THE WOMAN AND THE MAN
"When's your board, Jim?" The flickering light of the fire lit up the
old oak hall, playing on the face of the girl buried in an easy chair.
Tea was over, and they were alone.
"On Tuesday, dear," he answered gravely.
"But you aren't fit, old man; you don't think you're fit yet, do you?"
There was a note of anxiety in her voice.
"I'm perfectly fit, Sybil," he said quietly--"perfectly fit, my dear."
"Then you'll go back soon?" She looked at him with frightened eyes.
"Just as soon as they'll send me. I am going to ask the Board to pass me
fit 'for General Service.'"
"Oh, Jim!"--he hardly caught the whisper. "Oh, Jim! my man."
"Well----" he came over and knelt in front of her.
"It makes me sick," she cried fiercely, "to think of you and Hugh and
men like you--and then to think of all these other cowardly beasts. My
dear, my dear--do you _want_ to go back?"
"At present, I don't. I'm utterly happy here with you, and the old
peaceful country life. I'm afraid, Syb--I'm afraid of going on with it
I'm afraid of its sapping my vitality--I'm afraid of never wanting to go
back." His voice died away, and then suddenly he leant forward and
kissed her on the mouth.
"Come over here a moment," he stood up and drew her to him. "Come over
here." With his arm round her shoulders he led her over to a great
portrait in oils that hung against the wall, the portrait of a
stern-faced soldier in the uniform of a forgotten century. To the girl
the picture of her great-grandfather was not a thing of surpassing
interest--she had seen it too often before. But she was a girl of
understanding, and she realised that the soul of the man beside her was
in the melting-pot; and, moreover, that she might make or mar the mould
into which it must run. So in her wisdom she said nothing, and waited.
"I want you to listen to me for a bit, Syb," he began after a while.
"I'm not much of a fist at talking--especially on things I feel very
deeply about. I can't track my people back like you can. The
corresponding generation in my family to that old buster was a junior
inkslinger in a small counting-house up North. And that junior
inkslinger made good: you know what I'm worth to-day if the governor
died."
He started to pace restlessly up and down the hall, while the girl
watched him quietly.
"Then came this war and I went into it--not for any highfalutin motives,
not because I longed to avenge Belgium--but simply because my pals were
all soldiers or sailors, and it never occurred to me not to. In fact at
first I was rather pleased with myself--I treated it as a joke more or
less. The governor was inordinately proud of me; the mater had about
twelve dozen photographs of me in uniform sent round the country to
various bored and unwilling recipients; and lots of people combined to
tell me what a damn fine fellow I was. Do you think he'd have thought
so?" He stopped underneath the portrait and for a while gazed at the
painted face with a smile.
"That old blackguard up there--who lived every moment of his life--do
you think he would have accounted that to me for credit? What would _he_
say if he knew that in a crisis like this there are men who cloak
perfect sight behind blue glasses; that there are men who have joined
home defence units though they are perfectly fit to fight anywhere? And
what would he say, Sybil, if he knew that a man, even though he'd done
something, was now resting on his oars--content?"
"Go on, dear!" The girl's eyes were shining now.
"I'm coming to the point This morning the old dad started on the line of
various fellows he knew whose sons hadn't been out yet; and he didn't
see why I should go a second time--before they went. The business
instinct to a certain extent, I suppose--the point of view of a business
man. But would _he_ understand that?" Again he nodded to the picture.
"I think----" She began to speak, and then fell silent.
"Ah! but would he, my dear? What of Hugh, of the Rabbit, of Torps? With
them it was bred in the bone--with me it was not. For years I and mine
have despised the soldier and the sailor: for years you and yours have
despised the counting-house. And all that is changing. Over there the
tinkers, the tailors, the merchants, are standing together with the old
breed of soldier--the two lots are beginning to understand one
another--to respect one another. You're learning from us, and we're
learning from you, though _he_ would never have believed that possible."
Jim was standing very close to the girl, and his voice was low.
"It's because I'm not very sure of one of the lessons I've learnt: it's
because at times I do think it hard that others should not take their
fair share that I must get back to that show quick--damn quick.
"I want to be worthy of that old ancestor of yours--now that I'm going
to marry one of his family. I know we're all mad--I know the world's
mad; but, Syb, dear, you wouldn't have me sane, would you; not for ever?
And I shall be if I stay here any longer...."
"I understand, Jim," she answered, after a while. "I understand exactly.
And I wouldn't have you sane, except just now for a little while.
Because it's a glorious madness, and"--she put both her arms round his
neck and kissed him passionately--"and I love you."
Which was quite illogical and inconsequent--but there you are. What is
not illogical and inconsequent nowadays?
From which it will be seen that Jim Denver was not of the first of the
three types which I have mentioned. He did not love the game for itself
alone; my masters, there are not many who do. But there was no job in
England in which he would prove invaluable: though there were many which
with a little care he might have adorned beautifully.
And just because there _is_ blood in the counting-house, which only
requires to be brought out to show itself, he knew that he must go
back--he knew that it was his job.
* * * * *
That wild enthusiasm which he had shared with other subalterns in his
battalion before they had been over the first time was lacking now; he
was calmer--more evenly balanced. He had attained the courage of
knowledge instead of the courage of ignorance.
No longer did the men who waited to be fetched excuse him--even though
he had "done his bit." No longer was it possible to shelter behind
another man's failure, and plead for so-called equality of sacrifice. To
him had come the meaning of tradition--that strange, nameless something
which has kept regiments in a position, battered with shells, stunned
with shock, gassed, brain reeling, mind gone, with nothing to hold them
except that nameless something which says to them, "Hold on!" While
other regiments, composed of men as brave, have not held. To him had
come that quality which has sent men laughing and talking without a
quaver to their death; that quality which causes men--eaten with fever,
lonely, weary to death, thinking themselves forsaken even of God--to
carry on the Empire's work in the uttermost corners of the globe, simply
because it is their job.
He had assimilated to a certain extent the ideas of that stern, dead
soldier; he had visualised them; he had realised that the destinies of a
country are not entrusted to all her children. Many are not worthy to
handle them, which makes the glory for the few all the greater....
Winds of the world, give answer! They are whimpering
to and fro--
And what should they know of England, who only
England know?
The poor little street-bred people that vapour and fume
and brag,
They are lifting their heads in the stillness to yelp at
the English Flag.
* * * * *
Never the lotos closes, never the wild-fowl wake,
But a soul goes out on the East wind that died for
England's sake--
Man or woman or suckling, mother or bride or maid--
Because on the bones of the English the English flag is
stayed.