Civilization had gone to pieces, but outwardly London looked just the
same. The winding loops of traffic weaved their perpetual chain, checked
by imperturbable, blue policemen; picture palaces and public houses,
congested tubes and swinging ’buses, the long, blue shadows of the dusk
and the arched lights of the street corners, had no new secrets to
reveal. The husks of everything Anthony saw were mercilessly indifferent
to change.
But surely the people would be different? People cannot pass through
hell and keep their values of life the same; they cannot lose security
and not gain a certain spiritual significance.
It was startling to Anthony to find that Henry had not altered at all;
he did not even look older. He lived in the same charming rooms, full of
old French china. Henry could not afford good pictures, so he had very
wisely limited himself to excellent prints. His books neither frightened
the unreading public nor shocked the cultivated. Henry had kept an
expensive cook, and during the war by her help had evaded food
difficulties while keeping patriotically within his rations. There was
no track once beaten that Henry did not follow; nor had he ever found it
difficult to believe what he knew to be generally accepted. He shook
hands with Anthony with some emotion, and asked twice how he was.
“This is really tremendous,” Henry exclaimed, “quite tremendous.” The
situation promptly dwindled under his qualifying adjectives. “By Jove!
what a lot we shall have to talk over! How does it feel to be back?”
“I can’t tell you yet,” said Anthony, sinking into a luxurious arm-chair
before the fire. “Physically it’s comfortable. I’ve often thought of
this arm-chair.”
Henry said, “My dear fellow!” deprecatingly. He hoped he wasn’t going to
hear too much about hardship; he always skipped what he referred to as
“literary horrors” in the accounts of war correspondents. “Things,” as
he often used to say without specifying what things, “were quite bad
enough without unduly harrowing one’s feelings.”
“We’ll have dinner in a minute,” Henry continued cheerfully, “and then
we’ll make history. Of course I know everybody has written regularly to
you, but it’s quite extraordinary how facts drop out one way or another
in correspondence—quite important little facts.”
“I haven’t written everything back,” observed Anthony in a queer, tired
voice, which sounded thick. “You see, I couldn’t—lots of things. I
couldn’t; but I dare say they don’t matter now.”
“I knew you’d take a sensible view,” Henry agreed eagerly. “It’s no use
raking over old troubles, is it? I assure you we’ve all had hardships to
bear as well; air raids, for instance, _most_ unpleasant and so noisy.
The servants felt it a great deal. The one thing that has kept me up
during the last few years has been the spirit of cheeriness. I’ve
insisted upon taking a bright view of things, and I’ve found it paid;
over and over again I’ve found it paid.”
“You would find it pay,” Anthony agreed after a short pause, looking
round the room with curious, inattentive eyes. “And none of the china
has been broken, has it? It seems to me I remember all the pieces.”
“No,” Henry replied; “Mary is very careful, you know. I shouldn’t let
her touch them if she wasn’t. Some of this is priceless.”
“Quite right,” agreed Anthony. “Only being careful doesn’t always
prevent things from being broken, does it? There’s an awful lot of luck
in what breaks and what doesn’t. D’you mind, before we have dinner,
telling me what’s known about Tom?”
Anthony moved as he spoke, and crouched forward a little over the fire
as if he were cold. Henry couldn’t see his face; he was privately
shocked at the thin, rather weak, and shaky look of his restored
brother.
Anthony had not kept his spirit up; he had lost smartness in a manner
that, if it was pitiable, was also annoying to a relative who had been
prepared to be proud of him. And it showed a certain lack of tact upon
Anthony’s part to ask Henry about Tom before dinner.
“I expect,” Henry said in a grave, constrained voice, which indicated
deep feeling without transgressing good taste, “you know practically all
there is to know already. Tom was acting as Forward observing officer in
one of the woods on the Somme. It is a little confusing, as no one
actually saw what took place, but they suppose a shell caught him and
his telephonist. The messages stopped, and when they advanced they found
the bodies. The major wrote, of course, and several of his
brother-officers. Mother will show you all the letters. Dear old Tom, he
did his duty like—”
Henry stopped abruptly. He was going to say a Briton or a hero; a burst
of most appalling profanity checked him.
He stared blankly at the crouched and blasphemous figure in front of the
fire. Anthony cursed steadily and monotonously for several seconds. He
seemed beyond his own control; then he pulled himself together.
“I beg your pardon, old man,” he stammered. “I—I—my nerves, you know;
that was why I wanted to have my home-coming over gradually. Don’t pay
any attention to me. I’ll be all right in a minute. What I want to know
is, How long was it between the time they got Tom’s last message and
found the body? That’s all I want to know.”
