“It interests me,” said Bertram.
“I know I shall hate it anyhow. I want to forget the silly old war.”
“Everybody wants to forget it,” said Bertram, with a touch of passion in his voice. “The Profiteers, the Old Men who ordered the massacre, the politicians who spoilt the Peace, the painted flappers. I’m damned if I’m going to let them!”
“Painted flappers?” said Joyce. “Meaning me?”
“Not meaning you,” he answered.
“Thanks for that!”
She left the room, and Bertram heard Edith say the taxi was waiting. He rose and made a step towards the door, as though to join her after all. He wanted to go, in spite of Kenneth and the Russian girls. He wanted Joyce’s beauty, though he would have to share it with her friends. But it was too late. The door had clicked behind her, and he heard the taxi-cab drive away.
He was too rough with Joyce. Why shouldn’t she dance with other men? Was it some strain of his father in him that made him hate it so—his father’s harshness and intolerance. Or was it the passion of his love which Joyce seemed to deny him—did deny him—after the death of her baby? She did not respond to his endearments, and made no disguise of her dislike of his caresses. Or was this constant wrangling between them—becoming rather serious at times—due to an intellectual challenge between their different points of view—her patrician philosophy of life, his democratic leanings? Anyhow, it was all very difficult. He would have to be more careful, get a better grip on himself, rise to more selfless heights of love, if need be, and if possible, make a sacrifice of his very passion for Joyce’s sake. It was all very difficult!
He constrained himself to get to his writing again, now that he had refused her offer of companionship. Soon he lost himself in his task, glad of the swift flow of his pen and his savage strokes. It was strong stuff. It was a bitter indictment of the stupidities, the blunders, the unnecessary slaughter of men, which he had cursed in time of war because his own men had been the victims, with the others. Those orders from Corps Headquarters! Inconceivable! Unbelievable in their imbecility!
He had written for several hours, utterly absorbed, when he heard the electric bell ringing in the hall. Joyce back already? Hardly. The clock said midnight, and she was not back then, as a rule, from one of her dances. Edith had gone to bed, as Joyce had taken a key. He would have to open the door. Confound it! Who on earth—