.</p> +<p>For the awful thing was that it had been all his fault. If he +had kept Jerry's weight down Boris couldn't have caught him.</p> +<p>"Daddy said so, Mummy."</p> +<p>Over and over again Frances said, "It wasn't your fault. It was +Don-Don's. He left the door open. Surely you can forgive Don-Don?" +Over and over again Nicky said, "I do forgive him."</p> +<p>But it was no good. Nicky became first supernaturally subdued +and gentle, then ill. They had to take him away from home, away +from the sight of the garden, and away from Mr. Parsons, +forestalling the midsummer holidays by two months.</p> +<p>Nicky at the seaside was troublesome and happy, and they thought +he had forgotten. But on the first evening at Hampstead, as Frances +kissed him Good-night, he said: "Shall I have to see Mr. Parsons +to-morrow?"</p> +<p>Frances said: "Yes. Of course."</p> +<p>"I'd rather not."</p> +<p>"Nonsense, you must get over that."</p> +<p>"I--can't, Mummy."</p> +<p>"Oh, Nicky, can't you forgive poor Mr. Parsons? When he was so +unhappy?"</p> +<p>Nicky meditated.</p> +<p>"Do you think," he said at last, "he really minded?"</p> +<p>"I'm sure he did."</p> +<p>"As much as you and Daddy?"</p> +<p>"Quite as much."</p> +<p>"Then," said Nicky, "I'll forgive him."</p> +<p>But, though he forgave John and Mr. Parsons and even God, who, +to do him justice, did not seem to have been able to help it, Nicky +did not forgive himself.</p> +<p>Yet Frances never could think why the sight of mustard and cress +made Nicky sick. Neither did Mr. Parsons, nor any schoolmaster who +came after him understand why, when Nicky knew all the rest of the +verb [Greek: erchomai] by heart he was unable to remember the +second aorist.</p> +<p>He excellent memory, but there was always a gap in it just +there.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="VI"></a>VI</h2> +<br> +<p>In that peace and tranquillity where nothing ever happened, +Jerry's violent death would have counted as an event, a date to +reckon by; but for three memorable things that happened, one after +another, in the summer and autumn of 'ninety-nine: the return of +Frances's brother, Maurice Fleming, from Australia where Anthony +had sent him two years ago, on the express understanding that he +was to stay there; the simultaneous arrival of Anthony's brother, +Bartholomew, and his family; and the outbreak of the Boer War.</p> +<p>The return of Morrie was not altogether unforeseen, and +Bartholomew had announced his coming well beforehand, but who could +have dreamed that at the end of the nineteenth century England +would be engaged in a War that really <i>was</i> a War? Frances, +with the <i>Times</i> in her hands, supposed that that meant more +meddling and muddling of stupid politicians, and that it would mean +more silly speeches in Parliament, and copy, at last, for foolish +violent, pathetic and desperate editors, and breach of promise +cases, divorces and fires in paraffin shops reduced to momentary +insignificance.</p> +<p>But as yet there was no war, nor any appearance that sensible +people interpreted as a sign of war at the time of Morrie's return. +It stood alone, as other past returns, the return from Bombay, the +return from Canada, the return from Cape Colony, had stood, in its +sheer awfulness. To Frances it represented the extremity of +disaster.</p> +<p>They might have known what was coming by Grannie's behaviour. +One day, the day when the Australian mail arrived, she had subsided +suddenly into a state of softness and gentleness. She approached +her son-in-law with an air of sorrowful deprecation; she showed a +certain deference to her daughter Louie; she was soft and gentle +even with Emmeline and Edith.</p> +<p>Mrs. Fleming broke the news to Louie who broke it to Frances who +in her turn broke it to Anthony. That was the procedure they +invariably adopted.</p> +<p>"I wonder," Grannie said, "what he can be coming back for!" Each +time she affected astonishment and incredulity, as if Morrie's +coming back were, not a recurrence that crushed you with its +flatness and staleness, but a thing that must interest Louie +because of its utter un-likeliness.</p> +<p>"I wonder," said Louie, "why he hasn't come before. What else +did you expect?"</p> +<p>"I'm sure I don't know," said Grannie helplessly. "Go and tell +Frances."</p> +<p>Louie went. And because she knew that the burden of Morrie would +fall again on Frances's husband she was disagreeable with +Frances.</p> +<p>"It's all very well for you," she said. "You haven't got to live +with him. You haven't got to sleep in the room next him. You don't +know what it's like."</p> +<p>"I do know," said Frances. "I remember. You'll have to bear +it."</p> +<p>"You haven't had to bear it for fourteen years."</p> +<p>"You'll have to bear it," Frances repeated, "till Anthony sends +him out again. That's all it amounts to."</p> +<p>She waited till the children were in bed and she was alone with +Anthony.</p> +<p>"Something awful's happened," she said, and paused hoping he +would guess.</p> +<p>"I don't know how to tell you."</p> +<p>"Don't tell me if it's that Nicky's been taking my new bike to +pieces."</p> +<p>"It isn't Nicky--It's Maurice."</p> +<p>Anthony got up and cleared his pipe, thoroughly and +deliberately. She wondered whether he had heard.</p> +<p>"I'd no business to have married you--to have let you in for +him."</p> +<p>"Why? What's he been up to now?"</p> +<p>"He's coming home."</p> +<p>"So," said Anthony, "is Bartholomew. I'd no business to have let +you in for <i>him</i>."</p> +<p>"Don't worry, Frances. If Morrie comes home he'll be sent out +again, that's all."</p> +<p>"At your expense."</p> +<p>"I don't grudge any expense in sending Morrie out. Nor in +keeping him out."</p> +<p>"Yes. But this time it's different. It's worse."</p> +<p>"Why worse?"</p> +<p>"Because of the children. They're older now than they were last +time. They'll understand."</p> +<p>"What if they do? They must learn," Anthony said, "to realize +facts."</p> +<p>They realized them rather sooner than he had expected. Nobody +but Louie had allowed for the possibility of Morrie's sailing by +the same steamer as his letter; and Louie had argued that, if he +had done so, he was bound either to have arrived before the letter +or to have sent a wire. Therefore they had at least a clear five +days of peace before them. Anthony thought he had shown wisdom +when, the next morning which was a Wednesday, he sent Grannie and +the Aunties to Eastbourne for a week, so that they shouldn't worry +Frances, and when on Thursday he made her go with him for a long +day in the country, to take her mind off Morrie.</p> +<p>They came back at nine in the evening and found Dorothy, Michael +and Nicholas sitting up for them. Michael and Nicky were excited, +but Dorothy looked grown-up and important.</p> +<p>"Uncle Morrie's come," they said.</p> +<p>"Dorothy saw him first--"</p> +<p>"Nicky let him in--"</p> +<p>"He hadn't got a hat on."</p> +<p>"We kept him in the schoolroom till Nanna could come and put him +to bed."</p> +<p>"He was crying because he'd been to Grannie's house and there +wasn't anybody there--"</p> +<p>"And because he'd lost the love-birds he'd brought for Auntie +Emmy--"</p> +<p>"And because he couldn't remember which of us was dead."</p> +<p>"No, Mummy, nobody's seen him but us and Nanna."</p> +<p>"Nanna's with him now."</p> +<p>Uncle Morrie never accounted, even to himself, for the time he +had spent between the arrival of his ship at Tilbury on Sunday +morning and that Saturday afternoon. Neither could he remember what +had become of his luggage or whether he had ever had any. Only the +County Council man, going his last rounds in the farthest places of +the Heath, came upon a small bundle tied in a blue handkerchief, a +cap belonging to E.D. Boulger, of the S.S. <i>Arizona</i>, a cage +of love-birds, and a distinct impression of a recumbent human form, +on the grass together, under a young birch tree.</p> +<p>In the stuffy little house behind the Judge's Walk the four +women lived now under male protection. When they crossed the Heath +they had no longer any need to borrow Anthony from Frances; they +had a man of their own. To make room for him Auntie Louie and her +type-writer were turned out of their own place, and Auntie Louie +had to sleep in Grannie's bed, a thing she hated. To make room for +the type-writer the grey parrot was turned out of the dining-room +into the drawing-room. And as Maurice couldn't stand either the +noise of the type-writer or the noises of the parrot he found both +the dining-room and the drawing-room uninhabitable.</p> +<p>Day after day Dorothy and Michael and Nicky, on the terrace, +looked out for his coming. (Only extreme distance made Uncle +Morrie's figure small and harmless and pathetic.) Day after day he +presented himself with an air of distinction and assurance, +flushed, and a little battered, but still handsome, wearing a +spruce grey suit and a panama hat bought with Anthony's money. +Sheep-farming in Australia--he had infinitely preferred the Cape +Mounted Police--had ruined Maurice's nerves. He was good for +nothing but to lounge in Anthony's garden, to ride his horses--it +was his riding that had got him into the Cape Mounted Police--to +sit at his table and drink his wines, and, when there was no more +wine for him, to turn into Jack Straw's Castle for a pick-me-up on +his way home.</p> +<p>And before July was out three others were added to the garden +group: Bartholomew and Vera and Veronica. And after them a fourth, +Vera's friend, Captain Ferdinand Cameron, home on sick leave before +anybody expected him.</p> +<p>Frances's tree of Heaven sheltered them all.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="VII"></a>VII</h2> +<br> +<p>Bartholomew, Anthony's brother, lived in Bombay and looked after +his business for him in the East. He had something the matter with +him, and he had come home to look after his own health. At least, +Bartholomew's health was what he was supposed to be looking after; +but Dorothy had heard her father say that Bartie had come home to +look after Vera.</p> +<p>Vera was Bartie's wife and Veronica's mother. Before she became +Mrs. Bartholomew Harrison she had been Frances's schoolfellow and +her dearest friend. Frances Fleming had been her bridesmaid and had +met Anthony for the first time at Vera's wedding, when he had +fallen in love with her; and she had fallen in love with him when +they stayed together in Bartholomew's house, before Bartholomew +took Vera to Bombay.</p> +<p>Bartie had not been married ten months before he wanted to get +Vera out of England; and Vera had not been in India for ten weeks +before he wanted her to go back. They were always coming backwards +and forwards, but they never came together. Vera would be sent home +first, and then Bartie would come over in a great hurry and take +her out again.</p> +<p>Twelve years after their marriage Veronica was born at Simla, +and the coming and going ceased for three years. Then Bartie sent +them both home. That time Vera had refused to travel farther +westward than Marseilles. She was afraid of damp and cold, and she +had got the ship's doctor to order her to the Riviera. She and +Veronica had been living for two years in a small villa at +Agaye.</p> +<p>This summer she had come to England. She was no longer afraid of +damp and cold. And Bartie followed her.</p> +<p>Dorothy and Michael had no difficulty in remembering Vera, +though it was more than six years since they had seen her; for Vera +looked the same. Her hair still shone like copper-beech leaves; her +face had still the same colour and the same sweet, powdery smell. +And if these things had changed Frances would still have known her +by her forehead that looked so broad because her eyebrows and her +eyes were so long, and by her fine, unfinished, passionate mouth, +by her pointed chin and by her ways.</p> +<p>But though her brother-in-law's ways had always been more or +less disagreeable, Frances was not prepared for the shock of the +renewed encounter with Bartholomew. Bartie was long and grey, and +lean even when you allowed for the thickness of his cholera belt. +He wore a white scarf about his throat, for his idea was that he +had cancer in it. Cancer made you look grey. He, too, had the face +of a hawk, of a tired and irritable hawk. It drooped between his +hunched shoulders, his chin hanging above the scarf as if he were +too tired or too irritable to hold it up. He behaved to Vera and +Veronica as if it was they who had worried him into cancer of the +throat, they who tired and irritated him.</p> +<p>Vera talked to him as you might talk to a sick child whose +peevishness prolongs, unreasonably, its pain. Bartie's manner +almost amounted to a public repudiation of her. The whole house +vibrated to the shutting of his door at Good-night time. Yet when +Bartie came down in the morning, late, and more morose than ever, +Vera's mouth made as if it kissed some visionary image of the poor +thing's absurdity. She didn't believe for one minute in his cancer. +It was an excuse for the shutting of his door.</p> +<p>She kept out of his way as much as possible; yet, when they were +together they watched each other. They watched; Bartie openly with +sudden dartings and swoopings of his hawk's eyes; Vera furtively. +Her eyes were so large and long that, without turning her head, or +any visible movement, they could hold his image.</p> +<p>But for Captain Cameron Vera's eyes had a full, open gaze. +Spread wide apart under her wide forehead they were like dark +moth's wings; they hovered, rested, flickering, vibrating to the +fine tips of their corners.</p> +<p>Whatever had been the matter with him in India, Captain Cameron +had recovered. His keen, fair, Highland face made Bartie's face +look terrible. Ferdie was charming; not more charming to Bartie's +wife than he was to Frances; not more charming to Frances than to +her sisters; so that even Louie unbent, and Emmeline and Edith fell +in love with him. He flirted with Frances under Anthony's nose; and +with the Aunties under Grannie's nose. The corners of Vera's mouth +followed the tilt of her long eyes' corners as she saw him do +it.</p> +<p>You could not think of Vera as the children's Auntie, or as +Bartie's wife, or as Veronica's mother.</p> +<p>Veronica was a very little girl who sang songs and was afraid of +ghosts.</p> +<p>She slept in her mother's room, and so never could be put to bed +till half-past seven, or till her mother was dressed to the last +hook of her gown, the last hairpin, the last touch of powder +(adhesive without bismuth), and the last shadow drawn fine about +her eyelashes. When Vera beautiful in a beautiful gown, came +trailing into the room where everybody waited for her, Veronica hid +herself behind Uncle Anthony's big chair. When her father told her +to come out of that and say good-night and be quick about it, she +came slowly (she was not in the least afraid of Bartie), showing +herself bit by bit, honey-coloured hair, eyebrows dark under her +gold, very dark against her white; sorrowful, transparent, lucid +eyes. A little girl with a straight white face. A little, slender +girl in a straight white frock. She stood by Anthony's chair, +spinning out the time, smiling at him with her childish wavering +mouth, a smile that would not spread, that never went higher than +the tip of her white nose, that left her lucid, transparent eyes +still sorrowful.</p> +<p>She knew that Anthony would take her on his knee, and that she +could sit there with her head tucked under his chin, smiling at +him, prolonging her caresses, till Vera told him to put her down +and let her go.</p> +<p>Bartie growled: "Did you hear your mother telling you to say +Good-night?"</p> +<p>"Yes. But I must kiss Uncle Anthony first. Properly. Once on his +mouth. Once--on his nose. And once--on--his--eyes. +And--once--on--his dear little--ears."</p> +<p>After that, Veronica went slowly from chair to chair, lingering +at each, sitting first on Frances's lap, then on Vera's, spinning +out her caresses, that spun out the time and stretched it farther +and farther between her and the unearthly hour ahead of her.</p> +<p>But at her father's chair she did not linger for a single +instant. She slipped her hand into his hand that dropped it as if +it had hurt him; she touched his forehead with her small mouth, +pushed out, absurdly, to keep her face as far as possible from his. +For, though she was not afraid of Bartie, he was not nice either to +sit on or to kiss.</p> +<p>Half-way across the room she lingered.</p> +<p>"I haven't sung 'London Bridge is broken down.' Don't you want +me to sing it?"</p> +<p>"No, darling. We want you to go to bed."</p> +<p>"I'm going, Mummy."</p> +<p>And at the door she turned and looked at them with her +sorrowful, lucid, transparent eyes.</p> +<p>Then she went, leaving the door open behind her. She left it +open on purpose, so that she might hear their voices, and look down +into the room on her way upstairs. Besides, she always hoped that +somebody would call her back again.</p> +<p>She lingered at the foot of the stairs till Bartie got up and +shut the door on her. She lingered at the turn of the stairs and on +the landing. But nobody ever called her back again.</p> +<p>And nobody but Nicky knew what she was afraid of.</p> +<p>Veronica was sitting up in the cot that used to be Nicky's when +he was little. Nicky, rather cold in his pyjamas, sat on the edge +of it beside her. A big, yellow, tremendous moon hung in the sky +outside the window, behind a branch of the tree of Heaven, and +looked at them.</p> +<p>Veronica crouched sideways on her pillow in a corner of the cot, +her legs doubled up tight under her tiny body, her shoulders +hunched together, and her thin arms hanging before her straight to +her lap. Her honey coloured hair was parted and gathered into two +funny plaits, that stuck out behind her ear. Her head was tilted +slightly backwards to rest against the rail of the cot. She looked +at Nicky and her look reminded him of something, he couldn't +remember what.</p> +<p>"Were you ever afraid, Nicky?" she said.</p> +<p>Nicky searched his memory for some image encircled by an +atmosphere of terror, and found there a white hound with red smears +on his breast and a muzzle like two saws.</p> +<p>"Yes," he said, "I was once."</p> +<p>A lamb--a white lamb--was what Veronica looked like. And Jerry +bad looked at him like that when he found him sitting on the +mustard and cress the day Boris killed him.</p> +<p>"Afraid--what of?"</p> +<p>"I don't know that it was 'of' exactly."</p> +<p>"Would you be afraid of a ghost, now, if you saw one?"</p> +<p>"I expect I jolly well should, if I <i>really</i> saw one."</p> +<p>"Being afraid of ghosts doesn't count, does it?"</p> +<p>"No, of course it doesn't. You aren't afraid as long as I'm +here, are you?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"I shall stay, then, till you go to sleep."</p> +<p>Night after night he heard her calling to him, "Nicky, I'm +frightened." Nobody but Veronica and Nicky were ever in bed on that +floor before midnight. Night after night he got up and came to her +and stayed beside her till she went to sleep.</p> +<p>Once he said, "If it was Michael he could tell you stories."</p> +<p>"I don't <i>want</i> Michael. I want you."</p> +<p>In the day-time she went about looking for him. "Where's Nicky?" +she said. "I want him."</p> +<p>"Nicky's in the schoolroom. You can't have him."</p> +<p>"But--I <i>want</i> him."</p> +<p>"Can't be helped. You must do without him."</p> +<p>"Will he be very long?"</p> +<p>"Yes, ever so long. Run away like a good little girl and play +with Don-Don."</p> +<p>She knew that they told her to play with Don-Don, because she +was a little girl. If only she could grow big quick and be the same +age as Nicky.</p> +<p>Instead of running away and playing with Don-Don, Ronny went +away by herself into the apple-tree house, to wait for Nicky.</p> +<p>The apple-tree house stood on the grass-plot at the far end of +the kitchen garden. The apple-tree had had no apples on it for +years. It was so old that it leaned over at a slant; it stretched +out two great boughs like twisted arms, and was propped up by a +wooden post under each armpit. The breast of its trunk rested on a +cross-beam. The posts and the cross-beam were the doorway of the +house, and the branches were its roof and walls. Anthony had given +it to Veronica to live in, and Veronica had given it to Nicky. It +was Nicky's and Ronny's house. The others were only visitors who +were not expected to stay. There was room enough for them both to +stand up inside the doorway, to sit down in the middle, and to lie +flat at the far end.</p> +<p>"What more," said Nicky, "do you want?"</p> +<p>He thought that everybody would be sure to laugh at him when he +played with Bonny in the apple-tree house.</p> +<p>"I don't care a ram if they do," he said. But nobody ever did, +not even Mr. Parsons.</p> +<p>Only Frances, when she passed by that way and saw Nicky and +Bonny sitting cramped and close under their roof-tree, smiled +unwillingly. But her smile had in it no sort of mockery at all. +Nicky wondered why.</p> +<p>"Is it," said Dorothy one morning, "that Ronny doesn't look as +if she was Uncle Bartie's daughter, or that Uncle Bartie looks as +if he wasn't Ronny's father?"</p> +<p>However suddenly and wantonly an idea struck Dorothy, she +brought it out as if it had been the result of long and mature +consideration.</p> +<p>"Or is it," said Vera, "that I don't look as if I were Ronny's +mother?"</p> +<p>Her eyes had opened all their length to take in Dorothy.</p> +<p>"No. I think it is that Uncle Bartie looks--"</p> +<p>Frances rushed in. "It doesn't matter, my dear, what you +think."</p> +<p>"It will some day," said Dorothy.</p> +<p>It was perhaps the best thing she could have said, as showing +that she was more interested in the effect she would produce some +day than in the sensation she had created there and then.</p> +<p>"May I go round to Rosalind's after lessons?"</p> +<p>"You may."</p> +<p>"And may I stay to lunch if they ask me?"</p> +<p>"You may stay as long as they care to have you. Stay to tea, +stay to dinner, if you like."</p> +<p>Dorothy knew by the behaviour of her mother's face that she had +scored somewhere, somehow. She also knew that she was in disgrace +and yet not in disgrace; which, if you came to think of it, was a +funny thing.</p> +<p>About this time Frances began to notice a symptom in herself. +She was apt to resent it when Vera discussed her children with her. +One late afternoon she and Anthony were alone with Vera. Captain +Cameron had not come round that day, and Bartie had gone into town +to consult either his solicitor or a specialist. He was always +consulting one or the other.</p> +<p>"You're wrong, you two," said Vera. "You think Michael's tender +and Nicky's hard and unimpressionable. Michael's hard. You won't +have to bother about Michael's feelings."</p> +<p>"Michael's feelings," said Frances, "are probably what I shall +have to bother about more than anything."</p> +<p>"You needn't. For one thing, they'll be so unlike your feelings +that you won't know whether they're feelings at all. You won't even +know whether he's having them or not. Nicky's the one you'll have +to look out for. He'll go all the howlers."</p> +<p>"I don't think that Nicky'll be very susceptible. He hasn't +shown any great signs so far."</p> +<p>"Hasn't he! Nicky's susceptibility is something awful."</p> +<p>"My dear Vera, you say yourself you don't care about children +and that you don't understand them."</p> +<p>"No more I do," said Vera. "But I understand men."</p> +<p>"Do you understand Veronica?"</p> +<p>"Of course I don't. I said men. Veronica's a girl. Besides, I'm +Veronica's mother."</p> +<p>"Nicky," said Anthony, "is not much more than nine."</p> +<p>"You keep on thinking of him as a child--a child--nothing but a +child. Wait till Nicky has children of his own. Then you'll +know."</p> +<p>"They would be rather darlings, Nicky's children," Frances +said.</p> +<p>"So would Veronica's."</p> +<p>"Ver-onica?"</p> +<p>You needn't be frightened. Nicky's affection for Ronny is purely +paternal."</p> +<p>"I'm not frightened," said Frances. But she left the room. She +did not care for the turn the talk had taken. Besides, she wanted +Vera to see that she was not afraid to leave her alone with +Anthony.</p> +<p>"I'm glad Frances has gone," said Vera, "because I want to talk +to you. You'd never have known each other if it hadn't been for me. +She couldn't have married you. It was I who saw you both +through."</p> +<p>He assented.</p> +<p>"And you said if there was ever anything you could do for +me--You haven't by any chance forgotten?"</p> +<p>"I have not."</p> +<p>"Well, if anything should happen to me--"</p> +<p>"But, my dear girl, what <i>should</i> happen to you?"</p> +<p>"Things <i>do</i> happen, Anthony."</p> +<p>"Yes, but how about Bartie?"</p> +<p>"That's it. Supposing we separated."</p> +<p>"Good Heavens, you're not contemplating <i>that</i>, are +you?"</p> +<p>"I'm not contemplating anything. But Bartie isn't very easy to +live with, is he?"</p> +<p>"No, he's not. He never was. All the same--"</p> +<p>Bartie was impossible. Between the diseases he had and thought +he hadn't and the diseases he hadn't and thought he had, he made +life miserable for himself and other people. He was a jealous +egoist; he had the morbid coldness of the neurotic, and Vera was +passionate. She ought never to have married him. All the +same--"</p> +<p>"All the same I shall stick to Bartie as long as it's possible. +And as long as it's possible Bartie'll stick to me. But, if +anything happens I want you to promise that you'll take Ronny."</p> +<p>"You must get Frances to promise."</p> +<p>"She'll do anything you ask her to, Anthony."</p> +<p>When Frances came into the room again Vera was crying.</p> +<p>And so Frances promised.</p> +<blockquote>"'London Bridge is broken down<br> +(<i>Ride over My Lady Leigh</i>!)<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +"'Build it up with stones so strong--<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +"'Build it up with gold so fine'"--</blockquote> +<p>It was twenty to eight and Ronny had not so much as begun to say +Good night. She was singing her sons to spin out the time.</p> +<blockquote>"'London Bridge--'"</blockquote> +<p>"That'll do, Ronny, it's time you were in bed."</p> +<p>There was no need for her to linger and draw out her caresses, +no need to be afraid of going to bed alone. Frances, at Vera's +request, had had her cot moved up into the night nursery.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> +<br> +<p>Anthony had begun to wonder where on earth he should send Morrie +out to this time, when the Boer War came and solved his +problem.</p> +<p>Maurice, joyous and adventurous again, sent himself to South +Africa, to enlist in the Imperial Light Horse.</p> +<p>Ferdie Cameron went out also with the Second Gordon Highlanders, +solving, perhaps, another problem.</p> +<p>"It's no use trying to be sorry, Mummy," Dorothy said.</p> +<p>Frances knew what Anthony was thinking, and Anthony knew it was +what Frances thought herself: Supposing this time Morrie didn't +come back? Then that problem would be solved for ever. Frances +hated problems when they worried Anthony. Anthony detested problems +when they bothered Frances.</p> +<p>And the children knew what they were thinking. Dorothy went +on.</p> +<p>"It's all rot pretending that we want him to come back."</p> +<p>"It was jolly decent of him to enlist," said Nicky.</p> +<p>Dorothy admitted that it was jolly decent. "But," she said, +"what else could he do? His only chance was to go away and do +something so jolly plucky that <i>we</i>'re ashamed of ourselves, +and never to come back again to spoil it. You don't want him to +spoil it, Mummy ducky, do you?"</p> +<p>Anthony and Frances tried, conscientiously and patriotically, to +realize the Boer War. They said it was terrible to have it hanging +over them, morning, noon and night. But it didn't really hang over +them. It hung over a country that, except once when it had +conveniently swallowed up Morrie, they had never thought about and +could not care for, a landscape that they could not see. The war +was not even part of that landscape; it refused to move over it in +any traceable course. It simply hung, or lay as one photographic +film might lie upon another. It was not their fault. They tried to +see it. They bought the special editions of the evening papers; +they read the military dispatches and the stories of the war +correspondents from beginning to end; they stared blankly at the +printed columns that recorded the disasters of Nicholson's Nek, and +Colenso and Spion Kop. But the forms were grey and insubstantial; +it was all fiat and grey like the pictures in the illustrated +papers; the very blood of it ran grey.</p> +<p>It wasn't real. For Frances the brown walls of the house, the +open wings of its white shutters, the green garden and tree of +Heaven were real; so were Jack Straw's Castle and Harrow on the +Hill; morning and noon and night were real, and getting up and +dressing and going to bed; most real of all the sight and sound and +touch of her husband and her children.</p> +<p>Only now and then the vision grew solid and stood firm. Frances +carried about with her distinct images of Maurice, to which she +could attach the rest. Thus she had an image of Long Tom, an +immense slender muzzle, tilted up over a high ridge, nosing out +Maurice.</p> +<p>Maurice was shut up in Ladysmith.</p> +<p>"Don't worry, Mummy. That'll keep him out of mischief. Daddy +said he ought to be shut up somewhere."</p> +<p>"He's starving, Dorothy. He won't have anything to eat."</p> +<p>"Or drink, ducky."</p> +<p>"Oh, you're cruel! Don't be cruel!"</p> +<p>"I'm not cruel. If I didn't care so awfully for you, Mummy, I +shouldn't mind whether he came back or didn't. <i>You</i>'re cruel. +You ought to think of Grannie and Auntie Louie and Auntie Emmy and +Auntie Edie."</p> +<p>"At the moment," said Frances, "I am thinking of Uncle +Morrie."</p> +<p>She was thinking of him, not as he actually was, but as he had +been, as a big boy like Michael, as a little boy like John, two +years younger than she; a little boy by turns spoiled and thwarted, +who contrived, nevertheless, to get most things that he happened to +want by crying for them, though everybody else went without. And in +the grown-up Morrie's place, under the shells of Ladysmith, she saw +Nicky.</p> +<p>For Nicky had declared his intention of going into the Army.</p> +<p>"And I'm thinking of Morrie," Dorothy said. "I don't want him to +miss it."</p> +<p>Frances and Anthony had hung out flags for Mafeking; Dorothy and +Nicky, mounted on bicycles, had been careering through the High +Street with flags flying from their handlebars. Michael was a +Pro-Boer and flew no flags. All these things irritated Maurice.</p> +<p>He had come back again. He had missed it, as he had missed all +the chances that were ever given him. A slight wound kept him in +hospital throughout the greater part of the siege, and he had +missed the sortie of his squadron and the taking of the guns for +which Ferdie Cameron got his promotion and his D.S.O. He had come +back in the middle of the war with nothing but a bullet wound in +his left leg to prove that he had taken part in it.</p> +<p>The part he had taken had not sobered Maurice. It had only +depressed him. And depression after prolonged, brutal abstinence +broke down the sheer strength by which sometimes he stretched a +period of sobriety beyond its natural limits.</p> +<p>For there were two kinds of drinking: great drinking that came +seldom and was the only thing that counted, and ordinary drinking +that, though it went on most of the time, brought no satisfaction +and didn't count at all. And there were two states of drunkenness +to correspond: one intense and vivid, without memory, transcending +all other states; and one that was no more remarkable than any +other. Before the war Morrie's great drinking came seldom, by fits +and bursts and splendid unlasting uprushes; after the war the two +states tended to approach till they merged in one continual sickly +soaking. And while other important and outstanding things, and +things that he really wanted to remember, disappeared in the +poisonous flood let loose in Morrie's memory, he never for one +moment lost sight of the fact that it was he and not Anthony, his +brother-in-law, who had enlisted and was wounded.</p> +<p>He was furious with his mother and sisters for not realizing the +war. He was furious with Frances and Anthony. Not realizing the war +meant not realizing what he had been through. He swore by some +queer God of his that he would make them realize it. The least they +could do for him was to listen to what he had to say.</p> +<p>"You people here don't know what war is. You think it's all +glory and pluck, and dashing out and blowing up the enemy's guns, +and the British flag flying, and wounded pipers piping all the time +and not caring a damn. Nobody caring a damn.</p> +<p>"And it isn't. It's dirt and funk and stinks and more funk all +the time. It's lying out all night on the beastly veldt, and going +to sleep and getting frozen, and waking up and finding you've got +warm again because your neighbour's inside's been fired out on the +top of you. You get wounded when the stretcher-bearers aren't +anywhere about, and you crawl over to the next poor devil and lie +back to back with him to keep warm. And just when you've dropped +off to sleep you wake up shivering, because he's died of a wound he +didn't know he'd got.</p> +<p>"You'll find a chap lying on his back all nice and comfy, and +when you start to pick him up you can't lift him because his head's +glued to the ground. You try a bit, gently, and the flesh gives way +like rotten fruit, and the bone like a cup you've broken and stuck +together without any seccotine, and you heave up a body with half a +head on it. And all the brains are in the other half, the one +that's glued down. That's war.</p> +<p>"Huh!" He threw out his breath with a jerk of contempt. It +seemed to him that neither Frances nor Anthony was listening to +him. They were not looking at him. They didn't want to listen; they +didn't want to look at him. He couldn't touch them; he couldn't +evoke one single clear image in their minds; there was no horror he +could name that would sting them to vision, to realization. They +had not been there.</p> +<p>Dorothy and Michael and Nicky were listening. The three kids had +imagination; they could take it in. They stared as if he had +brought those horrors into the room. But even they missed the +reality of it. They saw everything he meant them to see, except +him. It was as if they were in the conspiracy to keep him out of +it.</p> +<p>He glared at Frances and Anthony. What was the good of telling +them, of trying to make them realize it? If they'd only given some +sign, made some noise or some gesture, or looked at him, he might +have spared them. But the stiff, averted faces of Frances and +Anthony annoyed him.</p> +<p>"And if you're a poor wretched Tommy like me, you'll have to +sweat in a brutal sun, hauling up cases of fizz from the railway up +country to Headquarters, with a thirst on you that frizzles your +throat. You see the stuff shining and spluttering, and you go mad. +You could kill the man if you were to see him drink it, when you +know there's nothing for <i>you</i> but a bucket of green water +with typhoid germs swimming about in it. That's war.</p> +<p>"You think you're lucky if you're wounded and get bumped down in +a bullock wagon thirty miles to the base hospital. But the best +thing you can do then is to pop off. For if you get better they +make you hospital orderly. And the hospital orderly has to clean up +all the muck of the butcher's shop from morning to night. When +you're so sick you can't stand you get your supper, dry bread and +bully beef. The bully beef reminds you of things, and the +bread--well, the bread's all nice and white on the top. But when +you turn it over on the other side--it's red. That's war."</p> +<p>Frances looked at him. He thought: "At last she's turned; at +last I've touched her; she can realize that."</p> +<p>"Morrie dear, it must have been awful," she said. "It's +<i>too</i> awful. I don't mind your telling me and Anthony about +it; but I'd rather you did it when the children aren't in the +room."</p> +<p>"Is that all you think about? The children? The children. You +don't care a tinker's cuss about the war. You don't care a damn +what happens to me or anybody else. What does it matter who's +wounded or who's killed, as long as it isn't one of your own +kids?</p> +<p>"I'm simply trying to tell you what war <i>is</i>. It's dirt and +stink and funk. That's all it is. And there's precious little glory +in it, Nicky."</p> +<p>"If the Boers won there would be glory," Michael said.</p> +<p>"Not even if the Boers won," said Maurice.</p> +<p>"Certainly not if the Boers won," said Anthony.</p> +<p>"You'll say next there'd be no glory if there was war between +England and Ireland and the Irish won. And yet there would be +glory."</p> +<p>"Would there? Go and read history and don't talk rot."</p> +<p>"I have read it," said Michael.</p> +<p>Frances thought: "He doesn't know what he's talking about. Why +should he? He's barely thirteen. I can't think where he gets these +ideas from. But he'll grow out of them."</p> +<p>It was not Maurice that she saw in Maurice's war-pictures. But +he had made them realize what war was; and they vowed that as long +as they lived not one of their sons should have anything to do with +it.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>In the spring of nineteen-one Anthony sent Maurice out to +California. The Boer War was ended.</p> +<p>Another year, and the vision of war passed from Frances as if it +had never been.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="IX"></a>IX</h2> +<p>Michael was unhappy.</p> +<p>The almond trees flowered in front of the white houses in the +strange white streets.</p> +<p>White squares, white terraces, white crescents; at the turn of +the roads the startling beauty of the trees covered with pink +blossoms, hot against the hot white walls.</p> +<p>After the pink blossoms, green leaves and a strange white heat +everywhere. You went, from pavements burning white, down long +avenues grey-white under the shadows of the limes.</p> +<p>A great Promenade going down like a long green tunnel, from the +big white Hotel at the top to the High Street at the bottom of the +basin where the very dregs of the heat sank and thickened.</p> +<p>Promenade forbidden for no earthly reason that Michael could +see, except that it was beautiful. Hotel where his father gave him +dinner on his last day of blessed life, telling him to choose what +he liked best, as the condemned criminal chooses his last meal on +the day they hang him.</p> +<p>Cleeve Hill and Battledown and Birdlip, and the long rampart of +Leckhampton, a thin, curling bristle of small trees on the edge of +it; forms that made an everlasting pattern on his mind; forms that +haunted him at night and tempted and tormented him all day. Memory +which it would have been better for him if he had not had, of the +raking open country over the top, of broad white light and luminous +blue shadows, of white roads switchbacking through the sheep +pastures; fields of bright yellow mustard in flower on the lower +hills; then, rectangular fir plantations and copses of slender +beech trees in the hollows. Somewhere, far-off, the Severn, faint +and still, like a river in a dream.</p> +<p>Memory of the round white town in the round pit of the valley, +shining, smoking through the thick air and the white orchard +blossoms; memory saturated by a smell that is like no other smell +on earth, the delicate smell of the Midland limestone country, the +smell of clean white dust, and of grass drying in the sun and of +mustard flowers.</p> +<p>Michael was in Cheltenham.</p> +<p>It was a matter of many unhappinesses, not one unhappiness. A +sudden intolerable unhappiness, the flash and stab of the beauty of +the almond-flowers, seen in passing and never seized, beauty which +it would have been better for him if he had not seen; the +knowledge, which he ought never to have had, that this beauty had +to die, was killed because he had not seized it, when, if he could +but have held it for one minute, it would have been immortal. A +vague, light unhappiness that came sometimes, could not for the +life of him think why, from the sight of his own body stripped, and +from the feeling of his own muscles. There was sadness for him in +his very strength. A long, aching unhappiness that came with his +memory of the open country over the tops of the hills, which, in +their incredible stupidity and cruelty, they had let him see. A +quick, lacerating unhappiness when he thought of his mother, and of +the garden on the Heath, and the high ridge of the Spaniards' Road, +and London below it, immense and beautiful.</p> +<p>The unhappiness of never being by himself.</p> +<p>He was afraid of the herd. It was with him night and day. He was +afraid of the thoughts, the emotions that seized it, swaying, +moving the multitude of undeveloped souls as if they had been one +monstrous, dominating soul. He was afraid of their voices, when +they chanted, sang and shouted together. He loathed their slang +even when he used it. He disliked the collective, male odour of the +herd, the brushing against him of bodies inflamed with running, the +steam of their speed rising through their hot sweaters; and the +smell of dust and ink and india-rubber and resinous wood in the +warm class-rooms.</p> +<p>Michael was at school.</p> +<p>The thing he had dreaded, that had hung over him, threatening +him for years before it happened, had happened. Nothing could have +prevented it; their names had been down for Cheltenham long ago; +first his, then Nicky's. Cheltenham, because Bartie and Vera lived +there, and because it had a college for girls, and Dorothy, who +wanted to go to Roedean, had been sent to Cheltenham, because of +Bartie and Vera and for no other reason. First Dorothy; then, he, +Michael; then, the next term, Nicky. And Nicky had been sent (a +whole year before his time) because of Michael, in the hope that +Michael would settle down better if he had his brother with him. It +didn't seem reasonable.</p> +<p>Not that either Dorothy or Nicky minded when they got there. All +that Nicky minded was not being at Hampstead. Being at Cheltenham +he did not mind at all. He rather liked it, since Major Cameron had +come to stay just outside it--on purpose to annoy Bartie--and took +them out riding. Even Michael did not mind Cheltenham more than any +other place his people might have chosen. He was not unreasonable. +All he asked was to be let alone, and to have room to breathe and +get ahead in. As it was, he had either to go with the school mass, +or waste energy in resisting its poisonous impact.</p> +<p>He had chosen resistance.</p> +<blockquote> TUDOR HOUSE.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Sunday</i>.</blockquote> +<p>DEAREST MOTHER:</p> +<p>I've put Sunday on this letter, though it's really Friday, +because I'm supposed to be writing it on Sunday when the other +fellows are writing. That's the beastly thing about this place, +you're expected to do everything when the other fellows are doing +it, whether you want to or not, as if the very fact that they're +doing it too didn't make you hate it.</p> +<p>I'm writing now because I simply must. If I waited till Sunday I +mightn't want to, and anyhow I shouldn't remember a single thing I +meant to say. Even now Johnson minor's digging his skinny elbows +into one side of me, and Hartley major's biting the feathers off +his pen and spitting them out again on the other. But they're only +supposed to be doing Latin verse, so it doesn't matter so much. +What I mean is it's as if their beastly minds kept on leaking into +yours till you're all mixed up with them. That's why I asked Daddy +to take me away next term. You see--it's more serious than he +thinks--it is, really. You've no idea what it's like. You've got to +swot every blessed thing the other fellows swot even if you can't +do it, and whether it's going to be any good to you or not. Why, +you're expected to sleep when they're sleeping, even if the chap +next you snores. Daddy <i>might</i> remember that it's Nicky who +likes mathematics, not me. It's all very well for Nicky when he +wants to go into the Army all the time. There are things <i>I</i> +want to do. I want to write and I'm going to write. Daddy can't +keep me off it. And I don't believe he'd want to if he understood. +There's nothing else in the world I'll ever be any good at.</p> +<p>And there are things I want to know. I want to know Greek and +Latin and French and German and Italian and Spanish, and Old French +and Russian and Chinese and Japanese, oh, and Provençal, and +every blessed language that has or has had a literature. I can +learn languages quite fast. Do you suppose I've got a chance of +knowing one of them--really knowing--even if I had the time? Not +much. And that's where being here's so rotten. They waste your time +as if it was theirs, not yours. They've simply no notion of the +value of it. They seem to think time doesn't matter because you're +young. Fancy taking three months over a Greek play you can read in +three hours. That'll give you some idea.</p> +<p>It all comes of being in a beastly form and having to go with +the other fellows. Say they're thirty fellows in your form, and +twenty-nine stick; you've got to stick with them, if it's terms and +terms. They can't do it any other way. It's <i>because</i> I'm +young, Mummy, that I mind so awfully. Supposing I died in ten +years' time, or even fifteen? It simply makes me hate +everybody.</p> +<p>Love to Daddy and Don.</p> +<blockquote> Your loving +MICK.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.-I don't mean that Hartley major isn't good at Latin verse. +He is. He can lick me into fits when he's bitten <i>all</i> the +feathers off.</p> +<blockquote> TUDOR HOUSE.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Tuesday</i>.</blockquote> +<p>DARLING MUMMY:</p> +<p>Daddy <i>doesn't</i> understand. You only think he does because +you like him. It's all rot what he says about esprit de corps, the +putridest rot, though I know he doesn't mean it.</p> +<p>And he's wrong about gym, and drill and games and all that. I +don't mind gym, and I don't mind drill, and I like games. I'm +fairly good at most of them--except footer. All the fellows say I'm +fairly good--otherwise I don't suppose they'd stick me for a +minute. I don't even mind Chapel. You see, when it's only your body +doing what the other chaps do, it doesn't seem to matter. If esprit +de corps <i>was</i> esprit de corps it would be all right. But it's +esprit d'esprit. And it's absolutely sickening the things they can +do to your mind. I can't stand another term of it.</p> +<blockquote> Always your loving<br> + +MICK.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.-How do you know I shan't be dead in ten or fifteen years' +time? It's enough to make me.</p> +<p>P.P.S.-It's all very well for Daddy to talk--<i>he</i> doesn't +want to learn Chinese.</p> +<blockquote> TUDOR HOUSE.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Thursday</i>.</blockquote> +<p>DEAR FATHER:</p> +<p>All right. Have it your own way. Only I shall kill myself. You +needn't tell Mother that--though it won't matter so much as she'll +very likely think. And perhaps then you won't try and stop Nicky +going into the Army as you've stopped me.</p> +<p>I don't care a "ram", as Nicky would say, whether you bury me or +cremate me; only you might give my Theocritus to old Parsons, and +my revolver to Nicky if it doesn't burst. He'd like it.</p> +<blockquote> MICHAEL.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.--If Parsons would rather have my <i>Æschylus</i> he +can, or both.</p> +<blockquote> TUDOR HOUSE.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Sunday</i>.</blockquote> +<p>DARLING MUMMY:</p> +<p>It's your turn for a letter. Do you think Daddy'd let me turn +the hen-house into a workshop next holidays, as there aren't any +hens? And would he give me a proper lathe for turning steel and +brass and stuff for my next birthday I'm afraid it'll cost an awful +lot; but he could take it out of my other birthdays, I don't mind +how many so long as I can have the lathe this one.</p> +<p>This place isn't half bad once you get used to it. I like the +fellows, and all the masters are really jolly decent, though I wish +we had old Parsons here instead of the one we have to do Greek for. +He's an awful chap to make you swot.</p> +<p>I don't know what you mean about Mick being seedy. He's as fit +as fit. You should see him when he's stripped. But he hates the +place like poison half the time. He can't stand being with a lot of +fellows. He's a rum chap because they all like him no end, the +masters and the fellows, though they think he's funny, all except +Hartley major, but he's such a measly little blighter that he +doesn't count.</p> +<p>We had a ripping time last Saturday. Bartie went up to town, and +Major Cameron took Dorothy and Ronny and Vera and me and Mick to +Birdlip in his dog-cart, only Mick and me had to bike because there +wasn't room enough. However we grabbed the chains behind and the +dog-cart pulled us up the hills like anything, and we could talk to +Dorothy and Ronny without having to yell at each other. He did us +jolly well at tea afterwards.</p> +<p>Dorothy rode my bike stridelegs coming back, so that I could sit +in the dog-cart. She said she'd get a jolly wigging if she was +seen. We shan't know till Monday.</p> +<p>You know, Mummy, that kid Ronny's having a rotten time, what +with Bartie being such a beast and Vera chumming up with Ferdie and +going off to country houses where he is. I really think she'd +better come to us for the holidays. Then I could teach her to ride. +Bartie won't let her learn here, though Ferdie'd gone and bought a +pony for her. That was to spite Ferdie. He's worse than ever, if +you can imagine that, and he's got three more things the matter +with him.</p> +<p>I must stop now.</p> +<p>Love to Dad and Don and Nanna. Next year I'm to go into physics +and stinks--that's chemistry.</p> +<p>Your loving NICKY.</p> +<blockquote> THE LEAS. PARABOLA +ROAD.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Sunday</i>.</blockquote> +<p>DEAREST MUMMY:</p> +<p>I'm awfully sorry you don't like my last term's school report. I +know it wasn't what it ought to have been. I have to hold myself in +so as to keep in the same class with Rosalind when we're moved up +after Midsummer. But as she's promised me faithfully she'll let +herself rip next term, you'll see it'll be all right at Xmas. We'll +both be in I A the Midsummer after, and we can go in for our matic, +together. I wish you'd arrange with Mrs. Jervis for both of us to +be at Newnham at the same time. Tell her Rosalind's an awful +slacker if I'm not there to keep her up to the mark. No--don't tell +her that. Tell her <i>I'm</i> a slacker if she isn't there.</p> +<p>I was amused by your saying it was decent of Bartie to have us +so often. He only does it because things are getting so tight +between him and Vera that he's glad of anything that relaxes the +strain a bit. Even us. He's snappier than ever with Ronny. I can't +think how the poor kid stands it.</p> +<p>You know that ripping white serge coat and skirt you sent me? +Well, the skirt's not nearly long enough. It doesn't matter a bit +though, because I can keep it for hockey. It's nice having a mother +who <i>can</i> choose clothes. You should see the last blouse Mrs. +Jervis got for Rosalind. She's burst out of <i>all</i> the seams +already. You could have heard her doing it.</p> +<p>Much love to you and Daddy and Don-Don. I can't send any to Mr. +Parsons now my hair's up. But you might tell him I'm going in +strong for Sociology and Economics.--</p> +<blockquote> Your loving<br> + +DOROTHY.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.--Vera asked me if I thought you'd take her and Ronny in at +Midsummer. I said of course you would--like a shot.</p> +<blockquote> LANSDOWN LODGE.<br> + +CHELTENHAM,<br> + <i> +Friday.</i></blockquote> +<p>MY DEAREST FRANCES:</p> +<p>I hope you got my two wires in time. You needn't come down, +either of you. And you needn't worry about Mick. Ferdie went round +and talked to him like a fa--I mean a big brother, and the revolver +(bless his heart!) is at present reposing at the bottom of my +glove-box.</p> +<p>All the same we both think you'd better take him away at +Midsummer. He says he can stick it till then, but not a day longer. +Poor Mick! He has the most mysterious troubles.</p> +<p>I daresay it's the Cheltenham climate as much as anything. It +doesn't suit me or Bonny either, and it's simply killing Ferdie by +inches. I suppose that's why Bartie makes us stay here--in the +hope--</p> +<p>Oh! my dear, I'm worried out of my life about him. He's never +got over that fever he had in South Africa. He's looking +ghastly.</p> +<p>And the awful thing is that I can't do a thing for him. Not a +thing. Unless--</p> +<p>You haven't forgotten the promise you made me two years ago, +have you?</p> +<p>Dorothy seemed to think you could put Bonny and me +up--again!--at Midsummer. Can you? And if poor Ferdie wants to come +and see us, you won't turn him off your door-mat, will you?</p> +<blockquote> Your lovingest<br> + +"VERA."</blockquote> +<p>Frances said, "Poor Vera! She even makes poor Mick an excuse for +seeing Ferdie."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="X"></a>X</h2> +<br> +<p>Three more years passed and Frances had fulfilled her promise. +She had taken Veronica.</p> +<p>The situation had become definite. Bartie had delivered his +ultimatum. Either Vera must give up Major Cameron, signing a +written pledge in the presence of three witnesses, Frances, Anthony +and Bartie's solicitor, that she would neither see him nor write to +him, nor hold any sort or manner of communication with him, direct +or indirect, or he would obtain a judicial separation. It was to be +clearly understood by both of them that he would not, in any +circumstances, divorce her. Bartie knew that a divorce was what +they wanted, what they had been playing for, and he was not going +to make things easy for them; he was going to make things hard and +bitter and shameful He had based his ultimatum on the calculation +that Vera would not have the courage of her emotions; that even her +passion would surrender when she found that it had no longer the +protection of her husband's house and name. Besides Vera was +expensive, and Cameron was a spendthrift on an insufficient income; +he could not possibly afford her. If Bartie's suspicions were +correct, the thing had been going on for the last twelve years, and +if in twelve years' time they had not forced his hand that was +because they had counted the cost, and decided that, as Frances had +put it, the "game was not worth the scandal."</p> +<p>For when suspicion became unendurable he had consulted Anthony +who assured him that Frances, who ought to know, was convinced that +there was nothing in it except incompatibility, for which Bartie +was superlatively responsible.</p> +<p>Anthony's manner did not encourage confidence, and he gathered +that his own more sinister interpretation would be dismissed with +contemptuous incredulity. Anthony was under his wife's thumb and +Frances had been completely bamboozled by her dearest friend. +Still, when once their eyes were opened, he reckoned on the support +of Anthony and Frances. It was inconceivable, that, faced with a +public scandal, his brother and his sister-in-law would side with +Vera.</p> +<p>It was a game where Bartie apparently held all the cards. And +his trump card was Veronica.</p> +<p>He was not going to keep Veronica without Vera. That had been +tacitly understood between them long ago. If Vera went to Cameron +she could not take Veronica with her without openly confirming +Bartie's worst suspicion.</p> +<p>And yet all these things, so inconceivable to Bartie, happened. +When it came to the stabbing point the courage of Vera's emotions +was such that she defied her husband and his ultimatum, and went to +Cameron. By that time Ferdie was so ill that she would have been +ashamed of herself if she had not gone. And though Anthony's house +was not open to the unhappy lovers, Frances and Anthony had taken +Veronica.</p> +<p>Grannie and Auntie Louie and Auntie Emmeline and Auntie Edie +came over to West End House when they heard that it had been +decided. It was time, they said, that somebody should protest, that +somebody should advise Frances for her own good and for the good of +her children.</p> +<p>They had always detested and distrusted Vera Harrison; they had +always known what would happen. The wonder was it had not happened +before. But why Frances should make it easy for her, why Frances +should shoulder Vera Harrison's responsibilities, and burden +herself with that child, and why Anthony should give his consent to +such a proceeding, was more than they could imagine.</p> +<p>Once Frances had stood up for the three Aunties, against +Grannie; now Grannie and the three Aunties were united against +Frances.</p> +<p>"Frances, you're a foolish woman."</p> +<p>"My folly is my own affair and Anthony's."</p> +<p>"You'll have to pay for it some day."</p> +<p>"You might have thought of your own children first."</p> +<p>"I did. I thought, How would I like <i>them</i> to be forsaken +like poor Ronny?"</p> +<p>"You should have thought of the boys. Michael's growing up; so +is Nicky."</p> +<p>"Nicky is fifteen; Ronny is eleven, if you call that growing +up."</p> +<p>"That's all very well, but when Nicky is twenty-one and Ronny is +seventeen what are you going to do?"</p> +<p>"I'm not going to turn Ronny out of doors for fear Nicky should +fall in love with her, if that's what you mean."</p> +<p>"It <i>is</i> what I mean, now you've mentioned it."</p> +<p>"He's less likely to fall in love with her if I bring them up as +brother and sister."</p> +<p>"You might think of Anthony. Bartholomew's wife leaves him for +another man, and you aid and abet her by taking her child, +relieving her of her one responsibility."</p> +<p>"Bartie's wife leaves him, and we help Bartie by taking care of +his child--who is <i>our niece</i>, not yours."</p> +<p>"My dear Frances, that attitude isn't going to deceive anybody. +If you don't think of Anthony and your children, you might think of +us. We don't want to be mixed up in this perfectly horrible +affair."</p> +<p>"How are you mixed up in it?"</p> +<p>"Well, after all, Frances, we are the family. We are your +sisters and your mother and your children's grand-mother and +aunts."</p> +<p>"Then," said Frances with decision, "you must try to bear it. +You must take the rough with the smooth, as Anthony and I do."</p> +<p>And as soon as she had said it she was sorry. It struck her for +the first time that her sisters were getting old. It was no use for +Auntie Louie, more red and more rigid than ever, to defy the +imminence of her forty-ninth birthday. Auntie Emmy's gestures, her +mouthings and excitement, only drew attention to the fact that she +was forty-seven. And Edie, why, even poor little Auntie Edie was +forty-five. Grannie, dry and wiry, hardly looked older than Auntie +Edie.</p> +<p>They left her, going stiffly, in offence. And again the +unbearable pathos of them smote her. The poor Aunties. She was a +brute to hurt them. She still thought of them as Auntie Louie, +Auntie Emmy, Auntie Edie. It seemed kinder; for thus she bestowed +upon them a colour and vitality that, but for her and for her +children, they would not have had. They were helpless, tiresome, +utterly inefficient. In all their lives they had never done +anything vigorous or memorable. They were doomed to go out before +her children; when they were gone they would be gone altogether. +Neither Auntie Louie, nor Auntie Emmy, nor Auntie Edie would leave +any mark or sign of herself. But her children gave them titles by +which they would be remembered after they were gone. It was as if +she had bestowed on them a little of her own enduring life.</p> +<p>It was absurd and pathetic that they should think that they were +the Family.</p> +<p>But however sorry she was for them she could not allow them to +dictate to her in matters that concerned her and Anthony alone. If +they were so worried, about the scandal, why hadn't they the sense +to see that the only way to meet it was to give it the lie by +taking Ronny, by behaving as if Ronny were unquestionably Bartie's +daughter and their niece? They were bound to do it, if not for +Vera's sake, for the dear little girl's sake. And that was what +Vera had been thinking of; that was why she had trusted them.</p> +<p>But her three sisters had always disliked Vera. They disliked +her because, while they went unmarried, Vera, not content with the +one man who was her just and legal portion, had taken another man +whom she had no right to. And Auntie Emmeline had been in love with +Ferdie.</p> +<p>Still, there was a certain dreadful truth in their reproaches; +and it stung. Frances said to herselv that she had not been wise. +She had done a risky thing in taking Ronny. It was not fair to her +children, to Michael and Nicholas and John. She was afraid. She had +been afraid when Vera had talked to her about Nicky and Veronica; +and when she had seen Veronica and Nicky playing together in the +apple-tree house; and when she had heard Ronny's voice outside the +schoolroom door crying, "Where's Nicky? I want him. Will he be very +long?"</p> +<p>Supposing Veronica should go on wanting Nicky, and supposing +Nicky--</p> +<p>Frances was so worried that, when Dorothy came striding across +the lawn to ask her what the matter was, and what on earth Grannie +and the Aunties had been gassing about all that time, she told +her.</p> +<p>Dorothy was nineteen. And Dorothy at nineteen, tall and upright, +was Anthony's daughter. Her face and her whole body had changed; +they were Anthony's face and body made feminine. Her little +straight nose had now a short high bridge; her brown eyes were keen +and alert; she had his hawk's look. She put her arm in Frances's, +protecting her, and they walked up and down the terrace path, +discussing it. In the distance Grannie and the Aunties could be +seen climbing the slope of the Heath to Judges' Walk. They were +not, Dorothy protested, pathetic; they were simply beastly. She +hated them for worrying her mother.</p> +<p>"They think I oughtn't to have taken Ronny. They think Nicky'll +want to marry her."</p> +<p>"But Ronny's a kid--"</p> +<p>"When she's not a kid."</p> +<p>"He won't, Mummy ducky, he won't. She'll be a kid for ages. +Nicky'll have married somebody else before she's got her hair +up."</p> +<p>"Then Ronny'll fall in love with <i>him</i>, and get her little +heart broken."</p> +<p>"She won't, Mummy, she won't. They only talk like that because +they think Ferdie's Ronny's father."</p> +<p>"Dorothy!"</p> +<p>Frances, in horror, released herself from that protecting arm. +The horror came, not from the fact, but from her daughter's +knowledge of it.</p> +<p>"Poor Mummy, didn't you know? That's why Bartie hates her."</p> +<p>"It isn't true."</p> +<p>"What's the good of that as long as Bartie thinks it is?" said +Dorothy.</p> +<blockquote>"London Bridge is broken down<br> +(<i>Ride over my Lady Leigh</i>!)"</blockquote> +<p>Veronica was in the drawing-room, singing "London Bridge."</p> +<p>Michael, in all the beauty of his adolescence, lay stretched out +on the sofa, watching her. Her small, exquisite, childish face +between the plaits of honey-coloured hair, her small, childish face +thrilled him with a singular delight and sadness. She was so young +and so small, and at the same time so perfect that Michael could +think of her as looking like that for ever, not growing up into a +tiresome, bouncing, fluffy flapper like Rosalind Jervis.</p> +<p>Aunt Louie and Aunt Emmeline said that Rosalind was in love with +him. Michael thought that was beastly of them and he hoped it +wasn't true.