The primitive, the proletarian, the common man and woman solution is

merely one of _quantity_. Get all the grub and copulation you want and

more than you want and ipso facto you will be happy. Put money in thy

purse. Excellent Iago, what a fool you are! Noble Caliban, what a silly

beast! Savages, the heroes of Homer and working men gorge on the flesh

of beeves. To sack a town and rape all the women was the sexual ideal

of centuries of civilized savages. To do the same thing with money

sneakingly, instead of with the sword openly, is the actual ideal of

Dr. Frank Crane’s world-famous business men. The judgment of the wiser

world is upon them all. Let them join the megatherium and the wild ass.

Then you have the Rudyard Kipling or British Public School solution.

Not so far removed from the other as you might think, for it is

a harnessing of the same primitive instincts to the service of a

group—the nation—instead of to the service of the individual.

Whatever is done for the Empire is right. Not Truth and Justice, but

British Truth and British Justice. Odious profanation! You are the

servant of the Empire, never mind whether you are rich or poor, do what

the Empire tells you, and so long as the Empire is rich and powerful

you ought to be happy. Woman? A rag, a bone, and a hank of hair. Get

rid of the sexual problem by teaching men to despise women, either by

open scorn or by putting them on the pedestal of chastity. Of course,

they’re valuable as possessions. Oh, quite! There can be no world peace

because the man who has the most money gets the best woman, as the

German Kaiser said at the gathering of the nations. As if the nations

were a set of Kiplingesque characters bidding against each other for an

expensive tart! How despicable, how odious!

No, each of us has to work out the problems for himself and, I repeat,

on the correct solution of both depends happiness in life. I do not

pretend to be able to teach what is your solution. I think I know what

is mine; but that is not necessarily yours. But I am quite sure that

the quantitative and the British Public School solutions are wrong....

The struggle with Hunger, or the economic problem, leads to situations

of astonishing “human interest,” as Balzac recognized. But we are not

much concerned with it here. It was highly important in the case of

Isabel; very little in the case of Elizabeth and George. They were

content with very little, which they obtained quite easily—Elizabeth

from her parents, George by various odd jobs which occupied only a

comparatively small part of his time. Each wanted to avoid the slavery

of working eight hours a day at a stated wage, for some one else,

though both were willing to work sixteen hours a day on their own, at

what they wanted to do. Neither had the slightest ambition to dominate

others through wealth. Of course, you may say they solved the economic

problem by dodging it. However, as far as they are concerned as

individuals, that _was_ a solution.

But this “dodging solution” (if you like to call it such) involved the

sexual problem, too. It was quite obvious that George was incapable

of supporting a woman and children on his perfunctorily performed

jobs, while his painting was rather a liability than an asset. On the

other hand, it was equally obvious that Elizabeth was not rich enough

to afford the luxury of an artist husband and a family. It therefore

followed that they could not afford children, and since they didn’t

want them, this was a misfortune they contemplated with calm. But,

since they didn’t want children, it followed that there was no need to

get married. Why get married, except for the sake of the unfortunate

little bastard?

All of which they talked out very fully before they ever lay together.

You may say, of course, that this is very wicked and “unnatural,” that

if every one acted in this way the human race would soon come to a

full stop. I shall not make the obvious retort of “a good job too,”

but merely say that I observe no danger of under-population in Europe.

Since the population of England is about three times the amount which

the land of England can feed, I am inclined to think that George and

Elizabeth should be regarded as a national hero and heroine in this

respect....

If you are as quick-witted as you ought to be you will already have

noticed one big difference between the George-Elizabeth _ménage_

(I don’t mean the legal irregularity, which is of no importance)

and the _ménages_ of George Augustus-Isabel, Dear Mamma-Dear Papa,

Ma-and-Pa Hartly. “They talked it out very fully before they ever

lay together.” You get the point? They used their intelligence, they

actually used their intelligence _before_ embarking on a joint sexual

experience. That’s the great break in the generations. Trying to use

some intelligence in life, instead of blindly following instincts and

the collective imbecility of the ages as embodied in social and legal

codes. Isabel “married for money” and got what she deserved, viz.,

bankruptcy. But she had been obliquely taught that it was a girl’s duty

to use men’s sexual passions as a means of acquiring property. Whoring

within the law. The Trade Union of married women. George Augustus was

greatly attracted by Isabel and wanted to lie with her. Why not? My

God, why not? But he had never thought about the problems. He didn’t

want children; Isabel didn’t want children. Not really. But they had

been taught that if a man and woman wanted to lie together it was

horribly wicked to do so unless they were “married.” The parson, the

public ceremonies and the signatures made “sacred” what was otherwise

inexpressibly wrong and sinful. But in the code on which George

Augustus and Isabel were reared “marriage” meant “a dear little baby”

nine months after the wedding bells. All right for those who go into it

with open eyes. Perfect. Charming. I’ll be godfather every ten months.

J’adore les enfants. But all wrong, all so rottenly wrong, if you go

into it like a couple of ninnies, mess up your sexual life, disappoint

the man, disgust the woman, and produce an infant you can’t look after

properly....

Which is precisely what George Augustus and Isabel did, and what their

parents did before them....

Now the marriage of Molière’s time was jolly sensible so far as it

went. You, Eraste, love Lisette? Good. You, Lisette, love Eraste?

Admirable. You wish to crown your flame? Most natural and delightful.

But you know that means infants? Perfect. How much money have you

got, Eraste? Nothing? Ah!... But your father approves? Will give ten

thousand crowns if Lisette’s father will give another five thousand?

Delicious. _Quite_ a different situation. Your father approves,

Lisette? Yes? Quick, a notary. Bless you, my children.

That was blunt, bluff common-sense. I’m sorry for Lisette, but not for

Lisette’s children.

The only trouble was that Lisette and Eraste were not very happy

sexually—hence the _amants_ of Lisette and the _amies_ of Eraste. So

you dropped into promiscuity, and Eraste didn’t know if Lisette’s later

brats were his; and Lisette didn’t know how many dear little bastards

Eraste was scattering about the world. All of which made for nastiness,

cantankerousness and hypocrisy.

The simple process of dissociating sex life from the philoprogenitive

instinct was performed by the War Generation—at least on the grand

scale, for isolated practitioners had long existed. The march of

Science (how delightful clichés are!) had brought certain engines

within the reach of all; and sensible people profited by them. The old

alternative of burning or marrying disappeared. And the following,

far better proposition arose. It was perfectly possible for man or

woman to live a satisfactory sex life without having children. Hence,

by the scientific process of trial and error, it became possible for

each to seek the really satisfactory lover; while those who were

philoprogenitively inclined might marry (en attendant mieux) for the

sake of the children. Thus there was a return to the wise promiscuity

of the Ancients (if the Ancients ever did anything so sensible, which I

greatly doubt) which was a great advance on humbug, domestic tyranny,

furtive promiscuity and whoring. One definite result, which we see

to-day, is an undeniable decline in the number of whores—the first

time this has occurred since the Edict of Milan.

Unfortunately the pre-war “engines” were rather crude and not wholly

reliable....

George and Elizabeth, then, were either extremely sensible or

disgustingly immoral—I don’t mind what your judgment is, I am

recording facts. I don’t, however, attempt to disguise my own

prejudice, which is that intelligence makes for a far better life than

“Luv” and “God,” those euphuisms for stupidity and ignorance. In a

manner of speaking they were pioneers. At any rate, they thought they

were, which is all that matters here. They really thought they had

worked out a more sensible, more intelligent, more humane relationship

between the sexes. But there were certain rather important little

snags they overlooked. Like most bright young things, they were very

cock-sure of themselves, a good bit too cock-sure. And then, while one

doesn’t at all deny that they were pretty bright, and on the right

track, their knowledge was unhappily theoretical, chiefly derived

from George’s reading and meditations. It’s a confoundedly dangerous

thing for two virgins to take on the job of initiating each other into

a complicated art they only know theoretically. Dangerous, in that

high hopes may be dashed, rather lovely emotions sadly frustrated and

a beautiful relationship spoiled. There are dangers in meeting the

undeniably right person too soon in life. Two handsome young married

people, obviously deeply in love—what a charming spectacle, how

delightful.... Wait! You wait! Not very long either....

* * * * *

You haven’t forgotten Fanny and the young man from Cambridge....

* * * * *

Well, Elizabeth and George worked out their scheme, and for a

considerable time it all worked admirably. But for the war and the

upset of every one’s mind and life and character, it might have

weathered the small storms of Fanny and the young man—and perhaps

other Fannies and other young men—and still have gone on working.

Elizabeth abandoned her Hampstead boarding house, and found a large

room, which did as a studio, in Bloomsbury. She wrote her parents

in Manchester that she did this for the sake of economy and to be

nearer her “work”—whatever that might mean. The economy consisted in

the fact that when she spent the night with George at his “studio”

she was obviously not wearing out her own bed clothes. Elizabeth’s

mother paid her a surprise visit. Most luckily George had gone away

for the week-end, and Elizabeth was “discovered” calmly painting by

herself. She behaved with the admirable dissimulation which comes so

naturally to women, swiftly whipped away one or two objects (such as a

tobacco pipe and pouch, the _Psychology of Sex_, inscribed “To darling

Elizabeth from George”) which might have betrayed a certain intimacy

with a male, and sent George a long warning telegram. Mrs. Paston

stayed three days. Of course, she suspected “something.” Elizabeth

looked about ten times prettier, was much more smartly dressed, talked

differently, used all sorts of new phrases, and was obviously very

happy, so happy that even three days of her mother failed to depress

her completely. Elizabeth treated her char-lady with reasonable

humanity, so when Mrs. Paston severely cross-examined her in secret

about Elizabeth, the char-lady just went beautifully stupid and stood

by Elizabeth nobly. “Oh, no, Ma’am, I never seen nothin’ wrong.” “Oh,

yes, Ma’am, Miss Elizabeth’s such a nice young lady.” “I’m only here of

mornings, Ma’am.” So Mrs. Paston, baffled but somewhat suspicious—what

right had Elizabeth to look so well and happy and pretty away from her

dear parents?—had to return home and present a blank report.

So that alarm died down.

* * * * *

Elizabeth became inordinately proud of being no longer a virgin. You

might have thought she was the only devirginated young woman in London.

But, like King Midas, she burned to share her secret, to make somebody

else envious. So one week when George had run over to Paris about some

pictures, she invited Fanny to tea, and after a tremendous amount

of preparation, confessed the lovely secret. Partly to Elizabeth’s

disappointment and partly to her relief, Fanny took the news as

something very ordinary.

“I’m really surprised you waited so long, my dear.”

“But you’re nearly as old as I am!”

“Oh, but, darling, didn’t you _know?_ I’ve had two or three affairs.

Only I didn’t say anything to _you_. I thought you’d be shocked.”

“Shocked?” Elizabeth laughed scornfully, though she _was_ a bit

surprised. “Why on earth should _I_ be shocked? _I_ think people should

be free to have all the love affairs they want.”

“Do tell me who he is!”

Elizabeth blushed slightly and hesitated.

“No, I won’t tell you now, but you’ll meet him soon.”

“But, Elizabeth, I hope you’re careful? You won’t go and have a baby?”

Elizabeth laughed scornfully again.

“Have a baby? Of course not! Why ever do you think I’m so silly? George

and I talked it—”

“Oh! His name’s ‘George’ is it?”

“Yes. Did I let that out? Yes, George Winterbourne. Well, we talked

it all out, and we’ve got a perfectly good arrangement. George says

we’re too young to have children, so why get married; and anyway we’re

too poor. If we want children later on, we can always _get_ married. I

said I wouldn’t tie myself down with _any_ man—I don’t want anybody

else’s name. I told George that if I wanted other lovers I should have

them, and if he wanted any one else he was to have her. But, of course,

when there’s a relationship as firmly established as ours, one doesn’t

_want_ any one else.”

Fanny smiled.

* * * * *

As a matter of fact, Elizabeth had not said anything of the sort, when

George drew up his Triumphal Scheme of the Perfect Sex Relationship.

She had been rather timid and uncertain at first. But George’s

discourses and the books on physiology and psychology and sex which he

made her read and her own exultation at being no longer a virgin had

sent her spinning in the other direction. She had, in a few months,

far outdistanced George in “freedom.” Her argument was rational and

quite defensible; indeed it was a corollary to George’s own views,

though he hadn’t seen it. Because you were very fond of one person, she

argued, that was no reason why you shouldn’t be attracted by others.

Monogamy was established to tyrannize women and to make sure offspring

were legitimate and to provide for them and the mother. But where

women are free and there is no offspring, what on earth is the good

of an artificial and forced fidelity? Directly one has to _promise_

fidelity, directly an effort of will is made to “remain faithful,” a

false position is set up. The effort of keeping such a promise is the

surest assurance that it will be broken sooner or later. On the other

hand, while you are in love with some one, well, you’re in love, and

you either don’t want any one else, or if you do, you’re probably only

too happy to get back speedily to the person you do really care for.

There was logic and a good deal of sense in this, George had to admit.

But he also had to admit to himself that he didn’t altogether like the

idea of Elizabeth “going with” somebody else. Nor, for that matter,

would Elizabeth have liked George “going with” another girl. But she

deceived herself unknowingly. At that time she was very much under the

influence of a Swedish book she had read, a book devoted to the Future

of the Race. This was the work of an earnest-minded virgin of fifty

who laid it down as an indisputable axiom that there must be complete

frankness between the sexes. “The old notion of sexual fidelity must

go,” declared this enthusiastic writer, “and only from the golden

sun-bath of divinely nude freedom can rise the glorious new race et

cetera, et cetera.” Elizabeth didn’t know the authoress was an old

maid, and she was annoyed with George for making fun of the “golden

sun-bath of divinely nude freedom.”

“But, Elizabeth,” George had said, when she propounded this argument,

“of course, I believe that people should be free, and it’s disgusting

for them to stay together when they don’t any longer love each other.

But suppose I happened to want some one else, just a sort of whim, and

went on loving you, wouldn’t it be better if I said nothing about it?

And the same with you?”

“And tell each other lies? Why, George, you yourself have said time and

again that there can be no genuine relationship which involves deceit.

The very essence and beauty and joy of our relation depend upon its

being honest and frank and accepting facts.”

“Why, yes, but...”

“Look at the lives of our parents, look at all the sneaking adulteries

going on at this very moment in every suburb of London. Don’t you see,

why, you _must_ see, that what’s wrong about adultery is not the sexual

part of it at all, but the plotting and sneaking and dissimulation and

lies and pretence....”

“That’s true,” said George slowly and reflectively, “that’s true.

But—suppose I told you that when I was last in Paris I spent the

nights with Georgina Harris?”

“Did you?”

“No, of course not. But, you see...”

“What would it have mattered if you had? My Swedish woman you make fun

of is very sound about that. She says that two people should spend a

few days or more away from each other every few weeks, and that it

may be a very good thing for them to have other sexual experience. It

prevents any feeling of sameness and satiety, and often brings two

people together more closely than ever, if only they’re frank about it.”

“I wonder,” said George, “I wonder. Is there any one you’re interested

in, Elizabeth?”

“Of course not. You’re really rather unintelligent about this, George.

You know perfectly well I love you and shall never love any one else

so much. But there mustn’t be any lying and dissimulation, and no

artificial fidelity. If you want to go off for a night or a week-end

or a week with some charming girl or woman, you must go. And if I want

to do the same with a man, I must. Don’t you see that by thwarting a

mere _béguin_ you may turn it into something more serious, whereas by

enjoying it you get rid of it? Probably, as my Swedish woman says, one

is so much disappointed that a single night is more than enough, and

one returns to one’s love eagerly, cured of wandering fancies for the

next six months.”

“Yes, I daresay there’s something in that. It seems sound. And yet if

the original relationship is so secure and if the other affair is so

slight and unimportant and merely physical, it seems unnecessary to

hurt one’s love by speaking about it. I don’t tell you every day what I

had for lunch. Besides, even if one spends only one night with another

person that implies at least a one night’s preference which might hurt.”

“Which might hurt!” Elizabeth mocked. “George, you’re being positively

old-fashioned. Why, when you go to Paris, isn’t that a preference? And

when I go to Fanny’s cottage in the country for a week-end, isn’t that

a preference? How do you know we’re not Sapphic friends?”

“I’m jolly sure you’re not! You’re neither of you in the least bit

Lesbian types. Besides, you’d have told me.”

“You see! You know quite well I’d have told you.”

“Yes, but going to Paris or the country for a few days isn’t the same

sort of ‘preference.’”

The argument tailed off in a futile attempt to define “preference.”

Ultimately Elizabeth carried her point. It was definitely established

that “nothing could break” a relationship such as theirs; but that

“love itself must have rest” and therefore there was wisdom in

occasional short separations; that so far from breaking up such

a relationship occasional “slight affairs” elsewhere would only

strengthen and stimulate it. George allowed himself to be convinced.

The snag here lay in the fact that he had definitely sensed the

possible danger of arousing jealousy, whereas Elizabeth, confident in

herself and the theories of her Swedish old maid, scorned the idea that

so base a passion could even enter _their_ relation.

* * * * *

About two months after this George and Elizabeth were cheerfully dining

in a small Soho restaurant when Fanny came in with a young man, the

“young man from Cambridge,” Reggie Burnside.

“Oh, look!” exclaimed Elizabeth, “there’s Fanny and a friend with her.

Fanny! Fanny!” signalling across the room. Fanny came across.

“This is George Winterbourne. You’ve often heard of Fanny, George. I

say, Fanny, do come and have dinner with us.”

“Yes, do.”

“But I’ve got Reggie Burnside with me.”

“Well, bring him along too.”

The young man was introduced, and they sat down at the table. In most

respects Fanny was curiously different from Elizabeth; each was not so

much the antithesis as the complement to the other. Fanny was just a

little taller than Elizabeth (George disliked short women), and where

Elizabeth was dark and Egyptian-looking and pale, Fanny was golden and

English (not chocolate-box English) and most delicate white and red.

She was a bit like Priscilla, George thought, but with the soft gold of

Priscilla made hard and glittering like an exquisite metallic flower.

There was something both gem-like and flower-like in Fanny. Perhaps

that was due to her eyes. With other women you are conscious almost

immediately of all sorts of beauties and defects, but with Fanny you

were instantaneously absorbed by the eyes. When you thought about her

afterwards, you just saw a mental image of those extraordinary blue

eyes, disassociated from the rest of her, like an Edgar Poe vision.

But unlike so many vivid blue eyes, they were gem-like rather than

flower-like; they were not soft nor stupid nor sentimental nor languid,

but clear, alert and rather hard. You may see exactly their shade

of colour in the deeper parts of Lake Garda on a sunny day. Yet the

quality was not aqueous, but vitreous. Venetian glass, perhaps? No,

that is too opaque. It is very hard to say what was the quality which

made them so remarkable. Men looked at them once and fell helplessly

in love, one might say almost noisily in love—Fanny didn’t mind, it

was obviously her _métier_ to have men fall in love with her. Perhaps

Fanny’s eyes were simply made a symbol in the imagination of that

mysterious sexual attraction which radiated from her, or perhaps they

conformed to some unwritten but instinctively recognized canon of the

perfect eye, the Platonic “idea” of eyes....

With Elizabeth you saw not the eyes alone, but the whole head. You

would have liked to keep Fanny’s eyes, magnificently set in gold, in

an open jewel-casket, to look at when you doubted whether any beauty

remained in the dull world. But with Elizabeth you wanted the whole

head, it was so much like one of those small stone heads of Egyptian

princesses in the Louvre. So very Egyptian. The full delicately-moulded

lips, the high cheek-bones, the slightly oblique eye-sockets, the

magnificent line from ear to chin, the upward sweep of the wide

brow, the straight black hair. Oddly enough, on analysis Elizabeth’s

eyes proved to be quite as beautiful as Fanny’s, but somehow less

ostentatiously lovely. They were deeper and softer, and which is rare

in dark eyes, intelligent. Fanny’s blue eyes were intelligent enough,

but they hadn’t quite the subtle depths of Elizabeth’s, they hadn’t the

same reserve.

Elizabeth lived very much in and on herself; Fanny was a whole-hearted

extravert. Where Elizabeth hesitated, mused, suffered, Fanny acted,

came a cropper, picked herself up gaily and started off again with

just the same zest for experience. She was more smartly dressed

than Elizabeth. Of course, Elizabeth was always quite charming and

attractive, but you guessed that she had other things to think about

beside clothes. Fanny loved clothes, and with no more money than

Elizabeth, contrived to look stunningly fashionable where Elizabeth

merely looked O. K. Oddly enough, Fanny was not devoured by the Scylla

of clothes, the monster of millinery which is never satiate with its

female victims. Her energy saved her from that. She and Elizabeth were

both restlessly energetic, but whereas Elizabeth’s energy went into

dreaming and arguing and trying to paint, Fanny’s went into all sorts

of activities with all sorts of persons. She did not “do” anything,

having sense enough to see that in most young women, “art” is merely a

kind of safety-valve for sex. Fanny, I’m glad to say, did not need a

safety-valve for her sex; the steam-pressure was kept regulated and the

engine worked perfectly, thank you very much. She was emotionally and

mentally far less complicated than Elizabeth, less profound; therefore

to her the new sexual régime, where perfect freedom has happily taken

the place of service, presented fewer possible snags. I’ve said, of

course, that Fanny sometimes came a cropper; she did, but she hadn’t

Elizabeth’s capacity for suffering, Elizabeth’s desolate despair when

her silk purse turned out to be a sow’s ear—which every one else had

known long before.

Perhaps the remarkable quality of Elizabeth’s mind and character is

best shown by the fact that she never said or implied anything mean or

nasty about Fanny’s clothes....

* * * * *

Reggie Burnside was a rich young man engaged in some mysterious

“research work” at Cambridge, something connected with the structure

of the atom, and highly impressive because the nature of his work

could only be explained in elaborate mathematical symbols. He wore

spectacles, talked in a high intellectual voice with the peculiar

intonation and blurred syllables favoured by some members of that

great centre of learning, and appeared exceedingly weary. Even Fanny’s

impetuous dash never galvanized him into a spontaneous action or a

natural remark. He also was extremely modern, and was devoted to

Fanny. He was always at hand when nothing better presented itself—the

permanent second string to the fiddle, or, as Fanny put it, one of her

_fautes_, adding sotto-voce, my _faute-de-mieux_.

The talk at first was the usual high-brow chatter of the

period—Flecker and Brooke and Mr. Russell, referred to as “Bertie”

in a casual way by Fanny and Reggie, to the mystification of George.

This is one of the charming traits of the English intelligentsia. Every

one they don’t know is an outsider, and they love to keep the outsider

outside by a gently condescending patronage. A most effective method is

to talk nonchalantly about well-known people by their Christian names:

“Have you read Johnny’s last book?”

“No-oh. Not yet. The last one was a dreadful bore. Is this any better?”

“No-oh, I don’t think so. Tommy dislikes it profoundly. Says it reminds

him of sports on the village green.”

“How a-_mus_ing!”

“Oh, Tommy can be quite a-_mus_ing at times. I was with him and Bernard

the other day, and Bernard said...”

And if the outsider is silly enough to bite, and to say timidly or

bluntly: “Who’s Johnny?” the answer comes swift and sweet:

“O-oh! Don’t you _know_...!”

And then the dazzled outsider is condescendingly informed who “Johnny”

is, and especially if a mere American or Continental, is crushed to

learn that “Johnny” is Johnny Walker or some other enormously brilliant

light in the firmament of British culture....

* * * * *

George got sick of hearing about “Bertie” without being told who the

devil Bertie was, and began to talk about Ezra Pound, Jules Romains and

Modigliani. But he soon learned by sweet implication that such people

might be all very well in their way, but after all, well, you know

what I mean, Cambridge _is_ Cambridge.... So George shut up, and said

nothing. Then Reggie began to talk to Elizabeth about Alpine climbing,

the sport of Dons—and a very appropriate one too, if you think about

it. And Fanny talked to George.

Now Fanny was quite a subtile little beast of the field, and saw

that George was a bit sulky, and guessed why. Vapourish airs were

indifferent to her. She had been brought up among such people, and

unconsciously adopted their tone when speaking to them. But when she

was among other sorts of people she just as unconsciously dropped the

vapourish airs, and let her natural self respond to theirs. She had

a foot, one might almost say a leg, in several social worlds; and

got on perfectly well in any of them. There was a sort of physical

indifference in Fanny which at first sight looked like mere hardness,

and wasn’t. In fact, she wasn’t nearly as hard as Elizabeth, who could

be quite Stonehenge-y at times. And then suddenly crumble. But Fanny’s

physical indifference carried her through a lot; one felt that her

morning bath had something Lethean about it, and washed away the memory

of last night’s lover along with his touch.

So Fanny began to talk to George quite naturally and gaily. He was

suspicious, and gave her three verbal bangs in quick succession. She

took them with unflinching good humour, and went on talking and trying

to find out what he was interested in. George pretty soon melted to

her gaiety—or perhaps it was the gem-like eyes. He looked at them,

and wondered what it felt like to possess natural organs which were

such superb _objets d’art_. They must, he reflected, cause her a good

deal of annoyance. Every man who met her would feel called upon to

inform her that she had wonderful eyes, as if he had made an astounding

discovery, hitherto unrevealed by any one. George decided that it would

be well _not_ to comment upon Fanny’s eyes at a first meeting.

Reggie had failed to interest Elizabeth in Alpine climbing, and

switched off on to “a_mus_ing” anecdotes, which were more successful.

Under the mild influence of a little wine and a sympathetic listener

Reggie shed some of his worst mannerisms, and became almost human.

He liked Elizabeth. She might not be wholly “a_mus_ing” but she was

“re_fresh_ing.” (She was a good listener.) And when the talk once again

became general, George began to think that Reggie was not such a bad

fellow after all; there was a sort of “niceness” about him, the genuine

English pride and good nature under a screen of affectation.

