"Never quite, I think," was my answer; "at least I never formulated it that way. I took things pretty easily as they came, Dalt, and didn't worry about reasons. I've never been a philosophical person, never lived up to any consciously organized plan. If I had any God in those days I suppose I named him 'Culture'; or worse still 'Good Taste.' Not much of a god for these times," I added.
"Oh, I don't know," Dalton struck in; "I'm not so sure of that! I can't see that these times differ much from any others. There's a big war on, yes; but that's nothing new, is it? Looks to me pretty much like the same old planet, right now. Never was much of a planet for the great majority; never will be. A few of us get all the prizes—always have. Some of us partly deserve 'em, but most of us just happen to be lucky. I don't see anything that's likely to change that arrangement. Do you?"
"They've changed it in Russia," I suggested.
"Not a bit!" exclaimed Dalton. "Some different people have taken their big chance and climbed on top, that's all! I doubt if they stay there long; still, they may. That fellow Lenine, now; he has a kind of well-up-in-the-saddle feel to him. Quite a boy, I've no doubt; and if he sticks, I congratulate him! It's the one really amusing place to be."
"You sound like a Junker war-lord," I smiled. "Fortunately, I know your bark, and I've never seen you bite."
"My dear Hunt," said Dalton, lowering his voice, "my teeth are perfectly sound, I assure you; and I've always used 'em when I had to, believe me. It's the law of life, as I read it. And just here between ourselves, eh—cutting out all the nonsense we've learned to babble—do you see any difference between a Junker war-lord and a British Tory peer—or an American capitalist? Any real difference, I mean? I'm all for licking Germany if we can, because if we don't she'll control the cream supply of the world. But I can't blame her for wanting to, and if she gets away with it—which the devil forbid!—we'll all mighty soon forget all the nasty things we've been saying about her and begin trying to lick her Prussian boots instead of her armies! That's so, and you know it! Why, the most sickening thing about this war, Hunt, isn't the loss of life—that may be a benefit to us all in the end; no sir, it's the moral buncombe it's let loose! That man Wilson simply sweats the stuff day and night, drenches us with it—till we stink like a church of Easter lilies. Come now! Doesn't it all, way down in your tummy somewhere, give you a good honest griping pain?"
I stared at him. Yes; the man was evidently in earnest; was even, I could see, expecting me to smile—however deprecatingly, for form's sake—and in the main agree with him, as became my situation in life; my class. I had supposed myself incapable of moral shock, but found now that the sincerity of his cynicism had unquestionably shocked me; I felt suddenly embarrassed, awkward, ashamed.
"Dalt," I finally managed, pretty lamely, "it's absurd, I admit; but if I try to answer you, I shall lose my temper. I mean it. And as I've dined wonderfully at your expense, that's something I don't care to do."
It was his turn to stare at me.
"Do you mean to say, Hunt, you've been caught by all this sentimental parson's palaver? Brotherhood, peace on earth, all the rest of it?"