A marrying man

by G. B. Stern

Carr said, after a pause, remembering vaguely that he had been confidant to rather a queer outburst from the reader, some years ago: "Why 'no,' Temple? You're qualified to put us all right on the subject; you're in the thick of it here, while we've been scampering about the globe."

"'The thick of it' is hardly in a publisher's office," Gareth retorted bitterly, though the other man's remark had been made without any sub-intention to hurt. "It's the 'thin of it'—the war in words—you never grope through them to the realities going on beyond. Words that muffle suffering till it reaches here beautiful—poignant—noble—crude—restrained—oh, as anything but itself! First the war books, and then criticism of the books, and criticism of the criticism ... how are we—how am I to get past that to the very beat of the war?... The very beat of the war—that's only a phrase too—I don't know what it signifies, when I come to think about it. But expression is not connection. Those like you—and you—and you——" His look roamed from Carr to Wyman, rested an instant on young Burnett's drawn thin face—avoided Patricia altogether—"who have fought in the war, can you be identified with it any closer by ... writing about it?" He came to a halt; experienced a queer satisfaction in the knowledge that for once they were all listening to him intently ... then, in desperate realization that even now he was only talking about talk, rushed on to achievement of his purpose: "I intend to leave here—resign my job as reader. I can't stand it any longer, Mr. Campbell; I want things straight from the source ... it's indecent to feel as heroic as I do after reading a good war-novel ... to respond as I do to a mere clump of words. Do you remember, at the very beginning of hostilities, when the message came through: 'The Black Watch is cut to pieces!'—I've never forgotten that—the stern sombre ring of it.... I'd repeat it, and feel my face growing stern and sombre. It was all in the sound; just as bad if it had been the Second Middlesex ... but not to me. I can't get beneath the covers. Suvla Bay—that's exciting too ... though hardly to you and me in quite the same way, Burnett. I don't suppose the name matters much to you. Suvla Bay....

"And when the war is over, I shall be left with a fistful of second-hand quotations. Stranded on the outer rim. If I stop here, reading about it, hearing about it. Here—where the best emotion the Great War has to give me is a thrill out of someone else's book—and the worst thing it can do to me is to spoil the chances of my own...."

He walked blindly from the room. On the threshold the conviction was still upon him that he had been eloquent. Half-way down the flight of stairs, he wondered if he had made a complete fool of himself. Already it occurred to him that after all Campbell might not take seriously his notice to resign his job. Although certainly it was meant seriously. But the embers of feeling of the past two years had blazed up and burnt themselves out in speech. ... And now his only desire was to ascertain how his outburst had impressed Patricia. He stood stock-still, one hand gripping the iron balustrade rail ... listened intently. He had left the door ajar ... and was aware that Campbell had just said something—he could not catch what. Then clear and careless, came Pat's reply:

"Ah, but he'll be back in a day or two, Mr. Campbell. Dear old Gareth—his intentions are sincere, but rather collapsible!"

... Gareth went on, down the stairs, and into the street.

Pat knew.

CHAPTER IV

He did not go back to Leslie Campbell's after two or three days. He went back after a fortnight....

For one tensely expectant week, he waited for England to become aware of the fact that he was now definitely free to take up any war work it might have been holding in reserve for him. A phrase in poster use became part of his mental equipment—he was ready to do his bit—eager to do his bit—surely to the nation might be left the minor responsibility of finding him the bit to do. Most people, he conjectured hazily, "dropped into something" by invitation; a friend "in the swim"; a chance encounter with another friend who "tipped them the wink." And thus, by slang and by haphazard, the great ship Organization was manned, and launched, to be tested in strange and stormy seas.