They sat over coffee and cigarettes until the fidgeting of the waiter

and “Madame’s” little games with the electric switches warned them that

their money and absence would now be more welcome than their company.

It was well after ten—too late for the cinema. They walked down

Shaftesbury Avenue, George with Reggie, and Elizabeth with Fanny.

“I like your George,” said Fanny.

“Do you? I’m so glad.”

“He’s a bit _farouche_, but I like the way he enthuses about what

interests him. It’s not put on.”

“I think Reggie’s rather nice.”

“Oh! Reggie....” and Fanny waved her hand with a little shrug.

“But he _is_ nice, Fanny. You know you like him.”

“Yes, he’s all right. I’m not wild about him. You can have him, if you

want.”

“Oh! Oh!” Elizabeth laughed, “wait till I ask you!”

* * * * *

They separated at Piccadilly Circus. Fanny and Reggie went off

somewhere in a taxi. Coming down Shaftesbury Avenue, George had noticed

that it was a clear night with a full moon, and insisted on going to

the Embankment to see the moonlight on the Thames. They turned into the

Haymarket.

“What do you think of Fanny?” asked Elizabeth.

“I think she has most marvelous eyes.”

“Yes, that’s what every one says.”

“I was trying to be original! But she’s a nice girl, too. At first,

when she and Burnside began talking, I thought she was hopelessly

infected by his sort of affectation.”

“Why! Don’t you like him? I thought he was charming.”

“Charming? I shouldn’t say that. I think he’s not a bad sort of fellow

really, but you know how exasperating I find the Cambridge bleat. Ah’d

much raver lis’n to a muckin’ Cawkn’y, swop me bob, I would.”

“But you know he’s a very important young scientist, and supposed to be

doing marvelous research work.”

“Do you know what it is?”

“No. Fanny couldn’t tell me. She said you had to be a specialist

yourself to understand what he’s doing.”

“Well, I must say I’m a bit suspicious of these mysterious

‘specialists,’ who can’t even tell you plainly what they’re doing.

I think Boileau’s right—what’s accurately conceived can be clearly

expressed. When Science begins to talk the language of mystic Theology

and superstition, I begin to suspect it vehemently. Besides, only the

feeble sections of any aristocracy take on vapourish airs and affected

ways of talk. Well-bred people haven’t any affectations. And men with

really fine minds haven’t any intellectual vanity.”

“Oh, but Reggie isn’t vain. He didn’t even mention his work to me. And

he told such a_mus_ing stories.”

“That’s just another form of insolence—they assume you’re too ignorant

and stupid to understand their great and important labours, so they

never condescend even to mention them, but tell ‘a_mus_ing stories,’ as

I see you’ve already learned to call Common-Room gossip.”

Elizabeth was silent, ominously silent. She was more used to the

Cambridge manner than George was, and thought he fussed too much

about it. Besides, she had been really attracted by Reggie. She

thought George was making a jealous scene. There she did him a wrong;

it never occurred to George that Elizabeth might fall in love with

Reggie. (Oddly enough, it never _does_ occur to a husband or a lover

_in esse_ to suspect his probable coadjutor—until it is too late. He

suspects plenty of wrong people, but rarely the right one. The Cyprian

undoubtedly has artful ways.) As a matter of fact, George had not the

slightest feeling of jealousy. He was merely saying what he felt, as

he would have done about any other chance acquaintance. He respected

Elizabeth’s silence. It was one of their numerous pacts—to respect

each other’s silence. So they walked mutely down Whitehall, while

George thought vaguely about Fanny and his next day’s work and cocked

his head up to try to see the moon and watched the occasional busses

bounding along like rapid barges in the empty light-filled river of

Belgian blocks; and Elizabeth brooded over the supposed revelation

of a hitherto unsuspected tendency to silly jealousy in George. But

just as they approached the Abbey, George slipped his arm through

hers so naturally, affectionately and unsuspiciously that Elizabeth’s

ill-humour vanished, and in two minutes they were chattering as volubly

as ever.

They walked along the Embankment from Westminster Bridge towards the

City. A serene sky hung over London, transposed to an astonishing blue

by the complementary yellow of the brilliant street lights. A few

trams and taxis were still moving on the Embankment, but after the

ceaseless roar of day traffic, the air seemed almost silent. At times,

they could hear the lap and gurgle of the swift river water, as the

strong flood tide ran inland, bearing a faint flavour of salt. The

river was beautifully silver in the soft steady moonlight which wavered

into multitudes of ripples as soon as it touched the broken surface of

the Thames. Blocks of moored barges stood black and immovable in the

silver flood. The Southern bank was dark, low and motionless, except

for the luminous announcements of the blessings of Lipton’s Tea and

the Daily Mail. The Scotchman in coloured moving lights pledged the

bonny highlands in countless sparkling glasses of electric whiskey.

Hungerford Railway Bridge seemed filled with the red eyes of immense

dragons, whose vast bulk lay coiled somewhere invisibly on either bank.

Occasionally a red eye would wink green, and presently a brightly-lit

train would crawl cautiously and heavily over the vibrating bridge. The

lighted windows of the Cecil and the Savoy aroused no envy in them. Nor

did they pine to inspect the records of a great people lying behind the

darkened and silent façade of Somerset House.

Opposite the quiet Temple Garden they paused by the parapet and looked

up and down that magnificent sweep of river, with its amazing mixture

of dignified beauty and almost incredible sordidness. They stood for

some time, talking in quiet tones, comparing the Thames with the Seine,

and wondering what dream-like city would have arisen by those noble

curves if London had been inhabited by a race of artists. Elizabeth

wanted to set Florence or Oxford on either side of the Thames between

Westminster and St. Paul’s. George agreed that that would be lovely,

but thought the buildings would be dwarfed by the width of the river,

the long bridges and the length of façade. And they finally agreed

that with all its sordidness and hugger-mugger and strange contrast of

palaces abutting on slums, the Embankment had a beauty of its own which

they would not exchange even for the dream-city of a race of artists.

Midnight boomed with majestic, policeman-like slowness from Big Ben;

and as the last deep vibrations faded from the air, the great city

seemed to be gliding into sleep and silence. They lingered a little

longer, and then turned to go.

Then, for the first time they noticed what they knew would be there

but had forgotten in their absorbed delight in the silvery water and

moon-washed outlines of the city—that on every bench sat crouched or

huddled one or more miserable ragged human beings. In front of them

ran the mystically lovely river; behind them the dark masses of the

Temple rose solidly and sternly defensive of Law and Order behind

the spear-front of its tall sharp-pointed iron fence. And there they

crouched and huddled in rags and hunger and misery, free-born members

of the greatest Empire the earth has yet seen, citizens of Her who so

proudly claimed to be the wealthiest of cities, the exchange and mart

of the whole world.

George gave what change he had in his pockets to a noseless syphilitic

hag, and Elizabeth emptied her purse into the hand of a shivering child

which had to be awakened to receive the gift, and cowered as if it

thought it was going to be struck.

Ignoring the hag’s hoarse: “Thank yer kindly, Sir, Gord bless yer,

Lidy,” they fled clutching each other’s hands. They did not speak until

they said good-night outside Elizabeth’s door.

[ VI ]

During 1913 life ran on very pleasantly and happily for George and

Elizabeth. As in the cases of the fortunate nations without a history,

there appears to be very little to record about this year. I make no

doubt that it was the happiest in George’s life. He was, as they say,

“getting on,” and had less need to worry about money. In the spring

they went to Dorsetshire and stayed at an Inn. Elizabeth did a certain

amount of painting, but apart from a few sketches George did not

attempt landscape—especially the picturesque landscape; he wanted his

painting to be urban, contemporary and hard. They walked a good deal

over Worbarrow Down and the rather desolate heath land round about.

On more than one occasion they traversed the very same piece of land

where George was afterwards in camp with me, a coincidence which seemed

to make a great impression upon him. Certain aspects of a familiar

landscape always call up the same train of thought: and as people are

never weary of telling us what particularly strikes them, so George

rarely failed to convey this piece of stale news to me as we walked out

of camp by what had once been the rough cart-track he and Elizabeth had

followed in less desolate days. He seemed to think it remarkable that

he should be so miserable in exactly the same place where he had once

been so happy. As I pointed out, that showed great ignorance of the

ironic temper of the gods, who are very fond of such genial contrasts.

They delight to lay a corpse in a marriage bed, and to strike down a

great nation in the fullest flush of its pride and power. One might

think that happiness was “hubris,” the excess which calls down the

vengeance of Fate.

They returned to London for a few weeks, and then went to Paris,

Elizabeth adored Paris, and wanted to live there permanently; but

George was against it. He had got some bug about the best art being

“autochthonous,” and declared that an artist ought to live in his own

country. But the real reason was that Parisian life seemed so pleasant

and the town so full of artists more gifted and more advanced than

himself that he found it almost impossible to work there. It was easier

to feel important in the comparative desert of London. So they returned

to London, and in the autumn George had his first “show,” which was not

altogether such a failure as he had expected.

When autumn turned to winter, and the yellow leaves of the plane

trees drifted down into heaps in the London squares lying miserably

sodden under the rain—the everlasting London drizzle—Elizabeth got

very restless. She wanted to get away, anywhere under blue skies and

sun. Her throat and lungs were rather sensitive, and when the weather

turned foggy, she nearly choked in the heavy soot-laden stifling air.

They talked about going to Italy or Spain, but George knew only too

well that he could not afford it. He might indeed get assurances from

various impresarios he frequented that “work could go on as usual,”

but he knew only too well that a month’s absence would mean a decline

and that after three months he would be practically forgotten and

dropped. It’s a dangerous thing to have a national reputation for

honesty—people get to trading upon it and seem to think it absolves

them from individual obligations. So George, after forming various

vague plans for a delightful winter in Sicily or the island of Majorca,

had to admit to Elizabeth that he simply dared not go. He begged her to

go alone, or to find some friend to go with her. But Elizabeth flatly

refused to go without him. So they stayed in London, and worked and

coughed together. Perhaps it might have been better to take the risk,

for as things turned out George never saw either Spain or Italy, which

he had wanted to see so much.

Fanny came to London for a week in November, before going South for the

winter, and they saw her nearly every day. Fanny and George were by

this time on a footing of pretty friendly familiarity. That is to say,

they always kissed each other on meeting and parting—after Fanny had

kissed Elizabeth—and held hands in taxis whether Elizabeth was there

or not. Elizabeth didn’t object at all. Not only because of her theory

of freedom. She was at that time rather deeply involved in some theory

of “erogenous zones” in women, and men’s reaction to them. And she had

got it firmly into her mind that Fanny was “sexually antipathetic” to

George, because he had one day innocently and casually remarked that

he thought Fanny rather flat-chested. Elizabeth leaped on this—it

confirmed her theory so nicely. George had known Fanny for over a year

and “nothing had happened” between them, and therefore it was plain

that Fanny’s “erogenous zones” awoke no response in him.

“Most peculiar,” said Elizabeth, when she discussed the matter with

a demure-looking but mighty ironical Fanny, “_I_ should have thought

you’d be the very type of woman to attract him. But he only talks about

your ‘marvellous eyes,’ and they aren’t erogenous zones at all. That

means he only likes you as a human being....”

So Elizabeth took no notice when Fanny kissed George; or when she

said: “George darling, do go and get some cigarettes for me,” and

George departed with alacrity; or when George called Fanny “My love”

or “Fanny darling.” People throw these endearments about so liberally

nowadays, how on earth is one to know? And, in fact, all this went on

for a long time, and nothing did “happen.” George was quite devoted

to Elizabeth, and then they were away when Fanny was in London, and

Fanny was away when they were in London. Both George and Fanny begged

Elizabeth to “go South” with Fanny, but Elizabeth wouldn’t. She was

very loyal, and wouldn’t take a holiday George couldn’t share. But

by this time Fanny had become fond of George, very fond indeed. She

was weary of Reggie, who was sometimes so absorbed in atoms that he

neglected his functions as Fanny’s _faute-de-mieux_. She thought it

might be an excellent plan if she and Elizabeth swopped riders, so to

speak. Not that she wanted to “take George away” from his mistress.

Oh! Not at all. Fanny didn’t want him as a _permanence_—Elizabeth

was welcome to that. But she felt he might do excellently as a locum

tenens, while Elizabeth was widening her experience with Reggie. So

there was an unusual warmth in her farewell kiss to George, who had

gone down to see her off at Victoria, and a lingeringly soft pressure

of her hand, and a particularly inviting look in her beautiful eyes.

“Good-bye, darling!” and she leaned from the window and to his surprise

kissed him again on the lips, “of course, I’ll write—often. And mind

you write to me. I shall be back in March at latest.”

Fanny did write—occasionally to Elizabeth, once or twice to them both,

frequently to George. Her letters to George were much longer and more

amusing than the others. George showed some of them to Elizabeth and

forgot to show others. He replied punctually and affectionately.