</p> +<blockquote>"'Build it up with gold so fine'"--</blockquote> +<p>Veronica was happy; for she knew herself to be a cause of +happiness. Like Frances once, she was profoundly aware of her own +happiness, and for the same reason. It was, if you came to think of +it, incredible. It had been given to her, suddenly, when she was +not looking for it, after she had got used to unhappiness.</p> +<p>As long as she could remember Veronica had been aware of +herself. Aware of herself, chiefly, not as a cause of happiness, +but as a cause of embarrassment and uncertainty and trouble to +three people, her father, her mother and Ferdie, just as they were +causes of embarrassment and trouble and uncertainty to her. They +lived in a sort of violent mystery that she, incomprehensibly, was +mixed up with. As long as she could remember, her delicate, +childish soul had quivered with the vibration of their +incomprehensible and tiresome passions. You could never tell what +any of them really wanted, though among them they managed to create +an atmosphere of most devastating want. Only one thing she knew +definitely--that they didn't want <i>her</i>.</p> +<p>She was altogether out of it except as a meaningless counter in +their incomprehensible, grown-up game. Her father didn't want her; +her mother didn't want her very much; and though now and then +Ferdie (who wasn't any relation at all) behaved as if he wanted +her, <i>his</i> wanting only made the other two want her less than +ever.</p> +<p>There had been no peace or quietness or security in her little +life of eleven years. Their places (and they had had so many of +them!) had never had any proper place for her. She seemed to have +spent most of her time in being turned out of one room because her +father had come into it, and out of another because her mother +wanted to be alone in it with Ferdie. And nobody, except Ferdie +sometimes, when they let him, ever wanted to be alone in any room +with her. She was so tired of the rooms where she was obliged to be +always alone with herself or with the servants, though the servants +were always kind.</p> +<p>Now, in Uncle Anthony's house, there was always peace and +quietness and an immense security. She knew that, having taken her, +they wouldn't give her up.</p> +<p>She was utterly happy.</p> +<p>And the house, with its long, wainscoted rooms, its whiteness +and darkness, with its gay, clean, shining chintzes, the delicate, +faded rose stuffs, the deep blue and purple and green stuffs, and +the blue and white of the old china, and its furniture of curious +woods, the golden, the golden-brown, the black and the +wine-coloured, bought by Anthony in many countries, the round +concave mirrors, the pictures and the old bronzes, all the things +that he had gathered together and laid up as treasure for his Sons; +and the garden on the promontory, with its buttressed walls and its +green lawn, its flower borders, and its tree of Heaven, saturated +with memories, became for her, as they had become for Frances, the +sanctuary, crowded with visible and tangible symbols, of the +Happiness she adored.</p> +<p>"Sing it again, Ronny."</p> +<p>She sang it again.</p> +<blockquote>"'London Bridge is broken down'"--</blockquote> +<p>It was funny of Michael to like the silly, childish song; but if +he wanted it he should have it. Veronica would have given any of +them anything they wanted. There was nothing that she had ever +wanted that they had not given to her.</p> +<p>She had wanted to be strong, to be able to run and ride, to play +tennis and cricket and hockey, and Nicky had shown her how. She had +wanted books of her own, and Auntie Frances, and Uncle Anthony and +Dorothy and Michael had given her books, and Nicky had made her a +bookcase. Her room (it was all her own) was full of treasures. She +had wanted to learn to sing and play properly, and Uncle Anthony +had given her masters. She had wanted people to love her music, and +they loved it. She had wanted a big, grown-up sister like Dorothy, +and they had given her Dorothy; and she had wanted a little brother +of her own age, and they had given her John. John had a look of +Nicky. His golden white hair was light brown now; his fine, wide +mouth had Nicky's impudence, even when, like Frances, he kept it +shut to smile her unwilling, twitching, mocking smile. She had +wanted a father and mother like Frances and Anthony; and they had +given her themselves.</p> +<p>And she had wanted to live in the same house with Nicky +always.</p> +<p>So if Michael wanted her to sing "London Bridge" to him twenty +times over, she would sing it, provided Nicky didn't ask her to do +anything else at the same time. For she wanted to do most for +Nicky, always.</p> +<p>And yet she was aware of something else that was not happiness. +It was not a thing you could name or understand, or seize, or see; +you were simply aware of it, as you were aware of ghosts in your +room at night. Like the ghosts, it was not always there; but when +it was there you knew.</p> +<p>It felt sometimes as if Auntie Frances was afraid of her; as if +she, Veronica, was a ghost.</p> +<p>And Veronica said to herself, "She is afraid I am not good. She +thinks I'll worry her. But I shan't."</p> +<p>That was before the holidays. Now that they had come and Nicky +was back, "it" seemed to her something to do with Nicky; and +Veronica said to herself, "She is afraid I'll get in his way and +worry him, because he's older. But I shan't."</p> +<p>As if she had not been taught and trained not to get in older +people's ways and worry them. And as if she wasn't growing older +every minute herself!</p> +<blockquote>"'Build it up with gold so fine--<br> +(<i>Ride over my Lady Leigh</i>!)<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +"'Build it up with stones so strong'"--</blockquote> +<p>She had her back to the door and to the mirror that reflected +it, yet she knew that Nicky had come in.</p> +<p>"That's the song you used to sing at bed-time when you were +frightened," he said.</p> +<p>She was sitting now in the old hen-house that was Nicky's +workshop, watching him as he turned square bars of brass into round +bars with his lathe. She had plates of steel to polish, and pieces +of wood to rub smooth with glass-paper. There were sheets of brass +and copper, and bars and lumps of steel, and great poles and planks +of timber reared up round the walls of the workshop. The metal +filings fell from Nicky's lathe into sawdust that smelt +deliciously.</p> +<p>The workshop was nicer than the old apple-tree house, because +there were always lots of things to do in it for Nicky.</p> +<p>"Nicky," she said suddenly, "do you believe in ghosts?"</p> +<p>"Well--" Nicky caught his bar as it fell from the lathe and +examined it critically.</p> +<p>"You remember when I was afraid of ghosts, and you used to come +and sit with me till I went to sleep?"</p> +<p>"Rather."</p> +<p>"Well--there <i>are</i> ghosts. I saw one last night. It came +into the room just after I got into bed."</p> +<p>"You <i>can</i> see them," Nicky said. "Ferdie's seen heaps. It +runs in his family. He told me."</p> +<p>"He never told <i>me</i>."</p> +<p>"Rather not. He was afraid you'd be frightened."</p> +<p>"Well, I wasn't frightened. Not the least little bit."</p> +<p>"I shall tell him that. He wanted most awfully to know whether +you saw them too."</p> +<p>"<i>Me</i>? But Nicky--it was Ferdie I saw. He stood by the door +and looked at me. Like he does, you know."</p> +<p>The next morning Frances had a letter of two lines from +Veronica's mother:</p> +<blockquote>"Ferdie died last evening at half past eight.<br> +<br> +"He wants you to keep Ronny.<br> +<br> + "VERA."<br> +</blockquote> +<p>It was not till years later that Veronica knew that "He wanted +most awfully to know whether you saw them too" meant "He wanted +most awfully to know whether you really were his daughter."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="PART_II"></a>PART II</h2> +<h3><i>THE VORTEX</i></h3> +><br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XI"></a>XI</h2> +<br> +<p>Three years passed. It was the autumn of nineteen-ten. Anthony's +house was empty for the time being of all its children except +Dorothea.</p> +<p>Michael was in the beginning of his last year at Cambridge. +Nicholas was in his second year. He had taken up mathematics and +theoretical mechanics. In the long vacation, when the others went +into the country, he stayed behind to work in the engineering sheds +of the Morss Motor Company. John was at Cheltenham. Veronica was in +Dresden.</p> +<p>Dorothea had left Newnham a year ago, having taken a first-class +in Economics.</p> +<p>As Anthony came home early one evening in October, he found a +group of six strange women in the lane, waiting outside his garden +door in attitudes of conspiracy.</p> +<p>Four of them, older women, stood together in a close ring. The +two others, young girls, hung about near, but a little apart from +the ring, as if they desired not to identify themselves with any +state of mind outside their own. By their low sibilant voices, the +daring sidelong sortie of their bright eyes, their gestures, +furtive and irrepressible, you gathered that there was unanimity on +one point. All six considered themselves to have been +discovered.</p> +<p>At Anthony's approach they moved away, with slow, casual steps, +passed through the posts at the bottom of the lane and plunged down +the steep path, as if under the impression that the nature of the +ground covered their retreat. They bobbed up again, one after the +other, when the lane was clear.</p> +<p>The first to appear was a tall, handsome, bad-tempered-looking +girl. She spoke first.</p> +<p>"It's a damned shame of them to keep us waiting like this."</p> +<p>She propped herself up against Anthony's wall and smouldered +there in her dark, sullen beauty.</p> +<p>"We were here at six sharp."</p> +<p>"When they know we were told not to let on where we meet."</p> +<p>"We're led into a trap," said a grey-haired woman.</p> +<p>"I say, who is Dorothea Harrison?"</p> +<p>"She's the girl who roped Rosalind in. She's all right."</p> +<p>"Yes, but are her people all right?"</p> +<p>"Rosalind knows them."</p> +<p>The grey-haired woman spoke again.</p> +<p>"Well, if you think this lane is a good place for a secret +meeting, I don't. Are you aware that the yard of `Jack Straw's +Castle' is behind that wall? What's to prevent them bringing up +five or six coppers and planting them there? Why, they've only got +to post one 'tee at the top of the lane, and another at the bottom, +and we're done. Trapped. I call it rotten."</p> +<p>"It's all right. Here they are."</p> +<p>Dorothea Harrison and Rosalind Jervis came down the lane at a +leisured stride, their long coats buttoned up to their chins and +their hands in their pockets. Their I gestures were devoid of +secrecy or any guile. Each had a joyous air of being in command, of +being able to hold up the whole adventure at her will, or let it +rip.</p> +<p>Rosalind Jervis was no longer a bouncing, fluffy flapper. In +three years she had shot up into the stature of command. She +slouched, stooping a little from the shoulders, and carried her +pink face thrust forward, as if leaning from a platform to address +an audience. From this salience her small chin retreated delicately +into her pink throat.</p> +<p>"Is Miss Maud Blackadder here?" she said, marshalling her +six.</p> +<p>The handsome girl detached herself slowly from Anthony's +wall.</p> +<p>"What's the point," she said, "of keeping us hanging about like +this--"</p> +<p>"Till <i>all</i> our faces are known to the police--"</p> +<p>"There's a johnnie gone in there who can swear to <i>me</i>. Why +didn't you two turn up before?" said the handsome girl.</p> +<p>"Because," said Dorothea, "that johnnie was my father. He was +pounding on in front of us all up East Heath Road. If we'd got here +sooner I should have had to introduce you."</p> +<p>She looked at the six benevolently, indulgently. They might have +been children whose behaviour amused her. It was as if she had +said, "I avoided that introduction, not because it would have been +dangerous and indiscreet, but because it would have spoiled your +fun for you."</p> +<p>She led the way into the garden and the house and through the +hall into the schoolroom. There they found eleven young girls who +had come much too soon, and mistaking the arrangements, had rung +the bell and allowed themselves to be shown in.</p> +<p>The schoolroom had been transformed into a sort of meeting hall. +The big oblong table had been drawn across one end of it. Behind it +were chairs for the speakers, before it were three rows of chairs +where the eleven young girls sat scattered, expectant.</p> +<p>The six stood in the free space in front of the table and looked +at Rosalind with significance.</p> +<p>"This," said Rosalind, "is our hostess, Miss Dorothea Harrison. +Dorothy, I think you've met Mrs. Eden, our Treasurer. This is our +secretary, Miss Valentina Gilchrist; Miss Ethel Farmer; Miss +Winifred Burstall--"</p> +<p>Dorothy greeted in turn Mrs. Eden, a pretty, gentle woman with a +face of dreaming tragedy (it was she who had defended Rosalind +outside the gate); Miss Valentina Gilchrist, a middle-aged woman +who displayed a large grey pompadour above a rosy face with +turned-back features which, when she was not excited, had an +incredulous quizzical expression (Miss Gilchrist was the one who +had said they had been led into a trap); Miss Ethel Farmer, fair, +attenuated, scholastic, wearing pince-nez with an air of not seeing +you; and Miss Winifred Burstall, weather-beaten, young at fifty, +wearing pince-nez with an air of seeing straight through you to the +other side.</p> +<p>Rosalind went on. "Miss Maud Blackadder--"</p> +<p>Miss Blackadder's curt bow accused Rosalind of wasting time in +meaningless formalities.</p> +<p>"Miss--" Rosalind was at a loss.</p> +<p>The other girl, the youngest of the eight, came forward, holding +out a slender, sallow-white hand. She was the one who had hung with +Miss Blackadder in the background.</p> +<p>"Desmond," she said. "Phyllis Desmond."</p> +<p>She shrugged her pretty shoulders and smiled slightly, as much +as to say, "She forgets what she ought to remember, but it doesn't +matter."</p> +<p>Phyllis Desmond was beautiful. But for the moment her beauty was +asleep, stilled into hardness. Dorothy saw a long, slender, +sallow-white face, between sleek bands of black hair; black eyes, +dulled as if by a subtle film, like breath on a black +looking-glass; a beautiful slender mouth, pressed tight, holding +back the secret of its sensual charm.</p> +<p>Dorothy thought she had seen her before, but she couldn't +remember where.</p> +<p>Rosalind Jervis looked at her watch with a businesslike air; +paper and pencils were produced; coats were thrown on the little +school-desks and benches in the corner where Dorothy and her +brothers had sat at their lessons with Mr. Parsons some twelve +years ago; and the eight gathered about the big table, Rosalind +taking the presidential chair (which had once been Mr. Parsons' +chair) in the centre between Miss Gilchrist and Miss +Blackadder.</p> +<p>Miss Burstall and Miss Farmer looked at each other and Miss +Burstall spoke.</p> +<p>"We understood that this was to be an informal meeting. Before +we begin business I should like to ask one question. I should like +to know what we are and what we are here for?"</p> +<p>"We, Mrs. Eden, Miss Valentina Gilchrist, Miss Maud Blackadder +and myself," said Rosalind in the tone of one dealing reasonably +with an unreasonable person, "are the Committee of the North +Hampstead Branch of the Women's Franchise Union. Miss Gilchrist is +our secretary, I am the President and Miss Blackadder is--er--the +Committee."</p> +<p>"By whom elected? This," said Miss Burstall, "is most +irregular."</p> +<p>Rosalind went on: "We are here to appoint a vice-president, to +elect members of the Committee and enlist subscribers to the Union. +These things will take time."</p> +<p>"<i>We</i> were punctual," said Miss Farmer.</p> +<p>Rosalind did not even look at her. The moment had come to +address the meeting.</p> +<p>"I take it that we are all agreed as to the main issue, that we +have not come here to convert each other, that we all want Women's +Franchise, that we all mean to have it, that we are all prepared to +work for it, and, if necessary, to fight for it, to oppose the +Government that withholds it by every means in our power--"</p> +<p>"By every constitutional means," Miss Burstall amended, and was +told by Miss Gilchrist that, if she desired proceedings to be +regular, she must not interrupt the Chairwoman.</p> +<p>"--To oppose the Government that refuses us the vote, whatever +Government it may be, regardless of party, by <i>every means in our +power</i>."</p> +<p>Rosalind's sentences were punctuated by a rhythmic sound of +tapping. Miss Maud Blackadder, twisted sideways on the chair she +had pushed farther and farther back from the table, so as to bring +herself completely out of line with the other seven, from time to +time, rhythmically, twitching with impatience, struck her own leg +with her own walking-stick.</p> +<p>Rosalind perorated. "If we differ, we differ, not as to our end, +but solely as to the means we, personally and individually, are +prepared to employ." She looked round. "Agreed."</p> +<p>"Not agreed," said Dorothy and Miss Burstall and Miss Farmer all +at once.</p> +<p>"I will now call on Miss Maud Blackadder to speak. She will +explain to those of you who are strangers" (she glanced +comprehensively at the eleven young girls) "the present program of +the Union."</p> +<p>"I protest," said Miss Burstall. "There has been confusion."</p> +<p>"There really <i>has</i>, Rosalind," said Dorothy. "You +<i>must</i> get it straight. You can't start all at sixes and +sevens. I protest too."</p> +<p>"We all three protest," said Miss Farmer, frowning and blinking +in an agony of protest.</p> +<p>"Silence, if you please, for the Chairwoman," said Miss +Gilchrist.</p> +<p>"May we not say one word?"</p> +<p>"You may," said Rosalind, "in your turn. I now call on Miss +Blackadder to speak."</p> +<p>At the sound of her own name Miss Blackadder jumped to her feet. +The walking-stick fell to the floor with a light clatter and crash, +preluding her storm. She jerked out her words at a headlong pace, +as if to make up for the time the others had wasted in +futilities.</p> +<p>"I am not going to say much, I am not going to take up your +time. Too much time has been lost already. I am not a speaker, I am +not a writer, I am not an intellectual woman, and if you ask me +what I am and what I am here for, and what I am doing in the Union, +and what the Union is doing with me, and what possible use I, an +untrained girl, can be to you clever women" (she looked +tempestuously at Miss Burstall and Miss Farmer who did not flinch), +"I will tell you. I am a fighter. I am here to enlist volunteers. I +am the recruiting sergeant for this district. That is the use my +leaders, who should be <i>your</i> leaders, are making of +<i>me</i>."</p> +<p>Her head was thrown back, her body swayed, rocked from side to +side with the violent rhythm of her speech.</p> +<p>"If you ask me why they have chosen <i>me</i> I will tell you. +It's because I know what I want and because I know how to get what +I want.</p> +<p>"I know what I want. Oh, yes, you think that's nothing; you all +think you know what you want. But do you? <i>Do</i> you?"</p> +<p>"Of course we do!"</p> +<p>"We want the vote!"</p> +<p>"Nothing but the vote!"</p> +<p>"<i>Nothing but?</i> Are you quite sure of that? Can you even +say you want it till you know whether there are things you want +more?"</p> +<p>"What are you driving at?"</p> +<p>"You'll soon see what I'm driving at. I drive straight. And I +ride straight. And I don't funk my fences.</p> +<p>"Well--say you all want the vote. Do you know how much you want +it? Do you know how much you want to pay for it? Do you know what +you're prepared to give up for it? Because, if you don't know +<i>that</i>, you don't know how much you want it."</p> +<p>"We want it as much as you do, I imagine."</p> +<p>"You want it as much as I do? Good. <i>Then</i> you're going to +pay the price whatever the price is. <i>Then</i> you're ready to +give up everything else, your homes and your families and your +friends and your incomes. Until you're enfranchised you are not +going to own any <i>man</i> as father, or brother or husband" (her +voice rang with a deeper and stronger vibration) "or lover, or +friend. And the man who does not agree with you, the man who +refuses you the vote, the man who opposes your efforts to get the +vote, the man who, whether he agrees with you or not, <i>will not +help you to get it</i>, you count as your enemy. That is wanting +the vote. That is wanting it as much as I do.</p> +<p>"You women--are you prepared to go against your men? To give up +your men?"</p> +<p>There were cries of "Rather!" from two of the eleven young girls +who had come too soon.</p> +<p>Miss Burstall shook her head and murmured, "Hopeless confusion +of thought. If <i>this</i> is what it's going to be like, Heaven +help us!"</p> +<p>"You really <i>are</i> getting a bit mixed," said Dorothy.</p> +<p>"We protest--"</p> +<p>"Protest then; protest as much as you like. Then we shall know +where we are; then we shall get things straight; then we can begin. +You all want the vote. Some of you don't know how much, but at +least you know you want it. Nobody's confused about that. Do you +know how you're going to get it? Tell me that."</p> +<p>Lest they should spoil it all by telling her Miss Blackadder +increased her vehement pace. "You don't because you can't and +<i>I</i> will tell you. You won't get it by talking about it or by +writing about it, or by sitting down and thinking about it, you'll +get it by coming in with me, coming in with the Women's Franchise +Union, and fighting for it. Fighting women, not talkers--not +writers--not thinkers are what we want!" She sat down, heaving a +little with the ground-swell of her storm, amid applause in which +only Miss Burstall and Miss Farmer did not join. She was now +looking extraordinarily handsome.</p> +<p>Rosalind bent over and whispered something in her ear. She rose +to her feet again, flushed, smiling at them, triumphant.</p> +<p>"Our Chairwoman has reminded me that I came here to tell you +what the program of our Union is. And I can tell you in six words. +It's Hell-for-leather, and it's Neck-or-nothing!"</p> +<p>"Now," said Rosalind sweetly, bowing towards Miss Burstall, +"it's your turn. We should like to know what you have to say."</p> +<p>Miss Burstall did not rise and in the end Dorothea spoke.</p> +<p>"My friend, Miss Rosalind Jervis, assumed that we were all +agreed, not only as to our aims, but as to our policy. She has not +yet discriminated between constitutional and unconstitutional +means. When we protested, she quashed our protest. We took +exception to the phrase 'every means in our power,' because that +would commit us to all sorts of unconstitutional things. It is in +my power to squirt water into the back of the Prime Minister's +neck, or to land a bomb in the small of his back, or in the centre +of the platform at his next public meeting. We were left to +conclude that the only differences between us would concern our +choice of the squirt or the bomb. As some of us here might equally +object to using the bomb or the squirt, I submit that either our +protest should have been allowed or our agreement should not have +been taken for granted at the start.</p> +<p>"Again, Miss Maud Blackadder, in her sporting speech, her heroic +speech, has not cleared the question. She has appealed to us to +come in, without counting the cost; but she has said nothing to +convince us that when our account at our bank is overdrawn, and we +have declared war on all our male friends and relations, and have +left our comfortable homes, and are all camping out on the open +Heath--I repeat, she has said nothing to convince us that the price +we shall have paid is going to get us the thing we want.</p> +<p>"She says that fighters are wanted, and not talkers and writers +and thinkers. Are we not then to fight with our tongues and with +our brains? Is she leaving us anything but our bare fists? She has +told us that she rides straight and that she doesn't funk her +fences; but she has not told us what sort of country she is going +to ride over, nor where the fences are, not what Hell-for-leather +and Neck-or-nothing means.</p> +<p>"We want meaning; we want clearness and precision. We have not +been given it yet.</p> +<p>"I would let all this pass if Miss Blackadder were not your +colour-sergeant. Is it fair to call for volunteers, for raw +recruits, and not tell them precisely and clearly what services +will be required of them? How many" (Dorothy glanced at the eleven) +"realize that the leaders of your Union, Mrs. Palmerston-Swete, and +Mrs. Blathwaite, and Miss Angela Blathwaite, demand from its +members blind, unquestioning obedience?"</p> +<p>Maud Blackadder jumped up.</p> +<p>"I protest. I, too, have the right to protest. Miss Harrison +calls me to order. She tells me to be clear and precise. Will she +be good enough to be clear and precise herself? Will she say +whether she is with us or against us? If she is not with us she is +against us. Let her explain her position."</p> +<p>She sat down; and Rosalind rose.</p> +<p>"Miss Harrison," she said, "will explain her position to the +Committee later. This is an open meeting till seven. It is now five +minutes to. Will any of you here"--she held the eleven with her +eyes--"who were not present at the meeting in the Town Hall last +Monday, hold up your hands. No hands. Then you must all be aware of +the object and the policy and the rules of the Women's Franchise +Union. Its members pledge themselves to help, as far as they can, +the object of the Union; to support the decisions of their leaders; +to abstain from public and private criticism of those decisions and +of any words or actions of their leaders; and to obey orders--not +blindly or unquestioningly, but within the terms of their +undertakings.</p> +<p>"Those of you who wish to join us will please write your names +and addresses on the slips of white paper, stating what kind of +work you are willing to do and the amount of your subscription, if +you subscribe, and hand your slips to the Secretary at the door, as +you go out."</p> +<p>Miss Burstall and Miss Farmer went out. Miss Blackadder +counted--"One--two--"</p> +<p>Eight of the eleven young girls signed and handed in the white +slips at the door, and went out.</p> +<p>"Three--four--"</p> +<p>Miss Blackadder reckoned that Dorothea Harrison's speech had +cost her five recruits. Her own fighting speech had carried the +eleven in a compact body to her side: Dorothea's speech had divided +and scattered them again.</p> +<p>Miss Blackadder hurled her personality at the heads of audiences +in the certainty that it would hit them hard. That was what she was +there for. She knew that the Women's Franchise union relied on her +to wring from herself the utmost spectacular effect. And she did it +every time. She never once missed fire. And Dorothea Harrison had +come down on the top of her triumph and destroyed the effect of all +her fire. She had corrupted five recruits. And, supposing there was +a secret program, she had betrayed the women of the Union to +fourteen outsiders, by giving it away. Treachery or no treachery, +Dorothea Harrison would have to pay for it.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Everybody had gone except the members of the Committee and +Phyllis Desmond who waited for her friend, Maud Blackadder.</p> +<p>Dorothy remembered Phyllis Desmond now; she was that art-student +girl that Vera knew. She had seen her at Vera's house.</p> +<p>They had drawn round the table again. Miss Blackadder and Miss +Gilchrist conferred in whispers.</p> +<p>"Before we go," said Rosalind, "I propose that we ask Miss +Dorothea Harrison to be our Vice-President."</p> +<p>Miss Gilchrist nodded to Miss Blackadder who rose. It was her +moment.</p> +<p>"And <i>I</i> propose," she said, "that before we invite Miss +Harrison to be anything we ask her to define her position--clearly +and precisely."</p> +<p>She made a sign, and the Secretary was on her feet.</p> +<p>"And first we must ask Miss Harrison to explain <i>how</i> she +became possessed of the secret policy of the Union which has never +been discussed at any open meeting and is unknown to members of the +General Committee."</p> +<p>"Then," said Dorothy, "there <i>is</i> a secret policy?"</p> +<p>"You seem to know it. We have the right to ask <i>how</i> you +know? Unless you invented it."</p> +<p>Dorothy faced them. It was inconceivable that it should have +happened, that she should be standing there, in the old schoolroom +of her father's house, while two strange women worried her. She +knew that her back was to the wall and that the Blackadder girl had +been on the watch for the last half-hour to get her knife into her. +(Odd, for she had admired the Blackadder girl and her fighting +gestures.) It was inconceivable that she should have to answer to +that absurd committee for her honour. It was inconceivable that +Rosalind, her friend, should not help her.</p> +<p>Yet it had happened. With all her platform eloquence Rosalind +couldn't, for the life of her, get out one heroic, defending word. +From the moment when the Gilchrist woman had pounced, Rosalind had +simply sat and stared, like a rabbit, like a fish, her mouth open +for the word that would not come. Rosalind was afraid to stand up +for her. It was dreadful, and it was funny to see Rosalind looking +like that, and to realize the extent of her weakness and her +obstinacy.</p> +<p>Yet Rosalind had not changed. She was still the school-girl +slacker who could never do a stroke of work until somebody had +pushed her into it, who could never leave off working until stopped +by the same hand that had set her going. Her power to go, and to +let herself rip, and the weakness that made her depend on Dorothy +to start her were the qualities that attracted Dorothy to Rosalind +from the beginning. But now she was the tool of the fighting +Suffrage Women. Or if she wasn't a tool, she was a machine; her +brain was a rapid, docile, mechanical apparatus for turning out bad +imitations of Mrs. Palmerston-Swete and the two Blathwaites. Her +air of casual command, half-swagger, half-slouch, her stoop and the +thrusting forward of her face, were copied sedulously from an +admired model.</p> +<p>Dorothy found her pitiable. She was hypnotized by the +Blathwaites who worked her and would throw her away when she was of +no more use. She hadn't the strength to resist the pull and the +grip and the drive of other people. She couldn't even hold out +against Valentina Gilchrist and Maud Blackadder. Rosalind would +always be caught and spun round by any movement that was strong +enough. She was foredoomed to the Vortex.</p> +<p>That was Dorothy's fault. It was she who had pushed and pulled +the slacker, in spite of her almost whining protest, to the edge of +the Vortex; and it was Rosalind, not Dorothy, who had been caught +and sucked down into the swirl. She whirled in it now, and would go +on whirling, under the impression that her movements made it +move.</p> +<p>The Vortex fascinated Dorothy even while she resisted it. She +liked the feeling of her own power to resist, to keep her head, to +beat up against the rush of the whirlwind, to wheel round and round +outside it, and swerve away before the thing got her.</p> +<p>For Dorothy was afraid of the Feminist Vortex, as her brother +Michael had been afraid of the little vortex of school. She was +afraid of the herded women. She disliked the excited faces, and the +high voices skirling their battle-cries, and the silly business of +committees, and the platform slang. She was sick and shy before the +tremor and the surge of collective feeling; she loathed the +gestures and the movements of the collective soul, the swaying and +heaving and rushing forward of the many as one. She would not be +carried away by it; she would keep the clearness and hardness of +her soul. It was her soul they wanted, these women of the Union, +the Blathwaites and the Palmerston-Swetes, and Rosalind, and the +Blackadder girl and the Gilchrist woman; they ran out after her +like a hungry pack yelping for her soul; and she was not going to +throw it to them. She would fight for freedom, but not in their way +and not at their bidding.</p> +<p>She was her brother Michael, refusing to go to the party; +refusing to run with the school herd, holding out for his private +soul against other people who kept him from remembering. Only +Michael did not hold out. He ran away. She would stay, on the edge +of the vortex, fascinated by its danger, and resisting.</p> +<p>But as she looked at them, at Rosalind with her open mouth, at +the Blackadder girl who was scowling horribly, and at Valentina +Gilchrist, sceptical and quizzical, she laughed. The three had been +trying to rush her, and because they couldn't rush her they were +questioning her honour. She had asked them plainly for a plain +meaning, and their idea of apt repartee was to pretend to question +her honour.</p> +<p>Perhaps they really did question it. She didn't care. She +loathed their excited, silly, hurrying suspicion; but she didn't +care. It was she who had drawn them and led them on to this display +of incomparable idiocy. Like her brother Nicholas she found that +adversity was extremely funny; and she laughed.</p> +<p>She was no longer Michael, she was Nicky, not caring, delighting +in her power to fool them.</p> +<p>"You think," she said, "I'd no business to find out?"</p> +<p>"Your knowledge would certainly have been mysterious," said the +Secretary; "unless at least two confidences had been betrayed. +Supposing there had been any secret policy."</p> +<p>"Well, you see, I don't know it; and I didn't invent it; and I +didn't find it out--precisely. Your secret policy is the logical +conclusion of your present policy. I deduced it; that's all. +Anybody could have done the same. Does that satisfy you? (They +won't love me any better for making them look fools!)"</p> +<p>"Thank you," said Miss Gilchrist. "We only wanted to be +sure."</p> +<p>The dinner-bell rang as Dorothy was defining her position.</p> +<p>"I'll work for you; I'll speak for you; I'll write for you; I'll +fight for you. I'll make hay of every Government meeting, if I can +get in without lying and sneaking for it. I'll go to prison for +you, if I can choose my own crime. But I won't give up my liberty +of speech and thought and action. I won't pledge myself to obey +your orders. I won't pledge myself not to criticize policy I +disapprove of. I won't come on your Committee, and I won't join +your Union. Is that clear and precise enough?"</p> +<p>Somebody clapped and somebody said, "Hear, Hear!" And somebody +said, "Go it, Dorothy!"</p> +<p>It was Anthony and Frances and Captain Drayton, who paused +outside the door on their way to the dining-room, and listened, +basely.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>They were all going now. Dorothy stood at the door, holding it +open for them, glad that it was all over.</p> +<p>Only Phyllis Desmond, the art-student, lingered. Dorothy +reminded her that they had met at her aunt Vera Harrison's +house.</p> +<p>The art-student smiled. "I wondered when you were going to +remember."</p> +<p>"I did, but they all called you Desmond. That's what put me +out."</p> +<p>"Everybody calls me Desmond. You had a brother or something with +you, hadn't you?"</p> +<p>"I might have had two. Which? Michael's got green eyes and +yellow hair. Nicky's got blue eyes and black hair."</p> +<p>"It was Nicky--nice name--then."</p> +<p>Desmond's beauty stirred in its sleep. The film of air was +lifted from her black eyes.</p> +<p>"I'm dining with Mrs. Harrison to-night," she said.</p> +<p>"You'll be late then."</p> +<p>"It doesn't matter. Lawrence Stephen's never there till after +eight. She won't dine without him."</p> +<p>Dorothy stiffened. She did not like that furtive betrayal of +Vera and Lawrence Stephen.</p> +<p>"I wish you'd come and see me at my rooms in Chelsea. And bring +your brother. Not the green and yellow one. The blue and black +one."</p> +<p>Dorothy took the card on which Desmond had scribbled an address. +But she did not mean to go and see her. She wasn't sure that she +liked Desmond.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Rosalind stayed on to dine with Dorothy's family. She was no +longer living with her own family, for Mrs. Jervis was hostile to +Women's Franchise. She had rooms off the Strand, not far from the +headquarters of the Union.</p> +<p>Frances looked a little careworn. She had been sent for to +Grannie's house to see what could be done with Aunt Emmeline, and +had found, as usual, that nothing could be done with her. In the +last three years the second Miss Fleming had become less and less +enthusiastic, and more and more emphatic, till she ceased from +enthusiasm altogether and carried emphasis beyond the bounds of +sanity. She had become, as Frances put it, extremely tiresome.</p> +<p>It was not accurate to say, as Mrs. Fleming did, that you never +knew when Emmeline would start a nervous crisis; for as a matter of +fact you could time her to a minute. It was her habit to wait till +her family was absorbed in some urgent affair that diverted +attention from her case, and then to break out alarmingly. Dorothy +was generally sent for to bring her round; but to-day it was +Dorothy who had important things on hand. Aunt Emmeline had scented +the Suffrage meeting from afar, and had made arrangements +beforehand for a supreme crisis that would take all the shine out +of Dorothy's affair.</p> +<p>When Frances said that Aunt Emmy had been tiresome again, +Dorothy knew what she meant. For Aunt Emmy's idea was that her +sisters persecuted her; that Edie was jealous of her and hated her; +that Louie had always trampled on her and kept her under; that +Frances had used her influence with Grannie to spoil all her +chances one after another. It was all Frances's fault that Vera +Harrison had come between her and Major Cameron; Frances had +encouraged Vera in her infamous intrigue; and between them they had +wrecked two lives. And they had killed Major Cameron.</p> +<p>Since Ferdie's death Emmeline Fleming had lived most of the time +in a sort of dream in which it seemed to her that these things had +really happened.</p> +<p>This afternoon she had been more than usually tiresome. She had +simply raved.</p> +<p>"You should have brought her round to the meeting," said +Dorothy, "and let her rave there. I'd back Aunt Emmeline against +Maud Blackadder. I wish, Rosalind, you'd leave off making faces and +kicking my shins. You needn't worry any more, Mummy ducky. I'm +going to rope them all into the Suffrage Movement. Aunt Edie can +distribute literature, Aunt Louie can interrupt like anything, and +Aunt Emmeline can shout and sing."</p> +<p>"I think, Dorothy," said Rosalind with weak bitterness, "that +you might have stuck by me."</p> +<p>The two were walking down East Heath Road to the tram-lines +where the motor buses started for Charing Cross.</p> +<p>"It was you who dragged me into it, and the least you could do +was to stick. Why didn't you keep quiet instead of forcing our +hands?"</p> +<p>"I couldn't keep quiet. I'll go with you straight or I won't go +with you at all."</p> +<p>"You know what's the matter with you? It's your family. You'll +never be any good to us, you'll never be any good to yourself till +you've chucked them and got away. For years--ever since you've been +born--you've simply been stewing there in the family juice until +you're soaked with it. You oughtn't to be living at home. You ought +to be on your own--like me."</p> +<p>"You're talking rot, Rosalind. If my people were like yours I'd +have to chuck them, I suppose; but they're not. They're +angels."</p> +<p>"That's why they're so dangerous. They couldn't influence you if +they weren't angels."</p> +<p>"They don't influence me the least little bit. I'd like to see +them try. They're much too clever. They know I'd be off like a shot +if they did. Why, they let me do every mortal thing I please--turn +the schoolroom into a meeting hall for your friends to play the +devil in. That Blackadder girl was yelling the house down, yet they +didn't say anything. And your people aren't as bad as you make out, +you know. You couldn't live on your own if your father didn't give +you an allowance. I like Mrs. Jervis."</p> +<p>"Because she likes you."</p> +<p>"Well, that's a reason. It isn't the reason why I like my own +mother, because she doesn't like me so very much. That's why she +lets me do what I like. She doesn't care enough to stop me. She +only really cares for Dad and John and Nicky and Michael."</p> +<p>Rosalind looked fierce and stubborn.</p> +<p>"That's what's the matter with all of you," she said.</p> +<p>"What is?"</p> +<p>"Caring like that. It's all sex. Sex instinct, sex feeling. +Maud's right. It's what we're up against all the time."</p> +<p>Dorothy said to herself, "That's what's the matter with +Rosalind, if she only knew it."</p> +<p>Rosalind loved Michael and Michael detested her, and Nicky +didn't like her very much. She always looked fierce and stubborn +when she heard Michael's name.</p> +<p>Rosalind went on. "When it comes to sex you don't revolt. You +sit down."</p> +<p>"I do revolt. I'm revolting now. I go much farther than you do. +I think the marriage laws are rotten; I think divorce ought to be +for incompatibility. I think love isn't love and can't last unless +it's free. I think marriage ought to be abolished--not yet, +perhaps, but when we've become civilized. It will be. It's bound to +be. As it is, I think every woman has a right to have a baby if she +wants one. If Emmeline had had a baby, she wouldn't be devastating +us now."</p> +<p>"That's what you think, but it isn't what you feel. It's all +thinking with you, Dorothy. The revolt goes on in your brain. +You'll never do anything. It isn't that you haven't the courage to +go against your men. You haven't the will. You don't want to."</p> +<p>"Why should I? What do they do? Father and Michael and Nicky +don't interfere with me any more than Mother does."</p> +<p>"You know I'm not thinking of them. They don't really +matter."</p> +<p>"Who are you thinking of then? Frank Drayton? You needn't!"</p> +<p>It was mean of Rosalind to hit below the belt like that, when +she knew that <i>she</i> was safe. Michael had never been brought +against her and never would be. It was disgusting of her to imply +that Dorothy's state of mind was palpable, when her own (though +sufficiently advertised by her behaviour) had received from +Michael's sister the consecration of silence as a secret, tragic +thing.</p> +<p>They had reached the tram-lines.</p> +<p>At the sight of the Charing Cross `bus Rosalind assumed an air +of rollicking, adventurous travel.</p> +<p>"My hat! What an evening! I shall have a ripping ride down. +Don't say there's no room on the top. Cheer up, Dorothy!"</p> +<p>Which showed that Rosalind Jervis was a free woman, suggested +that life had richer thrills than marrying Dorothy's brother +Michael, and fixed the detested imputation securely on her +friend.</p> +<p>Dorothy watched her as she swung herself on to the footboard and +up the stair of the motor bus. There was room on the top. Rosalind, +in fact, had the top all to herself.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>As Dorothy crossed the Heath again in the twilight she saw +something white on the terrace of her father's house. Her mother +was waiting for her.</p> +<p>She thought at first that Aunt Emmeline had gone off her head +and that she had been sent for to keep her quiet. She gloried in +their dependence on her. But no, that wasn't likely. Her mother was +just watching for her as she used to watch for her and the boys +when they were little and had been sent across the Heath to +Grannie's house with a message.</p> +<p>And at the sight and memory of her mother Dorothy felt a +childish, sick dissatisfaction with herself and with her day, and +an absurd longing for the tranquillity and safety of the home whose +chief drawback lately had been that it was too tranquil and too +safe. She could almost have told her mother how they had all gone +for her, and how Rosalind had turned out rotten, and how beastly it +had all been. Almost, but not quite. Dorothy had grown up, and she +was there to protect and not to be protected. However agreeable it +might have been to confide in her mother, it wouldn't have +done.</p> +<p>Frances met her at the garden door. She had been crying.</p> +<p>"Nicky's come home," she said.</p> +<p>"Nicky?"</p> +<p>"He's been sent down."</p> +<p>"Whatever for?"</p> +<p>"Darling, I can't possibly tell you."</p> +<p>But in the end she did.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XII"></a>XII</h2> +<br> +<p>Up till now Frances had taken a quiet interest in Women's +Suffrage. It had got itself into the papers and thus become part of +the affairs of the nation. The names of Mrs. Palmerston-Swete and +Mrs. Blathwaite and Angela Blathwaite had got into the papers, +where Frances hoped and prayed that the name of Dorothea Harrison +might not follow them. The spectacle of a frantic Government at +grips with the Women's Franchise Union had not yet received the +head-lines accorded to the reports of divorce and breach of promise +cases and fires in paraffin shops; still, it was beginning to +figure, and if Frances's <i>Times</i> ignored it, there were other +papers that Dorothy brought home.</p> +<p>But for Frances the affairs of the nation sank into +insignificance beside Nicky's Cambridge affair.</p> +<p>There could be no doubt that Nicky's affair was serious. You +could not, Anthony said, get over the letters, the Master's letter +and the Professor's letter and Michael's. They had arrived one hour +after Nicky, Nicky so changed from his former candour that he +refused to give any account of himself beyond the simple statement +that he had been sent down. They'd know, he had said, soon enough +why.</p> +<p>And soon enough they did know.</p> +<p>To be sure no details could be disentangled from the discreet +ambiguities of the Master and the Professor. But Michael's letter +was more explicit. Nicky had been sent down because old "Booster" +had got it into his head that Nicky had been making love to +"Booster's" wife when she didn't want to be made love to, and +nothing could get it out of "Booster's" head.</p> +<p>Michael was bound to stand up for his brother, and it was clear +to Anthony that so grave a charge could hardly have been brought +without some reason. The tone of the letters, especially the +Professor's, was extraordinarily restrained. That was what made the +thing stand out in its sheer awfulness. The Professor, although, +according to Michael, he conceived himself to be profoundly +injured, wrote sorrowfully, in consideration of Nicky's youth.</p> +<p>There was one redeeming circumstance, the Master and the +Professor both laid stress on it: Anthony's son had not attempted +to deny it.</p> +<p>"There must," Frances said wildly, "be some terrible +mistake."</p> +<p>But Nicky cut the ground from under the theory of the terrible +mistake by continuing in his refusal to deny it.</p> +<p>"What sort of woman," said Anthony, "is the Professor's +wife?"</p> +<p>"Oh, awfully decent," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"You had no encouragement, then, no provocation?"</p> +<p>"She's awfully fascinating," said Nicky.</p> +<p>Then Frances had another thought. It seemed to her that Nicky +was evading.</p> +<p>"Are you sure you're not screening somebody else?"</p> +<p>"Screening somebody else? Do you mean some other fellow?"</p> +<p>"Yes. I'm not asking you to give the name, Nicky."</p> +<p>"I swear I'm not. Why should I be? I can't think why you're all +making such a fuss about it. I don't mean poor old 'Booster.' He's +got some cause, if you like."</p> +<p>"But what was it you did--really did, Nicky?"</p> +<p>"You've read the letters, Mother."</p> +<p>Nicky's adolescence seemed to die and pass from him there and +then; and she saw a stubborn, hard virility that frightened and +repelled her, forcing her to believe that it might have really +happened.</p> +<p>To Frances the awfulness of it was beyond belief. And the pathos +of her belief in Nicky was unbearable to Anthony. There were the +letters.</p> +<p>"I think, dear," Anthony said, "you'd better leave us."</p> +<p>"Mayn't I stay?" It was as if she thought that by staying she +could bring Nicky's youth back to life again.</p> +<p>"No," said Anthony.</p> +<p>She went, and Nicky opened the door for her. His hard, tight +man's face looked at her as if it had been she who had sinned and +he who suffered, intolerably, for her sin. The click of the door as +he shut it stabbed her.</p> +<p>"It's a damnable business, father. We'd better not talk about +it."</p> +<p>But Anthony would talk about it. And when he had done talking +all that Nicky had to say was: "You know as well as I do that these +things happen."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>For Nicky had thought it out very carefully beforehand in the +train. What else could he say? He couldn't tell them that +"Booster's" poor little wife had lost her head and made hysterical +love to him, and had been so frightened at what she had done that +she had made him promise on his word of honour that, whatever +happened, he wouldn't give her away to anybody, not even to his own +people.</p> +<p>He supposed that either Peggy had given herself away, or that +poor old "Booster" had found her out. He supposed that, having +found her out, there was no other line that "Booster" could have +taken. Anyhow, there was no other line that <i>he</i> could take; +because, in the world where these things happened, being found out +would be fifty times worse for Peggy than it would be for him.</p> +<p>He tried to recall the scene in the back drawing-room where she +had asked him so often to have tea with her alone. The most vivid +part was the end of it, after he had given his promise. Peggy had +broken down and put her head on his shoulder and cried like +anything. And it was at that moment that Nicky thought of +"Booster," and how awful and yet how funny it would be if he walked +into the room and saw him there. He had tried hard not to think +what "Booster's" face would look like; he had tried hard not to +laugh as long as Peggy's head was on his shoulder, for fear of +hurting her feelings; but when she took it off he did give one +half-strangled snort; for it really was the rummest thing that had +ever happened to him.</p> +<p>He didn't know, and he couldn't possibly have guessed, that as +soon as the door had shut on him Peggy's passion had turned to rage +and utter detestation of Nicky (for she had heard the snort); and +that she had gone straight to her husband's study and put her head +on <i>his</i> shoulder, and cried, and told him a lie; and that it +was Peggy's lie and not the Professor's imagination that had caused +him to be sent down. And even if Peggy had not been Lord Somebody's +daughter and related to all sorts of influential people she would +still have been capable of turning every male head in the +University. For she was a small, gentle woman with enchanting +manners and the most beautiful and pathetic eyes, and she had not +yet been found out. Therefore it was more likely that an +undergraduate with a face like Nicky's should lose his head than +that a woman with a face like Peggy's should, for no conceivable +reason, tell a lie. So that, even if Nicky's word of honour had not +been previously pledged to his accuser, it would have had no chance +against any statement that she chose to make. And even if he had +known that she had lied, he couldn't very well have given it +against poor pretty Peggy who had lost her head and got +frightened.</p> +<p>As Nicky packed up his clothes and his books he said, "I don't +care if I am sent down. It would have been fifty times worse for +her than it is for me."</p> +<p>He had no idea how bad it was, nor how much worse it was going +to be. For it ended in his going that night from his father's house +to the house in St. John's Wood where Vera and Mr. Lawrence Stephen +lived.</p> +<p>And it was there that he met Desmond.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicky congratulated himself on having pulled it off so well. At +the same time he was a little surprised at the ease with which he +had taken his father and mother in. He might have understood it if +he had known that Vera had been before him, and that she had warned +them long ago that this was precisely the sort of thing they would +have to look out for. And as no opinion ever uttered on the subject +of their children was likely to be forgotten by Frances and +Anthony, when this particular disaster came they were more prepared +for it than they would have believed possible.</p> +<p>But there were two members of his family whom Nicky had failed +altogether to convince, Michael and Dorothy. Michael luckily, Nicky +said to himself, was not on the spot, and his letter had no weight +against the letters of the Master and the Professor, and on this +also Nicky had calculated. He reckoned without Dorothy, judging it +hardly likely that she would be allowed to know anything about it. +Nobody, not even Frances, was yet aware of Dorothy's +importance.</p> +<p>And Dorothy, because of her importance, blamed herself for all +that happened afterwards. If she had not had that damned Suffrage +meeting, Rosalind would not have stayed to dinner; if Rosalind had +not stayed to dinner she would not have gone with her to the +tram-lines; if she had not gone with her to the tram-lines she +would have been at home to stop Nicky from going to St. John's +Wood. As it was, Nicky had reached the main road at the top of the +lane just as Dorothy was entering it from the bottom.</p> +<p>At first Frances did not want Dorothy to see her father. He was +most horribly upset and must not be disturbed. But Dorothy +insisted. Her father had the letters, and she must see the +letters.</p> +<p>"I may understand them better than you or Daddy," she said. "You +see, Mummy, I know these Cambridge people. They're awful asses, +some of them."</p> +<p>And though her mother doubted whether attendance at the +Professor's lectures would give Dorothy much insight into the +affair, she had her way. Anthony was too weak to resist her. He +pushed the letters towards her without a word. He would rather she +had been left out of it. And yet somehow the sight of her, coming +in, so robust and undismayed and competent, gave him a sort of +comfort.</p> +<p>Dorothy did not agree with Michael. There was more in it than +the Professor's imagination. The Professor, she said, hadn't got +any imagination; you could tell from the way he lectured. But she +did not believe one word of the charge against her brother. +Something had happened and Nicky was screening somebody.</p> +<p>"I'll bet you anything you like," said Dorothy, "it's +'Booster's' wife. She's made him give his word."</p> +<p>Dorothy was sure that "Booster's" wife was a bad lot.</p> +<p>"Nicky said she was awfully decent."</p> +<p>"He'd <i>have</i> to. He couldn't do it by halves."</p> +<p>"They couldn't have sent him down, unless they'd sifted the +thing to the bottom."</p> +<p>"I daresay they've sifted all they could, the silly asses."</p> +<p>She could have killed them for making her father suffer. The +sight of his drawn face hurt her abominably. She had never seen him +like that. She wasn't half so sorry for her mother who was +sustained by a secret, ineradicable faith in Nicky. Why couldn't he +have faith in Nicky too? Was it because he was a man and knew that +these things happened?</p> +<p>"Daddy--being sent down isn't such an awful calamity. It isn't +going to blast his career or anything. It's always touch and go. +<i>I</i> might have been sent down any day. I should have been if +they'd known about me half what they don't know about Nicky. Why +can't you take it as a rag? You bet <i>he</i> does."</p> +<p>Anthony removed himself from her protecting hand. He got up and +went to bed.</p> +<p>But he did not sleep there. Neither he nor Frances slept. And he +came down in the morning looking worse than ever.</p> +<p>Dorothy thought, "It must be awful to have children if it makes +you feel like that." She thought, "It's a lucky thing they're not +likely to cut up the same way about me." She thought again, "It +must be awful to have children." She thought of the old discussions +in her room at Newnham, about the woman's right to the child, and +free union, and easy divorce, and the abolition of the family. Her +own violent and revolutionary speeches (for which she liked to +think she might have been sent down) sounded faint and far-off and +irrelevant. She did not really want to abolish Frances and Anthony. +And yet, if they had been abolished, as part of the deplorable +institution of parentage, it would have been better for them; for +then they would not be suffering as they did.</p> +<p>It must be awful to have children. But perhaps they knew that it +was worth it.</p> +<p>And as her thoughts travelled that way they were overtaken all +of a sudden by an idea. She did not stop to ask herself what +business her idea had in that neighbourhood. She went down first +thing after breakfast and sent off two wires; one to Captain +Drayton at Croft House, Eltham; one to the same person at the Royal +Military Academy, Woolwich.</p> +<p>"Can I see you? It's about Nicky.</p> +<p>"DOROTHY HARRISON."</p> +<p>Wires to show that she was impersonal and businesslike, and that +her business was urgent. "Can I see you?" to show that he was not +being invited to see <i>her</i>. "It's about Nicky" to justify the +whole proceeding. "Dorothy Harrison" because "Dorothy" by itself +was too much.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>As soon as she had sent off her wires Dorothy felt a sense of +happiness and well-being. She had no grounds for happiness; far +otherwise; her great friendship with Rosalind Jervis was +disintegrating bit by bit owing to Rosalind's behaviour; the fiery +Suffrage meeting had turned into dust and ashes; her darling Nicky +was in a nasty scrape; her father and mother were utterly +miserable; yet she was happy.</p> +<p>Half-way home her mind began to ask questions of its own +accord.</p> +<p>"Supposing you had to choose between the Suffrage and Frank +Drayton?"</p> +<p>"But I haven't got to."</p> +<p>"You might have. You know you might any minute. You know he +hates it. And supposing--"</p> +<p>But Dorothy refused to give any answer.</p> +<p>His wire came within the next half hour.</p> +<p>"Coming three sharp. FRANK."</p> +<p>Her sense of well-being increased almost to exaltation.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>He arrived with punctuality at three o'clock. (He was in the +gunners and had a job at Woolwich.) She found him standing on the +hearth-rug in the drawing-room. He had blown his nose when he heard +her coming, and that meant that he was nervous. She caught him +stuffing his pocket-handkerchief (a piece of damning evidence) into +his breast-pocket.</p> +<p>With her knowledge of his nervousness her exaltation ceased as +if it had not been. At the sight of him it was as if the sentence +hidden somewhere in her mind--"You'll have to choose. You know +you'll have to"--escaping thought and language, had expressed +itself in one suffocating pang. Unless Nicky's affair staved off +the dreadful moment.</p> +<p>"Were you frightfully busy?"</p> +<p>"No, thank goodness."</p> +<p>The luck she had had! Of course, if he had been busy he couldn't +possibly have come.</p> +<p>She could look at him now without a tightening in her throat. +She liked to look at him. He was made all of one piece. She liked +his square face and short fine hair, both the colour of light-brown +earth; his eyes, the colour of light brown earth under clear water; +eyes that looked small because they were set so deep. She liked +their sudden narrowing and their deep wrinkles when he smiled. She +liked his jutting chin, and the fine, rather small mouth that +jerked his face slightly crooked when he laughed. She liked that +slender crookedness that made it a face remarkable and unique among +faces. She liked his brains. She liked all that she had ever seen +or heard of him.</p> +<p>Vera had told them that once, at an up-country station in India, +he had stopped a mutiny in a native battery by laughing in the +men's faces. Somebody that Ferdie knew had been with him and saw it +happen. The men broke into his office where he was sitting, +vulnerably, in his shirt-sleeves. They had brought knives with +them, beastly native things, and they had their hands on the +handles, ready. They screamed and gesticulated with excitement. And +Frank Drayton leaned back in his office chair and looked at them, +and burst out laughing, because, he said, they made such funny +faces. When they got to fingering their knives, he tilted back his +chair and rocked with laughter. His sudden, incredible mirth +frightened them and stopped the mutiny. She could see him, she +could see his face jerked crooked with delight.</p> +<p>That was the sort of thing that Nicky would have done. She loved +him for that. She loved him because he was like Nicky.</p> +<p>She was not able to recall the process of the states that +flowered in that mysterious sense of well-being and exaltation. A +year ago Frank Drayton had been only "that nice man we used to meet +at Cheltenham." First of all he had been Ferdie's and Vera's +friend. Then he became Nicky's friend; the only one who took a +serious interest in his inventions and supported him when he wanted +to go into the Army and consoled him when he was frustrated. Then +he had become the friend of the family. Now he was recognized as +more particularly Dorothea's friend.</p> +<p>At Cheltenham he had been home on leave; and it was not until +this year that he had got his job at Woolwich teaching gunnery, +while he waited for a bigger job in the Ordnance Department. Ferdie +Cameron had always said that Frank Drayton would be worth watching. +He would be part of the brains of the Army some day. Nicky watched +him. His brains and their familiarity with explosives and the +machinery of warfare had been his original attraction for Nicky. +But it was Dorothea who watched him most.</p> +<p>She plunged abruptly into Nicky's affair, giving names and +lineage. "You know all sorts of people, do you know anything about +her?"</p> +<p>He looked at her clearly, without smiling. Then he said "Yes. I +know a good bit about her. Is that what's wrong with Nicky?"</p> +<p>"Not exactly. But he's been sent down."</p> +<p>His wry smile intimated that such things might be.</p> +<p>Then she told him what the Master had written and what the +Professor had written and what Michael had written, and what Nicky +had said, and what she, Dorothea thought. Drayton smiled over the +Master's and the Professor's letters, but when it came to Michael's +letter he laughed aloud.</p> +<p>"It's all very well for <i>us</i>. But Daddy and Mummy are +breaking their hearts. Daddy says he's going down to Cambridge to +see what really did happen."</p> +<p>Again that clear look. She gathered that he disapproved of +"Booster's" wife. He disapproved of so many things: of Women's +Suffrage; of revolutions; of women who revolted; of anybody who +revolted; of Mrs. Palmerston-Swete and Mrs. Blathwaite and Angela +Blathwaite. It was putting it too mildly to say he disapproved of +Rosalind Jervis; he detested her. He disapproved of Vera and of her +going to see Vera; she remembered that he had even disapproved, +long ago, of poor Ferdie, though he liked him. Evidently he +disapproved of "Booster's" wife for the same reason that he +disapproved of Vera. That was why he didn't say so.</p> +<p>"I believe you think all the time I'm right," she said. "Would +you go down if you were he?"</p> +<p>"No. I wouldn't."</p> +<p>"Why not?"</p> +<p>"Because he won't get anything out of them. They can't give her +away any more than Nicky can. Or than <i>you</i> can, Dorothy."</p> +<p>"You mean I've done it already--to you. I <i>had</i> to, because +of Nicky. I can't help it if you <i>do</i> think it was beastly of +me."</p> +<p>"My dear child--"</p> +<p>He got up vehemently, as if his idea was to take her in his arms +and stifle her outbreak that way. But something in her eyes, cold, +unready, yet aware of him, repelled him.</p> +<p>He thought: "It's too soon. She's all rigid. She isn't alive +yet. That's not what she wired for." He thought: "I wish people +wouldn't send their children to Newnham. It retards their +development by ten years."</p> +<p>And she thought: "No. I mustn't let him do that. For then he +won't be able to go back on me when I tell him my opinions. It +would be simply trapping him. Supposing--supposing--"</p> +<p>She did not know that that instinctive renunciation was her +answer to the question. Her honour would come first.</p> +<p>"Of course. Of course you had to."</p> +<p>"What would you do about it if you were Daddy?"</p> +<p>"I should send them all to blazes."</p> +<p>"No, but <i>really</i> do?"</p> +<p>"I should do nothing. I should leave it. You'll find that before +very long there'll be letters of apology and restitution."</p> +<p>"Will you come down to the office with me and tell Daddy +that?"</p> +<p>"Yes, if you'll come to tea with me somewhere afterwards."</p> +<p>(He really couldn't be expected to do all this for nothing.)</p> +<p>She sent her mother to him while she put on her hat and coat. +When she came down Frances was happy again.</p> +<p>"You see, Mummy, I was right, after all."</p> +<p>"You always were right, darling, all the time."</p> +<p>For the life of her she couldn't help giving that little flick +at her infallible daughter.</p> +<p>"She <i>is</i> right--most of the time," said Drayton. His eyes +covered and protected her.</p> +<p>Anthony was in his office, sitting before the open doors of the +cabinet where he kept his samples of rare and valuable woods. The +polished slabs were laid before him on the table in rows, as he had +arranged them to show to a customer: wine-coloured mahogany, and +golden satinwood; ebony black as jet; tulip-wood mottled like fine +tortoiseshell; coromandel wood, striped black and white like the +coat of a civet cat; ghostly basswood, shining white on dead white; +woods of clouded grain, and woods of shining grain, grain that +showed like the slanting, splintered lines of hewn stone, like +moss, like the veins of flowers, the fringes of birds' feathers, +the striping and dappling of beasts; woods of exquisite grain where +the life of the tree drew its own image in its own heart; woods +whose surface was tender to the touch like a fine tissue; and +sweet-smelling sandalwood and camphor-wood and cedar.</p> +<p>Anthony loved his shining, polished slabs of wood. If a man must +have a business, let it be timber. Timber was a clean and fine and +noble thing. He had brought the working of his business to such a +pitch of smooth perfection that his two elder sons, Michael and +Nicholas, could catch up with it easily and take it in their +stride.</p> +<p>Now he was like a sick child that has ranged all its toys in +front of it and finds no comfort in them.</p> +<p>And, as he looked at them, the tulip-wood and the scented +sandalwood and camphor-wood gave him an idea.</p> +<p>The Master and the Professor had both advised him to send his +son Nicholas out of England for a little while. "Let him travel for +six months and get the whole miserable business out of his +head."</p> +<p>Nicky, when he gave up the Army, had told him flatly that he +would rather die than spend his life sitting in a beastly office. +Nicky had put it to him that timber meant trees, and trees meant +forests; why, lots of the stuff they imported came from the +Himalaya and the West Indies and Ceylon. He had reminded him that +he was always saying a timber merchant couldn't know enough about +the living tree. Why shouldn't he go into the places where the +living trees grew and learn all about them? Why shouldn't he be a +tree-expert? Since they were specializing in rare and foreign +woods, why shouldn't he specialize in rare and foreign trees?</p> +<p>And the slabs of tulip-wood and scented camphor-wood and +sandalwood were saying to Anthony, "Why not?" Neither he nor +Frances had wanted Nicky to go off to the West Indies and the +Himalaya; but now, since clearly he must go off somewhere, why +not?</p> +<p>Drayton and Dorothy came in just as Anthony (still profoundly +dejected) was saying to himself, "Reinstate him. Give him +responsibility--curiosity--healthy interests. Get the whole +miserable business out of his head."</p> +<p>It seemed incredible, after what they had gone through, that +Drayton should be standing there, telling him that there was +nothing in it, that there never had been any miserable business, +that it was all a storm in a hysterical woman's teacup. He blew the +whole dirty nightmare to nothing with the laughter that was like +Nicky's own laughter.</p> +<p>Then Anthony and Drayton and Dorothy sat round the table, +drafting letters to the Master and the Professor. Anthony, at +Drayton's dictation, informed them that he regretted the step they +had seen fit to take; that he knew his own son well enough to be +pretty certain that there had been some misunderstanding; +therefore, unless he received within three days a written +withdrawal of the charge against his son Nicholas, he would be +obliged to remove his son Michael from the Master's College.</p> +<p>The idea of removing Michael was Anthony's own inspiration.</p> +<p>Drayton's advice was that he should give Nicky his choice +between Oxford and Germany, the big School of Forestry at +Aschaffenburg. If he chose Germany, he would be well grounded; he +could specialize and travel afterwards.</p> +<p>"Now <i>that's</i> all over," Anthony said, "you two had better +come and have tea with me somewhere."</p> +<p>But there was something in their faces that made him consult his +watch and find that "Oh dear me, no! he was afraid he couldn't." He +had an appointment at five.</p> +<p>When they were well out of sight he locked up his toys in his +cabinet, left the appointment at five to Mr. Vereker, and went home +to tell Frances about the letters he had written to Cambridge and +the plans that had been made for Nicky's future.</p> +<p>"He'll choose Germany," Anthony said. "But that can't be +helped."</p> +<p>Frances agreed that they could hardly have hit upon a better +plan.</p> +<p>So the affair of Nicky and "Booster's" wife was as if it had +never been. And for that they thanked the blessed common sense and +sanity of Captain Drayton.</p> +<p>And yet Anthony's idea was wrecked by "Booster's" wife. It had +come too late. Anthony had overlooked the fact that his son had +seventeen hours' start of him. He was unaware of the existence of +Nicky's own idea; and he had not allowed for the stiff logic of his +position.</p> +<p>When he drove down in his car to St. John's Wood to fetch Nicky, +he found that he had left that afternoon for Chelsea, where, Vera +told him, he had taken rooms.</p> +<p>She gave him the address. It had no significance for +Anthony.</p> +<p>Nicky refused to be fetched back from his rooms in Chelsea. For +he had not left his father's house in a huff; he had left it in his +wisdom, to avoid the embarrassment of an incredible position. His +position, as he pointed out to his father, had not changed. He was +as big a blackguard to-day as he was yesterday; the only difference +was, that to-morrow or the next day he would be a self-supporting +blackguard.</p> +<p>He wouldn't listen to his father's plan. It was a beautiful +plan, but it would only mean spending more money on him. He'd be +pretty good, he thought, at looking after machinery. He was going +to try for a job as a chauffeur or foreman mechanic. He thought he +knew where he could get one; but supposing he couldn't get it, if +his father cared to take him on at the works for a bit he'd come +like a shot; but he couldn't stay there, because it wouldn't be +good enough.</p> +<p>He was absolutely serious, and absolutely firm in the logic of +his position. For he argued that, if he allowed himself to be taken +back as though nothing had happened, this, more than anything he +could well think of, would be giving Peggy away.</p> +<p>He sent his love to his mother and Dorothy, and promised to come +out and dine with them as soon as he had got his job.</p> +<p>So Anthony drove back without him. But as he drove he smiled. +And Frances smiled, too, when he told her.</p> +<p>"There he is, the young monkey, and there he'll stay. It's +magnificent, but of course he's an ass."</p> +<p>"If you can't be an ass at twenty," said Frances, "when can you +be?"</p> +<p>They said it was so like Nicky. For all he knew to the contrary +his career was ruined; but he didn't care. You couldn't make any +impression on him. They wondered if anybody ever would.</p> +<p>Dorothy wondered too.</p> +<p>"What sort of rooms has he got, Anthony?" said Frances.</p> +<p>"Very nice rooms, at the top of the house, looking over the +river."</p> +<p>"Darling Nicky, I shall go and see him. What are you thinking +of, Dorothy?"</p> +<p>Dorothy was thinking that Nicky's address at Chelsea was the +address that Desmond had given her yesterday.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XIII"></a>XIII</h2> +<br> +<p>When Frances heard that Nicholas was going about everywhere with +the painter girl they called Desmond, she wrote to Vera to come and +see her. She could never bring herself to go to the St. John's Wood +house that was so much more Mr. Lawrence Stephen's house than it +was Vera's.</p> +<p>The three eldest children went now and then, refusing to go back +on Vera. Frances did not like it, but she had not interfered with +their liberty so far as to forbid it positively; for she judged +that frustration might create an appetite for Mr. Stephen's society +that otherwise they might not, after all, acquire.</p> +<p>Vera understood that her husband's brother and sister-in-law +could hardly be expected to condone her last aberration. Her +attachment to Ferdie Cameron had been different. It was inevitable, +and in a sense forgivable, seeing that it had been brought about by +Bartie's sheer impossibility. Besides, the knowledge of it had +dawned on them so gradually and through so many stages of +extenuating tragedy, that, even when it became an open certainty, +the benefit of the long doubt remained. And there was Veronica. +There was still Veronica. Even without Veronica Vera would have had +to think of something far worse than Lawrence Stephen before +Frances would have cast her off. Frances felt that it was not for +her to sit in judgment under the shelter of her tree of Heaven. +Supposing she could only have had Anthony as Vera had had Ferdie, +could she have lived without him? For Frances nothing in the world +had any use or interest or significance but her husband and her +children; her children first, and Anthony after them. For Vera +nothing in the world counted but her lover.</p> +<p>"If only I were as sure of Lawrence as you are of Anthony!" she +would say.</p> +<p>Yet she lived the more intensely, if the more dangerously, +through the very risks of her exposed and forbidden love.</p> +<p>Vera was without fidelity to the unreturning dead; but she made +up for it by an incorruptible adoration of the living. And she had +been made notorious chiefly through Stephen's celebrity, which was, +you might say, a pure accident.</p> +<p>Thus Frances made shelter for her friend. Only Vera must be made +to understand that, though <i>she</i> was accepted Lawrence Stephen +was not. He was the point at which toleration ceased.</p> +<p>And Vera did understand. She understood that Frances and Anthony +disapproved of her last adventure considerably more on Ferdie's and +Veronica's account than on Bartie's. Even family loyalty could not +espouse Bartie's cause with any zest. For Bartie showed himself +implacable. Over and over again she had implored him to divorce her +so that Lawrence might marry her, and over and over again he had +refused. His idea was to assert himself by refusals. In that way he +could still feel that he had power over her and a sort of +possession. It was he who was scandalous. Even now neither Frances +nor Anthony had a word to say for him.</p> +<p>So Vera consented to be received surreptitiously, by herself, +and without receiving Frances and Anthony in her turn. It had hurt +her; but Stephen's celebrity was a dressing to her wound. He was so +distinguished that it was unlikely that Frances, or Anthony either, +would ever have been received by him without Vera. She came, +looking half cynical, half pathetic, her beauty a little blurred, a +little beaten after seventeen years of passion and danger, saying +that she wasn't going to force Larry down their throats if they +didn't like him; and she went away sustained by her sense of his +distinction and <i>his</i> repudiations.</p> +<p>And she found further support in her knowledge that, if Frances +and Anthony could resist Lawrence, their children couldn't. Michael +and Dorothy were acquiring a taste for him and for the people he +knew; and he knew almost everybody who was worth knowing. To be +seen at the parties he and Vera gave in St. John's Wood was itself +distinction. Vera had never forgotten and never would forget what +Anthony and Frances had done for her and Ferdie when they took +Veronica. She wanted to make up, to pay back, to help their +children as they had helped her child; to give the best she had, +and do what they, poor darlings, couldn't possibly have done. +Nicholas was all right; but Michael's case was lamentable. In his +family and in the dull round of their acquaintance there was not +anybody who was likely to be of the least use to Michael; not +anybody that he cared to know. No wonder that he kept up his old +attitude of refusing to go to the party. Lawrence Stephen had +promised her that he would help Michael.</p> +<p>And Frances was afraid. She saw her children, Michael, Nicholas +and Dorothy, swept every day a little farther from the firm, +well-ordered sanctities, a little nearer to the unclean moral +vortex that to her was the most redoubtable of all. She hid her +fear, because in her wisdom she knew that to show fear was not the +way to keep her children. She hid her strength because she knew +that to show it was not the way. Her strength was in their love of +her. She had only used it once when she had stopped Nicky from +going into the Army. She had said to herself then, "I will never do +that again." It wasn't fair. It was a sort of sacrilege, a +treachery. Love was holy; it should never be used, never be +bargained with. She tried to hold the balance even between their +youth and their maturity.</p> +<p>So Frances fought her fear.</p> +<p>She had known that Ferdie Cameron was good, as she put it, "in +spite of everything"; but she had not seen Lawrence Stephen, and +she did not know that he had sensibilities and prejudices and +scruples like her own, and that he and Vera distinguished very +carefully between the people who would be good for Michael and +Nicholas and Dorothy, and the people who would not. She did not +know that they both drew the line at Desmond.</p> +<p>Vera protested that it was not her fault, it was not Lawrence's +fault that Nicky had met Desmond. She had never asked them to meet +each other. She did not deny that it was in her house they +<i>had</i> met; but she had not introduced them. Desmond had +introduced herself, on the grounds that she knew Dorothy. Vera +suspected that, from the first moment when she had seen him +there--by pure accident--she had marked him down. Very likely she +had wriggled into Dorothy's Suffrage meeting on purpose. She was +capable of anything.</p> +<p>Not that Vera thought there was any need for Frances to worry. +It was most unlikely that Desmond's business with Nicky could be +serious. For one thing she was too young herself to care for +anybody as young as Nicky. For another she happened to be in the +beginning, or the middle, certainly nowhere near the end of a +tremendous affair with Headley Richards. As she was designing the +dresses and the scenery for the new play he was putting on at the +Independent Theatre, Vera argued very plausibly that the affair had +only just started, and that Frances must allow it a certain time to +run.</p> +<p>"I hope to goodness that the Richards man will marry her."</p> +<p>"My dear, how can he? He's married already to a nice little +woman that he isn't half tired of yet. Desmond was determined to +have him and she's got him; but he's only taken her in his stride, +as you may say. I don't suppose he cares very much one way or +another. But with Desmond it's a point of honour."</p> +<p>"What's a point of honour?"</p> +<p>"Why, to have him. Not to be left out. Besides, she always said +she could take him from poor little Ginny Richards, and she's done +it. That was another point of honour."</p> +<p>With a calmness that was horrible to Frances Vera weighed her +friend Desmond's case. To Frances it was as if she had never known +Vera. Either Vera had changed or she had never known her. She had +never known women, or men either, who discussed such performances +with calmness. Vera herself hadn't made her infidelities a point of +honour.</p> +<p>These were the passions and the thoughts of Lawrence Stephen's +and of Desmond's world; these were the things it took for granted. +These people lived in a moral vortex; they whirled round and round +with each other; they were powerless to resist the swirl. Not one +of them had any other care than to love and to make love after the +manner of the Vortex. This was their honour, not to be left out of +it, not to be left out of the vortex, but to be carried away, to be +sucked in, and whirl round and round with each other and the +rest.</p> +<p>The painter girl Desmond was horrible to Frances.</p> +<p>And all the time her mind was busy with one question: "Do you +think Nicky knows?"</p> +<p>"I'm perfectly sure he doesn't."</p> +<p>"Perhaps--if he did--"</p> +<p>"No, my dear, that's no good. If you tell him he won't believe +it. You'll have all his chivalry up in arms. And you'll be putting +into his head what may never come into it if he's left alone. And +you'll be putting it into Desmond's head."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Captain Drayton, whom Anthony consulted, said, "Leave him +alone." Those painting and writing johnnies were a rum lot. You +couldn't take them seriously. The Desmond girl might be everything +that Vera Harrison said she was. He didn't think, though, that the +idea of making love to her would enter Nicky's head if they left +him alone. Nicky's head had more important ideas in it.</p> +<p>So they left him alone.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>And at first Nicholas really was too busy to think much of +Desmond. Too busy with his assistant manager's job at the Morss +Motor Works; too busy with one of the little ideas to which he owed +the sudden rise in his position: the little idea of making the +Morss cars go faster; too busy with his big Idea which had nothing +whatever to do with the Morss Company and their cars.</p> +<p>His big Idea was the idea of the Moving Fortress. The dream of a +French engineer, the old, abandoned dream of the <i>forteresse +mobile</i>, had become Nicky's passion. He claimed no originality +for his idea. It was a composite of the amoured train, the +revolving turret, the tractor with caterpillar wheels and the +motor-car. These things had welded themselves together gradually in +Nicky's mind during his last year at Cambridge. The table in +Nicky's sitting-room at the top of the house in Chelsea was now +covered with the parts of his model of the Moving Fortress. He made +them at the Works, one by one; for the Morss Company were proud of +him, and he had leave to use their material and plant now and then +for little ideas of his own. The idea of the Moving Fortress was +with him all day in the workshops and offices and showrooms, +hovering like a formless spiritual presence among the wheeled +forms. But in the evening it took shape and sound. It arose and +moved, after its fashion, as he had conceived it, beautiful, +monstrous, terrible. At night, beside the image of the +<i>forteresse mobile</i>, the image of Desmond was a thin ghost +that stood back, mournful and dumb, in the right-hand corner of the +vision.</p> +<p>But the image of Desmond was there.</p> +<p>At first it stood for Nicky's predominant anxiety: "I wonder +when Desmond will have finished the drawings."</p> +<p>The model of the Moving Fortress waited upon Desmond's +caprice.</p> +<p>The plans of the parts and sections had to be finished before +these could be fitted together and the permanent model of the +Moving Fortress set up. The Moving Fortress itself waited upon +Desmond.</p> +<p>For, though Nicky could make and build his engine, he could not +draw his plans properly; and he could not trust anybody who +understood engines to draw them. He was haunted, almost insanely, +by the fear that somebody else would hit upon the idea of the +Moving Fortress; it seemed to him so obvious that no gunner and no +engineer could miss it. And the drawings Desmond made for him, the +drawings in black and white, the drawings in grey wash, and the +coloured drawings were perfect. Nicky, unskilled in everything but +the inventing and building up of engines, did not know how perfect +the drawings were, any more than he knew the value of the +extraordinary pictures that hung on the walls and stood on the +easels in her studio; but he did know that, from the moment when he +took Desmond into his adventure, he and his Idea were dependent on +her.</p> +<p>He didn't care. He liked Desmond. He couldn't help it if Drayton +disapproved of her and if Dorothy didn't like her. She was, he said +to himself, a ripping good sort. She might be frightfully clever; +Nicky rather thought she was; but she never let you feel it; she +never talked that revolting rot that Rosalind and Dorothy's other +friends talked. She let you think.</p> +<p>It was Desmond who told him that his sister didn't like her and +that Frank Drayton disapproved of her.</p> +<p>"They wouldn't," said Nicky, "if they knew you." And he turned +again to the subject of his Moving Fortress.</p> +<p>For Desmond's intelligence was perfect, and her sympathy was +perfect, and her way of listening was perfect. She sat on the +floor, on the orange and blue cushions, in silence and in patience, +embracing her knees with her long, slender, sallow-white arms, +while Nicky stamped up and down her studio and talked to her, like +a monomaniac, about his Moving Fortress. It didn't bore her to +listen, because she didn't have to answer; she had only to look at +him and smile, and nod her head at him now and then as a sign of +enthusiasm. She liked looking at him; she liked his young +naïveté and monomania; she liked his face and all his +gestures, and the poise and movement of his young body.</p> +<p>And as she looked at him the beauty that slept in her dulled +eyes and in her sallow-white face and in her thin body awoke and +became alive. It was not dangerous yet; not ready yet to tell the +secret held back in its long, subtle, serious, and slender lines. +Desmond's sensuality was woven with so fine a web that you would +have said it belonged less to her body than to her spirit and her +mind.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>In nineteen-eleven, on fine days in the late spring and early +summer, when the Morss Company lent him a car, or when they sent +him motoring about the country on their business, he took Desmond +with him and Desmond's painting box and easel. And they rested on +the grass borders of the high roads and on the edges of the woods +and moors, and Desmond painted her extraordinary pictures while +Nicky lay on his back beside her with his face turned up to the sky +and dreamed of flying machines.</p> +<p>For he had done with his Moving Fortress. It only waited for +Desmond to finish the last drawing.</p> +<p>When he had that he would show the plans and the model to Frank +Drayton before he sent them to the War Office.</p> +<p>He lived for that moment of completion.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>And from the autumn of nineteen-ten to the spring of +nineteen-eleven Desmond's affair with Headley Richards increased +and flowered and ripened to its fulfilment. And in the early summer +she found that things had happened as she had meant that they +should happen.</p> +<p>She had always meant it. She had always said, and she had always +thought that women were no good unless they had the courage of +their opinions; the only thing to be ashamed of was the cowardice +that prevented them from getting what they wanted.</p> +<p>Desmond had no idea that the violence of the Vortex had sucked +her in. Being in the movement of her own free will, she thought +that by simply spinning round faster and faster she added her own +energy to the whirl. It was not Dorothy's vortex, or the vortex of +the fighting Suffrage woman. Desmond didn't care very much about +the Suffrage; or about any kind of freedom but her own kind; or +about anybody's freedom but her own. Maud Blackadder's idea of +freedom struck Desmond as sheer moral and physical insanity. Yet +each, Desmond and Dorothy and Maud Blackadder and Mrs. Blathwaite +and her daughter and Mrs. Palmerston-Swete, had her own particular +swirl in the immense Vortex of the young century. If you had youth +and life in you, you were in revolt.</p> +<p>Desmond's theories were Dorothy's theories too; only that while +Dorothy, as Rosalind had said, thought out her theories in her +brain without feeling them, Desmond felt them with her whole being; +and with her whole being, secret, subtle and absolutely relentless, +she was bent on carrying them out.</p> +<p>And in the summer, in the new season, Headley Richards decided +that he had no further use for Desmond. The new play had run its +course at the Independent Theatre, a course so brief that Richards +had been disappointed. He put down the failure mainly to the +queerness of the dresses and the scenery she had designed for him. +Desmond's new art was too new; people weren't ready yet for that +sort of thing. At the same time he discovered that he was really +very much attached to his own wife Ginny, and when Ginny nobly +offered to give him his divorce he had replied nobly that he didn't +want one. And he left Desmond to face the music.</p> +<p>Desmond's misery was acute; but it was not so hopeless as it +would have been if she could have credited Ginny Richards with any +permanent power of attraction for Headley. She knew he would come +back to her. She knew the power of her own body. She held him by +the tie that was never broken so long as it endured. He would never +marry her; yet he would come back.</p> +<p>But in the interval between these acts there was the music.</p> +<p>And the first sound of the music, the changed intonations of her +landlady, frightened Desmond; for though she was older than Nicky +she was very young. And there were Desmond's people. You may forget +that you have people and behave as if they weren't there; but, if +they are there, sooner or later they will let you know it. An +immense volume of sound and some terrifying orchestral effects were +contributed by Desmond's people. So that the music was really very +bad to bear.</p> +<p>Desmond couldn't bear it. And in her fright she thought of +Nicky.</p> +<p>She knew that she hadn't a chance so long as he was absorbed in +the Moving Fortress. But the model was finished and set up and she +was at work on the last drawing. And no more ideas for engines were +coming into Nicky's head. The Morss Company and Nicky himself were +even beginning to wonder whether there ever would be any more.</p> +<p>Then Nicky thought of Desmond. And he showed that he was +thinking of her by sitting still and not talking when he was with +her. She did not fill that emptiness and spaciousness of Nicky's +head, but he couldn't get her out of it.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>When Vera noticed the silence of the two she became uneasy, and +judged that the time had come for discreet intervention.</p> +<p>"Nicky," she said, "is it true that Desmond's been doing +drawings for you?"</p> +<p>"Yes," said Nicky, "she's done any amount."</p> +<p>"My dear boy, have you any idea of the amount you'll have to pay +her?"</p> +<p>"I haven't," said Nicky, "I wish I had. I hate asking her, and +yet I suppose I'll have to."</p> +<p>"Of course you'll have to. <i>She</i> won't hate it. She's got +to earn her living as much as you have."</p> +<p>"Has she? You don't mean to say she's hard up?"</p> +<p>He had never thought of Desmond as earning her own living, still +less as being hard up.</p> +<p>"I only wish she were," said Vera, "for your sake."</p> +<p>"Why on earth for my sake?"</p> +<p>"Because <i>then</i>, my dear Nicky, you wouldn't have to pay so +stiff a price."</p> +<p>"I don't care," said Nicky, "how stiff the price is. I shall pay +it."</p> +<p>And Vera replied that Desmond, in her own queer way, really was +a rather distinguished painter. "Pay her," she said. "Pay her for +goodness sake and have done with it. And if she wants to give you +things don't let her."</p> +<p>"As if," said Nicky, "I should dream of letting her."</p> +<p>And he went off to Chelsea to pay Desmond then and there.</p> +<p>Vera thought that she had been rather clever. Nicky would dash +in and do the thing badly. He would be very proud about it, and he +would revolt from his dependence on Desmond, and he would show +her--Vera hoped that he would show her--that he did not want to be +under any obligation to her. And Desmond would be hurt and lose her +temper. The hard look would get into her face and destroy its +beauty, and she would say detestable things in a detestable voice, +and a dreadful ugliness would come between them, and the impulse of +Nicky's yet unborn passion would be checked, and the memory of that +abominable half-hour would divide them for ever.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>But Vera herself had grown hard and clever. She had forgotten +Nicky's tenderness, and she knew nothing at all about Desmond's +fright. And, as it happened, neither Nicky nor Desmond did any of +the things she thought they would do.</p> +<p>Nicky was not impetuous. He found Desmond in her studio working +on the last drawing of the Moving Fortress, with the finished model +before her. That gave him his opening, and he approached shyly and +tentatively.</p> +<p>Desmond put on an air of complete absorption in her drawing; but +she smiled. A pretty smile that lifted the corners of her mouth and +made it quiver, and gave Nicky a queer and unexpected desire to +kiss her.</p> +<p>He went on wanting to know what his debt was--not that he could +ever really pay it.</p> +<p>"Oh, you foolish Nicky," Desmond said.</p> +<p>He repeated himself over and over again, and each time she had +an answer, and the answers had a cumulative effect.</p> +<p>"There isn't any debt. You don't pay anything--"</p> +<p>"I didn't do it for <i>that</i>, you silly boy."</p> +<p>"What did I do it for? I did it for fun. You couldn't draw a +thing like that for anything else. Look at it--"</p> +<p>--"Well, if you want to be horrid and calculating about it, +think of the lunches and the dinners and the theatre tickets and +the flowers you've given <i>me</i>. Oh, and the gallons and gallons +of petrol. How am I ever to pay you back again?"</p> +<p>Thus she mocked him.</p> +<p>"Can't you see how you're spoiling it all?"</p> +<p>And then, passionately: "Oh, Nicky, please don't say it again. +It hurts."</p> +<p>She turned on him her big black looking-glass eyes washed +bright, each with one tear that knew better than to fall just yet. +He must see that she was holding herself well in hand. It would be +no use letting herself go until he had forgotten his Moving +Fortress. He was looking at the beastly thing now, instead of +looking at her.</p> +<p>"Are you thinking of another old engine?"</p> +<p>"No," said Nicky. "I'm not thinking of anything."</p> +<p>"Then you don't want me to do any more drawings?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"Well then--I wonder whether you'd very much mind going +away?"</p> +<p>"Now?"</p> +<p>"No. Not now. But soon. From here. Altogether."</p> +<p>"Go? Altogether? Me? Why?"</p> +<p>He was utterly astonished. He thought that he had offended +Desmond past all forgiveness.</p> +<p>"Because I came here to be alone. To work. And I can't work. And +I want to be alone again."</p> +<p>"Am I--spoiling it?"</p> +<p>"Yes. You're spoiling it damnably."</p> +<p>"I'm sorry, Desmond. I didn't mean to. I thought--" But he +hadn't the heart to say what he had thought.</p> +<p>She looked at him and knew that the moment was coming.</p> +<p>It had come.</p> +<p>She turned away from the table where the Moving Fortress stood, +threatening her with its mimic guns, and reminding Nicky of the +things she most wanted him to forget. She withdrew to her crouching +place at the other end of the studio, among the cushions.</p> +<p>He followed her there with slow, thoughtful steps, steps full of +brooding purpose and of half-unconscious meaning.</p> +<p>"Nicky, I'm so unhappy. I didn't know it was possible for +anybody to be so unhappy in this world."</p> +<p>She began to cry quietly.</p> +<p>"Desmond--what is it? What is it? Tell me. Why can't you tell +me?"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>She thought, "It will be all right if he kisses me once. If he +holds me in his arms once. Then I can tell him."</p> +<p>For then he would know that he loved her. He was not quite sure +now. She knew that he was not quite sure. She trusted to the power +of her body to make him sure.</p> +<p>Her youth neither understood his youth, nor allowed for it, nor +pitied it.</p> +<p>He had kissed her. He had held her in his arms and kissed her +more than once while she cried there, hiding her face in the hollow +of his arm. She was weak and small. She was like some small, soft, +helpless animal and she was hurt. Her sobbing and panting made her +ribs feel fragile like the ribs of some small, soft, helpless +animal under the pressure of his arms. And she was frightened.</p> +<p>He couldn't stand the sight of suffering. He had never yet +resisted the appeal of small, weak, helpless things in fright and +pain. He could feel Desmond's heart going thump, thump, under the +blue thing he called her pinafore. Her heart hurt him with its +thumping.</p> +<p>And through all his painful pity he knew that her skin was +smooth and sweet like a sallow-white rose-leaf. And Desmond knew +that he knew it. His mouth slid with an exquisite slipperiness over +the long, polished bands of her black hair; and he thought that he +loved her. Desmond knew that he thought it.</p> +<p>And still she waited. She said to herself, "It's no good his +thinking it. I daren't tell him till he says it. Till he asks me to +marry him."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>He had said it at last. And he had asked her to marry him. And +then she had told him.</p> +<p>And all that he said was, "I don't care." He said it to Desmond, +and he said it to himself.</p> +<p>The funny thing was that he did not care. He was as miserable as +it was well possible to be, but he didn't really care. He was not +even surprised. It was as if the knowledge of it had been hiding in +the back of his head behind all the ideas.</p> +<p>And yet he couldn't have known it all the time. Either it must +have gone away when his ideas went, or he must have been trying not +to see it.</p> +<p>She had slipped from his arms and stood before him, dabbing her +mouth and eyes now and then with her pocket-handkerchief, +controlling herself, crying quietly.</p> +<p>She knew, what had not dawned on Nicky yet, that he didn't love +her. If he had loved her he would have cared intolerably. He didn't +care about Headley Richards because he didn't care about Desmond +any more. He was only puzzled.</p> +<p>"Why did you do it?"</p> +<p>"I can't think why. I must have been off my head. I didn't know +what it was like. I didn't know. I thought it would be wonderful +and beautiful. I thought he was wonderful and beautiful."</p> +<p>"Poor little Desmond."</p> +<p>"Oh, Nicky, do you think me a beast? Does it make you hate +me?"</p> +<p>"No. Of course it doesn't. The only awful thing is--"</p> +<p>"What? Tell me."</p> +<p>"Well--you see--"</p> +<p>"You mean the baby? I know it's awful. You needn't tell me that, +Nicky."</p> +<p>He stared at her.</p> +<p>"I mean it's so awful for <i>it</i>."</p> +<p>She thought he had been thinking of himself and her.</p> +<p>"Why should it be?"</p> +<p>"Why? There isn't any why. It just is. I <i>know</i> it is."</p> +<p>He was thinking of Veronica.</p> +<p>"You see," he said simply, "that's why this sort of thing is +such a rotten game. It's so hard on the kiddy. I suppose you didn't +think of that. You couldn't have, or else you wouldn't--"</p> +<p>He paused. There was one thing he had to know. He must get it +out of her.</p> +<p>"It hasn't made you feel that you don't want it?"</p> +<p>"Oh--I don't know what I want--<i>now</i>. I don't know what it +makes me feel!"</p> +<p>"Don't let it, Desmond. Don't let it. It'll be all right. You +won't feel like that when you've married me. Can't you see that +<i>that's</i> the wonderful and beautiful part?"</p> +<p>"<i>What</i> is?" she said in her tired drawl.</p> +<p>"<i>It</i>--the poor kiddy."</p> +<p>Because he remembered Veronica he was going to marry +Desmond.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Veronica's mother was the first to hear about it. Desmond told +her.</p> +<p>Veronica's mother was determined to stop it for the sake of +everybody concerned.</p> +<p>She wrote to Nicholas and asked him to come and dine with her +one evening when Lawrence Stephen was dining somewhere else. +(Lawrence Stephen made rather a point of not going to houses where +Vera was not received; but sometimes, when the occasion was +political, or otherwise important, he had to. That was her +punishment, as Bartholomew had meant that it should be.)</p> +<p>Nicky knew what he had been sent for, and to all his aunt's +assaults and manoeuvres he presented an inexpugnable front.</p> +<p>"You mustn't do it; you simply mustn't."</p> +<p>He intimated that his marriage was his own affair.</p> +<p>"It isn't. It's the affair of everybody who cares for you."</p> +<p>"Their caring isn't my affair," said Nicky.</p> +<p>And then Vera began to say things about Desmond.</p> +<p>"It's absurd of you," she said, "to treat her as if she was an +innocent child. She isn't a child, and she isn't innocent. She knew +perfectly well what she was about. There's nothing she doesn't +know. She meant it to happen, and she made it happen. She said she +would. She meant you to marry her, and she's making you marry her. +I daresay she said she would. She's as clever and determined as the +devil. Neither you nor Headley Richards ever had a chance against +her."</p> +<p>"She hasn't got a dog's chance against all you people yelping at +her now she's down. I should have thought--"</p> +<p>"You mean <i>I</i>'ve no business to? That was different. I +didn't take any other woman's husband, or any other woman's lover, +Nicky."</p> +<p>"If you had," said Nicky, "I wouldn't have interfered."</p> +<p>"I wouldn't interfere if I thought you cared <i>that</i> for +Desmond. But you don't. You know you don't."</p> +<p>"Of course I care for her."</p> +<p>He said it stoutly, but he coloured all the same, and Vera knew +that he was vulnerable.</p> +<p>"Oh, Nicky dear, if you'd only waited--"</p> +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> +<p>His young eyes interrogated her austerely; and she flinched. "I +don't know what I mean. Unless I mean that you're just a little +young to marry anybody."</p> +<p>"I don't care if I am. I don't <i>feel</i> young, I can tell +you. Anyhow Desmond's years younger."</p> +<p>"Desmond is twenty-three. You're twenty. It's Veronica who's +years younger."</p> +<p>"Veronica?"</p> +<p>"She's sixteen. You don't imagine Desmond is as young as that, +do you? Wait till she's twenty-five and you're twenty-two."</p> +<p>"It wouldn't do poor Desmond much good if I did. I could kill +Headley Richards."</p> +<p>"What for?"</p> +<p>"For leaving her."</p> +<p>Vera smiled. "That shows how much you care. You wouldn't have +felt like killing him if he'd stuck to her. Why should you marry +Headley Richards' mistress and take on his child? It's +preposterous."</p> +<p>"It isn't. If the other fellow's a brute it's all the more +reason why I shouldn't be. I want to be some use in this rotten +world where people are so damnably cruel to each other. And there's +that unhappy kiddy. You've forgotten the kiddy."</p> +<p>"Do you mean to say it's Desmond's child <i>you</i>'re thinking +of?"</p> +<p>"I can't understand any woman not thinking of it," said +Nicky.</p> +<p>He looked at her, and she knew that he remembered Veronica.</p> +<p>Then she gave him back his own with interest, for his good.</p> +<p>"If you care so much, why don't you choose a better mother for +your own children?"</p> +<p>It was as if she said: "If you care so much about Veronica, why +don't you marry <i>her</i>?"</p> +<p>"It's a bit too late to think of that now," said poor Nicky.</p> +<p>Because he had cared so much about Veronica he was going to +marry Desmond.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"I couldn't do anything with him," Vera said afterwards. +"Nothing I said made the least impression on him."</p> +<p>That however (as both Vera and Nicky were aware), was not +strictly true. But, in spite of Nicky's terrible capacity for +remembering, she stuck to it that Desmond's affair would have made +no impression on him if it had not been for that other absurd +affair of the Professor's wife. And it would have been better, +Lawrence Stephen said, for Nicky to have made love to all the +married women in Cambridge than for him to marry Phyllis +Desmond.</p> +<p>These reflections were forced on them by the ironic coincidence +of Nicky's engagement with his rehabilitation at the +University.</p> +<p>Drayton's forecast was correct; Nicky's brother Michael had not +been removed from Nicky's College eight months before letters of +apology and restitution came. But both apology and restitution came +too late.</p> +<p>For by that time Nicky had married Desmond.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XIV"></a>XIV</h2> +<br> +<p>After Nicholas, Veronica; and after Veronica, Michael.</p> +<p>Anthony and Frances sat in the beautiful drawing-room of their +house, one on each side of the fireplace. They had it all to +themselves, except for the cats, Tito and Timmy, who crouched on +the hearthrug at their feet. Frances's forehead and her upper lip +were marked delicately with shallow, tender lines; Anthony's eyes +had crow's-feet at their corners, pointing to grey hairs at his +temples. To each other their faces were as they had been fifteen +years ago. The flight of time was measured for them by the +generations of the cats that had succeeded Jane and Jerry. For +still in secret they refused to think of their children as +grown-up.</p> +<p>Dorothy was upstairs in her study writing articles for the +Women's Franchise Union. They owed it to her magnanimity that they +had one child remaining with them in the house. John was at +Cheltenham; Veronica was in Dresden. Michael was in Germany, too, +at that School of Forestry at Aschaffenburg which Anthony had meant +for Nicky. They couldn't bear to think where Nicky was.</p> +<p>When Frances thought about her children now her mind went +backwards. If only they hadn't grown-up; if only they could have +stayed little for ever! In another four years even Don-Don would be +grown-up--Don-Don who was such a long time getting older that at +fourteen, only two years ago, he had been capable of sitting in her +lap, a great long-legged, flumbering puppy, while mother and son +rocked dangerously together in each other's arms, like two +children, laughing together, mocking each other.</p> +<p>She was going to be wiser with Don-Don than she had been with +Nicky. She would be wiser with Michael when he came back from +Germany. She would keep them both out of the Vortex, the horrible +Vortex that Lawrence Stephen and Vera had let Nicky in for, the +Vortex that seized on youth and forced it into a corrupt maturity. +After Desmond's affair Anthony and Frances felt that to them the +social circle inhabited by Vera and Lawrence Stephen would never be +anything but a dirty hell.</p> +<p>As for Veronica, the longer she stayed in Germany the +better.</p> +<p>Yet Frances knew that they had not sent Veronica to Dresden to +prevent her mother from getting hold of her. When she remembered +the fear she had had of the apple-tree house, she said to herself +that Desmond was a judgment on her for sending little Veronica +away.</p> +<p>And yet it was the kindest thing they could have done for her. +Veronica was happy in Dresden, living with a German family and +studying music and the language. She had no idea that music and the +language were mere blinds, and that she had been sent to the German +family to keep her out of Nicky's way.</p> +<p>They would have them all back again at Christmas. Frances +counted the days. From to-night, the seventh of June, to December +the twentieth was not much more than six months.</p> +<p>To-night, the seventh of June, was Nicky's wedding-night. But +they did not know that. Nicky had kept the knowledge from them, in +his mercy, to save them the agony of deciding whether they would +recognize the marriage or not. And as neither Frances nor Anthony +had ever faced squarely the prospect of disaster to their children, +they had turned their backs on Nicky's marriage and supported each +other in the hope that at the last minute something would happen to +prevent it.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The ten o'clock post, and two letters from Germany. Not from +Michael, not from Veronica. One from Frau Schäfer, the mother +of the German family. It was all in German, and neither Anthony nor +Frances could make out more than a word here and there. "Das +süsse, liebe Mädchen" meant Veronica. But certain +phrases: "traurige Nachrichten" ... "furchtbare Schwächheit" +... "... eine entsetzliche Blutleere ..." terrified them, and they +sent for Dorothy to translate.</p> +<p>Dorothy was a good German scholar, but somehow she was not very +fluent. She scowled over the letter.</p> +<p>"What does it mean?" said Frances. "Hæmorhage?"</p> +<p>"No. No. Anæmia. Severe anæmia. Heart and stomach +trouble."</p> +<p>"But 'traurige Nachrichten' is 'bad news.' They're breaking it +to us that she's dying."</p> +<p>(It was unbearable to think of Nicky marrying Ronny; but it was +more unbearable to think of Ronny dying.)</p> +<p>"They don't say they're sending <i>us</i> bad news; they say +they think Ronny must have had some. To account for her illness. +Because they say she's been so happy with them."</p> +<p>"But what bad news could she have had?"</p> +<p>"Perhaps she knows about Nicky."</p> +<p>"But nobody's told her, unless Vera has."</p> +<p>"She hasn't. I know she hasn't. She didn't want her to +know."</p> +<p>"Well, then--"</p> +<p>"Mummy, you don't <i>have</i> to tell Ronny things. She always +knows them."</p> +<p>"How on earth could she know a thing like that?"</p> +<p>"She might. She sort of sees things--like Ferdie. She may have +seen him with Desmond. You can't tell."</p> +<p>"Do they say what the doctor thinks?"</p> +<p>"Yes. He thinks it's worry and Heimweh--homesickness. They want +us to send for her and take her back. Not let her have another +term."</p> +<p>Though Frances loved Veronica she was afraid of her coming back. +For she was more than ever convinced that something would happen +and that Nicky would not marry Desmond.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The other letter was even more difficult to translate or to +understand when translated.</p> +<p>The authorities at Aschaffenburg requested Herr Harrison to +remove his son Michael from the School of Forestry. Michael after +his first few weeks had done no good at the school. In view of the +expense to Herr Harrison involved in his fees and maintenance, they +could not honestly advise his entering upon another term. It would +only be a deplorable throwing away of money on a useless scheme. +His son Michael had no thoroughness, no practical ability, and no +grasp whatever of theoretic detail. From Herr Harrison's point of +view this was the more regrettable inasmuch as the young man had +colossal decision and persistence and energy of his own. He was an +indefatigable dreamer. Very likely--when his dreams had +crystallized--a poet. But the idea Herr Harrison had had that his +son Michael would make a man of business, or an expert in Forestry, +was altogether fantastic and absurd. And from the desperate +involutions of the final sentence Dorothy disentangled the clear +fact that Michael's personal charm, combined with his hostility to +discipline, his complete indifference to the aims of the +authorities, and his utter lack of any sense of responsibility, +made him a dangerous influence in any school.</p> +<p>That was the end of Anthony's plans for Michael.</p> +<p>The next morning Nicky wired from some village in Sussex: +"Married yesterday.--NICKY."</p> +<p>After that nothing seemed to matter. With Nicky gone from them +they were glad to have Michael back again. Frances said they might +be thankful for one thing--that there wasn't any German Peggy or +any German Desmond in Michael's problem.</p> +<p>And since both Michael and Veronica were to be removed at once, +the simplest arrangement was that he should return to Dresden and +bring her back with him.</p> +<p>Frances had never been afraid for Michael.</p> +<p>Michael knew that he had made havoc of his father's plans. He +couldn't help that. His affair was far too desperate. And any other +man but his father would have foreseen that the havoc was +inevitable and would have made no plans. He knew he had been turned +into the tree-travelling scheme that had been meant for Nicky, +because, though Nicky had slipped out of it, his father simply +couldn't bear to give up his idea. And no wonder, when the dear old +thing had so few of them.</p> +<p>He had been honest with his father about it; every bit as honest +as Nicky had been. He had wanted to travel if he could go to China +and Japan, just as Nicky had wanted to travel if he could go to +places like the West Indies and the Himalaya. And he didn't mind +trying to get the trees in when he was there. He was even prepared +to accept Germany and the School for Forestry if Germany was the +only way to China and Japan. But he had told his father not to mind +if nothing came of it at the end of all the travelling. And his +father had said he would take the risk. He preferred taking the +risk to giving up his idea.</p> +<p>And Michael had been honest with himself. He had told himself +that he too must take some risks, and the chances were that a year +or two in Germany wouldn't really hurt him. Things never did hurt +you as much as you thought they would. He had thought that +Cambridge would do all sorts of things to him, and Cambridge had +not done anything to him at all. As for Oxford, it had given him +nearly all the solitude and liberty he wanted, and more +companionship than he was ever likely to want. At twenty-two +Michael was no longer afraid of dying before he had finished his +best work. In spite of both Universities he had done more or less +what he had meant to do before he went to Germany. His work had not +yet stood the test of time, but to make up for that he himself, in +his uneasy passion for perfection, like Time, destroyed almost as +much as he created. Still, after some pitiless eliminations, enough +of his verse remained for one fine, thin book.</p> +<p>It would be published if Lawrence Stephen approved of the +selection.</p> +<p>So, Michael argued, even if he died to-morrow there was no +reason why he should not go to Germany to-day.</p> +<p>He was too young to know that he acquiesced so calmly because +his soul was for a moment appeased by accomplishment.</p> +<p>He was too young to know that his soul had a delicate, profound +and hidden life of its own, and that in secret it approached the +crisis of transition. It was passing over from youth to maturity, +like a sleep-walker, unconscious, enchanted, seeing its way without +seeing it, safe only from the dangers of the passage if nobody +touched it, and if it went alone.</p> +<p>Michael had no idea of what Germany could and would do to his +soul.</p> +<p>Otherwise he might have listened to what Paris had to say by way +of warning.</p> +<p>For his father had given him a fortnight in Paris on his way to +Germany, as the reward of acquiescence. That (from Herr Harrison's +point of view) was a disastrous blunder. How could the dear old +Pater be expected to know that Paris is, spiritually speaking, no +sort of way even to South Germany? He should have gone to Brussels, +if he was ever, spiritually speaking, to get there at all.</p> +<p>And neither Anthony nor Frances knew that Lawrence Stephen had +plans for Michael.</p> +<p>Michael went to Paris with his unpublished poems in his pocket +and a letter of introduction from Stephen to Jules +Réveillaud. He left it with revolution in his soul and the +published poems of Réveillaud and his followers in his +suit-case, straining and distending it so that it burst open of its +own accord at the frontier.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen had said to him: "Before you write another line +read Réveillaud and show him what you've written."</p> +<p>Jules Réveillaud was ten years older than Michael, and he +recognized the symptoms of the crisis. He could see what was +happening and what had happened and would happen in Michael's soul. +He said: "One third of each of your poems is good. And there are a +few--the three last--which are all good."</p> +<p>"Those," said Michael, "are only experiments."</p> +<p>"Precisely. They are experiments that have succeeded. That is +why they are good. Art is always experiment, or it is nothing. Do +not publish these poems yet. Wait and see what happens. Make more +experiments. And whatever you do, do not go to Germany. That School +of Forestry would be very bad for you. Why not," said +Réveillaud, "stay where you are?"</p> +<p>Michael would have liked to stay for ever where he was, in Paris +with Jules Réveillaud, in the Rue Servandoni. And because +his conscience kept on telling him that he would be a coward and a +blackguard if he stayed in Paris, he wrenched himself away.</p> +<p>In the train, going into Germany, he read Réveillaud's +"Poèmes" and the "Poèmes" of the young men who +followed him. He had read in Paris Réveillaud's "Critique de +la Poésie Anglaise Contemporaine." And as he read his poems, +he saw that, though he, Michael Harrison, had split with "la +poésie anglaise contemporaine," he was not, as he had +supposed, alone. His idea of being by himself of finding new forms, +doing new things by himself to the disgust and annoyance of other +people, in a world where only one person, Lawrence Stephen, +understood or cared for what he did, it was pure illusion. These +young Frenchmen, with Jules Réveillaud at their head, were +doing the same thing, making the same experiment, believing in the +experiment, caring for nothing but the experiment, and carrying it +farther than he had dreamed of carrying it. They were not so far +ahead of him in time; Réveillaud himself had only two years' +start; but they were all going the same way, and he saw that he +must either go with them or collapse in the soft heap of +rottenness, "la poésie anglaise contemporaine."</p> +<p>He had made his own experiments in what he called "live verse" +before he left England, after he had said he would go to Germany, +even after the final arrangements had been made. His father had +given him a month to "turn round in," as he put it. And Michael had +turned completely round.</p> +<p>He had not shown his experiments to Stephen. He didn't know what +to think of them himself. But he could see, when once +Réveillaud had pointed it out to him, that they were the +stuff that counted.</p> +<p>In the train going into Germany he thought of certain things +that Réveillaud had said: "Nous avons trempé la +poésie dans la peinture et la musique. Il faut la +délivrer par la sculpture. Chaque ligne, chaque vers, chaque +poème taillé en bloc, sans couleur, sans decor, sans +rime."... "La sainte pauvresse du style +dépouillé."... "Il faut de la dureté, toujours +de la dureté."</p> +<p>He thought of Réveillaud's criticism, and his sudden +startled spurt of admiration: "Mais! Vous l'avez trouvée, la +beauté de la ligne droite."</p> +<p>And Réveillaud's question: "Vraiment? Vous n'avez jamais +lu un seul vers de mes poèmes? Alors, c'est +étonnant." And then: "C'est que la réalité est +plus forte que nous."</p> +<p>The revolting irony of it! After stumbling and fumbling for +years by himself, like an idiot, trying to get it, the clear hard +Reality; trying not to collapse into the soft heap of contemporary +rottenness; and, suddenly, to get it without knowing that he had +got it, so that, but for Réveillaud, he might easily have +died in his ignorance; and then, in the incredible moment of +realization, to have to let go, to turn his back on Paris, where he +wanted to live, and on Réveillaud whom he wanted to know, +and to be packed in a damnable train, like a parcel, and sent off +to Germany, a country which he did not even wish to see.</p> +<p>He wondered if he could have done it if he had not loved his +father? He wondered if his father would ever understand that it was +the hardest thing he had ever yet done or could do?</p> +<p>But the trees would be beautiful. He would rather like seeing +the trees.</p> +<p>Trees--</p> +<p>He wondered whether he would ever care about a tree again.</p> +<p>Trees--</p> +<p>He wondered whether he would ever see a tree again, ever smell +tree-sap, or hear the wind sounding in the ash-trees like a river +and in the firs like a sea.</p> +<p>Trees--</p> +<p>He wondered whether any tree would ever come to life for him +again.</p> +<p>He looked on at the tree-felling. He saw slaughtered trees, +trees that tottered, trees that staggered in each other's branches. +He heard the scream and the shriek of wounded boughs, the creaking +and crashing of the trunk, and the long hiss of branches falling, +trailing through branches to the ground. He smelt the raw juice of +broken leaves and the sharp tree dust in the saw pits. The trees +died horrible deaths, in the forests under the axes of the woodmen, +and in the schools under the tongues of the Professors, and in +Michael's soul. The German Government was determined that he should +know all about trees. Its officials, the Professors and +instructors, were sorry if he didn't like it, but they were ordered +by their Government and paid by their Government to impart this +information; they had contracted with Herr Harrison to impart it to +his son Michael for so long as he could endure it, and they +imparted it with all their might.</p> +<p>Michael rather liked the Germans of Aschaffenburg. Instead of +despising him because he would never make a timber-merchant or a +tree expert, they admired and respected him because he was a poet. +The family he lived with, Herr Henschel and Frau Henschel, and his +fellow-boarders, Carl and Otto Kraus, and young Ludwig Henschel, +and Hedwig and Löttchen admired and respected him because he +was a poet. When he walked with Ludwig in the great forests Michael +chanted his poems, both in English and in German, till Ludwig's +soul was full of yearning and a delicious sorrow, so that Ludwig +actually shed tears in the forest. He said that if he had not done +so he would have burst. Ludwig's emotions had nothing whatever to +do with the forest or with Michael's poems, but he thought they +had.</p> +<p>Michael knew that his only chance of getting out of Germany was +to show an unsurpassable incompetence. He showed it. He flourished +his incompetence in the faces of all the officials, until some +superofficial wrote a letter to his father that gave him his +liberty.</p> +<p>The Henschels were sorry when he left. The students, Otto and +Carl and Ludwig, implored him not to forget them. Hedwig and +Löttchen cried.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Michael was not pleased when he found that he was to go home by +Dresden to bring Veronica back. He wanted to be alone on the +journey. He wanted to stop in Paris and see Jules +Réveillaud. He was afraid that Ronny had grown into a +tiresome flapper and that he would have to talk to her.</p> +<p>And he found that Ronny had skipped the tiresome stage and had +grown up. Only her school clothes and her girlish door-knocker +plait tied up with broad black ribbon reminded him that she was not +yet seventeen.</p> +<p>Ronny was tired. She did not want to talk. When he had tucked +her up with railway rugs in her corner of the carriage she sat +still with her hands in her muff.</p> +<p>"I shall not disturb your thoughts, Michael," she said.</p> +<p>She knew what he had been thinking. Her clear eyes gazed at him +out of her dead white face with an awful look of spiritual +maturity.</p> +<p>"What can have happened to her?" he wondered.</p> +<p>But she did not disturb his thoughts.</p> +<p>Up till then Michael's thoughts had not done him any good. They +had been bitter thoughts of the months he had been compelled to +waste in Bavaria when every minute had an incomparable value; +worrying, irritating thoughts of the scenes he would have to have +with his father, who must be made to understand, once for all, that +in future he meant to have every minute of his own life for his own +work. He wondered how on earth he was to make his people see that +his work justified his giving every minute to it. He had asked +Réveillaud to give him a letter that he could show to his +father. He was angry with his father beforehand, he was so certain +that he wouldn't see.</p> +<p>He had other thoughts now. Thoughts of an almond tree flowering +in a white town; of pink blossoms, fragile, without leaves, casting +a thin shadow on white stones; the smell of almond flowers and the +sting of white dust in an east wind; a drift of white dust against +the wall.</p> +<p>Thoughts of pine-trees falling in the forest, glad to fall. He +thought: The pine forest makes itself a sea for the land wind, and +the young pine tree is mad for the open sea. She gives her slender +trunk with passion to the ax; for she thinks that she will be +stripped naked, and that she will be planted in the ship's hold, +and that she will carry the great main-sail. She thinks that she +will rock and strain in the grip of the sea-wind, and that she will +be whitened with the salt and the foam of the sea.</p> +<p>She does not know that she will be sawn into planks and made +into a coffin for the wife of the sexton and grave-digger of +Aschaffenburg.</p> +<p>Thoughts of Veronica in her incredible maturity, and of her +eyes, shining in her dead white face, far back through deep +crystal, and of the sense he got of her soul poised, steady and +still, with wings vibrating.</p> +<p>He wondered where it would come down.</p> +<p>He thought: "Of course, Veronica's soul will come down like a +wild pigeon into the ash-tree in our garden, and she will think +that our ash-tree is a tree of Heaven."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Presently he roused himself to talk to her.</p> +<p>"How is your singing getting on, Ronny?"</p> +<p>"My singing voice has gone."</p> +<p>"It'll come back again."</p> +<p>"Not unless-"</p> +<p>But he couldn't make her tell him what would bring it back.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>When Michael came to his father and mother to have it out with +them his face had a hard, stubborn look. He was ready to fight +them. He was so certain that he would have to fight. He had shown +them Jules Réveillaud's letter.