"This war that's just ended is the only war of which I have had any experience." Braithwaite glanced across at Terry for encouragement. "I
know what it created in me and in thousands like me. It created in us the most valuable of all assets—character. In the bitter test of pain and dirt and despair we found ourselves—found ourselves capable of more nobility than we had ever dreamt possible. We sorted out afresh, in hours that we thought would be our last, all our inherited superstitions and servilities; in so doing we discovered that God and life itself are much kinder than we had been informed. Because of that discovery men who had been timid learnt how to face death gladly, shirkers how to shoulder responsibility, selfish people how to become decent through the fine humanity of sharing. Time-servers learnt how to get up off their bellies and confront misfortune with a laugh. I don't know whether I make myself clear; perhaps one had to be a part of the great game to understand its lessons. That we do understand them is the reward of those who have survived. We've come back to you as uncomfortable fellows; we shall be much more uncomfortable before we're satisfied. We intend to fight for the same equalities in peace that you sent us out to fight for in war. You asked me what this particular war has created; it has created a complete new set of social and spiritual values. It's done away with the uncharity of caste."
During his last words he had been gazing across the table at Tabs with a fearless challenge, as much as to say, "That's who I am. Now expose me."
But Tabs was remembering the coster's reason for not having dragged him into the police-courts, "Served in the ranks, did yer? Then you and me
was pals out there!" Braithwaite, whether he knew it or not, had been doing a piece of special pleading for himself. He and Braithwaite, whatever they might be now, had been pals out there. Silently Tabs had been thinking while he had been listening, "You're right and I'm with you. I'd be with you still more if you'd only live up to your standards by sticking to Ann."
It was Sir Tobias who took the offensive. The soup-plates had been removed and the fish-course had not yet been served. He had the leisure to talk. "You men who have been in the Army," he said testily, "especially those of you who have gained your promotion rapidly, always speak as if the rest of us had been receivers of stolen goods until you put on uniforms. Armies are composed of youth; for most of you it was the first time you had tasted authority. It's gone to your heads; you want to brush experience aside and dragoon the older world into new formations. You, who were civilians yourselves, have come back despising us civilians; your contempt is three-parts fear lest you'll fail, as you failed before, in the old civilian competitive struggle. You talk about the virtues war has taught; let's grant them and grant them gratefully—they saved us from destruction. But what about the frantic recklessness it encouraged, the cheap views of bodily chastity, the desperate insistence on momentary happiness?" At the mention of bodily chastity, Lady Beddow from the other end of the table had stuttered a "tut, tut!" Her husband dodged it, as a boy might dodge a wheelbarrow upset in his path. With
out shifting his glance he ran on. "A complete new set of social and spiritual values! Rubbish! War places an excessive premium on merely brutal qualities—muscle, bone, sinew, all the paraphernalia of physical endurance. What use has it got for old fellows of intellectual attainments like myself? It takes the greatest poet, singer, painter, violinist; all it can do with him is to thrust a rifle into his hands. All brains look alike, Michael Angelo's or a rag-picker's, when they're spattered in the mud of a trench. Take Lord Taborley here, for instance—all that military stupidity could do with him was to keep him in the ranks for two years. You can't make me believe in your complete new set of social and spiritual values. A complete unrest and insubordination to time-honored moralities is the legacy of war."
Having delivered himself, he tucked his napkin tighter into his waistcoat and attacked the fish-course, as though by this display of gastronomic energy he could somehow strengthen his argument.
It was clear to Tabs that behind all that Sir Tobias had been saying lay his misery over Maisie and Adair. He saw the world always in the personal equation.
"I agree with most of your statements," the General blundered on. "And yet you're wrong. You miss something. I think it's the vision of the stupendous heroism. You never saw it; you don't want to see it. That you never saw it we can understand; but that you shouldn't want to see it, makes us see red. It was something that we did for you, and you