Just before Christmas, Reggie Burnside passed through London on his

way to Mürren. He dropped into Elizabeth’s studio for tea, and finding

her alone asked her to marry him, in a casual offhand way, rather

as he might have suggested their going to Rumpelmeyer’s instead of

having tea in the studio. Elizabeth was surprised, flattered and

fluttered. They had quite a long discussion. Elizabeth was amazed

that Reggie should want to marry, and above all to marry her. If

she hadn’t been so flattered, she would have been offended at

any one’s thinking she would do such a thing. She had almost the

“thank-you-I’m-not-that-sort-of-girl” sniffiness about it.

“Is this a new brand of joke, Reggie?”

“Good God, no! I’m perfectly serious.”

“But why in heaven’s name do you want to _marry?_”

“It’s more convenient, you know, addressing letters and meeting people

and all that.”

“But why want to marry _me?_”

“Because I’m in love with you.”

Elizabeth pondered a little over this.

“Well,” she said slowly, “I don’t believe I’m in love with you. I’m

sure I’m not. I like you most awfully, but I’m not in love with you,

I’m in love with George.”

“Oh, George!” Reggie waved a contemptuous hand. “What’s the good of

your wasting your time with a man like that, Elizabeth? He won’t do

anything. He doesn’t know anybody worth mentioning, except ourselves,

and nobody at Cambridge thinks anything of his painting.”

Elizabeth was on the defensive immediately.

“Don’t talk nonsense, Reggie! George is a dear, and I won’t have you

say things like that about him. And as if anybody cares a hang what

mouldy young Cambridge thinks about a painter!”

Reggie changed his tack.

“All right, if you don’t want to marry me, don’t. But, look here. You

oughtn’t to spend the winter in London with that cough and your chest.

I’ll give up Mürren if you’ll come for a month with me to some small

place on the Riviera. We can easily find a place where there aren’t any

English.”

This was a far more gratifying and dangerous proposal to Elizabeth

than matrimony. She was heartily sick of London fog and cold and

drizzle and mire and soot and messy open fires which fill the room

with dust but don’t warm it. More than once she had regretted not

having gone away with Fanny. Moreover, a “month’s affair” with Reggie

would perfectly well fit into the arrangement with George, whereas

they hadn’t thought of and hadn’t discussed the possibility of either

marrying some one else. Elizabeth hesitated, but she had a feeling that

it would be rather mean to leave George suddenly alone in London and

go off on her own with Reggie, if only for a month. She certainly was

extraordinarily fond of George.

“No, Reggie, I can’t come this time. Go to Mürren, and when you come

back, perhaps... well, we’ll see.”

Elizabeth made toast and tea, and they sat on a large low divan in

front of the fire. The dingy light soon faded from the soiled London

sky, but they sat on in the firelight, holding hands.

She let Reggie kiss her as much as he wanted, but for the time being

resisted any further encroachments.

* * * * *

Elizabeth’s resistance, at that precise moment, to the advances of

Mr. Reginald Burnside, seems to me a striking example of George’s

infelicity. I mean that I see a direct link between it and the sudden

inexplicable standing up of a man in khaki, before a murderous machine

gun fire, not long after dawn, on the morning of the 4th of November,

1918.... Not that I wish melodramatically “to set the brand of Cain”

upon Elizabeth or upon Fanny or upon both jointly. Far from it. _They_

didn’t make the war. _They_ didn’t give George the jumps. And after

all there is a doubt, almost a mystery involved in George’s death. Did

he really commit suicide? I don’t know. I’ve only got circumstantial

evidence and my own hunch about it, a sort of intuition, a something

haunting in my memory of the man, an Orestes-like feeling of some

inexpiated guilt. Who is to say whether a man can really commit suicide

on a battlefield? Desperate recklessness and looking for trouble may be

the very means of his escaping the death which finds the prudent coward

crouching in a shell-hole. And suppose he did deliberately get himself

killed, ought we, ought I, to attach any blame to Elizabeth and Fanny?

I don’t think so. There were plenty of other things to disgust him with

life. And even supposing that he realized the war was ending, realized

that in his state of mind he simply could not face the problem of his

relation with those two women, still I think them utterly blameless.

The mess was as much his fault as theirs. It was really quite an easy

mess to clear up. What made it impossible was George’s shattered

nerves, and for that they were not to blame. Oh, not in the least.

Perhaps I’m as much to blame as anybody. I ought to have done something

to get George sent out of the line. I think I might have gone to the

Brigadier and have told him in private what I knew about George’s state

of mind—or perhaps to his Colonel. But I didn’t go. At that time I was

not persona grata with those in authority, for I happened to sympathize

then with the young Russian Revolution, and had foolishly argued hotly

about it. So perhaps my effort would have been wasted. And anyhow it

was a very difficult and ticklish thing to do, and I was tired, very

tired....

At any rate, just about a fortnight after Reggie went to Mürren,

the abominable winter climate of London gave Elizabeth some sort of

a chill inside and upset her interior economy. Within four or five

days she became quite demented. She insisted that she was with child,

and insisted that the only solution was for George to marry her—at

once. Perhaps the afternoon with Reggie had somehow inserted the idea

of marriage into her “subconscious.” At all events, her extraordinary

energy was suddenly concentrated upon attaining a state which she

had hitherto utterly scorned. It was a silly thing to do, but one

really cannot blame her. Men are oddly callous about these mysterious

female maladies and demoniacal possessions. They get peevish and

pathetic enough if something goes wrong with their own livers, but

they are strangely unsympathetic about the profounder derangements

of their yoke-fellows in iniquity. Perhaps they might feel a little

more humane if they too had a sort of twenty-eight day clock inside

them, always a nuisance, often liable to go wrong and set up irregular

blood-pressure and an intolerable poisoning of the brain. George ought

to have hiked her off to a gynecologist at once. Instead of which,

he behaved as stupidly as any George Augustus would have done under

the circumstances. He did nothing but gasp and stare at Elizabeth’s

whirling tantrums, and worry, and offer exasperating comfort, and

propose remedies and measures which, as Elizabeth told him, with a

stamp of her foot, were impossible, impossible, _impossible_. Of

course, by the Triumphal Scheme for the Perfect Sex Relation, it was

duly enacted that under such circumstances there was nothing to do but

marry the girl. But elementary prudence would suggest that it might be

sensible to make certain the circumstances _had_ arisen, a precaution

which they entirely overlooked in the mental disarray caused by

Elizabeth’s regrettable dementia.

The change wrought in Elizabeth’s outlook in a few days was amazing.

If she hadn’t felt so tragically about it, she would have been

ludicrous in her mental manœuvres. The whole Triumphal Scheme was

scrapped almost instantaneously, and by a rapid and masterly series of

evolutions her whole army of arguments was withdrawn from the outpost

line of Complete Sexual Freedom, and fell back upon the Hindenburg line

of Safety First, Female Honour, and Legal Marriage. It was, of course,

ridiculous for them to marry at all, either of them. They weren’t

the marrying sort. They were adventurers in life, not good citizens.

Neither of them was the kind of person who exults in life insurance

and buying a house on the hire-purchase system and mowing the lawn

on Saturday afternoon and taking the “kiddies” (odious word) to the

seaside. Neither of them looked forward to the “Old Age Will Come”

summit of felicity, with an elderly and imbecilly contented-looking

George sitting beside a placid and motherly white-haired Elizabeth

in the garden of a dear little home, contemplating together with

smug beatitude the document from the insurance company guaranteeing

a safe ten pounds a week for the remainder of their joint lives. I

am glad to say that George and Elizabeth would have shuddered at any

such prospect. But Elizabeth insisted upon marriage, and married they

duly were, despite the feeble protests of Elizabeth’s family and the

masterly denunciations of Isabel, already recorded.

In all outward respects the legal marriage made no difference whatever

to their lives and relationships. Elizabeth retained her studio, and

George his. They met no more frequently and on exactly the same terms

of affectionate sensuality into which their first exultant passion had

long ago evolved. One of the terms of the Triumphal Scheme emphatically

laid down the axiom that it was most undesirable and dangerous for

two lovers to inhabit the same flat or small house. If they were

rich enough to live in separate wings of a large house, all well and

good; but if not, then they should live no nearer than neighbouring

streets. The essence of freedom is the disposal of one’s own time in

one’s own way, and how can two people do that if they are living on

top of each other? Moreover, a daily absence of several hours is quite

indispensable to the avoidance of the domestic den atmosphere. It is

far better for two lovers to be happy together for three or four hours

a day than to be indifferent or miserable for twenty-four. The joint

marriage-bed, Elizabeth used to state impressively, is destructive

of all self-respect and sexual charm, and blunts the finer edges of

sensibility....

Soon after the legal formalities were irrevocably accomplished and

Elizabeth’s social anxieties somewhat calmed, it occurred to her that

she ought to consult a doctor, in order to learn how to behave during

these months of “expecting,” as the modest working-class matron calls

it. So she got the address of a “modern” physician, who was supposed

to have all the latest and most enlightened methods of dealing with

pregnancy and its distresses. To Elizabeth’s amazement she found she

was not pregnant at all! With the not unnatural suspicion that most

doctors are more or less charlatans imposing on the ignorance of the

public, she refused to believe him until he told her flatly that in

her present condition she might wait till doomsday for the appearance

of an infant, but that if she neglected her present slight disorder

it might become dangerous and permanent. She then condescended to

accept his diagnosis and advice. George had accompanied her, and was

in the specialist’s waiting room. A serious, concentrated, rather

pi-jaw Elizabeth had left him to enter the consulting room, and George

fidgeted over the imbecilities of “Punch,” wondering how on earth

they would deal with the problem of an infant and feeling that he

would probably have to take a job and “settle down” into the horrible

morass of domestic life. To his amazement, as the consulting-room door

opened, he heard Elizabeth laugh with her old merry gaiety which was so

attractive, and caught the words:

“Well, if it’s twins, Doctor, you shall be godfather.”

To which the Doctor replied with a laugh George thought rather ribald

and heartless under the circumstances. Elizabeth rushed into the room,

exclaiming:

“It’s all right, darling, a false alarm. I’m no more pregnant than you

are.”

George, who was wool-gathering, might have remained indefinitely

perplexed, if the doctor had not taken him aside and told him briefly

the situation, adding that for a little time it would be well if

Elizabeth refrained from sexual relations.

“How long do you advise?” asked George.

“Oh, let her follow the treatment prescribed for about a month, and

then let me examine her again. I’ve no doubt whatever that she’ll be

perfectly all right again. As a matter of fact, she couldn’t have a

child without a slight operation. Only, in the future, she must avoid

chills. She ought not to spend the winter in England.”

George wrote out a cheque for three guineas (which Elizabeth insisted

on repaying afterwards), and they celebrated the event with a dinner.

“Let us drink,” said George, “to this happy occasion when we have NOT

committed the unforgivable sin of thrusting an unwanted existence upon

one more unfortunate human being.”

But perhaps the most amazing circumstance in this peculiar episode was

the speed with which Elizabeth once more evacuated the old familiar

Hindenburg Line, and reoccupied the most advanced positions of Sexual

Freedom. But, of course, she did so with a difference. Though she

wouldn’t admit it even to herself, and though George tried not to see

it, in her case the Triumphal Scheme had broken down badly under its

first stern test. Directly that test had come, she had fallen back in

panic on the old cut-and-dried solution; she hadn’t had the courage to

go through with it. In a way one could excuse her by saying that the

interior trouble had temporarily deranged her brain, that she wasn’t

really responsible for her actions. But that’s only a quibble—the

fact remains that she did fly in a panic to social safety and the

registrar. And then the legal tie introduced a subtle difference

in their relation. You may say, of course, that it needn’t, that

since they continued to live in exactly the same way and to profess

exactly the same attitude towards each other and “freedom,” it made no

difference whether they were legally married or not. But it did. And

it does. You can see that perfectly well if you watch people. Somehow

the mere fact of marriage introduces the sense of possession, and

hence jealousy. Lovers, of course, may be and frequently are just as

possessive and quite as jealous. But there is a difference. As a rule

lovers are not first occupants, so to speak; and they are generally

willing to grant each other more liberty and to “forgive.” But you will

see married people who have become totally indifferent to each other,

rise in a fury of possessiveness and jealousy when they happen to find

out that the wife or husband, as the case may be, is in love with some

one else. This, indeed may be only another aspect of that peculiar

vindictiveness bred by marriage. And another curious modification of

their relationship arose. When Elizabeth reoccupied the Sexual Freedom

line, without knowing it she did so for herself alone, and not for

George. If George liked to accept the subsequent Elizabeth-Reggie

affair, in accordance with the provisions of the Triumphal Scheme, all

well and good; that was his lookout. But when it came to Elizabeth’s

accepting the Fanny-George affair in the same spirit, that was a very

different matter. Elizabeth now felt somehow responsible for George,

and feeling responsible translated itself into keeping possession of....

However, three months after the false alarm, Elizabeth seemed more

“advanced” and full of “freedom” than ever. Her position as a married

woman enabled her to talk with greater liberty on all sorts of topics

which are now discussed in every nursery, but at that time were

considered highly improper and not to be named before Citizens of the

Empire. She got hold of a book on the woes of the Uranians, and was

deeply affected by it. She wanted to start a crusade on their behalf,

and was greatly disappointed by the coolness with which George met her

enthusiasm.

