LOVE AND THE INFANT DUNDAS
"... Of which, if thou be a severe sour-complexion'd man, then I
hereby disallow thee to be a competent judge."--_The Compleat
Angler._
The Infant Dundas struck up a rag-time on the sergeant-major's
typewriter, did a juggling turn with the army list, and let forth a
few hunting yells; then, seeing that the interpreter had reached the
required state of exasperation, he said:
"Aurelle, why should we stay in this camp? Let's go into the town;
I'll get hold of the Intelligence car, and we'll go and see
Germaine."
Germaine was a pretty, friendly girl who sold novels, chocolates and
electric lamps at Abbeville. Dundas, who was not interested in
women, pretended to have a discreet passion for her; in his mind
France was associated with the idea of love-affairs, and he thought
it the right thing to have a girl-friend there, just as he would have
thought it correct to hunt in Ireland, or to ski at St. Moritz.
But when Germaine, with feigned timidity, directed on him the slowly
dwindling fire of her gaze, Dundas was afraid to put his arm round
her waist; this rosy-cheeked giant, who was a champion boxer and had
been wounded five times, was as bashful and shy as a child.
"Good morning," he would say with a blush.
"Good morning," Germaine would answer, adding in a lower voice for
Aurelle's benefit, "Tell him to buy something."
In vain did Aurelle endeavour to find books for the Infant. French
novels bored him; only the elder Dumas and Alphonse Daudet found
favour in his eyes. Dundas would buy his seventeenth electric lamp,
stop a few minutes on the doorstep to play with Germaine's black dog
Dick, and then say good-bye, giving her hand a long squeeze and going
away perfectly happy in the thought that he had done his duty and
gone on the spree in France in the correct manner.
"A nice boy, your friend--but he is rather shy," she used to say.
On Sundays she went for walks along the river with an enormous mother
and ungainly sisters, escorted gravely by Dundas. The mess did not
approve of these rustic idylls.
"I saw him sitting beside her in a field," said Colonel Parker, "and
his horse was tied to a tree. I think it's disgusting."
"It's shameful," said the padre.
"I'll speak to him about it," said the general, "it's a disgrace to
the mess."
Aurelle tried to speak up for his friend.
"Maybe," said the doctor, "pleasure is a right in France, but in
England it's a crime. With you, Aurelle, when girls see you taking a
lady-friend out, their opinion of you goes up. In London, on the
other hand----"
"Do you mean to say, doctor, that the English never flirt?"
"They flirt more than you do, my boy; that's why they say less about
it. Austerity of doctrine bears a direct proportion to strength of
instinct. You like to discuss these matters, because you think
lightly of them, and in that we Irish resemble you. Our great
writers, such as Bernard Shaw, write thousands of paradoxes about
marriage, because their thoughts are chaste. The English are far more
prudish because their passions are stronger."
"What's all this you're saying, doctor?" interrupted the general. "I
seem to be hearing very strange doctrines."
"We're talking about French morals, sir."
"Is it true, Messiou," inquired Colonel Parker, "that it is the
custom in France for a man to take his wife and his mistress to the
theatre together to the same box?"
"You needn't try to convince Aurelle of your virtue, colonel," said
the doctor; "he's been living with you for four years, and he knows
you."
* * * * *
Meanwhile Dundas continued to go down into Abbeville every day and
meet his friend. The shelling had got very bad, and the inhabitants
began to leave the town. Germaine, however, remained calm. One day a
shell hit the shop next door to hers, and shattered the whole of
the whitewashed front of the house, and the plaster crumbling away
revealed a fine wooden building which for the last two centuries
had been concealing its splendid carved beams beneath a wretched
coat of whitewash. So also did Germaine, divested by danger of her
superficial vulgarity, suddenly show her mettle and prove herself
the daughter of a race of soldiers.
Accordingly Dundas had conceived a warm and respectful friendship for
her. But he went no further until one day when the alarm caught them
together just as he was bidding her good-bye; then only did the
darkness and the pleasant excitement of danger cause him to forget
ceremony and convention for a few minutes.
Next day Germaine presented the Infant with a fat yellow book; it was
Madame de Staels _Corinne_. The rosy-cheeked one looked askance at
the small closely printed pages.
"Aurelle," he implored, "be a good chap and tell me what it's all
about--I'm not going to read the damned thing!"
"It's the story of a young Scotch laird," replied Aurelle, "who wants
to marry a foreign girl against his family's wish."
"My God!" exclaimed Dundas. "Do you think she expects me to marry
her? My cousin Lord Bamford married a dancer and he's very happy;
he's the gentleman and she has the brains. But in this case it's the
mother--she's a terrible creature!"
"The Zulus," put in the doctor, who was listening, "have a religious
custom which forbids the bridegroom-elect to see his mother-in-law.
Should he happen but to see her footprints in the sand, he must turn
and flee. Nothing could be wiser; for love implies an absurd and
boundless admiration for the loved one, and her mother, appearing to
the lover in the very image of his beloved without the charm and
liveliness of youth, will deter him from that brief spell of folly
which is so necessary for the propagation of the species."
"Some mothers are charming," argued Aurelle.
"That's another danger," said the doctor, "for as the mother always
tends to live her daughter's emotional life, there is a constant risk
of her falling in love with her son-in-law."
"My God!" cried Dundas, horror-struck.
However, the German airmen set his fears at rest that very evening by
destroying half the town. The statue of Admiral Courbet in the middle
of the square near the bookseller's shop was hit by a bomb. The
admiral continued to point an outstretched finger towards the
station, but the bookseller cleared out. Germaine followed him
regretfully.
As she was unable to take her dog Dick--a horrid mongrel, half-poodle
and half-spaniel--Dundas gravely consented to look after him. He
loved dogs with a sentimental warmth which he denied to men. Their
ideas interested him, their philosophy was the same as his, and he
used to talk to them for hours at a time like a nurse to her
children.
The general and Colonel Parker were not a bit astonished when he
introduced Dick into the mess. They had found fault with him for
falling in love, but they approved of his adopting a dog.
Dick, an Abbeville guttersnipe, was therefore admitted to the
refinements of the general's table. He remained, however, a rough son
of the people, and barked when Private Brommit appeared with the
meat.
"Behave yourself, sir," Dundas said to him, genuinely shocked,
"behave yourself. A well-brought-up dog never, never does that. A
good dog never barks indoors, never, never, never."
Germaine's pet was offended and disappeared for three days. The
orderlies reported he had been seen in the country in doubtful
company. At last he returned, cheerful and unkempt, with one ear torn
and one eye bleeding, and asked to be let in by barking merrily.
"You're a very naughty dog, sir," said Dundas as he nursed him
adroitly, "a very, very bad little dog indeed."
Whereupon he turned towards the general.
"I'm very much afraid, sir," he said, "that this fellow Dick is not
quite a gentleman."
"He's a French dog," replied General Bramble with sorrowful
forbearance.