some bright citizens in my time … And now he’s going to win out, unless we get mighty busy.’
There was a knock at the door and the solid figure of Andrew Amos revealed itself.
‘It’s time ye was home, Miss Mary. It chappit half-eleven as I came up the stairs. It’s comin’ on to rain, so I’ve brought an umbrelly.’
‘One word,’ I said. ‘How old is the man?’
‘Just gone thirty-six,’ Blenkiron replied.
I turned to Mary, who nodded. ‘Younger than you, Dick,’ she said wickedly as she got into her big Jaeger coat.
‘I’m going to see you home,’ I said. ‘Not allowed. You’ve had quite enough of my society for one day. Andrew’s on escort duty tonight.’
Blenkiron looked after her as the door closed.
‘I reckon you’ve got the best girl in the world.’ ‘Ivery thinks the same,’ I said grimly, for my detestation of the man who had made love to Mary fairly choked me.
‘You can see why. Here’s this degenerate coming out of his rotten class, all pampered and petted and satiated with the easy pleasures of life. He has seen nothing of women except the bad kind and the overfed specimens of his own country. I hate being impolite about females, but I’ve always considered the German variety uncommon like cows. He has had desperate years of intrigue and danger, and consorting with every kind of scallawag. Remember, he’s a big man and a poet, with a brain and an imagination that takes every grade without changing gears. Suddenly he meets something that is as fresh and lovely as a spring flower, and has wits too, and the steeliest courage, and yet is all youth and gaiety. It’s a new experience for him, a kind of revelation, and he’s big enough to value her as she should be valued … No, Dick, I can understand you getting cross, but I reckon it an item to the man’s credit.’
‘It’s his blind spot all the same,’ I said.
‘His blind spot,’ Blenkiron repeated solemnly, ‘and, please God, we’re going to remember that.’
Next morning in miserable sloppy weather Blenkiron carted me about Paris. We climbed five sets of stairs to a flat away up in Montmartre, where I was talked to by a fat man with spectacles and a slow voice and told various things that deeply concerned me. Then I went to a room in the Boulevard St Germain, with a little cabinet opening off it, where I was shown papers and maps and some figures on a sheet of paper that made me open my eyes. We lunched in a modest cafe tucked away behind the Palais Royal, and our companions were two Alsatians who spoke German better than a Boche and had no names - only numbers. In the afternoon I went to a low building beside the Invalides and saw many generals, including more than one whose features were familiar in two hemispheres. I told them everything about myself, and I was examined like a convict, and all particulars about my appearance and manner of speech written down in a book. That was to prepare the way for me, in case of need, among the vast army of those who work underground and know their chief but do not know each other.
The rain cleared before night, and Blenkiron and I walked back to the hotel through that lemon-coloured dusk that you get in a French winter. We passed a company of American soldiers, and Blenkiron had to stop and stare. I could see that he was stiff with pride, though he wouldn’t show it.
‘What d’you think of that bunch?’ he asked.
‘First-rate stuff,’ I said.
‘The men are all right,’ he drawled critically. ‘But some of the officer-boys are a bit puffy. They want fining down.’ ‘They’ll get it soon enough, honest fellows. You don’t keep your weight long in this war.’
‘Say, Dick,’ he said shyly, ‘what do you truly think of our Americans? You’ve seen a lot of them, and I’d value your views.’ His tone was that of a bashful author asking for an opinion on his first book.
‘I’ll tell you what I think. You’re constructing a great middle-class army, and that’s the most formidable fighting machine on earth. This kind of war doesn’t want the Berserker so much as the quiet fellow with a trained mind and a lot to fight for. The American ranks are filled with all sorts, from cow-punchers to college boys, but mostly with decent lads that have good prospects in life before them and are fighting because they feel they’re bound to, not because they like it. It was the same stock that pulled through your Civil War. We have a middle-class division, too - Scottish Territorials, mostly clerks and shopmen and engineers and farmers’ sons. When I first struck them my only crab was that the officers weren’t much better than the men. It’s still true, but the men are super- excellent, and consequently so are the officers. That division gets top marks in the Boche calendar for sheer fighting devilment … And, please God, that’s what your American army’s going to be. You can wash out the old idea of a regiment of scallawags commanded by dukes. That was right enough, maybe, in the days when you hurrooshed into battle waving a banner, but it don’t do with high explosives and a couple of million men on each side and a battle front of five hundred miles. The hero of this war is the plain man out of the middle class, who wants to get back to his home and is going to use all the brains and grit he possesses to finish the job soon.’