</p> +<p>He said, "Look here, we've got to get it straight. It isn't any +use going on like this. I'm afraid I wasn't very honest about +Germany."</p> +<p>"Weren't you?" said Anthony. "Let me see, I think you said you'd +take it on your way to China and Japan."</p> +<p>"Did I? I tried to be straight about it. I thought I was giving +it a fair chance. But that was before I'd seen +Réveillaud."</p> +<p>"Well," said Anthony, "now that you have seen him, what is it +exactly that you want to do?"</p> +<p>Michael told him.</p> +<p>"You can make it easy for me. Or you can make it hard. But you +can't stop me."</p> +<p>"What makes you think I want to stop you?"</p> +<p>"Well--you want me to go into the business, though I told you +years ago there was only one thing I should ever be any good at. +And I see your point. I can't earn my living at it. That's where +I'm had. Still, I think Lawrence Stephen will give me work, and I +can rub along somehow."</p> +<p>"Without my help, you mean?"</p> +<p>"Well, yes. Why <i>should</i> you help me? You've wasted tons of +money on me as it is. Nicky's earning his own living, and he's got +a wife, too. Why not me?"</p> +<p>"Because you can't do it, Michael."</p> +<p>"I can. I don't mind roughing it. I could live on a hundred a +year--or less, if I don't marry."</p> +<p>"Well, I don't mean you to try. You needn't bother about what +you can live on and what you can't live on. It was all settled last +night. Your mother and I talked it over. We don't want you to go +into the business. We don't want you to take work from Mr. Stephen. +We want you to be absolutely free to do your own work, under the +best possible conditions, whether it pays or not. Nothing in the +world matters to us but your happiness. You're to have a hundred +and fifty a year when you're living at home and two hundred and +fifty when you're living abroad. I suppose you'll want to go abroad +sometimes. I can't give you a bigger allowance, because I have to +help Nicky--"</p> +<p>Michael covered his face with his hands.</p> +<p>"Oh--don't, Daddy. You do make me feel a rotten beast."</p> +<p>"We should feel rottener beasts," said Frances, "if we stood in +your way."</p> +<p>"Then," said Michael (he was still incredulous), "you do +care?"</p> +<p>"Of course we care," said Anthony.</p> +<p>"I don't mean for me--for <i>it</i>?"</p> +<p>"My dear Mick," said Frances, "we care for It almost as much as +we care for you. We're sorry about Germany though. Germany was one +of your father's bad jokes."</p> +<p>"Germany--a joke?"</p> +<p>"Did you take it seriously? Oh, you silly Michael!"</p> +<p>"But," said Michael, "how about Daddy's idea? He loved it."</p> +<p>"I loved it," said Anthony, "but I've given it up."</p> +<p>They knew that this was defeat, for Michael was top-dog. And it +was also victory.</p> +<p>They had lost Nicholas, or thought they had lost Nicholas, by +opposing him. But Michael and Michael's affection they would have +always.</p> +<p>Besides, Anthony hadn't given up his idea. He had only +transferred it--to his youngest son, John.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XV"></a>XV</h2> +<br> +<p>It was five weeks since Nicholas's wedding-day and Desmond had +quarrelled with him three times.</p> +<p>First, because he had taken a flat in Aubrey Walk, with a studio +inside it, instead of a house in Campden Hill Square with a studio +outside it in the garden.</p> +<p>Then, because he had refused to go into his father's +business.</p> +<p>Last of all, because of Captain Drayton and the Moving +Fortress.</p> +<p>Nicky had said that his father, who was paying his rent, +couldn't afford the house with the studio in the garden; and +Desmond said Nicky's father could afford it perfectly well if he +liked. He said he had refused to go into his father's business for +reasons which didn't concern her. Desmond pointed out that the +consequences of his refusal were likely to concern her very much +indeed. As for Captain Drayton and the Moving Fortress, nobody but +a supreme idiot would have done what Nicky did.</p> +<p>But Nicky absolutely refused to discuss what he had done. Nobody +but a cad and a rotter would have done anything else.</p> +<p>In the matter of the Moving Fortress what had happened was +this.</p> +<p>The last of the drawings was not finished until Desmond had +settled down in the flat in Aubrey Walk. You couldn't hurry +Desmond. Nicky hadn't even waited to sign his name in the margins +before he had packed the plans in his dispatch box and taken them +to the works, and thence, hidden under a pile of Morss estimates, +to Eltham. He couldn't rest till he had shown them to Frank +Drayton. He could hardly wait till they had dined, and till +Drayton, who thought he was on the track of a new and horrible +explosive, had told him as much as he could about it.</p> +<p>Nicky gave his whole mind to Drayton's new explosive in the hope +that, when his turn came, Drayton would do as much for him.</p> +<p>"You know," he said at last, "the old idea of the <i>forteresse +mobile</i>?</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>He couldn't tell whether Drayton was going to be interested or +not. He rather thought he wasn't.</p> +<p>"It hasn't come to anything, <i>has</i> it?"</p> +<p>Drayton smiled and his eyes glittered. He knew what that excited +gleam in Drayton's eyes meant.</p> +<p>"No," he said. "Not yet."</p> +<p>And Nicky had an awful premonition of his doom.</p> +<p>"Well," he said, "I believe there's something in it."</p> +<p>"So do I, Nicky."</p> +<p>Drayton went on. "I believe there's so much in it that--Look +here, I don't know what put it into your head, and I'm not asking, +but that idea's a dead secret. For God's sake don't talk about it. +You mustn't breathe it, or it'll get into the air. And if it does +my five years' work goes for nothing. Besides we don't want Germany +to collar it."</p> +<p>And then: "Don't look so scared, old chap. I was going to tell +you about it when I'd got the plans drawn."</p> +<p>He told him about it then and there.</p> +<p>"Low on the ground like a racing-car--"</p> +<p>"Yes," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"Revolving turret for the guns--no higher than +<i>that</i>--"</p> +<p>"Yes," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"Sort of armoured train. Only it mustn't run on rails. It's got +to go everywhere, through anything, over anything, if it goes at +all. It must turn in its own length. It must wade and burrow and +climb, Nicky. It must have caterpillar wheels--"</p> +<p>"By Jove, of course it must," said Nicky, as if the idea had +struck him for the first time.</p> +<p>"What have you got there?" said Drayton finally as Nicky rose +and picked up his dispatch-box. "Anything interesting?</p> +<p>"No," said Nicky. "Mostly estimates."</p> +<p>For a long time afterwards he loathed the fields between Eltham +and Kidbrooke, and the Mid-Kent line, and Charing Cross Station. He +felt as a man feels when the woman he loves goes from him to +another man. His idea had gone from him to Drayton.</p> +<p>And that, he said to himself, was just like his luck, just like +the jolly sells that happened to him when he was a kid.</p> +<p>To be sure, there was such a thing as sharing. He had only to +produce his plans and his finished model, and he and Drayton would +go partners in the Moving Fortress. There was no reason why he +shouldn't do it. Drayton had not even drawn his plans yet; he +hadn't thought out the mechanical details.</p> +<p>He thought, "I could go back now and tell him."</p> +<p>But he did not go back. He knew that he would never tell him. If +Drayton asked him to help him with the details he would work them +out all over again with him; but he would never show his own +finished plans or his own model.</p> +<p>He didn't know whether it had been hard or easy for him to give +up the Moving Fortress. He did it instinctively. There was--unless +he had chosen to be a blackguard--nothing else for him to do.</p> +<p>Besides, the Moving Fortress wasn't his idea. Drayton had had it +first. Anybody might have had it. He hadn't spoken of it first; but +that was nothing. The point was that he had had it first, and Nicky +wasn't going to take it from him.</p> +<p>It meant more to Drayton, who was in the Service, than it could +possibly mean to him. He hadn't even got a profession.</p> +<p>As he walked back through the fields to the station, he said to +himself that he didn't really care. It was only one more jolly +sell. He didn't like giving up his Moving Fortress; but it wouldn't +end him. There was something in him that would go on.</p> +<p>He would make another engine.</p> +<p>He didn't care. There was something in him that would go on.</p> +<p>"I can't see," Desmond had said, "why Captain Drayton should be +allowed to walk off with your idea."</p> +<p>"He's worked five years on it."</p> +<p>"He hasn't worked it <i>out</i> yet, and you have. Can't you see +"--her face was dark and hard with anger--"there's money in +it?"</p> +<p>"If there is, all the more reason why I shouldn't bag it."</p> +<p>"And where do I come in?"</p> +<p>"Not just here, I'm afraid. It isn't your business."</p> +<p>"Not my business? When I did the drawings? You couldn't possibly +have done them yourself."</p> +<p>At that point Nicky refused to discuss the matter farther.</p> +<p>And still Desmond brooded on her grievance. And still at +intervals Desmond brought it up again.</p> +<p>"There's stacks of money in your father's business--"</p> +<p>"There's stacks of money in that Moving Fortress--"</p> +<p>"You are a fool, Nicky, to throw it all away."</p> +<p>He never answered her. He said to himself that Desmond was +hysterical and had a morbid fancy.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>But it didn't end there.</p> +<p>He had taken the drawings and the box that had the model of the +Moving Fortress in it and buried them in the locker under the big +north window in Desmond's studio.</p> +<p>And there, three weeks later, Desmond found them. And she packed +the model of the Moving Fortress and marked it "Urgent with Care," +and sent it to the War Office with a letter. She packed the +drawings in a portfolio--having signed her own and Nicky's name on +the margins--and sent them to Captain Drayton with a letter. She +said she had no doubt she was doing an immoral thing; but she did +it in fairness to Captain Drayton, for she was sure he would not +like Nicky to make so great a sacrifice. Nicky, she said, was +wrapped up in his Moving Fortress. It was his sweetheart, his baby. +"He will never forgive me," she said, "as long as he lives. But I +simply had to let you know. It means so much to him."</p> +<p>For she thought, "Because Nicky's a fool, I needn't be one."</p> +<p>Drayton came over the same evening after he had got the letter. +He shouted with laughter.</p> +<p>"Nicky," he said, "you filthy rotter, why on earth didn't you +tell me?... It <i>was</i> Nickyish of you.... What if I did think +of it first? I should have had to come to you for the details. It +would have been jolly to have worked it out together.... Not a bit +of it! Your wife's absolutely right. Good thing, after all, you +married her.</p> +<p>"By the way, she says there's a model. I want to see that model. +Have you got it here?"</p> +<p>Nicky went up into the studio to look for it. He couldn't find +it in the locker where he'd left it. "Wherever is the damned +thing?" he said.</p> +<p>"The damned thing," said Desmond, "is where you should have sent +it first of all--at the War Office. You're clever, Nicky, but you +aren't quite clever enough."</p> +<p>"I'm afraid," he said, "<i>you've</i> been a bit too clever, +this time."</p> +<p>Drayton agreed with him. It was, he said, about the worst thing +that could possibly have happened.</p> +<p>"She shouldn't have done that, Nicky. What on earth could have +made her do it?"</p> +<p>"Don't ask me," said Nicky, "what makes her do things."</p> +<p>"It looks," Drayton meditated, "as if she didn't trust me. I'm +afraid she's dished us. God knows whether we can ever get it +back!"</p> +<p>Desmond had a fit of hysterics when she realized how clever she +had been.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Desmond's baby was born late in November of that year, and it +died when it was two weeks old. It was as if she had not wanted it +enough to give it life for long outside her body.</p> +<p>For though Desmond had been determined to have a child, and had +declared that she had a perfect right to have one if she chose, she +did not care for it when it came. And when it died Nicky was +sorrier than Desmond.</p> +<p>He had not wanted to be a father to Headley Richards' child. And +yet it was the baby and nothing but the baby that had let him in +for marrying Desmond. So that, when it died, he felt that somehow +things had tricked and sold him. As they had turned out he need not +have married Desmond after all.</p> +<p>She herself had pointed out the extreme futility of his +behaviour, lest he should miss the peculiar irony of it. For when +her fright and the cause of her fright were gone Desmond resented +Nicky's having married her. She didn't really want anybody to marry +her, and nobody but Nicky would have dreamed of doing it.</p> +<p>She lay weak and pathetic in her bed for about a fortnight; and +for a little while after she was content to lie stretched out among +her cushions on the studio floor, while Nicky waited on her. But, +when she got well and came downstairs for good, Nicky saw that +Desmond's weakness and pathos had come with the baby and had gone +with it. The real Desmond was not weak, she was not pathetic. She +was strong and hard and clever with a brutal cleverness. She didn't +care how much he saw. He could see to the bottom of her nature, if +he liked, and feel how hard it was. She had no more interest in +deceiving him.</p> +<p>She had no more interest in him at all.</p> +<p>She was interested in her painting again. She worked in long +fits, after long intervals of idleness. She worked with a hard, +passionless efficiency. Nicky thought her paintings were hideous +and repulsive; but he did not say so. He was not aware of the +extent to which Desmond imitated her master, Alfred Orde-Jones. He +knew nothing about painting and he had got used to the things. He +had got used to Desmond, slouching about the flat, in her sloping, +slovenly grace, dressed in her queer square jacket and straight +short skirt, showing her long delicate ankles, and her slender feet +in their grey stockings and black slippers.</p> +<p>He was used to Desmond when she was lazy; when she sat hunched +up on her cushions and smoked one cigarette after another without a +word, and watched him sullenly. Her long, slippered feet, thrust +out, pointed at him, watching. Her long face watched him between +the sleek bands of hair and the big black bosses plaited over her +ears.</p> +<p>The beauty of Desmond's face had gone to sleep again, stilled +into hardness by the passing of her passion. A sort of ugliness was +awake there, and it watched him.</p> +<p>In putting weakness and pathos away from her Desmond had parted +with two-thirds of her power. Yet the third part still served to +hold him, used with knowledge and a cold and competent economy. He +resented it, resisted it over and over again; and over and over +again it conquered resentment and resistance. It had something to +do with her subtle, sloping lines, with her blackness and her +sallow whiteness, with the delicate scent and the smoothness of her +skin under the sliding hand. He couldn't touch her without still +feeling a sort of pity, a sort of affection.</p> +<p>But she could take and give caresses while she removed her soul +from him in stubborn rancour.</p> +<p>He couldn't understand that. It amazed him every time. He +thought it horrible. For Nicky's memory was faithful. It still kept +the impression of the Desmond he had married, the tender, +frightened, helpless Desmond he had thought he loved. The Desmond +he remembered reminded him of Veronica.</p> +<p>And Desmond said to herself, "He's impossible. You can't make +any impression on him. I might as well be married to a Moving +Fortress."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Months passed. The War Office had not yet given up Nicky's model +of the Moving Fortress. In the first month it was not aware of any +letter or of any parcel or of any Mr. Nicholas Harrison. In the +second month inquiries would be made and the results communicated +to Captain Drayton. In the third month the War Office knew nothing +of the matter referred to by Captain Drayton.</p> +<p>Drayton hadn't a hope. "We can't get it back, Nicky," he +said.</p> +<p>"I can," said Nicky, "I can get it back out of my head."</p> +<p>All through the winter of nineteen-eleven and the spring of +nineteen-twelve they worked at it together. They owned that they +were thus getting better results than either of them could have got +alone. There were impossibilities about Nicky's model that a gunner +would have seen at once, and there were faults in Drayton's plans +that an engineer would not have made. Nicky couldn't draw the plans +and Drayton couldn't build the models. They said it was fifty times +better fun to work at it together.</p> +<p>Nicky was happy.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Desmond watched them sombrely. She and Alfred Orde-Jones, the +painter, laughed at them behind their backs. She said "How funny +they are! Frank wouldn't hurt a fly and Nicky wouldn't say 'Bo!' to +a goose if he thought it would frighten the goose, and yet they're +only happy when they're inventing some horrible machine that'll +kill thousands of people who never did them any harm." He said, +"That's because they haven't any imagination."</p> +<p>Nicky got up early and went to bed late to work at the Moving +Fortress. The time between had to be given to the Works. The +Company had paid him fairly well for all his patents in the hope of +getting more of his ideas, and when they found that no ideas were +forthcoming they took it out of him in labour. He was too busy and +too happy to notice what Desmond was doing.</p> +<p>One day Vera said to him, "Nicky, do you know that Desmond is +going about a good deal with Alfred Orde-Jones?"</p> +<p>"Is she? Is there any reason why she shouldn't?"</p> +<p>"Not unless you call Orde-Jones a reason."</p> +<p>"You mean I've got to stop it? How can I?"</p> +<p>"You can't. Nothing can stop Desmond."</p> +<p>"What do you think I ought to do about it?"</p> +<p>"Nothing. She goes about with scores of people. It doesn't +follow that there's anything in it."</p> +<p>"Oh, Lord, I should hope not! That beastly bounder. What +<i>could</i> there be in it?"</p> +<p>"He's a clever painter, Nicky. So's Desmond. There's that in +it."</p> +<p>"I've hardly a right to object to that, have I? It's not as if I +were a clever painter myself."</p> +<p>But as he walked home between the white-walled gardens of St. +John's Wood, and through Regent's Park and Baker Street, and down +the north side of Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens, he worried the +thing to shreds.</p> +<p>There couldn't be anything in it.</p> +<p>He could see Alfred Orde-Jones--the raking swagger of the tall +lean body in the loose trousers, the slouch hat and the flowing +tie. He could see his flowing black hair and his haggard, eccentric +face with its seven fantastic accents, the black eyebrows, the +black moustache, the high, close-clipped side whiskers, the two +forks of the black beard.</p> +<p>There couldn't be anything in it.</p> +<p>Orde-Jones's mouth was full of rotten teeth.</p> +<p>And yet he never came home rather later than usual without +saying to himself, "Supposing I was to find him there with +her?"</p> +<p>He left off coming home late so that he shouldn't have to ask +himself that question.</p> +<p>He wondered what--if it really did happen--he would do. He +wondered what other men did. It never occurred to him that at +twenty-two he was young to be considering this problem.</p> +<p>He rehearsed scenes that were only less fantastic than +Orde-Jones's face and figure, or that owed their element of fantasy +to Orde-Jones's face and figure. He saw himself assaulting +Orde-Jones with violence, dragging him out of Desmond's studio, and +throwing him downstairs. He wondered what shapes that body and +those legs and arms would take when they got to the bottom. Perhaps +they wouldn't get to the bottom all at once. He would hang on to +the banisters. He saw himself simply opening the door of the studio +and ordering Orde-Jones to walk out of it. Really, there would be +nothing else for him to do but to walk out, and he would look an +awful ass doing it. He saw himself standing in the room and looking +at them, and saying, "I've no intention of interrupting you." +Perhaps Desmond would answer, "You're not interrupting us. We've +finished all we had to say." And <i>he</i> would walk out and leave +them there. Not caring.</p> +<p>He wondered if <i>he</i> would look an awful ass doing it.</p> +<p>In the end, when it came, he hadn't to do any of these things. +It happened very quietly and simply, early on a Sunday evening +after he had got back from Eltham. He had dined with Drayton and +his people on Saturday, and stayed, for once, over-night, risking +it.</p> +<p>Desmond was sitting on a cushion, on the floor, with her thin +legs in their grey stockings slanting out in front of her. She +propped her chin on her hands. Her thin, long face, between the +great black ear-bosses, looked at him thoughtfully, without +rancour.</p> +<p>"Nicky," she said, "Alfred Orde-Jones slept with me last +night."</p> +<p>And he said, simply and quietly, "Very well, Desmond; then I +shall leave you. You can keep the flat, and I or my father will +make you an allowance. I shan't divorce you, but I won't live with +you."</p> +<p>"Why won't you divorce me?" she said.</p> +<p>"Because I don't want to drag you through the dirt."</p> +<p>She laughed quietly. "Dear Nicky," she said, "how sweet and like +you. But don't let's have any more chivalrous idiocy. I don't want +it. I never did." (She had forgotten that she had wanted it very +badly once. But Nicky did not remind her of that time. No matter. +She didn't want it now). "Let's look at the thing sensibly, without +any rotten sentiment. We've had some good times together, and we've +had some bad times. I'll admit that when you married me you saved +me from a very bad time. That's no reason why we should go on +giving each other worse times indefinitely. You seem to think I +don't want you to divorce me. What else do you imagine Alfred came +for last night? Why we've been trying for it for the last three +months.</p> +<p>"Of course, if you'll let <i>me</i> divorce <i>you</i> for +desertion, it would be very nice of you. That," said Desmond, "is +what decent people do."</p> +<p>He went out and telephoned to his father. Then he left her and +went back to his father's house.</p> +<p>Desmond asked the servant to remember particularly that it was +the fifteenth of June and that the master was going away and would +not come back again.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>As Nicky walked up the hill and across the Heath, he wondered +why it had happened, and why, now that it had happened, he cared so +little. He could have understood it if he hadn't cared at all for +Desmond. But he had cared in a sort of way. If she had cared at all +for him he thought they might have made something of it, something +enduring, perhaps, if they had had children of their own.</p> +<p>He still couldn't think why it had happened. But he knew that, +even if he had loved Desmond with passion, it wouldn't have been +the end of him. The part of him that didn't care, that hadn't cared +much when he lost his Moving Fortress, was the part that Desmond +never would have cared for.</p> +<p>He didn't know whether it was outside him and beyond him, bigger +and stronger than he was, or whether it was deep inside, the most +real part of him. Whatever happened or didn't happen it would go +on.</p> +<p>How could he have ended <i>here</i>, with poor little Desmond? +There was something ahead of him, something that he felt to be +tremendous and holy. He had always known it waited for him. He was +going out to meet it; and because of it he didn't care.</p> +<p>And after a year of Desmond he was glad to go back to his +father's house; even though he knew that the thing that waited for +him was not there.</p> +<p>Frances and Anthony were happy again. After all, Heaven had +manipulated their happiness with exquisite art and wisdom, letting +Michael and Nicholas go from them for a little while that they +might have them again more completely, and teaching them the art +and wisdom that would keep them.</p> +<p>Some day the children would marry; even Nicky might marry again. +They would prepare now, by small daily self-denials, for the big +renunciation that must come.</p> +<p>Yet in secret they thought that Michael would never marry; that +Nicky, made prudent by disaster, wasn't really likely to marry +again. John would marry; and they would be happy in John's +happiness and in John's children.</p> +<p>And Nicky had not been home before he offered to his parents the +spectacle of an outrageous gaiety. You would have said that life to +Nicholas was an amusing game where you might win or lose, but +either way it didn't matter. It was a rag, a sell. Even the +preceedings, the involved and ridiculous proceedings of his +divorce, amused him.</p> +<p>It was undeniably funny that he should be supposed to have +deserted Desmond.</p> +<p>Frances wondered, again, whether Nicky really had any feelings, +and whether things really made any impression on him.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XVI"></a>XVI</h2> +<br> +<p>It was a quarter past five on a fine morning, early in July. On +the stroke of the quarter Captain Frank Drayton's motor-car, after +exceeding the speed limit along the forlorn highway of the +Caledonian Road, drew up outside the main entrance of Holloway +Gaol. Captain Frank Drayton was alone in his motor-car.</p> +<p>He had the street all to himself till twenty past five, when he +was joined by another motorist, also conspicuously alone in his +car. Drayton tried hard to look as if the other man were not +there.</p> +<p>The other man tried even harder to look as if he were not there +himself. He was the first to be aware of the absurdity of their +competitive pretences. He looked at his watch and spoke.</p> +<p>"I hope they'll be punctual with those doors. I was up at four +o'clock."</p> +<p>"I," said Drayton, "was up at three."</p> +<p>"I'm waiting for my wife," said the other man.</p> +<p>"I am <i>not</i>," said Drayton, and felt that he had +scored.</p> +<p>The other man's smile allowed him the point he made.</p> +<p>"Yes, but my wife happens to be Lady Victoria Threlfall."</p> +<p>The other man laughed as if he had made by far the better +joke.</p> +<p>Drayton recognized Mr. Augustin Threlfall, that Cabinet Minister +made notorious by his encounters with the Women's Franchise Union. +Last year Miss Maud Blackadder had stalked him in the Green Park +and lamed him by a blow from her hunting-crop. This year his wife, +Lady Victoria Threlfall, had headed the June raid on the House of +Commons.</p> +<p>And here he was at twenty minutes past five in the morning +waiting to take her out of prison.</p> +<p>And here was Drayton, waiting for Dorothea, who was not his wife +yet.</p> +<p>"Anyhow," said the Cabinet Minister, "we've done them out of +their Procession."</p> +<p>"What Procession?"</p> +<p>All that Drayton knew about it was that, late last night, a +friend he had in the Home Office had telephoned to him that the +hour of Miss Dorothea Harrison's release would be five-thirty, not +six-thirty as the papers had it.</p> +<p>"The Procession," said the Cabinet Minister, "that was to have +met 'em at six-thirty. A Car of Victory for Mrs. Blathwaite, and a +bodyguard of thirteen young women on thirteen white horses. The +girl who smashed my knee-cap is to be Joan of Arc and ride at the +head of 'em. In armour. Fact. There's to be a banquet for 'em at +the Imperial at nine. We can't stop <i>that</i>. And they'll +process down the Embankment and down Pall Mall and Piccadilly at +eleven; but they won't process here. We've let 'em out an hour too +soon."</p> +<p>A policeman came from the prison-yard. He blew a whistle. Four +taxi-cabs crept round the corner furtively, driven by visibly +hilarious chauffeurs.</p> +<p>"The triumphant procession from Holloway," said the Cabinet +Minister, "is you and me, sir, and those taxi-cabs."</p> +<p>On the other side of the gates a woman laughed. The released +prisoners were coming down the prison-yard.</p> +<p>The Cabinet Minister cranked up his engine with an unctuous +glee. He was boyishly happy because he and the Home Secretary had +done them out of the Car of Victory and the thirteen white +horses.</p> +<p>The prison-gates opened. The Cabinet Minister and Drayton raised +their caps.</p> +<p>The leaders, Mrs. Blathwaite and Angela Blathwaite and Mrs. +Palmerston-Swete came first. Then Lady Victoria Threlfall. Then +Dorothea. Then sixteen other women.</p> +<p>Drayton did not look at them. He did not see what happened when +the Cabinet Minister met his wife. He did not see the sixteen other +women. He saw nothing but Dorothea walking by herself.</p> +<p>She had no hat on. Her clothes were as the great raid had left +them, a month ago. Her serge coat was torn at the breast pocket, +the three-cornered flap hung, showing the white lining. Another +three-cornered flap hung from her right knee. She carried her +small, hawk-like head alert and high. Her face had the incomparable +bloom of youth. Her eyes shone. They and her face showed no memory +of the prison-cell, the plank-bed, and the prison walls; they +showed no sense of Drayton's decency in coming to meet her, no +sense of anything at all but of the queerness, the greatness and +the glory of the world--of him, perhaps, as a part of it. She +stepped into the car as if they had met by appointment for a run +into the country. "I shan't hurt your car. I'm quite clean, though +you mightn't think it. The cells were all right this time."</p> +<p>He disapproved of her, yet he adored her.</p> +<p>"Dorothy," he said, "do you want to go to that banquet?"</p> +<p>"No, but I've got to. I must go through with it. I swore I'd do +the thing completely or not at all."</p> +<p>"It isn't till nine. We've three whole hours before we need +start."</p> +<p>"What are you going to do with me?"</p> +<p>"I'm going to take you home first. Then I suppose I shall have +to drive you down to that beastly banquet."</p> +<p>"That won't take three and a half hours. It's a heavenly +morning. Can't we do something with it?"</p> +<p>"What would you like to do?"</p> +<p>"I'd like to stop at the nearest coffee-stall. I'm hungry. +Then--Are you frightfully sleepy?"</p> +<p>"Me? Oh, Lord, no."</p> +<p>"Then let's go off somewhere into the country." They went.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>They pulled up in a green lane near Totteridge to finish the +buns they had brought with them from the coffee-stall.</p> +<p>"Did you ever smell anything like this lane? Did you ever eat +anything like these buns? Did you ever drink anything like that +divine coffee? If epicures had any imagination they'd go out and +obstruct policemen and get put in prison for the sake of the +sensations they'd have afterwards."</p> +<p>"That reminds me," he said, "that I want to talk to you. No--but +seriously."</p> +<p>"I don't mind how seriously you talk if I may go on eating."</p> +<p>"That's what I brought the buns for. So that I mayn't be +interrupted. First of all I want to tell you that you haven't taken +me in. Other people may be impressed with this Holloway business, +but not me. I'm not moved, or touched, or even interested."</p> +<p>"Still," she murmured, "you did get up at three o'clock in the +morning."</p> +<p>"If you think I got up at three o'clock in the morning to show +my sympathy, you're mistaken."</p> +<p>"Sympathy? I don't need your sympathy. It was worth it, Frank. +There isn't anything on earth like coming out of prison. Unless it +is going in."</p> +<p>"That won't work, Dorothy, when I know why you went in. It +wasn't to prove your principles. Your principles were against that +sort of thing. It wasn't to get votes for women. You know as well +as I do that you'll never get them that way. It wasn't to annoy Mr. +Asquith. You knew Mr. Asquith wouldn't care a hang. It was to annoy +me."</p> +<p>"I wonder," she said dreamily, "if I shall <i>ever</i> be able +to stop eating."</p> +<p>"You can't take me in. I know too much about it. You said you +were going to keep out of rows. You weren't going on that +deputation because it meant a row. You went because I asked you not +to go."</p> +<p>"I did; and I should go again tomorrow for the same reason."</p> +<p>"But it isn't a reason. It's not as if I'd asked you to go +against your conscience. Your conscience hadn't anything to do with +it."</p> +<p>"Oh, hadn't it! I went because you'd no right to ask me not +to."</p> +<p>"If I'd had the right you'd have gone just the same."</p> +<p>"What do you mean by the right?"</p> +<p>"You know perfectly well what I mean."</p> +<p>"Of course I do. You mean, and you meant that if I'd married you +you'd have had the right, not just to ask me not to, but to prevent +me. That was what I was out against. I'd be out against it tomorrow +and the next day, and for as long as you keep up that +attitude."</p> +<p>"And yet--you said you loved me."</p> +<p>"So I did. So I do. But I'm out against that too."</p> +<p>"Good Lord, against what?"</p> +<p>"Against your exploiting my love for your purposes."</p> +<p>"My poor dear child, what do you suppose I wanted?"</p> +<p>She had reached the uttermost limit of absurdity, and in that +moment she became to him helpless and pathetic.</p> +<p>"I knew there was going to be the most infernal row and I wanted +to keep you out of it. Look here, you'd have thought me a rotter if +I hadn't, wouldn't you?</p> +<p>"Of course you would. And there's another thing. You weren't +straight about it. You never told me you were going."</p> +<p>"I never told you I wasn't."</p> +<p>"I don't care, Dorothy; you weren't straight. You ought to have +told me."</p> +<p>"How could I tell you when I knew you'd only go trying to stop +me and getting yourself arrested."</p> +<p>"Not me. They wouldn't have touched me."</p> +<p>"How was I to know that? If they had I should have dished you. +And I'd have stayed away rather than do that. I didn't tell Michael +or Nicky or Father for the same reason."</p> +<p>"You'd have stayed at home rather than have dished me? Do you +really mean that?"</p> +<p>"Of course I mean it. And I meant it. It's you," she said, "who +don't care."</p> +<p>"How do you make that out?"</p> +<p>He really wanted to know. He really wanted, if it were possible, +to understand her.</p> +<p>"I make it out this way. Here have I been through the adventure +and the experience of my life. I was in the thick of the big raid; +I was four weeks shut up in a prison cell; and you don't care; +you're not interested. You never said to yourself, 'Dorothy was in +the big raid, I wonder what happened to her?' or 'Dorothy's in +prison, I wonder how she's feeling?' You didn't care; you weren't +interested.</p> +<p>"If it had happened to you, I couldn't have thought of anything +else, I couldn't have got it out of my head. I should have been +wondering all the time what you were feeling; I couldn't have +rested till I knew. It would have been as if I was in prison +myself. And now, when I've come out, all you think of is how you +can rag and score off me."</p> +<p>She was sitting beside him on the green bank of the lane. Her +hands were clasped round her knees. One knickerbockered knee +protruded through the three-cornered rent in her skirt; she stared +across the road, a long, straight stare that took no heed of what +she saw, the grey road, and the green bank on the other side, +topped by its hedge of trees.</p> +<p>Her voice sounded quiet in the quiet lane; it had no accent of +self-pity or reproach. It was as if she were making statements that +had no emotional significance whatever.</p> +<p>She did not mean to hurt him, yet every word cut where he was +sorest.</p> +<p>"I wanted to tell you about it. I counted the days, the minutes +till I could tell you; but you wouldn't listen. You don't want to +hear."</p> +<p>"I won't listen if it's about women's suffrage. And I don't want +to hear if it's anything awful about you."</p> +<p>"It is about me, but it isn't awful.</p> +<p>"That's what I want to tell you.</p> +<p>"But, first of all--about the raid. I didn't mean to be in it at +all, as it happens. I meant to go with the deputation because you +told me not to. You're right about that. But I meant to turn back +as soon as the police stopped us, because I hate rows with the +police, and because I don't believe in them, and because I told +Angela Blathwaite I wasn't going in with her crowd any way. You +see, she called me a coward before a lot of people and said I +funked it. So I did. But I should have been a bigger coward if I'd +gone against my own will, just because of what she said. That's how +she collars heaps of women. They adore her and they're afraid of +her. Sometimes they lie and tell her they're going in when their +moment comes, knowing perfectly well that they're not going in at +all. I don't adore her, and I'm not afraid of her, and I didn't +lie.</p> +<p>"So I went at the tail of the deputation where I could slip out +when the row began. I swear I didn't mean to be in it. I funked it +far too much. I didn't mind the police and I didn't mind the crowd. +But I funked being with the women. When I saw their faces. You +world have funked it.</p> +<p>"And anyhow I don't like doing things in a beastly body. +Ugh!</p> +<p>"And then they began moving.</p> +<p>"The police tried to stop them. And the crowd tried. The crowd +began jeering at them. And still they moved. And the mounted police +horses got excited, and danced about and reared a bit, and the +crowd was in a funk then and barged into the women. That was rather +awful.</p> +<p>"I could have got away then if I'd chosen. There was a man close +to me all the time who kept making spaces for me and telling me to +slip through. I was just going to when a woman fell. Somewhere in +the front of the deputation where the police were getting +nasty.</p> +<p>"Then I had to stay. I had to go on with them. I swear I wasn't +excited or carried away in the least. Two women near me were +yelling at the police. I hated them. But I felt I'd be an utter +brute if I left them and got off safe. You see, it was an ugly +crowd, and things were beginning to be jolly dangerous, and I'd +funked it badly. Only the first minute. It went--the funk I +mean--when I saw the woman go down. She fell sort of slanting +through the crowd, and it was horrible. I couldn't have left them +then any more than I could have left children in a burning +house.</p> +<p>"I thought of you."</p> +<p>"You thought of me?"</p> +<p>"Yes. I thought of you--how you'd have hated it. But I didn't +care. I was sort of boosted up above caring. The funk had all gone +and I was absolutely happy. Not insanely happy like some of the +other women, but quietly, comfily happy.</p> +<p>"After all, I didn't do anything you <i>need</i> have +minded."</p> +<p>"What <i>did</i> you do?" he said.</p> +<p>"I just went on and stood still and refused to go back. I stuck +my hands in my pockets so that I shouldn't let out at a policeman +or anything (I knew you wouldn't like <i>that</i>). I may have +pushed a bit now and then with my shoulders and my elbows; I can't +remember. But I didn't make one sound. I was perfectly lady-like +and perfectly dignified."</p> +<p>"I suppose you <i>know</i> you haven't got a hat on?"</p> +<p>"It didn't <i>come</i> off. I <i>took</i> it off and threw it to +the crowd when the row began. It doesn't matter about your hair +coming down if you haven't got a hat on, but if your hair's down +and your hat's bashed in and all crooked you look a perfect +idiot.</p> +<p>"It wasn't a bad fight, you know, twenty-one women to I don't +know how many policemen, and the front ones got right into the +doorway of St. Stephen's. That was where they copped me.</p> +<p>"But that, isn't the end of it.</p> +<p>"The fight was only the first part of the adventure. The +wonderful thing was what happened afterwards. In prison.</p> +<p>"I didn't think I'd really <i>like</i> prison. That was another +thing I funked. I'd heard such awful things about it, about the +dirt, you know. And there wasn't any dirt in my cell, anyhow. And +after the crowds of women, after the meetings and the speeches, the +endless talking and the boredom, that cell was like heaven.</p> +<p>"Thank God, it's always solitary confinement. The Government +doesn't know that if they want to make prison a deterrent they'll +shut us up together. You won't give the Home Secretary the tip, +will you?</p> +<p>"But that isn't what I wanted to tell you about.</p> +<p>"It was something bigger, something tremendous. You'll not +believe this part of it, but I was absolutely happy in that cell. +It was a sort of deep-down unexcited happiness. I'm not a bit +religious, but I <i>know</i> how the nuns feel in their cells when +they've given up everything and shut themselves up with God. The +cell was like a convent cell, you know, as narrow as that bit of +shadow there is, and it had nice white-washed walls, and a +planked-bed in the corner, and a window high, high up. There ought +to have been a crucifix on the wall above the plank-bed, but there +wasn't a crucifix. There was only a shiny black Bible on the +chair.</p> +<p>"Really Frank, if you're to be shut up for a month with just one +book, it had better be the Bible. Isaiah's ripping. I can remember +heaps of it: 'in the habitation of jackals, where they lay, shall +be grass with reeds and rushes. And an highway shall be there ... +the redeemed shall walk there: and the ransomed of the Lord shall +return with singing into Zion' ... 'They that wait upon the Lord +shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as +eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not +faint.' I used to read like anything; and I thought of things. They +sort of came to me.</p> +<p>"That's what I wanted to tell you about. The things that came to +me were so much bigger than the thing I went in for. I could see +all along we weren't going to get it that way. And I knew we +<i>were</i> going to get it some other way. I don't in the least +know how, but it'll be some big, tremendous way that'll make all +this fighting and fussing seem the rottenest game. That was one of +the things I used to think about."</p> +<p>"Then," he said, "you've given it up? You're corning out of +it?"</p> +<p>She looked at him keenly. "Are those still your conditions?"</p> +<p>He hesitated one second before he answered firmly. "Yes, those +are still my conditions. You still won't agree to them?"</p> +<p>"I still won't agree. It's no use talking about it. You don't +believe in freedom. We're incompatible. We don't stand for the same +ideals."</p> +<p>"Oh, Lord, what <i>does</i> that matter?"</p> +<p>"It matters most awfully."</p> +<p>"I should have thought," said Drayton, "it would have mattered +more if I'd had revolting manners or an impediment in my speech or +something."</p> +<p>"It wouldn't, <i>really</i>."</p> +<p>"Well, you seem to have thought about a lot of things. Did you +ever once think about me, Dorothy?"</p> +<p>"Yes, I did. Have you ever read the Psalms? There's a jolly one +that begins: 'Blessed be the Lord my strength, which teacheth my +hands to war and my fingers to fight.' I used to think of you when +I read that. I thought of you a lot.</p> +<p>"That's what I was coming to. It was the queerest thing of all. +Everything seemed ended when I went to prison. I knew you wouldn't +care for me after what I'd done--you must really listen to this, +Frank--I knew you couldn't and wouldn't marry me; and it somehow +didn't matter. What I'd got hold of was bigger than that. I knew +that all this Women's Suffrage business was only a part of it, a +small, ridiculous part.</p> +<p>"I sort of saw the redeemed of the Lord. They were men, as well +as women, Frank. And they were all free. They were all free because +they were redeemed. And the funny thing was that you were part of +it. You were mixed up in the whole queer, tremendous business. +Everything was ended. And everything was begun; so that I knew you +understood even when you didn't understand. It was really as if I'd +got you tight, somehow; and I knew you couldn't go, even when you'd +gone."</p> +<p>"And yet you don't see that it's a crime to force me to go."</p> +<p>"I see that it would be a worse crime to force you to stay if +you mean going.</p> +<p>"What time is it?"</p> +<p>"A quarter to eight."</p> +<p>"And I've got to go home and have a bath. Whatever you do, don't +make me late for that infernal banquet. You <i>are</i> going to +drive me there?"</p> +<p>"I'm going to drive you there, but I'm not going in with +you."</p> +<p>"Poor darling! Did I ask you to go in?"</p> +<p>He drove her back to her father's house. She came out of it +burnished and beautiful, dressed in clean white linen, with the +broad red, white and blue tricolour of the Women's Franchise Union +slanting across her breast.</p> +<p>He drove her to the Banquet of the Prisoners, to the Imperial +Hotel, Kingsway. They went in silence; for their hearts ached too +much for speaking. But in Dorothy's heart, above the aching, there +was that queer exaltation that had sustained her in prison.</p> +<p>He left her at the entrance of the hotel, where Michael and +Nicholas waited to receive her.</p> +<p>Michael and Nicholas went in with her to the Banquet. They hated +it, but they went in.</p> +<p>Veronica was with them. She too wore a white frock, with red, +white and blue ribbons.</p> +<p>"Drayton's a bit of a rotter," Michael said, "not to see you +through."</p> +<p>"How can he when he feels like that about it?"</p> +<p>"As if we didn't feel!"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Three hundred and thirty women and twenty men waited in the +Banquet Hall to receive the prisoners.</p> +<p>The high galleries were festooned with the red, white and blue +of the Women's Franchise Union, and hung with flags and blazoned +banners. The silk standards and the emblems of the Women's Suffrage +Leagues and Societies, supported by their tall poles, stood ranged +along three walls. They covered the sham porphyry with gorgeous and +heroic colours, purple and blue, sky-blue and sapphire blue and +royal blue, black, white and gold, vivid green, pure gold, pure +white, dead-black, orange and scarlet and magenta.</p> +<p>From the high table under the windows streamed seven dependent +tables decorated with nosegays of red, white and blue flowers. In +the centre of the high table three arm-chairs, draped with the +tricolour, were set like three thrones for the three leaders. They +were flanked by nine other chairs on the right and nine on the left +for the eighteen other prisoners.</p> +<p>There was a slight rustling sound at the side door leading to +the high table. It was followed by a thicker and more prolonged +sound of rustling as the three hundred and fifty turned in their +places.</p> +<p>The twenty-one prisoners came in.</p> +<p>A great surge of white, spotted with red and blue, heaved itself +up in the hall to meet them as the three hundred and fifty rose to +their feet.</p> +<p>And from the three hundred and fifty there went up a strange, a +savage and a piercing collective sound, where a clear tinkling as +of glass or thin metal, and a tearing as of silk, and a crying as +of children and of small, slender-throated animals were held +together by ringing, vibrating, overtopping tones as of violins +playing in the treble. And now a woman's voice started off on its +own note and tore the delicate tissue of this sound with a solitary +scream; and now a man's voice filled up a pause in the shrill +hurrahing with a solitary boom.</p> +<p>To Dorothea, in her triumphal seat at Angela Blathwaite's right +hand, to Michael and Nicholas and Veronica in their places among +the crowd, that collective sound was frightful.</p> +<p>From her high place Dorothea could see Michael and Nicholas, one +on each side of Veronica, just below her. At the same table, facing +them, she saw her three aunts, Louie, Emmeline and Edith.</p> +<p>It was from Emmeline that those lacerating screams arose.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The breakfast and the speeches of the prisoners were over. The +crowd was on its feet again, and the prisoners had risen in their +high places.</p> +<p>Out of the three hundred and seventy-one, two hundred and +seventy-nine women and seven men were singing the Marching Song of +the Militant Women.</p> +<blockquote>Shoulder to shoulder, breast to breast,<br> +Our army moves from east to west.<br> + Follow on! Follow on!<br> +<br> +With flag and sword from south and north,<br> +The sounding, shining hosts go forth.<br> + Follow on! Follow on!<br> +<br> +Do you not bear our marching feet,<br> +From door to door, from street to street?<br> + Follow on! Follow on!</blockquote> +<p>Dorothea was fascinated and horrified by the singing, swaying, +excited crowd.</p> +<p>Her three aunts fascinated her. They were all singing at the top +of their voices. Aunt Louie stood up straight and rigid. She sang +from the back of her throat, through a mouth not quite sufficiently +open; she sang with a grim, heroic determination to sing, whatever +it might cost her and other people.</p> +<p>Aunt Edie sang inaudibly, her thin shallow voice, doing its +utmost, was overpowered by the collective song. Aunt Emmeline sang +shrill and loud; her body rocked slightly to the rhythm of a +fantastic march. With one large, long hand raised she beat the +measure of the music. Her head was thrown back; and on her face +there was a look of ecstasy, of a holy rapture, exalted, half +savage, not quite sane.</p> +<p>Dorothea was fascinated and horrified by Aunt Emmeline.</p> +<p>The singing had threatened her when it began; so that she felt +again her old terror of the collective soul. Its massed emotion +threatened her. She longed for her white-washed prison-cell, for +its hardness, its nakedness, its quiet, its visionary peace. She +tried to remember. Her soul, in its danger, tried to get back +there. But the soul of the crowd in the hail below her swelled and +heaved itself towards her, drawn by the Vortex. She felt the +rushing of the whirlwind; it sucked at her breath: the Vortex was +drawing her, too; the powerful, abominable thing almost got her. +The sight of Emmeline saved her.</p> +<p>She might have been singing and swaying too, carried away in the +same awful ecstasy, if she had not seen Emmeline. By looking at +Emmeline she saved her soul; it stood firm again; she was clear and +hard and sane.</p> +<p>She could look away from Emmeline now. She saw her brothers, +Michael and Nicholas. Michael's soul was the prey of its terror of +the herd-soul. The shrill voices, fine as whipcord and sharp as +needles, tortured him. Michael looked beautiful in his martyrdom. +His fair, handsome face was set clear and hard. His yellow hair, +with its hard edges, fitted his head like a cap of solid, polished +metal. Weariness and disgust made a sort of cloud over his light +green eyes. When Nicky looked at him Nicky's face twitched and +twinkled. But he hated it almost as much as Michael hated it.</p> +<p>She thought of Michael and Nicholas. They hated it, and yet they +stuck it out. They wouldn't go back on her. She and Lady Victoria +Threlfall were to march on foot before the Car of Victory from +Blackfriars Bridge along the Embankment, through Trafalgar Square +and Pall Mall and Piccadilly to Hyde Park Corner. And Michael and +Nicholas would march beside them to hold up the poles of the +standard which, after all, they were not strong enough to +carry.</p> +<p>She thought of Drayton who had not stuck it out. And at the same +time she thought of the things that had come to her in her prison +cell. She had told him the most real thing that had ever happened +to her, and he had not listened. He had not cared. Michael would +have listened. Michael would have cared intensely.</p> +<p>She thought, "'I am not come to bring peace, but a sword.'" The +sword was between her and her lover.</p> +<p>She had given him up. She had chosen, not between him and the +Vortex, but between him and her vision which was more than either +of them or than all this.</p> +<p>She looked at Rosalind and Maud Blackadder who sang violently in +the hall below her. She had chosen freedom. She had given up her +lover. She wondered whether Rosalind or the Blackadder girl could +have done as much, supposing they had had a choice?</p> +<p>Then she looked at Veronica.</p> +<p>Veronica was standing between Michael and Nicholas. She was +slender and beautiful and pure, like some sacrificial virgin. +Presently she would be marching in the Procession. She would carry +a thin, tall pole, with a round olive wreath on the top of it, and +a white dove sitting in the ring of the olive wreath. And she would +look as if she was not in the Procession but in another place.</p> +<p>When Dorothea looked at her she was lifted up above the insane +ecstasy and the tumult of the herd-soul. Her soul and the soul of +Veronica went alone in utter freedom.</p> +<blockquote>Follow on! Follow on!<br> +<br> +For Faith's our spear and Hope's our sword,<br> +And Love's our mighty battle-lord.<br> +Follow on! Follow on!<br> +<br> +And Justice is our flag unfurled,<br> +The flaming flag that sweeps the world.<br> +Follow on! Follow on!<br> +<br> +And "Freedom!" is our battle-cry;<br> +For Freedom we will fight and die.<br> +Follow on! Follow on!</blockquote> +<p>The Procession was over a mile long.</p> +<p>It stretched all along the Embankment from Blackfriar's Bridge +to Westminster. The Car of Victory, covered with the tricolour, and +the Bodyguard on thirteen white horses were drawn up beside +Cleopatra's Needle and the Sphinxes.</p> +<p>Before the Car of Victory, from the western Sphinx to +Northumberland Avenue, were the long regiments of the Unions and +Societies and Leagues, of the trades and the professions and the +arts, carrying their banners, the purple and the blue, the black, +white and gold, the green, the orange and the scarlet and +magenta.</p> +<p>Behind the Car of Victory came the eighteen prisoners with Lady +Victoria Threlfall and Dorothea at their head, under the immense +tricolour standard that Michael and Nicholas carried for them. +Behind the prisoners, closing the Procession, was a double line of +young girls dressed in white with tricolour ribbons, each carrying +a pole with the olive wreath and dove, symbolizing, with the +obviousness of extreme innocence, the peace that follows victory. +They were led by Veronica.</p> +<p>She did not know that she had been chosen to lead them because +of her youth and her processional, hieratic beauty; she thought +that the Union had bestowed this honour on her because she belonged +to Dorothea.</p> +<p>From her place at the head of the Procession she could see the +big red, white and blue standard held high above Dorothea and Lady +Victoria Threlfall. She knew how they would look; Lady Victoria, +white and tense, would go like a saint and a martyr, in exaltation, +hardly knowing where she was, or what she did; and Dorothea would +go in pride, and in disdain for the proceedings in which her honour +forced her to take part; she would have an awful knowledge of what +she was doing and of where she was; she would drink every drop of +the dreadful cup she had poured out for herself, hating it.</p> +<p>Last night Veronica had thought that she too would hate it; she +thought that she would rather die than march in the Procession. But +she did not hate it or her part in it. The thing was too beautiful +and too big to hate, and her part in it was too little.</p> +<p>She was not afraid of the Procession or of the soul of the +Procession. She was not afraid of the thick crowd on the pavements, +pressing closer and closer, pushed back continually by the police. +Her soul was by itself. Like Dorothea's soul it went apart from the +soul of the crowd and the soul of the Procession; only it was not +proud; it was simply happy.</p> +<p>The band had not yet begun to play; but already she heard the +music sounding in her brain; her feet felt the rhythm of the +march.</p> +<p>Somewhere on in front the policemen made gestures of release, +and the whole Procession began to move. It marched to an unheard +music, to the rhythm that was in Veronica's brain.</p> +<p>They went through what were once streets between walls of +houses, and were now broad lanes between thick walls of people. The +visible aspect of things was slightly changed, slightly distorted. +The houses stood farther back behind the walls of people; they were +hung with people; a swarm of people clung like bees to the house +walls.</p> +<p>All these people were fixed where they stood or hung. In a still +and stationary world the Procession was the only thing that +moved.</p> +<p>She had a vague, far-off perception that the crowd was +friendly.</p> +<p>A mounted policeman rode at her side. When they halted at the +cross-streets he looked down at Veronica with an amused and benign +expression. She had a vague, far-off perception that the policeman +was friendly. Everything seemed to her vague and far off.</p> +<p>Only now and then it struck her as odd that a revolutionary +Procession should be allowed to fill the streets of a great +capital, and that a body of the same police that arrested the +insurgents should go with it to protect them, to clear their +triumphal way before them, holding up the entire traffic of great +thoroughfares that their bands and their banners and their +regiments should go through. She said to herself "What a country! +It couldn't happen in Germany; it couldn't happen in France, or +anywhere in Europe or America. It could only happen in +England."</p> +<p>Now they were going up St. James's Street towards Piccadilly. +The band was playing the Marseillaise.</p> +<p>And with the first beat of the drum Veronica's soul came down +from its place, and took part in the Procession. As long as they +played the Marseillaise she felt that she could march with the +Procession to the ends of the world; she could march into battle to +the Marseillaise; she could fight to that music and die.</p> +<p>The women behind her were singing under their breath. They sang +the words of the Women's Marseillaise.</p> +<p>And Veronica, marching in front of them by herself, sang another +song. She sang the Marseillaise of Heine and of Schumann.</p> +<blockquote>"'Daun reitet mein Kaiser wohl über mein Grab,<br> +Viel' Schwerter klirren und blitzen;<br> +Dann steig' ich gewaffnet hervor aus mein Grab,--<br> +Den Kaiser, den Kaiser zu schützen!'"</blockquote> +<p>The front of the Procession lifted as it went up Tyburn +Hill.</p> +<p>Veronica could not see Michael and Nicholas, but she knew that +they were there. She knew it by the unusual steadiness of the +standard that they carried. Far away westwards, in the middle and +front of the Procession, the purple and the blue, the gold and +white, the green, the scarlet and orange and magenta standards +rocked and staggered; they bent forwards; they were flung backwards +as the west wind took them. But the red, white and blue standard +that Michael and Nicholas carried went before her, steady and +straight and high.</p> +<p>And Veronica followed, carrying her thin, tall pole with the +olive wreath on the top of it, and the white dove sitting in the +ring of the wreath. She went with the music of Schumann and Heine +sounding in her soul.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XVII"></a>XVII</h2> +<br> +<p>Another year passed.</p> +<p>Frances was afraid for Michael now. Michael was being drawn in. +Because of his strange thoughts he was the one of all her children +who had most hidden himself from her; who would perhaps hide +himself from her to the very end.</p> +<p>Nicholas had settled down. He had left the Morss Company and +gone into his father's business for a while, to see whether he +could stand it. John was going into the business too when he left +Oxford. John was even looking forward to his partnership in what he +called "the Pater's old tree-game." He said, "You wait till I get +my hand well in. Won't we make it rip!"</p> +<p>John was safe. You could depend on him to keep out of trouble. +He had no genius for adventure. He would never strike out for +himself any strange or dangerous line. He had settled down at +Cheltenham; he had settled down at Oxford.</p> +<p>And Dorothea had settled down.</p> +<p>The Women's Franchise Union was now in the full whirl of its +revolution. Under the inspiring leadership of the Blathwaites it +ran riot up and down the country. It smashed windows; it hurled +stone ginger-beer bottles into the motor cars of Cabinet Ministers; +it poured treacle into pillar-boxes; it invaded the House of +Commons by the water-way, in barges, from which women, armed with +megaphones, demanded the vote from infamous legislators drinking +tea on the Terrace; it went up in balloons and showered down +propaganda on the City; now and then, just to show what violence it +could accomplish if it liked, it burned down a house or two in a +pure and consecrated ecstasy of Feminism. It was bringing to +perfection its last great tactical manoeuvre, the massed raid +followed by the hunger-strike in prison. And it was considering +seriously the very painful but possible necessity of interfering +with British sport--say the Eton and Harrow Match at Lord's--in +some drastic and terrifying way that would bring the men of England +to their senses.</p> +<p>And Dorothea's soul had swung away from the sweep of the +whirlwind. It would never suck her in. She worked now in the office +of the Social Reform Union, and wrote reconstructive articles for +<i>The New Commonwealth</i> on Economics and the Marriage Laws.</p> +<p>Frances was not afraid for her daughter. She knew that the +revolution was all in Dorothea's brain.</p> +<p>When she said that Michael was being drawn in she meant that he +was being drawn into the vortex of revolutionary Art. And since +Frances confused this movement with the movements of Phyllis +Desmond she judged it to be terrible. She understood from Michael +that it was <i>the</i> Vortex, the only one that really mattered, +and the only one that would ever do anything.</p> +<p>And Michael was not only in it, he was in it with Lawrence +Stephen.</p> +<p>Though Frances knew now that Lawrence Stephen had plans for +Michael, she did not realize that they depended much more on +Michael himself than on him. Stephen had said that if Michael was +good enough he meant to help him. If his poems amounted to anything +he would publish them in his <i>Review</i>. If any book of +Michael's poems amounted to anything he would give a whole article +to that book in his <i>Review</i>. If Michael's prose should ever +amount to anything he would give him regular work on the +<i>Review</i>.</p> +<p>In nineteen-thirteen Michael Harrison was the most promising of +the revolutionary young men who surrounded Lawrence Stephen, and +his poems were beginning to appear, one after another, in the +<i>Green Review</i>. He had brought out a volume of his experiments +in the spring of that year; they were better than those that +Réveillaud had approved of two years ago; and Lawrence +Stephen had praised them in the <i>Green Review</i>.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen was the only editor "out of Ireland," as he +said, who would have had the courage either to publish them or to +praise them.</p> +<p>And when Frances realized Michael's dependence on Lawrence +Stephen she was afraid.</p> +<p>"You wouldn't be, my dear, if you knew Larry," Vera said.</p> +<p>For Frances still refused to recognize the man who had taken +Ferdinand Cameron's place.