He waved a hand. "That's just the point. The present doesn't matter—not in the wide conception of things. It is the past and the future that count. The present is mere fluidity."
"The poor devils up to their waists in water in the trenches would agree with you," said I.
"They would also agree with me," he retorted, "if they had time to go into the reconstruction of the future that we are contemplating."
At this juncture Marigold came in with the decanters and syphons. I noticed his one eye harden on the velvet dinner-jacket. He fidgeted about the room, threw a log on the fire, drew the curtains closer, always with an occasional malevolent glance at the jacket. Then Randall, like a silly young ass, said, from the depths of his easy chair, a very silly thing.
"I see you've not managed to get into khaki yet, Sergeant."
Marigold took a tactical pace or two to the door.
"Neither have you, sir," he said in a respectful tone, and went out.
Randall laughed, though I saw his dark cheek flush. "If Marigold had his way he would have us all in a barrack square."
"Preferably in those fluid trenches of the present," said I. "And he wouldn't be far wrong."
My eyes rested on him somewhat stonily. People have complained sometimes—defaulters, say, in the old days—that there can be a beastly, nasty look in them.