Chapter IX: Part THREE: I (3)

He hung up his hat and coat, and shut the door. I watched him as though it was a dream. It seemed so strange to see him there. I took him downstairs to the dining-room where tea was being laid.

‘We have shut the drawing-room up,’ I said, ‘because of the coal,’ and I wished I need not have him in that room where the ugly sideboard was. It looked so dull that room, and so crowded up now we used it altogether, and I wanted to have Hugo in a beautiful room.

I left him there while I went upstairs with the children. Their undressing and preparing for tea seemed to take longer than usual that day.

When I came downstairs, Mrs. Sebright was there. I had quite forgotten that she was coming to tea.

Mrs. Sebright asked Hugo about his journey, about the length of his leave, about his billets in France. Hugo answered her questions quietly, smiling very faintly his hesitating smile. Mrs. Sebright talked about submarine warfare; she asked him if he knew what the latest inventions for catching submarines were; Hugo did not know.

Mrs. Sebright seemed to find no difficulty in talking to Hugo. She asked him things that I could not have asked.

I could not talk to him at all while she was there. I sat and watched him while he talked to her. I felt the precious moments slipping away, precious, irrevocable moments, and wondered what it was that had happened to him.

‘Is it just the War?’ I wondered. ‘Is that what it is?’

I felt a passionate longing to talk to him of the War, of my soul and his, to help him and be helped.

Tea was over, and cleared away. We drew our chairs up to the fire. Nobody spoke much. Eleanor and Rachel played with wooden bricks on the floor behind us. Hugo helped them to build a little while, then he stood up to go. I went with him up the stairs into the hall.

I said:

‘Hugo, I must see you again.’

He stood looking up at me from the lower step.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘When? Let us go and see some pictures.’

I said:

‘Yes; to-morrow, after lunch I will come.’

‘I will meet you at the station; at Charing Cross, at the Tube.’

I said:

‘I will be there at half-past two.’

‘Right. Good-bye till then.’

‘Good-bye.’

I stood, and looked after him; his figure was lost quickly in the shadow of the darkened street.

And I thought:

‘He has come and is gone; but I shall see him again.’

I thought:

‘To-morrow; at half-past two.’

Then I thought:

‘Hugo.’

I asked Mrs. Sebright if she would look after the children for me the next afternoon. She had done so sometimes before, when there was no maid I could trust, and she said she would.

‘I want to see Hugo again, down in London,’ I said. ‘He will only be here for two days, just now.’

‘Poor young man,’ Mrs. Sebright said, ‘he looks very ill. Has he had shell shock, do you think, at any time?’

I said I didn’t think so, but I felt a rush of gratitude to Mrs. Sebright for her kindly tone. I bent down suddenly and kissed her, and she looked surprised.

‘Poor boys,’ she said, ‘poor boys, I pity them indeed.’

And it struck me as very strange that she should class Hugo in any group—as one among others like him—he who to me had always seemed unique; so wholly different from all other people.

XXVIII

Hugo was waiting for me on the platform. We made our way through the hurrying crowds of people, and out of the station, hardly speaking a word.

It was a grey day, a heavy overcast sky threatened rain. We crossed Trafalgar Square, to the Admiralty Arch; then we went through it, and turned to the left, across the open space of the Horse Guards Parade. We walked along where the water used to be, by the War Trades Intelligence Department, those strange piles of Government buildings that usurped the bright coolness of the water. In one small remaining corner the pelicans still lived, crowding with ruffled feathers on their little clumps of rock.

We walked along to the end, to Buckingham Palace, then we turned back, to the right, along the Mall.

I felt a new excitement and delight at Hugo’s presence; at being with him again after so many years, and so many changes. The sympathy and understanding that had been so much a part of our relation before seemed there as strong as ever, now we were together again. We spoke very little; there seemed no need for speech. From time to time we looked at each other and, as our eyes met, a sense of assurance and security seemed to pass from one to the other.

It seemed to me as we walked as though we two were alone in a world of desolation and ruin. I felt my thoughts and my emotions of the last three years rising up, formulating themselves, seeking expression. I was possessed by a sense of experience, of our separate experiences, to be shared now, to be unified, and made whole.

We crossed Piccadilly and turned into Bond Street.

Hugo had chosen an exhibition of Raemakers’ cartoons as the pictures we were to see. We took our tickets at the door, gave up our umbrellas, and were inside.

We walked round the two small rooms for a long time. Hugo looked at the pictures, dumbly, intensely, and I watched Hugo.

We stopped before a picture of a wood in autumn; the leaves falling from the trees, and a dead soldier, a German, lying on the ground.

‘When the leaves fall, you shall have peace.’

The words from a speech of the Kaiser’s were below it. I felt a cold grip at my heart, at my throat, and the picture swam before me . . .

‘When the leaves fall, you shall have peace.’ The words echoed through my brain, emptily, metallically. I saw the dead soldier, huddled, hunched up in the wet ditch, and the leaves falling over him, and I felt suddenly that I must cry out, scream, that it was more than could be borne.

