His arm was round her, her cheek was pressed to his, her bosom heaved against him. She turned her lips to his in a quick kiss, and whispered:
"And when you came down out of your sky 'like pigeons homing at nightfall'—that's a sentence in one of your letters—d'you recognise it?—the river went on rolling still?"
"Just the same, without a break. And what a—welter. Remnants of crack infantry brigades tangled with the rags of cavalry squadrons—grimy, hairy, ragged chimney-sweeps with bandaged feet and empty bellies, and blackened tongues hanging out, and blind, blank, staring eyes.... Imagine all the toy soldier outfits in the kiddy-shops of Regent Street emptied into the gutters and you'll get an idea of what the thing was like.... And Transport and Supply-columns jumbled with bits of R.G.A. batteries and R.F.A.—three dying horses to a howitzer, and one gunner left out of six! Bands of refugees and troops of stragglers. Lunatics led along howling and gibbering. Lorries, carts, and motor-vans crammed with swollen-footed cripples—cheek by jowl with bloody spectres evacuated from Field Hospitals that were reddening the sky with their burning in the rear. A day-and-nightmare to haunt one for ever if the end had been different—" He caught his breath. "But when I remember that we straightened the muddle—brought Order out of Chaos—turned on the Germans and bit to the bone—I pray that the memory may stay with me always, so that I may teach your sons and mine what it means to be Englishmen!"
"Oh, Alan! My poor boy! ..." She caught him in her arms with sudden passion, strained him to her and then freed herself from him, and moved away, signing to him that he must not approach. "What you hope for can never be! I'd have told you this before if I'd been decent, but I wanted your kisses—I was hungry for the touch of you—and the sound of your voice in my ears after all these weeks and weeks——"
"Then why do you say it can never be—and tell me in the same breath that you long for me and love me?" His light brows were drawn into a heavy line over his stern grey eyes. "Aren't you and I going to be married? Is it possible that you'd draw back—now?"
"Because your wife should be a pure woman, and I am not, it is possible. Don't move! Don't come nearer! If you do I'll never have the courage to tell—what must be told!"
And he had sat still, as a figure in carved khaki-coloured stone with his knees apart and his knotted hands hanging between them, and his eyes, curiously hard and pale against the strong red sunburn of his face, fixed immovably upon her mouth. When she ended there had been a great silence; and she had looked up at the azure dome lidding their green nest, wondering why the burning, perfumed breeze had suddenly turned cold. His voice recalled her:
"Why have you told me this?"
"To be honest." She hugged her knees. "To give you a chance for freedom before you were handicapped with me for life, poor boy!"
"And how do you suppose it makes me feel?" He breathed roughly, and gritted his teeth, wringing his hands in one another so strongly that the knuckles started death-white against the reddened skin. She heard herself saying lamely: