“Oh, nor do I,” very quickly.
His mother waited; there were obviously more skeins of perplexity to be unwound.
“One doesn’t have anything to do with a German,” Greville blurted out. “But what’s one to do if he’s your pal beforehand?”
“I wonder....” Mrs Dunne thought it out, though hardly realizing that this was the predicament of a great many of her fellow English.
Greville was not the type of boy who would ever of his own volition commit any act that was in the least degree complex or eccentric. Richard had been as normal and sturdy a disciple of take-it-for-granted as himself, when they had first paired off as inseparables. So that the shatterment of Richard’s normal world, of necessity involved a twitch where it joined Greville’s.
“I think you owe something to old friendship, my boy.”
“Oh, this child isn’t going to be a perishing deserter, betcherlife....” In proof of which, Greville summoned Richard for a long tramp through the slowly russeting country. They swung along for the most part in silence, as they had always been wont to do; but previously it was the silence which signified “all’s well,” whereas now it was lumpish—a case of nothing to say. For Greville’s natural disposition was for anecdotes of the gunroom—joyous narrative of the day when they “bagged a Fritz,” or technical details of his present training for the R.N.A.S.—his companion’s set face and monosyllabic appreciation was discouraging on such themes. Even had Greville realized that the other was sick with envy, and not, as he thought, bored, it would hardly have rendered matters more comfortable. Mutual memories of Winborough were safe enough, and recurred in spasms, but Greville’s interest had been superseded by fresher, more vital stuff; and Richard’s occasional starts on an abstract subject were, curiously, addressed more to an absent David than to Greville:—“Have you ever noticed how nearly all the popular songs they sing have something in ’em about a long long way or long long trails?” he remarked once, as a chorus from a khaki group in the distance floated to them in wind-borne snatches. “A long, long road in Flanders or France, straight and planted with poplars ... tired men dragging on and on with a sense of endlessness like in a Nevinson picture—but it’s queer that it should have worked its way into the very songs.”
Greville knew little of roads and cared less.
They were at the moment on the outskirts of a neighbouring town; a road of detached houses, picturesque and gabled: each so fretfully and laboriously different, and all so drearily alike. All of these bore their names painted on the gates; and one was “Heimat.” Richard’s lower lip twisted sardonically.... “Heimat”—home—after three years of war with Germany! Who in their simplicity had dared leave such a name displayed? A wistful group of exiles from the Vaterland, who still clung to their own tongue, wore plaid, and basket plaits, and stupid socks, drank coffee for breakfast, and sang in chorus round the piano after dinner?—No—they would have called their house Omdurman or the Cedars or Kenilworth; was it likely that a second Otto Redbury would have the temerity to dwell behind a gate with “Heimat” painted boldly upon it—“In our position—”? Heimat probably sheltered a serenely unconscious English family, who accepted the rum name they found when they moved in, and pronounced it wrong—and who could with safety have dwelt in a house called “Kaiser Wilhelm” and still not meet with suspicion. Perhaps they had an ancient German governess whom they tolerated and sheltered for pre-war sake, and she guarded in her sentimental old rag-bag of a heart the secret understanding of “Heimat,” and found comfort in it....
Greville, who had not noticed the house called Heimat, interrupted his companion’s musings: “I say, did you hear old Rogers has had both his legs shot away?”