I turned to Hugo: his eyes were fixed on the picture, and again I saw that haunted, terrified expression that had struck me when I saw him first, but it was more now. I felt suddenly, that my own emotion was somehow a reflection of his emotion, that my own despair was an echo of his despair.

‘You shall have peace . . . You shall have peace . . .’

I felt at that moment that I was seeing with his eyes and feeling with his mind. I was fascinated, horrified, paralysed; then I broke the spell:

‘No, Hugo,’ I said, and my voice sounded rough and unnatural to myself, ‘come away, come away quickly!’

I seized hold of his arm and pulled him after me, through the swinging glass doors, and down the steps.

Outside, the rain had begun to fall, a thin, drizzling rain . . . we paused here and drew breath: I felt as though I had woken up from a very ghastly dream.

I laughed, nervously, I knew, and shivered——

I said:

‘Those are terrible pictures—they make one remember and think——’

Hugo stared at me, with sombre, unseeing eyes.

‘Yes, they make one think,’ he repeated.

We walked out into the street; I kept my hand on his arm: I felt dizzy, and still frightened at my own thoughts and feelings, and almost frightened of him.

As we turned into Piccadilly the rain came on more heavily, beating and pattering against our faces; we remembered suddenly that we had left our umbrellas in the gallery; we turned and hurried back again.

When we came out for the second time, we were calmer, and more established.

We turned into the nearest tea shop, Stewart’s, at the corner of Bond Street, and went upstairs. There was an empty table by the window; we went to it and sat down.

Hugo leaned his chin on his hands, and looked across at me.

He said:

‘That is a wicked picture, Helen,——do you know what it is to want peace?’

I said:

‘I think I begin to know.’

‘I won’t give up,’ he went on, as though he were talking to himself, ‘I won’t; I am not going to be killed; I am going right through to the end. Nothing can be worse now.’

He buried his face, and shivered.

I asked:

‘Do you want very much to be killed?’

And he bent his head.

‘I am frightened sometimes,’ he said, ‘I think I am going mad in the night; even here; I see things, and hear them, over and over again; I am afraid of doing it on purpose; of letting it happen. . . . George would never have got like this. . . .’

‘No, George was different. I think, perhaps, it was easier for him.’

‘Yes, George was braver than me, and now, you see, he has finished. He has not got to go on afterwards as I must. I must go on, partly because of George, and can you think what it will be like, Helen, afterwards, when we are sane again, and realize what we have been doing?’

I said:

‘I can’t think about afterwards at all, Hugo. I can’t look ahead at all beyond next week.’

We were silent then, looking out of the window at the rain in the street. It pattered on the tops of omnibuses, on umbrellas, on mackintoshes, on the grey paving stones. The humming noise of the traffic rose up to us, muffled, through the double glass, and all those people, and the hurry, and the busyness, seemed very far away.

The waitress came to take our order; we asked for tea, and turned back to the window.

I said:

‘Yes; we must go on; it is all we can do now; just wait and hold out . . . on and on and on. . . .’

And he repeated:

‘Yes; that is all; somebody must go on; that is the only way to look at it, I think.’

I said:

‘Oh, Hugo, is it possible that all this is only three years?’

Hugo looked up with his hesitating smile.

‘Three years has not much meaning now,’ he said, ‘has it? We didn’t know anything then; we hadn’t begun. We don’t know much now; afterwards, if we can go through with it till the end, we may know something, perhaps.’

He added abruptly:

‘I am sorry for you, Helen.’

‘And I, for you,’ I said.

‘It is the same for us both, in a way; for everybody, I suppose.’

‘No, not quite everybody, I think; but for you and me. I am glad we have met again, Hugo, so glad.’

He put out his hand across the table and took mine.

‘I wondered if you would come to-day,’ he said.

The waitress had brought our tea and put it down, but we had not noticed her.

There was to us both, I think, great consolation in this clasping of hands: strength and companionship in a world of destruction.

After tea we went out in the rain, and walked in the Green Park.

We walked up and down, backwards and forwards, talking a little, not very much, of casual, trivial things; comforted and upheld by each other’s nearness.

At last we went back to the station, and Hugo saw me into the train.

I said:

‘Let me know when you come back,’

He said:

‘I shall come back in ten days.’

‘In ten days?’

‘Yes, in ten days.’

XXIX

The next days passed, unreal and dreamlike to me. I was happy, elated, filled with a renewal of youth. Hugo was there, Hugo was alive, I had found him anew after this long time, and I would see him again in a few days.

It seemed to me during those ten days that everything was easier and pleasanter than before. Nothing worried or irritated me; I lived in a world of my own.

Even Walter noticed a change. Something had come back, I think, that he had missed.

He said to me, one day:

‘You are happier than you were, Helen . . . .’

And I was pleased and laughed.

‘Yes, Walter,’ I said, ‘I am so happy at seeing Hugo again.’

Walter looked at me queerly, and sighed.

‘You ought to see more of your friends,’ he said, ‘I know that. It is natural you should miss them.’

I stroked his cheek.

‘I shall see them again, after the war,’ I said. ‘We shall all meet together then, except George . . .’

‘Poor George,’ said Walter, and he sighed again.

