Scissors

BOOK V

THE NEW WORLD

CHAPTER I

I

The crowded steamer from Folkestone reached Ostend in the last glow of the sunset as it fell on the straggling Digue, domes, hotels, casinos, verandahed houses, the pleasure haunt standing inviolate on the edge of the plains, that beyond, were now drenched with blood. A fortnight had elapsed, full of irritating delays. There were interviews at the War Office, where every obstacle had been raised, frantic journeys to the Foreign Office, the Belgian Legation, the offices of the Newspaper Proprietors Association. Nobody wanted war correspondents out there, except the papers. Then more delay while John bought a car, a rare thing, for every one had been commandeered by the War Office; and with all this work he had made desperate attempts to get into touch with the Daily Post resident correspondent at Brussels, beseeching him to ask for Muriel at the Convent of the Sacred Heart. But all was chaotic at the other end of the wire and day after day he had to return to poor Mrs. Vernley with no news. Then, the last day, at the last minute, news came from Muriel herself. She had joined the Belgian Red Cross; the convent had been turned into a hospital.

The steamer was warped in at Ostend amid amazing scenes. The harbour was crowded with refugees, pitiable objects, sitting on their small bundles hastily gathered before flight. The moment his car was landed, John pressed on towards Bruges. Again and again he almost told his chauffeur to turn round and pick up the wretched people straggling along the road towards Ostend and England. Tired women trudged the long roads, carrying infants in their arms, while small children clutched at their skirts. There was no crying, no complaining, only dull, voiceless despair on every face. Old men and women went by, pushing their worldly wealth, bedding for the most part, on barrows. Yes, they had seen the war, out there. The German bombardment was terrible. They were destroying everything. The gallant army resisted every inch, but what could they do, little Belgium, against these hordes? John ran into Bruges soon after dusk.

At daylight, he was on the crowded road again, this time towards Ghent, where the other correspondents had established their headquarters. There had been one topic at Bruges. The wonderful English army was over and fighting! It had all been so swift and silent. The Germans were furious and amazed. They had orders to wipe out the contemptible little army. Nearing Ghent there were signs of war. Ambulance vans swept by, in them inert swathed figures, mud-stained and pallid. The environs of Ghent were choked with cars, lorries, refugees, detachments of men on the march.

John found his colleagues at the long low Hotel de la Poste in the Place d'Armes. There was Tompkins of the Standard, tall, lean, and depressed with the hopelessness of it all; and V. E. A. Stevenson, the veteran, who had seen ten wars, and hated them all. He was a cynic, a pacifist and a revolutionary. He derived grim satisfaction when ardent Belgians mistook him, with his red, weather-beaten face, trim beard and white hair, and breast blazing with war ribbons, for an English general. He suffered them to embrace him ecstatically, and sighed for his home at Hampstead,—"built out of the blood of the Boers," he explained grimly. Trevor of the Times walked about morose and self-important; the heavy brow of Willing of the Express was seen towering above every group of Belgian generals. He had a miraculous knowledge of the disposition of the armies, and they consulted him as a general staff. Also, genial, and an optimist to the core, Biddings of Reuter walked about the lounge in carpet slippers. He refused to go out. What was the good of running about the highways and the byways? Every general and person who was somebody came to the hotel. He picked their brains—"very poor rubbish heaps"—gathered up the gossip and at tea-time had such a store that the weary, muddy colleagues were glad to barter news. He was more eloquent, despite an impediment, with the poker in his hands, when, with the cinders, he would show why the Germans could not possibly get to Paris.

On the third day after John's arrival, Phipps turned up. He had been in the thick of it, at Termond and Alost. He had had no food, was nervy and on the verge of a breakdown. His eagle features were sharper than ever, and his brain wonderfully alert. His despatches had created something of a sensation in England, not only for their news, but also for the humanity, the tenderness running through his vivid epics of suffering and incredible heroism. He was in Paris when the war broke out, moved up with the French armies, had been with the British Army in its great stand at Mons, had dragged back through that dogged retreat, "a bloody terrible business, Dean—walking on torn flesh all the way,"—and had passed on into Belgium.

"God—how I hate it—it's insensate, blowing all these splendid lads to atoms, for what?" he cried.

"For England," said Trevor, with disapproving dignity.

"England! Rubbish!" snapped Phipps. "They're giving the same reason in Germany, Russia, Austria, Serbia—the same fierce old women are brow-beating every timid lad, and the same stupid, red-faced Generals are sitting at mess while their puppets are pulverised with something they can't see, which doesn't give them a dog's chance before bespattering the turf with their brains! If this is civilisation, why—" he broke off as though realising the futility of everything. "I suppose we shall have to go on writing as if it were a football match, and be censored every time we hint at such a thing as spilt blood or a nasty mess."

He walked out, even more pallid, and went up to his bedroom where he hammered out a long despatch on his "Corona." Eight other correspondents were doing the same thing in other bedrooms. For an hour there was a rapid clatter of typewriter keys. At five o'clock the despatch rider left for the Signal Station, whence their despatches crossed the wires overnight, in time for the Englishman's breakfast table. Curiously, those at home knew more than these correspondents. They explored a corner, oblivious of the fate of the world beyond. In England every morning the public watched the ugly black snake marked on the map, as it slowly curled its way towards Paris. In a top left hand corner another black line closed in upon Antwerp and crept along the coast towards Ostend.

"We shall have to move out soon," said Riddings. "The streets are choked to-day with ambulances—that's a sure sign." Every night sleep was broken by the incessant roar of guns, and the night sky flickered and quivered. Those were the days when the name of Liége was on every tongue. Could General Leman hold out? Then came news of a terrible massacre at Malines. The name sang in John's heart like a bell. Muriel—was she there? Had she remained and met the German invasion, or where was she? He wired to the Vernleys' beseeching news. That same day a shell fell into the town. The British had marched through St. Nicolas; the fate of Antwerp hung in the balance, the black snake was closing in on Ghent and curling upwards towards the coast.

"If we don't move soon, we're luggage for Germany," said Biddings. "The generals have all gone and they know when it gets chilly as well as the swallows."

Walking down the Grande Place, John suddenly clutched Phipps' arm. The next moment he had seized a car standing outside a shop and was driving madly down a side street. Phipps watched him go in silent amazement, but John, half-crazed with fear that the car ahead would give him the slip, drove furiously, without heeding the traffic through which he miraculously raced. For in the car ahead, he had caught a glimpse of a face that had made his heart jump. Muriel was in it, a Muriel he knew despite her nurse's hood and cape! He was gaining on it now; it paused in front of a building. He alighted on the pavement simultaneously with the slim nurse.

"Muriel!"

She turned, then rushed into his arms.

"Oh, John!"

Two ragged children lifted their caps and yelled "Vive les Anglais! Vive l'Angleterre!" but the lovers stood there alone in the world.

"Why are you here?" he asked.

She laughed, her fingers playing with the button of his tunic.

"And you?"

"Our headquarters are here—Hotel de la Poste—until to-night," he replied.

Her face shadowed.

"I have just been fetched. Tod—he is here—dying."