‘That sounds about right,’ said Blenkiron reflectively. ‘It pleases me some, for you’ve maybe guessed that I respect the British Army quite a little. Which part of it do you put top?’ ‘All of it’s good. The French are keen judges and they give front place to the Scots and the Australians. For myself I think the backbone of the Army is the old- fashioned English county regiments that hardly ever get into the papers Though I don’t know, if I had to pick, but I’d take the South Africans. There’s only a brigade of them, but they’re hell’s delight in a battle. But then you’ll say I’m prejudiced.’
‘Well,’ drawled Blenkiron, you’re a mighty Empire anyhow. I’ve sojourned up and down it and I can’t guess how the old-time highbrows in your little island came to put it together. But I’ll let you into a secret, Dick. I read this morning in a noospaper that there was a natural affinity between Americans and the men of the British Dominions. Take it from me, there isn’t - at least not with this American. I don’t understand them one little bit. When I see your lean, tall Australians with the sun at the back of their eyes, I’m looking at men from another planet. Outside you and Peter, I never got to fathom a South African. The Canadians live over the fence from us, but you mix up a Canuck with a Yank in your remarks and you’ll get a bat in the eye … But most of us Americans have gotten a grip on your Old Country. You’ll find us mighty respectful to other parts of your Empire, but we say anything we damn well please about England. You see, we know her that well and like her that well, we can be free with her.
‘It’s like,’ he concluded as we reached the hotel, ‘it’s like a lot of boys that are getting on in the world and are a bit jealous and stand-offish with each other. But they’re all at home with the old man who used to warm them up with a hickory cane, even though sometimes in their haste they call him a standpatter.’
That night at dinner we talked solid business - Blenkiron and I and a young French Colonel from the IIIeme Section at G.Q.G. Blenkiron, I remember, got very hurt about being called a business man by the Frenchman, who thought he was paying him a compliment.
‘Cut it out,’ he said. ‘It is a word that’s gone bad with me. There’s just two kind of men, those who’ve gotten sense and those who haven’t. A big percentage of us Americans make our living by trading, but we don’t think because a man’s in business or even because he’s made big money that he’s any natural good at every job. We’ve made a college professor our President, and do what he tells us like little boys, though he don’t earn more than some of us pay our works’ manager. You English have gotten business on the brain, and think a fellow’s a dandy at handling your Government if he happens to have made a pile by some flat-catching ramp on your Stock Exchange. It makes me tired. You’re about the best business nation on earth, but for God’s sake don’t begin to talk about it or you’ll lose your power. And don’t go confusing real business with the ordinary gift of raking in the dollars. Any man with sense could make money if he wanted to, but he mayn’t want. He may prefer the fun of the job and let other people do the looting. I reckon the biggest business on the globe today is the work behind your lines and the way you feed and supply and transport your army. It beats the Steel Corporation and the Standard Oil to a frazzle. But the man at the head of it all don’t earn more than a thousand dollars a month … Your nation’s getting to worship Mammon, Dick. Cut it out. There’s just the one difference in humanity - sense or no sense, and most likely you won’t find any more sense in the man that makes a billion selling bonds than in his brother Tim that lives in a shack and sells corn-cobs. I’m not speaking out of sinful jealousy, for there was a day when I was reckoned a railroad king, and I quit with a bigger pile than kings usually retire on. But I haven’t the sense of old Peter, who never even had a bank account … And it’s sense that wins in this war.’
The Colonel, who spoke good English, asked a question about a speech which some politician had made.
‘There isn’t all the sense I’d like to see at the top,’ said Blenkiron. ‘They’re fine at smooth words. That
