There was a moment’s pause, during which Lytham darted a quick look at Fallaray. A gleam came into the eyes of both men.
“What did they say to that?” he asked.
“My dear man, what do you suppose they said? Having no imagination and precious little knowledge of the facts of the case, they dragged in Ulster and talked about civil war, which I think is absurd, because already, as Arthur knows perfectly well, Ulster is feeling the pinch of the boycott and has deserted Carson to a man. They’re longing for a settlement and only anxious to go on making bawbees in the good old Scotch Presbyterian manner.—They couldn’t see, and I don’t suppose they will ever be made to see, this lot, that a letter from the King would immediately have the effect of withdrawing all the sympathy from the Irish and reduce them from martyrs to the level of ordinary human beings. They couldn’t see that every Irish grievance would be taken away in one fell swoop, that the priests would be left without a leg to stand on and that above all America would be the first to say ‘Now show us.’ It would be a frightful blow to Collins and de Valera and also to the Germans and the Sinn Feiners in the United States, and make all the world admire the British sense of sportsmanship,—which we have almost lost by everything that has been done during and since the War by our people in Ireland.—What do you think of it,—both of you?”
She threw her head back and waited for a scoffing laugh from Lytham and a look from her husband that would move her to ribaldry. Her long white neck rose out of her queer gown like a pillar, the pieces of jade in her hair shimmered oddly and there was the gleam of undergraduate ragging in her eyes.
Fallaray looked at his wife for the first time. “It was an inspiration,” he said. “I confess that I have never thought of this solution.”
Feo was amazed but bowed ironically. “Very generous, Arthur, very generous. I couldn’t have been married to you all this time without having acquired a certain amount of intelligence, though, could I?” Even at such a moment she could not remain serious, although she was perfectly ready to confess to a considerable flutter of vanity at Fallaray’s favorable comment.
“My God,” said George Lytham, “it takes a woman to think of a thing like this.”
“You’ll make me swollen-headed in a moment, you two.”
Lytham took no further notice of her. He strode over to Fallaray. “Could this be done? I quite agree with your wife in her interpretation of the effect of such a letter and of course it could be made the sort of human document which would electrify the world. I agree, too, that once our soldiers were withdrawn with all the brass hats from the castle, the huge majority of reasonable Irishmen would insist on taking hold of things against the very small minority of Republicans who have merely used Ireland as a means of feathering their own nests, and be obliged to prove that they are fit to run their own country without bloody squabbles, cat-calling, filthy recriminations and all the other things for which they have earned a historical reputation. But—can it be done?”
Fallaray paced up and down the room with his hands clasped behind his back and his great shoulders rounded. Lytham and Lady Feo watched him. It was a peculiar moment. They both saw in it the test of Fallaray’s imagination and, in a way, humor. They could see that he was looking at this thing from every possible angle, dissecting it as a chemist would dissect bad water. At last he gave a groan and stopped and faced them.