At last the day came, and a note from Hugo, at Yearsly. He would be in London that morning, by twelve o’clock; crossing that night to France.

I took the next train. I left the children in the care of Mrs. Simms.

Hugo was there to meet me; he had come straight from Waterloo. We lunched together, and then we walked in the Park.

This day it was fine. A clear, cold winter’s day, with tiny transparent clouds, high up in a pale sky. We walked quickly, rejoicing in the cold air and the warmth of walking.

Then we went to the National Gallery. Most of the pictures were hidden away in bomb-proof cellars; that was a disappointment; but we were happy to-day.

We went to tea with Grandmother, at Campden Hill Square; we enjoyed the familiarity of the room, of the atmosphere, and the china, and the cat.

The hours passed; how we did not know. It was evening already, and we stood on the steps of the ‘Coliseum,’ going in to the Russian Ballet. It was the Scarlatti Ballet, ‘The Good Humoured Ladies,’ that we saw. The music and the dancing excited us; it was perfect. All was perfect, on this most wonderful of days.

We left the lighted theatre, and went out . . . out into the dark night and the shaded streets.

We made our way across Trafalgar Square, bare and empty in the shadow, through the Admiralty Arch again, and across the Green Park.

Hugo’s train was to leave at midnight.

We were silent in the darkness of the trees. The bitterness of ending was over our joy now.

We walked close together, bumping against each other as we walked. Hugo took my hand and held it, and we walked like children, holding hands. We passed out of the Park, and down the road, into the hurry and rush of Victoria Street, past the Underground Station, and under the vaulted roof of Victoria Station.

Smoke from the waiting trains swirled in white eddies under the shadowy roof. Whistles sounded: calling voices and heavy footsteps: the churning noise of engines, getting up steam, and the clanging of luggage barrows on the platforms.

There were soldiers everywhere; waiting groups, sitting and lounging about, loaded with their service kit; bags, rifles and helmets slung about them in a shapeless mass; tired, anxious faces, and joking voices; one was telling a story to a listening group; it seemed to be a funny story, for bursts of laughter interrupted him.

Hugo inquired about his train. No one seemed to know. We wandered from one official to another; there was no train to leave at midnight, they said.

At last some one came who knew about it; the leave train was postponed till the morning, at 7 a.m.

I felt an immense, disproportionate relief; I glanced at Hugo; he was looking at me with his whimsical, questioning expression.

‘Seven hours more,’ he said.

‘Seven hours,’ I repeated.

What should we do for seven hours?

‘I told them not to expect me back till they saw me,’ I said. ‘I must wait and see you off.’

‘Helen? I should like it.’

‘Will you, Helen?’

We turned back to the Hotel, where Hugo had a room reserved till the next day. I would stay there too. He engaged another room.

We walked up the stairs like people in a dream. The stuffy hotel smell, the thick, shabby carpet, the dull glare of the electric light, stamped themselves on my mind, but dazedly, as fantastic, unreal things.

In the long, deserted passage we stood still. Rows of shut doors stretched on either side of us. Boots stood outside some of them, military boots, and empty water cans. One bulb of electric light shone at the further end.

We read the numbers on the doors. 247 was my room. We reached the door, and then stood still again. It seemed a waste of precious time to sleep, but we were very tired, suddenly, unbearably tired.

‘Good night, Helen.’

‘Good night.’

We paused, and waited again.

Dumbly, instinctively, I raised my arms to Hugo’s neck. He grasped me, and we kissed. It flashed through my mind, as something very strange, that we had not kissed each other since that time we did not kiss on the evening of Guy’s birthday, beside the Jasmine Gate. We had before that always, without thinking about it.

‘My dear, dear Helen . . .’ Hugo murmured; and I said nothing at all. My hands clasped each other, hard, behind his neck; I felt just then that I could never let him go . . . and then it seemed suddenly that something snapped . . .

‘Good night, Hugo,’ I said, and my arms dropped to my sides.

‘My dear, good night.’

I waited a moment longer with my hand on the handle of the door; it seemed to us both, I think, that there was something more we must say; but we could not; no words came.

I opened my bedroom door, and pulled it to behind me. I dropped into a chair by the window, and sat there, quite still, for a time. Then I roused myself, took off my hat and shoes, and lay down on the bed.

I lay still and listened to the stir of the traffic outside. The rumble of trains, the perpetual hoots of taxi cabs turning round the corner, in and out of the station. From the open window, came the acrid smell of train smoke, drifting in with the night fog. I felt cold, and shivered; then I got up and threw my coat over the quilt of the bed.

It seemed to me that I must have lain awake all night, but at last I fell asleep.

A maid woke me at a quarter to six, with a can of hot water. I woke with a start of terror, and plunged myself awake properly in the hot water.

A few minutes later I met Hugo in the ‘Breakfast Room’ of the hotel. There were other people there; about a dozen other officers, two or three women with them. We smiled faintly at each other, and sat down. Outside it was still dark, and an early morning fog obscured what lights there were. We drank hot coffee and ate fried bacon, and then again we went into the station.

The train was there this time. Hugo found a place and put his luggage in. Then we walked up and down on the platform till it was time to start. The morning was raw and chilly. The cold fog got into our throats and eyes. It seemed to enclose us in a deadened solitude; to shut out the world beyond; to muffle even the footsteps of the other waiting people.

‘It must not be so long till you come again, Hugo.’

And he looked at me with his odd little questioning smile.

‘Remember,’ I said suddenly, ‘you are going through with it. We have got to go through to the end.’

‘Yes,’ he replied quietly, ‘we have got to go on. I will, and you will too,’ and he turned abruptly to me.

I bent my head.

‘Yes, I will too, of course.’

‘Guy will be having leave soon,’ said Hugo.

‘Yes, and Mollie is coming home this summer.’

‘It would be good if we could all be here together.’

‘After the war, anyhow.’

‘Yes . . . after the war. . . .’

The train was going to start. The guard waved to all the waiting passengers to get in. Hugo jumped in quickly. He leaned out of the window and took both my hands.

‘Good-bye, Helen.’

‘Good-bye, Hugo . . . till next time. . . .’

The train jerked and puffed. A porter hurried along, slamming the doors. Hugo drew back his head, the train jerked again, and moved slowly forward.

I stood where I was, looking after the train. Hugo did not look out of it again, and I did not wave my hand.

I watched it drawing past me; carriage after carriage reaching the bend of the line where a station lamp threw a glittering light upon the windows; then out into the fog and darkness; and the smoke drifted back, chilly, mockingly, along the empty lines.

There were other women on the platform, walking back towards the barrier now, and I walked with them, dazed, hardly sensible, not knowing where I went.

And I never saw Hugo again.

XXX

In March, peace between Germany and Bolshevik Russia was signed at Brest Litovsk.

Maud said the Russians were traitors. She said she would be ashamed to be a Russian.

I thought:

‘Some Russians will live, now, who would have died . . . that is some good in a world gone wrong. . . .’

But then the great offensive began in France. The tension and anxiety grew acuter, day by day. More news of the German advance, more Americans arriving in France, and we wondered which would come the fastest. Even in the streets, when one went out, one could feel the general anxiety, and see it in the people’s faces as they passed.

In April, came the famous Army Order of Lord Haig, when he said:

‘Our back is to the wall.’

Walter came in with the _Sunday Evening Telegram_, and threw it on the table, and a sense of dread and insecurity came with him into the room.

He said:

‘This is the end of everything!’

And I thought of Guy and Hugo, out there in France, with the Germans pressing them back, step by step. There seemed so many Germans, and so few with them.

I said:

‘There is still a chance.’

And Walter answered wearily:

‘I suppose there is!’

So the spring wore on. Every week I wrote to Hugo, and every week he wrote to me, and from those letters I drew strength and courage and happiness.

Walter said that he could not understand it; now, when the news was at its worst, I seemed so cheerful and serene, he said. I could only smile and admit that it was true.

It seemed to me that I was bound by my compact with Hugo. I had pledged myself to carry on with my job; I would make a success of my marriage with Walter, for Hugo’s sake, and the determination to do so gave a new purpose to life.

I did not look far ahead, I did not make plans for the future, the present was enough in itself, with Hugo’s letters as points of light to look for, and mine to him, as the expression of a week’s fighting.

I could give much more to Walter now, and I gave it, and I felt him turn more and more to me for strength.

When I was in bed at night, I could see Hugo so clearly sometimes, that I could hardly believe it was not true. It was as if the war was between us, noise and confusion, and horror . . . and I could get through that, and somewhere behind it, I found Hugo . . . and there were shell holes, and barbed wire, and all that sort of thing about, but it didn’t matter . . . Hugo was there, and it was all happy, and wonderful, and I knew that he was alive.

My son was born on the 15th of July, the same day that the German advance was held. In the strange serenity and confidence of these last months, I had felt sure that it would be a son this time. He was called John, after Walter’s father, but I counted it partly for Cousin John as well.

It seemed to me that this son was a symbol of victory . . . not of Foch over Ludendorf, nor the Entente over Germany; these things were again remote to me, and unreal, but of peace over war, strength over weakness, light over darkness. I was filled with a sense of fulfilment and triumph, and of peace.

I thought:

‘This is what they mean by the “Peace of God.”’ And I wrote all I felt to Hugo, and I told him about my son.

XXXI

In August, Guy was wounded and sent home. He was badly wounded this time. Cousin Delia wrote to me; he was sent to a hospital for officers in Park Lane. Cousin Delia came up to be near him; she stayed with Grandmother, in Campden Hill Square.

They would not let me see Guy at first; they said he was too ill. I saw Cousin Delia, and I saw in her face that she did not think he would live.

I said:

‘Is Guy any better?’

She said:

‘Not yet; he may get better.’

Guy did get better, very slowly indeed. He would live, they said, he would walk again, but he would be lame always. I could not imagine Guy lame, walking about with a stick.

Cousin Delia said only:

‘I am so glad that he will live.’

There was, it seemed, something unconquerable in Guy.

