Guy had caught her as she started back from him like a frightened animal. “Judas nothing,” he murmured. Her face streamed with tears. Guy held her, his eyes strangely sad. “Judas nothing, my Iris,” he murmured. “You’ve won, girl. Go away and play at your lovely game of love. You’ve got me again, as you had when you were a child. I must say I like someone who really loves and really hates. I’m proud of you, Iris.”
Somehow, somehow, as Guy held her, Iris’s eyes looked through the mist towards me, and I moved my lips to make two words: Saint George. Somewhere in the mist she smiled. …
She whispered: “Unfair, unfair, unfair! Guy, to kiss me like that, sweet, forgiving Guy! Oh, unfair, unfair, unfair! And I was so sure I wouldn’t cry tonight. …”
Sir Maurice was fidgeting with the black ebony paper-knife. Hilary said “hm” and blew his nose. It was very funny now that it was Sir Maurice who seemed to be alone. I was glad. Iris had at last been forced to retreat from that proud battlefield on which she met men on their own ground. She had made her one gesture of womanhood; and now it was Sir Maurice who stood alone. Clever Guy. He was looking towards the General, smiling. …
“Maurice,” he smiled, “the girl’s right. You were rather a sickening ass. …”
“My dear Guy,” said the General with a tremendous helplessness; and he smiled. “How on earth was I to know then that a boy and gir—”
“Oh, phut!” Guy smiled like a boy. “You don’t catch me interfering with any of my boy’s friendships, I can tell you. Not that I’ve ever really thought about these things before. One just goes driving along never giving these things a thought until one day we all go off the deep end just because we never have given them a thought. I fancy Hilary’s right about this father and child business. I mean, people have been having sons, I suppose, since the year one, and the relation between them is still a mess. In this century, for instance, all we people have been bucking no end about being brotherly with our sons, as though being a fatheaded brother was any good if you don’t understand what the cub is driving at. I just thought of that this very moment. For instance, my boy told me the other day that Kipling wrote true-blue miracles calculated to increase the blood-pressure in men who were too old to fight. I gave him a thrashing with the gloves for his infernal cheek, especially as he must have got it out of some book, for the boy hasn’t what you could call a brain, which is just as well, for it will keep him from going over to Labour. But, after all, our cubs can’t make more of a mess of everything than we and our fathers have done. That’s the point to hang on to.”
“Good God, man!” snapped Hilary. “I’ve been saying that to you for twenty years, and you’ve—”
“That’s right, Hilary,” Guy grinned. “But you’ve got a way of saying things. …”
Iris was looking from one to the other of us. It was as though she was in a dream, looking at faces in a dream. Soft she was now, soft and white and small. And her eyes were clouds of blue mist. She stared at Sir Maurice, who stood fidgeting with the paper-knife. “Maurice,” she whispered, “goodbye.”
Sharply he looked up from the paper-knife. He flipped the paper-knife on to the card-table. Then I saw that Sir Maurice hated his ancient enemy.
“Goodbye, Iris,” he said. “But you must not expect me to wish you happiness. You have taken from me my only son.”
“Maurice,” she said desperately, “isn’t that special pleading? Haven’t you any pity, any understanding, of what I have been through?”
“Understanding! Yes, I have understanding, Iris. But I can’t let it stretch across the wide gulf that should separate you from my son.”
“But you made the gulf, Maurice! You, you!” She seemed passionately to want his understanding now!
“I!” cried Sir Maurice. “Good God, woman, I merely parted a boy and a girl. But you could have found each other again—if you hadn’t been you! I made the gulf! Iris, did I murder Boy Fenwick!”
“Maurice, you take that back!”
“Hilary, never mind.” It was a faint, husky whisper. “Just don’t mind, Hilary.” She was staring at Sir Maurice as at a snake. She was calm. “Did you say murder, Sir Maurice? Murder?”
Sir Maurice made the most helpless gesture. He looked very old. “I apologise, Iris, I apologise! I take it back completely. I was carried away. I apologise, child. Of course, murder was much too strong—”
“Too strong?” Guy echoed softly. “If you ask me, sir, it was so damned strong that it’s a wonder to me that it hasn’t blown us all out of the house.”
“I have apologised, Guy!” snapped Sir Maurice.
Iris was looking at me. She seemed lost in some thought, she was very still. Her lips said: “Dear, take me away.”
Sir Maurice darted for his paper-knife, fumbled among the cards for it, got it, rapped out: “Just one moment, Iris. I didn’t mean to say that. You must see that. I apologise sincerely.”
“I cannot hear your apology, Maurice. Because of that gulf.”
“I never thought of saying that,” Guy murmured. “Damn!”
“Just a moment, just a moment!” the General waved the paper-knife fretfully. “Ever since Napier came to see me this morning I have been thinking of these things. I saw Venice this afternoon. She is mad, I think, or enchanted. She believes in your love for Napier. I can only see the helpless ruin you have made of my son. And you say you love him! Let’s forget if we can all the other men you have ‘loved.’ Just take this one fact. Not two years after parting from Napier for good, which you say broke your heart, you marry Boy Fenwick. And when Boy
