"But I don't think I know what to tell them," said Peter miserably, but drawn out by the other.
Arnold smiled. "The Prayer Book's not much use here, eh? But forgive me; I don't mean to be rude. I know what you mean. To tell you the truth, I think this war is what we padres have been needing. It'll help us to find our feet. Only—this is honest—if you don't take care you may lose them. I have to keep a tight hold of that"—and he laid his hand on a big Bible—"to mind my own."
Peter did not reply for a minute. He could not talk easily to a stranger. But at last he said: "Yes; but it doesn't seem to me to fit the case. Men are different. Times are different. The New Testament people took certain things for granted, and even if they disagreed, they always had a common basis with the Apostles. Men out here seem to me to talk a different language: you don't know where to begin. It seems to me that they have long ago ceased to believe in the authority of anyone or anything in religion, and now to-day they actually deny our very commonplaces. But I don't know how to put it," he added lamely.
Arnold puffed silently for a little. Then he took his pipe out of his mouth and regarded it critically. "God's in the soul of every man still," he said. "They can still hear Him speak, and speak there. And so must we too, Graham."
Peter said nothing. In a minute or so steps sounded in the passage, and Arnold looked up quickly. "Maybe," he said, "our ordinary life prevented us hearing God very plainly ourselves, Graham, and maybe He has sent us here for that purpose. I hope so. I've wondered lately if we haven't come to the kingdom for such a time as this."
Pennell pushed the door open, and looked in. "You there, Graham?" he asked. "Oh, I thought I'd find him here, padre; his stuff's come."
Peter got up. "Excuse me, Arnold," he said; "I must shake in. But I'm jolly glad you said what you did, and I hope you'll say it again, and some more."
The older man smiled an answer, and the door closed. Then he sighed a little, and stretched out his hand again for the Bible.
CHAPTER VI
The great central ward at No. 1 Base Hospital looked as gay as possible. In the centre a Guard's band sat among palms and ferns, and an extemporised stage, draped with flags, was behind, with wings constructed of Japanese-figured material. Pretty well all round were the beds, although many of them had been moved up into a central position, and there was a space for chairs and forms. The green-room had to be outside the ward, and the performers, therefore, came and went in the public gaze. But it was not a critical public, and the men, with a plenitude of cigarettes, did not object to pauses. On the whole, they were extraordinarily quiet and passive. Modern science has made the battlefield a hell, but it has also made the base hospital something approaching a Paradise.