Parade's End (105 page)

She was standing in the doorway so that this fellow should not run upstairs to where the conversation was going on. The windows consoled her. She only gathered that Tietjens had had great mental trouble. He must have. She knew nothing of either Sylvia Tietjens or the General except for their beautiful looks. But Tietjens must have had great mental trouble. Dreadful!

It was hateful. How could she stand it! But she must, to keep this fellow from Tietjens, who was talking to her mother.

And … if his wife was a bad wife, didn’t it …

The windows were consoling. A little dark boy of an officer passed the railings of the house, looking up at the windows.

McKechnie had talked himself hoarse. He was coughing. He began to complain that his uncle, Sir Vincent
Macmaster,
had refused him an introduction to the Foreign Office. He had made a scene at the Macmasters’ already that morning. Lady Macmaster – a haggard wanton, if there ever was one – had refused him access to his uncle, who was suffering from nervous collapse. He said suddenly:

‘Now about this sonnet: I’m at least going to show this fellow… .’ Two more officers, one short, the other tall, passed the window. They were laughing and calling out. ‘… that I’m a better Latinist than he… .’

She sprang into the hall. Thunder again had come from the door.

In the light outside a little officer with his half profile towards her seemed to be listening. Beside him was a thin lady, very tall. At the bottom of the steps were the two laughing officers. The boy, his eye turned towards her, with a shrinking timidity you would have said, exclaimed in a soft voice:

‘We’ve come for Major Tietjens… . This is Nancy. Of Bailleul, you know!’ He had turned his face still more towards the lady. She was unreasonably thin and tall, the face of her skin drawn. She was much the older. Much. And hostile. She must have put on a good deal of colour. Purplish. Dressed in black. She ducked a little.

Valentine said:

‘I’m afraid … He’s engaged… .’

The boy said:

‘Oh, but he’ll see us. This is Nancy, you know!’

One of the officers said:

‘We said we’d look old Tietjens up… .’ He had only one arm. She was losing her head. The boy had a blue band round his hat. She said:

‘But he’s dreadfully urgently engaged… .’

The boy turned his face full on her with a gesture of entreaty.

‘Oh, but …’ he said. She nearly fell, stepping back. His eyesocket contained nothing; a disorderly reddish scar. It made him appear to be peering blindly; the absence of the one eye blotted out the existence of the other. He said in Oriental pleading tones:

‘The Major saved my life; I must see him!’ The sleeveless officer called out:

‘We said we’d look old Tietjens up… . IT’s armi … hick… . At Rouen in the pub …’ The boy continued:

‘I’m Aranjuez, you know! Aranjuez… .’ They had only been married last week. He was going to the Indian Army to-morrow. They
must
spend Armistice Day with the Major. Nothing would be anything without the Major. They had a table at the Holborn.

The third officer – he was a very dark, silky-voiced, young Major – crept slowly up the steps, leaning on a stick, his dark eyes on her face.

‘It
is
an engagement, you know!’ he said. He had a voice like silk and bold eyes. ‘We really did make an engagement to come to Tietjens’ house to-day… . Whenever it happened … a lot of us. In Rouen. Those who were in Number Two.’

Aranjuez said:

‘The C.O.’s to be there. He’s dying, you know. And it would be nothing without the Major… .’

She turned her back on him. She was crying because of the pleading tones of his voice and his small hands. Tietjens was coming down the stairs, mooning slowly.

II

STANDING AT THE
telephone, Tietjens had recognised at once that this was a mother, pleading with infinite statesmanship for her daughter. There was no doubt about that. How could he continue to … to entertain designs on the daughter of this voice? … But he
did
. He couldn’t. He did. He
couldn’t
. He did… . You may expel Nature by pleading …
tamen usque recur
… . She must recline in his arms before midnight. Having cut her hair had made her face look longer. Infinitely attracting. Less downright: with a refinement. Melancholy! Longing! One must comfort.

There was nothing to answer to the mother on sentimental lines. He wanted Valentine Wannop enough to take her away. That was the overwhelming answer to Mrs. Wannop’s sophistications of the advanced writer of a past generation. It answered her then; still more it answered her now, to-day, when a man could stand up. Still, he could not overwhelm an elderly, distinguished, and inaccurate lady! It is not done.

He took refuge in the recital of facts. Mrs. Wannop, weakening her ground, asked:

‘
Isn’t
there any legal way out? Miss Wanostrocht tells me your wife …’

Tietjens answered:

‘I can’t divorce my wife. She’s the mother of my child. I can’t live with her, but I can’t divorce her.’

Mrs. Wannop took it lying down again, resuming her proper line. She said that he knew the circumstances and that if his conscience … And so on and so on. She believed, however, in arranging things quietly if it could be done. He was looking down mechanically, listening. He read that our client Mrs. Tietjens of Groby-in-Cleveland requests us to inform you that after the late occurrences at a Base Camp in France she thinks it useless that you and she should contemplate a common life for the future… . He had contemplated that set of facts enough already. Campion during his leave had taken up his quarters at Groby. He did not suppose that Sylvia had become his mistress. It was improbable in the extreme. Unthinkable! He had gone to Groby with Tietjens’ sanction in order to sound his prospects as candidate for the Division. That is to say that, ten months ago, Tietjens had told the General that he might make Groby his headquarters as it had been for years. But, in that communication trench he had not told Tietjens that he had been at Groby. He had said ‘London’, specifically.

That
might
be adulterer’s guilty conscience but it was more likely that he did not want Tietjens to know that he had been under Sylvia’s influence. He had gone for Tietjens bald-headed, beyond all reason for a Commander-in-Chief speaking to a Battalion Commander. Of course he might have the wind up at being in the trenches and being kept waiting so near the area of a real
strafe
as he might well have taken that artillery lark to be. He might have let fly just to relieve his nerves. But it was more likely that Sylvia had bewildered his old brains into thinking that he, Tietjens, was such a villain that he ought not to be allowed to defile the face of the earth. Still less a trench under General Campion’s control.

Campion had afterwards taken back his words very handsomely – with a sort of distant and lofty deprecation. He had even said that Tietjens had deserved a decoration,
but
that there were only a certain number of decorations now to be given and that he imagined that Tietjens would prefer it to be given to a man to whom it would be of more advantage. And he did not like to recommend for decoration an officer so closely connected with himself. He said this before members of his staff … Levin and some others. And he went on, rather pompously, that he was going to employ Tietjens on a very responsible and delicate duty. He had been asked by H.M. Government to put the charge over all enemy prisoners between Army H.Q. and the sea in charge of an officer of an exceptionally trustworthy nature, of high social position and weight; in view of the enemy’s complaints to The Hague of ill-treatment of prisoners.

So Tietjens had lost all chance of distinction, command pay, cheerfulness, or even equanimity. And all tangible proof that he had saved life under fire – if the clumsy mud-bath of his incompetence could be called saving life under fire. He could go on being discredited by Sylvia till kingdom come, with nothing to show on the other side but the uncreditable fact that he had been a gaoler. Clever old General! Admirable old god-father-in-law!

Tietjens astonished himself by saying to himself that if he had had any proof that Campion had committed adultery with Sylvia he would kill him! Call him out and kill him… . That of course was absurd. You do not kill a General Officer commanding in chief an Army. And a good General, too. His reorganisation of that Army had been everything that was shipshape and soldierly; his handling it in the subsequent fighting had been impeccably admirable. It was in fact the apotheosis of the Regular Soldier. That alone was a benefit to have conferred on the country. He had also contributed by his political action to forcing the single command on the Government. When he had gone to Groby he had let it be quite widely known that he was prepared to fight that Division of Cleveland on the political issue of single command or no single command – and to fight it in his absence in France. Sylvia no doubt would have run the campaign for him!

Well, that, and the arrival of the American troops in large quantities, had no doubt forced the hand of Downing Street. There could no longer have been any question
of
evacuating the Western Front. Those swine in their corridors were scotched. Campion was a good man. He was good – impeccable! – in his profession; he had deserved well of his country. Yet, if Tietjens had had proof that he had committed adultery with his, Tietjens’, wife he would call him out. Quite properly. In the eighteenth-century traditions for soldiers. The old fellow could not refuse. He was of eighteenth-century traditions, too.

Mrs. Wannop was informing him that she had had the news of Valentine’s having gone to him from a Miss Wanostrocht. She had, she said, at first agreed that it was proper that Valentine should look after him if he were mad and destitute. But this Miss Wanostrocht had gone on to say that she had heard from Lady Macmaster that Tietjens and her daughter had had a liaison lasting for years. And … Mrs. Wannop’s voice hesitated … Valentine seemed to have announced to Miss Wanostrocht that she intended to live with Tietjens. ‘Maritally,’ Miss Wanostrocht had expressed it.

It was the last word alone of Mrs. Wannop’s talk that came home to him. People would talk. About him. It was his fate. And hers. Their identities interested Mrs. Wannop, as novelist. Novelists live on gossip. But it was all one to him.

The word ‘Maritally!’ burst out of the telephone like a blue light! That girl with the refined face, the hair cut longish, but revealing its thinner refinement… . That girl longed for him as he for her! The longing had refined her face. He must comfort …

He was aware that for a long time, from below his feet a voice had been murmuring on and on. Always one voice. Who could Valentine find to talk to or to listen to for so long? Old Macmaster was almost the only name that came to his mind. Macmaster would not harm her. He felt her being united to his by a current. He had always felt that her being was united to his by a current. This then was the day!

The war had made a man of him! It had coarsened him and hardened him. There was no other way to look at it. It had made him reach a point at which he would no longer stand unbearable things. At any rate from his equals! He counted Campion as his equal; few other people, of course. And what he wanted he was prepared
to
take… . What he had been before, God alone knew. A Younger Son? A Perpetual Second-in-Command? Who knew. But to-day the world changed. Feudalism was finished; its last vestiges were gone. It held no place for him. He was going – he was damn well going! – to make a place in it for … A man could now stand up on a hill, so he and she could surely get into some hole together!

He said:

‘Oh, I’m not destitute, but I was penniless this morning. So I ran out and sold a cabinet to Sir John Robertson. The old fellow had offered me a hundred and forty pounds for it before the war. He would only pay forty to-day – because of the immorality of my character.’ Sylvia had completely got hold of the old collector. He went on: ‘The Armistice came too suddenly. I was determined to spend it with Valentine. I expected a cheque to-morrow. For some books I’ve sold. And Sir John was going down to the country. I had got into an old suit of
mufti
and I hadn’t a civilian hat.’ Reverberations came from the front door. He said earnestly:

‘Mrs. Wannop… . If Valentine and I can, we will… . But to-day’s to-day! … If we can’t we can find a hole to get into… . I’ve heard of an antiquity shop near Bath. No special regularity of life is demanded of old furniture dealers. We should be quite happy! I have also been recommended to apply for a vice-consulate. In Toulon, I believe. I’m quite capable of taking a practical hold of life!’

All the Government Departments, staffed of course by noncombatants, were aching to transfer those who had served to any other old Department. The Department of Statistics would transfer him… .

A great many voices came from below stairs. He could not leave Valentine to battle with a great number of voices. He said:

‘I’ve got to go!’ Mrs. Wannop’s voice answered:

‘Yes; do. I’m very tired.’

He came mooning slowly down the stairs. He smiled. He exclaimed:

‘Come up, you fellows. There’s some hooch for you!’ He had a royal aspect. An all-powerfulness. They pushed past her and then past him on the stairs. They all ran up the stairs, even the man with the stick. The armless man
shook
hands with his left hand as he ran. They exclaimed enthusiasms… . On all celebrations it is proper for His Majesty’s officers to exclaim and to run upstairs when whisky is mentioned. How much the more so to-day!

They were alone now in the hall, he on a level with her. He looked into her eyes. He smiled. He had never smiled at her before. They had always been such serious people. He said:

‘We shall have to celebrate! But I’m not mad. I’m not destitute!’ He had run out to get money to celebrate with her. He had meant to go and fetch her. To celebrate that day together.

She wanted to say: ‘I am falling at your feet. My arms are embracing your knees!’