Part 15

The Colonel tasted the punch and pronounced it excellent. He then asked the carol singers their names and where they came from, and finally gave their leader five shillings and sent them off into the snow.

‘It’s been just like this every year, as long as I can remember,’ said the Colonel. ‘We always had a party at Christmas when we were boys . . . acted some very amusing charades too . . . always a glass of sherry after luncheon in the servants’ hall and carol singers in the evening. . . . Tell me,’ he said, suddenly changing the subject, ‘did you _really_ like what you saw of the film yesterday?’

‘It was the most divine film I ever saw, Papa.’

‘I enjoyed it enormously, sir, really I did.’

‘Did you? Did you? Well, I’m glad to hear that. I don’t believe the Rector did—not properly. Of course, you only saw a bit of it, most disappointing. I didn’t like to say so at the time, but I thought it most negligent of him to have his electric light in that sort of condition so that it wouldn’t last out for one evening. Most inconsiderate to any one who wants to show a film. But it’s a glorious film, isn’t it? You did think so?’

‘I never enjoyed a film so much, honestly.’

‘It makes a stepping stone in the development of the British film industry,’ said the Colonel dreamily. ‘It is the most important all-talkie super-religious film to be produced solely in this country by British artists and management and by British capital. It has been directed throughout regardless of difficulty and expense, and supervised by a staff of expert historians and theologians. Nothing has been omitted that would contribute to the meticulous accuracy of every detail. The life of that great social and religious reformer John Wesley is for the first time portrayed to a British public in all its humanity and tragedy. . . . I’m glad you realized all that, my boy, because as a matter of fact, I had a proposal to make to you about it. I’m getting an old man and can’t do everything, and I feel my services should be better spent in future as actor and producer, rather than on the commercial side. One needs some one young to manage that. Now what I thought was, that perhaps you would care to come in with me as business partner. I bought the whole thing from Isaacs and, as you’re one of the family, I shouldn’t mind selling you a half-share for, say, two thousand pounds. I know that that isn’t much to you, and you’ld be humanly certain to double your money in a few months. What do you say to it?’

‘_Well_ . . .’ said Adam.

But he was never called upon to answer, for just at that moment the door of the dining-room opened and the Rector came in.

‘Hullo, Rector, come in. This is very neighbourly of you to come and call at this time of night. A happy Christmas to you.’

‘Colonel Blount, I’ve got very terrible news. I had to come over and tell you . . .’

‘I say, I am sorry. Nothing wrong at the Rectory, I hope?’

‘Worse, far worse. My wife and I were sitting over the fire after dinner, and as we couldn’t read—not having any light—we put on the wireless. They were having a very pretty carol service. Suddenly they stopped in the middle and a special news bulletin was read. . . . Colonel, the most terrible and unexpected thing—_War has been declared_.’

_Happy Ending_

On a splintered tree stump in the biggest battlefield in the history of the world, Adam sat down and read a letter from Nina. It had arrived early the day before, but in the intensive fighting which followed he had not had a spare minute in which to open it.

_Doubting Hall_, _Aylesbury_.

‘_Dearest Adam,—I wonder how you are. It is difficult to know what is happening quite because the papers say such odd things. Van has got a divine job making up all the war news, and he invented a lovely story about you the other day, how you’d saved hundreds of people’s lives, and there’s what they call a popular agitation saying why haven’t you got the V.C., so probably you will have by now, isn’t it amusing?_

‘_Ginger and I are very well. Ginger has a job in an office in Whitehall and wears a very grand sort of uniform, and, my dear, I’m going to have a baby, isn’t it too awful? But Ginger has quite made up his mind it’s his, and is as pleased as anything, so that’s all right. He’s quite forgiven you about last Christmas, and says anyway you’re doing your bit now, and in war time one lets bygones be bygones._

‘_Doubting is a hospital, did you know? Papa shows his film to the wounded and they adore it. I saw Mr Benfleet, and he said how awful it was when one had given all one’s life in the cause of culture to see everything one’s stood for swept away, but he’s doing very well with his “Sword Unsheathed” series of war poets._

‘_There’s a new Government order that we have to sleep in gas masks because of the bombs, but no one does. They’ve put Archie in prison as an undesirable alien, Ginger saw to that, he’s terrific about spies. I’m sick such a lot because of this baby, but everyone says it’s patriotic to have babies in war time. Why?_

‘_Lots of love, my angel, take care of your dear self._

_N._’

He put it back in its envelope and buttoned it into his breast-pocket. Then he took out a pipe, filled it and began to smoke. The scene all round him was one of unrelieved desolation; a great expanse of mud in which every visible object was burnt or broken. Sounds of firing thundered from beyond the horizon, and somewhere above the grey clouds there were aeroplanes. He had had no sleep for thirty-six hours. It was growing dark.

Presently he became aware of a figure approaching, painfully picking his way among the strands of barbed wire which strayed across the ground like drifting cobweb; a soldier clearly. As he came nearer Adam saw that he was levelling towards him a liquid fire-projector. Adam tightened his fingers about his Huxdane-Halley bomb (for the dissemination of leprosy germs), and in this posture of mutual suspicion they met. Through the dusk Adam recognized the uniform of an English staff officer. He put the bomb back in his pocket and saluted.

The newcomer lowered his liquid-fire projector and raised his gas mask. ‘You’re English, are you?’ he said. ‘Can’t see a thing. Broken my damned monocle.’

‘Why,’ said Adam. ‘You’re the drunk Major.’

‘I’m not drunk, damn you, sir,’ said the drunk Major, ‘and, what’s more, I’m a General. What the deuce are _you_ doing here?’

‘Well,’ said Adam. ‘I’ve lost my platoon.’

‘Lost your platoon. . . . I’ve lost my whole bloody division!’

‘Is the battle over, sir?’

‘I don’t know, can’t see a thing. It was going on all right last time I heard of it. My car’s broken down somewhere over there. My driver went out to try and find some one to help and got lost, and I went out to look for him, and now I’ve lost the car too. Damn difficult country to find one’s way about in. No landmarks. . . . Funny meeting you. I owe you some money.’

‘Thirty-five thousand pounds.’

‘Thirty-five thousand and five. Looked for you everywhere before this scrap started. I can give you the money now if you like.’

‘The pound’s not worth much nowadays, is it?’

‘About nothing. Still, I may as well give you a cheque. It’ll buy you a couple of drinks and a newspaper. Talking of drinks, I’ve got a case of bubbly in the car if we could only find it. Salvaged it out of an R.A.F. mess that got bombed back at H.Q. Wish I could find that car.’

Eventually they did find it. A Daimler limousine sunk to the axles in mud.

‘Get in and sit down,’ said the General hospitably. ‘I’ll turn the light on in a second.’

Adam climbed in and found that it was not empty. In the corner, crumpled up in a French military greatcoat, was a young woman fast asleep.

‘_Hullo_, I’d forgotten all about you,’ said the General. ‘I picked up this little lady on the road. I can’t introduce you, because I don’t know her name. Wake up, mademoiselle.’

The girl gave a little cry and opened two startled eyes.

‘That’s all right, little lady, nothing to be scared about—all friends here. _Parlez anglais?_’

‘Sure,’ said the girl.

‘Well, what about a spot?’ said the General, peeling the tinfoil from the top of a bottle. ‘You’ll find some glasses in the locker.’

The woebegone fragment of womanhood in the corner looked a little less terrified when she saw the wine. She recognized it as the symbol of international good will.

‘Now perhaps our fair visitor will tell us her name,’ said the General.

‘I dunno,’ she said.

‘Oh, come, little one, you mustn’t be shy.’

‘I dunno. I been called a lot of things. I was called Chastity once. Then there was a lady at a party, and she sent me to Buenos Aires, and then when the war came she brought me back again, and I was with the soldiers training at Salisbury Plain. That was swell. They called me bunny—I don’t know why. Then they sent me over here and I was with the Canadians, what they called me wasn’t nice, and then they left me behind when they retreated and I took up with some foreigners. They were nice too, though they _were_ fighting against the English. Then _they_ ran away, and the lorry I was in got stuck in the ditch, so I got in with some other foreigners who were on the same side as the English, and they were beasts, but I met an American doctor who had white hair, and he called me Emily because he said I reminded him of his daughter back home, so he took me to Paris and we had a lovely week till he took up with another girl in a night club, so he left me behind in Paris when he went back to the front, and I hadn’t no money and they made a fuss about my passport, so they called me _numero mille soixante dix huit_, and they sent me and a lot of other girls off to the East to be with the soldiers there. At least they would have done only the ship got blown up, so I was rescued and the French sent me up here in a train with some different girls who were very unrefined. Then I was in a tin hut with the girls, and then yesterday they had friends and I was alone, so I went for a walk, and when I came back the hut was gone and the girls were gone, and there didn’t seem any one anywhere until you came in your car, and now I don’t rightly know where I am. _My_, isn’t war awful?’

The General opened another bottle of champagne.

‘Well, you’re as right as rain now, little lady,’ he said, ‘so let’s see you smile and look happy. You mustn’t sit there scowling, you know—far too pretty a little mouth for that. Let me take off that heavy coat. Look, I’ll wrap it round your knees. There, now, isn’t that better? . . . Fine, strong little legs, eh? . . .’

Adam did not embarrass them. The wine and the deep cushions and the accumulated fatigue of two days’ fighting drew him away from them and, oblivious to all the happy emotion pulsing near him, he sank into sleep.

The windows of the stranded motor car shone over the wasted expanse of the battlefield. Then the General pulled down the blinds, shutting out that sad scene.

‘Cosier now, eh?’ he said.

And Chastity in the prettiest way possible fingered the decorations on his uniform and asked him all about them.

And presently, like a circling typhoon, the sounds of battle began to return.

THE END

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.

Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.