"Tod!"

"Yes—he came out with the Antwerp expedition—I am just going in to him—come!"

She clasped his hand and they entered the gloomy porch together. The place had been a school—desks and chairs were piled up in the lobby. A Belgian soldier saluted and conducted them to the matron, a pale little Belgian woman. Lieutenant Vernley? Yes, he was here, but he could not be seen, M'sieur was ill, very ill, "a la morte," she added, raising her hands helplessly. John explained.

"Ah!—his sister?—pardon! We expected her. Yes, come! You shall go in."

They followed down a long ward, with dozens of beds, and groaning shapes beneath blankets, and entered a small room, very dull. In the corner was a bed and on it the figure of a boy. His shirt was open at the neck. His unshaven chin was growing a sandy beard, which contrasted with the green-grey pallor of his face; the hands which lay over the brown blanket, were red and soiled. Muriel slipped to her knees at his side.

"Tod dear!" she whispered, taking his hand in hers. But he lay without response, his leaden head deep in the pillow. John stood in the doorway.

"In the stomach, m'sieur—a shell splinter," explained the matron. "He has been delirious, 'Muriel,' that was all he cried, 'Muriel.' We found a letter from Mademoiselle in his pocket, and sent for her yesterday."

"He doesn't know me," said Muriel, turning pathetically, but a pressure on her hand told her she was wrong.

"Oh Tod, darling, I've come. I'm going to nurse you."

A glimmer of a smile faded across the lad's face.

John left her then, he would be back in an hour.

When he returned, Muriel, very quiet, was sitting in the matron's room. He knew in a moment it was all over. Very gently he took her into his arms, and let her cry, with her head on his shoulder.

They buried Tod the next morning. Phipps was there, and an English Army Chaplain, and two Belgian generals, carrying wreaths from the town authorities. Thus another Englishman was committed to the soil for whose defence he had gladly given his young life.

After the funeral, they had to hurry away. Shells were falling into the town. Melle had been heavily bombarded and the Town Hall was a heap of ruins. Half the inhabitants of Ghent seemed to be streaming along the road to Bruges. The inevitable moment of parting came for John and Muriel. She was rejoining her unit, now at Bruges.

When would they meet again? For a long moment she clung to him in the desperation of love.

"We will get leave together and be married, Muriel," he urged.

"Yes, John but not now—we must go on, these poor things need us. I am almost happy here. I could not sleep in England, knowing what happens day and night!"

"Muriel—promise you will take care, I shall be anxious for you."

"And you—you are running all the risks. Oh, John, we must come through! Life is going to be so wonderful even yet."

He kissed her hungrily, wrapped the rugs round her in the car, and saluted as it carried her away. He waited until the traffic blotted her from view. Then he joined Stevenson who was waiting with his car at the hotel.

It was burdened with their luggage, the precious typewriters precariously balanced on the top. They were going south into the British lines and the welter of blood. Antwerp had fallen; nothing could now stop the Germans reaching the coast. And England perhaps. But that was an incredible thought to John. England could not know ruin like this. He looked up at the moon hanging serenely over the flat Belgian countryside. The same moon peered down on English homes and in silent glades where the birds slept.

II

So ran the drama, act by act, in those epic days. While England waited breathlessly, the terrible tides of war, now sweeping onwards, now refluent, devastated the countryside of Europe. The little fire, lighted in Sarajevo, spread outwards until it lapped countries and capitals and nations in its lurid glow; until the windy plain of Troy, the desert slopes of the Holy Land, the forests of the Caucasian mountains, and the shores of the Tigris and Danube shook with the tramp of men. Month after month, the war spread its leprous hand across the face of splendid courageous manhood. Sometimes, in the agony of his soul, when coming from dressing stations where men held in their entrails, by pools coloured like sunset with the blood and limbs of men and horses, John cried out against the monstrous infliction of pain. Was it not better that the world should crash into another planet, and find the peace of obliteration? And to heighten the useless agony of this drama, came the reports of official squabbles, the blunders of statesmen, the rhetorical recriminations of politicians, hurled from nation to nation with cheap victories of words, while men struggled with mud under a murderous hail of iron.

For fifteen months John rushed about the fringe of war in his great car. They were days of terrible strain, but his efforts seemed as nothing beside the herculean labour of those wonderful boys who tramped along the tree splintered roads of Flanders, singing in defeat as in victory, dropping swiftly by the roadside in a convulsive cough as death fell upon them from the air. He was up every morning at five, astir before daylight in the cold wintry air, with a long motor journey to the lines, there to watch the coloured panorama of a bombardment, the unearthly silence of "zero" when the barrage lifted, to wait in those minutes when youth leapt forward upon death; and then to visit the clearing stations where men who had been splendid to look upon, so full of the vigour of youth, lay torn in ribbons, demented, delirious. Month after month he went through the hideous routine when suddenly, one night, after writing his despatch, he fell forwards upon his typewriter. They found him in a dead faint.

"I've seen this coming," said Biddings. "He's worn himself away—and he'll have company soon," he said, turning to Phipps, "if you don't write and smoke less."

A week later John was at the Vernleys, lying about in their rooms, and talking as though all those months had been a nightmare. It was not the same house; Kitty was nursing in London, Alice was on a farm. Bobbie was back home with a wound, hoping to be released daily from a luxurious private hospital in Sussex, "where the chambermaid's a countess and the matron a snob." Muriel—the saga of Muriel, they all called it. She had contributed to history. The story of her stand at Lens had made all England ring with her fame. She had been mentioned in despatches for her heroism under fire. John had not seen her since that memorable day in Ghent, but letters came and went. She wrote vividly of her experiences, and he began to be a little in awe of her obvious efficiency. News of one, he could not gain. There was no mention of Marsh among any of his friends. Bobbie had been curtly silent when asked. "Never heard of him—don't expect he's wounded." Was that a sneer? thought John. Even Mr. Fletcher, forwarding parcels from the boys of his House asked, "We can't trace Marsh—do you know his regiment? He does not reply to letters."

With quiet, and Mrs. Vernley's assiduous attention, John quickly recovered. She had aged much since the death of her eldest boy, and sorrow had rendered her more gentle and self-effacing than ever. These were lonely days for her, with Mr. Vernley away as a Director in one of the Ministries, her daughters all on war work. They had long talks at tea time, when John read the pages he had gathered together of a book of despatches. He was a famous man now, and he rather enjoyed the experience. There was nothing elating in being famous, just because every one was glad to shake you by the hand or because your name was a password whenever and wherever it was uttered; it was indeed wearisome to be pestered with petitions for your support of all kinds of fantastic charities, to be expected to speak here, there and everywhere, or to be an afternoon's attraction at an ambitious lady's drawing-room party. What he enjoyed was the freemasonry in which he could now move among the men and women of the earth who did things, and were great, simply because their natures were rich in character and prodigal with varying gifts.