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen was one of those Nationalist Irishmen who love +Ireland with a passion that satisfies neither the lover nor the +beloved. It was a pure and holy passion, a passion so entirely of +the spirit as to be compatible with permanent bodily absence from +its object. Stephen's body had lived at ease in England (a country +that he declared his spirit hated) ever since he had been old +enough to choose a habitation for himself.</p> +<p>He justified his predilection on three grounds: Ireland had been +taken from him; Ireland had been so ruined and raped by the Scotch +and the English that nothing but the soul of Ireland was left for +Irishmen to love. He could work and fight for Ireland better in +London than in Dublin. And again, the Irishman in England can make +havoc in his turn; he can harry the English, he can spite, and +irritate and triumph and get his own back in a thousand ways. +Living in England he would be a thorn in England's side.</p> +<p>And all this meant that there was no place in Ireland for a man +of his talents and his temperament. His enemies called him an +opportunist: but he was a opportunist gone wrong, abandoned to an +obstinate idealism, one of those damned and solitary souls that +only the north of Ireland produces in perfection. For the +Protestantism of Ulster breeds rebels like no other rebels on +earth, rebels as strong and obstinate and canny as itself. Before +he was twenty-one Stephen had revolted against the material comfort +and the spiritual tyranny of his father's house.</p> +<p>He was the great-grandson of an immigrant Lancashire cotton +spinner settled in Belfast. His western Irish blood was steeled +with this mixture, and braced and embittered with the Scottish +blood of Antrim where his people married.</p> +<p>Therefore, if he had chosen one career and stuck to it he would +have been formidable. But one career alone did not suffice for his +inexhaustible energies. As a fisher of opportunities he drew with +too wide a net and in too many waters. He had tried parliamentary +politics and failed because no party trusted him, least of all his +own. And yet few men were more trustworthy. He turned his back on +the House of Commons and took to journalism. As a journalistic +politician he ran Nationalism for Ireland and Socialism for +England. Neither Nationalists nor Socialists believed in him; yet +few men were more worthy of belief. In literature he had +distinguished himself as a poet, a playwright, a novelist and an +essayist. He did everything so well that he was supposed not to do +anything quite well enough. Because of his politics other men of +letters suspected his artistic sincerity; yet few artists were more +sincere. His very distinction was unsatisfying. Without any of the +qualities that make even a minor statesman, he was so far +contaminated by politics as to be spoiled for the highest purposes +of art; yet there was no sense in which he had achieved +popularity.</p> +<p>Everywhere he went he was an alien and suspected. Do what he +would, he fell between two countries and two courses. Ireland had +cast him out and England would none of him. He hated Catholicism +and Protestantism alike, and Protestants and Catholics alike +disowned him. To every Church and every sect he was a free thinker, +destitute of all religion. Yet few men were more religious. His +enemies called him a turner and a twister; yet on any one of his +lines no man ever steered a straighter course.</p> +<p>A capacity for turning and twisting might have saved him. It +would at any rate have made him more intelligible. As it was, he +presented to two countries the disconcerting spectacle of a +many-sided object moving with violence in a dead straight line. He +moved so fast that to a stationary on-looker he was gone before one +angle of him had been apprehended. It was for other people to turn +and twist if any one of them was to get a complete all-round view +of the amazing man.</p> +<p>But taken all round he passed for a man of hard wit and +suspicious brilliance.</p> +<p>And he belonged to no generation. In nineteen-thirteen he was +not yet forty, too old to count among the young men, and yet too +young for men of his own age. So that in all Ireland and all +England you could not have found a lonelier man.</p> +<p>The same queer doom pursued him in the most private and sacred +relations of his life. To all intents and purposes he was married +to Vera Harrison and yet he was not married. He was neither bound +nor free.</p> +<p>All this had made him sorrowful and bitter.</p> +<p>And to add to his sorrowfulness and bitterness he had something +of the Celt's spiritual abhorrence of the flesh; and though he +loved Vera, after his manner, there were moments when Vera's +capacity for everlasting passion left him tired and bored and +cold.</p> +<p>All his life <i>his</i> passions had been at the service of +ideas. All his life he had looked for some great experience, some +great satisfaction and consummation; and he had not found it.</p> +<p>In nineteen-thirteen, with half his life behind him, the +opportunist was still waiting for his supreme opportunity.</p> +<p>Meanwhile his enemies said of him that he snatched.</p> +<p>But he did not snatch. The eyes of his idealism were fixed too +steadily on a visionary future. He merely tried, with a bored and +weary gesture, to waylay the passing moment while he waited. He had +put his political failure behind him and said, "I will be judged as +an artist or not at all." They judged him accordingly and their +judgment was wrong.</p> +<p>There was not the least resemblance between Lawrence Stephen as +he was in himself and Lawrence Stephen as he appeared to the +generation just behind him. To conservatives he passed for the +leader of the revolution in contemporary art, and yet the +revolution in contemporary art was happening without him. He was +not the primal energy in the movement of the Vortex. In +nineteen-thirteen his primal energies were spent, and he was +trusting to the movement of the Vortex to carry him a little +farther than he could have gone by his own impetus. He was +attracted to the young men of the Vortex because they were not of +the generation that had rejected him, and because he hoped thus to +prolong indefinitely his own youth. They were attracted to him +because of his solitary distinction, his comparative poverty, and +his unpopularity. A prosperous, well-established Stephen would have +revolted them. He gave the revolutionaries the shelter of his +<i>Review</i>, the support of his name, and the benefit of his +bored and wearied criticism. They brought him in return a certain +homage founded on his admirable appreciation of their merits and +tempered by their sense of his dealings with the past they +abominated.</p> +<p>"Stephen is a bigot," said young Morton Ellis; "he believes in +Swinburne."</p> +<p>Stephen smiled at him in bored and weary tolerance.</p> +<p>He believed in too many things for his peace of mind. He knew +that the young men distrusted him because of his beliefs, and +because of his dealings with the past; because he refused to +destroy the old gods when he made place for the new.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Young Morton Ellis lay stretched out at his ease on the couch in +Stephen's study.</p> +<p>He blinked and twitched as he looked up at his host with half +irritated, half affable affection.</p> +<p>The young men came and went at their ease in and out of that +house in St. John's Wood which Lawrence Stephen shared with Vera +Harrison. They were at home there. Their books stood in his +bookcase; they laid their manuscripts on his writing table and left +them there; they claimed his empty spaces for the hanging of their +pictures yet unsold.</p> +<p>Every Friday evening they met together in the long, low room at +the top of the house, and they talked.</p> +<p>Every Friday evening Michael left his father's house to meet +them there, and to listen and to talk.</p> +<p>To-night, round and about Morton Ellis, the young poet, were +Austen Mitchell, the young painter, and Paul Monier-Owen, the young +sculptor, and George Wadham, the last and youngest of Morton +Ellis's disciples.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen stood among them like an austere guest in some +rendezvous of violent youth, or like the priest of some romantic +religion that he has blasphemed yet not quite abjured. He was lean +and dark and shaven; his black hair hung forward in two masses, +smooth and straight and square; he had sorrowful, bitter eyes, and +a bitter, sorrowful mouth, the long Irish upper lip fine and hard +drawn, while the lower lip quivered incongruously, pouted and +protested and recanted, was sceptical and sensitive and tender. His +short, high nose had wide yet fastidious nostrils.</p> +<p>It was at this figure that Morton Ellis continued to gaze with +affability and irritation. It was this figure that Vera's eyes +followed with anxious, restless passion, as if she felt that at any +moment he might escape her, might be off, God knew where.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen was ill at ease in that house and in the +presence of his mistress and his friends.</p> +<p>"I believe in the past," he said, "because I believe in the +future. I want continuity. Therefore I believe in Swinburne; and I +believe in Browning and in Tennyson and Wordsworth; I believe in +Keats and Shelley and in Milton. But I do not believe, any more +than you do, in their imitators. I believe in destroying their +imitators. I do not believe in destroying them."</p> +<p>"You can't destroy their imitators unless you destroy them. They +breed the disgusting parasites. Their memories harbour them like a +stinking suit of old clothes. They must be scrapped and burned if +we're to get rid of the stink. Art has got to be made young and new +and clean. There isn't any disinfectant that'll do the trick. So +long as old masters are kow-towed to as masters people will go on +imitating them. When a poet ceases to be a poet and becomes a +centre of corruption, he must go."</p> +<p>Michael said, "How about <i>us</i> when people imitate us? Have +we got to go?"</p> +<p>Morton Ellis looked at him and blinked. "No," he said. "No. We +haven't got to go."</p> +<p>"I don't see how you get out of it."</p> +<p>"I get out of it by doing things that can't be imitated."</p> +<p>There was a silence in which everybody thought of Mr. George +Wadham. It made Mr. Wadham so uncomfortable that he had to break +it.</p> +<p>"I say, how about Shakespeare?" he said.</p> +<p>"Nobody, so far, <i>has</i> imitated Shakespeare, any more than +they have <i>succeeded</i> in imitating me."</p> +<p>There was another silence while everybody thought of Morton +Ellis as the imitator of every poetic form under the sun except the +forms adopted by his contemporaries.</p> +<p>"That's all very well, Ellis," said Stephen, "but you aren't the +Holy Ghost coming down out of heaven. We can trace your +sources."</p> +<p>"My dear Stephen, I never said I was the Holy Ghost. Nobody ever +does come down out of heaven. You <i>can</i> trace my sources, +thank God, because they're clean. I haven't gone into every stream +that swine like--and--and--and--and--" (he named five contemporary +distinctions) "have made filthy with their paddling."</p> +<p>He went on. "The very damnable question that you've raised, +Harrison, is absurd. You believe in the revolution. Well then, +supposing the revolution's coming--you needn't suppose it, because +it's come. We <i>are</i> the revolution--the revolution means that +we've made a clean sweep of the past. In the future no artist will +want to imitate anybody. No artist will be allowed to exist unless +he's prepared to be buried alive or burned alive rather than +corrupt the younger generation with the processes and the products +of his own beastly dissolution.</p> +<p>"That's why violence is right.</p> +<blockquote>"'O Violenza, sorgi, balena in questo cielo<br> +Sanguigno, stupra le albe,<br> +irrompi come incendio nei vesperi,<br> +fa di tutto il sereno una tempesta,<br> +fa di tutta la vita una bataglia,<br> +fa con tutte le anime un odio solo!'</blockquote> +<p>"There's no special holiness in violence. Violence is right +because it's necessary."</p> +<p>"You mean it's necessary because it's right."</p> +<p>Austen Mitchell spoke. He was a sallow youth with a broad, +flat-featured, British face, but he had achieved an appearance of +great strangeness and distinction by letting his hay-coloured hair +grow long and cultivating two beards instead of one.</p> +<p>"Violence," he continued, "is not a means; it's an end! Energy +must be got for its own sake, if you want to generate more energy +instead of standing still. The difference between Pastism and +Futurism is the difference between statics and dynamics. Futurist +art is simply art that has gone on, that, has left off being static +and become dynamic. It expresses movement. Owen will tell you +better than I can why it expresses movement."</p> +<p>A light darted from the corner of the room where Paul +Monier-Owen had curled himself up. His eyes flashed like the eyes +of a young wild animal roused in its lair.</p> +<p>Paul Monier-Owen was dark and soft and supple. At a little +distance he had the clumsy grace and velvet innocence of a black +panther, half cub, half grown. The tips of his ears, the corners of +his prominent eyes, his eyebrows and his long nostrils tilted +slightly upwards and backwards. Under his slender, mournful nose +his restless smile showed the white teeth of a young animal.</p> +<p>Above this primitive, savage base of features that responded +incessantly to any childish provocation, the intelligence of +Monier-Owen watched in his calm and beautiful forehead and in his +eyes.</p> +<p>He said, "It expresses movement, because it presents objects +directly as cutting across many planes. To do this you have to +break up objects into the lines and masses that compose them, and +project those lines and masses into space on any curve, at any +angle, according to the planes you mean them to cross, otherwise +the movements you mean them to express. The more planes intersected +the more movement you get. By decomposing figures you compose +movements. By decomposing groups of figures you compose groups of +movement. Nothing but a cinema can represent objects as intact and +as at the same time moving; and even the cinema only does this by a +series of decompositions so minute as to escape the eye.</p> +<p>"You want to draw a battle-piece or the traffic at Hyde Park +Corner. It can't be done unless you break up your objects as +Mitchell breaks them up. You want to carve figures in the round, +wrestling or dancing. It can't be done unless you dislocate their +lines and masses as I dislocate them, so as to throw them all at +once into those planes that the intact body could only have +traversed one after another in a given time.</p> +<p>"By taking time into account as well as space we produce +rhythm.</p> +<p>"I know what you're going to say, Stephen. The Dancing Faun and +the Frieze of the Parthenon express movements. But they do nothing +of the sort. They express movements arrested at a certain point. +They are supposed to represent nature, but they do not even do +that, because arrested motion is a contradiction in terms, and +because the point of arrest is an artificial and arbitrary +thing.</p> +<p>"Your medium limits you. You have to choose between the intact +body which is stationary and the broken and projected bodies which +are in movement. That is why we destroy or suppress symmetry in the +figure and in design. Because symmetry is perfect balance which is +immobility. If I wanted to present perfect rest I should do it by +an absolute symmetry."</p> +<p>"And there's more in it than that," said Austen Mitchell. "We're +out against the damnable affectations of naturalism and humanism. +If I draw a perfect likeness of a fat, pink woman I've got a fat, +pink woman and nothing else but a fat pink woman. And a fat, pink +woman is a work of Nature, not a work of art. And I'm lying. I'm +presenting as a reality what is only an appearance. The better the +likeness the bigger the lie. But movement and rhythm are realities, +not appearances. When I present rhythm and movement I've done +something. I've made reality appear."</p> +<p>He went on to unfold a scheme for restoring vigour to the +exhausted language by destroying its articulations. These he +declared to be purely arbitrary, therefore fatal to the development +of a spontaneous and individual style. By breaking up the rigid +ties of syntax, you do more than create new forms of prose moving +in perfect freedom, you deliver the creative spirit itself from the +abominable contact with dead ideas. Association, fixed and +eternalized by the structure of the language, is the tyranny that +keeps down the live idea.</p> +<p>"We've got to restore the innocence of memory, as Gauguin +restored the innocence of the eye."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Michael noticed that the talk was not always sustained at this +constructive level. And to-night, towards twelve o'clock, it +dropped and broke in a welter of vituperation. It was, first, a +frenzied assault on the Old Masters, a storming of immortal +strongholds, a tearing and scattering of the wing feathers of +archangels; then, from this high adventure it sank to a perfunctory +skirmishing among living eminences over forty, judged, by reason of +their age, to be too contemptible for an attack in force. It +rallied again to a bombing and blasting of minute ineptitudes, the +slaughter of "swine like ---- and ---- and ---- and ---- and ----"; +and ended in a furious pursuit of a volatile young poet, Edward +Rivers, who had escaped by sheer levity from the tug of the Vortex, +and was setting up a small swirl of his own.</p> +<p>Michael was with the revolutionaries heart and soul; he believed +in Morton Ellis and Austen Mitchell and Monier-Owen even more than +he believed in Lawrence Stephen, and almost as much as he believed +in Jules Réveillaud. They stood for all the realities and +all the ideas and all the accomplishments to which he himself was +devoted. He had no sort of qualms about the wholesale slaughter of +the inefficient.</p> +<p>But to-night, as he listened to these voices, he felt again his +old horror of the collective soul. The voices spoke with a terrible +unanimity. The vortex--<i>the</i> Vortex--was like the little +vortex of school. The young men, Ellis and Mitchell and Monier-Owen +belonged to a herd like the school-herd, hunting together, crying +together, saying the same thing. Their very revolt against the Old +Masters was a collective and not an individual revolt. Their chase +was hottest when their quarry was one of the pack who had broken +through and got away. They hated the fugitive, solitary private +soul.</p> +<p>And yet it was only as private souls that Ellis and Mitchell and +Monier-Owen counted. Each by himself did good things; each, if he +had the courage to break loose and go by himself, might do a great +thing some day. Even George Wadham might do something if he could +get away from Ellis and the rest. Edward Rivers had had +courage.</p> +<p>Michael thought: "It's Rivers now. It'll be my turn next" But he +had a great longing to break loose and get away.</p> +<p>He thought: "I don't know where they're all going to end. They +think they're beginning something tremendous; but I can't see +what's to come of it. And I don't see how they can go on like that +for ever. I can't see what's coming. Yet something must come. +<i>They</i> can't be the end."</p> +<p>He thought: "Their movement is only a small swirl in an immense +Vortex. It may suck them all down. But it will clear the air. They +will have helped to clear it."</p> +<p>He thought of himself going on, free from the whirl of the +Vortex, and of his work as enduring; standing clear and hard in the +clean air.</p> +<br> +<h3>END OF PART II</h3> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="PART_III"></a>PART III</h2> +<h3><i>VICTORY</i></h3> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XVIII"></a>XVIII</h2> +<br> +<p>It was July, nineteen-fourteen, a month remarkable in the +British Isles because of the fine weather and the disturbances in +the political atmosphere due to the fine weather.</p> +<p>Every other evening in that July Anthony Harrison reminded his +family that fine weather is favourable to open-air politics, and +that the mere off-chance of sunstroke is enough to bring out the +striker. And when Michael asked him contentiously what the weather +had to do with Home Rule, he answered that it had everything to do +with it by increasing parliamentary blood-pressure.</p> +<p>"Wait," he said, "till we get a good thunderstorm You'll see how +long the strike'll last, and what Sir Edward Carson has to say to +Mr. Redmond then."</p> +<p>Anthony kept his head. He had seen strikes before, and he knew +that Home Rule had never been a part of practical politics and +never would be.</p> +<p>And Michael and Dorothea laughed at him. They had their own +views about the Home Rule question and the Labor question, and they +could have told Anthony what the answers were going to be; only +they said it wasn't any good talking to Father; when he got an idea +into his dear old head it stuck there.</p> +<p>Now, on Mother, if you talked to her long enough, you could make +some impression; you could get ideas into her head and you could +get them out.</p> +<p>Frances, no longer preoccupied with the care of young children, +had time for the affairs of the nation. She was a more intelligent +woman than the Mrs. Anthony Harrison who, nineteen years ago, +informed herself of the affairs of the nation from a rapid skimming +of the <i>Times</i>. In the last four years the affairs of the +nation had thrust themselves violently upon her attention. She had +even realized the Woman's Suffrage movement as a vivid and vital +affair, since Dorothy had taken part in the fighting and had gone +to prison.</p> +<p>Frances, sitting out this July under her tree of Heaven with the +<i>Times</i>, had a sense of things about to happen if other things +didn't happen to prevent them. At any rate she had no longer any +reason to complain that nothing happened.</p> +<p>It was the Home Rule crisis now. The fact that England and +Ireland were on the edge of civil war was brought home to her, not +so much by the head-lines in the papers as by the publication of +her son Michael's insurgent poem, "Ireland," in the Green +Review.</p> +<p>For Michael had not grown out of his queer idea. He was hardly +thirteen when he had said that civil war between England and +Ireland would be glorious if the Irish won, and he was saying it +still. His poem was the green flag that he flew in the face of his +family and of his country. Neither Frances nor Anthony would have +been likely to forget the imminence of civil war (only that they +didn't really believe in it), when from morning till night Michael +talked and wrote of nothing else. In this Michael was not carried +away by collective feeling; his dream of Ireland's freedom was a +secret and solitary dream. Nobody he knew shared it but Lawrence +Stephen. The passion he brought to it made him hot and restless and +intense. Frances expressed her opinion of the Irish crisis when she +said, "I wish that Carson man would mind his own business. This +excitement is very bad for Michael."</p> +<p>And she thanked Heaven that Ireland was not England, and that +none of them lived there. If there was civil war in Ireland for a +week or two, Anthony and the boys would be out of it.</p> +<p>Frances was also alive to the war between Capital and Labour. +There was, indeed, something very intimate and personal to Frances +in this particular affair of the nation; for Anthony's business was +being disagreeably affected by the strike in the building +trade.</p> +<p>So much so that Anthony had dismissed his chauffeur and given up +his idea of turning the stable loft into a billiard-room. He had +even thought of trying to let the shooting-box and the cottage on +the Yorkshire moors which he had bought, unforeseeingly, in the +spring of last year; but Michael and Nicholas had persuaded him +that this extreme measure was unnecessary.</p> +<p>And Frances, even with the strike hanging over her, was happy. +For the children, at their first sight of possible adversity, were +showing what was in them. Their behaviour made her more arrogant +than ever. Michael and Dorothea had given up their allowances and +declared their complete ability to support themselves. (They earned +about fifty pounds a year each on an average.) She had expected +this from Dorothy, but not from Michael. Nicholas was doing the +chauffeur's work in his absence; and John showed eagerness to offer +up his last year at Oxford; he pressed it on his father as his +contribution to the family economies.</p> +<p>Veronica brought her minute dividends (paid to her every quarter +through Ferdinand Cameron's solicitors), and laid them at Frances's +and Anthony's feet. ("As if," Anthony said, "I could have taken her +poor little money!") Veronica thought she could go out as a music +teacher.</p> +<p>There were moments when Frances positively enjoyed the strike. +Her mind refused to grasp the danger of the situation. She +suspected Anthony of exaggerating his losses in order to draw out +Dorothy and Michael and Nicholas and John, and wallow in their +moral beauty. He, too, was arrogant. He was convinced that, though +there might be girls like Dorothea, there were no boys like his +three Sons. As for the strike in the building trade, strikes, as +Anthony insisted, had happened before, and none of them had +threatened for very long either Frances's peace of mind or +Anthony's prosperity.</p> +<p>The present strike was not interfering in the least with Mrs. +Anthony Harrison's Day, the last of the season. It fell this year, +on the twenty-fifth of July.</p> +<p>Long afterwards she remembered it by what happened at the end of +it.</p> +<p>Frances's Day--the fourth Saturday in the month--was one of +those slight changes that are profoundly significant. It stood for +regeneration and a change of heart. It marked the close of an +epoch. Frances's life of exclusive motherhood had ended; she had +become, or was at any rate trying to become, a social creature. Her +Day had bored her terribly at first, when it didn't frighten her; +she was only just beginning to get used to it; and still, at times, +she had the air of not taking it seriously. It had been forced on +her. Dorothea had decided that she must have a Day, like other +people.</p> +<p>She had had it since Michael's first volume of Poems had come +out in the spring of the year before, when the young men who met +every Friday evening in Lawrence Stephen's study began to meet at +Michael's father's house.</p> +<p>Anthony liked to think that his house was the centre of all this +palpitating, radiant life; of young men doing all sorts of +wonderful, energetic, important, interesting things. They stirred +the air about him and kept it clean; he liked the sound of their +feet and of their voices, and of their laughter. And when the house +was quiet and Anthony had Frances to himself he liked that, +too.</p> +<p>But Frances thought: "If only they wouldn't come quite so +often--if only I could have my children sometimes to myself!"</p> +<p>It was the last rebellion of her flesh that had borne and +suckled them.</p> +<p>There was this to be said for Frances's Day that it attracted +and diverted, and confined to one time and one place a whole crowd +of tiresome people, who, without it, would have spread themselves +over the whole month; also that it gave a great deal of innocent +happiness to the "Poor dears." Frances meant old Mrs. Fleming, and +Louie and Emmeline and Edith Fleming, who figured as essential +parts of the social event. She meant Mr. and Mrs. Jervis, who, in +the inconceivability of their absence on Frances's Bay, wondered +more than ever why their daughter Rosalind found them so +impossible. She meant Mr. Vereker and Mr. Norris from the office, +and their wives and children, and Anthony's secretary, Miss Lathom. +If Miss Lathom were not engaged to young George Vereker, she soon +would be, to judge by the behaviour of their indiscreet and +guileless faces.</p> +<p>Frances also meant her brother-in-law, Bartholomew, home from +India for good, and cherishing a new disease, more secret and more +dangerous than his cancer; she meant her brother Maurice, who was +genuinely invalided, who had come back from California for the last +time and would never be sent out anywhere again.</p> +<p>Dorothea had said: "Let's kill them all off in one awful day." +Frances had said: "Yes, but we must do it decently. We must be kind +to them, poor dears!"</p> +<p>Above all they must be decent to Grannie and the Aunties, and to +Uncle Morrie and Uncle Bartie. That was the only burden she had +laid on her children. It was a case of noblesse oblige; their youth +constrained them. They had received so much, and they had been let +off so much; not one of them had inherited the taint that made +Maurice and Emmeline Fleming and Bartie Harrison creatures diseased +and irresponsible. They could afford to be pitiful and +merciful.</p> +<p>And now that the children were grown up Frances could afford to +be pitiful and merciful herself. She could even afford to be +grateful to the poor dears. She looked on Maurice and Emmeline and +Bartie as scapegoats, bearers of the hereditary taint, whose +affliction left her children clean. She thought of them more and +more in this sacred and sacrificial character. At fifty-two Frances +could be gentle over the things that had worried and irritated her +at thirty-three. Like Anthony she was still young and strong +through the youth and strength of her children.</p> +<p>And the poor dears were getting weak and old. Grannie was +seventy-nine, and Maurice, the youngest of that generation, was +forty-nine, and he looked sixty. Every year Frances was more +acutely aware of their pathos, their futility, their mortality. +They would be broken and gone so soon and so utterly, leaving no +name, no sign or memorial of themselves; only living in the +memories of her children who would remain.</p> +<p>And, with an awful sense of mortality surrounding them, her +children had learned that they must be kind because the old people +would be gone while they endured and remained.</p> +<p>This Saturday being the last of the season, they had all come; +not only the Flemings, but the Jervises and Verekers and Norrises, +and Uncle Bartie. The fine weather alone would have brought +them.</p> +<p>Bartie, more morose and irritable than ever, sat under the tree +of Heaven and watched the triumphal progress of the Day. He scowled +darkly and sourly at each group in turn; at the young men in white +flannels playing tennis; at Mr. and Mr. Jervis and the Verekers and +Norrises; at the Flemings, old Mrs. Fleming, and Louie and Emmeline +and Edith, and the disgraceful Maurice, all five of them useless +pensioners on his brother's bounty; Maurice a thing of battered, +sodden flesh hanging loose on brittle bone, a rickety prop for the +irreproachable summer suit bought with Anthony's money. He scowled +at the tables covered with fine white linen, and at the costly +silver and old china, at the sandwiches and cakes and ices, and the +piled-up fruits and the claret cup and champagne cup glowing and +shining in the tall glass jugs, and at the pretty maidservants +going to and fro in their accomplished service.</p> +<p>Bartie wondered how on earth Anthony managed it. His wonder was +a savage joy to Bartie.</p> +<p>Mr. Jervis, a heavy, pessimistic man, wondered how they managed +it, and Mr. Jervis's wonder had its own voluptuous quality. Mr. +Vereker and Mr. Norris, who held that a strike was a downright +serious matter, also wondered. But they were sustained by their +immense belief in Mr. Anthony. Mr. Anthony knew what he was doing; +he always had known. A strike might be serious while it lasted, but +it didn't last. And Mr. Nicholas was in the business now, and Mr. +John was coming into it next year, and Mr. Nicholas might be +married again by that time; and the chances were that the firm of +Harrison and Harrison would last long enough to provide for a young +Vereker and a still younger Norris.</p> +<p>In spite of the strike, Mr. and Mrs. Vereker and Mr. and Mrs. +Norris, like Frances and Anthony, were extraordinarily cheerful +that afternoon.</p> +<p>So were young George Vereker and Miss Lathom.</p> +<p>"I can't think why I feel so happy," said Mrs. Vereker to Mrs. +Norris. She was looking at her son George.</p> +<p>"Nor I, either," said Miss Lathom, who was trying suddenly to +look at nothing in particular.</p> +<p>Miss Lathom lied and Mrs. Vereker lied; they knew perfectly well +why they were happy. Each knew that the other lied; each knew that +the other knew she knew; and neither of them could have said why +she found it so necessary to lie.</p> +<p>And to Frances this happiness of Mrs. Vereker, and of young +Vereker and Miss Lathom was significant and delightful, as if she +had been personally responsible for it.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>A day flashed out of her memory on a trail of blue larkspurs and +of something that she had forgotten, something that was mixed up +with Mr. and Mrs. Jervis and Rosalind. She stared at the larkspurs +as if they held the clue--Nicky's face appeared among the tall blue +spires, Nicky's darling face tied up in a scarf, brown stripes and +yellow stripes--something to do with a White Cake--it must have +been somebody's birthday. Now she had it--Mr. Jervis's cricket +scarf. It was the day of Nicky's worst earache, the day when Mr. +Vereker climbed the tree of Heaven--was it possible that Mr. +Vereker had ever climbed that tree?--the day when Michael wouldn't +go to the party--Rosalind's birthday.</p> +<p>Eight candles burning for Rosalind. Why, it was nineteen years +ago. Don-Don was a baby then, and Michael and Nicky were only +little boys. And look at them now!</p> +<p>She fed her arrogance by gazing on the tall, firmly knit, +slender bodies of her sons, in white flannels, playing furiously +and well.</p> +<p>"Dorothy is looking very handsome," Mrs. Jervis said. Yes, +certainly Dorothy was looking handsome; but Frances loved before +all things the male beauty of her sons. In Michael and Nicholas it +had reached perfection, the clean, hard perfection that would last, +as Anthony's had lasted.</p> +<p>She thought of their beauty that had passed from her, dying many +deaths, each death hurting her; the tender mortal beauty of +babyhood, of childhood, of boyhood; but this invulnerable beauty of +their young manhood would be with her for a long time. John would +have it. John was only a fairer Nicholas; but as yet his beauty had +not hardened; his boyhood lingered in the fine tissues of his +mouth, and in his eyelids and the soft corners of his eyes; so that +in John she could still see what Nicky had been.</p> +<p>She had adored Anthony's body, as if she had foreseen that it +would give her such sons as these; and in her children she had +adored the small bodies through whose clean, firm beauty she +foresaw the beauty of their manhood. These were the same bodies, +the same faces that she had loved in them as children; nothing was +blurred or twisted or overlaid.</p> +<p>Michael at six-and-twenty was beautiful and serious as she had +foreseen him. Frances knew that Michael had genius, and at other +moments she was proud of his genius; but at this particular moment, +sitting beside her friend and conscious of her jealousy, she was +chiefly aware of his body.</p> +<p>Michael's body was quiescent; its beauty gave her a proud, but +austere and tranquil satisfaction. It was when she looked at her +second son that something caught at her breath and held it. She saw +him as the lover and bridegroom of Veronica. Her sense of his +virility was terrible to her and delightful.</p> +<p>Perhaps they were engaged already.</p> +<p>And Frances was sorry for Mrs. Jervis, who had borne no sons, +who had only borne one unattractive and unsatisfactory daughter. +She used to be sorry for her because Rosalind was pink and fat and +fluffy; she was sorry for her now because Rosalind was +unsatisfactory. She was sorry for Mrs. Norris because her boy could +never grow up like Michael or Nicholas or John. She was sorry for +Mrs. Vereker because George, though he looked all right when he was +by himself, became clumsy and common at once beside Michael and +Nicholas and John. George was also in white flannels; he played +furiously and well; he played too furiously and too consciously +well; he was too damp and too excited; his hair became damp and +excited as he played; his cries had a Cockney tang.</p> +<p>Her arrogance nourished itself on these contrasts.</p> +<p>Mrs. Jervis looked wistfully at the young men as they played. +She looked still more wistfully at Dorothy.</p> +<p>"What do you do," she said, "to keep your children with +you?"</p> +<p>"I do nothing," Frances said. "I don't try to keep them. I've +never appealed to their feelings for my own purposes, or taken +advantage of their affection, that's all.</p> +<p>"They know that if they want to walk out of the house to-morrow, +and stay out, they can. Nobody'll stop them."</p> +<p>There was a challenging, reminiscent glint in Mr. Jervis's eyes, +and his wife was significantly silent. Frances knew what they were +thinking.</p> +<p>"Nicky," she said, "walked out; but he came back again as soon +as he was in trouble. Michael walks out and goes abroad every year; +but he comes back again. Dorothy walks out, but she's never dreamed +of not coming back again."</p> +<p>"Of course, if you aren't afraid of taking risks," said Mr. +Jervis.</p> +<p>"I am afraid. But I've never shown it."</p> +<p>"It's very strange that Dorothy hasn't married." Mrs. Jervis +spoke. She derived comfort from the thought that Dorothy was +eight-and-twenty and not married.</p> +<p>"Dorothy," said Frances, "could marry to-morrow if she wanted +to; but she doesn't want."</p> +<p>She was sorry for her friend, but she really could not allow her +that consolation.</p> +<p>"Veronica is growing up very good-looking," said Mrs. Jervis +then.</p> +<p>But it was no use. Frances was aware that Veronica was grown up, +and that she was good-looking, and that Nicky loved her; but Mrs. +Jervis's shafts fell wide of all her vulnerable places. Frances was +no longer afraid.</p> +<p>"Veronica," she said, "is growing up very good." It was not the +word she would have chosen, yet it was the only one she could think +of as likely to convey to Mrs. Jervis what she wanted her to know, +though it left her obtuseness without any sense of Veronica's +mysterious quality.</p> +<p>She herself had never tried to think of a word for it before; +she was only driven to it now because she detected in her friend's +tone a challenge and a warning. It was as if Rosalind's mother had +said, extensively and with pointed reference to the facts: +"Veronica is dangerous. Her mother has had adventures. She is +grown-up and she is good-looking, and Nicky is susceptible to that +sort of thing. If you don't look out he will be caught again. The +only difference between Phyllis Desmond and Veronica is in their +skins."</p> +<p>So when Frances said Veronica was good, she meant that Mrs. +Jervis should understand, once for all, that she was not in the +least like her mother or like Phyllis Desmond.</p> +<p>That was enough for Mrs. Jervis. But it was not enough for +Frances, who found her mind wandering off from Rosalind's mother +and looking for the word of words that would express her own +meaning to her own satisfaction.</p> +<p>Her thoughts went on deep down under the stream of conversation +that flowed through her from Mrs. Jervis on her right hand to Mrs. +Vereker and Mrs. Norris on her left.</p> +<p>Veronica was good. But she was not wrapped up in other people's +lives as Frances was wrapped up. She was wrapped up, not in +herself, but in some life of her own that, as Frances made it out, +had nothing in the world to do with anybody else's.</p> +<p>And yet Veronica knew what you were feeling and what you were +thinking, and what you were going to do, and what was happening to +you. (She had really known, in Dresden, what was happening to Nicky +when Desmond made him marry her.) It was as if in her the walls +that divide every soul from every other soul were made of some thin +and porous stuff that let things through. And in this life of +yours, for the moments that she shared it, she lived intensely, +with uncanny delight and pain that were her own and not her +own.</p> +<p>And Frances wanted some hard, tight theory that would reconcile +these extremes of penetration and detachment.</p> +<p>She remembered that Ferdinand Cameron had been like that. He saw +things. He was a creature of queer, sudden sympathies and insights. +She supposed it was the Highland blood in both of them.</p> +<p>Mrs. Vereker on her right expressed the hope that Mr. +Bartholomew was better. Frances said he never would be better till +chemists were forbidden to advertise and the <i>British Medical +Journal</i> and <i>The Lancet</i> were suppressed. Bartie would +read them; and they supplied him with all sorts of extraordinary +diseases.</p> +<p>She thought: Seeing things had not made poor Ferdie happy; and +Veronica in her innermost life was happy. She had been happy when +she came back from Germany, before she could have known that Nicky +cared for her, before Nicky knew it himself.</p> +<p>Supposing she had known it all the time? But that, Frances said +to herself, was nonsense. If she had known as much as all that, why +should she have suffered so horribly that she had nearly died of +it? Unless--supposing--it had been his suffering that she had +nearly died of?</p> +<p>Mrs. Norris on her left was saying that she was sorry to see Mr. +Maurice looking so sadly; and Frances heard herself replying that +Morrie hadn't been fit for anything since he was in South +Africa.</p> +<p>Between two pop-gun batteries of conversation the serious theme +sustained itself. She thought: Then, Nicky had suffered. And +Veronica was the only one who knew. She knew more about Nicky than +Nicky's mother. This thought was disagreeable to Frances.</p> +<p>It was all nonsense. She didn't really believe that these things +happened. Yet, why not? Michael said they happened. Even Dorothy, +who didn't believe in God and immortality or anything, believed +that.</p> +<p>She gave it up; it was beyond her; it bothered her.</p> +<p>"Yes. Seventy-nine her last birthday."</p> +<p>Mrs. Norris had said that Mrs. Fleming was wonderful.</p> +<p>Frances thought: "It's wonderful what Veronica does to +them."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The sets had changed. Nicholas and a girl friend of Veronica's +played against George Vereker and Miss Lathom; John, with Mr. +Jervis for his handicap, played against Anthony and Mr. Norris. The +very young Norris fielded. All afternoon he had hoped to +distinguish himself by catching some ball in full flight as it went +"out." It was a pure and high ambition, for he knew he was so young +and unimportant that only the eyes of God and of his mother watched +him.</p> +<p>Michael had dropped out of it. He sat beside Dorothy under the +tree of Heaven and watched Veronica.</p> +<p>"Veronica's wonderful," he said. "Did you see that?"</p> +<p>Dorothy had seen.</p> +<p>Veronica had kept Aunt Emmeline quiet all afternoon. She bad +made Bartie eat an ice under the impression that it would be good +for him. And now she had gone with Morrie to the table where the +drinks were, and had taken his third glass of champagne cup from +him and made him drink lemonade instead.</p> +<p>"How does she do it?" said Michael.</p> +<p>"I don't know. She doesn't know herself. I used to think I could +manage people, but I'm not in it with Ronny. She ought to be a +wardress in a lunatic asylum."</p> +<p>"Now look at that!"</p> +<p>Veronica had returned to the group formed by Grannie and the +Aunties and some strangers. The eyes of the four Fleming women had +looked after her as she went from them; they looked towards her now +as if some great need, some great longing were appeased by her +return.</p> +<p>Grannie made a place by her side for the young girl; she took +her arm, the young white arm, bare from the elbow in its short +sleeve, and made it lie across her knees. From time to time +Grannie's yellow, withered hand stroked the smooth, warm white arm, +or held it. Emmeline and Edith squatted on the grass at Veronica's +feet; their worn faces and the worn face of Louie looked at her. +They hung on her, fascinated, curiously tranquillized, as if they +drank from her youth.</p> +<p>"It's funny," Dorothy said, "when you think how they used to +hate her."</p> +<p>"It's horrible," said Michael.</p> +<p>He got up and took Veronica away.</p> +<p>He was lying at her feet now on the grass in the far corner of +the lawn under the terrace.</p> +<p>"Why do you go to them?" he said.</p> +<p>"Because they want me."</p> +<p>"You mustn't go when they want you. You mustn't let them get +hold of you."</p> +<p>"They don't get hold of me--nothing gets hold of me. I want to +help them. They say it does them good to have me with them."</p> +<p>"I should think it did do them good! They feed on you, Ronny. I +can see it by the way they look at you. You'll die of them if you +don't give it up."</p> +<p>"Give what up?"</p> +<p>"Your game of keeping them going. That is your game, isn't it? +Everybody's saying how wonderful Grannie is. They mean she ought to +have been dead years ago.</p> +<p>"They were all old, horribly old and done for, ages ago. I can +remember them. But they know that if they can get a young virgin +sacrificed to them they'll go on. You're the young virgin. You're +making them go on."</p> +<p>"If I could--it wouldn't hurt me. Nothing hurts you, Michael, +when you're happy. It's awful to think how they've lived without +being happy, without loving.</p> +<p>"They used to hate me because I'm Vera's daughter. They don't +hate me now."</p> +<p>"You don't hate what you feed on. You love it. They're vampires. +They'll suck your life out of you. I wonder you're not afraid of +them.</p> +<p>"I'm afraid of them. I always was afraid of them; when I was a +kid and Mother used to send me with messages to that beastly spooky +house they live in. I used to think it was poor old Grandpapa's +ghost I funked. But I know now it wasn't. It was those four +terrible women. They're ghosts. I thought you were afraid of +ghosts."</p> +<p>"I'm much more afraid of you, when you're cruel. Can't you see +how awful it must be for them to be ghosts? Ghosts among living +people. Everybody afraid of them--not wanting them."</p> +<p>"Michael--it would be better to be dead!"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Towards the end of the afternoon Frances's Day changed its +appearance and its character. In the tennis courts Michael's +friends played singles with an incomparable fury, frankly rejecting +the partners offered them and disdaining inferior antagonists; they +played, Ellis against Mitchell and Monier-Owen against +Nicholas.</p> +<p>They had arrived late with Vera and Lawrence Stephen.</p> +<p>It had come to that. Anthony and Frances found that they could +not go on for ever refusing the acquaintance of the man who had +done so much for Michael. Stephen's enthusiastic eulogy of +Michael's Poems had made an end of that old animosity a year ago. +Practically, they had had to choose between Bartie and Lawrence +Stephen as the turning point of honour. Michael had made them see +that it was possible to overvalue Bartie; also that it was possible +to pay too high a price for a consecrated moral attitude. In all +his life the wretched Bartie had never done a thing for any of +them, whereas he, Michael, owed his rather extraordinary success +absolutely to Lawrence Stephen. If the strike made his father +bankrupt he would owe his very means of livelihood to Lawrence +Stephen.</p> +<p>Besides, he liked Stephen, and it complicated things most +frightfully to go on living in the same house with people who +disliked him.</p> +<p>If, Michael said, they chose to dissociate themselves altogether +from their eldest son and his career, very well. They could go on +ignoring and tacitly insulting Mr. Stephen. He could understand +their taking a consistently wrong-headed line like that; but so +long as they had any regard, either for him or his career, he +didn't see how they could very well keep it up any longer. He was +sorry, of course, that his career had let them in for Stephen if +they didn't like him; but there it was.</p> +<p>And beyond a doubt it was there.</p> +<p>"You might vindicate Bartie gloriously," Michael said, "by +turning me out of the house and disinheriting me. But would it be +worth while? I'm not asking you to condone Stephen's conduct--if +you can't condone it; I'm asking you either to acknowledge +<i>or</i> repudiate your son's debts.</p> +<p>"After all, if <i>he</i> can condone your beastly treatment of +him--I wouldn't like him if he was the swine you think him."</p> +<p>And Anthony had appealed to Michael's mother.</p> +<p>To his "Well, Frances, what do you think? Ought we or oughtn't +we?" she had replied: "I think we ought to stand solid behind +Michael."</p> +<p>It was Michael's life that counted, for it was going on into a +great future. Bartie would pass and Michael would remain.</p> +<p>Their nervous advances had ended in a complete surrender to +Stephen's charm.</p> +<p>Vera and Stephen seemed to think that the way to show the +sincerity and sweetness of their reconciliation was to turn up as +often as possible on Frances's Day. They arrived always at the same +hour, a little late; they came by the road and the front door, so +that when Bartie saw them coming he could retreat through the +garden door and the lane. The Flemings and the Jervises retreated +with him; and presently, when it had had a good look at the +celebrities, the rest of the party followed.</p> +<p>This Saturday Frances's Day dwindled and melted away and closed, +after its manner; only Vera and Stephen lingered. They stayed on +talking to Michael long after everybody else had gone.</p> +<p>Stephen said he had come to say good-bye to Michael's people and +to make a proposal to Michael himself. He was going to Ireland.</p> +<p>Vera interrupted him with passion.</p> +<p>"He isn't. He hasn't any proposal to make. He hasn't come to say +good-bye."</p> +<p>Her restless, unhappy eyes turned to him incessantly, as if, +more than ever, she was afraid that he would escape her, that he +would go off God knew where.</p> +<p>God knew where he was going, but Vera did not believe that he +was going to Ireland. He had talked about going to Ireland for +years, and he had never gone.</p> +<p>Stephen looked as if he did not see her; as if he did not even +see Michael very distinctly.</p> +<p>"I'm going," he said, "to Ireland on Monday week, the third of +August. I mayn't come back for long enough. I may not come back at +all."</p> +<p>"That's the sort of thing he keeps on saying."</p> +<p>"I may not come back <i>at all</i>. So I want you to take over +the <i>Review</i> for me. Ellis and my secretary will show you how +it stands. You'll know what to do. I can trust you not to let it +down."</p> +<p>"He doesn't mean what he says, Michael. He's only saying it to +frighten me. He's been holding it over me for years.</p> +<p>"<i>Say</i> you'll have nothing to do with it. <i>Say</i> you +won't touch his old <i>Review</i>."</p> +<p>"Could I go to Ireland for you?"</p> +<p>"You couldn't."</p> +<p>"Why not? What do you think you're going to do there?"</p> +<p>"I'm going to pull the Nationalists together, so that if there's +civil war in Ireland, the Irish will have a chance to win. Thank +God for Carson! He's given us the opportunity we wanted."</p> +<p>"Tell him he's not to go, Michael. He won't listen to me, but +he'll mind what you say."</p> +<p>"I want to go instead of him."</p> +<p>"You can't go instead of me. Nobody can go instead of me."</p> +<p>"I can go with you."</p> +<p>"You can't."</p> +<p>"Larry, if you take Michael to Ireland, Anthony and Frances will +never forgive you. <i>I</i>'ll never forgive you."</p> +<p>"I'm not taking Michael to Ireland, I'm telling you. There's no +reason why Michael should go to Ireland at all. It isn't <i>his</i> +country."</p> +<p>"You needn't rub <i>that</i> in," said Michael.</p> +<p>"It isn't <i>yours</i>," said Vera. "Ireland doesn't want you. +The Nationalists don't want you. You said yourself they've turned +you out of Ireland. When you've lived in England all these years +why should you go back to a place that doesn't want you?"</p> +<p>"Because if Carson gets a free hand I see some chance of Ireland +being a free country."</p> +<p>Vera wailed and entreated. She said it showed how much he cared +for her. It showed that he was tired of her. Why couldn't he say so +and have done with it?</p> +<p>"It's not," she said, "as if you could really do anything. +You're a dreamer. Ireland has had enough of dreamers." And +Stephen's eyes looked over her head, into the high branches of the +tree of Heaven, as if he saw his dream shining clear through them +like a moon.</p> +<p>The opportunist could see nothing but his sublime +opportunity.</p> +<p>Michael went back with him to dine and talk it over. There was +to be civil war in Ireland then?</p> +<p>He thought: If only Lawrence would let him go with him. He +wanted to go to Ireland. To join the Nationalists and fight for +Ireland, fight for the freedom he was always dreaming +about--<i>that</i> would be a fine thing. It would be a finer thing +than writing poems about Ireland.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen went soberly and steadily through the affair of +the <i>Review</i>, explaining things to Michael. He wanted this +done, and this. And over and over again Michael's voice broke +through his instructions. Why couldn't he go to Ireland instead of +Lawrence? Or, if Lawrence wouldn't let him go instead of him, he +might at least take him with him. He didn't want to stay at home +editing the <i>Review</i>. Ellis or Mitchell or Monier-Owen would +edit it better than he could. Even the wretched Wadham would edit +it just as well. He wanted to go to Ireland and fight.</p> +<p>But Lawrence wouldn't let him go. He wasn't going to have the +boy's blood on his hands. His genius and his youth were too +precious.</p> +<p>Besides, Ireland was not his country.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>It was past ten o'clock. Frances was alone in the drawing-room. +She sat by the open window and waited and watched.</p> +<p>The quiet garden lay open to her sight. Only the inner end of +the farther terrace, under the orchard wall, was hidden by a high +screen of privet.</p> +<p>It seemed hours to Frances since she had seen Nicky and Veronica +go down the lawn on to the terrace.</p> +<p>And then Anthony had gone out too. She was vexed with Anthony. +She could see him sitting under his ash-tree, her tree of heaven; +his white shirt-front gave out an oblong gleam like phosphorous in +the darkness under the tree. She was watching to see that he didn't +get up and go on to the terrace. Anthony had no business in the +garden at all. He was catching cold in it. He had sneezed twice. +She wanted Nicholas and Veronica to have the garden to themselves +to-night, and the perfect stillness of the twilight to themselves, +every tree and every little leaf and flower keeping quiet for them; +and there was Anthony sneezing.</p> +<p>She was restless and impatient, as if she carried the burden of +their passion in her own heart.</p> +<p>Presently she could bear it no longer. She got up and called to +Anthony to come in. He came obediently. "What are you thinking of," +she said, "planting yourself out there and sneezing? I could see +your shirt-front a mile off. It's indecent of you."</p> +<p>"Why indecent?"</p> +<p>"Because Nicky and Veronica are out there."</p> +<p>"I don't see them."</p> +<p>"Do you suppose they want you to see them?"</p> +<p>She turned the electric light on full, to make darkness of their +twilight out there.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicky and Veronica talked together in the twilight, sitting on +the seat under the orchard well behind the privet screen. They did +not see Anthony sitting under the ash-tree, they did not hear him, +they did not hear Frances calling to him to come in. They were +utterly unaware of Frances and Anthony.</p> +<p>"Ronny," he said, "did Michael say anything to you?"</p> +<p>"When?"</p> +<p>"This afternoon, when he made you come with him here?"</p> +<p>"How do you mean, 'say anything'?"</p> +<p>"You know what I mean."</p> +<p>"<i>Mick</i>?"</p> +<p>"Yes. Did he ask you to marry him?"</p> +<p>"No. He said a lot of funny things, but he didn't say that. He +wouldn't."</p> +<p>"Why wouldn't he?"</p> +<p>"Because--he just wouldn't."</p> +<p>"Well, he says he understands you."</p> +<p>"Then," said Veronica conclusively, "of course he wouldn't."</p> +<p>"Yes; but he says <i>I</i> don't."</p> +<p>"Dear Nicky, you understand me when nobody else does. You always +did."</p> +<p>"Yes, when we were kids. But supposing <i>now</i> I ever didn't, +would it matter? You see, I'm stupid, and caring--caring +awfully--might make me stupider. <i>Have</i> people got to +understand each other?"</p> +<p>To that she replied astonishingly, "Are you quite sure you +understand about Ferdie?"</p> +<p>"Ferdie?"</p> +<p>"Yes." She turned her face full to him. "I don't know whether +you know about it. <i>I</i> didn't till Mother told me the other +day. I'm Ferdie's daughter.</p> +<p>"Did you know?"</p> +<p>"Oh, Lord, yes. I've known it for--oh, simply ever so long."</p> +<p>"Who told you?"</p> +<p>"Dorothy, I think. But I guessed it because of something he said +once about seeing ghosts."</p> +<p>"I wonder if you know how I feel about it? I want you to +understand that. I'm not a bit ashamed of it. I'm proud. I'm +<i>glad</i> I'm Ferdie's daughter, not Bartie's.... I'd take his +name, so that everybody should know I was his daughter, only that I +like Uncle Anthony's name best. I'm glad Mother loved him."</p> +<p>"So am I, Ronny. I know I shouldn't have liked Bartie's +daughter. Bartie's daughter wouldn't have been you."</p> +<p>He took her in his arms and held her face against his face. And +it was as if Desmond had never been.</p> +<p>A little while ago he had hated Desmond because she had come +before Veronica; she had taken what belonged to Veronica, the first +tremor of his passion, the irrecoverable delight and surprise. And +now he knew that, because he had not loved her, she had taken +nothing.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"Do you love me?"</p> +<p>"Do you love <i>me</i>?"</p> +<p>"You know I love you."</p> +<p>"You know. You know."</p> +<p>What they said was new and wonderful to them as if nobody before +them had ever thought of it.</p> +<p>Yet that night, all over the Heath, in hollows under the +birch-trees, and on beds of trampled grass, young lovers lay in +each other's arms and said the same thing in the same words: "Do +you love me?" "You know I love you!" over and over, in voices +drowsy and thick with love.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"There's one thing I haven't thought of," said Nicky. "And +that's that damned strike. If it hits Daddy badly we may have to +wait goodness knows how long. Ages we may have to."</p> +<p>"I'd wait all my life if I could have you in the last five +seconds of it. And if I couldn't, I'd still wait."</p> +<p>And presently Veronica remembered Michael.</p> +<p>"Why did you ask me whether Mick had said anything?"</p> +<p>"Because I thought you ought to know about it before +you--Besides, if he <i>had</i>, we should have had to wait a bit +before we told him."</p> +<p>It seemed that there was nothing to prevent them marrying +to-morrow if they liked. The strike, Anthony said, couldn't hit him +as badly as all that.</p> +<p>He and Frances sat up till long past midnight, talking about +their plans, and the children's plans. It was all settled. The +first week in August they would go down to Morfe for the shooting. +They would stay there till the first week in September. Nicky and +Veronica would be married the first week in October. And they would +go to France and Belgium and Germany for their honeymoon.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XIX"></a>XIX</h2> +<br> +<p>They did not go down to Morfe the first week in August for the +shooting.</p> +<p>Neither did Lawrence Stephen go to Ireland on Monday, the third. +At the moment when he should have been receiving the +congratulations of the Dublin Nationalists after his impassioned +appeal for militant consolidation, Mr. Redmond and Sir Edward +Carson were shaking hands dramatically in the House of Commons. +Stephen's sublime opportunity, the civil war, had been snatched +from him by the unforeseen.</p> +<p>And there was no chance of Nicky and Veronica going to Belgium +and France and Germany for their honeymoon.</p> +<p>For within nine days of Frances's Day Germany had declared war +on France and Russia, and was marching over the Belgian frontier on +her way to Paris.</p> +<p>Frances, aroused at last to realization of the affairs of +nations, asked, like several million women, "What does it +mean?"</p> +<p>And Anthony, like several million men, answered, "It means +Armageddon." Like several million people, they both thought he was +saying something as original as it was impressive, something clear +and final and descriptive. "Armageddon!" Stolid, unimaginative +people went about saying it to each other. The sound of the word +thrilled them, intoxicated them, gave them an awful feeling that +was at the same time, in some odd way, agreeable; it stirred them +with a solemn and sombre passion. They said "Armageddon. It means +Armageddon." Yet nobody knew and nobody asked or thought of asking +what Armageddon meant.</p> +<p>"Shall We come into it?" said Frances. She was thinking of the +Royal Navy turning out to the last destroyer to save England from +invasion; of the British Army most superfluously prepared to defend +England from the invader, who, after all, could not invade; of +Indian troops pouring into England if the worst came to the worst. +She had the healthy British mind that refuses and always has +refused to acknowledge the possibility of disaster. Yet she asked +continually, "Would England be drawn in?" She was thankful that +none of her sons had gone into the Army or the Navy. Whoever else +was in, they would be out of it.</p> +<p>At first Anthony said, "No. Of course England wouldn't be drawn +in."</p> +<p>Then, on the morning of England's ultimatum, the closing of the +Stock Exchange and the Banks made him thoughtful, and he admitted +that it looked as if England might be drawn in after all. The long +day, without any business for him and Nicholas, disturbed him. +There was a nasty, hovering smell of ruin in the air. But there was +no panic. The closing of the Banks was only a wise precaution +against panic. And by evening, as the tremendous significance of +the ultimatum sank into him, he said definitively that England +would not be drawn in.</p> +<p>Then Drayton, whom they had not seen for months (since he had +had his promotion) telephoned to Dorothy to come and dine with him +at his club in Dover Street. Anthony missed altogether the +significance of <i>that</i>.</p> +<p>He had actually made for himself an after-dinner peace in which +coffee could be drunk and cigarettes smoked as if nothing were +happening to Europe.</p> +<p>"England," he said, "will not be drawn in, because her ultimatum +will stop the War. There won't be any Armageddon."</p> +<p>"Oh, won't there!" said Michael. "And I can tell you there won't +be much left of us after it's over."</p> +<p>He had been in Germany and he knew. He carried himself with a +sort of stern haughtiness, as one who knew better than any of them. +And yet his words conveyed no picture to his brain, no definite +image of anything at all.</p> +<p>But in Nicholas's brain images gathered fast, one after another; +they thickened; clear, vivid images with hard outlines. They came +slowly but with order and precision. While the others talked he had +been silent and very grave.</p> +<p>"<i>Some</i> of us'll be left," he said. "But it'll take us all +our time."</p> +<p>Anthony looked thoughtfully at Nicholas. A sudden wave of +realization beat up against his consciousness and receded.</p> +<p>"Well," he said, "we shall know at midnight."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>An immense restlessness came over them.</p> +<p>At a quarter-past eight Dorothy telephoned from her club in +Grafton street. Frank had had to leave her suddenly. Somebody had +sent for him. And if they wanted to see the sight of their lives +they were to come into town at once. St. James's was packed with +people from Whitehall to Buckingham Palace. It was like nothing on +earth, and they mustn't miss it. She'd wait for them in Grafton +Street till a quarter to nine, but not a minute later.</p> +<p>Nicky got out his big four-seater Morss car. They packed +themselves into it, all six of them somehow, and he drove them into +London. They had a sense of doing something strange and memorable +and historic. Dorothy, picked up at her club, showed nothing but a +pleasurable excitement. She gave no further information about +Frank. He had had to go off and see somebody. What did he think? He +thought what he had always thought; only he wouldn't talk about +it.</p> +<p>Dorothy was not inclined to talk about it either. The Morss was +caught in a line blocked at the bottom of Albemarle Street by two +streams of cars, mixed with two streams of foot passengers, that +poured steadily from Piccadilly into St. James's Street.</p> +<p>Michael and Dorothy got out and walked. Nicholas gave up his +place to Anthony and followed with Veronica.</p> +<p>Their restlessness had been a part of the immense restlessness +of the crowd. They were drawn, as the crowd was drawn; they went as +the crowd went, up and down, restlessly, from Trafalgar Square and +Whitehall to Buckingham Palace; from Buckingham Palace to Whitehall +and Trafalgar Square. They drifted down Parliament Street to +Westminster and back again. An hour ago the drifting, nebulous +crowd had split, torn asunder between two attractions; its two +masses had wheeled away, one to the east and the other to the west; +they had gathered themselves together, one at each pole of the +space it now traversed. The great meeting in Trafalgar Square +balanced the multitude that had gravitated towards Buckingham +Palace, to see the King and Queen come out on their balcony and +show themselves to their people.</p> +<p>And as the edges of the two masses gave way, each broke and +scattered, and was mixed again with the other. Like a flood, +confined and shaken, it surged and was driven back and surged again +from Whitehall to Buckingham Palace, from Buckingham Palace to +Whitehall. It looked for an outlet in the narrow channels of the +side-streets, or spread itself over the flats of the Green Park, +only to return restlessly upon itself, sucked back by the main +current in the Mall.</p> +<p>It was as if half London had met there for Bank Holiday. Part of +this crowd was drunk; it was orgiastic; it made strange, fierce +noises, like the noises of one enormous, mystically excited beast; +here and there, men and women, with inflamed and drunken faces, +reeled in each other's arms; they wore pink paper feathers in their +hats. Some, only half intoxicated, flicked at each other with long +streamers of pink and white paper, carried like scourges on small +sticks. These were the inspired.</p> +<p>But the great body of the crowd was sober. It went decorously in +a long procession, young men with their sweethearts, friends, +brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers with +their children; none, or very few, went alone that night.</p> +<p>It was an endless procession of faces; grave and thoughtful +faces; uninterested, respectable faces; faces of unmoved integrity; +excited faces; dreaming, wondering, bewildered faces; faces merely +curious, or curiously exalted, slightly ecstatic, open-mouthed, +fascinated by each other and by the movements and the lights; +laughing, frivolous faces, and faces utterly vacant and +unseeing.</p> +<p>On every other breast there was a small Union Jack pinned; every +other hand held and waggled a Union Jack. The Union Jack flew from +the engine of every other automobile. In twelve hours, out of +nowhere, thousands and thousands of flags sprang magically into +being; as if for years London had been preparing for this day.</p> +<p>And in and out of this crowd the train of automobiles with their +flags dashed up and down the Mall for hours, appearing and +disappearing. Intoxicated youths with inflamed faces, in full +evening dress, squatted on the roofs of taxi-cabs or rode astride +on the engines of their cars, waving flags.</p> +<p>All this movement, drunken, orgiastic, somnambulistic, +mysteriously restless, streamed up and down between two solemn and +processional lines of lights, two solemn and processional lines of +trees, lines that stretched straight from Whitehall to Buckingham +Palace in a recurrent pattern of trees and lamps, dark trees, +twilit trees, a lamp and a tree shining with a metallic unnatural +green; and, at the end of the avenue, gilded gates and a +golden-white façade.</p> +<p>The crowd was drifting now towards the Palace. Michael and +Dorothea, Nicholas and Veronica, went with it. In this eternal +perambulation they met people that they knew; Stephen and Vera; +Mitchell, Monier-Owen; Uncle Morrie and his sisters. Anthony, +looking rather solemn, drove past them in his car. It was like +impossible, grotesque encounters in a dream.</p> +<p>Outside the Palace the crowd moved up and down without rest; it +drifted and returned; it circled round and round the fountain. In +the open spaces the intoxicated motor-cars and taxi-cabs darted and +tore with the folly of moths and the fury of destroyers. They stung +the air with their hooting. Flags, intoxicated flags, still hung +from their engines. They came flying drunkenly out of the dark, +like a trumpeting swarm of enormous insects, irresistibly, +incessantly drawn to the lights of the Palace, hypnotized by the +golden-white façade.</p> +<p>Suddenly, Michael's soul revolted.</p> +<p>"If this demented herd of swine is a great people going into a +great war, God help us! Beasts--it's not as if <i>their</i> bloated +skins were likely to be punctured."</p> +<p>He called back over his shoulders to the others.</p> +<p>"Let's get out of this. If we don't I shall be sick."</p> +<p>He took Dorothy by her arm and shouldered his way out.</p> +<p>The water had ceased playing in the fountain.</p> +<p>Nicholas and Veronica stood by the fountain. The water in the +basin was green like foul sea-water. The jetsam of the crowd +floated there. A small child leaned over the edge of the basin and +fished for Union Jacks in the filthy pool. Its young mother held it +safe by the tilted edge of its petticoats. She looked up at them +and smiled. They smiled back again and turned away.</p> +<p>It was quiet on the south side by the Barracks. Small, sober +groups of twos and threes strolled there, or stood with their faces +pressed close against the railings, peering into the barrack yard. +Motionless, earnest and attentive, they stared at the men in khaki +moving about on the other side of the railings. They were silent, +fascinated by the men in khaki. Standing safe behind the railing, +they stared at them with an awful, sombre curiosity. And the men in +khaki stared back, proud, self-conscious, as men who know that the +hour is great and that it is their hour.</p> +<p>"Nicky," Veronica said, "I wish Michael wouldn't say things like +that."</p> +<p>"He's dead right, Ronny. That isn't the way to take it, getting +drunk and excited, and rushing about making silly asses of +themselves. They <i>are</i> rather swine, you know."</p> +<p>"Yes; but they're pathetic. Can't you see how pathetic they are? +Nicky, I believe I love the swine--even the poor drunken ones with +the pink paper feathers--just because they're English; because +awful things are going to happen to them, and they don't know it. +They're English."</p> +<p>"You think God's made us all like that? He <i>hasn't</i>."</p> +<p>They found Anthony in the Mall, driving up and down, looking for +them. He had picked up Dorothy and Aunt Emmeline and Uncle +Morrie.</p> +<p>"We're going down to the Mansion House," he said, "to hear the +Proclamation. Will you come?"</p> +<p>But Veronica and Nicholas were tired of crowds, even of historic +crowds. Anthony drove off with his car-load, and they went +home.</p> +<p>"I never saw Daddy so excited," Nicky said.</p> +<p>But Anthony was not excited. He had never felt calmer or cooler +in his life.</p> +<p>He returned some time after midnight. By that time it had sunk +into him. Germany <i>had</i> defied the ultimatum and England +<i>had</i> declared war on Germany.</p> +<p>He said it was only what was to be foreseen. He had known all +the time that it would happen--really.</p> +<p>The tension of the day of the ultimatum had this peculiar +psychological effect that all over England people who had declared +up to the last minute that there would be no War were saying the +same thing as Anthony and believing it.</p> +<p>Michael was disgusted with the event that had put an end to the +Irish Revolution. It was in this form that he conceived his first +grudge against the War.</p> +<p>This emotion of his was like some empty space of horror opened +up between him and Nicholas; Nicky being the only one of his family +who was as yet aware of its existence.</p> +<p>For the next three days, Nicholas, very serious and earnest, +shut himself up in his workshop at the bottom of the orchard and +laboured there, putting the last touches to the final, perfect, +authoritative form of the Moving Fortress, the joint creation of +his brain and Drayton's, the only experiment that had survived the +repeated onslaughts of the Major's criticism. The new model was +three times the size of the lost original; it was less like a +battleship and more like a racing-car and a destroyer. It was his +and Drayton's last word on the subject of armaments.</p> +<p>It was going to the War Office, this time, addressed to the +right person, and accompanied by all sorts of protective +introductions, and Drayton blasting its way before it with his new +explosive.</p> +<p>In those three days Nick found an immense distraction in his +Moving Fortress. It also served to blind his family to his real +intentions. He knew that his real intentions could not be kept from +them very long. Meanwhile the idea that he was working on something +made them happy. When Frances saw him in his overalls she smiled +and said: "Nicky's got <i>his</i> job, anyhow." John came and +looked at him through the window of the workshop and laughed.</p> +<p>"Good old Nicky," he said. "Doing his bit!"</p> +<p>In those three days John went about with an air of agreeable +excitement. Or you came upon him sitting in solitary places like +the dining-room, lost in happy thought. Michael said of him that he +was unctuous. He exuded a secret joy and satisfaction. John had +acquired a sudden remarkable maturity. He shone on each member of +his family with benevolence and affection, as if he were its +protector and consoler, and about to confer on it some tremendous +benefit.</p> +<p>"Look at Don-Don," Michael said. "The bloodthirsty little brute. +He's positively enjoying the War."</p> +<p>"You might leave me alone," said Don-Don. "I shan't have it to +enjoy for long."</p> +<p>He was one of those who believed that the War would be over in +four months.</p> +<p>Michael, pledged to secrecy, came and looked at the Moving +Fortress. He was interested and intelligent; he admired that +efficiency of Nicky's that was so unlike his own.</p> +<p>Yet, he wondered, after all, was it so unlike? He, too, was +aiming at an art as clean and hard and powerful as Nicky's, as +naked of all blazonry and decoration, an art which would attain its +objective by the simplest, most perfect adjustment of means to +ends.</p> +<p>And Anthony was proud of that hidden wonder locked behind the +door of the workshop in the orchard. He realized that his son +Nicholas had taken part in a great and important thing. He was +prouder of Nicholas than he had been of Michael.</p> +<p>And Michael knew it.</p> +<p>Nicky's brains could be used for the service of his country.</p> +<p>But Michael's? Anthony said to himself that there wasn't any +sense--any sense that he could endure to contemplate--in which +Michael's brains could be of any use to his country. When Anthony +thought of the mobilization of his family for national service, +Michael and Michael's brains were a problem that he put behind him +for the present and refused to contemplate. There would be time +enough for Michael later.</p> +<p>Anthony was perfectly well aware of his own one talent, the +talent which had made "Harrison and Harrison" the biggest +timber-importing firm in England. If there was one thing he +understood it was organization. If there was one thing he could not +tolerate it was waste of good material, the folly of forcing men +and women into places they were not fit for. He had let his eldest +son slip out of the business without a pang, or with hardly any +pang. He had only taken Nicholas into it as an experiment. It was +on John that he relied to inherit it and carry it farther.</p> +<p>As a man of business he approved of the advertised formula: +"Business as Usual." He understood it to mean that the duty which +England expected every man to do was to stay in the place he was +most fitted for and to go where he was most wanted. Nothing but +muddle and disaster could follow any departure from this rule.</p> +<p>It was fitting that Frances and Veronica should do Red Cross +work. It was fitting that Dorothy should help to organize the +relief of the Belgium refugees. It was fitting that John should +stay at home and carry on the business, and that he, Anthony, +should enlist when he had settled John into his place. It was, +above all, fitting that Nicky should devote himself to the +invention and manufacture of armaments. He could not conceive +anything more wantonly and scandalously wasteful than a system that +could make any other use of Nicky's brains. He thanked goodness +that, with a European War upon us, such a system, if it existed, +would not be allowed to live a day.</p> +<p>As for Michael, it might be fitting later--very much +later--perhaps. If Michael wanted to volunteer for the Army then, +and if it were necessary, he would have no right to stop him. But +it would not be necessary. England was going to win this War on the +sea and not on land. Michael was practically safe.</p> +<p>And behind Frances's smile, and John's laughter, and Michael's +admiration, and Anthony's pride there was the thought: "Whatever +happens, Nicky will he safe."</p> +<p>And the model of the Moving Fortress was packed up--Veronica and +Nicky packed it--and it was sent under high protection to the War +Office. And Nicky unlocked the door of his workshop and rested +restlessly from his labour.</p> +<p>And there was a call for recruits, and for still more +recruits.</p> +<p>Westminster Bridge became a highway for regiments marching to +battle. The streets were parade-grounds for squad after squad of +volunteers in civilian clothes, self-conscious and abashed under +the eyes of the men in khaki.</p> +<p>And Michael said: "This is the end of all the arts. Artists will +not be allowed to exist except as agents for the recruiting +sergeant. We're dished."</p> +<p>That was the second grudge he had against the War. It killed the +arts in the very hour of their renaissance. "Eccentricities" by +Morton Ellis, with illustrations by Austin Mitchell, and the "New +Poems" of Michael Harrison, with illustrations by Austin Mitchell, +were to have come out in September. But it was not conceivable that +they should come out.</p> +<p>At the first rumour of the ultimatum Michael and Ellis had given +themselves up for lost.</p> +<p>Liége fell and Namur was falling.</p> +<p>And the call went on for recruits, and for still more recruits. +And Nicky in five seconds had destroyed his mother's illusions and +the whole fabric of his father's plans.</p> +<p>It was one evening when they were in the drawing-room, sitting +up after Veronica had gone to bed.</p> +<p>"I hope you won't mind, Father," he said; "but I'm going to +enlist to-morrow."</p> +<p>He did not look at his father's face. He looked at his mother's. +She was sitting opposite him on the couch beside Dorothy. John +balanced himself on the head of the couch with his arm round his +mother's shoulder. Every now and then he stooped down and rubbed +his cheek thoughtfully against her hair.</p> +<p>A slight tremor shook her sensitive, betraying upper lip; then +she looked back at Nicholas and smiled.</p> +<p>Dorothy set her mouth hard, unsmiling.</p> +<p>Anthony had said nothing. He stared before him at Michael's +foot, thrust out and tilted by the crossing of his knees. Michael's +foot, with its long, arched instep, fascinated Anthony. He seemed +to be thinking: "If I look at it long enough I may forget what +Nicky has said."</p> +<p>"I hope you won't mind, Father; but I'm enlisting too."</p> +<p>John's voice was a light, high echo of Nicky's.</p> +<p>With a great effort Anthony roused himself from his +contemplation of Michael's foot.</p> +<p>"I--can't--see--that my minding--or not minding--has +anything--to do--with it."</p> +<p>He brought his words out slowly and with separate efforts, as if +they weighed heavily on his tongue. "We've got to consider what's +best for the country all round, and I doubt if either of you is +called upon to go."</p> +<p>"Some of us have got to go," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"Quite so. But I don't think it ought to be you, Nicky; or John, +either."</p> +<p>"I suppose," said Michael, "you mean it ought to be me."</p> +<p>"I don't mean anything of the sort. One out of four's +enough."</p> +<p>"One out of four? Well then--"</p> +<p>"That only leaves me to fight," said Dorothy.</p> +<p>"I wasn't thinking of you, Michael. Or of Dorothy."</p> +<p>They all looked at him where he sat, upright and noble, in his +chair, and most absurdly young.</p> +<p>Dorothy said under her breath: "Oh, you darling Daddy."</p> +<p>"<i>You</i> won't be allowed to go, anyhow," said John to his +father. "You needn't think it."</p> +<p>"Why not?"</p> +<p>"Well--." He hadn't the heart to say: "Because you're too +old."</p> +<p>"Nicky's brains will be more use to the country than my old +carcass."</p> +<p>Nicky thought: "You're the very last of us that can be spared." +But he couldn't say it. The thing was so obvious. All he said was: +"It's out of the question, your going."</p> +<p>"Old Nicky's out of the question, if you like," said John. "He's +going to be married. He ought to be thinking of his wife and +children."</p> +<p>"Of course he ought," said Anthony. "Whoever goes first, it +isn't Nicky."</p> +<p>"You ought to think of Mummy, Daddy ducky; and you ought to +think of <i>us</i>," said Dorothy.</p> +<p>"I," said John, "haven't got anybody to think of. I'm not going +to be married, and I haven't any children."</p> +<p>"I haven't got a wife and children yet," said Nicky.</p> +<p>"You've got Veronica. You ought to think of her."</p> +<p>"I am thinking of her. You don't suppose Veronica'd stop me if I +wanted to go? Why, she wouldn't look at me if I didn't want to +go."</p> +<p>Suddenly he remembered Michael.</p> +<p>"I mean," he said, "after my <i>saying</i> that I was +going."</p> +<p>Their eyes met. Michael's flickered. He knew that Nicky was +thinking of him.</p> +<p>"Then Ronny knows?" said Frances.</p> +<p>"Of course she knows. <i>You</i> aren't going to try to stop me, +Mother?"</p> +<p>"No," she said. "I'm not going to try to stop you--this +time."</p> +<p>She thought: "If I hadn't stopped him seven years ago, he would +be safe now, with the Army in India."</p> +<p>One by one they got up and said "Good night" to each other.</p> +<p>But Nicholas came to Michael in his room.</p> +<p>He said to him: "I say, Mick, don't you worry about not +enlisting. At any rate, <i>not yet</i>. Don't worry about Don and +Daddy. They won't take Don because he's got a mitral murmur in his +heart that he doesn't know about. He's going to be jolly well sold, +poor chap. And they won't take the guv'nor because he's too old; +though the dear old thing thinks he can bluff them into it because +he doesn't look it.</p> +<p>"And look here--don't worry about me. As far as I'm concerned, +the War's a blessing in disguise. I always wanted to go into the +Army. You know how I loathed it when they went and stopped me. Now +I'm going in and nobody--not even mother--really wants to keep me +out. Soon they'll all be as pleased as Punch about it.</p> +<p>"And I sort of know how you feel about the War. You don't want +to stick bayonets into German tummies, just <i>because</i> they're +so large and oodgy. You'd think of that first and all the time and +afterwards. And I shan't think of it at all.</p> +<p>"Besides, you disapprove of the War for all sorts of reasons +that I can't get hold of. But it's like this--you couldn't respect +yourself if you went into it; and I couldn't respect myself if I +stayed out."</p> +<p>"I wonder," Michael said, "if you really see it."</p> +<p>"Of course I see it. That's the worst of you clever writing +chaps. You seem to think nobody can ever see anything except +yourselves."</p> +<p>When he had left him Michael thought: "I wonder if he really +does see? Or if he made it all up?"</p> +<p>They had not said to each other all that they had really meant. +Of Nicky's many words there were only two that he remembered +vividly, "Not yet."</p> +<p>Again he felt the horror of the great empty space opened up +between him and Nicky, deep and still and soundless, but for the +two words: "Not yet."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XX"></a>XX</h2> +<br> +<p>It was as Nicholas had said. Anthony and John were rejected; +Anthony on account of his age, John because of the mitral murmur +that he didn't know about.</p> +<p>The guv'nor had lied, John said, like a good 'un; swore he was +under thirty-five and stuck to it. He might have had a chance if +he'd left it at that, because he looked a jolly sight better than +most of 'em when he was stripped. But they'd given him so good an +innings that the poor old thing got above himself, and spun them a +yarn about his hair having gone grey from a recent shock. That +dished him. They said they knew that sort of hair; they'd been +seeing a lot of it lately.</p> +<p>Anthony was depressed. He said bitter things about "red tape," +and declared that if that was the way things were going to be +managed it was a bad look-out for the country. John was furious. He +said the man who examined him was a blasted idiot who didn't know +his own rotten business. He'd actually had the beastly cheek to +tell him they didn't want him dropping down dead when he went into +action, or fainting from sheer excitement after they'd been to the +trouble and expense of training him. As if he'd be likely to do a +damn silly thing like that. He'd never been excited in his life. It +was enough to <i>give</i> him heart-disease.</p> +<p>So John and Anthony followed the example of their women, and +joined the ambulance classes of the Red Cross. And presently they +learned to their disgust that, though they might possibly be +accepted as volunteers for Home Service, their disabilities would +keep them forever from the Front.</p> +<p>At this point Anthony's attention was diverted to his business +by a sudden Government demand for timber. As he believed that the +War would be over in four months he did not, at first, realize the +personal significance of this. Still, there could be no doubt that +its immediate message for him was that business must be attended +to. He had not attended to it many days before he saw that his work +for his country lay there under his hand, in his offices and his +stackyards and factories. He sighed and sat down to it, and turned +his back resolutely on the glamour of the Front. The particular +business in hand had great issues and a fascination of its own.</p> +<p>And his son John sat down to it beside him, with a devoted body +and a brain alive to the great issues, but with an ungovernable and +abstracted soul.</p> +<p>And Nicky, a recruit in Kitchener's Army, went rapidly through +the first courses of his training; sleeping under canvas; marching +in sun and wind and rain; digging trenches, ankle-deep, waist high, +breast high in earth, till his clear skin grew clearer, and his +young, hard body harder every day.</p> +<p>And every day the empty spiritual space between him and Michael +widened.</p> +<p>With the exception of Michael and old Mrs. Fleming, Anthony's +entire family had offered itself to its country; it was mobilized +from Frances and Anthony down to the very Aunties. In those days +there were few Red Cross volunteers who were not sure that sooner +or later they would be sent to the Front. Their only fear was that +they might not be trained and ready when the moment of the summons +came. Strong young girls hustled for the best places at the +ambulance classes. Fragile, elderly women, twitching with nervous +anxiety, contended with these remorseless ones and were pushed to +the rear. Yet they went on contending, sustained by their +extraordinary illusion.</p> +<p>Aunt Louie, displaying an unexpected and premature dexterity +with bandages, was convinced that she would be sent to the Front if +nobody else was. Aunt Emmeline and Aunt Edith, in states of +cerebral excitement, while still struggling to find each other's +arteries, declared that they were going to the Front. They saw no +earthly reason why they should not go there. Uncle Maurice haunted +the Emergency class-rooms at the Polytechnic, wearing an Esmarch +triangular bandage round his neck, and volunteered as an +instructor. He got mixed up with his bandages, and finally +consented to the use of his person as a lay-figure for practical +demonstrations while he waited for his orders to go to the +Front.</p> +<p>They forebore to comment on the palpable absurdity of each +other's hopes.</p> +<p>For, with the first outbreak of the War, the three Miss Flemings +had ceased from mutual recrimination. They were shocked into a +curious gentleness to each other. Every evening the old schoolroom +(Michael's study) was turned into a Red Cross demonstration hall, +and there the queer sight was to be seen of Louie, placable and +tender, showing Edith over and over again how to adjust a scalp +bandage on Emmeline's head, and of Emmeline motionless for hours +under Edie's little, clumsy, pinching fingers. It was thus, with +small vibrations of tenderness and charity, that they responded to +the vast rhythm of the War.</p> +<p>And Grannie, immutable in her aged wisdom and malevolence, +pushed out her lower lip at them.</p> +<p>"If you three would leave off that folly and sit down and knit, +you might be some use," said Grannie. "Kitchener says that if every +woman in England knitted from morning till night he wouldn't have +enough socks for his Army."</p> +<p>Grannie knitted from morning till night. She knitted +conspicuously, as a protest against bandage practice; giving to her +soft and gentle action an air of energy inimical to her three +unmarried daughters. And not even Louie had the heart to tell her +that all her knitting had to be unravelled overnight, to save the +wool.</p> +<p>"A set of silly women, getting in Kitchener's way, and wasting +khaki!"</p> +<p>Grannie behaved as if the War were her private and personal +affair, as if Kitchener were her right-hand man, and all the other +women were interfering with them.</p> +<p>Yet it looked as if all the women would be mobilized before all +the men. The gates of Holloway were opened, and Mrs. Blathwaite and +her followers received a free pardon on their pledge to abstain +from violence during the period of the War. And instantly, in the +first week of war, the Suffrage Unions and Leagues and Societies +(already organized and disciplined by seven years' methodical +resistance) presented their late enemy, the Government, with an +instrument of national service made to its hand and none the worse +because originally devised for its torture and embarassment.</p> +<p>The little vortex of the Woman's Movement was swept without a +sound into the immense vortex of the War. The women rose up all +over England and went into uniform.</p> +<p>And Dorothea appeared one day wearing the khaki tunic, breeches +and puttees of the Women's Service Corps. She had joined a +motor-ambulance as chauffeur, driving the big Morss car that +Anthony had given to it. Dorothea really had a chance of being sent +to Belgium before the end of the month. Meanwhile she convoyed +Belgian refugees from Cannon Street Station.</p> +<p>She saw nothing before her as yet. Her mind was like Cannon +Street Station--a dreadful twilit terminus into which all the +horror and misery of Belgium poured and was congested.</p> +<p>Cannon Street Station. Presently it was as if she were spending +all of her life that counted there; as if for years she had been +familiar with the scene.</p> +<p>Arch upon iron arch, and girder after iron girder holding up the +blurred transparency of the roof. Iron rails running under the long +roof, that was like the roof of a tunnel open at one end. By day a +greyish light, filtered through smoke and grit and steam. Lamps, +opaque white globes, hanging in the thick air like dead moons. By +night a bluish light, and large, white globes grown opalescent like +moons, lit again to a ghastly, ruinous life.</p> +<p>The iron breasts of engines, huge and triumphant, advancing +under the immense fanlight of the open arch. Long trains of +carriages packed tight with packages, with, enormous bundles; human +heads appearing, here and there, above the swollen curves of the +bundles; human bodies emerging in the struggle to bring forth the +bundles through the narrow doors.</p> +<p>For the first few weeks the War meant to Dorothea, not bleeding +wounds and death, but just these train-loads of refugees--just this +one incredible spectacle of Belgium pouring itself into Cannon +Street Station. Her clear hard mind tried and failed to grasp the +sequences of which the final act was the daily unloading of tons of +men, women and children on Cannon Street platform. Yesterday they +were staggering under those bundles along their straight, flat +roads between the everlasting rows of poplars; their towns and +villages flamed and smoked behind them; some of them, goaded like +tired cattle, had felt German bayonets at their backs--yesterday. +And this morning they were here, brave and gay, smiling at Dorothea +as she carried their sick on her stretcher and their small children +in her arms.</p> +<p>And they were still proud of themselves.</p> +<p>A little girl tripped along the platform, carrying in one hand a +large pasteboard box covered with black oilcloth, and in the other +a cage with a goldfinch in it. She looked back at Dorothea and +smiled, proud of herself because she had saved her goldfinch. A +Belgium boy carried a paralyzed old man on his shoulders. He +grinned at Dorothea, proud of himself because he had saved his +grandfather. A young Flemish peasant woman pushed back the shawl +that covered her baby's face to show her how pretty he was; she +laughed because she had borne him and saved him.</p> +<p>And there were terrible things significant of yesterday. Women +and girls idiotic with outrage and grief. A young man lamed in +trying to throw himself into a moving train because he thought his +lost mother was in it. The ring screening the agony of a woman +giving birth to her child on the platform. A death in the train; +stiff, upturned feet at the end of a stretcher that the +police-ambulance carried away.</p> +<p>And as Dorothea drove her car-loads of refugees day after day in +perfect safety, she sickened with impatience and disgust. Safety +was hard and bitter to her. Her hidden self was unsatisfied; it had +a monstrous longing. It wanted to go where the guns sounded and the +shells burst, and the villages flamed and smoked; to go along the +straight, flat roads between the poplars where the refugees had +gone, so that her nerves and flesh should know and feel their +suffering and their danger. She was not feeling anything now except +the shame of her immunity.</p> +<p>She thought: "I can't look at a Belgian woman without wishing I +were dead. I shall have no peace till I've gone."</p> +<p>Her surface self was purely practical. She thought: "If I were +in Belgium I could get them out of it quicker than they could +walk."</p> +<p>Dorothea could bring all her mind to bear on her Belgians, +because it was at ease about her own people. They, at any rate, +were safe. Her father and poor Don were out of it. Michael was not +in it--yet; though of course he would be in it some time. She tried +not to think too much about Michael. Nicky was safe for the next +six months. And Frank was safe. Frank was training recruits. He had +told her he might be kept indefinitely at that infernal job. But +for that he would be fighting now. He wanted her to be sorry for +him; and she was sorry for him. And she was glad too.</p> +<p>One afternoon, late in August, she had come home, to sleep till +dinner-time between her day's work and her night's work, when she +found him upstairs in her study. He had been there an hour waiting +for her by himself. The others were all at bandage practice in the +schoolroom.</p> +<p>"I hope you don't mind," he said. "Your mother told me to wait +up here."</p> +<p>She had come in straight from the garage; there was a light fur +of dust on her boots and on the shoulders of her tunic, and on her +face and hair. Her hands were black with oil and dirt from her +car.</p> +<p>He looked at her, taking it all in: the khaki uniform (it was +the first time he had seen her in it), the tunic, breeches and +puttees, the loose felt hat turned up at one side, its funny, +boyish chin-strap, the dust and dirt of her; and he smiled. His +smile had none of the cynical derision which had once greeted her +appearances as a militant suffragist.</p> +<p>"And yet," she thought, "if he's consistent, he ought to loathe +me now."</p> +<p>"Dorothea. Going to the War," he said.</p> +<p>"Not <i>yet</i>--worse luck."</p> +<p>"Are you going as part of the Canadian contingent from overseas, +or what?"</p> +<p>"I wish I was. Do you think they'd take me if I cut my hair +off?"</p> +<p>"They might. They might do anything. This is a most +extraordinary war."</p> +<p>"It's a war that makes it detestable to be a woman."</p> +<p>"I thought--" For a moment his old ungovernable devil rose in +him.</p> +<p>"What did you think?"</p> +<p>"No matter. That's all ancient history. I say, you look like +business. Do you really mean it? Are you really going to +Flanders?"</p> +<p>"Do you suppose any woman would go and get herself up like this +if she wasn't going <i>some</i>where?"</p> +<p>He said (surprisingly), "I don't see what's wrong with it." And +then: "It makes you look about eighteen."</p> +<p>"That's because you can't see my face for the dirt."</p> +<p>"For the chin-strap, you mean. Dorothy--do you realize that +you're not eighteen? You're eight and twenty."</p> +<p>"I do," she said. "But I rather hoped you didn't; or that if you +did, you wouldn't say so."</p> +<p>"I realize that I'm thirty-eight, and that between us we've made +a pretty mess of each other's lives."</p> +<p>"Have I made a mess of <i>your</i> life?'</p> +<p>"A beastly mess."</p> +<p>"I'm sorry. I wouldn't have done it for the world if I'd known. +You know I wouldn't.</p> +<p>"But one doesn't know things."</p> +<p>"One doesn't if one's Dorothea. One knows some things awfully +well; but not the things that matter."</p> +<p>"Well--but what could I do?" she said.</p> +<p>"You could have done what you can do now. You could have married +me. And we would have had three years of each other."</p> +<p>"You mean three centuries. There was a reason why we couldn't +manage it."</p> +<p>"There wasn't a reason. There isn't any reason now.</p> +<p>"Look here--to-day's Wednesday. Will you marry me on Friday if I +get leave and a licence and fix it up tomorrow? We shall have three +days."</p> +<p>"Three days." She seemed to be saying to herself that for three +days--No, it wasn't worth while.</p> +<p>"Well, three months perhaps. Perhaps six, if my rotten luck +doesn't change. Because, I'm doing my level best to make it change. +So, you see, it's got to be one thing or another."</p> +<p>And still she seemed to be considering: Was it or was it not +worth while?</p> +<p>"For God's sake don't say you're going to make conditions. There +really isn't time for it. You can think what you like and say what +you like and do what you like, and wear anything--wear a busby--I +shan't care if you'll only marry me."</p> +<p>"Yes. That's the way you go on. And yet you don't, say you love +me. You never have said it. You--you're leaving me to do all +that."</p> +<p>"Why--what else have I been doing for seven years? Nine +years--ten years?"</p> +<p>"Nothing. Nothing at all. You just seem to think that I can go +off and get married to a man without knowing whether he cares for +me or not.</p> +<p>"And now it's too late. My hands are all dirty. So's my +face--filthy--you mustn't--"</p> +<p>"I don't care. They're your hands. It's your face. I don't +care."</p> +<p>The chin-strap, the absurd chin-strap, fretted his mouth. He +laughed. He said, "She takes her hat off when she goes into a +scrimmage, and she keeps it on <i>now</i>!"</p> +<p>She loosened the strap, laughing, and threw her hat, the hat of +a Canadian trooper, on to the floor. His mouth moved over her face, +over her hair, pressing hard into their softness; his arms clasped +her shoulders; they slipped to her waist; he strained her slender +body fast to him, straight against his own straightness, till the +passion and the youth she had denied and destroyed shook her.</p> +<p>He said to himself, "She <i>shall</i> come alive. She +<i>shall</i> feel. She <i>shall want</i> me. I'll make her. I +should have thought of this ten years ago."</p> +<p>Her face was smooth; it smiled under the touch of his mouth and +hands. And fear came with her passion. She thought, "Supposing +something happens before Friday. If I could only give myself to him +now--to-night."</p> +<p>Then, very gently and very tenderly, he released her, as if he +knew what she was thinking. He was sorry for her and afraid. Poor +Dorothy, who had made such a beastly mess of it, who had come alive +so late.</p> +<p>She thought, "But--he wouldn't take me that way. He'd loathe me +if he knew."</p> +<p>Yet surely there was the same fear in his eyes as he looked at +her?</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>They were sitting beside each other now, talking quietly. Her +face and hands were washed clean; as clean, she said, as they ever +would be.</p> +<p>"When I think," he said, "of the years we've wasted. I wonder if +there was anything that could have prevented it."</p> +<p>"Only your saying what you've said now. That it didn't +matter--that it made no difference to you what I did. But, you see, +it made all the difference. And there we were."</p> +<p>"It didn't--really."</p> +<p>She shook her head. "We thought it did."</p> +<p>"No. Do you remember that morning I fetched you from +Holloway?</p> +<p>"Yes." And she said as he had said then, "I don't want to talk +about it. I don't want to think about it--except that it was dear +of you."</p> +<p>"And yet it was from that morning--from five-thirty a.m.--that +we seemed to go wrong.</p> +<p>"There's something I wanted most awfully to say, if you could +stand going back to it for just one second. Do you remember saying +that I didn't care? That I never thought of you when you were in +prison or wondered what you were feeling? <i>That's</i> what put me +off. It hurt so atrociously that I couldn't say anything.</p> +<p>"It wasn't true that I didn't think about you. I thought about +nothing else when I wasn't working; I nearly went off my head with +thinking.</p> +<p>"And you said I didn't listen to what you told me. That wasn't +true. I was listening like anything."</p> +<p>"Darling--what did I tell you?"</p> +<p>"Oh--about the thing you called your experience, or your +adventure, or something."</p> +<p>"My adventure?"</p> +<p>"That's what you called it. A sort of dream you had in prison. I +couldn't say anything because I was stupid. It was beyond me. It's +beyond me now."</p> +<p>"Never mind my adventure. What does it matter?"</p> +<p>"It matters awfully. Because I could see that it meant something +big and important that I couldn't get the hang of. It used to +bother me. I kept on trying to get it, and not getting it."</p> +<p>"You poor dear! And I've forgotten it. It did feel frightfully +big and important and real at the time. And now it's as if it had +happened to somebody else--to Veronica or somebody--not me."</p> +<p>"It was much more like Veronica. I do understand the rest of +that business. Now, I mean. I own I didn't at the time."</p> +<p>"It's all over, Frank, and forgotten. Swallowed up in the +War."</p> +<p>"You're not swallowed up."</p> +<p>"Perhaps I shall be."</p> +<p>"Well, if you are--if I am--all the more reason why I want you +to know that I understand what you were driving at. It was this +way, wasn't it? You'd got to fight, just as I've got to fight. You +couldn't keep out of it any more than I can keep out of this +War."</p> +<p>"You couldn't stay out just for me any more than I can stay out +for just you."</p> +<p>"And in a sort of way I'm in it for you. And in a sort of way +you were in it--in that damnable suffrage business--for me."</p> +<p>"How clever of you," she said, "to see it!"</p> +<p>"I didn't see it then," he said simply, "because there wasn't a +war on. We've both had to pay for my stupidity."</p> +<p>"And mine. And my cowardice. I ought to have trusted you to see, +or risked it. We should have had three--no, two--years."</p> +<p>"Well, anyhow, we've got this evening."</p> +<p>"We haven't. I've got to drive Belgians from nine till past +midnight."</p> +<p>"We've got Friday. Suppose they'll give me leave to get married +in. I say--how about to-morrow evening?"</p> +<p>"I can't. Yes, I can. At least, I shall. There's a girl I know +who'll drive for me. They'll have to give me leave to get married +in, too."</p> +<p>She thought: "I can't go to Flanders now, unless he's sent out. +If he is, nothing shall stop me but his coming back again."</p> +<p>It seemed to her only fair and fitting that they should snatch +at their happiness and secure it, before their hour came.</p> +<p>She tried to turn her mind from the fact that at Mons the +British line was being pressed back and back. It would recover. Of +course it would recover. We always began like that. We went back to +go forwards faster, when we got into our stride.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The next evening, Thursday, the girl she knew drove for +Dorothea.</p> +<p>When Frances was dressing for dinner her daughter came to her +with two frocks over her arm.</p> +<p>"Mummy ducky," she said, "I think my head's going. I can't tell +whether to wear the white thing or the blue thing. And I feel as if +it mattered more than anything. More than anything on earth."</p> +<p>Frances considered it--Dorothea in her uniform, and the white +frock and the blue frock.</p> +<p>"It doesn't matter a little bit," she said. "If he could propose +to you in that get-up--"</p> +<p>"Can't you see that I want to make up for <i>that</i> and for +all the things he's missed, the things I haven't given him. If only +I was as beautiful as you, Mummy, it wouldn't matter."</p> +<p>"My dear--my dear--"</p> +<p>Dorothy had never been a pathetic child--not half so pathetic as +Nicky with his recklessness and his earache--but this grown-up +Dorothy in khaki breeches, with her talk about white frocks and +blue frocks, made Frances want to cry.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Frank was late. And just before dinner he telephoned to Dorothy +that he couldn't be with her before nine and that he would only +have one hour to give her.</p> +<p>Frances and Anthony looked at each other. But Dorothy looked at +Veronica.</p> +<p>"What's the matter, Ronny? You look simply awful."</p> +<p>"Do I? My head's splitting. I think I'll go and lie down."</p> +<p>"You'd better."</p> +<p>"Go straight to bed," said Frances. "and let Nanna bring you +some hot soup."</p> +<p>But Veronica did not want Nanna and hot soup. She only wanted to +take herself and her awful look away out of Dorothy's sight.</p> +<p>"Well," said Anthony, "if she's going to worry herself sick +about Nicky now--"</p> +<p>Frances knew that she was not worrying about Nicky.</p> +<p>It was nine o'clock.</p> +<p>At any minute now Frank might be there. Dorothy thought: +"Supposing he hasn't got leave?" But she knew that was not likely. +If he hadn't got leave he would have said so when he +telephoned.</p> +<p>The hour that was coming had the colour of yesterday. He would +hold her in his arms again till she trembled, and then he would be +afraid, and she would be afraid, and he would let her go.</p> +<p>The bell rang, the garden gate swung open; his feet were loud +and quick on the flagged path of the terrace. He came into the room +to them, holding himself rather stiffly and very upright. His eyes +shone with excitement. He laughed the laugh she loved, that +narrowed his eyes and jerked his mouth slightly crooked.</p> +<p>They all spoke at once. "You've got leave?" "<i>He's</i> got it +all right." "What kept you?" "You <i>have</i> got leave?"</p> +<p>His eyes still shone; his mouth still jerked, laughing.</p> +<p>"Well, no," he said. "That's what I haven't got. In fact, I'm +lucky to be here at all."</p> +<p>Nanna came in with the coffee. He took his cup from her and sat +down on the sofa beside Frances, stirring his coffee with his +spoon, and smiling as if at something pleasant that he knew, +something that he would tell them presently when Nanna left the +room.</p> +<p>The door closed softly behind her. He seemed to be listening +intently for the click of the latch.</p> +<p>"Funny chaps," he said meditatively. "They keep putting you off +till you come and tell them you want to get married to-morrow. Then +they say they're sorry, but your marching orders are fixed for that +day.</p> +<p>"Twelve hours isn't much notice to give a fellow."</p> +<p>He had not looked at Dorothy. He had not spoken to her. He was +speaking to Anthony and John and Frances who were asking questions +about trains and boats and his kit and his people. He looked as if +he were not conscious of Dorothy's eyes fixed on him as he sat, +slowly stirring his coffee without drinking it. The vibration of +her nerves made his answers sound muffled and far-off.</p> +<p>She knew that her hour was dwindling slowly, wasting, passing +from her minute by minute as they talked. She had an intolerable +longing to be alone with him, to be taken in his arms; to feel what +she had felt yesterday. It was as if her soul stood still there, in +yesterday, and refused to move on into to-day.</p> +<p>Yet she was glad of their talking. It put off the end. When they +stopped talking and got up and left her alone with him, that would +be the end.</p> +<p>Suddenly he looked straight at her. His hands trembled. The cup +he had not drunk from rattled in its saucer. It seemed to Dorothea +that for a moment the whole room was hushed to listen to that small +sound. She saw her mother take the cup from him and set it on the +table.</p> +<p>One by one they got up, and slunk out of the room, as if they +were guilty, and left her alone with him.</p> +<p>It was not like yesterday. He did not take her in his arms. He +sat there, looking at her rather anxiously, keeping his distance. +He seemed to be wondering how she was going to take it.</p> +<p>He thought: "I've made a mess of it again. It wasn't fair to +make her want me--when I might have known. I ought to have left +it."</p> +<p>And suddenly her soul swung round, released from yesterday.</p> +<p>She knew what he had wanted yesterday: that her senses should be +ready to follow where her heart led. But that was not the readiness +he required from her to-day; rather it was what his anxious eyes +implored her to put away from her.</p> +<p>There was something more.</p> +<p>He wasn't going to say the obvious things, the "Well, this is +hard luck on both of us. You must be brave. Don't make it too hard +for me." (She could have made it intolerable.) It wasn't that. He +knew she was brave; he knew she wouldn't make it hard for him; he +knew he hadn't got to say the obvious things.</p> +<p>There was something more; something tremendous. It came to her +with the power and sweetness of first passion; but without its +fear. She no longer wanted him to take her in his arms and hold her +as he had held her yesterday. Her swinging soul was steady; it +vibrated to an intenser rhythm.</p> +<p>She knew nothing now but that what she saw was real, and that +they were seeing it together. It was Reality itself. It was more +than they. When realization passed it would endure.</p> +<p>Never as long as they lived would they be able to speak of it, +to say to each other what it was they felt and saw.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>He said, "I shall have to go soon."</p> +<p>And she said, "I know. Is there anything I can do?"</p> +<p>"I wish you'd go and see my mother some time. She'd like +it."</p> +<p>"I should love to go and see her. What else?"</p> +<p>"Well--I've no business to ask you, but I wish you'd give it +up."</p> +<p>"I'll give anything up. But what?"</p> +<p>"That ambulance of yours that's going to get into the firing +line."</p> +<p>"Oh--"</p> +<p>"I know why you want to get there. You want to tackle the +hardest and most dangerous job. Naturally. But it won't make it +easier for us to win the War. You can't expect us to fight so +comfy, and to be killed so comfy, if we know our womenkind are +being pounded to bits in the ground we've just cleared. If I +thought <i>you</i> were knocking about anywhere there--"</p> +<p>"It would make it too hard?"</p> +<p>"It would make me jumpy. The chances are I shouldn't have much +time to think about it, but when I did--"</p> +<p>"You'd think 'She might have spared me <i>that</i>.'"</p> +<p>"Yes. And you might think of your people. It's bad enough for +them, Nicky going."</p> +<p>"It isn't only that I'd have liked to be where you'll be, and +where he'll be. That was natural."</p> +<p>"It's also natural that we should like to find you here when we +come back."</p> +<p>"I was thinking of those Belgian women, and the babies--and +England; so safe, Frank; so disgustingly safe."</p> +<p>"I know. Leaving the children in the burning house?"</p> +<p>(She had said that once and he had remembered.)</p> +<p>"You can do more for them by staying in England--I'm asking you +to take the hardest job, really."</p> +<p>"It isn't; if it's what you want most."</p> +<p>He had risen. He was going. His hands were on her shoulders, and +they were still discussing it as if it were the most momentous +thing.</p> +<p>"Of course," she said, "I won't go if you feel like that about +it. I want you to fight comfy. You mustn't worry about me."</p> +<p>"Nor you about me. I shall be all right. Remember--it's +<i>your</i> War, too--it's the biggest fight for freedom--"</p> +<p>"I know," she said.</p> +<p>And then: "Have you got all your things?"</p> +<p>"Somebody's got 'em."</p> +<p>"I haven't given you anything. You must have my +wrist-watch."</p> +<p>She unstrapped the leather band and put it on him.</p> +<p>"My wrist's a whopper."</p> +<p>"So's mine. It'll just meet--at the last hole. It's +phosphorous," she said. "You can see the time by it in the +dark."</p> +<p>"I've nothing for <i>you</i>. Except--" he fumbled in his +pockets--"I say--here's the wedding-ring."</p> +<p>They laughed.</p> +<p>"What more could you want?" she said.</p> +<p>He put it on her finger; she raised her face to him and he +stooped and kissed her. He held her for a minute in his arms. But +it was not like yesterday.</p> +<p>Suddenly his face stiffened. "Tell them," he said, "that I'm +going."</p> +<p>The British were retreating from Mons.</p> +<p>The German attack was not like the advance of an Army but like +the travelling of an earthquake, the bursting of a sea-wall. There +was no end to the grey battalions, no end to the German Army, no +end to the German people. And there was no news of British +reinforcements, or rumour of reinforcements.</p> +<p>"They come on like waves. Like waves," said Dorothea, reading +from the papers.</p> +<p>"I wouldn't read about it if I were you, darling," said +Frances.</p> +<p>"Why not? It isn't going to last long. We'll rally. See if we +don't."</p> +<p>Dorothea's clear, hard mind had gone under for the time, given +way before that inconceivable advance. She didn't believe in the +retreat from Mons. It couldn't go on. Reinforcements had been +sent.</p> +<p>Of course they had been sent. If Frank was ordered off at twelve +hours' notice that meant reinforcements, or there wouldn't be any +sense in it. They would stop the retreat. We were sitting here, +safe; and the least we could do for <i>them</i> was to trust them, +and not believe any tales of their retreating.</p> +<p>And all the time she wondered how news of him would come. By +wire? By letter? By telephone? She was glad that she hadn't got to +wait at home, listening for the clanging of the garden gate, the +knock, the ringing of the bell.</p> +<p>She waited five days. And on the evening of the sixth day the +message came from his mother to her mother: "Tell your dear child +for me that my son was killed five days ago, in the retreat from +Mons. And ask her to come and see me; but not just yet."</p> +<p>She had enclosed copies of the official telegram; and the letter +from his Colonel.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>After Mons, the siege of Antwerp. The refugees poured into +Cannon Street Station.</p> +<p>Dorothea tried hard to drown her grief in the grief of Belgium. +But she could not drown it. She could only poison it with thoughts +that turned it into something more terrible than grief. They came +to her regularly, beginning after midnight, when she lay in bed and +should have slept, worn out with her hard day's driving.</p> +<p>She thought: "I could bear it if I hadn't wasted the time we +might have had together. All those years--like a fool--over that +silly suffrage.</p> +<p>"I could bear it if I hadn't been cruel to him. I talked to him +like a brute and an idiot. I told him he didn't care for freedom. +And he's died for it. He remembered that. It was one of the last +things he remembered. He said 'It's <i>your</i> War--it's the +biggest fight for freedom.' And he's killed in it.</p> +<p>"I could bear it if I'd given myself to him that night--even for +one night.</p> +<p>"How do you know he'd have loathed it? I ought to have risked +it. I was a coward. He got nothing."</p> +<p>His persistent image in her memory tortured her. It was an +illusion that prolonged her sense of his material presence, urging +it towards a contact that was never reached. Death had no power +over this illusion. She could not see Drayton's face, dead among +the dead.</p> +<p>Obsessed by her illusion she had lost her hold on the reality +that they had seen and felt together. All sense of it was gone, as +if she had dreamed it or made it up.</p> +<p>Presently she would not have her work to keep her from thinking. +The Ambulance Corps was going out to Flanders at the end of +September, and it would take her car with it and a new driver.</p> +<p>Frances's heart ached when she looked at her.</p> +<p>"If I could only help you."</p> +<p>"You can't, Mummy ducky," she would say. And she would get up +and leave the room where Frances was. Sometimes she would go to +Veronica; but more often she hid away somewhere by herself.</p> +<p>Frances thought: "She is out of my reach. I can't get at her. +She'll go to anybody rather than to me. It used to be Rosalind. Now +it's Veronica."</p> +<p>But Dorothy could not speak about Drayton to her mother. Only to +Veronica, trying to comfort her, she said, "I could bear it if he'd +been killed in an attack. But to go straight, like that, into the +retreat. He couldn't have had five hours' fighting.</p> +<p>"And to be killed--Retreating.</p> +<p>"He got nothing out of it but agony."</p> +<p>Veronica said, "How do you know he got nothing out of it? You +don't know what he may have got in the last minute of it."</p> +<p>"Ronny, I don't believe I should mind so much if I were going +out to Flanders--if there was the least little chance of a bullet +getting me. But I gave him my word I wouldn't go.</p> +<p>"Do you think I'm bound by that--now?"</p> +<p>"Now? You're more bound than ever, because he's more near you, +more alive."</p> +<p>"You wouldn't say that if you loved him."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>One day a package came to her from Eltham. Two notes were +enclosed with it, one from Drayton's mother and one from +Drayton:</p> +<p>"Frank said I was to send you this if he was killed. I think he +must have known that he would not come back."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"My Dear Dorothy,--You will think this is a very singular +bequest. But I want you to see that my memory is fairly good."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The very singular bequest was a Bible, with three +cigarette-lighters for markers, and a date on the fly-leaf: "July +5th, 1912."</p> +<p>The cigarette-lighters referred her to Psalm cxliv., and Isaiah +xxxv. and xl., and pencil marks to the verses:</p> +<p>"Blessed be the Lord my strength which teacheth my hands to war +and my fingers to fight."...</p> +<p>"And an highway shall be there ... the redeemed shall walk +there, and the ransomed of the Lord shall return" ...</p> +<p>... "They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; +they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not be +weary; they shall walk and not faint."</p> +<p>And their last hour came back to her with its mysterious, sweet +and powerful passion that had no fear in it; and she laid hold +again on the Reality they had seen and felt together.</p> +<p>The moment passed. She wanted it to come back, for as long as it +lasted she was at peace.</p> +<p>But it did not come back. Nothing came back but her anguish of +remorse for all that she had wasted.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XXI"></a>XXI</h2> +<br> +<p>After Drayton's death Frances and Anthony were sobered and had +ceased to feed on illusions. The Battle of the Marne was fought in +vain for them. They did not believe that it had saved Paris.</p> +<p>Then came the fall of Antwerp and the Great Retreat. There was +no more Belgium. The fall of Paris and the taking of Calais were +only a question of time, of perhaps a very little time. Then there +would be no more France. They were face to face with the further +possibility of there being no more England.</p> +<p>In those months of September and October Anthony and Frances +were changed utterly to themselves and to each other. If, before +the War, Frances had been asked whether she loved England, she +would, after careful consideration, have replied truthfully, "I +like England. But I dislike the English people. They are narrow and +hypocritical and conceited. They are snobbish; and I hate snobs." +At the time of the Boer War, beyond thinking that the British ought +to win, and that they would win, and feeling a little spurt as of +personal satisfaction when they did win, she had had no +consciousness of her country whatsoever. As for loving it, she +loved her children and her husband, and she had a sort of mild, +cat-like affection for her garden and her tree of Heaven and her +house; but the idea of loving England was absurd; you might just as +well talk of loving the Archbishopric of Canterbury. She who once +sat in peace under the tree of Heaven with her <i>Times</i> +newspaper, and flicked the affairs of the nation from her as less +important than the stitching on her baby's frock, now talked and +thought and dreamed of nothing else. She was sad, not because her +son Nicholas's time of safety was dwindling week by week, but +because England was in danger; she was worried, not because Lord +Kitchener was practically asking her to give up her son Michael, +but because she had found that the race was to the swift and the +battle to the strong, and that she was classed with her incompetent +sisters as too old to wait on wounded soldiers. Every morning she +left her household to old Nanna's care and went down to the City +with Anthony, and worked till evening in a room behind his office, +receiving, packing, and sending off great cases of food and +clothing to the Belgian soldiers.</p> +<p>Anthony was sad and worried, not because he had three sons, all +well under twenty-seven, but simply and solely because the +Government persisted in buying the wrong kind of timber--timber +that swelled and shrank again--for rifles and gun-carriages, and +because officials wouldn't listen to him when he tried to tell them +what he knew about timber, and because the head of a department had +talked to <i>him</i> about private firms and profiteering. As if +any man with three sons under twenty-seven would want to make a +profit out of the War; and as if they couldn't cut down everybody's +profits if they took the trouble. They might cut his to the last +cent so long as we had gun-carriages that would carry guns and +rifles that would shoot. He knew what he was talking about and they +didn't.</p> +<p>And Frances said he was right. He always had been right. She who +had once been impatient over his invariable, irritating rightness, +loved it now. She thought and said that if there were a few men +like Anthony at the head of departments we should win the War. We +were losing it for want of precisely that specialized knowledge and +that power of organization in which Anthony excelled. She was proud +of him, not because he was her husband and the father of her +children, but because he was a man who could help England. They +were both proud of Michael and Nicholas and John, not because they +were their sons, but because they were men who could fight for +England.</p> +<p>They found that they loved England with a secret, religious, +instinctive love. Two feet of English earth, the ground that a man +might stand and fight for, became, mysteriously and magically, +dearer to them than their home. They loved England more than their +own life or the lives of their children. Long ago they had realized +that fathers do not beget children nor mothers bear them merely to +gratify themselves. Now, in September and October, they were +realizing that children are not begotten and born for their own +profit and pleasure either.</p> +<p>When they sat together after the day's work they found +themselves saying the most amazing things to each other.</p> +<p>Anthony said, "Downham thinks John's heart is decidedly better. +I shouldn't wonder if he'd have to go." Almost as if the idea had +been pleasant to him.</p> +<p>And Frances: "Well, I suppose if we had thirteen sons instead of +three, we ought to send them all."</p> +<p>"Positively," said Anthony. "I believe I'd let Dorothy go out +now if she insisted."</p> +<p>"Oh, no, I think we might be allowed to keep Dorothy."</p> +<p>She pondered. "I suppose one will get used to it in time. I +grudged giving Nicky at first. I don't grudge him now. I believe if +he went out to-morrow, and was killed, I should only feel how +splendid it was of him."</p> +<p>"I wish poor Dorothy could feel that way about Drayton."</p> +<p>"She does--really. But that's different. Frank had to go. It was +his profession. Nicky's gone in of his own free will."</p> +<p>He did not remind her that Frank's free will had counted in his +choice of a profession.</p> +<p>"Once," said Frances, "volunteers didn't count. Now they count +more than the whole Army put together."</p> +<p>They were silent, each thinking the same thing; each knowing +that sooner or later they must speak of it.