“It is ridiculous,” said Elizabeth, “that these unfortunate people

should be persecuted by obsolete laws derived from the prejudices of

the Jewish prophets and mediæval ignorance.”

“Of course it is, but what can one do about it? Persecution-mania

has always existed. It’s a very curious coincidence that the vulgar

English word for one sort of intermediate sexual type originally meant

a heretic. But there’s nothing to be done.”

“I think something ought to be done.”

“Well, I think it’s too soon to do anything. You’ve got to allow time

for knowledge to percolate into rock-like heads, and for ignorance and

superstitions to be dispelled. Let’s get the ordinary relations of men

and women on to a decent basis first, and then it’ll be time to think

about the heretics in love.”

“But, George darling, these people are hunted and exiled and despised

for something which is not their ‘fault’ at all, some difference in

their physiological or psychological structure. There probably isn’t

any such thing as a perfectly ‘normal’ sexual type. Simply because

we’re ‘normal’ why should we hate and despise these people?”

“I know, I know. Theoretically, I agree with you absolutely. But it’s

no good my mind trying to defend what my instincts and feelings reject.

Frankly, I don’t like homosexuals. I respect their freedom, of course,

but I don’t like them. As a matter of fact, I don’t know any, at least

so far as I am aware. No doubt some of our friends are homosexual, but

as I’m not personally interested in it, I never notice it.”

“Yes, but because you don’t notice it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t

exist. Don’t be narrow-minded, George. There are probably tens of

thousands of people living miserable lives....”

“Oh, I know all about that! But you can’t break down the inherited

prejudices of ages in five minutes. I personally don’t object to such

people doing as they want. There’s no tort to person or property. But

my advice to them would be to keep jolly quiet about it, and not try to

make themselves martyrs, and flaunt themselves publicly.”

“Oh, oh!” Elizabeth laughed. “Grandpa George foregathering with the

Victorians.”

“All right, but I’m not going to say what I don’t feel. In this matter

you must look upon me as a neutral.”

“Well, I think you ought to look into it more carefully and

sympathetically, and get Bobbe to let you write some articles on it.”

“Thanks very much. You ask him to do it himself, it’s far more likely

to attract _him_. If I wrote such articles I should immediately be

suspect. It’s a damned dangerous thing to do in England; in most cases

the suspicion is far too likely to be true!”

And they left it at that.

* * * * *

All this time the war was drawing steadily nearer. Probably it

had become certain since 1911, though most people were taken quite

unawares. Why did it happen? Who was responsible? Questions which

have been interminably debated already and will furnish exultant

historians with controversial material for generations to come.

Already one foresees the creation of Chairs in the History of the

First World War, to be set up in whatever civilized countries remain

in existence after the next one. But for us the debate is vain, as

vain as the pathetic and reiterated enquiry, “_Where_ did I catch this

horrible cold?” If anybody or bodies engineered this catastrophe they

must have been gratified by its shattering success. Few lives indeed

in the belligerent countries remained unaffected by it, and in most

cases the effect was unpleasant. Adult lives were cut sharply into

three sections—pre-war, war, and post-war. It is curious—perhaps not

so curious—but many people will tell you that whole areas of their

pre-war lives have become obliterated from their memories. Pre-war

seems like prehistory. What did we do, how did we feel, what were we

living for in those incredibly distant years? One feels as if the

period 1900-14 has to be treated archæologically, painfully recreated

by experts from slight vestiges. Those who were still children at

the Armistice, who were so to speak born into the war, can hardly

understand the feeling of tranquil security which existed, the almost

smug optimism of our lives. Especially in England, for the French

retained uncomfortable memories of 1870; but still, even in France life

seemed established and secure. Since Waterloo, England had engaged in

no great war. There were frontier and colonial skirmishes, and the

reputation of the country for military organization and efficiency

was immensely strengthened in the world’s eyes by the conduct of the

Crimean and Boer Wars. But there had been nothing on a really big

scale. The Franco-Prussian War was just one of those unfortunate

occurrences one must expect from backward Continental nations, and the

huge struggle of the War of Secession was observed through the wrong

end of the telescope. In some quarters, indeed, that war had been

considered as a peculiar mercy of God to His Chosen People, enabling

the British Merchant Marine to re-establish an indisputable primacy at

the expense of a regrettable upstart among nations.

Talleyrand used to say that those who had not known Europe before

1789, had never known the real pleasure of living. No one would dare

to substitute 1914 for 1789 in that sentence. But such a wholesale

shattering of values had certainly not occurred since 1789. God knows

how many governments and rulers crashed down in the earthquake, and

those which remain are agitatedly trying to preserve their existence by

the time-honoured methods of repression and persecution. And yet 1914

was greeted as a great release, a purgation from the vices supposed to

be engendered by peace! My God! Three days of glory engender more vices

and misery than all the alleged corrupters of humanity could achieve in

a millennium. _Les jeunes_ would be amazed if they read the nauseous

poppycock which was written in 1914-15 in England, and doubtless in all

the belligerent countries, except France where practically nothing was

printed at all. (However, the French have made up handsomely for the

loss since then.) “Our splendid troops” were to come home—oh, very

soon—purged and ennobled by slaughter and lice, and were to beget a

race of even nobler fellows to go and do likewise. We were to have a

great revival in religion, for peoples’ thoughts were now turned from

frivolities to great and serious themes. We were to have a new and

greater literature—hence the alleged vogue for “war poets,” which

resulted in the parents of the slain being asked to put up fifty pounds

for the publication (which probably cost fifteen) of poor little verses

which should never have passed the home circle. We were to have... but

really I lack courage to continue. Let those who are curious in human

imbecility consult the newspaper-files of those days....

* * * * *

But we are still lingering in the golden calm of the last few months

preceding August, 1914.

Fanny had followed Elizabeth’s amazing evolutions with considerable

surprise and that feeling of “something not displeasing” with which

we contemplate the misfortunes of our best friends. She chiefly felt

rather sorry for George....

* * * * *

“You have a vendetta of the dead against the living.” Yes, it is

true, I have a vendetta. Not a personal vendetta. What am I? O God,

nothing, less than nothing, a husk, a leaving, a half-chewed morsel

on the plate, a reject. But an impersonal vendetta, an unappeased

conscience crying in the wilderness, a river of tears in the desert.

What right have I to live? Is it five million, is it ten million, is

it twenty million? What does the exact count matter? There they are,

and we are responsible. Tortures of hell, we are responsible! When I

meet an unmaimed man of my generation, I want to shout at him: “How

did you escape? How did you dodge it? What dirty trick did you play?

Why are you not dead, trickster?” It is dreadful to have outlived your

life, to have shirked your fate, to have overspent your welcome. There

is nobody upon earth who cares whether I live or die, and I am glad of

it. To be alone, icily alone. You, the war dead, I think you died in

vain, I think you died for nothing, for a blast of wind, a blather,

a humbug, a newspaper stunt, a politician’s ramp. But at least you

died. You did not reject the sharp sweet shock of bullets, the sudden

smash of the shell-burst, the insinuating agony of poison gas. You

got rid of it all. You chose the better part. “They went down like a

lot o’ Charlie Chaplins,” said the little ginger-hair sergeant of the

Durhams. Like a lot of Charlie Chaplins. Marvellous metaphor! Can’t you

see them staggering on splayed-out test and waving ineffective hands

as they went down before the accurate machine-gun fire of the Durhams

sergeant? A splendid little hero—he got the Military Medal for it.

Like a lot of Charlie Chaplins. Marvellous. But why weren’t we one of

them? What right have we to live? And the women? Oh, don’t let’s talk

about the women. They were splendid, wonderful. Such devotion, such

devotion. How they comforted the troops. Oh, wonderful, beyond all

praise! They got the vote for it, you know. Oh, wonderful! Steel-true

and blade-straight. Yes, indeed, wonderful, wonderful! Whatever should

we have done without them? White feathers, and all that, you know. Oh,

the women were marvellous. You can always rely upon the women to come

up to scratch, you know. Yes, indeed. What would the Country be without

them? So splendid, such an example.

On Sundays the Union Jack flies over the cemetery at Etaples. It’s not

so big as it was in the old wooden cross days, but it will serve. Acres

and acres. Yes, acres and acres. And it’s too late to get one’s little

lot in the acres. Too late, too late....

* * * * *

Yes, Fanny was sorry for George, and showed it with practical

feminine sympathy. In the late spring Elizabeth “had” to go and spend

a fortnight with her parents in the north. Mrs. Paston—who never

failed in any of her duties, and took jolly good care to let you know

it—was accustomed to write every week to Elizabeth. This weekly

letter was supposed to be a nice, chatty, affectionate record of the

little home circle and friends, something to keep Elizabeth in touch

with their purer lives (of pure boredom) and preserve her from the

decadents and degenerates she frequented in London. In fact the letter

was almost invariably a perfidious and insinuating effort to make

Elizabeth uncomfortable and to discourage her with her own life. Under

the endearing words of conventional family affection lurked a curious

resentment and hatred. If Mrs. Paston could think of anything likely

to worry Elizabeth she never failed to convey it, in the strain of

“isn’t it a pity, dear?...” Sometimes Elizabeth answered these letters,

sometimes she did not. Recently, they had been filled with discouraging

hints about the state of Mr. Paston’s health. “Your dear father” could

not shake off his “bronchitis” (i.e., a cold in the head), he was very

“languid” (i.e., bored, the golf links were under water), he “scarcely

ever went out” (he hardly ever had done, except to play golf), he was

“getting so frail and white-haired, poor darling daddy” (he’d been grey

for fifteen years and still ate four hearty meals daily), he “seemed to

be failing fast”—a pure piece of mythology. Elizabeth was rather fond

of her father, and began to get alarmed, although she was more or less

aware of her mother’s strategy. But it is the misfortune of youth never

really to credit the aged with their full meed of perfidy and dislike.

She felt she ought to go and see her father for herself—it would be

awful if he suddenly died without her seeing him. She told George she

was going.

“All right, of course, if you want to. I’ll take you to the station.

When are you going?”

“I wish you’d come with me, George. Father and mother would like to see

you, and they’d appreciate it so much.”

“Now look here, Elizabeth, don’t let’s have any humbug here. I don’t

ask you to meet my parents and I don’t see why I should have to stay

with yours. I think your mother’s quite awful, one of those nagging

martyr women who’re always taking on unnecessary jobs and worries, and

then grumbling about how much they have to do and how little they’re

appreciated. Your father’s all right. He’s a decent sort, with a human

respect for other people. But after I’ve feigned an interest I don’t

feel in golf and we’ve shaken our heads over the wickedness of Liberal

governments, we’ve really nothing left to say to each other.”

“But it’s so much easier for me if you’d come too.”

“No, it wouldn’t. We’d be shown off as the happy married pair to your

mother’s friends, and our sufferings would be dreadful. Besides, it’ll

be easier for you to adjust yourself temporarily to their prejudices if

you don’t have the sensation of a satirical me watching you.”

So Elizabeth went by herself, and George remained alone in London. He

always missed Elizabeth frightfully when she went away, but instead of

going out and amusing himself, he stayed in and tried to pass the time

by overworking. By the evening of the fifth day, he was thoroughly fed

up. He decided to go out and ring up various friends in turn, until he

found some one to have dinner with him. He had just finished washing

and was putting on a clean collar, when some one knocked at the door of

his studio.

“Half a minute,” shouted George, “I’m dressing. Who is it?”

The door opened, and in came Fanny, wearing a charming new dress and a

gay wide-brimmed hat with a large feather in it.

“Why, Fanny! How good to see you, and how lovely you look!”

They kissed affectionately. Fanny sat down on the bed.

“I’ve come to be taken out to dinner. If you think you’re doing

anything else, you’re mistaken. You’ll have to ring up and say you

can’t come.”

“As a matter of fact, I was on the point of going out to find somebody

to dine with me, so your coming is a godsend.”

“How’s Elizabeth?”

“She’s all right. I got a letter from her this morning. She’s with her

parents, you know.”

“Yes, I know. How long’ll she be away?”

“Another ten days. Poor darling, she sounds awfully bored already.”

“And what are you doing?”

“Oh, fighting the lone hand here. Do you want to see the picture I’m

finishing?”

And George dragged round an easel with a large canvas on it, into the

light.

“But it’s good, George! It’s got great qualities of energy and design.”

“You don’t think it’s too hard and angular?”

“No, not a bit. It’s excellent. By far the best thing you’ve done.”

And Fanny jumped up from the bed, put her arm around George, and

kissed him again. For the first time her lips were not cool, shut and

sisterly, but warm and open and delicious—the lips of an accomplice.

The sudden flicker of warm desire awoke in George’s flesh, and he felt

his heart leap and the blood flush to his face. He held her to him, and

pressed eager firm lips to her soft yielding mouth. For a few seconds

she seemed to resist, and made as if to thrust him from her. He held

her more closely, and suddenly her stiffened body yielded delicately,

moulded itself to his, her head moved slowly backwards with closed

eyes. Between the moist velvet of her lips he felt on his the exquisite

caress of a gentle tongue-tip. George gently laid his hand on her left

breast, and felt the rapid beating of her heart. She softly drew away

her lips and looked at him.

