Parade's End

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 an 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 godfather-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: