Tietjens said:
"I'm enormously sorry, sir. It's difficult to make myself plain."
The general said:
"Neither of us do. What is language for? What the hell is language for? We go round and round. I suppose I'm an old fool who cannot understand your modern ways . . . But you're not modern. I'll do you that justice. . . . That beastly little McKechnie is modern. . . . I shall ram him into your divisional-transport job, so that he won't incommode you in your battalion. . . . Do you understand what the little beast did? He got leave to go and get a divorce. And then did not get a divorce. That's modernism. He said he had scruples. I understand that he and his wife and . . . some dirty other fellow . . . slept three in a bed. That's modern scruples. . . ."
Tietjens said:
"No, sir, it's not really. . . . But what is a man to do if his wife is unfaithful to him?"
The general said as if it were an insult:
"Divorce the harlot! Or live with her! . . ." Only a beast, he went on, would expect a woman to live all her life alone in a cockloft! She's bound to die. Or go on the streets. . . . What sort of a fellow wouldn't see that? Was there any sort of beast who'd expect a woman to live . . . with a man beside her. . . . Why, she'd . . . she'd be bound to. . . . He'd have to take the consequences of whatever happened. The general repeated: "Whatever happened! If she pulled all the strings of all the shower-baths in the world!"
Tietjens said:
"Still, sir . . . there are . . . there used to be . . . in families of . . . position . . . a certain . . ." He stopped.