After his sojourn at "The Croft," he spent a fortnight in town looking up old friends. It was a London strangely, terribly changed. It was, in one phase, a London more interesting. Down its pavements in great variety of uniforms, passed the young men of all the earth; youth from the plains, the jungle, the prairie, the veldt, the backwoods and the ranch, youth in splendid careless vigour, snatching hectically at joy, not turning to see the shadowy spectre over their shoulders. It was strange to stand in Piccadilly Circus, dimly lit, and watch the theatres pour out their festive crowds, to sit in the busy restaurants, to see mankind, strained, feverish, but debonair, trying to laugh in the face of ruin and death. It was a London of extremes; the wounded silently borne from Charing Cross, the beautiful living swept out in the deadly maelstrom at Victoria Station; the painted women gaily surrendering to the rabid hunger of youth in arms, full-blooded and reckless; the air of intense expectation of fresh development, the swift rise and fall of national heroes, the craving for a strong man to lead the nation to victory; the silent evidence of the wreckage in those endless hospitals, the fierce old women full of hate, and the beardless boys drilled and transported like sheep under the charge of hard-voiced blasphemous sergeants,—all these things revealed a nation at war, a nation unnatural in its hopes, fears, suspicions, enthusiasms, yet heroically treading the inevitable path through chaos to some kind of ending, either of victory or defeat.

It was while watching the crowd surging into the Piccadilly Tube entrance, that John's heart suddenly leapt up in surprise. Surely—yes, it was the undisguisable Marsh—and yet! John stared a moment. A tall, sun-browned youth in kilts, with the black and red hose of the Black Watch, was laughing down into the face of a girl whose hand rested persuasively on his arm. She was pursuing her profession, the oldest under the sun, with all the usual assets, the flaunting white stole over the shoulders, the large beaded vanity bag, one hand gloved, the other thin, manicured and nervous, glittering with rings, too large to be genuine. There was something pathetically obvious in the loud declaration of her clothes, the challenge of her carriage, the provoking tilt of her hat over large observant eyes. She had found her object of a night's passion and pay—the human agent of bread and rent. Here was another youth, beautiful in his strength, snatching at a brief expression of manhood as a pleasurable anodyne for an approaching ordeal.

She turned and the young officer half hesitated. John moved forward.

"Marsh!" he said quietly. A malevolent look glittered beneath the dark hat, the tall youth peered at the intruder half-resentfully; even then he seemed confused. With a shock, more of pain than disgust, John saw that Marsh was not quite sober.

"What are you—" began John, when Marsh's senses cleared.

"Scissors, by God, this is great!" Then, awkwardly, he grew conscious again of his company, insistently standing by him—

"This lady is—is—"

"That's all right, Marsh—where are you going?" asked John.

"He's coming home with me," said the girl sullenly.

John put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a note.

"This is an old friend I've not seen for a long time—I want to talk to him," he said quietly, putting the note in her hand. Defiantly she thrust it back, and her mouth, hard and unpleasant, curled malevolently; she was baulked of her prey.

"Keep yer bl—— money, I'm not depending on missionaries," she snarled.

John looked at her calmly.

"I'm sorry, I did not mean to offend you. Then you will join me at supper with my friend?"

There was something so kind and disarming in his voice, that she suddenly melted. Her eyes assumed a tenderness surprising and almost pathetic.

"I'll go—he's your pal I see, and you poor boys may not meet again." .She turned away, but John put a detaining hand on her arm.

"I really meant my invitation," he said quietly.

Then (God! the horror of it!), she momentarily misinterpreted his insistence, and involuntarily her professional air returned, only to be dispelled again by the kind cleanliness of the young man's eyes.

"No—kid, thanks, I guess I'll pick up a boy."

John put his hand in hers.

"No—in memory of our meeting, have a—holiday," he added lamely. This time she let the note rest in her hand. He thought she was going to cry, but suddenly she turned and was lost in the passing crowd. Marsh stood there, silent, bemused. John said not a word, but called a taxi, and pushed his friend into it. In the darkness Marsh sat huddled up. They were speeding down Piccadilly and turning by Hyde Park Gate when he seemed conscious that he was being carried away.

"Where are you taking me, Scissors," he asked in a dull voice. (Could this be Marsh, the debonair, the irrepressible?)

"Home," John replied laconically.

"I'm leaving Victoria at four a.m.—for France."

John started.

"But you—you were—" he began.

"Going to spend the night with a gay woman, like the filthy cad I am. Oh, I know what you're thinking! Well, I was—I'd have been one of those deserters you see under escort."

"You're drunk, Teddie," said John.

"That's no excuse—in a court martial."

There was silence again. It was now half-past eleven. He would get him home and make him rest for the few intervening hours.

Mrs. Perdie was up when they arrived. Fortunately Marsh pulled himself together, and was his graceful self, but when he gained John's room, he collapsed on the bed. John went below to ask for coffee, a little apologetically. But Mrs. Perdie was in a delightful fluster.

"The bonnie laddie—oh, I want to cry when I see a kiltie. His mother must be proud of him. An' the Black Watch! Many's the time in Edinburgh I've seen—"

John left her in ecstasies. He wanted to pull the bonnie laddie round, for the credit of his dear mother and himself. But Marsh had recovered and was sitting upright in a chair. He had been brushing his hair and straightening the thin khaki tie.

"I suppose you're thinking—" started Marsh, bitterly.

"What a stroke of luck it was—Jove, Teddie, it does me good to see you! But where have you been?" cried John. And the other, seeing he had no intention of alluding to the circumstances of their meeting, took the hint.

"This is the end of two years' resistance to the folly of mankind," said Marsh in a laugh that had no mirth, as he stroked the sporran over his knees. "It's been a long disagreeable story! Let's see, we parted at Boston in August 1914—Lord, it seems ages ago. I went home, and then the battle began. I didn't believe in war—I don't believe in the war," he added with emphasis, "and I've gone through hell for my belief. I'm not going to give you a recital of it all. The badgering of one's relatives, the sneers, the fierce old ladies who asked if I didn't think I ought to go. And the mater's had it too. They made it so unpleasant for her that she never goes out now. Well, I've stuck it out for two years, and hell every minute of it. Scissors, I'm just nowhere at all. I went to some of the meetings held by the conscientious objectors, but they made me ill. Most of 'em are long-haired fanatics, living on vegetables and cram full of isms. They've got courage, there's no denying that; it takes more courage to stay out of this war in face of public opinion and calumny, than to go into it—but they seem to enjoy their persecution and welcome it. I can't—it's misery not to be along with all the boys, but I've stuck to my belief until—until—oh, Scissors!"

He bent his head forward, burying his face in his hands, and cried like a child. John moved, and sat beside him on the arm of the lounge chair, placing an arm across his shoulders.

"Teddie, old man—I know it must have been awful—you needn't tell me."

Marsh lifted his head again, and blew his nose very hard.

"Until, Scissors—" he continued determinedly, "one day, a year ago, I was at Paddington Station, and saw Bobbie coming down the platform. He was in khaki, looking very fit. I hadn't seen him since our holiday. You can guess what a joy it was. I just rushed up to him—and—"

Marsh's knuckles whitened as he gripped his handkerchief.

"Scissors, he cut me dead—he didn't even acknowledge that he heard me—but he saw me—he looked right through me, and went on, leaving me like Lot's wife. I'd had a hellish time—that just finished me. A fellow can't go on fighting the world when his best friends quit him. I just went home and buried myself. I didn't write to you—or to any one; I wasn't going to risk a second incident like that. I kept in,—but—I've been in the war every minute. I've gone up and down those casualty lists, Scissors. They're all going; there's hardly any of the old set left. Fletcher's House has been wiped out—a whole bunch at Neuve Chapelle, and I'm going now. I don't believe in the damn war. It's mad, it can't bring anything but indemnities, starvation, hatred. Every day I am more convinced of the insanity—the beastly, selfish filthiness of it, with all these horrible old politicians making speeches out of it, the business man 'doing his bit,' as he calls his plundering, the fierce old women lapping up German blood like vampires. I've deserted, Scissors, I've funked the battle against it—I can't carry on this lone fight any longer. I enlisted a few months ago—been training at Salisbury and here I am, a tailored product of Scott Adie, Highland outfitters, and one of our 'darling brave lads' ready to die for his country."

He laughed bitterly at the wry humour of his position.

"I'm going to disembowel some mother's son I've never seen. They have been working us up to blood fury on stuffed sacks. I've learned how to draw out my bayonet with a twist, and when I've blotted out the light of life in half-a-dozen mother's hearts, a more expert pig-sticker than I am will blot out my mother's happiness. And it'll go on and on for years, till there's hardly a sane, able-bodied fellow left, and then one side will crack, and the political and financial ghouls will gather over Europe's corpse and exact terms and wave flags of victory."

Marsh stood up and paced the room.

"Where's the sense of it?" he cried, stretching out his hands. "What has victory to do with justice—the strongest wins!—but it doesn't follow the strongest is right!"

His eyes softened.

"And, Scissors, those kids in my platoon—there's not one of them eighteen yet; they're just babies and I mother 'em night and day. You know how puppies are, with clumsy paws and trusting eyes?—-well, they're just like that, Scissors—and when they're—they're sent into the line—"

Here his words choked him. Mrs. Perdie entered with the coffee, and with further exclamations of delight offered all kinds of service. With many thanks and refusals, John got her out of the room again, but not before she had asked to give the young gentleman a kiss, "as if I was your ain mother, bless her—and God keep you safe," she said, retreating to the door with tearful eyes. Marsh seemed better for having unburdened himself. John wanted him to have a nap, but he would not.

"Let's talk, Scissors, till it's time. We've such a lot to say and you never know, we may—"

"Oh, rubbish, Teddie."

So they talked, and the old days with their golden careless hours all came back again. Remorselessly the clock crept on. At three, Marsh said he would have to go. He had his kit to get at the luggage office. John went with him. They walked along the silent unlit streets. At Victoria there were signs of life. Figures in khaki loomed out of the darkness; for a moment they halted, the sound of marching feet came down the Buckingham Palace Road. Ghostly they sounded in the night hush; a little group under the flare of the coffee stall watched them pass a thousand strong, burdened with kit, obscurely leaving the homeland many would never see again. Marsh and John watched them pass, grim faces, pallid in the dim light, a few whistling out of bravado, but apathetically silent, most of them. They followed the detachment into the lighted station, passed the barrier at the departure bay. Marsh found a carriage full of other officers, some half-sleepy after long night journeys, two saying farewells to their lovers, one very drunk, alternately blasphemous and maudlin, kept in control by a friend. The doors slammed, a shrill whistle cut off the useless scrappy conversation.

Their hands met in a firm farewell clasp. They could not trust themselves to speak. The train moved. Marsh with a final forced smile looked at Scissors, equally mechanical in response. A yard now apart—two yards—the train diminished, the carriage faded—then two red lights receded in the girdered darkness; after that a mist and the heart's desolation.

III

The next morning, the Daily Post rang up, asking him to call at once, and the same voice told him that news had just come of the death of Ronald Stream. It was difficult for John to realise that the death of one so exuberantly young was possible. He had a vision of a night in a room at Cambridge when he had talked there, so radiant and intensely interested in anything, and so much the young god in his beauty and zest, that John had felt shy of approaching him. And now he was dead, in the far away Dardanelles. Fame too had touched him by his legacy of a few immortal sonnets, in which beat the heart of young England. Death seemed impossible to that pard-like spirit, swift and beautiful. For a space, John thought of his friend Freddie Pond. He had encountered him only two nights ago as he leaned against the box office in the vestibule of the Court Theatre, during an interval. John thought he had aged and looked sad and tired, perhaps the act of watching the swift passing of so many of the brilliant spirits he had herded, was wearing him. In some respects, waiting at home was worse than the struggle at the front.

He saw Merritt at the Daily Post, busy and tireless as ever.

"Don't know what the Chief wants—are you better? You're looking fit. Just heard young Bewley's won the Distinguished Service Cross for bombing Bruges docks—a bright kid always."

Walsh rang for John and he went in.

"You're fit, I see," said Walsh. "Would you care to tackle a naval job?"

"Anything," said John, "rather than be out of it."

"I'm sending you to the Dover Patrol. I know little more, how you'll live, on board or ashore. I'll give you a note to Blackrigg at the Admiralty, he'll tell you. Good luck to you, Dean."

He was outside again. This time the sea!

John called, in the afternoon, on Blackrigg and got his orders, then he made his way to Gieve's in Bond Street for a ready-made uniform; he was leaving for Dover the next day. Outside the Admiralty Arch he heard his name and turned.

A girlish figure in grey was calling him.

"Tilly!" he exclaimed in glad surprise, "wherever have you sprung from?"

"I think I must ask that!" she laughed softly.

She was looking very beautiful and he wished he was not in such a hurry; he had much to ask her and she came out of a happy past.

"Are you in the same studio?" he asked, in a string of questions. She was thinking how big and strong he had grown, the boy had disappeared in this rather stern looking young man. But he had seen things and was a name in the world.

"Oh—no—I'm at our flat," she replied. Then, seeing the enquiry in his face—"Oh, of course, you don't know—we were married a month ago—I'm Mrs. Lindon now."

She saw his face brighten with sudden pleasure, and as he expressed his wishes, she could not restrain the tears that gathered in her eyes.

"You are—are not unhappy?" he asked, suddenly. "Lindon's all right?—where is he?" he added anxiously, as the tears trickled down her face. She choked, and he took hold of her arm to draw her aside from the inquisitive glances directed to them.

"He's—he's not killed?" whispered John hoarsely, apprehensive of the common answer of these days.

"No—no," she replied, in a quiet nerveless voice—

"worse."

"Worse?" he queried.

"He was wounded four months ago—his right hand shot away."

They stood still, while the traffic roared about them. Strangely detached from the scene, John watched the confluence of the traffic around King Charles' statue, as it poured out of the Strand, Northumberland Avenue and Whitehall. He saw the pigeons fluttering down upon the placarded base of the Nelson plinth in Trafalgar Square, and over it all, his brain was repeating an awful echo, "His right hand shot away," the hand that had threaded those swift passages of Beethoven, Chopin and Debussy on many memorable nights, one of the hands on which rested his future fame.

"Tilly, my poor girl!" he said quietly, as she stood there, frail and tearful. "Let's walk down the Mall—I want to hear all." He took her arm, and led her away from the traffic's vortex. For a space she did not speak, then she smiled wanly.

"Oh, I have him with me—he is so brave, and pretends he never misses it—ties his own tie and is so proud when he gets it straight—but I know all he's suffering. Sometimes I have seen him looking at the closed piano as if his heart would break." She said no more, and they walked on. Then abruptly John stopped and looked down into her face.

"Tilly—you have been married a month—then his—"

Her eyes met his and answered him simply.

"Oh, you poor brave child!" he cried, his own voice trembling this time.

"He needed me so, Scissors—and it makes no difference to me; at least I have him safe now. But for him—"

They walked on in silence. At the Marlborough Gate he left her, with a promise to call on his next leave.

CHAPTER II

I

The months slipped, months of peril, of thrills, of human drama and comradeship. On Christmas Day, as they entered Dover Harbour, John looked forward to the leave he had obtained. It had been a dreary, nerve-wracking experience, a life in which monotony gave place to unexpected activity. But the moment they reached the harbour, he was told to report at the Admiral's office, and half an hour later was under orders to proceed to Scapa Flow, the other extremity of Great Britain, there to join H.M.S. Fanfare, of the Grand Fleet. Hastily collecting his things, including a bundle of letters awaiting him, he bade hurried and warm farewells to his shipmates, good fellows all of them, despite the fact that they growled night and day about the Service, knowing well they would be broken-hearted if they had to leave it.

On the evening of the same day, he was in the night express to Edinburgh. He had had a few hours in London and had made three calls—first at Mariton Street to deposit clothes and get fresh ones. Here he found Capt. Fisher in a state of high prosperity, as something in the Ordnance Survey Department. He was enjoying the war tremendously and prophesied that it would last another five years.

"It has revived British character, sir—the tonic we needed!" he said, blithely indifferent to the holocaust of youth. Miss Simpson, too, at the tea-table showed an indomitable spirit. She had been visiting the dear brave boys in a local hospital, and related with gusto a story told her of a Ghurka soldier who carried eight Germans' heads in a sack, which he had refused to give up. "That's what should happen to all the Germans," she added.

"It's very horrible!" said John.

Miss Simpson opened wide eyes in surprise.

Then he called on Mrs. Graham, for he remembered that her boy was a midshipman stationed with the Grand Fleet; perhaps they could meet. Her flat, with its exquisite taste, cast the old spell upon him, even before she came into the room. There was something so intimate in the books, cushions, curtains, rugs and china, something that revealed the hand of Mrs. Graham. She greeted him with great pleasure, made him talk, and as he did so, he sat wondering at her beauty, the lovely order of her hair, the music of her voice. She had just had a letter from Muriel. That opened the flood-gates and for an hour a wonderful little nurse near Amiens was the sole topic of conversation.

"It's more than a year since I saw her," he said, "and I am getting more desperate every day."

"You poor thing!" smiled Mrs. Graham. "This war is very hard for young lovers; I pity them most of all. But she writes?"

"Now and then—and wonderful letters too. I'm going to make extracts and publish them."

"You mercenary man!" she laughed.

The hour fled. He had to go. She pressed a little autographed copy of Flecker's Poems into his hand. He could smell the particular perfume she used, for an hour afterwards.

It was not until John was seated in the train, speeding northwards through the night, that he had time to open his letters. There was one from Marsh, in a base hospital, wounded but cheerful and recommended for the M.C. "for conspicuous bravery in attack."

"Just fancy how all the 'brave lad' stick-at-homes will be writing to congratulate me on coming to my senses and showing my courage! Ough! Scissors, it makes me sick. One hundred glad-eyed youngsters were minced by steel in that attack—we gained eighty yards and lost it all an hour afterwards. What idiots we humans are!"

A very short letter from Muriel. She was resting after a nervous breakdown. How long was the war going to last? It was very wonderful being in the midst of things, but sometimes she wanted to cry out; was Europe quite indifferent to all the suffering?

"Oh, John, if only we could just romp into tea at 'The Croft' as in those old days, with Dad and Mr. Ribble discussing the Insurance Bill, and poor Tod banging in, covered with motor grease, and you and Bobbie eating up all the bread and butter. It is awful to think it will never be like that again... I feel ages old... If this—"

Here came a break in the letter.

"I've been called away for half an hour—a poor fellow in my ward who kept asking for me. He's only twenty-five, and so young and strong, with the dearest funny little smile. He's so helpless. I feel just like a mother, with all these big babies around me—and they're quite as troublesome, but very dear. I begin to realise, John, that I had never really lived. I see things quite differently, and you'll probably find me another kind of Muriel altogether. I expect you've changed also—haven't all values changed these days? We lived in a very little world once, and thought too much of ourselves."

He dropped the letter, a chill had come over him. Was it envy of those big babies, and particularly the one "with the dearest funny little smile?" Changed!—what did she mean by that? He hadn't changed, why should she? True, they hadn't met for a year—and she had not written lately. Why had he not insisted on their marriage? He laughed then, a little uneasily at a thought that said, "You're jealous!" and read on—

"It was very wonderful when you wrote about our settling down when it is over—if ever. Somehow it seems too much to hope from life. Things were getting very crazy in 1914 and I feel this war is putting our relations on a more sensible basis."

A more sensible basis!—what on earth did the girl mean. Was she getting unnerved? He read the sentence over again. Yes, he must insist on their marriage. She wanted a controlling hand; this war was too much for her. With this resolve, he read on again, and became easier in mind.

"John, I couldn't leave this now, like this, with all this life going on. It must be terrible for women to sit and wait at home. Poor things. I read some of their letters to the men here and I nearly break down. I am feeling a little shy of you, John, you are so famous now. The nurses here bring me cuttings about you, and in the mess room, there's a Sphere photograph of you coming down a gangway. I love the naval uniform, and to think that I've never seen you in it! Be kind to all those dear little middies, they must feel so lonely on that big dreary sea."

John smiled as he put the letter away. At that very moment, one of those "dear little middies" lay with his head fast asleep on John's shoulder, where he had slipped over. He would have to tell Muriel that they detested being called "dear," "little," or "middies," and that the average "snotty" could be entrusted to look well after himself. There was another letter from Bobbie. He was not fit for foreign service and he had been given a post at the War Office. Miss Piggin sent a pair of woollen gloves she had knitted in "desperate moments," for Chawley School was now a hospital for the wounded, with Mrs. Tobin as commandant, "very successful, her firmness keeping the men in order." Mr. Tobin was a chaplain at the front. She had had a piece of Egyptian pottery sent by Mr. Woodman, who was a lieutenant in the Yeomanry stationed near the Suez Canal.