“Have a whisky and soda,” Henry murmured sympathetically. “Of course
it’s quite natural you should be upset; it would have been better to go
into all this after dinner. As far as I can make out—the major was a
little vague—there were three days before they actually found the body;
but of course Tom was killed instantly. All of them said so in their
letters. It was a great comfort to us to feel that there could have been
no actual suffering—my God! Anthony! don’t laugh like that! It doesn’t
sound human; it really doesn’t. Here, take this whisky and soda!”
Henry had to force the glass between Anthony’s stiffened lips. He was
bowed and contracted with his unearthly laughter. His hands shook as if
he were in an ague; his whole body shook. Henry had never been in such a
situation in his life, and all of it was perfectly unnecessary. Tom had
been dead two years. Then Anthony gasped out:
“Thanks. Yes, that’s what I wanted to know—three days.” The whisky and
soda had quieted him. He stopped trembling.
Mary came in and announced dinner.
Henry asked Anthony considerately if he would like to wait five minutes,
but Anthony, without any consideration whatever, replied that he was as
hungry as a wolf. He really did seem very hungry, and ate like a wolf,
but he drank nothing. Henry heard him say in a whisper that was
perfectly audible:
“If I drink anything, I shall go to pieces. If I drink anything, I shall
go to pieces.”
Henry looked anxiously at Mary, but her eyes were intent upon a green
vegetable, over which she noiselessly readjusted one of Henry’s solid
silver spoons. Anthony did not notice Mary at all, but in helping
himself he dropped the spoon.
When they were back again in Henry’s drawing-room, Anthony moved
restlessly about and tried to pull the curtains to look out of the
window.
Henry said:
“Sit down, my dear old chap,” and Anthony sat down with a jerk, as if
some one had pulled him.
“I don’t know if you would like me to run over the terms of Tom’s will,”
Henry suggested. “I suppose we must dip into business some time or
other, but perhaps—”
“Run over anything you like now,” said Anthony. He leaned back in his
arm-chair and closed his eyes, but he wasn’t asleep. He followed Henry’s
excellent account of business affairs with his old clear-cut attention.
Henry was greatly relieved at the questions Anthony shot out at him. He
went on to speak of Pannell.
“It wouldn’t be a bad thing if you were home for a time to look after
things,” Henry suggested. “Father has lost grip. You’ll notice a
difference in him, and in mother, too. The strain upon those who
remained at home has been greater perhaps than you fellows quite
realize.” Henry sighed a little reproachfully. He wanted Anthony to
understand that he had not been the only one to suffer; he felt that
self-pity would be very bad for a man of Anthony’s type. “I mustn’t
weaken him by my sympathy,” Henry reminded himself.
“Yes,” said Anthony, without opening his eyes. “If people realized it,
it must have been—I was going to say worse for them; but mercifully
we’re so built that what we don’t see reaches only the most imaginative.
Knowledge and realization seldom meet. I see that now. I used to
believe, as a doctor, that I knew something about pain; but of course I
didn’t. I knew as much about it as people know of an earthquake shock
from reading about it in a newspaper. My nerves were untouched.”
“I have always thought doctors must be rather insensitive,” said Henry,
complacently. “Frankly, I have never been able to stand the sight of
suffering. I suppose things were pretty rotten over there for you?” As
Anthony did not answer, Henry added tactfully, “You must tell me all
about it some time when you feel more up to the mark, and things get
easier to talk about.”
Anthony’s eyelids flickered; the lines between his lips and his mouth
were deep as furrows.
It was obvious that with his usual good sense he agreed with Henry that
it was better to postpone the history of his captivity.
Still, Henry did not want to postpone it entirely. He was curious to be
told something about it—how many meals one got a day, and what amount
of exercises one was allowed to take. He wanted to hear the kind of
things one could afterwards talk over comfortably at the club with the
other fellows.
But Anthony had lost the faculty of realizing what was expected of him
in conversation. He didn’t follow the line of Henry’s thoughts. He began
abruptly:
“Those were awfully good cigarettes you kept sending me. Wonderful what
a civilizing thing a cigarette is! Did some fellows good, you know, just
to look at them; kept them up to the mark. ’Pon my word, I shouldn’t
wonder if it helped ’em to be straight more than their prayers. What one
wants, you know, out there is some point to hold on to, some point
outside oneself. Religions that push you inside yourself make a shocking
mess of it, and all religions do it too much. What you want is to get
out, no matter how small the point you’re aiming at; then you’re safe—I
mean that’s your chance of keeping sane. Of course it’s only a chance.”