“Fanny! Fanny!”

Her gem-like eyes, now all flower-like, looked at him.

“Fanny! Most dear Fanny! I must have loved you a long time without

knowing it.”

Fanny spoke slowly, still watching him:

“You’re such a nice man, George, and yet such a boy.”

“And you are divine and inexpressibly lovely and thrilling and

adorable....”

They kissed again, and stood there embraced until George felt dizzy

with the blood beating in his brain. He pulled her gently towards the

bed, and they lay down, clothed, in each other’s arms. George’s hand

moved tenderly and delicately over her uncorseted girl body, so warm

and firm and fragile under the thin cool silk dress. The incoherent

words of lovers gave place to silence, and they lay trembling in each

other’s arms, almost like frightened children comforting each other.

Fanny sighed, and opened her eyes.

“What time is it?”

George fumbled for his watch.

“Nearly half-past eight!”

“Heavens! We shall be too late for dinner if we don’t hurry.”

George went to get his coat, and returned to find Fanny unconcernedly

drawing her silk stockings tight and trim.

“Where can we go that’s near?”

“There’s a new place just started in Frith Street—we can go there.”

George watched her as she smoothed her mussed hair, and absorbedly

fitted on the large hat before the mirror. He was still trembling a

little, and noticed how steady her hands were. Only a few minutes

before they had been so close, all the barriers down, each existence

melted in the other. That had been perfect, complete happiness. “Had

been.” Already the current of ordinary life was sweeping them apart

again. Oh, not very far really, still within hailing distance. But very

far, compared with that wonderful nearness. Such an ecstasy could not

last. But why not? Perhaps one of the many bitter jests of the gods—to

show us for an hour what happiness might be if we were gods. None can

possess another, none can be possessed. Is it possible to give, is it

possible to take? Does one existence really melt into another for a few

minutes, or does it only seem to? What is she thinking now? Her mind

is as remote from mine as if she had slipped into another dimension.

Romantically we ask too much. It is much that she is lovely and finds

me desirable. Let us not ask too much. Enjoyment is enough. Yet how

fragile even that is! It is as if one tried to carry a small flickering

light in a thin glass vessel through a tumultuous hostile crowd. How

earnest is the world to suppress the delight of lovers! How bitterly

wrong all that is!

They went down into the warm, airless street, where the lamps were

already lighted. Dirty children still played noisily and screamed

on the side-walks. An Italian woman slip-slopped past them in felt

slippers, carrying a jug of beer. Soho smelled frowzy and stale. Fanny

noticed this.

“Why do you and Elizabeth live in this horrid district? It must be

awfully unhealthy, especially for Elizabeth.”

“Oh, one gets used to it. Hampstead’s too far out. Kensington’s too

dear, Chelsea’s both dear and ungetatable. When I’m in town I like

to be in the middle of it. Suburbs are beastly. We all suffer from

the English ‘home’ system of building—one hut, one family—and from

our peculiar desire to be in a town and the country simultaneously.

We don’t seem able to live the purely urban life of the Latins. But

London’s too big and frowzy.”

* * * * *

They dined in the small restaurant, which had been “decorated” with

rather feeble pictures by young artists, to give it that Latin Quarter

air. It was somehow ineffectual. A bit amateurish. However, they didn’t

care about that. Since they were comparatively old friends, they did

not suffer the haunting and disagreeable uneasiness and strangeness

which fall between those who suddenly become lovers. The spontaneity

of their passion absorbed any possible feeling of remorse. They talked

quietly, but without any strain and effort. Fanny gave some amusing

descriptions of the odd freaks among the British “colonies” on the

Riviera. Why is it that one sees such curious and freakish specimens of

one’s countrymen abroad, types one never sees at home? Do the foreign

surroundings bring out the freakishness, or were such people destined

to emigration by their very oddity? But there could be no doubt—Fanny

and George were on a new footing with each other. There was a new and

delicious intimacy between them. Strange that a few kisses and caresses

should make such a difference.

As they were leaving the restaurant, Fanny was hailed by some friends

at a table near the door.

“Hullo, Fanny! How are you? I say, why don’t you come along with us?

We’re all going to Marshall’s chambers at ten. There’ll be lots of

people there. It ought to be amusing.”

“No, I want to see that new film at the Shaftesbury.”

“But you can see that any time.”

“No, this is the last week, and I’m going to Dieppe to-morrow for a

week.”

“Oh, all right. Sorry you won’t come. Look us up when you get back.

Good-bye, good-bye.”

They got into a taxi, and Fanny gave the address of her flat.

“Did you really mean that you are going to Dieppe to-morrow?” asked

George a little wistfully.

Fanny squeezed his arm, and kissed him briefly and skilfully as the

taxi lurched them together.

“Of course not, goose! We’re going to be together, unless you piously

decide not to. But it’s useful to have an alibi. People are still fussy

about one’s ‘reputation,’ you know.”

“But suppose we meet them, or some one else who knows you?”

“I shall say I changed my mind, or that I got bored and came straight

back.”

* * * * *

Fanny’s flat was small, but pleasantly clean and modern. After the

picturesque but rather dingy antiquity of his large eighteenth-century

panelled room, George found it delightful to be in bright-painted

clean rooms with a white-tiled bathroom. Among Fanny’s many remarkable

efficiencies was the genius of discovering excellent flats at a

fabulously cheap rental, furnishing them charmingly for about five

pounds and running them perfectly without the slightest fuss. She

generally shifted her quarters about every six months, and invariably

for the better. How pleasant is efficiency in others, especially when

you are rather inefficient yourself! I wouldn’t exactly say that George

was inefficient, but the details of material life rather bored him.

When you had so much else to do and so little time to do it in, he

thought it rather a waste of life to be too pernickety about one’s

surroundings and fixings. However, he decided then and there that he

and Elizabeth would have to get out of Soho. It was too disgustingly

frowzy.

Fanny was a marvelous lover. Or, at least, George thought so. It was

not only that she was golden and supple and lithe, where Elizabeth

was dark and rather stiff and virginal, but she really cared about

love-making. It was her art. It was for her neither a painful duty nor

a degrading necessity nor a series of disappointing experiments, but a

delightful art which gave full expression to her vitality, energy and

efficiency. Like all great artists, she was entirely disinterested—art

for art’s sake. She chose her lovers with great care, and rather

preferred them to be poor, to avoid any suspicion of commercialism

or arrivism. She knew she had the genius of touch, and was unwilling

that it should be wasted. If she hadn’t been a great lover, she might

have been a good sculptor. But like all artists she was exacting, and

had her vanity. She would not waste her talents. If a subject was

not profoundly responsive and appreciative, she put him aside at the

earliest possible moment. No clumsy, inhibited Englishman for her! No,

thank you. Perhaps that is why she spent so much of her time abroad.

But this particular Englishman was not inhibited or ineradicably

clumsy. Crude perhaps, rather lacking in style and finish, but capable

of rapid progress under expert guidance. Fanny, with the artist’s

unerring glance, had long ago perceived that there were considerable

possibilities in George. He had natural aptitudes and, what is far

more important, the sense of delicate artistry which finds its highest

satisfaction in bestowing delight. He was neither a bull nor a turkey

gobbler. Fanny was satisfied; she had not made a mistake....

* * * * *

For the remaining days of Elizabeth’s absence George did no work

whatever. And a very good thing too, for he needed a holiday. He

stayed at Fanny’s flat. They made picnic meals in the flat, or ate out

at places where they were pretty certain not to meet friends—City

stockbrokers’ taverns or curious pubs with sawdust and spittoons on

the floors, where you sat on stools at the bar and had a cut from the

joint and two vegetables with beer. They went to “low” music-halls and

saw all the primitive films of the day—Charlie’s were the only good

ones—and for a lark went to see what the inside of the Abbey looked

like, a place no Londoner ever visits. They agreed that it looked

like the atelier of an incredibly bad academic sculptor installed in

an overcrowded but rather beautiful Gothic barn. Fanny rather hated

Gothic architecture, she said all those points and squiggles gave her

the creeps; but George said that if you wanted to see the real spirit

of mediæval sculpture you ought to look underneath the seats of the

canon’s stalls. But they didn’t quarrel about that. They were far too

happy.

* * * * *

Nothing more was said about Elizabeth, until the day before she

returned.

“You’ll meet her, of course?” said Fanny.

“Of course.”

“Well, give her my love.”

“I suppose I ought to tell her about us,” said George reflectively.

Fanny saw the danger in a flash. Her “freedom” was of a different kind

from Elizabeth’s rather theoretical and idealizing kind. Fanny’s was

light-hearted and practical; moreover, she had observed human beings

and knew her Elizabeth far better than George did. She also knew her

George. If George told Elizabeth, she knew quite well there would be a

bust-up, that Elizabeth’s theories would be abandoned as speedily as on

the former occasion. But she knew it was useless to reveal the truth to

George. On the other hand, she didn’t want to lose him and didn’t want

to “take him away” from Elizabeth—not until much later when Elizabeth

started the struggle. Fanny knew that George had to be managed within

the limits of masculine stupidity.

“Oh, tell her if you like. But I shouldn’t discuss it with her, if I

were you. She must have long ago felt subconsciously the attraction

between us, and you can see by her attitude that she accepts it. I

don’t see the need for all this talk and re-hashing of what’s a private

and personal matter between two people. We’re so hypnotized by words,

that we think nothing exists until we have talked about it. How can you

interpret all these deep feelings and sensations in words? It’s because

words don’t suffice that we need touch. Tell Elizabeth by loving her

better.”

“Then you really thinks she knows?”

Fanny was a little annoyed. Why couldn’t he _see_, why couldn’t he take

a hint?

“If she’s as acute and experienced as she tells us, she ought to have

seen the possibility long ago. No doubt, if she’s said nothing about it

to you, the reason is that she just doesn’t want to discuss it. If she

accepts, that’s enough.”

“But she always believes that two people should be perfectly open and

frank with each other about their other affairs.”

“Does she? Well, I advise you to say nothing until she asks you.”

“All right, darling, if you think so.”

* * * * *

George duly met Elizabeth at Euston. She was delighted to be back in

London, away from the stuffiness of family and the solemn boredom of

middle-class existence. She leaned out the window of the taxi and

sniffed the air.

“How lovely to smell dirty old London mud again! It means I’m free,

free, free again!”

“Was it very awful?”

“Oh, awful, interminable.”

“I’m so glad you’re back.”

“It’s wonderful. And lovely to be with you again. How well you look,

George, quite handsome and Italian!”

“That’s because you haven’t seen me for a fortnight.”

“How’s Fanny?”

“Oh, very well. Sent her love to you.”

“Dear old beastly ugly Tottenham Court Road!” said Elizabeth with her

nose out the window again.

“By the way, it was awfully frowsty in Soho while you were away. Don’t

you think we might move to somewhere more modern?”

“What, to a suburb? Why, George! You know you hate suburbs, and always

said you liked to live in the middle of London.”

“Yes, I know. But we might find something at Chelsea.”

“But we couldn’t possibly afford two places at Chelsea rents.”

“Well, why not share a fairly large one?”

“What, and live in the same flat? George!”

“Oh, all right, if you don’t want to, but Fanny thinks Soho is

unhealthy for you.”

“Well, we’ll see.”

* * * * *

Whether, as the Swedish old-maid hinted in her book, it was the

stimulus of another affair or whether George was anxious to display the

artistries of Fanny or whether it was merely remorse, Elizabeth found

George peculiarly charming and ardent.

She attributed this to the happy effect of a brief absence.

[ VII ]

In a few weeks they duly moved to Chelsea. Fanny found them an

excellent apartment, with two large rooms, a kitchen and a modern

bathroom, for less than the combined rental of their two ramshackle

rooms in Soho. Elizabeth developed an unexpected talent for

“home-making,” and fussed a good deal over the installation in spite of

George’s light satire. But they were both only too happy to get away

from the frowstiness of Soho to a clean modern flat.

This was in June, 1914. They did not go away when the hot weather

arrived, intending to stay the summer in London, and go to Paris for

September and October. Elizabeth spent a good deal of her spare time

with Reggie Burnside, and George was absorbed in his painting. He

wanted to get enough good canvasses for a small show in Paris in the

autumn.

One day towards the end of July he left his painting early, to meet

Reggie and Elizabeth for lunch somewhere near Piccadilly. It was a

benign day, with fine white fleecy clouds suspended in a blue sky, and

a light wind ruffling the darkened foliage of summer trees. Even the

King’s Road looked pleasant. George noticed, and afterwards remembered

vividly, because these were the last really tranquil moments of his

life, how the policeman’s gloves made a clear blotch of white against

a plane-tree as he regulated the traffic. A little band of sparrows

were squabbling and twittering noisily in the lilacs of one of the

gardens. The heat was reflected, not unpleasantly, from the warm white

flagstones of the sidewalk.