Having read his letters John surveyed his carriage, thinking of sleep. He had been unable to get a sleeping berth, but there was only the "snotty" and himself in the compartment. That young gentleman had been solacing himself for his departure from home-worship and civilisation, with a copy of La Parisienne and the semi-nude mademoiselles therein, all of whom appeared to spend their time dressed only in chemises, sitting on the knees of officers. John reflected on the necessity of a press censor for the safeguarding of "snotties'" morals. The immediate problem was how to dispose of this lad without waking him, if possible. John looked at the face on his shoulder; it might have been a baby's, so fresh and unwrinkled, with a little red mouth through which a row of white teeth just showed.

Very quietly he lowered the lad until he was reclining on the full length of the seat; pulling his legs up entailed risk, but it was done, and the Navy slept soundly. John made himself comfortable and dozed off.

II

He was awakened by a ray of sunlight striking his eyes. The train was standing in a small station. Looking out of the window, he saw a group of houses, all brightly yellow in the morning sun. A slight mist and a chill air told him it was early morning and there was the smell of the sea in the air. A great range of blue mountains loomed in the distance, with a flat estuary between, and the tide out. He was alone in the compartment, but in a minute or so his companion returned along the platform, fresh-coloured and bright-eyed in the nipping air, bearing two cups of steaming coffee.

"Will you have one, sir?" he asked. "I'm awfully sorry I went to sleep on you last night—did I push you off the seat, sir?"

John laughed and explained.

"Where are we?" he asked.

"Bonar Bridge—we're on the Highland Railway now, sir. We've passed Cromarty Firth—we've got a dummy fleet in there to diddle Fritz—then through Sutherlandshire—jolly wild and desolate over those moors all the way to Thurso. We'll be there by tea-time, sir."

The boy chatted away brightly. This was his second journey, he was proud of being a veteran. He had been in the Jutland Battle, blown into the sea and picked up from a grating by a submarine, along with five survivors of a crew of eight hundred.

The day drew on; noon passed; still they climbed northwards. They were in desolate regions now, with tiny hamlets set in the wild moors. There was a feeling of great space and the silence was broken only by the cry of a bird. They passed Dunrobbin Castle, standing high and lonely on its promontory overlooking the desolate sea. As prophesied, they reached Thurso at tea-time.

A motor omnibus took them along the coast from Thurso to Scrabster, the point of embarkation. Here John parted from his young companion, who gave him the smartest little salute, bestowed on admirals and admiring young ladies only. John boarded a destroyer. Half an hour later, entering a gate made by two drifters which lowered a boom, he saw the Fleet. There it lay, enormous, like floating animals asleep on the water, glittering with the afternoon sun. Here was the strength of England. It was a sight to quicken the heart. From his place on the bridge, to which the skipper invited him, John surveyed this grey steel city of the brotherhood of the brave. The sea mist seemed to cloud his eyes.

That night he met his fellow officers, walked over the ship, a new model of the Dreadnought class, installed himself in his cabin, saw his office with typewriter, clerk's desk, and telephone to the wireless room. He interviewed his marine orderly, a stocky little Cockney youth, shining all over like the breach of a gun. He slept soundly that night, awakened early by his orderly with a hip-bath, hot water can and carefully brushed clothes. At ten a cutter came to take him to the flag ship to present his much-examined credentials. A smart flag officer met him at the top of the companion way and conducted him below. The Commander-in-Chief would see him in a few minutes. John waited on the deck flat. Rear-admirals entered and emerged from the white-enamelled, brass-handled door on his right. There seemed to be a staff of flag officers in attendance, all young and alert, with their gold lace and showy aiglettes drooping from their shoulders. Half an hour passed, John growing more nervous every minute. Then the young flag officer called his name and ushered him into the presence.

It was a large room, with a fireplace and the far end completely windowed, bow-shaped, under which ran a verandah round the stern of the ship, where grew potted geraniums. In the sunlit air above the wind-flecked water, small seagulls cried and hovered. The water threw a shimmering reflection on to the white ceiling. By a table, on which stood a silver portrait frame, a small bookrest holding novels, a "Who's Who" and an "Army Guide," was a baby grand piano. A red carpet covered the large floor up to the pilastered fireplace. All this John saw in a glance before looking into the face of the man, who stood, his back to a large flag-dotted map of the North Sea, holding out his hand, his face puckered in a pleasant smile.

He was a small man, with dark penetrating eyes, a thin-lipped wide mouth, with corners that suggested a vivid sense of humour. The nose was slightly hooked, and John immediately recognised the striking resemblance to his brother, a Hampshire vicar who had stayed with the Marshs. But if the great position and fame of the man before him made him nervous, it was immediately dispelled by the kindness of the voice, and the charm of his personality. For twenty minutes they talked, their conversation touching many points of common interest, and on this occasion only briefly upon the work of the new correspondent. Every minute an anxious officer looked into the room, but the Chief ignored his hint of fretful persons without. At the end, another warm handshake and John passed out. Back on his own ship again, he was assailed and made to satisfy the general curiosity concerning "the Old Man."

Thus he entered upon a new era of experience, and watched Spring give place to Summer in the chilly northern waters; and upon the precipitous cliffs of the lonely islands saw the bird life, indifferent to mankind invading its hitherto unmolested domain.

III

The tranquillity of his new life, despite the atmosphere of constant vigilance, brought a great calm to John. He had been a silent sufferer in the appalling devastation, human and material, he had witnessed in Flanders, and under the fearful strain of the Dover vigil. Life on board was industrious but regular, and with the cheerful companionship of these well-balanced philosophers around him, he began to feel less acutely sensitive to the tragic action of the world drama. In a way he felt uneasy. He was not quite taking his share of the burden laid on the shoulders of youth. He would have liked to stand by the side of Vernley and Marsh and a dozen others. Here he was a spectator, waiting for something that might never happen, something which he hoped never would happen, for the event was fraught with immense and appalling possibilities. Often John stared, hypnotised by the sleek quiet power of the long guns, that moved so slowly in the morning air, like cautious antennæ. Yet swift destruction could pour out of those harmless nozzles under the obedience of hidden forces within the turrets. It seemed incredible that floating mammoths such as these ships might dissolve in air under the battery of similar guns.

But as the weeks wore on, eventless save for rumours and the variations of discipline, the idea of war receded, though occasionally incoming destroyers or drifters brought grim little stories of short encounters outside their tranquil anchorage. They read the newspapers and closely followed the vicissitudes of the war, now spread to many fronts, in many climes, and affecting almost all races on the earth, either directly or indirectly. And the incredible was happening, the successive war prophets, the weekly commentators, fell into oblivion, for this war went on despite all the carefully enunciated reasons why it could not go on. According to statistics, the German legions had been wiped out many times over, but still they pressed hard the defending line, changed from the defensive to the offensive with astounding virility for an army pronounced exhausted and emaciated.

Letters from the front brought John into close touch with realities. Muriel now wrote less frequently. Her hospital work grew heavier; he could discern the heartache underlying some of her words, sometimes an impatient note of protest against the politicians gaining wordy victories, while wrecked humanity poured into the hospitals to be botched up and start out again, until the human shuttlecocks fell, never to rise. Then one day, a rare event, a letter from Vernley, a poor writer, yet one whose disjointed chronicles were eagerly read. John opened the letter in the messroom where he had been talking with the ship's doctor, and read through it slowly; then on the fourth page his heart seemed to stop.

"Poor old Marsh! I suppose we'll all go West sooner or later, but somehow Scissors, I can't think of him as dead. He was so full of life, such a tireless beggar and such a fund of fun in him. I'm tormenting myself with the thought that I once behaved rather silly—I cut him on a platform one day, before he joined up. I know it hurt—I wanted it to—he told me so later when I ran across him here. Thank God we put it right. Still, I hurt him, Scissors, and he was too dear a chap for me to behave like that, and I'm coming to think he was right,—the more I see of this bloody mess, with no end to it, and all of us wondering why we stand it."

John put the letter down, numbed. He watched a destroyer through the porthole, passing on, saw a gull wheel and turn, with a silver glint as the sun caught its wings, heard the siren of H.M.S. Oak, speeding on its message-delivering mission; all these things went on about him, yet they were in a picture; only he was the unreal thing. Marsh gone! How could that be with the morning so fresh and active, with so much life about? Surely he would walk in here, and with a laugh, clap him on the shoulder, with something thoroughly absurd to say. Dead? Why—fellows like Marsh could not die!

His thoughts flew away to the rambling vicarage. He saw Mrs. Marsh sitting at the piano, under the lamplight; saw Mr. Marsh in his study, pipe going, the "Nation" in his hands. Could life go on and Marsh not be part of it?

Hours passed before the significance of it became clear to him, but a week passed before he was able to take up a pen and write to Mrs. Marsh. That terrible task performed, he felt now prepared for anything. The world was falling to bits; nothing could be saved. The bad news from the front affected him little. He wondered at the gloomy faces of the men around him. Why be affected by the inevitable? It would all be enacted as relentlessly as in a Greek play. Another blow would come yet, of that he was sure; life was to be wholly disintegrated.

But the weeks went on and nothing happened. Letters came, curious restrained letters, at longer intervals from Muriel. Vernley, as if conscious of the lessening circle, wrote more frequently. Lindon, in a big boyish left hand sent the town gossip; he had found a consolation, he was composing, and Tilly was wonderful. June came, with warmer and longer days in those northern waters, and with it a hurried note from Muriel saying she would be in London in a week; could he meet her, as she wished to see him? Her wish was a command that found him eager to obey. A few wires, an interview, and he was released; his leave was overdue and the Daily Post offered to send a temporary substitute at once. John waited impatiently four days and almost embraced his successor when H.M.S. Oak brought him alongside. He wired to Muriel asking when and where they could meet. On Friday night he was back in London, more wonderful, more beloved than ever to the exile, and found a reply at Mrs. Perdie's bidding him meet her in the lounge at Claridge's on Saturday evening at seven. He pictured her, waiting for him there, in a chic nurse's uniform, and to be worthy of her and in celebration of the great occasion, he put on his best service jacket.

He was there at five minutes before the hour, and to his surprise she was already waiting for him. He rushed towards her with impetuous boyish joy, that raised smiles on many observant faces around. Her greeting was more restrained, and her calmness steadied him. How splendid she was and how lovely, he thought. She had changed, of course, but she was the more Muriel for all that.

"We've a private sitting room—let us go upstairs," she said, when he had let her withdraw her hand.

"You're staying here?" he asked, surprised.

"Yes," she answered. There was nothing said in the lift. He could only look at her, but once the door had closed upon them in the small hall opening on the tiny sitting room, he put his arms out to take her into them.

"Darling," he whispered, but she seemed too agitated with nervous joy to respond, and led the way into the room, where she immediately sat down. Even then he did not see that she was slightly unnatural, as under a strain. The first indication was her voice as she pronounced his name. He looked at her more observantly; a dumb pain in her eyes, which met his with a quiet strength, caused his heart to sink a little.

"Muriel—there's nothing wrong?"

She looked down at her hands a moment, and then up at him as he stood over her. Something in her whole attitude struck him as piteous. He sat down opposite her.

"John—dear—I am going to hurt you terribly. If you cannot forgive me I shall understand. I am no longer Muriel Vernley—I am Muriel Harvey."

He looked at her. What was she saying? She was unnerved, he could see that; this strain had been too much for her. But in that brief silence she saw by the kindness in his eyes that he had not understood.

"I am Mrs. Frank Harvey, John—I'm married." And to make her words clear, she held out her hand, with its ringed finger.

Even then he just looked at her, and she saw that his eyes were those of a troubled child.

"Muriel—you can't mean it!—how can you be married!" he cried, in a low voice.

This time she could not look at him, she did not want to see the agony that was coming.

"I cannot ask you to forgive me, John—I know that, and if you think hardly, perhaps I deserve it—but oh, I don't want to hurt you—I don't, John, I—"

He had risen now and had gone over to the window, his face turned from her, looking down into the well of the building. What was he thinking?

"It's incredible!" he said huskily, after a pause. "You cannot make a fool of me like this, Muriel, you can't—why, it's impossible!" he burst out, turning and spreading his hands wide; and then seeing her face clearly for the first time, he knew it was true.

She was talking now—words, words, words. What could a woman say worth listening to by a man thrown on one side like a discarded doll; and he knew it all. Of course she had met him in hospital, there was no need to narrate all that. He had appealed to her sympathies. But he blamed her, not the man, who only pressed his opportunity. He assumed a calm attitude until she had finished, as though he had not really heard, for he was busy putting on a mask, determined she should not see how cruelly hurt he was. Once out of the room, he could face the thing squarely, but here, she must not see.

"Of course it has all been very silly—our boy and girl romance," he said, as lightly as he could, and he found a slight pleasure in noticing he had hurt her, for she paled as she stood up.

"Silly?—you cannot think it was that, John—" she pleaded, and his heart smote him, but pride insisted on the mask. He held out his hand formally.

"Good-bye, Muriel."

Would he go like this, she thought, so blind to her terrible trial? A noise behind made him turn. A key was being fitted in the lock. She saw his face set, and its sudden tension told her more than his voice or words had betrayed. There was the sound of voices. One he knew well, would have rejoiced at on any other occasion but this,—it was Vernley's. And the other? John's eyes met Muriel's and they felt their hearts throbbing in that long moment. The door swung open and Vernley entered, following a young man, an officer, fresh-complexioned and of medium height and build.

"John!" cried Vernley, holding out an eager hand, but John was looking at him.

"Frank," said Muriel quietly, "this—"

The man interrupted her eagerly.

"Muriel—I'm getting on fine. I've put the key in myself. Don't move, I know where you are, watch me! There's a window on the right, the lounge on the left wall, you're standing by it—and a chair here!" he cried, touching it lightly with his fingers as he walked forward.

"Frank—this is my friend—Mr. Dean," she said.

The young officer halted, his hand raised for a moment.

"Oh, sorry," he cried, cheerfully. "How d'you do?"

He turned and held out his hand, but in front of John, a little to the left, as though he might be there, and the face turned that way, smiling at him.

A glance, and John took the misdirected hand and looked into sightless blue eyes.

"How d'ye do, Mr. Dean?—Glad to meet any of Muriel's friends. I'm rather sudden on the scene, eh!"

He laughed boyishly.

"And they'll wonder why she's got this blind old war horse—won't they, Muriel?"

His laughter would have been infectious at any other time, but now it echoed as in an empty room and was engulfed in silence. Vernley watching it all, stood by the door. Muriel was crying now; the blind man stood gripping the chair, sensing something unusual.

"I must hurry away now," said John. "Good-bye."

He shook the soldier's hand again, then moved towards Muriel, and without speaking raised her hand to his lips. For a long moment he held it so, while she looked down on his bowed head mistily. A moment later he had closed the door behind him and was in the corridor.

But he was not to go alone. Vernley hurried after him.

"Scissors, my dear old Scissors!" he cried, taking John's arm as they walked towards the lift. "It's a mystery, I don't understand it, I'm sure she—she—oh damn! you know what I mean! Let's go somewhere, I'm all upside down!"

The lift took them out to the world again.

CHAPTER III

I

They were very patient with him at the office of the Daily Post. He delayed his return to the Grand Fleet again and again. Merritt, with an observant eye saw that the young man was on the verge of a nervous breakdown, but he could not disguise his surprise, when, after fourteen days' absence, during which they had no word from him, Dean entered his room and said he could not go back to Scapa Flow again, and wished to resign.

Merritt stared for a moment and poured out a flood of reasons against such preposterous folly. There was his duty to the paper, which had given him his chance and helped him to fame. Would he let Walsh down in this manner? What of the public that read his despatches so avidly? It was base ingratitude, sheer folly. The gods had poured all the good gifts into his lap.

John laughed bitterly at this.

"What's come over you, Dean? I've never seen you like this before; you've been going about with a green hue on your face for the last two weeks. Are you crossed in love?"

"That's no business of yours!" flared John.

The suddenness and intensity of the reply startled him.

Merritt veiled his surprise: he had touched a secret spring somewhere.

"Oh, I'm sorry, Dean—but you're getting a little difficult to deal with."

"I'm sick of life!" said John, dropping into a chair and beating a tattoo upon the table with his hands. Merritt let him brood awhile.

"What's the matter?" he asked, "are you tired of the Navy?"

"No—but I want to go away, right away!"

"Well—go back to France. I'll speak to Walsh."

"No—that's too near—right away, if I go anywhere."

Merritt looked at him, but said nothing. John rose.

"Come in to-morrow—Walsh may want to see you."

"Right—and I want to see him. Merritt, I've decided to throw it all up—this correspondent work—I'm going to join up."

If Merritt felt like falling, he did not show it. He was sure now that the strain had affected the boy's reason.

"Oh—well, you'll be a quitter if you do."

"How?"

"With a pen like yours, you've a duty to perform. Haven't you thought of all the people who read newspapers for a gleam of comfort? You've a sympathetic note in your work—and many a worried mother's had a little more hope to hold out with, after she's finished your column."

It was the first time Merritt had praised him.

"If you want to go—you'll go, of course, and we can't stop you—but you fall in my estimation. If it's England you want to got out of—well, we want a man in Mesopotamia."

Mesopotamia, the East! Again and again John's thoughts had travelled eastwards. In the last few weeks a deep longing for the skies of his boyhood had possessed him; he wanted to throw off all the Western civilisation now curbing and fretting him.

"If you'll send me there," he replied quietly, "I'll carry on—but I want to get right away."

Merritt had won his point. John promised to return and see Walsh in the afternoon.

The subsequent interview was short and satisfactory. He was to sail from Plymouth in a fortnight, his ultimate destination being Basra.

"It's strange, Dean, but I didn't care to propose this when I first thought of it some time ago," said Walsh, as he bade him good-bye. "I thought you'd dislike being so far from your home-base."

Downstairs again, John, with the words "home-base" echoing in his ears, laughed to himself. What home-base had he here in England, with friends dying in every trench and the world tumbling in ruin about his ears? The East—that was, after all, his true home-base. He should never have left it. To this hour it called him; its witchery was in his blood; almost he could smell the distinctive odour, hear the jingle of camel bells as the caravans wound out along the old highways.

And then a pang of regret smote him. He had friends here, good friends. Ever since that terrible night when his whole future had collapsed like a pack of cards, Vernley had been assiduous in his attention. They had passed the ensuing days together, doing nothing in particular, strolling here, eating there, talking of everything but the one thing that obsessed them both. Once only had they faced reality.

"I can't think why she did it, Scissors, I can't really. She must have been deranged with all she'd seen, and her pity overcame her—women are at the mercy of moods. I've not spoken to her yet about it—I daren't trust myself at present, but when I do, I—"

John put a detaining hand on his arm.

"Bobbie—please don't. It can make no difference now. Perhaps we are all wrong—the whole world's upside down somehow. I don't want to feel bitter—I'm not going to feel anything again, I think, and if she's happy—"

"She can't be, Scissors!" interrupted Vernley vehemently.

"Then she is suffering too—don't make it harder."

"It's her fault—no, it's his, I think—he's played upon her sympathy—he caught her with a—"

"Bobbie—don't!—We—we can't hit him—now, as he is."

Vernley whisked his stick through the air, as though beating his way through a tangle. They walked on in silence. Suddenly he stopped, and confronted his friend, his face quivering, his voice ringing with suppressed emotion.

"Scissors—you're a wonderful chap to take it like this! God! if it had been me—I'd have—I'd have—"

"Faced it, Bobbie," said John simply, "but why talk about it any more?"

But his calm belied him. To the wondering Vernley, it was marvellous self-control and astounding resignation. Even Vernley did not realise that his friend had sunk so low in the waters of despair, that a numbness was upon him; that light and air were no longer the craving of life. He was drowning, and the first fearful struggle had given place to a benumbed acquiescence in Fate. Yes, light and air had gone, that was certain.

They never mentioned the subject again, not even when they shook hands for the last time, before John travelled down to the Marshs', prior to sailing. Vernley wanted to take him to "The Croft," but that would have been too much for him, and Vernley realised the artificial naturalness they would all assume, and dropped the project.

The sun had set, and the livid upper sky tinged the sullen waters of the Thames, as in the final minutes, they paused at the bottom of Mariton Street. Vernley was walking back along the Embankment to the hospital where he was still a patient, with a shell-splintered leg now healing, two inches permanently short.

He grew philosophical in those speeding minutes, as the light died, and the lamps began to glow dimly along the curve of the embankment, running from the darkened East into the fiery West.

"What a mess it all is, Scissors—and some old blighters are making speeches about the England that is to be after the war, the era of reconstruction, of glory and peace; and here we are blasting each other off the earth, many of us dead, half of us limping, and none of us quite knowing ourselves as we were. Jove! Sedley seems like a dream—poor old Marsh and Tod, and—my God, what a mess, what a mess, I'm not sure that I care about seeing the end of it! Scissors, it has been wonderful though—we can't be robbed of that by all the damned politicians and the butchering generals. And to have had you for a friend—why it's—"