Guy had paid some attention, and George; George most, I thought. I wondered very much what George would be thinking now.
My grandmother had been at Bath; she had gone to see a cousin who lived at Bath. She did not come back till late in September. I went to see her then and she told me that Guy and Hugo had volunteered.
VII
I was bewildered at first; I could not understand at all. I had seen the posters calling for recruits; I had seen the recruits drilling; but that too had seemed in its way remote; it had not occurred to me somehow that people of my own might go. I remember being glad, in the first days of all, that I had no one in the army. It had once been thought of for Guy, and I thought, ‘what a good thing Guy is not a soldier’; and then I felt ashamed at my own selfishness, for other people were soldiers, who mattered really as much.
And now I thought, it seems dreadful to say it, but I thought,
‘How silly of Guy and Hugo!’
And I thought:
‘That is just the side of them that Walter doesn’t like—fantastic—out of touch with reality.’
And I thought:
‘It is play acting, a little bit, and I always denied they did that. It would be much better if Hugo got a sensible job at last, and if Guy stuck to his law; he was getting on very well.’