I saw him in September. He looked ill, and almost old. Guy on his back, not moving, seemed all wrong; and his hair was turning grey.

He smiled at me.

He began, at once, to joke.

It was bad luck, he said, to be laid out like this, just at the very end.

‘I might have been in at the death,’ he said, ‘when I had kept going so long! Hugo has beaten me, good old Hugo!’

I talked about Hugo, and the letters I had had from him lately, and of the war ending, and how every one was saying that it must end very soon.

Then Diana came in. She was a V.A.D. Her eyes danced and sparkled under her white coif; she was so tall and strong and full of life, and she moved as though all movement were delight. She came to bring Guy tea, in a feeding cup, on a tray.

Guy introduced her to me, and she smiled at me, and at him. She put her arm under his head to raise him up; she gave him his tea to drink like a little child. She arranged his pillows deftly, with her strong white hands, and I watched Guy’s eyes as they followed her about the room, and I thought:

‘Guy is going to marry that girl . . .’

And I thought of Mollie, at Salonika, with George dead.

And I thought:

‘What chance has Mollie, against that joy and youth?’

And I thought:

‘Guy has forgotten Mollie . . .’

And I thought, as I watched her walk:

‘I know what she feels like. . . . I felt like that, once. . . . I can remember it. . . .’

And then I thought:

‘That is why Walter wanted me . . . do they always want that in us?’

And then I thought:

‘Guy is like Walter, now, in that way, and he wants her . . .’

Guy smiled at her as one might at a loved child.

‘You see,’ he said to me, ‘I have good care; I ought to get well very soon, oughtn’t I?’

She said:

‘You are getting well; we are very pleased with you!’

He said:

‘She loves the war; she thinks it is a splendid war, don’t you, Dinah?’

And she laughed, and her eyes danced.

‘Oh, top hole,’ she said, ‘simply topping!’

Guy said:

‘That is so refreshing. “_A quelqu’un le malheur est bon!_”’

And I thought:

‘She is not horrid; she doesn’t understand.’

I thought:

‘She is very lovely, and very young.’

She said:

‘There’s a dance to-night, at Bengy’s . . . you know . . . jazz of course . . . simply divine! simply divine! Old 31 is coming . . . his leg’s nearly all right. . . . It’s rotten,’ she said, ‘that you can’t come!’

And Guy said:

‘Awfully rotten!’

I thought:

‘How can she talk like that to Guy? Doesn’t she know that he will not dance any more?’

It was time for me to go, and Diana came with me to the top of the stairs.

‘Awfully good of you to come,’ she said, ‘he wanted to see you. . . . Come again when you can; he gets awfully blue, you know, at times. . . I buck him up a bit, chaff him, you know, and that sort of thing, but it’s jolly rotten really . . . bucked him up no end seeing you. . . .’

She was kind to me, she meant to be kind. She was explaining Guy to me; he was hers now, but she would not shut us out.

I wondered if she was kind to Cousin Delia too, and what Cousin Delia thought of her.

About a fortnight later they were engaged. Her name was Diana Sotheby; her father was the captain of a battleship; she was very ‘well connected,’ people told us, and twenty years old.

Cousin Delia said:

‘She is lovely, and I think she is fond of Guy. They will be married when Guy is better; when he is out of hospital.’

She wrote to Mollie in Salonika, and so did I. I don’t know at all if Guy wrote too.

Cousin Delia went back to Yearsly, and still the war went on.

We invited Diana to tea. Walter did not like her.

‘A dreadful young woman,’ he said, ‘I don’t know what Guy is about!’

I said:

‘You see, she is not lame, at all, in any way.’

Walter said:

‘Don’t be silly, Helen! There are plenty of young women who are not lame. I suppose Guy thinks her pretty.’

I said:

‘She is pretty.’

XXXII

News of the war kept coming; better and better news. The Germans were falling back now, all along the line. The German Front was breaking, the Allied troops were pressing forward everywhere. Bulgaria made peace, then Austria. President Wilson and the German Government were exchanging notes on peace.

‘It will end now very soon . . . any week . . . any day. . . Germany is beaten. . . . The war is won now. . .’ people said.

And then, on October 11th, Hugo was ‘wounded and missing.’

I read his name in the Casualty List, in the morning, at breakfast:

‘Hugo John Laurier, Second Rifle Brigade.’

Wounded and missing . . . wounded and missing . . . wounded and missing . . .

I thought:

‘It is not true . . . it is quite impossible . . .’

I thought:

‘It is quite certain that there must be a mistake . . .’

I thought:

‘. . . But the war is over now . . . so nearly over . . . that could not happen now . . .’

I stared at the words till my eyes ached. They seemed to grow larger and darker than the other words on the page.

I had not expected it.

Walter said:

‘Is there any news?’

And I said:

‘Yes . . . there is something . . . about the Americans . . . they have been fighting somewhere, I think.’

Walter said:

‘That is not important, what about the German retreat??’

I turned over the pages of the newspaper, and began to read aloud. My voice sounded to myself very odd, and remote, and unnatural, but Walter did not notice it.

I read that the German Front was breaking, that Allied troops were pressing forward at all points. I could not tell if the words I read made sense, but he seemed satisfied.

I could not tell him about Hugo. He did not care for Hugo enough.

After breakfast, I bathed the baby, and took the little girls for their walk. The morning passed so uneventfully, in so ordinary a way, that I thought again:

‘That could not have been true!’

When they were in bed for their midday rest I took the paper up again and looked, and it was there:

‘Hugo John Laurier, Second Rifle Brigade . . .’

And I turned all cold . . . cold like a stone . . . and I thought:

‘I must see Guy . . . I must see Guy at once . . .’

I could not go out yet, not till the afternoon; then I went upstairs and put on my hat and coat; then I went out and along to the tube station, and got into the tube. I changed at Leicester Square, and got into another tube, and that went very fast, and I got to Dover Street. Then I got out and walked into Park Lane, and along Park Lane to the hospital where Guy was. It was not the time for visitors, not for another hour, the nurse told me so at the door, but I said it was important, I said it was bad news. She looked at me hard, oddly I thought too, and then she told me to wait. She went away and came back, and then she told me to go upstairs. I knew my way to Guy well enough by this time, and I walked up the stairs, wondering what to do.

Diana met me at the top of the stairs. She smiled her flashing smile.

‘Hulloa,’ she said, ‘what a funny time to come!’

I said:

‘Has Guy seen the paper yet, this morning’s paper I mean?’

And she said:

‘I don’t know; I don’t think he has yet to-day.’

I said:

‘His brother is missing . . . it is in the paper to-day. . .’

She said:

‘I say! . . . how rotten! . . . how absolutely rotten!’

The smile died from her face.

‘Poor old chap,’ she said, ‘he’ll be awfully cut up! He thought no end of his brother . . . must have been jolly decent,’ she said, and then: ‘I suppose you knew him too?’

I said:

‘Yes, I did know him.’

She said:

‘Was he like Guy?’

I said:

‘No, different from Guy.’

And then I sat down on the stairs . . . and the whole place seemed to swim . . . the stairs and the banisters . . . and the doors of the rooms in the passage . . . bright mahogany doors with panels that shone like glass . . . and she said:

‘I say, what’s up? I say, you do look rotten!’

And she stared at me, perplexed.

Then she said:

‘I’ll get you some tea . . . that’ll buck you up no end!’

She said:

‘Come on to my room, I’ve got a decent chair.’

I said:

‘I’d rather stay here, thank you. I’m going away in a minute.’

She said:

‘Aren’t you going to see Guy?’

I said:

‘You had better tell him. I don’t think I can.’

I said:

‘His mother will be coming. She is sure to come and see Guy.’

Diana gave a whistle.

‘Lord! There will be an upset! . . . Our wedding’ll be put off . . . if Guy’s brother’s killed . . . sure to be, don’t you think?’

I said good-bye to Diana.

She gave me a cup of tea.

I thought:

‘I must go to Yearsly, to Cousin Delia now. . . .’

I got into a bus in Piccadilly, and off it at Waterloo. I walked up the long sloping entrance, under the bridge.

The station was very big and full of people. The wide arch of the roof seemed bigger than usual, higher, and further off. It seemed very full of smoke and noise.

I went to the booking-office where we always went for our tickets, but it was shut.

I thought:

‘There is no train . . . I cannot go to Yearsly . . .’

I came out again from the booking-office, to the open space of the station.

There were lights in the station, and people shouting; a porter was shouting at me; then he knocked me with a barrow, and hurt my knee.

I thought:

‘It is no use going . . . why should I go to her? She has Cousin John . . . and the people . . . and the garden . . . and the trees . . . everything there will be sorry . . . everything there loved Hugo . . . what use could I be to her . . . or she to me?’

I thought:

‘It is beyond that . . . beyond being good at all. . . .’

And I turned and went out of the station, and down the long sloping road, and under the bridge again. And there was the noise of the traffic, of trams, and buses, and cars, and people thick all round me, and shops, and the smell of fish . . . and there was mud in the street, and the pavement too was muddy. . . . The shops gleamed darkly through the chinks of the shutters, and the people jostled and bustled round me, about the shops.

I thought:

‘I must get away . . . I cannot bear these people . . .’

It was beginning to rain now. I turned down a side street, away from the crowd and the noise. The rain beat against my face, cold, steady October rain. I thought of the open country, in France, as I had seen it in pictures. Shell holes half full of water, distorted piles of wire, stunted remnants of trees . . . and the cold rain beating down. . . .

I walked on, faster and faster; I was almost running now. I knocked into some one . . . a policeman . . . I begged his pardon and hurried on. I felt that I must get away, by myself, alone, and the longing for this, superseded everything else. But there was nowhere to go . . . only houses, and streets, and people . . . and at home, there was no room where I could be alone.