As he waited for the number 19 bus, George did what he very rarely

did—bought a newspaper. He always said it was a waste of life to read

newspapers—if something really important happened people would tell

you about it soon enough. He didn’t know why he bought a paper that

morning. He had been working hard for two or three weeks without seeing

any one but Elizabeth, and perhaps thought he would see what was going

on in the world. Perhaps it was only to see if there was any new film.

George clambered to the top of the bus, with the paper under his arm,

and paid his fare. He then glanced casually at the headlines and

read: Serious Situation in the Balkans, Austro-Hungarian Ultimatum

to Servia, Servian Appeal to Russia, Position of Germany and France.

George looked up vaguely at the other people on the bus. There were

four men and two women; each of the men was intently reading the same

special early edition of the evening paper. He read the despatches

eagerly and carefully, and grasped the seriousness of the situation at

once. The Austrian Empire was on the verge of war with Serbia (Servia,

it was then called, until the country became one of our plucky little

allies); Russia threatened to support Serbia; the Triple Alliance would

bring in Germany and Italy on the side of Austria; France would be

bound to support Russia under the Treaty of Alliance, and the Entente

Cordiale might involve England. There was a chance of a European war,

the biggest conflict since the defeat of Napoleon. The event he had

always declared to be impossible—a war between the “civilized” nations

was threatened, was at hand. He refused to believe it. Germany didn’t

want war, France would be mad to want it, England couldn’t want it.

The “Powers” would intervene. What was Sir Edward Grey doing? Oh,

suggesting a conference.... The man on the seat opposite George leaned

towards him, tapping the newspaper with his hand:

“What do you say to that, Sir?”

“I think it looks confoundedly serious.”

“Chance of a war, eh?”

“I sincerely hope not. The newspapers always exaggerate, you know. It

would be an appalling catastrophe.”

“Oh, liven things up a bit. We’re getting stale, too much peace. Need a

bit of blood-letting.”

“I don’t think it’ll come to that. I...”

“It’s got to come sooner or later. Them Germans, you know. They’d never

be able to face our Navy.”

“Well, let’s hope it won’t be necessary.”

“Ah, I dunno. Shouldn’t mind ’avin’ a go at the Germans myself, and I

reckon you wouldn’t either.”

“Oh, I’m a neutral,” said George, laughing; “don’t count on me.”

“Umph!” said the man, as he got up to leave the bus, casting a

suspicious look at this foreign-looking and unpatriotic person. Yes,

that’s it, a foreigner, a bloody foreigner; umph, what’s he doing in

England I’d like to know? Umph!

George was back in the newspaper, unaware of the turmoil he had excited

in that elderly but patriotic bosom.

* * * * *

“I say,” exclaimed George, as soon as he met Elizabeth and Reggie,

“have you two seen the newspaper to-day?”

“Why?” said Elizabeth, “what’s in it? Something about you?”

“No, there’s a war threatened in the Balkans, and it may apparently

involve every one else.”

Reggie sneered.

“Oh, piffle! How absurd you are, George, to believe a newspaper

sensation. Why, we were talking about it last night in the Common Room,

and every one agreed that the conflict would have to be localized and

that Grey would probably make a statement in a day or two. It’ll all

blow over.”

Elizabeth had grabbed the newspaper, and was trying to find her way

through the unfamiliar mazes of sensational rhetoric.

“So you don’t think it’ll come to anything?” said George, hanging up

his hat, and sitting down at the restaurant table.

“Of course not!” said Reggie contemptuously.

“What do you think, Elizabeth?”

“I don’t know,” she said, looking up bewildered from the paper, “I

can’t understand this curious language. Are all newspapers written like

that?”

“Mostly,” said George, “but I’m glad you think it’s only a scare,

Reggie. I admit I was startled when I read those headlines. That’s

what comes of living absorbed in one’s own life, and neglecting the

fountain-heads of truth.”

* * * * *

All the same, he was not quite reassured, and on the way home left an

order with a local news agent for the delivery of a daily paper until

further notice. He hoped the next morning’s news would be better. It

wasn’t. Neither was the next day’s. Then came the news that Russia

was mobilizing, and that the Grand Fleet had sailed from Spithead “on

manœuvres,” but under sealed orders. George remembered the coastguard

officer who got drunk, and let slip that he had sealed orders in case

of war. Perhaps the man would be opening those orders in a few days,

perhaps he had already opened them. He tried to paint, and couldn’t;

picked up a book, and found himself thinking: Austria, Russia, Germany,

France, England, perhaps—good God, it’s impossible, impossible. He

fidgeted about, and then went into Elizabeth’s room. She was delicately

painting a large blue bowl of variegated summer flowers. The room was

very quiet. One of the windows was opened on to a large communal garden

surrounded by the backs of houses. A wasp came in through the striped

orange and black curtain and buzzed towards a bunch of grapes on a

large Spanish plate.

“What is it, George?”

The room was so peaceful, so secure, Elizabeth so unperturbed and as

usual, that George felt half-surprised at his own agitation.

“I’m worried about this war situation.”

“Really, George! What _is_ the good of getting into such a fuss? You

know Reggie told you there was nothing in it, and he hears all the

latest news at Cambridge.”

“Yes, darling, but it isn’t a matter of Cambridge now, but of Europe.

The Tsar and the Kaiser won’t consult the Dons before launching a war.”

Elizabeth, rather annoyed, went on painting.

“Well,” she said through the brush between her teeth, “I can’t help it.

Anyway it won’t concern us.”

It won’t concern us! George stood irresolute a moment.

“I think I’ll go out and see what’s the latest news.”

“Yes, do. I’m dining with Reggie to-night.”

“All right.”

* * * * *

George spent the first few days of August wandering about London,

taking busses, and buying innumerable editions of newspapers. London

seemed perfectly calm and as usual, and yet there was something

feverish about it. Perhaps it was George’s own feverishness

exteriorized, perhaps it was the unwonted number of special editions

with shouting newsboys in unusual places, handing out copies as fast as

they could to little groups of impatient people. His memories of those

days were confused and he couldn’t remember the chronological order of

events. Two or three scenes stood out vividly in his mind—all the rest

became a blur, the outlines obliterated by more dreadful scenes.

He remembered dining with Elizabeth and some other friends in a private

suite of the Berkeley as the guests of a wealthy American. The talk

kept running on the possibility of war, and the positions of England

and America. George still clung to the great illusion that wars between

the highly industrialized countries were impossible. He elaborated this

view to the American man, who agreed, and said that Wall Street and

Threadneedle Street between them could stop the universe.

“If there _is_ a war,” said George, “it will be a sort of impersonal,

natural calamity, like a plague or an earthquake. But I should think

that in their own interests all the governments will combine to avert

it, or at least limit it to Austria and Servia.”

“But don’t you think the Germans are spoiling for a war?” said another

Englishman.

“I don’t know, I simply don’t know. What does any of us know? The

governments don’t tell us what they’re doing or planning. We’re

completely in the dark. We can make surmises, but we don’t _know_.”

“It’s probably got to come sooner or later. The world’s too small to

hold an expanding Germany and a non-contracting British Empire.”

“The irresistible force and the immovable mass.... But it’s not a

question of England and Germany, but of Austria and Servia.”

“Oh, the murder of the Archduke’s just a pretext—probably arranged

beforehand.”

“But by which side? I can’t see the situation as a stage scene, with

villains on one side, and noble-minded fellows on the other. If the

Archduke’s murder was the result of an intrigue, as you suggest, it

was a damned despicable one. Now, either the various governments are

all despicable intriguers ready to stoop to any crime and duplicity to

attain their ends—in which case we shall certainly have a war, if they

want it—or they’re more or less decent and human men like ourselves,

in which case they’ll do anything to avert it. We can do nothing. We’re

impotent. They’ve got the power and the information. We haven’t....”

The white-gloved, immaculate Austrian waiters were silently handing

and removing plates. George noticed one of them, a young man with

close-cropped golden hair and a sensitive face. Probably a student

from Vienna or Prague, a poor man who had chosen waiting as a means of

earning his living while studying English. They both were about the

same age and height. George suddenly realized that he and the waiter

were potential enemies! How absurd, how utterly absurd....

After dinner they sat about and smoked. George took his chair over

to the open window and looked down on the lights and movement of

Piccadilly. The noise of the traffic was lulled by the height to a

long continuous rumble. The placards of the evening papers along the

railings beside the Ritz were sensational and bellicose. The party

dropped the subject of a possible great war, after deciding that there

wouldn’t be one, there couldn’t. George, who had great faith in Mr.

Bobbe’s political acumen, glanced through his last article, and took

great comfort from the fact that Bobbe said there wasn’t going to be a

war. It was all a scare, a stock-market ramp.... At that moment, three

or four people came in, more or less together, though they were in

separate parties. One of them was a youngish man in immaculate evening

dress. As he shook hands with his host, George heard him say rather

excitedly:

“I’ve just been dining with Tommy Parkinson of the Foreign Office. He

had to leave early and go back to Downing Street. It seems there are

Cabinet meetings all the time. Tommy was frightfully depressed and

pessimistic about the situation.”

“What did he say?” asked three or four eager voices.

“He wouldn’t commit himself at all. He was simply very gloomy and

_distrait_, and wouldn’t say anything definite.”

“Why didn’t you ask him whether Germany is mobilizing?”

“I did, but he wouldn’t tell me anything.”

“Oh, well, perhaps he only has a liver.”

Among the other guests was a tall, very erect, rather sun-burned man

of about forty, who had taken no part in the conversation. He was

sitting on a couch in silence beside a woman younger than himself—his

wife—who was also silent. George heard him introduced to another man

as Colonel Thomas. After a few minutes George went over and spoke to

him.

“My name’s Winterbourne. You’re Colonel Thomas, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“What do you think of the situation we’ve all been discussing so

intelligently?”

“I don’t think anything. A soldier mustn’t have political ‘views,’ you

know.”

“Well, but do you think the Germans are mobilizing?”

“I don’t know. I believe they are. But that doesn’t mean war

necessarily. They may be mobilizing for manœuvres. We’re mobilized for

manœuvres on Salisbury Plain.”

“Mobilized! The British Army mobilized!”

“Only for manœuvres, you know.”

“Are you mobilized too?”

“Yes, I leave to-morrow morning.”

“Good God!”

“Oh, it’s only manœuvres. They always happen at this time of the year.”

* * * * *

Another day—it must have been the Sunday before the 4th of

August—George went down to Trafalgar Square to attend a Socialist

Peace Meeting. The space round the Nelson Column was so crowded that

he could not get near enough to hear the speakers, who were standing

on the plinth above the heads of the crowd. An eager-faced man with

white hair and an aristocratic voice made a speech, directed at mob

prejudices. He apparently took the view that the threatened war was the

work of Imperial Russia. George caught repeatedly the words “knout,”

“Cossacks,” and the phrase “the eagles of war are spreadin’ their

wings.” Some of the listeners at a rival war meeting started an attack

on the peace party. There was a scuffle, which was very soon dispersed

by Mounted Police. The crowd surged away from Trafalgar Square. George

found himself carried towards the Admiralty Arch and up the Mall. He

thought he might as well go back that way, and try to get a bus at

Victoria. But opposite Buckingham Palace the road was blocked by a

huge crowd, which was continually reinforced from all three roads. The

Palace Gates were shut, with a cordon of police in front of them. The

red-coated Guardsmen in their furry busbies stood at ease in front of

the sentry-boxes.

“We want King George! We want King George!” chanted the mob.

“We want King George.”

After several minutes, a window was opened on to the centre balcony,

and the King appeared. He was greeted by an immense ragged cheer, and

acknowledged it by raising his hand to his forehead. The crowd began

another chant.

“We want War! We want War! We want WAR!”

More cheering. The King made no gesture of approval or disapproval.

“Speech!” shouted the mob, “speech! WE WANT WAR!”

The King saluted again, and disappeared. A roar of mingled cheering

and disappointment came from the crowd. There were several of the

inevitable humorous optimists to cry:

“Are we downhearted?”

“NO-OOOO!”

“Is Germany?”

“YUSS!”

“Do we care for the Germans?”

“NO-OOOO!”

There could be no doubt about the feelings of that small section of the

English population....

* * * * *

Even then George still clung to hopes of peace, bought only the

more pacific Radical papers, and believed that Sir Edward Grey would

“do something.” Touching faith of the English in the omnipotence of

their rulers! After all, Sir Edward was not God Almighty, but merely

a harassed Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in a difficult

position, with a divided Cabinet behind him. What on earth could the

man have done? Possibly a frank statement in July that if France or

Belgium were attacked, England would “come in”? People say so now, but

then it might have looked like a gesture of provocation.... Who are

we to pass judgments? And the nations cannot altogether pose as the

victims of their rulers. It is certain that the mobs in the capitals

were howling for war. It is certain that the largest demonstrations in

favour of peace occurred in Germany....

* * * * *

When the news came that France had mobilized, and that the Germans had

crossed the Belgian frontier, George abandoned all hope immediately.

