“Then all there is between us is the Atlantic—and that grows narrower every year. We’re the same people.”
“So long as we have the same languages and literature,” said Peter....
From these talks onward Peter may be regarded as having a Foreign Policy of his own.
§ 17
And it was in this hospital that Peter first clearly decided to become personally responsible for the reconstruction of the British Empire.
This decision was precipitated by the sudden reappearance in his world of Mir Jelalludin, the Indian whom he had once thought unsuitable company for Joan.
Peter had been dozing when Jelalludin appeared. He found him sitting beside the bed, and stared at the neat and smiling brown face, unable to place him, and still less able to account for the uniform he was wearing. For Jelalludin was wearing the uniform of the French aviator, and across his breast he wore four palms.
“I had the pleasure of knowing you at Cambridge,” said Mir Jelalludin in his Indian staccato. “Cha’med I was of use to you.”
An explanatory Frenchman standing beside the Indian dabbed his finger on the last of Jelalludin’s decorations. “He killed von Papen after your crash,” said the Frenchman.
“You were that Frenchman——?” said Peter.