</p> +<p>Frances was the braver of the two. She spoke first.</p> +<p>"There's Michael. I don't know what to make of him. He doesn't +seem to want to go."</p> +<p>That was the vulnerable place; there they had ached unbearably +in secret. It was no use trying to hide it any longer. Something +must be done about Michael.</p> +<p>"I wish you'd say something to him, Anthony."</p> +<p>"I would if I were going myself. But how can I?"</p> +<p>"When he knows that you'd have gone before any of them if you +were young enough."</p> +<p>"I can't say anything. You'll have to."</p> +<p>"No, Anthony. I can't ask him to go any more than you can. Nicky +is the only one of us who has any right to."</p> +<p>"Or Dorothy. Dorothy'd be in the trenches now if she had her +way."</p> +<p>"I can't think how he can bear to look at Dorothy."</p> +<p>But in the end she did say something.</p> +<p>She went to him in his room upstairs where he worked now, hiding +himself away every evening out of their sight. "Almost," she +thought, "as if he were ashamed of himself."</p> +<p>Her heart ached as she looked at him; at the fair, serious +beauty of his young face; at the thick masses of his hair that +would not stay as they were brushed back, but fell over his +forehead; it was still yellow, and shining as it shone when he was +a little boy.</p> +<p>He was writing. She could see the short, irregular lines of +verse on the white paper. He covered them with his hand as she came +in lest she should see them. That hurt her.</p> +<p>"Michael," she said, "I wonder if you <i>ever</i> realize that +we are at war."</p> +<p>"The War isn't a positive obsession to me, if that's what you +mean."</p> +<p>"It isn't what I mean. Only--that when other people are doing so +much--</p> +<p>"George Vereker enlisted yesterday."</p> +<p>"I don't care what other people are doing. I never did. If +George Vereker chooses to enlist it is no reason why I should."</p> +<p>"My darling Mick, I'm not so sure. Isn't it all the more reason, +when so much more has been done for you than was ever done for +him?"</p> +<p>"It's no use trying to get at me."</p> +<p>"England's fighting for her life," said Frances.</p> +<p>"So's Germany.</p> +<p>"You see, I can't feel it like other people. George Vereker +hates Germany; I don't. I've lived there. I don't want to make dear +old Frau Henschel a widow, and stick a bayonet into Ludwig and +Carl, and make Hedwig and Löttchen cry."</p> +<p>"I see. You'd rather Carl and Ludwig stuck bayonets into George +and Nicky, and that Ronny and Dorothy and Alice Lathom cried."</p> +<p>"Bayonetting isn't my business."</p> +<p>"Your own safety is. How can you bear to let other men fight for +you?"</p> +<p>"They're not fighting for <i>me</i>, Mother. You ask them if +they are, and see what they'll say to you. They're fighting for God +knows what; but they're no more fighting for me than they're +fighting for Aunt Emmeline."</p> +<p>"They <i>are</i> fighting for Aunt Emmeline. They're fighting +for everything that's weak and defenceless."</p> +<p>"Well, then, they're not fighting for me. I'm not weak and +defenceless," said Michael.</p> +<p>"All the more shame for you, then."</p> +<p>He smiled, acknowledging her score.</p> +<p>"You don't mean that, really, Mummy. You couldn't resist the +opening for a repartee. It was quite a nice one."</p> +<p>"If," she said, "you were only <i>doing</i> something. But you +go on with your own things as though nothing had happened."</p> +<p>"I <i>am</i> doing something. I'm keeping sane. And I'm keeping +sanity alive in other people."</p> +<p>"Much you care for other people," said Frances as she left the +room.</p> +<p>But when she had shut the door on him her heart turned to him +again. She went down to Anthony where he waited for her in his +room.</p> +<p>"<i>Well?</i>" he said.</p> +<p>"It's no use. He won't go."</p> +<p>And Frances, quite suddenly and to her own surprise, burst into +tears.</p> +<p>He drew her to him, and she clung to him, sobbing softly.</p> +<p>"My dear--my dear. You mustn't take it to heart like this. He's +as obstinate as the devil; but he'll come round."</p> +<p>He pressed her tighter to him. He loved her in her unfamiliar +weakness, crying and clinging to him.</p> +<p>"It's not that," she said, recovering herself with dignity. "I'm +glad he didn't give in. If he went out, and anything happened to +him, I couldn't bear to be the one who made him go."</p> +<p>After all, she didn't love England more than Michael.</p> +<p>They were silent.</p> +<p>"We must leave it to his own feeling," she said presently.</p> +<p>But Anthony's heart was hard against Michael.</p> +<p>"He must know that <i>public</i> feeling's pretty strong against +him. To say nothing of <i>my</i> feeling and <i>your</i> +feeling."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>He did know it. He knew that they were all against him; his +father and his mother, and John and Dorothy. Because he couldn't +bear to look at Dorothy, and couldn't bear Dorothy to look at him, +he kept out of her way as much as possible.</p> +<p>As for public opinion, it had always been against him, and he +against it.</p> +<p>But Anthony was mistaken when he thought that the pressure of +these antagonisms would move Michael an inch from the way he meant +to go. Rather, it drew out that resistance which Michael's mind had +always offered to the loathsome violences of the collective soul. +From his very first encounters with the collective soul and its +emotions they had seemed to Michael as dangerous as they were +loathsome. Collective emotion might be on the side of the +archangels or on the side of devils and of swine; its mass was what +made it dangerous, a thing that challenged the resistance of the +private soul But in his worst dreams of what it could do to him +Michael had never imagined anything more appalling than the +collective patriotism of the British and their Allies, this rushing +together of the souls of four countries to make one monstrous +soul.</p> +<p>And neither Anthony nor Frances realized that Michael, at this +moment, was afraid, not of the War so much as of the emotions of +the War, the awful, terrifying flood that carried him away from his +real self and from everything it cared for most. Patriotism was, no +doubt, a fine emotion; but the finer the thing was, the more it got +you; it got you and you were done for. He was determined that it +shouldn't get him. They couldn't see--and that was Michael's +grievance--that his resistance was his strength and not his +weakness.</p> +<p>Even Frances, who believed that people never changed, did not +realize that the grown-up Michael who didn't want to enlist was the +same entity as the little Michael who hadn't wanted to go to the +party, who had wanted to go on playing with himself, afraid of +nothing so much as of forgetting "pieces of himself that he wanted +to remember." He was Michael who refused to stay at school another +term, and who talked about shooting himself because he had to go +with his class and do what the other fellows were doing. He +objected to being suddenly required to feel patriotic because other +people were feeling patriotic, to think that Germany was in the +wrong because other people thought that Germany was in the wrong, +to fight because other people were fighting.</p> +<p>Why should he? He saw no earthly reason why.</p> +<p>He said to himself that it was the blasted cheek of the +assumption that he resented. There was a peculiarly British +hypocrisy and unfairness and tyranny about it all.</p> +<p>It wasn't--as they all seemed to think--that he was afraid to +fight. He had wanted to go and fight for Ireland. He would fight +any day in a cleaner cause. By a cleaner cause Michael meant a +cause that had not been messed about so much by other people. Other +people had not put pressure on him to fight for Ireland; in fact +they had tried to stop him. Michael was also aware that in the +matter of Ireland his emotions, though shared by considerable +numbers of the Irish people, were not shared by his family or by +many people whom he knew; to all intents and purposes he had them +to himself.</p> +<p>It was no use trying to explain all this to his father and +mother, for they wouldn't understand it. The more he explained the +more he would seem to them to be a shirker.</p> +<p>He could see what they thought of him. He saw it in their stiff, +reticent faces, in his mother's strained smile, in his sister's +silence when he asked her what she had been doing all day. Their +eyes--his mother's and his sister's eyes--pursued him with the +unspoken question: "Why don't you go and get killed--for +England--like other people?"</p> +<p>Still, he could bear these things, for they were visible, +palpable; he knew where he was with them. What he could not stand +was that empty spiritual space between him and Nicky. That hurt him +where he was most vulnerable--in his imagination.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>And again, his imagination healed the wound it made.</p> +<p>It was all very well, but if you happened to have a religion, +and your religion was what mattered to you most; if you adored +Beauty as the supreme form of Life; if you cared for nothing else; +if you lived, impersonally, to make Beauty and to keep it alive; +and for no other end, how could you consent to take part in this +bloody business? That would be the last betrayal, the most cowardly +surrender.</p> +<p>And you were all the more bound to faithfulness if you were one +of the leaders of a forlorn hope, of the forlorn hope of all the +world, of all the ages, the forlorn hope of God himself.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>For Michael, even more than Ellis, had given himself up as +lost.</p> +<p>And yet somehow they all felt curiously braced by the prospect. +When the young men met in Lawrence Stephen's house they discussed +it with a calm, high heroism. This was the supreme test: To go on, +without pay, without praise, without any sort of recognition. Any +fool could fight; but, if you were an artist, your honour bound you +to ignore the material contest, to refuse, even to your country, +the surrender of the highest that you knew. They believed with the +utmost fervour and sincerity that they defied Germany more +effectually, because more spiritually, by going on and producing +fine things with imperturbability than if they went out against the +German Armies with bayonets and machine-guns. Moreover they were +restoring Beauty as fast as Germany destroyed it.</p> +<p>They told each other these things very seriously and earnestly, +on Friday evenings as they lay about more or less at their ease +(but rather less than more) in Stephen's study.</p> +<p>They had asked each other: "Are <i>you</i> going to fight for +your country?"</p> +<p>And Ellis had said he was damned if he'd fight for his country; +and Mitchell had said he hadn't got a country, so there was no +point in his fighting, anyhow; and Monier-Owen that if you could +show him a country that cared for the arts before anything he'd +fight for it; but that England was very far from being that +country.</p> +<p>And Michael had sat silent, thinking the same thoughts.</p> +<p>And Stephen had sat silent, thinking other thoughts, not +listening to what was said.</p> +<p>And now people were whining about Louvain and Rheims Cathedral. +Michael said to himself that he could stand these massed war +emotions if they were sincere; but people whined about Louvain and +Rheims Cathedral who had never cared a damn about either before the +War.</p> +<p>Anthony looked up over the edge of his morning paper, inquired +whether Michael could defend the destruction of Louvain and Rheims +Cathedral?</p> +<p>Michael shrugged his shoulders. "Why bother," he said, "about +Rheims Cathedral and Louvain? From your point of view it's all +right. If Louvain and Rheims Cathedral get in the way of the +enemy's artillery they've got to go. They didn't happen to be in +the way of ours, that's all."</p> +<p>Michael's mind was showing certain symptoms, significant of its +malady. He was inclined to disparage the military achievements of +the Allies and to justify the acts of Germany.</p> +<p>"It's up to the French to defend Paris. And what have we got to +do with Alsace-Lorraine? As if every inteligent Frenchman didn't +know that Alsace-Lorraine is a sentimental stunt. No. I'm not +pro-German. I simply see things as they are."</p> +<p>"I think," Frances would say placably, "we'd better not talk +about the War."</p> +<p>He would remind them that it was not his subject.</p> +<p>And John laughed at him. "Poor old Nick hates the War because +it's dished him. He knows his poems can't come out till it's +over."</p> +<p>As it happened, his poems came out that autumn.</p> +<p>After all, the Germans had been held back from Paris. As Stephen +pointed out to him, the Battle of the Marne had saved Michael. In +magnificent defiance of the enemy, the "New Poems" of Michael +Harrison, with illustrations by Austin Mitchell, were announced as +forthcoming in October; and Morton Ellis's "Eccentricities," with +illustrations by Austin Mitchell, were to appear the same month. +Even Wadham's poems would come out some time, perhaps next +spring.</p> +<p>Stephen said the advertisements should be offered to the War +Office as posters, to strike terror into Germany and sustain the +morale of the Allied Armies. "If England could afford to publish +Michael--"</p> +<p>Michael's family made no comment on the appearance of his poems. +The book lay about in the same place on the drawing-room table for +weeks. When Nanna dusted she replaced it with religious care; none +of his people had so much as taken it up to glance inside it, or +hold it in their hands. It seemed to Michael that they were +conscious of it all the time, and that they turned their faces away +from it pointedly. They hated it. They hated him for having written +it.</p> +<p>He remembered that it had been different when his first book had +come out two years ago. They had read that; they had snatched at +all the reviews of it and read it again, trying to see what it was +that they had missed.</p> +<p>They had taken each other aside, and it had been:</p> +<p>"Anthony, do you understand Michael's poems?"</p> +<p>"Dorothy, do you understand Michael's poems?"</p> +<p>"Nicky, do you understand Michael's poems?"</p> +<p>He remembered his mother's apology for not understanding them: +"Darling, I <i>do</i> see that they're very beautiful." He +remembered how he had wished that they would give up the struggle +and leave his poems alone. They were not written for them. He had +been amused and irritated when he had seen his father holding the +book doggedly in front of him, his poor old hands twitching with +embarrassment whenever he thought Michael was looking at him.</p> +<p>And now he, who had been so indifferent and so contemptuous, was +sensitive to the least quiver of his mother's upper lip.</p> +<p>Veronica's were the only eyes that were kind to him; that did +not hunt him down with implacable suggestion and reminder.</p> +<p>Veronica had been rejected too. She was not strong enough to +nurse in the hospitals. She was only strong enough to work from +morning to night, packing and carrying large, heavy parcels for the +Belgian soldiers. She wanted Michael to be sorry for her because +she couldn't be a nurse. Rosalind Jervis was a nurse. But he was +not sorry. He said he would very much rather she didn't do anything +that Rosalind did.</p> +<p>"So would Nicky," he said.</p> +<p>And then: "Veronica, do <i>you</i> think I ought to enlist?"</p> +<p>The thought was beginning to obsess him.</p> +<p>"No," she said; "you're different.</p> +<p>"I know how you feel about it. Nicky's heart and soul are in the +War. If he's killed it can only kill his body. <i>Your</i> soul +isn't in it. It would kill your soul."</p> +<p>"It's killing it now, killing everything I care for."</p> +<p>"Killing everything we all care for, except the things it can't +kill."</p> +<p>That was one Sunday evening in October. They were standing +together on the long terrace under the house wall. Before them, a +little to the right, on the edge of the lawn, the great ash-tree +rose over the garden. The curved and dipping branches swayed and +swung in a low wind that moved like quiet water.</p> +<p>"Michael," she said, "do look what's happening to that +tree."</p> +<p>"I see," he said.</p> +<p>It made him sad to look at the tree; it made him sad to look at +Veronica--because both the tree and Veronica were beautiful.</p> +<p>"When I was a little girl I used to sit and look and look at +that tree till it changed and got all thin and queer and began to +move towards me.</p> +<p>"I never knew whether it had really happened or not; I don't +know now--or whether it was the tree or me. It was as if by looking +and looking you could make the tree more real and more alive."</p> +<p>Michael remembered something.</p> +<p>"Dorothy says you saw Ferdie the night he died."</p> +<p>"So I did. But that's not the same thing. I didn't have to look +and look. I just saw him. I <i>sort</i> of saw Frank that last +night--when the call came--only sort of--but I knew he was going to +be killed.</p> +<p>"I didn't see him nearly so distinctly as I saw Nicky-"</p> +<p>"Nicky? You didn't see him--as you saw Ferdie?"</p> +<p>"No, no, no! it was ages ago--in Germany--before he married. I +saw him with Desmond."</p> +<p>"Have you ever seen me?"</p> +<p>"Not yet. That's because you don't want me as they did."</p> +<p>"Don't I! Don't I!"</p> +<p>And she said again: "Not yet."</p> +<p>Nicky had had leave for Christmas. He had come and gone.</p> +<p>Frances and Anthony were depressed; they were beginning to be +frightened.</p> +<p>For Nicky had finished his training. He might be sent out any +day.</p> +<p>Nicky had had some moments of depression. Nothing had been heard +of the Moving Fortress. Again, the War Office had given no sign of +having received it. It was hard luck, he said, on Drayton.</p> +<p>And John was depressed after he had gone.</p> +<p>"They'd much better have taken me," he said.</p> +<p>"What's the good of sending the best brains in the Army to get +pounded? There's Drayton. He ought to have been in the Ordnance. +He's killed.</p> +<p>"And here's Nicky. Nicky ought to be in the engineers or the +gunners or the Royal Flying Corps; but he's got to stand in the +trenches and be pounded.</p> +<p>"Lot they care about anybody's brains. Drayton could have told +Kitchener that we can't win this war without high-explosive shells. +So could Nicky.</p> +<p>"You bet they've stuck all those plans and models in the +sanitary dust-bin behind the War Office back door. It's enough to +make Nicky blow his brains out."</p> +<p>"Nicky doesn't care, really," Veronica said. "He just leaves +things--and goes on."</p> +<p>That night, after the others had gone to bed, Michael stayed +behind with his father.</p> +<p>"It must look to you," he said, "as if I ought to have gone +instead of Nicky."</p> +<p>"I don't say so, Michael. And I'm sure Nicky wouldn't."</p> +<p>"No, but you both think it. You see, if I went I shouldn't be +any good at it. Not the same good as Nicky. He wants to go and I +don't. Can't you see it's different?"</p> +<p>"Yes," said Anthony, "I see. I've seen it for some time."</p> +<p>And Michael remembered the night in August when his brother came +to him in his room.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Beauty--the Forlorn Hope of God--if he cared for it supremely, +why was he pursued and tormented by the thought of the space +between him and Nicky?</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XXII"></a>XXII</h2> +<br> +<p>Michael had gone to Stephen's house.</p> +<p>He was no longer at his ease there. It seemed to him that +Lawrence's eyes followed him too; not with hatred, but with a +curious meditative wonder.</p> +<p>To-night Stephen said to him, "Did you know that +Réveillaud's killed?"</p> +<p>"Killed? Killed? I didn't even know he was fighting."</p> +<p>Lawrence laughed. "What did you suppose he was doing?"</p> +<p>"No--but how?"</p> +<p>"Out with the patrol and shot down. There you are--"</p> +<p>He shoved the <i>Times</i> to him, pointing to the extract from +<i>Le Matin</i>: "It is with regret that we record the death of M. +Jules Réveillaud, the brilliant young poet and critic--"</p> +<p>Michael stared at the first three lines; something in his mind +prevented him from going on to the rest, as if he did not care to +read about Réveillaud and know how he died.</p> +<p>"It is with regret that we record the death. It is with regret +that we record--with regret--"</p> +<p>Then he read on, slowly and carefully, to the end. It was a long +paragraph.</p> +<p>"To think," he said at last, "that this revolting thing should +have happened to him."</p> +<p>"His death?"</p> +<p>"No--<i>this</i>. The <i>Matin</i> never mentioned +Réveillaud before. None of the big papers, none of the big +reviews noticed his existence except to sneer at him. He goes out +and gets killed like any little bourgeois, and the swine plaster +him all over with their filthy praise. He'd rather they'd spat on +him."</p> +<p>He meditated fiercely. "Well--he couldn't help it. He was +conscripted."</p> +<p>"You think he wouldn't have gone of his own accord?"</p> +<p>"I'm certain he wouldn't."</p> +<p>"And I'm certain he would."</p> +<p>"I wish to God we'd got conscription here. I'd rather the +Government commandeered my body than stand this everlasting +interference with my soul."</p> +<p>"Then," said Lawrence, "you'll not be surprised at my +enlisting."</p> +<p>"You're not--"</p> +<p>"I am. I'd have been in the first week if I'd known what to do +about Vera."</p> +<p>"But--it's--it's not sane."</p> +<p>"Perhaps not. But it's Irish."</p> +<p>"Irish? I can understand ordinary Irishmen rushing into a +European row for the row's sake, just because they haven't got a +civil war to mess about in. But you--of all Irishmen--why on earth +should <i>you</i> be in it?"</p> +<p>"Because I want to be in it."</p> +<p>"I thought," said Michael, "you were to have been a thorn in +England's side?"</p> +<p>"So I was. So I am. But not at this minute. My grandmother was a +hard Ulster woman and I hated her. But I wouldn't be a thorn in my +grandmother's side if the old lady was assaulted by a brutal +voluptuary, and I saw her down and fighting for her honour.</p> +<p>"I've been a thorn in England's side all my life. But it's +nothing to the thorn I'll be if I'm killed fighting for her."</p> +<p>"Why--why--if you want to fight in the civil war +afterwards?"</p> +<p>"Why? Because I'm one of the few Irishmen who can reason +straight. I was going into the civil war last year because it was a +fight for freedom. I'm going into this War this year because it's a +bigger fight for a bigger freedom.</p> +<p>"You can't have a free Ireland without a free England, any more +than you can have religious liberty without political liberty. If +the Orangemen understood anything at all about it they'd see it was +the Nationalists and the Sinn Feiners that'll help them to put down +Catholicism in Ireland."</p> +<p>"You think it matters to Ireland whether Germany licks us or we +lick Germany?"</p> +<p>"I think it matters to the whole world."</p> +<p>"What's changed you?" said Michael.</p> +<p>He was angry with Lawrence. He thought: "He hasn't any excuse +for failing us. He hasn't been conscripted."</p> +<p>"Nothing's changed me. But supposing it didn't matter to the +whole world, or even to Europe, and supposing the Allies were +beaten in the end, you and I shouldn't be beaten, once we'd +stripped ourselves, stripped our souls clean, and gone in.</p> +<p>"Victory, Michael--victory is a state of mind."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The opportunist had seen his supreme opportunity.</p> +<p>He would have snatched at it in the first week of the War, as he +had said, but that Vera had made it hard for him. She was not +making it easy now. The dull, dark moth's wings of her eyes hovered +about him, fluttering with anxiety.</p> +<p>When she heard that he was going to enlist she sent for +Veronica.</p> +<p>Veronica said, "You must let him go."</p> +<p>"I can't let him go. And why should I? He'll do no good. He's +over age. He's no more fit than I am."</p> +<p>"You'll have to, sooner or later."</p> +<p>"Later, then. Not one minute before I must. If they want him let +them come and take him."</p> +<p>"It won't hurt so much if you let him go, gently, now. He'll +tear at you if you keep him."</p> +<p>"He has torn at me. He tears at me every day. I don't mind his +tearing. I mind his going--going and getting killed, wounded, +paralysed, broken to pieces."</p> +<p>"You'll mind his hating you. You'll mind that awfully."</p> +<p>"I shan't. He's hated me before. He went away and left me once. +But he came back. He can't really do without me."</p> +<p>"You don't know how he'll hate you if you come between him and +what he wants most."</p> +<p>"<i>I</i> used to be what he wanted most."</p> +<p>"Well--it's his honour now."</p> +<p>"That's what they all say, Michael and Anthony, and Dorothy. +They're men and they don't know. Dorothy's more a man than a +woman.</p> +<p>"But you're different. I thought you might help me to keep +him--they say you've got some tremendous secret. And this is the +way you go on!"</p> +<p>"I wouldn't help you to keep him if I could. I wouldn't have +kept Nicky for all the world. Aunt Frances wouldn't have kept him. +She wants Michael to go."</p> +<p>"She doesn't. If she says she does she lies. All the women are +lying. Either they don't care--they're just <i>lumps</i>, with no +hearts and no nerves in them--or they lie.</p> +<p>"It's this rotten pose of patriotism. They get it from each +other, like--like a skin disease. No wonder it makes Michael +sick."</p> +<p>"Men going out--thousands and thousands and thousands--to be cut +about and blown to bits, and their women safe at home, snuffling +and sentimentalizing--</p> +<p>"Lying--lying--lying."</p> +<p>"Who wouldn't? Who wouldn't tell one big, thumping, sacred lie, +if it sends them off happy?"</p> +<p>"But we're not lying. It's the most real thing that ever +happened to us. I'm glad Nicky's going. I shall be glad all my +life."</p> +<p>"It comes easy to you. You're a child. You've never grown up. +You were a miserable little mummy when you were born. And now you +look as if every drop of blood was drained out of your body in your +teens. If that's your tremendous secret you can keep it yourself. +It seems to be all you've got."</p> +<p>"If it wasn't for Aunt Frances and Uncle Anthony it <i>would</i> +have been all I've got."</p> +<p>Vera looked at her daughter and saw her for the first time as +she really was. The child was not a child any more. She was a +woman, astonishingly and dangerously mature. Veronica's sorrowful, +lucid eyes took her in; they neither weighed her nor measured her, +but judged her, off-hand with perfect accuracy.</p> +<p>"Poor little Ronny. I've been a beastly mother to you. Still, +you can thank my beastliness for Aunt Frances and Uncle +Anthony."</p> +<p>Veronica thought: "How funny she is about it!" She said, "It's +your beastliness to poor Larry that I mind. You know what you're +keeping him for."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>She knew; and Lawrence knew.</p> +<p>That night he told her that if he hadn't wanted to enlist he'd +be driven to it to get away from her.</p> +<p>And she was frightened and held her tongue.</p> +<p>Then she got desperate. She did things. She intrigued behind his +back to keep him; and he found her out.</p> +<p>He came to her, furious.</p> +<p>"You needn't lie about it," he said. "I know what you've done. +You've been writing letters and getting at people. You've told the +truth about my age and you've lied about my health. You've even +gone round cadging for jobs for me in the Red Cross and the Press +Bureau and the Intelligence Department, and God only knows whether +I'm supposed to have put you up to it."</p> +<p>"I took care of that, Larry."</p> +<p>"You? You'd no right to interfere with my affairs."</p> +<p>"Hadn't I? Not after living with you seven years?"</p> +<p>"If you'd lived with me seven centuries you'd have had no right +to try to keep a man back from the Army."</p> +<p>"I'm trying to keep a man's brain for my country."</p> +<p>"You lie. It's my body you're trying to keep for yourself. As +you did when I was going to Ireland."</p> +<p>"Oh, then--I tried to stop you from being a traitor to England. +They'd have hanged you, my dear, for that."</p> +<p>"Traitor? It's women like you that are the traitors. My God, if +there was a Government in this country that could govern, you'd be +strung up in a row, all of you, and hanged."</p> +<p>"No wonder you think you're cut out for a soldier. You're cruel +enough."</p> +<p>"<i>You're</i> cruel. I'd rather be hanged than live with you a +day longer after what you've done. A Frenchman shot his <i>wife</i> +the other day for less than that."</p> +<p>"What was 'less than that'?" she said.</p> +<p>"She crawled after him to the camp, like a bitch.</p> +<p>"He sent her away and she came again and again. He <i>had</i> to +shoot her."</p> +<p>"Was there nothing to be said for her?"</p> +<p>"There was. She knew it was a big risk and she took it. +<i>You</i> knew you were safe while you slimed my honour."</p> +<p>"She loved him, and he shot her, and you think that's a fine +thing. <i>How</i> she must have loved him!"</p> +<p>"Men don't want to be loved that way. That's the mistake you +women will make."</p> +<p>"It's the way you've taught us. I should like to know what other +way you ever want us to love you?"</p> +<p>"The way Veronica loves Nicky, and Dorothy loved Drayton and +Frances loves Anthony."</p> +<p>"Dorothy? She ruined Drayton's life."</p> +<p>"Men's lives aren't ruined that way. And not all women's."</p> +<p>"Well, anyhow, if she'd loved him she'd have married him. And +Frances loves her children better than Anthony, and Anthony knows +it."</p> +<p>"Veronica, then."</p> +<p>"Veronica doesn't know what passion is. The poor child's +anæmic."</p> +<p>"Another mistake. Veronica, and 'children' like Veronica have +more passion in one eyelash than you have in your whole body."</p> +<p>"It's a pity," she said, "you can't have Veronica and her +eyelashes instead of me. She's young and she's pretty."</p> +<p>He sighed with pain as her nerves lashed into his.</p> +<p>"That's what it all amounts to--your wanting to get out to the +Front. It's what's the matter with half the men who go there and +pose as heroes. They want to get rid of the wives--and +mistresses--they're tired of because the poor things aren't young +or pretty any longer."</p> +<p>She dropped into the mourning voice that made him mad with her. +"I'm old--old--old. And the War's making me older every day, and +uglier. And I'm not married to you. Talk of keeping you! How +<i>can</i> I keep you when I'm old and ugly?"</p> +<p>He looked at her and smiled with a hard pity. Compunction always +worked in him at the sight of her haggard face, glazed and stained +with crying.</p> +<p>"That's how--by getting older.</p> +<p>"I've never tired of you. You're more to me now than you were +when I first knew you. It's when I see you looking old that I'm +sure I love you."</p> +<p>She smiled, too, in her sad sexual wisdom.</p> +<p>"There may be women who'd believe you, Larry, or who'd say they +believe you; but not me."</p> +<p>"It's the truth," he said. "If you were young and if you were +married to me I should have enlisted months ago.</p> +<p>"Can't you see it's not you, it's this life we lead that I'm +sick and tired of? I tell you I'd rather be hanged than go on with +it. I'd rather be a prisoner in Germany than shut up in this house +of yours."</p> +<p>"Poor little house. You used to like it. What's wrong with it +now?"</p> +<p>"Everything. Those damned lime-trees all round it. And that +damned white wall round the lime-trees. Shutting me in.</p> +<p>"And those curtains in your bed-room. Shutting me in.</p> +<p>"And your mind, trying to shut mine in.</p> +<p>"I come into this room and I find Phyllis Desmond in it and +Orde-Jones, drinking tea and talking. I go upstairs for peace, and +Michael and Ellis are sitting there--talking; trying to persuade +themselves that funk's the divinest thing in God's universe.</p> +<p>"And over there's the one thing I've been looking for all my +life--the one thing I've cared for. And you're keeping me from +it."</p> +<p>They left it. But it began all over again the next day and the +next. And Lawrence went on growing his moustache and trying to +train it upwards in the way she hated.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>One evening, towards dinner-time he turned up in khaki, the +moustache stiff on his long upper lip, his lopping hair clipped. He +was another man, a strange man, and she was not sure whether she +hated him or not.</p> +<p>But she dried her eyes and dressed her hair, and put on her best +gown to do honour to his khaki.</p> +<p>She said, "It'll be like living with another man."</p> +<p>"You won't have very long to live with him," said Lawrence.</p> +<p>And even then, sombrely, under the shadow of his destiny, her +passion for him revived; his very strangeness quickened it to +violence, to perversity.</p> +<p>And in the morning the Army took him from her; it held him out +of her reach. He refused to let her go with him to the place where +he was stationed.</p> +<p>"What would you do," she said, "if I followed you? Shoot +me?"</p> +<p>"I might shoot <i>myself</i>. Anyhow, you'd never see me or hear +from me again."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>He went out to France three weeks before Nicholas.</p> +<p>She had worn herself out with wondering when he would be sent, +till she, too, was in a hurry for him to go and end it. Now that he +had gone she felt nothing but a clean and sane relief that was a +sort of peace. She told herself that she would rather he were +killed soon than that she should be tortured any longer with +suspense.</p> +<p>"If I saw his name in the lists this morning I shouldn't mind. +That would end it."</p> +<p>And she sent her servant to the stationer's to stop the papers +for fear lest she should see his name in the lists.</p> +<p>But Lawrence spared her. He was wounded in his first engagement, +and died of his wounds in a hospital at Dunkirk.</p> +<p>The Red Cross woman who nursed him wrote to Vera an hour before +he died. She gave details and a message.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"7.30. I'm writing now from his dictation. He says you're to +forgive him and not to be too sorry, because it was what he thought +it would be (he means the fighting) only much more so--all except +this last bit.</p> +<p>"He wants you to tell Michael and Dicky?--Nicky?--that. He says: +'It's odd I should be first when he got the start of me.'</p> +<p>"(I think he means you're to forgive him for leaving you to go +to the War.)"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"8.30. It is all over.</p> +<p>"He was too weak to say anything more. But he sent you his +love."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Vera said to herself: "He didn't. She made that up."</p> +<p>She hated the Red Cross woman who had been with Lawrence and had +seen so much; who had dared to tell her what he meant and to make +up messages.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XXIII"></a>XXIII</h2> +<br> +<p>Nicholas had applied for a commission, and he had got it, and +Frances was glad.</p> +<p>She had been proud of him because he had chosen the ranks +instead of the Officers' Training Corps; but she persisted in the +belief that, when it came to the trenches, second lieutenants stood +a better chance. "For goodness' sake," Nicholas had said, "don't +tell her that they're over the parapet first."</p> +<p>That was in December. In February he got a week's leave--sudden, +unforeseen and special leave. It had to be broken to her this time +that leave as special as that meant war-leave.</p> +<p>She said, "Well, if it does, I shall have him for six whole +days." She had learned how to handle time, how to prolong the +present, drawing it out minute by minute; thus her happiness, +stretched to the snapping point, vibrated.</p> +<p>She had a sense of its vibration now, as she looked at Nicholas. +It was the evening of the day he had come home, and they were all +in the drawing-room together. He was standing before her, straight +and tall, on the hearthrug, where he had lifted the Persian cat, +Timmy, out of his sleep and was holding him against his breast. +Timmy spread himself there, softly and heavily, hanging on to +Nicky's shoulder by his claws; he butted Nicky's chin with his +head, purring.</p> +<p>"I don't know how I'm to tear myself away from Timmy. I should +like to wear him alive as a waistcoat. Or hanging on my shoulder +like a cape, with his tail curled tight round my neck. He'd look +uncommonly <i>chic</i> with all his khaki patches."</p> +<p>"Why don't you take him with you?" Anthony said.</p> +<p>"'Cos he's Ronny's cat."</p> +<p>"He isn't. I've given him to you," Veronica said.</p> +<p>"When?"</p> +<p>"Now, this minute. To sleep on your feet and keep you warm."</p> +<p>Frances listened and thought: "What children--what babies they +are, after all." If only this minute could be stretched out +farther.</p> +<p>"I mustn't," Nicky said. "I should spend hours in dalliance; and +if a shell got him it would ruin my morale."</p> +<p>Timmy, unhooked from Nicky's shoulder, lay limp in his arms. He +lay on his back, in ecstasy, his legs apart, showing the soft, +cream-white fur of his stomach. Nicky rubbed his face against the +soft, cream-white fur.</p> +<p>"I say, what a heavenly death it would be to die--smothered in +Timmies."</p> +<p>"Nicky, you're a beastly sensualist. That's what's the matter +with you," John said. And they all laughed.</p> +<p>The minute broke, stretched to its furthest.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Frances was making plans now for Nicky's week. There were things +they could do, plays they could see, places they could go to. +Anthony would let them have the big car as much as they wanted. For +you could stretch time out by filling it; you could multiply the +hours by what they held.</p> +<p>"Ronny and I are going to get married to-morrow," Nicky said. +"We settled it that we would at once, if I got war-leave. It's the +best thing to do."</p> +<p>"Of course," Frances said, "it's the best thing to do."</p> +<p>But she had not allowed for it, nor for the pain it gave her. +That pain shocked her. It was awful to think that, after all her +surrenders, Nicky's happiness could give her pain. It meant that +she had never let go her secret hold. She had been a hypocrite to +herself.</p> +<p>Nicky was talking on about it, excitedly, as he used to talk on +about his pleasures when he was a child.</p> +<p>If Dad'll let us have the racing car, we'll go down to Morfe. We +can do it in a day."</p> +<p>"My dear boy," Anthony said, "don't you know I've lent the house +to the Red Cross, and let the shooting?"</p> +<p>"I don't care. There's the little house in the village we can +have. And Harker and his wife can look after us."</p> +<p>"Harker gone to the War, and his wife's looking after his +brother's children somewhere. And I've put two Belgian refugees +into it."</p> +<p>"<i>They</i> can look after us," said Nicky. "We'll stay three +days, run back, and have one day at home before I sail."</p> +<p>Frances gave up her play with time. She was beaten.</p> +<p>And still she thought: "At least I shall have him one whole +day."</p> +<p>And then she looked across the room to Michael, as if Michael's +face had signalled to her. His clear, sun-burnt skin showed +blotches of white where the blood had left it. A light sweat was on +his forehead. When their eyes met, he shifted his position to give +himself an appearance of ease.</p> +<p>Michael had not reckoned on his brother's marriage, either. It +was when he asked himself: "On what, then, <i>had</i> he been +reckoning?" that the sweat broke out on his forehead.</p> +<p>He had not reckoned on anything. But the sudden realization of +what he might have reckoned on made him sick. He couldn't bear to +think of Ronny married. And yet again, he couldn't bear to think of +Nicky not marrying her. If he had had a hold on her he would have +let her go. In this he knew himself to be sincere. He had had no +hold on her, and to talk about letting her go was idiotic; still, +there was a violent pursuit and possession by the mind--and +Michael's mind was innocent of jealousy, that psychic assault and +outrage on the woman he loved. His spiritual surrender of her was +so perfect that his very imagination gave her up to Nicky.</p> +<p>He was glad that they were going to be married tomorrow. Nothing +could take their three days from them, even when the War had done +its worst.</p> +<p>And then, with his mother's eyes on him, he thought: "Does she +think I was reckoning on that?"</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Nicholas and Veronica were married the next morning at Hampstead +Town Hall, before the Registrar.</p> +<p>They spent the rest of the day in Anthony's racing car, defying +and circumventing time and space and the police, tearing, Nicky +said, whole handfuls out of eternity by sheer speed. At intervals, +with a clear run before him, he let out the racing car to its top +speed on the Great North Road. It snorted and purred and throbbed +like some immense, nervous animal, but lightly and purely as if all +its weight were purged from it by speed. It flew up and down the +hills of Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire and out on to the flat +country round Peterborough and Grantham, a country of silver green +and emerald green grass and purple fallow land and bright red +houses; and so on to the great plain of York, and past Reyburn up +towards the bare hill country netted with grey stone walls.</p> +<p>Nicholas slowed the car down for the winding of the road.</p> +<p>It went now between long straight ramparts of hills that showed +enormous and dark against a sky cleared to twilight by the unrisen +moon. Other hills, round-topped, darker still and more enormous, +stood piled up in front of them, blocking the head of Rathdale.</p> +<p>Then the road went straight, and Nicholas was reckless. It was +as if, ultimately, they must charge into the centre of that +incredibly high, immense obstruction. They were thrilled, +mysteriously, as before the image of monstrous and omnipotent +disaster. Then the dale widened; it made way for them and saved +them.</p> +<p>The lights of Morfe on its high platform made the pattern of a +coronet and pendants on the darkness; the small, scattered lights +of the village below, the village they were making for, showed as +if dropped out of the pattern on the hill.</p> +<p>One larger light burned in the room that was their marriage +chamber. Jean and Suzanne, the refugees, stood in the white porch +to receive them, holding the lanterns that were their marriage +torches. The old woman held her light low down, lighting the +flagstone of the threshold. The old man lifted his high, showing +the lintel of the door. It was so low that Nicholas had to stoop to +go in.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>In the morning they read the date cut in the wall above the +porch: 1665.</p> +<p>The house was old and bent and grey. Its windows were narrow +slits in the stone mullions. It crouched under the dipping boughs +of the ash-tree that sheltered it. Inside there was just room for +Veronica to stand up. Nicholas had to stoop or knock his head +against the beams. It had only four rooms, two for Nicholas and +Veronica, and two for Jean and Suzanne. And it was rather dark.</p> +<p>But it pleased them. They said it was their apple-tree-house +grown up because they were grown up, and keeping strict +proportions. You had to crawl into it, and you were only really +comfortable sitting or lying down. So they sat outside it, watching +old Suzanne through the window as she moved about the house place, +cooking Belgian food for them, and old Jean as he worked in the +garden.</p> +<p>Veronica loved Jean and Suzanne. She had found out all about +them the first morning.</p> +<p>"Only think, Nicky. They're from Termonde, and their house was +burnt behind them as they left it. They saw horrors, and their son +was killed in the War.</p> +<p>"Yet they're happy and at peace. Almost as if they'd forgotten. +He'll plant flowers in his garden."</p> +<p>"They're old, Ronny. And perhaps they were tired already when it +happened."</p> +<p>"Yes, that must be it. They're old and tired."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>And now it was the last adventure of their last day. They were +walking on the slope of Renton Moor that looks over Rathdale +towards Greffington Edge. The light from the west poured itself in +vivid green down the valley below them, broke itself into purple on +Karva Hill to the north above Morfe, and was beaten back in subtle +blue and violet from the stone rampart of the Edge.</p> +<p>Nicholas had been developing, in fancy, the strategic resources +of the country. Guns on Renton Moor, guns along Greffington Edge, +on Sarrack Moor. The raking lines of the hills were straight as if +they had been measured with a ruler and then planed.</p> +<p>"Ronny," he said at last, "we've licked 'em in the first round, +you and I. The beastly Boche can't do us out of these three +days."</p> +<p>"No. We've been absolutely happy. And we'll never forget it. +Never."</p> +<p>"Perhaps it was a bit rough on Dad and Mummy, our carting +ourselves up here, away from them. But, you see, they don't really +mind. They're feeling about it now just as we feel about it. I knew +they would."</p> +<p>There had been a letter from Frances saying she was glad they'd +gone. She was so happy thinking how happy they were.</p> +<p>"They're angels, Nicky."</p> +<p>"Aren't they? Simply angels. That's the rotten part of it. I +wish--</p> +<p>"I wish I could tell them what I think of them. But you can't, +somehow. It sticks in your throat, that sort of thing."</p> +<p>"You needn't," she said; "they know all right."</p> +<p>She thought: "This is what he wants me to tell them +about--afterwards."</p> +<p>"Yes, but--I must have hurt them--hurt them horribly--lots of +times. I wish I hadn't.</p> +<p>"But" he went on, "they're funny, you know. Dad actually thought +it idiotic of us to do this. He said it would only make it harder +for us when I had to go. They don't see that it's just piling it +on--going from one jolly adventure to another.</p> +<p>"I'm afraid, though, what he really meant was it was hard on +you; because the rest of it's all my show."</p> +<p>"But it isn't all your show, Nicky darling. It's mine, and it's +theirs--because we haven't grudged you your adventure."</p> +<p>"That's exactly how I want you to feel about it."</p> +<p>"And they're assuming that I shan't come back. Which, if you +come to think of it, is pretty big cheek. They talk, and they +think, as though nobody ever got through. Whereas I've every +intention of getting through and of coming back. I'm the sort of +chap who does get through, who does come back."</p> +<p>"And even if I wasn't, if they studied statistics they'd see +that it's a thousand chances to one against the Boches getting +me--just me out of all the other chaps. As if I was so jolly +important.</p> +<p>"No; don't interrupt. Let's get this thing straight while we +can. Supposing--just supposing I didn't get through--didn't come +back--supposing I was unlike myself and got killed, I want you to +think of <i>that</i>, not as a clumsy accident, but just another +awfully interesting thing I'd done.</p> +<p>"Because, you see, you might be going to have a baby; and if you +took the thing as a shock instead of--of what it probably really +is, and went and got cut up about it, you might start the little +beggar with a sort of fit, and shake its little nerves up, so that +it would be jumpy all its life.</p> +<p>"It ought," said Nicky, "to sit in its little house all quiet +and comfy till it's time for it to come out."</p> +<p>He was struck with a sudden, poignant realization of what might +be, what probably would be, what ought to be, what he had wanted +more than anything, next to Veronica.</p> +<p>"It shall, Nicky, it shall be quiet and comfy."</p> +<p>"If <i>that</i> came off all right," he said, "it would make it +up to Mother no end."</p> +<p>"It wouldn't make it up to me."</p> +<p>"You don't know what it would do," he said.</p> +<p>She thought: "I don't want it. I don't want anything but +you."</p> +<p>"That's why," he went on, "I'm giving Don as the next of +kin--the one they'll wire to; because it won't take him that way; +it'll only make him madder to get out and do for them. I'm afraid +of you or Mummy or Dad, or Michael being told first."</p> +<p>"It doesn't matter a bit who's <i>told</i> first. I shall +<i>know</i> first," she said. "And you needn't be afraid. It won't +kill either me or the baby. If a shock could kill me I should have +died long ago."</p> +<p>"When?"</p> +<p>"When you went to Desmond. Then, when I thought I couldn't bear +it any longer, something happened."</p> +<p>"What?"</p> +<p>"I don't know. I don't know what it <i>is</i> now; I only know +what it does. It always happens--always--when you want it awfully. +And when you're quiet and give yourself up to it."</p> +<p>"It'll happen again."</p> +<p>He listened, frowning a little, not quite at ease, not quite +interested; puzzled, as if he had lost her trail; put off, as if +something had come between him and her.</p> +<p>"You can make it happen to other people," she was saying; "so +that when things get too awful they can bear them. I wanted it to +happen to Dorothy when she was in prison, and it did. She said she +was absolutely happy there; and that all sorts of queer things came +to her. And, Nicky, they were the same queer things that came to +me. It was like something getting through to her."</p> +<p>"I say--did you ever do it to me?"</p> +<p>"Only once, when you wanted it awfully."</p> +<p>"When? When?"</p> +<p>Now he was interested; he was intrigued; he was on her +trail.</p> +<p>"When Desmond did--that awful thing. I wanted you to see that it +didn't matter, it wasn't the end."</p> +<p>"But that's just what I did see, what I kept on telling myself. +It looks as if it worked, then?"</p> +<p>"It doesn't always. It comes and goes. But I think with +<i>you</i> it would always come; because you're more <i>me</i> than +other people; I mean I care more for you."</p> +<p>She closed and clinched it. "That's why you're not to bother +about me, Nicky. If <i>the</i> most awful thing happened, and you +didn't come back, It would come."</p> +<p>"I wish I knew what It was," he said.</p> +<p>"I don't know what it is. But it's so real that I think it's +God."</p> +<p>"That's why <i>they're</i> so magnificently brave--Dorothy and +Aunt Frances and all of them. They don't believe in it; they don't +know it's there; even Michael doesn't know it's there--yet; and +still they go on bearing and bearing; and they were glad to give +you up."</p> +<p>"I know," he said; "lots of people <i>say</i> they're glad, but +they really <i>are</i> glad."</p> +<p>He meditated.</p> +<p>"There's one thing. I can't think what you do, unless it's +praying or something; and if you're going to turn it on to me, +Ronny, I wish you'd be careful; because it seems to me that if +there's anything in it at all, there might be hitches. I mean to +say, you might work it just enough to keep me from being killed but +not enough to keep my legs from being blown off. Or the Boches +might get me fair enough and you might bring me back, all paralysed +and idiotic.</p> +<p>"That's what I should funk. I should funk it most damnably, if I +thought about it. Luckily one doesn't think."</p> +<p>"But, Nicky, I shouldn't try to keep you back then any more than +I tried before."</p> +<p>"You wouldn't? Honour bright?"</p> +<p>"Of course I wouldn't. It wouldn't be playing the game. To begin +with, I won't believe that you're not going to get through.</p> +<p>"But if you didn't--if you didn't come back--I still wouldn't +believe you'd gone. I should say, 'He hasn't cared. He's gone on to +something else. It doesn't end him.'"</p> +<p>He was silent. The long rampart of the hill, as he stared at it, +made a pattern on his mind; a pattern that he paid no attention +to.</p> +<p>Veronica followed the direction of his eyes. "Do you mind +talking about it?" she said.</p> +<p>"Me? Rather not. It sort of interests me. I don't know whether I +believe in your thing or not; but I've always had that feeling, +that you go on. You don't stop; you can't stop. That's why I don't +care. They used to think I was trying to be funny when I said I +didn't care. But I really didn't. Things, most things, don't much +matter, because there's always something else. You go on to it.</p> +<p>"I care for <i>you</i>. <i>You</i> matter most awfully; and my +people; but most of all you. You always have mattered to me more +than anything, since the first time I heard you calling out to me +to come and sit on your bed because you were frightened. You always +will matter.</p> +<p>"But Desmond didn't a little bit. You need'nt have tried to make +me <i>think</i> she didn't. She really didn't. I only married her +because she was going to have a baby. And <i>that</i> was because I +remembered you and the rotten time you'd had. I believe that would +have kept me straight with women if nothing else did.</p> +<p>"Of course I was an idiot about it. I didn't think of marrying +you till Vera told me I ought to have waited. Then it was too +late.</p> +<p>"That's why I want you most awfully to have a baby."</p> +<p>"Yes, Nicky.</p> +<p>"I'll tell you what I'm going to do when I know it's coming. The +cottage belongs to Uncle Anthony, doesn't it?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Well, I love it. Do you think he'd let me live in it?"</p> +<p>"I think he'd give it to you if you asked him."</p> +<p>"For my very own. Like the apple-tree house. Very well, he'll +give it to me--I mean to both of us--and I shall come up here where +it's all quiet and you'd never know there was a war at all--even +the Belgians have forgotten it. And I shall sit out here and look +at that hill, because it's straight and beautiful. I won't--I +simply won't think of anything that isn't straight and beautiful. +And I shall get strong. Then the baby will be straight and +beautiful and strong, too.</p> +<p>"I shall try--I shall try hard, Nicky--to make him like +you."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Frances's one Day was not a success. It was taken up with little +things that had to be done for Nicky. Always they seemed, he and +she, to be on the edge of something great, something satisfying and +revealing. It was to come in a look or a word; and both would +remember it afterwards for ever.</p> +<p>In the evening Grannie, and Auntie Louie, and Auntie Emmeline, +and Auntie Edie, and Uncle Morrie, and Uncle Bartie came up to say +good-bye. And in the morning Nicholas went off to France, excited +and happy, as he had gone off on his wedding journey. And between +Frances and her son the great thing remained unsaid.</p> +<p>Time itself was broken. All her minutes were scattered like fine +sand.</p> +<blockquote> <i>February 27th, +1915.</i><br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE.</blockquote> +<p>Dearest Mother and Dad,--I simply don't know how to thank you +all for the fur coat. It's pronounced the rippingest, by a long +way, that's been seen in these trenches. Did Ronny really choose it +because it "looked as if it had been made out of Timmy's tummy?" It +makes me feel as if I <i>was</i> Timmy. Timmy on his hind legs, +rampant, clawing at the Boches. Just think of the effect if he got +up over the parapet!</p> +<p>The other things came all right, too, thanks. When you can't +think what else to send let Nanna make another cake. And those +tubes of chutney are a good idea.</p> +<p>No; it's no earthly use worrying about Michael. If there was no +English and no Allies and no Enthusiasm, and he had this War all to +himself, you simply couldn't keep him out of it. I believe if old +Mick could send himself out by himself against the whole German +Army he'd manage to put in some first rate fancy work in the second +or two before they got him. He'd be quite capable of going off and +doing grisly things that would make me faint with funk, if he was +by himself, with nothing but the eye of God to look at him. And +<i>then</i> he'd rather God wasn't there. He always <i>was</i> +afraid of having a crowd with him.</p> +<p>The pity is he's wasting time and missing such a lot. If I were +you two, I should bank on Don. He's the sensiblest of us, though he +is the youngest.</p> +<p>And don't worry about me. Do remember that even in the thickest +curtain fire there <i>are</i> holes; there are more holes than +there is stuff; and the chances are I shall be where a hole is.</p> +<p>Another thing, Don's shell, the shell you see making straight +for you like an express train, isn't likely to be the shell that's +going to get you; so that if you're hit you don't feel that pang of +personal resentment which must be the worst part of the business. +Bits of shells that have exploded I rank with bullets which we knew +all about before and were prepared for. Really, if you're planted +out in the open, the peculiar awfulness of big shell-fire--what is +it more than the peculiar awfulness of being run over by express +trains let loose about the sky? Tell Don that when shrapnel empties +itself over your head like an old tin pail, you might feel injured, +but the big shell has a most disarming air of not being able to +help itself, of not looking for anybody in particular. It's so +innocent of personal malice that I'd rather have it any day than +fat German fingers squeezing my windpipe.</p> +<p>That's an answer to his question.</p> +<p>And Dorothy wanted to know what it feels like going into action. +Well--there's a lot of it that perhaps she wouldn't believe in if I +told her--it's the sort of thing she never has believed; but +Stephen was absolutely right. You aren't sold. It's more than +anything you could have imagined. I'm not speaking only for +myself.</p> +<p>There's just one beastly sensation when you're half way between +your parapet and theirs--other fellows say they've felt it +too--when you're afraid it (the feeling) should fizzle out before +you get there. But it doesn't. It grows more and more so, simply +swinging you on to them, and that swing makes up for all the rotten +times put together. You needn't be sorry for us. It's waste of +pity.</p> +<p>I know Don and Dorothy and Dad and Ronny aren't sorry for us. +But I'm not so sure of Michael and Mother.--Always your loving,</p> +<blockquote> NICKY.<br> +<br> + May, +1915.<br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE</blockquote> +<p>My Dear Mick,--It's awfully decent of you to write so often when +you loathe writing, especially about things that bore you. But you +needn't do that. We get the news from the other fronts in the +papers more or less; and I honestly don't care a damn what Asquith +is saying or what Lloyd George is doing or what Northcliffe's +motives are. Personally, I should say he was simply trying, like +most of us, to save his country. Looks like it. But you can tell +him from me, if he gets them to send us enough shells out <i>in +time</i> we shan't worry about his motives. Anyhow that sort of +thing isn't in your line, old man, and Dad can do it much better +than you, if you don't mind my saying so.</p> +<p>What I want to know is what Don and Dorothy are doing, and the +last sweet thing Dad said to Mother--I'd give a day's rest in my +billet for one of his <i>worst</i> jokes. And I like to hear about +Morrie going on the bust again, too--it sounds so peaceful. Only if +it really is anxiety about me that makes him do it, I wish he'd +leave off thinking about me, poor old thing.</p> +<p>More than anything I want to know how Ronny is; how she's +looking and what she's feeling; you'll be able to make out a lot, +and she may tell you things she won't tell the others. That's why +I'm glad you're there and not here.</p> +<p>And as for that--why go on worrying? I do know how you feel +about it. I think I always did, in a way. I never thought you were +a "putrid Pacifist." Your mind's all right. You say the War takes +me like religion; perhaps it does; I don't know enough about +religion to say, but it seems near enough for a first shot. And +when you say it doesn't take you that way, that you haven't "got" +it, I can see that that expresses a fairly understandable state of +mind. Of course, I know it isn't funk. If you'd happened to think +of the Ultimatum first, instead of the Government, you'd have been +in at the start, before me.</p> +<p>Well--there's such a thing as conversion, isn't there? You never +can tell what may happen to you, and the War isn't over yet. Those +of us who are in it now aren't going to see the best of it by a +long way. There's no doubt the very finest fighting'll be at the +finish; so that the patriotic beggars who were in such a hurry to +join up will be jolly well sold, poor devils. Take me, for +instance. If I'd got what I wanted and been out in Flanders in +1914, ten to one I should have been in the retreat from Mons, like +Frank, and never anywhere else. Then I'd have given my head to have +gone to Gallipoli; but <i>now</i>, well, I'm just as glad I'm not +mixed up in that affair.</p> +<p>Still, that's not the way to look at it, calculating the fun you +can get out of it for yourself. And it's certainly not the way to +win the War. At that rate one might go on saving oneself up for the +Rhine, while all the other fellows were getting pounded to a splash +on the way there. So if you're going to be converted let's hope +you'll be converted quick.</p> +<p>If you are, my advice is, try to get your commission straight +away. There are things you won't be able to stand if you're a +Tommy. For instance, having to pig it on the floor with all your +brother Tommies. I slept for three months next to a beastly +blighter who used to come in drunk and tread on my face and be ill +all over me.</p> +<p>Even now, when I look back on it, that seems worse than anything +that's happened out here. But that's because at home your mind +isn't adjusted to horrors. That chap came as a shock and a surprise +to me every time. I <i>couldn't</i> get used to him. Whereas out +here everything's shifted in the queerest way. Your mind shifts. +You funk your first and your second sight, say, of a bad stretcher +case; but when it comes to the third and the fourth you don't funk +at all; you're not shocked, you're not a bit surprised. It's all in +the picture, and you're in the picture too. There's a sort of +horrible harmony. It's like a certain kind of beastly dream which +doesn't frighten you because you're part of it, part of the +beastliness.</p> +<p>No, the thing that got me, so far, more than anything was--what +d'you think? A little dog, no bigger than a kitten, that was run +over the other day in the street by a motor-cyclist--and a civilian +at that. There were two or three women round it, crying and +gesticulating. It looked as if they'd just lifted it out of a bath +of blood. That made me sick. You see, the little dog wasn't in the +picture. I hadn't bargained for him.</p> +<p>Yet the things Morrie saw in South Africa--do you remember how +he <i>would</i> tell us about them?--weren't in it with the things +that happened here. Pounding apart, the things that corpses can do, +apparently on their own, are simply unbelievable--what the war +correspondents call "fantastic postures." But I haven't got to the +point when I can slap my thighs, and roar with laughter--if they +happen to be Germans.</p> +<p>In between, the boredom is so awful that I've heard some of our +men say they'd rather have things happening. And, of course, we're +all hoping that when those shells come along there won't be quite +so much "between."</p> +<p>Love to Ronny and Mother and all of them.--Your very +affectionate,</p> +<blockquote> NICHOLAS.<br> +<br> + June 1st, +1915.<br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE.</blockquote> +<p>My Darling Ronny,--Yes, I think all your letters must have come, +because you've answered everything. You always tell me just what I +want to know. When I see the fat envelopes coming I know they're +going to be chock-full of the things I've happened to be thinking +about. Don't let's ever forget to put the dates, because I make out +that I've always dreamed about you, too, the nights you've +written.</p> +<p>And so the Aunties are working in the War Hospital Supply +Depôt? It's frightfully funny what Dorothy says about their +enjoying the War and feeling so important. Don't let her grudge it +them, though; it's all the enjoyment, or importance, they're ever +had in their lives, poor dears. But I shall know, if a swab bursts +in my inside, that it's Auntie Edie's. As for Auntie Emmeline's, I +can't even imagine what they'd be like--monstrosities--or little +babies injured at birth. Aunt Louie's would be well-shaped and +firm, but erring a little on the hard side, don't you think?</p> +<p>That reminds me, I suppose I may tell you now since it's been in +the papers, that we've actually got Moving Fortresses out here. I +haven't seen them yet, but a fellow who has thinks they must be +uncommonly like Drayton's and my thing. I suspect, from what he +says, they're a bit better, though. We hadn't got the rocking-horse +idea.</p> +<p>It's odd--this time last year I should have gone off my head +with agony at the mere thought of anybody getting in before us; and +now I don't care a bit. I do mind rather for Drayton's sake, though +I don't suppose he cares, either. The great thing is that it's been +done, and done better. Anyway we've been lucky. Supposing the +Germans had got on to them, and trotted them out first, and one of +our own guns had potted him or me, <i>that</i> would have been a +jolly sell.</p> +<p>What makes you ask after Timmy? I hardly like to tell you the +awful thing that's happened to him. He had to travel down to the +base hospital on a poor chap who was shivering with shell-shock, +and--<i>he never came back again</i>. It doesn't matter, because +the weather's so warm now that I don't want him. But I'm sorry +because you all gave him to me and it looks as if I hadn't cared +for him. But I did....</p> +<blockquote>June 10th.</blockquote> +<p>Sorry I couldn't finish this last week. Things developed rather +suddenly. I wish I could tell you <i>what</i>, but we mustn't let +on what happens, not even now, when it's done happening. Still, +there are all the other things I couldn't say anything about at the +time.</p> +<p>If you <i>must</i> know, I've been up "over the top" three times +now since I came out in February. So, you see, one gets through all +right.</p> +<p>Well--I tried ages ago to tell Dorothy what it was like. It's +been like that every time (except that I've got over the queer +funky feeling half-way through). It'll be like that again next +time, I know. Because now I've tested it. And, Ronny--I couldn't +tell Dorothy this, because she'd think it was all rot--but when +you're up first out of the trench and stand alone on the parapet, +it's absolute happiness. And the charge is--well, it's simply +heaven. It's as if you'd never really lived till then; I certainly +hadn't, not up to the top-notch, barring those three days we had +together.</p> +<p>That's why--this part's mostly for Michael--there's something +rotten about that poem he sent me that somebody wrote, making out +that this gorgeous fight-feeling (which is what I suppose he's +trying for) is nothing but a form of sex-madness. If he thinks +that's all there is in it, he doesn't know much about war, or love +either. Though I'm bound to say there's a clever chap in my +battalion who thinks the same thing. He says he feels the ecstasy, +or whatever it is, all right, just the same as I do; but that it's +simply submerged savagery bobbing up to the top--a hidden lust for +killing, and the hidden memory of having killed, he called it. He's +always ashamed of it the next day, as if he had been drunk.</p> +<p>And my Sergeant-Major, bless him, says there's nothing in it but +"a ration of rum." Can't be that in my case because I always give +mine to a funny chap who <i>knows</i> he's going to have +collywobbles as soon as he gets out into the open.</p> +<p>But that isn't a bit what I mean. They're all wrong about it, +because they make it turn on killing, and not on your chance of +being killed. <i>That</i>--when you realize it--well, it's like the +thing you told me about that you said you thought must be God +because it's so real. I didn't understand it then, but I do now. +You're bang up against reality--you're going clean into it--and the +sense of it's exquisite. Of course, while one half of you is +feeling like that, the other half is fighting to kill and doing its +best to keep on <i>this</i> side reality. But I've been near enough +to the other side to know. And I wish Michael's friend would come +out and see what it's like for himself. Or, better still, Mick. +<i>He</i>'d write a poem about it that would make you sit up. It's +a sin that I should be getting all this splendid stuff when I can't +do anything with it.</p> +<p>Love to all of them and to your darling self.--Always your +loving,</p> +<blockquote> NICKY.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.-I wish you'd try to get some notion of it into Dad and +Dorothy and Mother. It would save them half the misery they're +probably going through.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>The gardener had gone to the War, and Veronica was in the +garden, weeding the delphinium border.</p> +<p>It was Sunday afternoon and she was alone there. Anthony was +digging in the kitchen garden, and Frances was with him, gathering +green peas and fruit for the hospital. Every now and then she came +through the open door on to the flagged path of the upper terrace +with the piled up baskets in her arms, and she smiled and nodded to +Veronica.</p> +<p>It was quiet in the garden, so that, when her moment came, +Veronica could time it by the striking of the clock heard through +the open doorway of the house: four strokes; and the half-hour; and +then, almost on the stroke, her rush of pure, mysterious +happiness.</p> +<p>Up till then she had been only tranquil; and her tranquillity +made each small act exquisite and delightful, as her fingers tugged +at the weeds, and shook the earth from their weak roots, and the +palms of her hand smoothed over the places where they had been. She +thought of old Jean and Suzanne, planting flowers in the garden at +Renton, and of that tranquillity of theirs that was the saddest +thing she had ever seen.</p> +<p>And her happiness had come, almost on the stroke of the +half-hour, not out of herself or out of her thoughts, but +mysteriously and from somewhere a long way off.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>She turned to nod and smile at Frances who was coming through +the door with her basket, and it was then that she saw +Nicholas.</p> +<p>He stood on something that looked like a low wall, raised +between her and the ash-tree; he stood motionless, as if arrested +in the act of looking back to see if she were following him. His +eyes shone, vivid and blue, as they always shone when he was happy. +He smiled at her, but with no movement of his mouth. He shouted to +her, but with no sound.</p> +<p>Everything was still; her body and her soul were still; her +heart was still; it beat steadily.</p> +<p>She had started forwards to go to him when the tree thrust +itself between them, and he was gone.</p> +<p>And Frances was still coming through the door as Veronica had +seen her when she turned. She was calling to her to come in out of +the sun.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="XXIV"></a>XXIV</h2> +<br> +<p>The young men had gone--Morton Ellis, who had said he was damned +if he'd fight for his country; and Austin Mitchell who had said he +hadn't got a country; and Monier-Owen, who had said that England +was not a country you could fight for. George Wadham had gone long +ago. That, Michael said, was to be expected. Even a weak gust could +sweep young Wadham off his feet--and he had been fairly carried +away. He could no more resist the vortex of the War than he could +resist the vortex of the arts.</p> +<p>Michael had two pitiful memories of the boy: one of young Wadham +swaggering into Stephen's room in uniform (the first time he had it +on), flushed and pleased with himself and talking excitedly about +the "Great Game"; and one of young Wadham returned from the Front, +mature and hard, not talking about the "Great Game" at all, and +wincing palpably when other people talked; a young Wadham who, they +said, ought to be arrested under the Defence of the Realm Act as a +quencher of war-enthusiasms.</p> +<p>The others had gone later, one by one, each with his own +gesture: Mitchell and Monier-Owen when Stephen went; Ellis the day +after Stephen's death. It had taken Stephen's death to draw +him.</p> +<p>Only Michael remained.</p> +<p>He told them they were mistaken if they thought their going +would inspire him to follow them. It, and Stephen's death, merely +intensified the bitterness he felt towards the War. He was more +than ever determined to keep himself pure from it, consecrated to +his Forlorn Hope. If they fell back, all the more reason why be +should go on.</p> +<p>And, while he waited for the moment of vision, he continued +Stephen's work on the <i>Green Review</i>. Stephen had left it to +him when he went out. Michael tried to be faithful to the tradition +he thus inherited; but gradually Stephen's spirit disappeared from +the <i>Review</i> and its place was taken by the clear, hard, +unbreakable thing that was Michael's mind.</p> +<p>And Michael knew that he was beginning to make himself felt.</p> +<p>But Stephen's staff, such as it was, and nearly all his +contributors had gone to the War, one after another, and Michael +found himself taking all their places. He began to feel a strain, +which he took to be the strain of overwork, and he went down to +Renton to recover.</p> +<p>That was on the Tuesday that followed Veronica's Sunday.</p> +<p>He thought that down there he would get away from everything +that did him harm: from his father's and mother's eyes; from his +sister's proud, cold face; and from his young brother's smile; and +from Veronica's beauty that saddened him; and from the sense of +Nicky's danger that brooded as a secret obsession over the house. +He would fill up the awful empty space. He thought: "For a whole +fortnight I shall get away from this infernal War."</p> +<p>But he did not get away from it. On every stage of the journey +down he encountered soldiers going to the Front. He walked in the +Park at Darlington between his trains, and wounded soldiers waited +for him on every seat, shuffled towards him round every turning, +hobbled after him on their crutches down every path. Their eyes +looked at him with a shrewd hostility. He saw the young Yorkshire +recruits drinking in the open spaces. Sergeants' eyes caught and +measured him, appraising his physique. Behind and among them he saw +Drayton's, and Réveillaud's, and Stephen's eyes; and young +Wadham's eyes, strange and secretive and hard.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>At Reyburn Michael's train was switched off to a side platform +in the open. Before he left Darlington, a thin, light rain had +begun to fall from a shred of blown cloud; and at Reyburn the burst +mass was coming down. The place was full of the noise of rain. The +drops tapped on the open platform and hissed as the wind drove them +in a running stream. They drummed loudly on the station roof. But +these sounds went out suddenly, covered by the trampling of +feet.</p> +<p>A band of Highlanders with their bagpipes marched into the +station. They lined up solemnly along the open platform with their +backs to Michael's train and their faces to the naked rails on the +other side. Higher up Michael could see the breast of an engine; it +was backing, backing, towards the troop-train that waited under the +cover of the roof. He could hear the clank of the coupling and the +recoil. At that sound the band had their mouths to their bagpipes +and their fingers ready on the stops. Two or three officers hurried +down from the station doors and stood ready.</p> +<p>The train came on slowly, packed with men; men who thrust their +heads and shoulders through the carriage windows, and knelt on the +seats, and stood straining over each other's backs to look out; men +whose faces were scarlet with excitement; men with open mouths +shouting for joy.</p> +<p>The officers saluted as it passed. It halted at the open +platform, and suddenly the pipers began to play.</p> +<p>Michael got out of his train and watched.</p> +<p>Solemnly, in the grey evening of the rain, with their faces set +in a sort of stern esctasy, the Highlanders played to their +comrades. Michael did not know whether their tune was sad or gay. +It poured itself into one mournful, savage, sacred cry of +salutation and valediction. When it stopped the men shouted; there +were voices that barked hoarsely and broke; voices that roared; +young voices that screamed, strung up by the skirling of the +bagpipes. The pipers played to them again.</p> +<p>And suddenly Michael was overcome. Pity shook him and grief and +an intolerable yearning, and shame. For one instant his soul rose +up above the music, and was made splendid and holy, the next he +cowered under it, stripped and beaten. He clenched his fists, +hating this emotion that stung him to tears and tore at his heart +and at the hardness of his mind.</p> +<p>As the troop-train moved slowly out of the station the pipers, +piping more and more shrilly, swung round and marched beside it to +the end of the platform. The band ceased abruptly, and the men +answered with shout after shout of violent joy; they reared up +through the windows, straining for the last look--and were +gone.</p> +<p>Michael turned to the porter who lifted his luggage from the +rack. "What regiment are they?" he said.</p> +<p>"Camerons, sir. Going to the Front."</p> +<p>The clear, uncanny eyes of Veronica's father pursued him +now.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>At last he had got away from it.</p> +<p>In Rathdale, at any rate, there was peace. The hills and their +pastures, and the flat river fields were at peace. And in the +villages of Morfe and Renton there was peace; for as yet only a few +men had gone from them. The rest were tied to the land, and they +were more absorbed in the hay-harvest than in the War. Even the old +Belgians in Veronica's cottage were at peace. They had +forgotten.</p> +<p>For three days Michael himself had peace.</p> +<p>He went up to Veronica's hill and sat on it; and thought how for +hundreds of miles, north, south, east and west of him, there was +not a soul whom he knew. In all his life he had never been more by +himself.</p> +<p>This solitude of his had a singular effect on Michael's mind. So +far from having got away from the War he had never been more +conscious of it than he was now. What he had got away from was +other people's consciousness. From the beginning the thing that +threatened him had been, not the War but this collective +war-spirit, clamouring for his private soul.</p> +<p>For the first time since August, nineteen-fourteen, he found +himself thinking, in perfect freedom and with perfect lucidity, +about the War. He had really known, half the time, that it was the +greatest War of Independence that had ever been. As for his old +hatred of the British Empire, he had seen long ago that there was +no such thing, in the continental sense of Empire; there was a +unique thing, the rule, more good than bad, of an imperial people. +He had seen that the strength of the Allies was in exact proportion +to the strength and the enlightenment of their democracies. +Reckoning by decades, there could be no deadlock in the struggle; +the deadlock meant a ten years' armistice and another war. He could +not help seeing these things. His objection to occupying his mind +with them had been that they were too easy.</p> +<p>Now that he could look at it by himself he saw how the War might +take hold of you like a religion. It was the Great War of +Redemption. And redemption meant simply thousands and millions of +men in troop-ships and troop-trains coming from the ends of the +world to buy the freedom of the world with their bodies. It meant +that the very fields he was looking over, and this beauty of the +hills, those unused ramparts where no batteries were hid, and the +small, silent villages, Morfe and Renton, were bought now with +their bodies.</p> +<p>He wondered how at this moment any sane man could be a Pacifist. +And, wondering, he felt a reminiscent sting of grief and yearning. +But he refused, resolutely, to feel any shame.</p> +<p>His religion also was good; and, anyhow, you didn't choose your +religion; it chose you.</p> +<p>And on Saturday the letters came: John's letter enclosing the +wire from the War Office, and the letter that Nicky's Colonel had +written to Anthony.</p> +<p>Nicky was killed.</p> +<p>Michael took in the fact, and the date (it was last Sunday). +There were some official regrets, but they made no impression on +him. John's letter made no impression on him. Last Sunday Nicky was +killed.</p> +<p>He had not even unfolded the Colonel's letter yet. The close +black lines showed through the thin paper. Their closeness repelled +him. He did not want to know how his brother had died; at least not +yet. He was afraid of the Colonel's letter. He felt that by simply +not reading it he could put off the unbearable turn of the +screw.</p> +<p>He was shivering with cold. He drew up his chair to the wide, +open hearth-place where there was no fire; he held out his hands +over it. The wind swept down the chimney and made him colder; and +he felt sick.</p> +<p>He had been sitting there about an hour when Suzanne came in and +asked him if he would like a little fire. He heard himself saying, +"No, thank you," in a hard voice. The idea of warmth and comfort +was disagreeable to him. Suzanne asked him then if he had had bad +news? And he heard himself saying: "Yes," and Suzanne trying, +trying very gently, to persuade him that it was perhaps only that +Monsieur Nicky was wounded?</p> +<p>"No? <i>Then</i>," said the old woman, "he is killed." And she +began to cry.</p> +<p>Michael couldn't stand that. He got up and opened the door into +the outer room, and she passed through before him, sobbing and +whimpering. Her voice came to him through the closed door in a +sharp cry telling Jean that Monsieur Nicky was dead, and Jean's +voice came, hushing her.</p> +<p>Then he heard the feet of the old man shuffling across the +kitchen floor, and the outer door opening and shutting softly; and +through the windows at the back of the room, he saw, without +heeding, as the Belgians passed and went up into the fields +together, weeping, leaving him alone.</p> +<p>They had remembered.</p> +<p>It was then that Michael read the Colonel's letter, and learned +the manner of his brother's death: "... About a quarter past four +o'clock in the afternoon his battalion was being pressed back, when +he rallied his men and led them in as gallant an attack as was ever +made by so small a number in this War. He was standing on the +enemy's parapet when he was shot through the heart and fell. By a +quarter to five the trench was stormed and taken, owing to his +personal daring and impetus and to the affection and confidence he +inspired.... We hear it continually said of our officers and men +that 'they're all the same,' and I daresay as far as pluck goes +they are. But, if I may say so, we all felt that your son had +something that we haven't got...."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Michael lay awake in the bed that had been his brother's +marriage bed. The low white ceiling sagged and bulged above him. +For three nights the room had been as if Nicky and Veronica had +never gone from it. They had compelled him to think of them. They +had lain where he lay, falling asleep in each other's arms.</p> +<p>The odd thing had been that his acute and vivid sense of them +had in no way troubled him. It had been simply there like some +exquisite atmosphere, intensifying his peace. He had had the same +feeling he always had when Veronica was with him. He had liked to +lie with his head on their pillow, to touch what they had touched, +to look at the same things in the same room, to go in and out +through the same doors over the same floors, remembering their +hands and feet and eyes, and saying to himself: "They did this and +this"; or, "That must have pleased them."</p> +<p>It ought to have been torture to him; and he could not imagine +why it was not.</p> +<p>And now, on this fourth night, he had no longer that sense of +Nicky and Veronica together. The room had emptied itself of its own +memory and significance. He was aware of nothing but the bare, +spiritual space between him and Nicky. He lay contemplating it +steadily and without any horror.</p> +<p>He thought: "This ends it. Of course I shall go out now. I might +have known that this would end it. <i>He</i> knew."</p> +<p>He remembered how Nicky had come to him in his room that night +in August. He could see himself sitting on the side of his bed, +half-dressed, and Nicky standing over him, talking.</p> +<p>Nicky had taken it for granted even then that he would go out +some time. He remembered how he had said, "Not yet."</p> +<p>He thought: "Of course; this must have been what he meant."</p> +<p>And presently he fell asleep, exhausted and at the same time +appeased.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>It was morning.</p> +<p>Michael's sleep dragged him down; it drowned and choked him as +he struggled to wake.</p> +<p>Something had happened. He would know what it was when he came +clear out of this drowning.</p> +<p>Now he remembered. Nicky was killed. Last Sunday. He knew that. +But that wasn't all of it. There was something else that followed +on--</p> +<p>Suddenly his mind leaped on it. He was going out. He would be +killed too. And because he was going out, and because he would be +killed, he was not feeling Nicky's death so acutely as he should +have thought he would have felt it. He had been let off that.</p> +<p>He lay still a moment, looking at the thing he was going to do, +feeling a certain pleasure in its fitness. Drayton and +Réveillaud and Lawrence had gone out, and they had been +killed. Ellis and Mitchell and Monier-Owen were going out and they +would certainly be killed. Wadham had gone out and young Vereker, +and they also would be killed.</p> +<p>Last Sunday it was Nicky. Now it must be he.</p> +<p>His mind acknowledged the rightness of the sequence without +concern. It was aware that his going depended on his own will. But +never in all his life had he brought so little imagination to the +act of willing.</p> +<p>He got up, bathed in the river, dressed, and ate his breakfast. +He accepted each moment as it arrived, without imagination or +concern.</p> +<p>Then his mother's letter came. Frances wrote, among other +things: "I know how terribly you will be feeling it, because I know +how you cared for him. I wish I could comfort you. We could not +bear it, Michael, if we were not so proud of him."</p> +<p>He answered this letter at once. He wrote: "I couldn't bear it +either, if I were not going out. But of course I'm going now."</p> +<p>As he signed himself, "Your loving Michael," he thought: "That +settles it." Yet, if he had considered what he meant by settling it +he would have told himself that he meant nothing; that last night +had settled it; that his resolution had been absolutely +self-determined and absolutely irrevocable then, and that his +signature gave it no more sanctity or finality than it had already. +If he was conscript, he was conscript to his own will.</p> +<p>He went out at once with his letter, though he knew that the +post did not leave Renton for another five hours.</p> +<p>It was the sliding of this light thing and its fall into the +letter-box that shook him into realization of what he had done and +of what was before him. He knew now why he was in such a hurry to +write that letter and to post it. By those two slight acts, not +dreadful nor difficult in themselves, he had put it out of his +power to withdraw from the one supremely difficult and dreadful +act. A second ago, while the letter was still in his hands, he +could have backed out, because he had not given any pledge. Now he +would have to go through with it. And he saw clearly for the first +time what it was that he would have to go through.</p> +<p>He left the village and went up to Renton Moor and walked along +the top for miles, without knowing or caring where he went, and +seeing nothing before him but his own act and what must come +afterwards. By to-morrow, or the next day at the latest, he would +have enlisted; by six months, at the latest, three months if he had +what they called "luck," he would be in the trenches, fighting and +killing, not because he chose, but because he would be told to +fight and kill. By the simple act of sending that letter to his +mother he was committed to the whole ghastly business.</p> +<p>And he funked it. There was no use lying to himself and saying +that he didn't funk it.</p> +<p>Even more than the actual fighting and killing, he funked +looking on at fighting and killing; as for being killed, he didn't +think he would really mind that so much. It would come--it must +come--as a relief from the horrors he would have to see before it +came. Nicky had said that they were unbelievable; he had seemed to +think you couldn't imagine them if you hadn't seen them. But +Michael could. He had only to think of them to see them now. He +could make war-pictures for himself, in five minutes, every bit as +terrifying as the things they said happened under fire. Any fool, +if he chose to think about it, could see what must happen. Only +people didn't think. They rushed into it without seeing anything; +and then, if they were honest, they owned that they funked it, +before and during and afterwards and all the time.</p> +<p>Nicky didn't. But that was only because Nicky had something that +the others hadn't got; that he, Michael, hadn't. It was all very +well to say, as he had said last night: "This ends it"; or, as +their phrase was, "Everything goes in now." It was indeed, as far +as he was concerned, the end of beauty and of the making of beauty, +and of everything worth caring for; but it was also the beginning +of a life that Michael dreaded more than fighting and killing and +being killed: a life of boredom, of obscene ugliness, of revolting +contacts, of intolerable subjection. For of course he was going +into the ranks as Nicky had gone. And already he could feel the +heat and pressure and vibration of male bodies packed beside and +around him on the floor; he could hear their breathing; he could +smell their fetid bedding, their dried sweat.</p> +<p>Of course he was going through with it; only--this was the +thought his mind turned round and round on in horror at itself--he +funked it. He funked it so badly that he would really rather die +than go through with it. When he was actually killed that would be +his second death; months before it could happen he would have known +all about it; he would have been dead and buried and alive again in +hell.</p> +<p>What shocked Michael was his discovering, not that he funked it +now, which was natural, almost permissible, but that he had funked +it all the time. He could see now that, since the War began, he had +been struggling to keep out of it. His mind had fought every +suggestion that he should go in. It had run to cover, like a mad, +frightened animal before the thoughts that hunted it down. Funk, +pure funk, had been at the bottom of all he had said and thought +and done since August, nineteen-fourteen; his attitude to the War, +his opinion of the Allies, and of the Government and of its conduct +of the War, all his wretched criticisms and disparagements--what +had they been but the very subterfuges of funk?</p> +<p>His mother had known it; his father had known it; and Dorothy +and John. It was not conceivable that Nicky did not know it.</p> +<p>That was what had made the horror of the empty space that +separated them.</p> +<p>Lawrence Stephen had certainly known it.</p> +<p>He could not understand his not knowing it himself, not seeing +that he struggled. Yet he must have seen that Nicky's death would +end it. Anyhow, it <i>was</i> ended; if not last night, then this +morning when he posted the letter.</p> +<p>But he was no longer appeased by this certainty of his. He was +going out all right. But merely going out was not enough. What +counted was the state of mind in which you went. Lawrence had said, +"Victory--Victory is a state of mind."</p> +<p>Well--it was a state that came naturally to Nicky, and did not +come naturally to him. It was all very well for Nicky: he had +wanted to go. He had gone out victorious before victory. Michael +would go beaten before defeat.</p> +<p>He thought: "If this is volunteering, give me compulsion." All +the same he was going.</p> +<p>All morning and afternoon, as he walked and walked, his thoughts +went the same round. And in the evening they began again, but on a +new track. He thought: "It's all very well to say I'm going; but +how <i>can</i> I go?" He had Lawrence Stephen's work to do; +Lawrence's Life and Letters were in his hands. How could he +possibly go and leave Lawrence dead and forgotten? This view seemed +to him to be sanity and common sense.</p> +<p>As his mind darted up this turning it was driven back. He saw +Lawrence Stephen smiling at him as he had smiled at him when +Réveillaud died. Lawrence would have wanted him to go more +than anything. He would have chosen to be dead and forgotten rather +than keep him.</p> +<p>At night these thoughts left him. He began to think of Nicky and +of his people. His father and mother would never be happy again. +Nicky had been more to them than he was, or even John. He had been +more to Dorothy. It was hard on Dorothy to lose Nicky and Drayton +too.</p> +<p>He thought of Nicky and Veronica. Poor little Ronny, what would +she do without Nicky? He thought of Veronica, sitting silent in the +train, and looking at him with her startling look of spiritual +maturity. He thought of Veronica singing to him over and over +again:</p> +<blockquote>"London Bridge is broken down--<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +<br> +"Build it up with gold so fine--<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<br> +<br> +"Build it up with stones so strong-"</blockquote> +<p>He thought of Veronica running about the house and crying, +"Where's Nicky? I want him."</p> +<p>Monday was like Sunday, except that he walked up Karva Hill in +the morning and up Greffington Edge in the afternoon, instead of +Renton Moor. Whichever way he went his thoughts went the same way +as yesterday. The images were, if anything, more crowded and more +horrible; but they had lost their hold. He was tired of looking at +them.</p> +<p>About five o'clock he turned abruptly and went back to the +village the same way by which he came.</p> +<p>And as he swung down the hill road in sight of Renton, suddenly +there was a great clearance in his soul.</p> +<p>When he went into the cottage he found Veronica there waiting +for him. She sat with her hands lying in her lap, and she had the +same look he had seen when she was in the train.</p> +<p>"Ronny--"</p> +<p>She stood up to greet him, as if it had been she who was staying +there and he who had incredibly arrived.</p> +<p>"They told me you wouldn't be long," she said.</p> +<p>"I? You haven't come because you were ill or anything?"</p> +<p>She smiled and shook her head. "No. Not for anything like +that."</p> +<p>"I didn't write, Ronny. I couldn't."</p> +<p>"I know." Their eyes met, measuring each other's grief. "That's +why I came. I couldn't bear to leave you to it."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>"I'd have come before, Michael, if you'd wanted me."</p> +<p>They were sitting together now, on the settle by the +hearth-place.</p> +<p>"I can't understand your being able to think of me," he +said.</p> +<p>"Because of Nicky? If I haven't got Nicky it's all the more +reason why I should think of his people."</p> +<p>He looked up. "I say--how are they? Mother and Father?"</p> +<p>"They're very brave.</p> +<p>"It's worse for them than it is for me," she said. "What they +can't bear is your going."</p> +<p>"Mother got my letter, then?"</p> +<p>"Yes. This morning."</p> +<p>"What did she say?"</p> +<p>"She said: 'Oh, no. <i>Not</i> Michael.'</p> +<p>"It was a good thing you wrote, though. Your letter made her +cry. It made even Dorothy cry. They hadn't been able to, +before."</p> +<p>"I should have thought if they could stand Nicky's going--"</p> +<p>"That was different. They know it was different."</p> +<p>"Do you suppose <i>I</i> don't know how different it was? They +mean I funked it and Nicky didn't."</p> +<p>"They mean that Nicky got what he wanted when he went, and that +there was nothing else he could have done so well, except flying, +or engineering."</p> +<p>"It comes to the same thing, Nicky simply wasn't afraid."</p> +<p>"Yes, Michael, he <i>was</i> afraid."</p> +<p>"What <i>of</i>?"</p> +<p>"He was most awfully afraid of seeing suffering."</p> +<p>"Well, so am I. And I'm afraid of suffering myself too. I'm +afraid of the whole blessed thing from beginning to end."</p> +<p>"That's because you keep on seeing the whole blessed thing from +beginning to end. Nicky only saw little bits of it. The bits he +liked. Machine-guns working beautifully, and shells dropping in the +right places, and trenches being taken.</p> +<p>"And then, remember--Nicky hadn't so much to give up."</p> +<p>"He had you."</p> +<p>"Oh, no. He knew that was the way to keep me."</p> +<p>"Ronny--if Nicky had been like me could he have kept you?"</p> +<p>She considered it.</p> +<p>"Yes--if he could have been himself too."</p> +<p>"He couldn't, you see. He never could have felt like that."</p> +<p>"I don't say He could."</p> +<p>"Well--the awful thing is 'feeling like that.'"</p> +<p>"And the magnificent thing is 'feeling like that,' and going all +the same. Everybody knows that but you, Michael."</p> +<p>"Yes," he said. "I'm <i>going</i>. But I'm not going to lie +about it and say I don't funk it. Because I do."</p> +<p>"You don't <i>really</i>."</p> +<p>"I own I didn't the first night--the night I knew Nicky was +killed. Because I couldn't think of anything else <i>but</i> +Nicky.</p> +<p>"It was after I'd written to Mother that it came on. Because I +knew then I couldn't back out of it. That's what I can't get +over--my having to do that--to clinch it--because I was +afraid."</p> +<p>"My dear, my dear, thousands of men do that every day for the +same reason, only they don't find themselves out; and if they did +they wouldn't care. You're finding yourself out all the time, and +killing yourself with caring."</p> +<p>"Of course I care. Can't you see it proves that I never meant to +go at all?"</p> +<p>"It proves that you knew you'd have to go through hell first and +you were determined that even hell shouldn't keep you back."</p> +<p>"Ronny--that's what it <i>has</i> been. Simply hell. It's been +inconceivable. Nothing--absolutely nothing out there could be as +bad. It went on all yesterday and to-day--till you came."</p> +<p>"I know, Michael. That's why I came."</p> +<p>"To get me out of it?"</p> +<p>"To get you out of it.</p> +<p>"It's all over," she said.</p> +<p>"It may come back--out there."</p> +<p>"It won't. Out there you'll be happy. I saw Nicky on Sunday--the +minute before he was killed, Michael. And he was happy."</p> +<p>"He would be." He was silent for a long time.</p> +<p>"Ronny. Did Nicky know I funked it?"</p> +<p>"Never! He knew you wouldn't keep out. All he minded was your +missing any of it."</p> +<p>She got up and put on her hat. "I must go. It's getting late. +Will you walk up to Morfe with me? I'm sleeping there. In the +hotel."</p> +<p>"No, I say--I'm not going to let you turn out for me. +<i>I</i>'ll sleep at the hotel."</p> +<p>She smiled at him with a sort of wonder, as if she thought: "Has +he forgotten, so soon?" And he remembered.</p> +<p>"I can't stop here," she said. "That would be more than even +<i>I</i> can bear."</p> +<p>He thought: "She's gone through hell herself, to get me out of +it."</p> +<blockquote> May, 1916.<br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE.</blockquote> +<p>DEAREST MOTHER AND FATHER,--Yes, "Captain," please. (I can +hardly believe it myself, but it is so.) It was thundering good +luck getting into dear old Nicky's regiment. The whole thing's +incredible. But promotion's nothing. Everybody's getting it like +lightning now. You're no sooner striped than you're starred.</p> +<p>I'm glad I resisted the Adjutant and worked up from the ranks. I +own it was a bit beastly at the time--quite as beastly as Nicky +said it would be; but it was worth while going through with it, +especially living in the trenches as a Tommy. There's nothing like +it for making you know your men. You can tell exactly what's going +to bother them, and what isn't. You've got your finger on the pulse +of their morale--not that it's jumpier than yours; it isn't--and +their knowing that they haven't got to stand anything that you +haven't stood gives you no end of a pull. Honestly, I don't believe +I could have faced them if it wasn't for that. So that <i>your</i> +morale's the better for it as well as theirs. You know, if you're +shot down this minute it won't matter. The weediest Tommy in your +Company can "carry on."</p> +<p><i>We</i>'re a funny crowd in my billet all risen from the ranks +except my Senior. John would love us. There's a chap who writes +short stories and goes out very earnestly among the corpses to find +copy; and there's another who was in the publishing business and +harks back to it, now and then, in a dreamy nostalgic way, and +rather as if he wanted to rub it into us writing chaps what he +<i>could</i> do for us, only he wouldn't; and there's a tailor who +swears he could tell a mile off where my tunic came from; and a +lawyer's clerk who sticks his cigarette behind his ear. (We used to +wonder what he'd do with his revolver till we saw what he did with +it.) They all love thinking of what they've been and telling you +about it. I almost wish I'd gone into Daddy's business. Then +perhaps I'd know what it feels like to go straight out of a shop or +an office into the most glorious Army in history.</p> +<p>I forgot the Jew pawnbroker at least we <i>think</i> he's a +pawnbroker--who's always inventing things; stupendous and +impossible things. His last idea was machine-howitzers fourteen +feet high, that take in shells exactly as a machine-gun takes in +bullets. He says "You'll see them in the next War." When you ask +him how he's going to transport and emplace and hide his +machine-howitzers, he looks dejected, and says "I never thought of +<i>that</i>," and has another idea at once, even more +impossible.</p> +<p>That reminds me. I've seen the "Tanks" (Nicky's Moving +Fortresses) in action. I'd give my promotion if only he could have +seen them too. We mustn't call them Fortresses any more--they're +most violently for attack. As far as I can make out Nicky's and +Drayton's thing was something between these and the French ones; +otherwise one might have wondered whether their plans and models +really did go where John says they did! I wish I could believe that +Nicky and Drayton really <i>had</i> had a hand in it.</p> +<p>I'm most awfully grieved to hear that young Vereker's reported +missing. Do you remember how excited he used to be dashing about +the lawn at tennis, and how Alice Lathom used to sit and look at +him, and jump if you brought her her tea too suddenly? Let's hope +we'll have finished up this damned War before they get little +Norris.</p> +<p>Love to Dorothy and Don and Ronny.--Your loving, MICK.</p> +<p>When Frances read that letter she said, "I wonder if he really +is all right. He says very little about himself."</p> +<p>And Anthony said, "Then you may be sure he is."</p> +<blockquote> May 31st, 1916.<br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE.</blockquote> +<p>MY DEAR RONNY,--I'm glad Mummy and Father have got all my +letters. They won't mind my writing to you this time. It really +<i>is</i> your turn now. Thanks for Wadham's "Poems" (I wish they'd +been Ellis's). It's a shame to laugh at Waddy--but--he <i>has</i> +spread himself over Flanders, hasn't he? Like the inundations round +Ypres.</p> +<p>I'm most awfully touched at Dad and Mummy wanting to publish +mine. Here they all are--just as I wrote them, in our billet, at +night or in the early morning, when the others were sleeping and I +wasn't. I don't know whether they're bad or good; I haven't had +time to think about them. It all seems so incredibly far away. Even +last week seems far away. You go on so fast here.</p> +<p>I'd like Ellis and Monier-Owen to see them and to weed out the +bad ones. But you mustn't ask them to do anything. They haven't +time, either. I think you and Dorothy and Dad will manage it all +right among you. If you don't I shan't much care.</p> +<p>Of course I'm glad that they've taken you on at the Hampstead +Hospital, if it makes you happier to nurse. And I'm glad Dad put +his foot down on your going to Vera. She gave you up to my people +and she can't take you back now. I'm sorry for her though; so is +he.</p> +<p>Have I had any adventures "by myself"? Only two. (I've given up +what Mother calls my "not wanting to go to the party.") One came +off in "No Man's Land" the other night. I went out with a "party" +and came back by myself--unless you count a damaged Tommy hanging +on to me. It began in pleasurable excitement and ended in some +perturbation, for I had to get him in under cover somehow, and my +responsibility weighed on me--so did he. The other was ages ago in +a German trench. I was by myself, because I'd gone in too quick, +and the "party" behind me took the wrong turning. I did manage to +squeeze a chilly excitement out of going on alone. Then I bumped up +against a fat German officer and his revolver. That really was an +exquisite moment, and I was beast enough to be glad I had it all to +myself. It meant a bag of fifteen prisoners--all my own. But that +was nothing; they'd have surrendered to a mouse. There was no +reason why they shouldn't, because I'd fired first and there was no +more officer to play up to.</p> +<p>But the things you don't do by yourself are a long way the best. +Nothing--not even poetry--can beat an infantry charge when you're +leading it. That's because of your men. It feels as if you were +drawing them all up after you. Of course you aren't. They're coming +on their own, and you're simply nothing, only a little unimportant +part of them--even when you're feeling as if you were God +Almighty.</p> +<p>I'm afraid it <i>does</i> look awfully as if young Vereker were +killed. They may hear, you know, in some roundabout way--through +the Red Cross, or some of his men. I've written to them.</p> +<p>Love to everybody. Certainly you may kiss Nanna for me, if she'd +like it. I wish I liked Waddy more--when you've given him to +me.--Always your affectionate,</p> +<blockquote> MICHAEL.</blockquote> +<p>P.S.--I don't sound pleased about the publication; but I am. I +can't get over their wanting to do it. I thought they didn't +care.</p> +<p>Ronny--I've been such a beast to them--when Father tried to read +my stuff--bless him!--and couldn't, I used to wish to God he'd +leave it alone. And now I'd give anything to see his dear old paws +hanging on to it and twitching with fright, and his eyes slewing +round to see if I'm looking at him.</p> +<blockquote> June 14th, 1916.<br> + B.E.F., +FRANCE.</blockquote> +<p>MY DEAR RONNY,--I'm glad you like them, and I'm glad Father +thinks he "understands Michael's poems" this time, and I'm glad +they've made Mother and Dorothy feel happier about me--BUT--they +must get it out of their heads that they're my "message," or any +putrescent thing of that sort. The bare idea of writing a message, +or of being supposed to write a message, makes me sick. I know it's +beastly of me, but, really I'd rather they weren't published at +all, if there's the smallest chance of their being taken that +way.</p> +<p>But if Ellis is doing the introduction there isn't the smallest +chance. Thank God for Ellis.</p> +<p>There--I've let off all my beastliness.</p> +<p>And now I'll try to answer your letter. Yes; the "ecstasy" in +the last two poems <i>is</i> Nicky's ecstasy. And as Ellis says it +strikes him as absolutely real, I take it that some of Nicky's +"reality" has got through. It's hard on Ellis that he has to take +<i>his</i> ecstasy from me, instead of coming out and getting it +for himself.</p> +<p>But you and Nicky and Lawrence are right. It <i>is</i> +absolutely real. I mean it has to do with absolute reality. With +God. It hasn't anything to do with having courage, or not having +courage; it's another state of mind altogether. It isn't what +Nicky's man said it was--you're not ashamed of it the next day. It +isn't excitement; you're not excited. It isn't a tingling of your +nerves; they don't tingle. It's all curiously quiet and steady. You +remember when you saw Nicky--how everything stood still? And how +two times were going on, and you and Nicky were in one time, and +Mother was in the other? Well--it's like that. Your body and its +nerves aren't in it at all. Your body may be moving violently, with +other bodies moving violently round it; but <i>you</i>'re +still.</p> +<p>But suppose it is your nerves. Why should they tingle at just +that particular moment, the moment that makes <i>animals</i> +afraid? Why should you be so extraordinarily happy? Why should the +moment of extreme danger be always the "exquisite" moment? Why not +the moment of safety?</p> +<p>Doesn't it look as if danger were the point of contact with +reality, and death the closest point? You're through. Actually you +lay hold on eternal life, and you know it.</p> +<p>Another thing--it always comes with that little shock of +recognition. It's happened before, and when you get near to it +again you know what it is. You keep on wanting to get near it, +wanting it to happen again. You may lose it the next minute, but +you know. Lawrence knew what it was. Nicky knew.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<blockquote>June 19th.</blockquote> +<p>I'm coming back to it--after that interruption--because I want +to get the thing clear. I have to put it down as I feel it; there's +no other way. But they mustn't think it's something that only +Lawrence and Nicky and I feel. The men feel it too, even when they +don't know what it is. And some of them <i>do</i> know.</p> +<p>Of course we shall be accused of glorifying War and telling lies +about it. Well--there's a Frenchman who has told the truth, piling +up all the horrors, faithfully, remorselessly, magnificently. But +he seems to think people oughtn't to write about this War at all +unless they show up the infamy of it, as a deterrent, so that no +Government can ever start another one. It's a sort of literary +"frightfulness." But who is he trying to frighten? Does he imagine +that France, or England, or Russia or Belgium, or Serbia, will want +to start another war when this is over? And does he suppose that +Germany--if we don't beat her--will be deterred by his +frightfulness? Germany's arrogance will be satisfied when she knows +she's made a Frenchman feel like that about it.</p> +<p>He's got his truth all right. As Morrie would say: "That's War." +But a peaceful earthquake can do much the same thing. And if +<i>our</i> truth--what <i>we</i>'ve seen--isn't War, at any rate +it's what we've got out of it, it's our "glory," our spiritual +compensation for the physical torture, and there would be a sort of +infamy in trying to take it from us. It isn't the French +Government, or the British that's fighting Germany; it's we--all of +us. To insist on the world remembering nothing but these horrors is +as if men up to their knees in the filth they're clearing away +should complain of each other for standing in it and splashing it +about.</p> +<p>The filth of War--and the physical torture--Good God! As if the +world was likely to forget it. Any more than we're likely to forget +what <i>we</i> know.</p> +<p>You remember because you've known it before and it all hangs +together. It's not as if danger were the only point of contact with +reality. You get the same ecstasy, the same shock of recognition, +and the same utter satisfaction when you see a beautiful thing. At +least to me it's like that. You know what Nicky thought it was +like. You know what it was like when you used to sit looking and +looking at Mother's "tree of Heaven."</p> +<p>It's odd, Ronny, to have gone all your life trying to get +reality, trying to get new beauty, trying to get utter +satisfaction; to have funked coming out here because you thought it +was all obscene ugliness and waste and frustration, and then to +come out, and to find what you wanted.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<blockquote>June 25th.</blockquote> +<p>I wrote all that, while I could, because I want to make them see +it. It's horrible that Dorothy should think that Drayton's dead and +that Mother should think that Nicky's dead, when they wouldn't, if +they really knew. If they don't believe Lawrence or me, can't they +believe Nicky? I'm only saying what he said. But I can't write to +them about it because they make me shy, and I'm afraid they'll +think I'm only gassing, or "making poetry"--as if poetry wasn't the +most real thing there is!</p> +<p>If anybody can make them see it, you can.--Always your +affectionate,</p> +<blockquote> MICHAEL.</blockquote> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>XXV</h2> +<br> +<p>Anthony was going into the house to take back the key of the +workshop.</p> +<p>He had locked the door of the workshop a year ago, after Nicky's +death, and had not opened it again until to-day. This afternoon in +the orchard he had seen that the props of the old apple-tree were +broken and he had thought that he would like to make new ones, and +the wood was in the workshop.</p> +<p>Everything in there was as it had been when Nicky finished with +his Moving Fortress. The brass and steel filings lay in a heap +under the lathe, the handle was tilted at the point where he had +left it; pits in the saw-dust showed where his feet had stood. His +overalls hung over the bench where he had slipped them off.</p> +<p>Anthony had sat down on the bench and had looked at these things +with remembrance and foreboding. He thought of Nicky and of Nicky's +pleasure and excitement over the unpacking of his first lathe--the +one he had begged for for his birthday--and of his own pleasure and +excitement as he watched his boy handling it and showing him so +cleverly how it worked. It stood there still in the corner. Nicky +had given it to Veronica. He had taught her how to use it. And +Anthony thought of Veronica when she was little; he saw Nicky +taking care of her, teaching her to run and ride and play games. +And he remembered what Veronica's mother had said to him and +Frances: "Wait till Nicky has children of his own."</p> +<p>He thought of John. John had volunteered three times and had +been three times rejected. And now conscription had got him. He had +to appear before the Board of Examiners that afternoon. He might be +rejected again. But the standard was not so exacting as it had +been--John might be taken.</p> +<p>He thought of his business--John's business and his, and +Bartie's. Those big Government contracts had more than saved them. +They were making tons of money out of the War. Even when the +Government cut down their profits; even when they had given more +than half they made to the War funds, the fact remained that they +were living on the War. Bartie, without a wife or children, was +appallingly rich.</p> +<p>If John were taken. If John were killed--</p> +<p>If Michael died--</p> +<p>Michael had been reported seriously wounded.</p> +<p>He had thought then of Michael. And he had not been able to bear +thinking any more. He had got up and left the workshop, locking the +door behind him, forgetting what he had gone in for; and he had +taken the key back to the house. He kept it in what his children +used to call the secret drawer of his bureau. It lay there with +Nicky's last letter of June, 1915, and a slab of coromandel +wood.</p> +<p>It was when he was going into the house with the key that John +met him.</p> +<p>"Have they taken you?"</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>John's face was hard and white. They went together into +Anthony's room.</p> +<p>"It's what you wanted," Anthony said.</p> +<p>"Of course it's what I wanted. I want it more than ever now.</p> +<p>"The wire's come, Father. Mother opened it."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>It was five days now since they had heard that Michael had died +of his wounds. Frances was in Michael's room. She was waiting for +Dorothea and Veronica to help her to find his papers. It was eight +o'clock in the evening, and they had to be sorted and laid out +ready for Morton Ellis to look over them to-morrow. To-morrow +Morton Ellis would come, and he would take them away.</p> +<p>The doors of Michael's and of Nicky's rooms were always kept +shut; Frances knew that, if she were to open the door on the other +side of the corridor and look in, every thing in Nicky's room would +welcome her with tenderness even while it inflicted its unique and +separate wound. But Michael's room was bare and silent. He had +cleared everything away out of her sight last year before he went. +The very books on the shelves repudiated her; reminded her that she +had never understood him, that he had always escaped her. His room +kept his secret, and she felt afraid and abashed in it, knowing +herself an intruder. Presently all that was most precious in it +would be taken from her and given over to a stranger whom he had +never liked.</p> +<p>Her mind turned and fastened on one object--the stiff, naked +wooden chair standing in its place before the oak table by the +window. She remembered how she had come to Michael there and found +him writing at his table, and how she had talked to him as though +he had been a shirker and a coward.</p> +<p>She had borne Nicky's death. But she could not bear Michael's. +She stood there in his room, staring, hypnotized by her memory. She +heard Dorothea come in and go out again. And then Veronica came +in.</p> +<p>She turned to Veronica to help her.</p> +<p>She clung to Veronica and was jealous of her. Veronica had not +come between her and Nicky as long as he was alive, but now that he +was dead she came between them. She came between her and Michael +too. Michael's mind had always been beyond her; she could only +reach it through Veronica and through Veronica's secret. Her mind +clutched at Veronica's secret, and flung it away as useless, and +returned, clutching at it again.</p> +<p>It was as if Veronica held the souls of Michael and Nicholas in +her hands. She offered her the souls of her dead sons. She was the +mediator between her and their souls.</p> +<p>"I could bear it, Veronica, if I hadn't made him go. I came to +him, here, in this room, and bullied him till he went. I said +horrible things to him--that he must have remembered.</p> +<p>"He wasn't like Nicky--it was infinitely worse for him. And I +was cruel to him. I had no pity. I drove him out--to be killed.</p> +<p>"And I simply cannot bear it."</p> +<p>"But--he didn't go then. He waited till--till he was free. If +anybody could have made him, Nicky could. But it wasn't even Nicky. +It was himself."</p> +<p>"If he'd been killed as Nicky was--but to die like that, in the +hospital--of those horrible wounds."</p> +<p>"He was leading a charge, just as Nicky was. And you know he was +happy, just as Nicky was. Every line he's written shows that he was +happy."</p> +<p>"It only shows that they were both full of life, that they loved +their life and wanted to live.</p> +<p>"It's no use, Ronny, you're saying you know they're there. I +don't. I'd give anything to believe it. And yet it wouldn't be a +bit of good if I did. I don't <i>want</i> them all changed into +something spiritual that I shouldn't know if it was there. I want +their bodies with me just as they used to be. I want to hear them +and touch them, and see them come in in their old clothes.</p> +<p>"To see Nicky standing on the hearthrug with Timmy in his arms. +I want things like that, Ronny. Even if you're right, it's all +clean gone."</p> +<p>Her lips tightened.</p> +<p>"I'm talking as if I was, the only one. But I know it's worse +for you, Ronny. I <i>had</i> them all those years. And I've got +Anthony. You've had nothing but your poor three days."</p> +<p>Veronica thought: "How can I tell her that I've got more than +she thinks? It's awful that I should have what she hasn't." She was +ashamed and beaten before this irreparable, mortal grief.</p> +<p>"And it's worse," Frances said, "for the wretched mothers whose +sons haven't fought."</p> +<p>For her pride rose in her again--the pride that uplifted her +supernaturally when Nicky died.</p> +<p>"You mustn't think I grudge them. I don't. I don't even grudge +John."</p> +<p>The silence of Michael's room sank into them, it weighed on +their hearts and they were afraid of each other's voices. Frances +was glad when Dorothy came and they could begin their work +there.</p> +<p>But Michael had not left them much to do. They found his papers +all in one drawer of his writing-table, sorted and packed and +labelled, ready for Morton Ellis to take away. One sealed envelope +lay in a place by itself. Frances thought: "He didn't want any of +us to touch his things."</p> +<p>Then she saw Veronica's name on the sealed envelope. She was +glad when Veronica left them and went to her hospital.</p> +<p>And when she was gone she wanted her back again.</p> +<p>"I wish I hadn't spoken that way to Veronica," she said.</p> +<p>"She won't mind. She knows you couldn't help it."</p> +<p>"I could, Dorothy, if I wasn't jealous of her. I mean I'm +jealous of her certainty. If I had it, too, I shouldn't be +jealous."</p> +<p>"She wants you to have it. She's trying to give it you.</p> +<p>"Mother--how do we know she isn't right? Nicky said she was. And +Michael said Nicky was right.</p> +<p>"If it had been only Nicky--<i>he</i> might have got it from +Veronica. But Michael never got things from anybody. And you +<i>do</i> know things in queer ways. Even I do. At least I did +once--when I was in prison. I knew something tremendous was going +to happen. I saw it, or felt it, or something. I won't swear I knew +it was the War. I don't suppose I did. But I knew Frank was all +mixed up with it. And it was the most awfully real thing. You +couldn't go back on it, or get behind it. It was as if I'd seen +that he and Lawrence and Nicky and Michael and all of them would +die in it to save the whole world. Like Christ, only that they +really <i>did</i> die and the whole world <i>was</i> saved. There +was nothing futile about it."</p> +<p>"Well--?"</p> +<p>"Well, <i>they</i> might see their real thing the same way--in a +flash. Aren't they a thousand times more likely to know than we +are? What right have we--sitting here safe--to say it isn't when +they say it is?"</p> +<p>"But--if there's anything in it--why can't I see it as well as +you and Veronica? After all, I'm their mother."</p> +<p>"Perhaps that's why it takes you longer, Mummy. You think of +their bodies more than we do, because they were part of your body. +Their souls, or whatever it is, aren't as real to you just at +first."</p> +<p>"I see," said Frances, bitterly. "You've only got to be a +mother, and give your children your flesh and blood, to be sure of +their souls going from you and somebody else getting them."</p> +<p>"That's the price you pay for being mothers."</p> +<p>"Was Frank's soul ever more real to <i>you</i>, Dorothy?"</p> +<p>"Yes. It was once--for just one minute. The night he went away. +That's another queer thing that happened."</p> +<p>"It didn't satisfy you, darling, did it?"</p> +<p>"Of course it didn't satisfy me. I want more and more of it. Not +just flashes."</p> +<p>"You say it's the price we pay for being mothers. Yet if +Veronica had had a child--"</p> +<p>"You needn't be so sorry for Veronica."</p> +<p>"I'm not. It's you I'm sorriest for. You've had nothing. From +beginning to end you had nothing.</p> +<p>"I might at least have seen that you had it in the +beginning."</p> +<p>"<i>You</i>, Mummy?"</p> +<p>"Yes. Me. You <i>shall</i> have it now. Unless you want to leave +me."</p> +<p>"I wouldn't leave you for the world, Mummy ducky. Only you must +let me work always and all the time."</p> +<p>"Let you? I'll let you do what you like, my dear."</p> +<p>"You always have let me, haven't you?"</p> +<p>"It was the least I could do."</p> +<p>"Poor Mummy, did you think you had to make up because you cared +for them more than me?"</p> +<p>"I wonder," said Frances, thoughtfully, "if I did."</p> +<p>"Of course. Of course you did. Who wouldn't?"</p> +<p>"I never meant you to know it, Dorothy."</p> +<p>"Of course I knew it. I must have known it ever since Michael +was born. I knew you couldn't help it. You had to. Even when I was +a tiresome kid I knew you had to. It was natural."</p> +<p>"Natural or unnatural, many girls have hated their mothers for +less. You've been very big and generous.</p> +<p>"Perhaps--if you'd been little and weak--but you were always +such an independent thing. I used to think you didn't want me."</p> +<p>"I wanted you a lot more than you thought. But, you see, I've +learned to do without."</p> +<p>She thought: "It's better she should have it straight."</p> +<p>"If you'd think less about me, Mother," she said, "and more +about Father--"</p> +<p>"Father?"</p> +<p>"Yes. Father isn't independent--though he looks it. He wants you +awfully. He always has wanted you. And he hasn't learned to do +without."</p> +<p>"Where is he?"</p> +<p>"He's sitting out there in the garden, all by himself, in the +dark, under the tree."</p> +<p>Frances went to him there.</p> +<p>"I wondered whether you would come to me," he said.</p> +<p>"I was doing something for Michael."</p> +<p>"Is it done?"</p> +<p>"Yes. It's done."</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<p>Five months passed. It was November now.</p> +<p>In the lane by the side door, Anthony was waiting in his car. +Rain was falling, hanging from the trees and falling. Every now and +then he looked at his watch.</p> +<p>He had still a quarter of an hour before he need start. But he +was not going back into the house. They were all in there saying +good-bye to John: old Mrs. Fleming, and Louie and Emmeline and +Edith. And Maurice. And his brother Bartie.</p> +<p>The door in the garden wall opened and they came out: the four +women in black--the black they still wore for Michael--and the two +men.</p> +<p>They all walked slowly up the lane. Anthony could see Bartie's +shoulders hunched irritably against the rain. He could see Morrie +carrying his sodden, quivering body with care and an exaggerated +sobriety. He saw Grannie, going slowly, under the umbrella, very +upright and conscious of herself as wonderful and outlasting.</p> +<p>He got down and cranked up his engine.</p> +<p>Then he sat sternly in his car and waited, with his hands on the +steering-wheel, ready.</p> +<p>The engine throbbed, impatient for the start.</p> +<p>John came out very quickly and took his seat beside his father. +And the car went slowly towards the high road.</p> +<p>Uncle Morrie stood waiting for it by the gate at the top of the +lane. As it passed through he straightened himself and put up his +hand in a crapulous salute.</p> +<p>The young man smiled at him, saluted, and was gone</p> +<br> +<br> +<br> +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 13883 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |