‘And what will you do after the war now that you are grown up, Alexander?’ Sylvia asked.
‘What would you like me to do?’
She thought for a while. ‘You don’t like militarism. Well, in that case I should like you to go into the Navy.’
‘Of course there’s the uniform — travels in foreign parts — dances — flagships — eguilettes. But to think of it, that a man should go to the trouble of being born, reared, educated, for one sole purpose in life: to drive a hole in another people’s vessel and send it to the bottom of the sea. In anticipation of that task he reads and writes, plays and loves, but all this is merely an interlude, a diversion in which he indulges till comes the grand proud moment of his life: he drives a hole in some other people’s vessel and sends it to the bottom of the sea.’
‘You are angry,’ she said.
I was angry: I visualized ‘le sabre de mon père’, and then I looked at Gustave. Why did I let another have her? Terrestrial love is not for ever — perhaps once in all eternity. I suddenly began to think: she is disgusted with me because I did not ignore, did not overrule her problem of deciding between happiness and sacrifice by simply taking her away. If not for this dilemma, these subversive solaces, I could have sat now beside her who was my love. What hypocrisy my pretending I was debarred from acting thus by considerations of my aunt. Why was I not of the Stone Age when I could have clubbed my aunt and carried Sylvia away? I had given up my precious claim — I who could have moulded her to my will. She was like wax — and like wax she had been moulded by what? — by the sloppy selfishness of Aunt Teresa! Oh, it was not easily to be borne. It was not to be borne!
Love is kindled by the wind of the imagination, blazed into a consuming flame by these trivial, unreasoning, and utterly contemptible twin-brothers — regret and jealousy — who are yet stronger than the human will. Stronger because they have secured an unfair leverage upon it. As a child can lead a bull by the ring in his nostrils, so they, too, fasten to the nerve centres, as it were, of human happiness and pain — and conquer shamelessly. It isn’t strength of will, nor the visible amount of damage wrought in you; it’s the particular leverage by which pain digs up your soul that matters. And the leverage by which I was made to suffer out of all proportion to my loss was the thought that it had been entirely my fault that there was any loss at all. So far our relations had been as simple as those of a cock and his consort. All I did was to say: ‘Cock-cock-cock-cockoricoo!’ And Sylvia after me: ‘Cock-cock-cock-cockoricoo!’The same trait I observed in Harry and Nora. What he said, she said. And even when I quoted something like:
The Spanish Fleet thou canst not see, because
It is not yet in sight.
Sylvia, though she neither knew nor cared whence this quotation came, would echo gladly:
The Spanish Fleet thou canst not see, because
Ha-ha-ha-ha … not yet in sight.
I hungered for her being. I was jealous of myself, of the days when I strutted about like a cock and she followed me like a pet hen and echoed all my sounds. And the thought occurred to me: that in eternal hell nothing but our memory will be left us to tease us over that which we had wilfully denied ourselves in life.
‘Bitter!’ shouted the General.
They kissed. The band played a flourish.
Beastly and Brown, who sat side by side, were boasting, it seemed, for all they were worth.
‘Gently! Gently!’ I prompted.
‘That’s all right,’ he guffawed. ‘I believe in talking to an American in his own language! Ha! Ha! Ha!’
As the dinner progressed, Beastly and Brown grew more and more tender and brotherly. Captain Negodyaev, on my left, soulful from drink, nudged my arm, and looking at Beastly said: ‘I am a captain, he is a major. But we have no majors any more. A Russian staff-captain is equal to your captain, and a Russian captain to your major. So he is a major, and I am a captain, and we are brothers-in-arms, and I want to give him something. Wait, I want to give him something, because he is a major and I am a captain, and we are brothers-in-arms. I want to give him something. Tell him so.’
‘What?’
He took off his badge. ‘This is my regimental badge,’ he said. ‘I want to give him this because it’s my dearest possession, and he is a major and I am a captain, and we are brothers-in-arms. Tell him so, will you.’
I nudged Beastly’s arm, but he was busy talking to Brown and only said: ‘Half a mo.’
‘He is busy,’ I said.
‘Tell him that it’s my dearest possession. I had it on my breast when the bullet struck it and so saved my life. I swore then I would never part with it, but would hand it on to my daughters and their children. But to-night I want to give it to him because, as I say, he is a major and I am a captain, and we are equal in rank and brothers-in-arms, and it’s the most precious thing that I have. I want him to value it. Tell him so, tell him.’
‘Half a mo,’ Beastly said, as I nudged his arm, and went on saying to Brown, looking at him with dim, soft eyes:
‘You’re a jolly good fellow, old Philip, and I don’t mind the United States joining the British Empire any day — any day.’
‘Gee! You’re a swell guy, Percy,’ said Brown, ‘and we’ll join your empire the day you transfer the capital to Washington.’
‘Look here, Beastly,’ I said. ‘Negodyaev—’
‘One man at a time, one man at a time.’
‘Tell him,’ Captain Negodyaev urged, ‘how dear it is to me.’
‘Oh, God, wait a little, man!’ snarled Beastly. ‘I can’t talk to two men at a time.’
Captain Negodyaev expostulated vociferously.
‘Just you dry up, ole man! Don’t you get too excited,’ said Beastly, turning to him with dull eyes.
‘But he wants to give you his badge,’ I explained.
Captain Negodyaev gave me his badge, which I handed over to Beastly.
‘That’s all right, old bean,’ he said to the Russian, pocketing the badge, ‘but I can’t talk to everyone at once, can I?’ And he turned back to Brown.
‘Did you tell him? Did you explain to him?’ Captain Negodyaev accosted me. ‘Will he value it?’
‘Oh yes, he’ll value it all right.’
‘But he didn’t say anything.’
‘He was busy talking to Brown.’
‘But this is my dearest possession.’
For the rest of the meal Captain Negodyaev was taciturn. He was no longer soulful but speechless, as if mortally hurt. But I had my own worries, and I could not be bothered with his. People, objects, conversations were the ‘atmosphere’ charge with my love. There was only one thing — my jealous love, and all the other things claimed my attention and added to my suffering. I saw her sitting in the evening, the soft lamplight on her dark head. I heard her laugh, or play the Four Seasons of the Year: the tune which made you want to cry. To be running with her in a field, to tramp the down with her in the rain, to dream of her as she sat at dinner one night in her champagne georgette, looking the tenderest of fairies, her dark velvety eyes blinking bashfully, softly. And then one wakes — she is not there. I fancied writing to her from afar: ‘It’s now past midnight. I’ve just come back from a dinner where I’d heard someone say “Sylvia”—and the thought of you went through my heart like an arrow. I couldn’t hear what my neighbour was saying; I listened politely, but my soul was with you, thousands of miles away. Where are you, Sylvia-Ninon?
Frisch weht der Wind