He knew that one of the cardinal points of British policy is never to

allow Antwerp to rest in the possession of a great power. The principle

is as old as the reign of Queen Elizabeth or older. Who was it said:

“Antwerp is a pistol pointed at England’s head”? All Europe was in

arms, and England would join. The impossible had happened. They were in

for three months of carnage and horrors. Yes, three months. It couldn’t

last longer. Probably less. Oh, much less. There would be an immense

financial collapse, and the governments would have to cease fighting.

Why, Bank Rate was ten per cent already. He jumped on a bus at Hyde

Park Corner and sat just inside the entrance.

“What’s the news?” said the conductor.

“Very serious; the French have mobilized.”

“What abaht us?”

“We’ve done nothing yet. But it looks inevitable.”

“Wy, we ain’t declared war, ’ave we?”

“No, not yet.”

“Well, there’s still ’opes then. I reckon we’d best mind ah own

business, and keep aht of it.”

Mind our own business! How quickly that unselfish sentiment was

crystallized in the national slogan: Business As Usual!

The long unendurable nightmare had begun. And the reign of Cant,

Delusion and Delirium. I have shown, with a certain amount of

excusable ferocity, how devilishly and perniciously the old régime

of Cant affected people’s sexual lives, and hence the whole of their

lives and characters, and those of their children. The subsequent

reaction was, at least in its origin, healthy and right. There

simply _had_ to be a better attitude, the facts had to be faced. And

nobody with any courage will allow himself to be frightened out of

saying so, either by the hush-hush partisans of the old régime or

doing-what-grandpa-did-and-let’s-pretend-it’s-all-lovely, or by the

fact that numerous congenital idiots have prattled and babbled and

slobbered about “Sex” until the very word is an exacerbation. But the

sexual life _is_ important. It is in so many cases the dominant or the

next to dominant factor in peoples’ lives. We can’t write about their

lives without bringing it in; so for God’s sake let’s do so honestly

and openly, in accordance with what we believe to be the facts, or else

give up pretending that we are writing about life. No more Cant. And I

mean free love Cant just as much as orange-blossoms and pealing church

bells Cant....

If you’re going to argue that Cant is necessary (the old political

excuse) then for Heaven’s sake let’s chuck up the game and hand in our

checks. But it isn’t necessary. It can only be necessary when deceit is

necessary, when people have to be influenced to act against their right

instincts and true interests. If you want to judge a man, a cause, a

nation, ask: Do they Cant? If the War had been an honest affair for

any participant, it would not have needed this preposterous bolstering

up of Cant. The only honest people—if they existed—were those who

said: “This is foul brutality, but we respect and admire brutality, and

admit we are brutes; in fact, we are proud of being brutes.” All right,

then we know. “War is hell.” It is, General Sherman, it is, a bloody

brutal hell. Thanks for your honesty. You, at least, were an honourable

murderer.

It was the régime of Cant _before_ the War which made the Cant

_during_ the War so damnably possible and easy. On our coming of age

the Victorians generously handed us a charming little cheque for fifty

guineas—fifty-one months of hell, and the results. Charming people,

weren’t they? Virtuous and far-sighted. But it wasn’t their fault? They

didn’t make the War? It was Prussia, and Prussian militarism? Right you

are, right ho! Who made Prussia a great power and subsidized Frederick

the Second to do it, thereby snatching an empire from France? England.

Who backed up Prussia against Austria, and Bismarck against Napoleon

III? England. And whose Cant governed England in the nineteenth

century? But never mind this domestic squabble of mine—put it that I

mean the “Victorians” of all nations.

One human brain cannot hold, one memory retain, one pen portray the

limitless Cant, Delusion and Delirium let loose on the world during

those four years. It surpasses the most fantastic imagination. It

was incredible—and I suppose that was why it was believed. It was

the supreme and tragic climax of Victorian Cant, for after all the

Victorians were still in full blast in 1914, and had pretty much the

control of everything. Did they appeal to us honestly, and say: “We

have made a colossal and tragic error, we have involved you and all

of us in a huge War; it’s too late to stop it; you must come and help

us, and we promise to take the first opportunity of making peace and

making it thoroughly?” They did not. They said they didn’t want to lose

us but they thought _WE_ ought to go; they said our King and Country

needed us; they said they’d kiss us when we came home (merci! effect of

the Entente Cordiale?); they said one of the most civilized races in

the world were “Huns”; they invented Cadaver factories; they asserted

that a race of men notorious during generations for their kindliness

were habitual baby-butchers, rapers of women, crucifiers of prisoners;

they said the “Huns” were sneaks and cowards and skedadellers, but

failed to explain why it took fifty-one months to beat their hopelessly

outnumbered armies; they said they were fighting for the Liberty of the

World, and everywhere there is less liberty; they said they would Never

sheathe the Sword until et cetera, and this sort of criminal rant was

called Pisgah-Heights of Patriotism.... They said... But why continue?

Why go on? It is desolating, desolating. And then they dare wonder why

the young are cynical and despairing and angry and chaotic! And they

still have adherents, who still dare to go on preaching to _us!_ Quick!

A shrine to the goddesses Cant and Impudence....

* * * * *

I don’t know if George was aware of all this, because we never

discussed it. There were numbers of things you prudently didn’t discuss

in those days; you never knew who might be listening and “report.”

I myself was twice arrested as a civilian, for wearing a cloak and

looking foreign, and for laughing in the street; I was under acute

suspicion for weeks in one battalion because I had a copy of Heine’s

poems and admitted that I had been abroad; in another I was suspected

of not being myself, God knows why. That was nothing compared with the

persecution endured by D. H. Lawrence, probably the greatest living

English novelist, and a man of whom—in spite of his failings—England

should be proud.

I do know that George suffered profoundly from the first day of the war

until his death at the end of it. He must have realized the awfulness

of the Cant and degradation, for he occasionally talked about the

yahoos of the world having got loose, and seized control, and by Jove,

he was right. I shan’t attempt to describe the sinister degradation

of English life in the last two years of the War; for one thing I was

mostly out of England, and for another Lawrence has done it once and

for all in the chapter called “The Nightmare” in his book “Kangaroo.”

In George’s case, the suffering which was common to all decent men

and women was increased and complicated and rendered more torturing by

his personal problems, which somehow became related to the War. You

must remember that he did not believe in the alleged causes for which

the War was fought. He looked upon the War as a ghastly calamity or a

more ghastly crime. They might talk about their idealism but it wasn’t

convincing. There wasn’t the élan, the conviction, the burning idealism

which carried the ragged untrained armies of the First French Republic

so dramatically to Victory over the hostile coalitions of the Kings.

There was always the suspicion of dupery and humbug. Therefore, he

could not take part in the War with any enthusiasm or conviction. On

the other hand, he saw the intolerable egotism of setting up oneself as

a notable exception or courting a facile martyrdom of _rouspetance_.

Going meant one more little brand in the conflagration; staying

out meant that some other, probably physically weaker brand, was

substituted. His conscience was troubled before he was in the army, and

equally troubled afterwards. The only consolation he felt was in the

fact that you certainly had a worse and a more dangerous time in the

line than out of it.

As a matter of fact, I never really “got” George’s position. He hated

talking about the subject, and he had thought about it and worried

about it so much that he was quite muddle-headed. It seemed to involve

the whole universe, and his attempts to express his point of view

would wander off into discussions about the Greek city-states or the

principles of Machiavelli. He was frankly incoherent, which meant a

considerable inner conflict. From the very beginning of the War he

had got into the habit of worrying, and this developed with alarming

rapidity. He worried about the War, about his own attitude to it, about

his relations with Elizabeth and Fanny, about his military duties,

about everything. Now “worry” is not “caused” by an event; it is a

state which seizes upon any event to “worry” over. It is a form of

neurasthenia, which may be induced in a perfectly healthy mind by shock

and strain. And for months and months he just worried and drifted.

When Elizabeth decided, somewhere towards the end of 1914, that

the time had come when the principles of Freedom must be put into

practice in the case of herself and Reggie, and duly informed George,

he acquiesced at once. Perhaps he was so sick at heart that he was

indifferent; perhaps he was only loyally carrying out the agreement.

What surprised me was that he did not take that opportunity of telling

her about Fanny. But he was apparently quite convinced that she knew.

It was, therefore, an additional shock when he found out that she

didn’t know, and a still greater shock to see how she behaved. He

suffered an obnubilation of the intellect in dealing with women. He

idealized them too much. When I told him with a certain amount of

bitterness that Fanny was probably a trollop who talked “freedom” as

an excuse and that Elizabeth was probably a conventional-minded woman

who talked “freedom” as in the former generation she would have talked

Ruskin and Morris politico-æstheticism, he simply got angry. He said

I was a fool. He said the War had induced in me a peculiar resentment

against women—which was probably true. He said I did not understand

either Elizabeth or Fanny—how could I possibly understand two people

I had never seen and have the cheek to try to explain them to _him_,

who knew them so well? He said I was far too downright, over-simplified

and _tranchant_ in my judgments, and that I didn’t—probably

couldn’t—understand the finer complexities of peoples’ psychology. He

said a great deal more, which I have forgotten. But we came as near to

a quarrel as two lonely men could, when they knew they had no other

companion. This was in the Officers’ Training Camp in 1917, when George

was already in a peculiar and exacerbated state of nerves. After that,

I made no effort at any sort of ruthless directness, but just allowed

him to go on talking. There was nothing else to do. He was living in a

sort of double nightmare—the nightmare of the War and the nightmare of

his own life. Each seemed inextricably interwoven. His personal life

became intolerable because of the War, and the War became intolerable

because of his own life. The strain imposed on him—or which he imposed

on himself—must have been terrific. A sort of pride kept him silent.

Once when it was my turn to act as commander of the other Cadets, I

was taking them in Company Drill. George was right-hand man in the

front rank of number one Platoon, and I glanced at him to see that he

was keeping direction properly. I was startled by the expression on

his face—so hard, so fixed, so despairing, so defiantly agonized. At

mess we ate at tables in sixes—he hardly ever spoke except to utter

some banality in an effort to be amiable or some veiled sarcasm which

sped harmlessly over the heads of those for whom it was intended. He

sneered a little too openly at the coarse obscene talk about tarts and

square-pushing, and was too obviously revolted by water-closet wit.

However, he wasn’t openly disliked. The others just thought him a rum

bloke, and left him pretty much alone.

Probably what had distressed him most was the row between Elizabeth

and Fanny. With the whole world collapsing about him, it seemed quite

logical that the Triumphal Scheme for the Perfect Sex Relation should

collapse too. He did not feel the peevish disgust of the reforming

idealist who makes a failure. But in the general disintegration of all

things he had clung very closely to those two women, too closely of

course. They had acquired a sort of mythical and symbolical meaning

for him. They resented and deplored the War, but they were admirably

detached from it. For George they represented what hope of humanity

he had left, in them alone civilization seemed to survive. All the

rest was blood and brutality and persecution and humbug. In them alone

the thread of life remained continuous. They were two small havens of

civilized existence and alone gave him any hope for the future. They

had escaped the vindictive destructiveness which so horribly possessed

the spirits of all right-thinking people. Of course, they were

persecuted, that was inevitable. But they remained detached, and alive.

Unfortunately, they did not quite realize the strain under which he was

living, and did not perceive the widening gulf which was separating the

men of that generation from the women. How could they? The friends of a

person with cancer haven’t got cancer. They sympathize, but they aren’t

in the horrid category of the doomed. Even before the Elizabeth-Fanny

row he was subtly drifting apart from them against his will, against

his desperate efforts to remain at one with them. Over the men of that

generation hung a doom which was admirably if somewhat ruthlessly

expressed by a British Staff Officer in an address to subalterns in

France: “You are the War generation. You were born to fight this War,

and it’s got to be won—we’re determined you shall win it. So far as

you are concerned as individuals, it doesn’t matter a tinker’s damn

whether you are killed or not. Most probably you will be killed, most

of you. So make up your minds to it.”

That extension of the Kiplingesque or Kicked-backside-of-the-Empire

principle was something for which George was not prepared. He resented

it, resented it bitterly, but the doom was on him as on all the young

men. When “we” had determined that they should be killed, it was

impious to demur.

After the row, the gap widened, and when once George had entered the

army it became complete. He still clung desperately to Elizabeth and

Fanny, of course. He wrote long letters to them trying to explain

himself, and they replied sympathetically. They were the only persons

he wanted to see when on leave, and they met him sympathetically.

But it was useless. They were gesticulating across an abyss. The

women were still human beings; he was merely a unit, a murder-robot,

a wisp of cannon-fodder. And he knew it. They didn’t. But they felt

the difference, felt it as a degradation in him, a sort of failure.

Elizabeth and Fanny occasionally met after the row, and made acid-sweet

remarks to each other. But on one point they were in agreement—George

had degenerated terribly since joining the army, and there was no

knowing to what preposterous depths of Tommydom he might fall.

“It’s quite useless,” said Elizabeth, “he’s done for. He’ll never

be able to recover. So we may as well accept it. What was rare and

beautiful in him is as much dead now as if he were lying under the

ground in France.”

And Fanny agreed....