Henry cleared his throat nervously.
“The Young Men’s Christian Association,” he said, “has really done
wonders in this war. It is one of the charities I made a point of
backing up. I quite agree with you that the social element in religion
is extremely important. The church has overlooked it shockingly. I put
down its comparative failure to its inability to deal with its
congregations socially.”
Anthony opened his eyes and stared at Henry. He looked as if he did not
know what his brother was talking about. Apparently he had not been
referring to the church.
The door burst open.
“I can’t help it, Mary. No matter what Mr. Henry said, I will
see—Tony!”
She was in his arms; when he heard her voice he had got up and felt for
her as if he were blind.
It was Daphne; of course she had done exactly what they had arranged for
her not to do. Her eyes blazed at him, fierce with tenderness; he could
hardly meet them. He felt her arms tighten round him.
“Ah, they’ve hurt you! they’ve hurt you!” she gasped.
Anthony tried hard to hold himself together. He kept telling himself
that he mustn’t make an ass of himself before Henry. Daphne pushed him
back into his chair and knelt beside him, gazing at him with the
piercing eyes of mercy and love. There was no use trying to hoodwink
Daphne. She saw what war had done to Anthony; she saw nothing else.
Henry hovered ineffectually in the rear of the situation; he tried hard
to stop its being a situation, but Daphne overpowered him. She took no
notice of the halves of inconspicuous sentences which escaped from his
lips except to say, after a moment or two, casually over her shoulder,
as if he weren’t a member of his family and her host, “You’d better go,
Henry.”
If Anthony had lifted his little finger to keep him, Henry would have
stayed—but Anthony did not look in his direction either. His lips had
started trembling; he held his elbow on his knee and his hand over his
eyes. Henry tiptoed out of the room as if he had inadvertently strayed
into a prayer-meeting.
Daphne took Anthony in her arms again.
“Oh, what have they done to you!” she murmured. “They have eaten half
your life.”
Then she began to cry terribly, and it gave back Anthony all his
self-control to see her cry. He laughed at her, and patted the back of
her obstinately untidy curls. They were just like his own, only made out
of spun gold. His had turned gray.
“Don’t be a goose,” he protested. “It’s all right now. Nothing’s the
matter really. I’m perfectly fit. Are you crying about me or is it Tom?”
“Oh, you!” she sobbed. “Tom’s only dead.”
“Well, I’ll be all right soon,” Anthony reassured her. “I’ll be just as
usual in a little while. All the fellows feel rather queer at first, you
know. You ought to be at Pannell. I kept thinking you’d meet me there
to-morrow. I suppose they’re all right, aren’t they? Henry would have
told me if they weren’t.”
[Illustration: _Daphne pushed him back into his chair and knelt beside
him._]
“Yes, yes, yes,” said Daphne, quickly; “everything’s quite all right.”
Her sobs had subsided now, and she searched through his pockets to find
the handkerchief she ought to have had the sense to bring with her.
“Something’s changed?” said Anthony, sharply. “What is it, Daphne?
You’re hiding something from me.”
“No, no, not changed,” whispered Daphne. “I’m not changed, Tony; only I
didn’t mean to tell you to-night. Don’t you see how old I am, how
monstrously, awfully old?”
Anthony studied her beautiful, radiant face with keen, questioning eyes.
“You’ve turned into some kind of grownup woman at last, haven’t you?” he
asked slowly. “Hullo! what’s that on your finger?”
“Yes,” she said, “it is really. Isn’t it funny? I can’t get used to it.
I didn’t want to be happy a bit by myself without you, but he was in the
Flying Corps, and I was so anxious! We were married last June. I made
them all swear not to tell you. I censored their letters for months for
fear of its dropping out. You see, I knew, if you were with me, you’d be
glad. O Tony, doesn’t it seem wonderful! It’s over, and he’s all right.
I keep saying that instead of my prayers all day. It’s over, and he’s
all right.”
Anthony nodded.
“Yes,” he said; “yes, I suppose so. It’s over, and it’s all right,
either way you look at it, perhaps.”
They were silent for a moment, then she said quickly: “Oh, Tony darling,
Tom was killed at once. Jim found out for me; I can prove it to you.
Tell me you believe me? You know I wouldn’t rest till I found out. Jim
went over and saw the Major. You know I wouldn’t lie to you. You do
believe me, Tony?”
Anthony was not looking at her; he was looking straight into the heart
of the fire.
“Yes,” he said in a perfectly level voice; “yes, I believe you. I say—I
say, Daphne, d’you think Henry’d mind if I kept a light in my room all
night?”