So, if you ignored the lost harvests of three years, the lost industrial output of the richest industrial region of the country, the smashed machinery, the barked fruit trees, the three years’ loss of four and a half-tenths of the coal output for three years — and the loss of life! — we could go to our allies and say:
“All your yappings about losses are the merest bulls. You can perfectly well afford to reinforce the weak places of your own lines. We intend to send our new troops to the Near East, where lies our true interest!” And, though they might sooner or later point out the fallacy, you would by so much have put off the abhorrent expedient of a single command.
Valentine, though it took her away from her own thoughts, couldn’t help saying:
“But weren’t you arguing against your own convictions?”
He said:
“Yes, of course I was. In the lightness of my heart! It’s always a good thing to formulate the other fellow’s objections.”
She had turned half round in her chair. They were gazing into each other’s eyes, he from above, she from below. She had no doubt of his love: he, she knew, could have no doubt of hers. She said:
“But isn’t it dangerous? To show these people how to do it?”
He said:
“Oh, no, no. No! You don’t know what a good soul little Vinnie is. I don’t think you’ve ever been quite just to Vincent Macmaster! He’d as soon think of picking my pocket as of picking my brains. The soul of honour!”
Valentine had felt a queer, queer sensation. She was not sure afterwards whether she had felt it before she had realised that Sylvia Tietjens was looking at them. She stood there, very erect, a queer smile on her face. Valentine could not be sure whether it was kind, cruel, or merely distantly ironic; but she was perfectly sure it showed, whatever was behind it, that its wearer knew all that there was to know of her, Valentine’s, feelings for Tietjens and for Tietjens’ feelings for her…. It was like being a woman and man in adultery in Trafalgar Square.
Behind Sylvia’s back, their mouths agape, were the two staff officers. Their dark hairs were too untidy for them to amount to much, but, such as they were, they were the two most presentable males of the assembly — and Sylvia had snaffled them.
Mrs. Tietjens said:
“Oh, Christopher! I’m going on to the Basils’.”
Tietjens said:
“All right. I’ll pop Mrs. Wannop into the tube as soon as she’s had enough of it, and come along and pick you up!”
Sylvia had just drooped her long eyelashes, in sign of salutation, to Valentine Wannop, and had drifted through the door, followed by her rather unmilitary military escort in khaki and scarlet.
From that moment Valentine Wannop never had any doubt. She knew that Sylvia Tietjens knew that her husband loved her, Valentine Wannop, and that she, Valentine Wannop, loved her husband — with a passion absolute and ineffable. The one thing she, Valentine, didn’t know, the one mystery that remained impenetrable, was whether Sylvia Tietjens was good to her husband!
A long time afterwards Edith Ethel had come to her beside the tea-cups and had apologised for not having known, earlier than Sylvia’s demonstration, that Mrs. Wannop was in the room. She hoped that they might see Mrs. Wannop much more often. She added after a moment that she hoped Mrs. Wannop wouldn’t, in future, find it necessary to come under the escort of Mr. Tietjens. They were too old friends for that, surely.
Valentine said:
“Look here, Ethel, if you think that you can keep friends with mother and turn on Mr. Tietjens after all he’s done for you, you’re mistaken. You are really. And mother’s a great deal of influence. I don’t want to see you making any mistakes, just at this juncture. It’s a mistake to make nasty rows. And you’d make a very nasty one if you said anything against Mr. Tietjens to mother. She knows a great deal. Remember. She lived next door to the rectory for a number of years. And she’s got a dreadfully incisive tongue….”
Edith Ethel coiled back on her feet as if her whole body were threaded by a steel spring. Her mouth opened, but she bit her lower lip and then wiped it with a very white handkerchief. She said:
“I hate that man! I detest that man! I shudder when he comes near me.”
“I know you do!” Valentine Wannop answered. “But I wouldn’t let other people know it if I were you. It doesn’t do you any real credit. He’s a good man.”
Edith Ethel looked at her with a long, calculating glance. Then she went to stand before the fireplace.
That had been five — or at most six — Fridays before Valentine sat with Mark Tietjens in the War Office waiting hall, and, on the Friday immediately before that again, all the guests being gone, Edith Ethel had come to the tea-table and, with her velvet kindness, had placed her right hand on Valentine’s left. Admiring the gesture with a deep fervour, Valentine knew that that was the end.
Three days before, on the Monday, Valentine, in her school uniform, in a great store to which she had gone to buy athletic paraphernalia, had run into Mrs. Duchemin, who was buying flowers. Mrs. Duchemin had been horribly distressed to observe the costume. She had said:
“But do you go about in that? It’s really dreadful.”
Valentine had answered:
“Oh, yes. When I’m doing business for the school in school hours I’m expected to wear it. And I wear it if I’m going anywhere in a hurry after school hours. It saves my dresses. I haven’t got too many.”
“But anyone might meet you,” Edith Ethel said in a note of agony. “It’s very inconsiderate. Don’t you think you’ve been very inconsiderate? You might meet any of the people who come to our Fridays!”
“I frequently do,” Valentine said. “But they don’t seem to mind. Perhaps they think I’m a Waac officer. That would be quite respectable….”
Mrs. Duchemin drifted away, her arms full of flowers and real agony upon her face.
Now, beside the tea-table she said, very softly:
“My dear, we’ve decided not to have our usual Friday afternoon next week.” Valentine wondered whether this was merely a lie to get rid of her. But Edith Ethel went on: “We’ve decided to have a little evening festivity. After a great deal of thought we’ve come to the conclusion that we ought, now, to make our union public.” She paused to await comment, but Valentine making none she went on: “It coincides very happily — I can’t help feeling it coincides very happily! — with another event. Not that we set much store by these things…. But it has been whispered to Vincent that next Friday…. Perhaps, my dear Valentine, you, too, will have heard…”
Valentine said:
“No, I haven’t. I suppose he’s got the O.B.E. I’m very glad.”
“The Sovereign,” Mrs. Duchemin said, “is seeing fit to confer the honour of knighthood on him.”
“Well!” Valentine said. “He’s had a quick career. I’ve no doubt he deserves it. He’s worked very hard. I do sincerely congratulate you. It’ll be a great help to you.”