I began to be out of breath. I stood still. My skirt was all wet now, it clung about my knees. I leaned with my hand against a lamp post. There was a seat beside it, and I sat down. I bent down in the shadow, and covered my eyes; and still I could not think. The rain beat down on the nape of my neck. It trickled down my back under the collar of my coat . . . and then, I was calling Hugo. . . . I called to him through the rain and the darkness, across the expanse of sea and land. . . . I stretched out my hands to him, and called again, and I felt that he must hear me, if he was anywhere. Was he somewhere lying alone, deserted, and wounded? I pressed my hands against my eyes, trying to see in the dark, to force myself to see, to hear his voice, answering me through the emptiness of the night. But I saw and heard nothing. Only whirligigs of light, as my fingers pressed against my eyeballs, and the splashing sound of rain on the pavement and in the puddles, and it was very cold.

I got up again from the seat, and turned to go home. I had come much farther than I knew, and it took a long time to find the way.

When I got home, Walter opened the door. There was light behind him in the hall, and I saw him black against the light.

He said:

‘Where in the world have you been? I waited an hour for dinner!’

The rain dripped off from my clothes, in a pool, on the step where I stood. I saw it dark, like a blot, growing bigger, in the light from the door.

I said:

‘Hugo is missing. You didn’t know, I think.’

Walter stood very still; then he pulled me into the hall.

‘When did you hear?’ he asked. ‘How do you know?’

I said:

‘This morning, at breakfast. It was in _The Times_, you know.’

He said:

‘You never told me! Why didn’t you tell me then?’

I said:

‘I couldn’t tell you. It was too bad for that.’

We stood and looked at each other.

I thought:

‘He doesn’t care . . .’

He put out his hands towards me and drew me close to him.

‘My poor dear Helen,’ he said. ‘Oh, my poor dear!’

XXXIII

The next day, came a letter from Cousin Delia, a short, quiet note, that was like her.

‘You will have seen yesterday that Hugo is missing. We have no further news of him,’ she wrote. ‘His father has been to the War Office, but they can tell him nothing more. Hugo was missing on the ninth after the taking of Cambrai. They could not collect all the wounded on that day, and when they did so, he was not among them. There was very heavy shelling on both days, and it is probable that he was killed. I am making inquiries at the hospitals for men of his battalion who were in that fighting, and I will let you know if I have any news.’

I read and reread her letter, and I wondered, as I had often wondered, at the calm of Cousin Delia, and I thought that she would die if she lost Hugo. Quietly, calmly, as she had lived, she would die.

And I thought all day of Yearsly, of the old brick walls, and the apple blossom, and Guy and Hugo, calling from the trees; and I thought of Cousin Delia in the garden as she had been when we were little, with her long yellow gloves, and her shady garden hat.

And I thought:

‘That is all over. The world has gone on since then.’

And my own grief became part of the world’s grief, and my own loss, part of the world’s loss.

And then, when Sunday came, I wrote to Hugo. I had written to him every Sunday since February, when he came home.

‘Hugo, my darling . . . they say that you are dead . . . killed . . . blown to pieces . . . not there anywhere any more. . . . I can’t believe it, for the world is going on . . . it looks just the same now, as it always did . . . and I can’t believe in a world without you in it . . . anywhere at all, for I think, Hugo, that you were the world to me. . .

‘They said: “When the leaves fall, you shall have peace.” Do you remember that? . . . they are falling now. . . .I can see them . . . from the poplar tree at the gate, yellow, dirty leaves that fall in the street . . . but you said that it must not be like that . . . we came away from that picture. . . . Have you got peace Hugo, now? . . . silence and peace, after tremendous noise? . . . I try to think of it like that, but it is difficult. . . . I can only think that you are gone away . . . out of everything . . . that I shall never see you again . . . and then it seems as though some one was laughing at me . . . .some horrible devil, and it can’t be true. . . .’

I addressed the letter and posted it. I don’t know where it went, or what happened to it.

Two days later, a letter came from Hugo. I saw it on the hall floor, where it had fallen through the letter-box.

And I thought:

‘He has answered me. He is not dead at all!’

I broke the envelope open, and I tried to read it, and I could not read it at first . . . the letters swam together, it seemed all blurred and indistinct, and I had to stand still and wait. And then, I tried again, and I read the date: October 8th, 1918. October 8th. That was more than a week ago. That was before he was killed. . . .

I looked at the address, and it told me nothing; illusive, non-committal as the addresses always were, but the writing was Hugo’s:

‘Helen dear,’ it ran, ‘I must write to you to-night, for I think we shall be busy to-morrow. Here it is quiet for the moment, and I have had a happy day. I saw cows and an old woman in a village . . . a piece of a village still . . . and I saw an old orchard that had been destroyed last year . . . and the stumps of the trees had flowered, the broken stumps of the trees . . . they had apples growing on them, round red apples, and there was grass over the stones already, and moss. I was glad to see it. And there were dahlias flowering at one end of the orchard, where there had been a garden, and there was a little tree, the sprout of a tree, where a clump of trees must have been. It was a birch, very tiny, by the edge of a pond, and its leaves were falling, tiny, golden leaves, and floating on the water.

‘There was a robin and a mouse, a wild mouse. It has made me very happy. It was like Faith and Hope and Charity . . . do you know what I mean? I wish I could see you to-night, Helen . . . but I believe I shall soon. Somehow, I don’t mind the thought of to-morrow as much as I generally do. It is nearly the end now.

‘The mouse was sitting up, looking at me in the shadow of the birch tree, and then it scuttled away under the leaves. Do you remember the mouse at Yearsly, in the Frog Pond? on the stones? It made me think of that. And now, good-night, my dear. . . .’

And that was all.

I thought:

‘Hugo was happy.’

It seemed to me at the moment, that what happened afterwards, could hardly count, and I felt his letter, after all, an answer to mine.

October wore to a close. The certainty of peace grew clearer day by day, but no news came of Hugo. No news ever came.

Cousin Delia came to see me once, and I saw Guy. He spoke of Hugo a little but not much; Diana was there.

He was to leave the hospital soon, in two or three weeks, they said. He was to go to Yearsly. They would be married later, after the New Year.

XXXIV

And then, on Armistice Day, something seemed to snap inside my head. I was out with the children at eleven o’clock, when the guns were fired and the bells began to ring. And it was then, at that moment, that it snapped, and it seemed as though I was mad for a time, and I did not understand what I was doing.

I thought:

‘It is too late . . . it is a month too late! . . . I do not want it now. . . .’

I thought:

‘If Hugo is killed, why should not all be killed? . . . it is silly to stop the fighting now . . .’

I took the children home and put them to rest. Then I took John, who was tiny, with me, and went out into the street. I walked to the Tube station, and got into a train. I got out at Charing Cross and walked across St. James’s Park, towards Victoria. It seemed to me that the world had gone mad. People were shouting, and yelling, and waving their hats; the bells were ringing still, there was a hubbub of noise; lorries crowded with munition workers whirled past me, one after the other, with shouting and singing and the raucous whirr of rattles. The king had been addressing the crowd at Buckingham Palace, and I found myself caught in the rush of people coming away. Taxi-cabs dashed past me, crammed to overflowing; officers hung out of the windows or sprawled across the roofs, blowing whistles and cheering. The crowd seethed and pressed along Victoria Street; people on the tops of omnibuses stood up and waved their arms.

And I thought:

‘Why do they do it? What do they understand?’

I thought:

‘They did not mind the war . . . they could have stopped it, these hundreds and hundreds of people, waving their arms. . . .’

I thought:

‘They did not mind it or they would not shout like this . . . they would make war again, these people that shout. . . .’

And I felt that I could not bear it, that I must get away.

I wondered why I had come, and where I was going. I did not know. I had no plan. I think I had come to Victoria because of Hugo, because I last saw him there. But now, I did not go into the station. I turned aside, and went along outside it, by the high, blind wall in Buckingham Palace Road, and then I turned over a bridge, the railway bridge that is there. I walked on and on, and I got away from the crowd, but the noise was everywhere.

John seemed very heavy, much heavier than I had thought. He began to cry and I rocked him, and still we went on through the grey, drizzling streets. We came to the Embankment, not far from Chelsea Bridge, and there was a seat. I sat down on the seat. I fed John there, and rocked him to sleep. I felt suddenly, now, quite weak and exhausted, as though I could not go on, and it seemed to me that I understood now, for the first time, that Hugo was dead.

I do not know how long I sat there. I know I was very cold, and so was John. He woke, and cried again, and I walked on. I came to Albert Bridge, and passed it, towards the chimneys. When I reached Mollie’s flat, I looked up, and the windows were open. I was not surprised at all.

I went up the stairs, with John, and knocked on Mollie’s door, and the knocking sounded loud, in a pause of the noise outside.

Mollie opened the door.

She cried out, as though she were startled, and stood back.

I walked past her into the room, and dropped down on the sofa. It was a low sofa, and I felt as though I were falling a long way, down and down and down.

Mollie was kneeling on the floor beside me. She took John from me, and laid him on a cushion. She made up the fire and put the kettle on to boil. Then she rubbed my hands, and asked me questions, in her low, quiet voice, that I had not heard for so long. And I lay back and watched her, as she moved about the room, and I felt in a strange dream, as though the past had come back.

I said:

‘Hugo is dead.’

She said:

‘I know. I heard from his mother.’ Her clear eyes darkened: ‘And you?’

I said:

‘Oh, that is all . . .’

Mollie was looking at me, and I looked at the fire.

‘I see,’ she said at last. ‘Poor Helen!’

I said:

‘Yes, that is all . . . I can’t bear it any longer. . . .’

Mollie asked:

‘Did you know you would find me here?’

I said:

‘No. How should I know? I just came away.’

Outside, along the Embankment, the shouting lorries passed, and the crowds, and the rattles, and the noise rose and fell, in irregular, intermittent waves. Bursts of singing floated in at the window, drunken, vulgar singing, of loud voices, cat calls, and shrill, unnatural laughter.

And I shivered, and buried my face, and Mollie comforted me.

She gave me tea to drink, and I felt better, and I realized then, for the first time, that it was strange to find her here.

I said:

‘So you are back!’

She said:

‘I came yesterday.’

And then I looked at Mollie, and I saw that she too was unhappy, and then I thought of George, and I put out my hand to her: