How Dear Is Life (13 page)

Thunder rolled continuously; reddish burnings arose upon the watery earth, or hovered as balls of fire, or shot sideways like expanding flares illuminating the massive sheets and torrents of the rain. White streams of water, suddenly suffused with pink, were everywhere gushing down through the heather; while through all was a roar that was frightening until he realized that it was the little Hoar Oak Water rolling its bed of boulders to the sea.

By the time the lightning had moved further away, and rain settled to a heavy fall without turbulence, he could see to walk again. His shoes squelched, so he lay down and held them over his head to run out brown liquid and small stones. It made walking a bit better, but there were blisters on both heels.

*

The track turned into a lane between banks of lichened stone walls, on top of which beech trees writhed in many old cuttings and layings. While he walked up the enclosed track the rain suddenly ceased; and looking back, he saw blue sky in patches, with high white clouds moving above. Their shadows raced over the sunlit moor. It was so surprising a transformation that he stopped to watch it; and while he watched, instantly he was surrounded by warmth and light. Tiny, jewel-like glints of purple, blue, green, and red trembled in the grasses and on the
beech leaves beside him. Already his clothes, like the earth, were steaming.

He took off his shirt, and wrung it out; and whirling it round his head, walked down the beechen grove, singing. Then in the pleasant grove he got out of his trousers, wrung them out, and continued to sing to an audience of bullocks watching through a gap in the beech hedge. They backed away, heads low, while the trousers went round like the sails of a windmill.

Saying goodbye to the bullocks, waving shirt and trousers, he went on up the grove, which ended at a sunken red lane arched over by trees. The lane was extremely steep on a surface of bare ribbed rock, so that he had to walk gingerly, to prevent himself from slithering.

Seeing a green valley below, and a road beside a river, he put on his trousers, and continued downhill until he came to a group of white-washed cottages, and a high arched stone bridge under which thick brown water was rushing. There was a monkey tree
growing in the garden of a cottage. He put on his shirt reluctantly.

A farmer told him he was at Barbrook, and the lane he had come down was Beggar's Roost. Lynmouth was down the road. He went happily on his way, sun hot on back until he entered the shade of trees upon the road cut through rock; and all the rest of the walk was in shadow through the forest until the bottom of the long steep hill into Lynmouth, through which he hobbled with blisters, but rejoicing in his adventure.

*

Where had he been? Was he quite sure he had not caught cold? Good heavens, no! Then, going upstairs to change, he noticed two gladstone bags packed and standing under the dresser, side by side.

He looked at the labels.
Passenger
to
Dublin
,
via
Holyhead
. Perhaps Sylvia was going away. For some days she had been talking about Dublin, a name known to him chiefly through Father reading bits out of
The
Daily
Trident.
He had neither listened to nor cared what it was about. Something about Carson, F. E. Smith, Orangemen, and Home Rule.

When, during tea, Aunt Dora said that she felt she must go with Sylvia to Dublin, in case civil war broke out, he began to take interest.

“Do you think you could look after yourself, Boy, for the remaining three days of your holiday?”

“Rather! I can cook, you know. Trout, eggs and bacon, toast, anything! Anyway, bananas and bread and butter are enough for me.”

“You see, Boy, the news today is very grave. Our national living has been wrong in England for some years, and if those of us who know this don't act now, we may all be plunged into something which might very well be the final catastrophe of Armageddon, foretold in the Old Testament.”

What rot, he thought: like the Salvation Army. He cared only that he would be having the house to himself. If only Desmond were with him!

“You may be wondering why we are going to Dublin, Boy. You see, Sylvia heard when you were out this morning that our soldiers, to their shame, have been firing on an unarmed crowd in Dublin, most of them children. One little boy was shot in the back, there was a little girl with her ankle shattered, while several parents were killed, and many more wounded.”

“
Our
soldiers did it? But why, Auntie?”

“Well, you have heard of the Home Rule Bill, have you not?”

“No, Auntie.”

Dora looked momentarily helpless.

“Well, Phillip, the Orangemen, or Irish Unionists of Northern Ireland, have armed to oppose the Home Rule Bill. And, you see, while arms for them are virtually permitted by our Government, they are forbidden to the National Volunteers, the Southern Irish that is. So they landed some secretly. The Viceroy sent soldiers to seize those arms, at Louth, where they were landed. On their way back to barracks the soldiers opened fire on an un
armed, jeering crowd, and some of the bullets killed the children.”

Phillip was only half listening. A fisherman on the quay had told him that salmon would be running in the “fresh”, and they would take a lobworm among the boiling water of the boulders. The thing to do was to water a lawn with mustard and water, then up would come the lobs. Could he ask Aunt Dora where there was a lawn?

“ … you will be mobilised, won't you, Boy?”

“War, Aunt Dora? You mean civil war in Ireland? Father said something about it, I remember now. The Terriers are home defence, you know. We're really more a sort of club than anything else.”

She looked at him with a gentle smile. He was so young, so unaware of the world. Pray God that he, and thousands of boys like him, would not be drawn into the threatening cataclysm.

“Do you ever read the newspapers, Phillip?”

“No, not much.”

“You have heard about the assassination of the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand at Sarajevo, surely?”

“Only sort of, Aunt Dora. I say, do excuse me, I want to ask the cobbler something, before he leaves his shop. I won't be long.”

When he had gone, the two women sat there in silence for awhile. Then Sylvia said, “That poor boy is typical of the European millions, Dora. What does he know of the dark forces?”

“It is the backwardness of time that conceals the truth of the present, Sylvia.”

“We are all part of it, Dora. Even the warnings of that noble man, our great friend Keir Hardie, seemed to me to be exaggerated, when he told me, a year or two ago, that Haldane's Army Bill, then before the Commons, meant, finally, war and conscription. I listened to him with sympathy, of course, but being involved in moment to moment problems of our own struggle, I thought that his attitude was too remote. I suppose Keir Hardie found me wanting.”

In the morning the two women left by the early train, and Phillip, to his satisfaction, was left in charge. He had instructions to leave the key with a neighbour, who would come in and clean up the cottage when he had gone.

*

On the following Sunday night at nine o'clock he caught the return excursion train from Barnstaple, and arrived, after sitting upright in a carriage all night with nine other people, at Waterloo station shortly before six in the morning. On the way home he had a carriage to himself, and turned inside out between the luggage racks in sheer exuberance of being alive. August Bank Holiday lay only a week ahead; Desmond would be coming home from school, and cousin Willie be living with him by then. What fun they would have together! He would take Willie to his secret Lake Woods, with Desmond, and they would fish for roach.

I
T WAS
very hot in London, though cool in Wine Vaults Lane. No artificial light in the downstairs office now; but upstairs, in his narrow frosted glass partition, Phillip worked under an electric bulb as he sat before the tall Remington machine, making out Fire and Combined Household policies from proposal forms, and at moments pausing to imagine the sun upon the heather of Hoar Oak Hill, and the clear gravelly runs of the Lyn.

When he got home he found the front door ajar. He stood on the hall mat, listening to Father’s voice in the sitting-room.

“You mark my words, Hetty, Lord Roberts knew what was to come as far back as 1908 when he said at Quebec—I cut it out of the
Trident
at the time—here it is—‘They refuse to believe me, and we sleep under a false security, for I do not hesitate to affirm that we shall have a frightful war in Europe, and that England and France will have the hardest experience of their existence. They will, in fact, see defeat very near, but the war will finally be won by the genius of a French general named Ferdinand Foch, professor of the Military School in Paris’.”

Phillip crept silently away. It was awful to be home again. He went next door, and had tea with Grandfather and Great-aunt Marian.

Later that evening, when he had told him of the Dublin journey, and Father said, “Preposterous idea! Dora’s a muckraker,” Phillip got up and left the room. They heard the front door close behind him.

“Curious chap,” remarked Richard. “You can’t tell him anything nowadays.”

*

“In 1908 Lord Roberts, in Quebec, said we would have a frightful war in Europe, and come near to defeat, Mr. Hollis. Hark, what’s that paper boy crying? Perhaps it’s started already!”

“I hope not,” said Mr. Hollis. “I sincerely hope you and Lord Roberts are not right, Maddison. Here, Edgar, stir your stumps, forget your pictorial harem, and go out and buy me an evening paper!”

“Yessir, certainly, sir!”

The messenger went smartly out into the narrow sunlight of the Lane, disappearing in the direction of the distant voice.

“Though I must agree with you,” went on Mr. Hollis, “that things look pretty bad. Even so, we ought to keep out of it. We’ve got a Navy, haven’t we? And we’re an island! As Napoleon once said, we’re a nation of shopkeepers and tradesmen. While we rule the seas, we rule the world, my boy! We’ve also got most of the world’s gold. Nations, like families, can’t exist without money. A modern war would soon exhaust the European nations’ gold reserves. In three months any country at war would be bankrupt. Contractors have to be paid for their armaments and supplies, you know! Take my word for it, there won’t be any war. So get on with your work, young feller-me-lad. No martial glory for you, you sunburnt trout tickler.”

Downham was at luncheon, so was Mr. Howlett. Mr. Hollis was dressed in his tail-coat and striped trousers. He was going to meet young Roy Cohen at the Piccadilly Hotel, and, he said, get the new clothing factory insurance of Moses Cohen, Ltd.

“Someone in this Branch has got to get new business, you know, Maddison.”

“Quite right, Mr. Hollis.”

It was Friday, the last day of July. Desmond was home from school, with Eugene his Brazilian friend who was a nice fellow; Cousin Willie was arriving that afternoon at Waterloo; Monday was August Bank Holiday. Then, very soon, camp at Eastbourne! Life
was
tremendous
fun
,
really
.

And yet—and yet—somehow, under everything, a feeling of coldness, of longing, of dread, was growing; and the feeling became centred on the talk of war, which, stealthily, and in secret, was a thing to be desired. War—everyone spoke about it: the fellows at Head Office; Father; Mrs. Neville; Gran’pa; Mr. Bol ton—everybody. The tobacconist spoke of it when he had gone to buy a sixpenny ounce of mixed cigarettes—yellow Russian, fat oval Turkish, strong black French, red-silk-topped Ladies, Italian with streaky thin rice-paper, African with paper ends screwed up, violet-tipped for passion. Secretly, awefully, fearfully, one part of him desired the excitement that was war to become more and more; while another part of him quailed before a vast, fathomless darkness. As these feelings grew side by side
in his mind there persisted a vision of hatless French soldiers slouching along a road, treeless, houseless, bare, a road leading nowhere, from nowhere. There was no fighting in this picture: nothing like the pictures of
Valour
and
Victory
, stories of the Boer War: only an endless straggle of ragged soldiers, some without arms, others with rifles slung on shoulders, all walking very slowly, listlessly, from nowhere to nowhere.

Edgar returned, breathless.

“All papers sold out, sir! I tried four pitches, sir!”

Edgar’s hair was smarmed smooth with oil. He would be sixteen on the morrow. Phillip determined to buy another sixpenny ounce of mixed cigarettes for Edgar’s birthday.

“I thought this might do instead, Mr. ’Ollis.”

Proudly Edgar put a copy of
John
Bull
on the counter, and, under it, Mr. Hollis’ penny.

“Good God! That rag!”

“I thought you might like a read of it, I bought it wi’ me own money, sir. There’s your penny back, under it, sir.”

“Oh,” said Mr. Hollis, his voice becoming winsome. “How very civil of you, Edgar! Thank you indeed! So you follow Horatio Bottomley, do you, eh?”

Edgar smirked in his sudden importance.

“H’m,” said Mr. Hollis. He opened the middle pages. “‘To Hell with Servia’. Well, that’s frank, anyway.” He glanced a few moments, then folded it again and put it on the counter. “Thank you, Edgar!” He gave a nod to the messenger, who stood by the counter. “I think,” he went on, as Edgar did not move, “that perhaps your periodical would be better in your drawer, Edgar.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Edgar, returning to his corner.

“This is a respectable office,” said Mr. Hollis,
sotte
voce
to Phillip. “Between ourselves, Horatio Bottomley is one of the biggest rogues out of gaol, and that’s putting it mildly. He’s escaped the penalty of dubious finance again and again, solely owing to his knowledge of the intricacy of company law. He’s a witty devil, too, in his way. This story is vouched for by my father-in-law, Carlton Turnham, the civil engineer, you know. Bottomley called one day on someone called Chumley, spelt, of course, C-h-o-l-m-o-n-d-e-l-e-y. To the butler he said, ‘Is Mr. Chol-mon-deley in?’, ‘No, sir, but Mr. Chumley is. Have you an appointment, sir?’ ‘I have,’ replied Bottomley. ‘Who shall I
say has called, sir?’ ‘Oh, Mr. Burnley.’ Ha-ha-ha, you see the joke, of course.”

Phillip laughed as he closed a shiny black reference book, and said, “Very good, very good,” while wondering what exactly the joke was.

A newspaper boy’s shouting came down the Lane.

“No, not now, Edgar, I have to go out.” To Phillip, “Where is Howlett, does he ever do any work? If he’s not back inside five minutes, I shall leave you in charge of the office, young feller. So for God’s sake don’t start playing jokes on anyone who may come in!”

“Certainly not, Mr. Hollis.”

To Phillip’s disappointment, Mr. Howlett arrived back a few moments later.

The senior clerk, with a glance at his gold watch, said to Edgar, “Fetch me a taxi, quick as you can, my lad! I have a business appointment and must not be late.”

“Yessir!” said Edgar, dashing out once more into Fenchurch Street.

“I thought you were going out to lunch with young Roy Cohen,” said Mr. Howlett, mildly, taking his pipe out of his mouth.

“I am; but I could hardly leave young Maddison in charge here. Where the devil is Downham? Is office routine at this Branch to be taken seriously, or is it not?”

“I should say that the office routine is liable to considerable upset, judging by the latest news,” replied Mr. Howlett, quietly.

“Oh?” said Mr. Hollis, pausing as he brushed his jacket with the office brush.

Phillip saw that Mr. Howlett’s face looked quite different from what it had ever looked before. It seemed longer; the eyes larger. Mr. Howlett’s manner was so serious that it seemed to add to his height. The creases were not noticeable in his trousers. He looked strangely unlike himself in this new quiet seriousness. Mr. Hollis responded to this new Mr. Howlett. Mr. Hollis’ appearance of always being in a hurry, which had always seemed to amuse Mr. Howlett, left him. Mr. Hollis awaited what he had to say, brush in hand. Movement was suspended for perhaps two or three seconds; but to Phillip it seemed, while it lasted, to be for ever.

Mr. Howlett said, in a low voice, “The Czar has ordered
general mobilization. I’ve just come from Lloyds, where they rang the Lutine bell.”

“Good God!” exclaimed Mr. Hollis, putting down the clothes brush. “In that event the fat is in the fire with a vengeance!”

Phillip felt a cold shiver pass through him, and then the fearful longing for war, like a dark spectre.

He remained in the office after Mr. Hollis had left in the taxi. When Downham returned he was supposed to go upstairs, to continue the typing of policies; but when Downham did come back, he followed his impulse and without a word walked out into the sunshine of Fenchurch Street. He must be free of the shaded Lane, and his dark thoughts, for a moment or two.

The usual traffic of heavy horse drays was passing up and down the street, but now it seemed as though all movement was half-dissolved, insubstantial in the brilliant summer light, which was somehow part of the news. He walked towards Aldgate, drawn by the brilliant feeling of light, away from his usual self, to be separated from that life. He felt on the verge of finding that something which had always been shut off from ordinary living. He remembered how he had first felt this something when singing to himself as a small child, left alone for a few moments in a tepid bath in the kitchen, by Minny his German nurse—the gas jet very low and blue—and singing to himself in a minor key. It was a strange sort of happiness. He had felt it later in the Backfield; and in the loft under the roof of his home; and later still in moments of Whitefoot Lane, and in his “preserves”. It had been strong during the holiday in Devon, high upon the moor in the burning sun. It was another life. He, the Phillip that lived at home, the Phillip seen by others, by himself in the mirror, was for the moment left behind, like the skin of a mayfly after it had flown.

It was much more than sad feeling, the lonely tepid-bath gas-jet singing feeling of childhood; it was more than an alone-feeling; it was a state in which he could know things without thinking—not the kind of thinking the Magister urged the boys at school to
do—he could almost
feel
things
themselves
,
r
ather than theorems.

He surprised himself by this sudden thought; and found he had come to Aldgate Tube station.

Newsboys were shouting. Men in top-hats, straw-hats, bowlers, cloth-caps—everyone except orthodox Jews with tallow faces
and black whiskers and hair under rather high black felt hats—clustered to buy papers.

While he was looking at
The
Globe
on the corner of Mark Lane, he saw Peter Wallace. He had seen Peter once or twice in the Lane, and at London Bridge; but they had never spoken, only nodded, until now. Peter, hatless too, also had a paper.

“Do you think that war will come, Peter?”

“My gov’nor says it’s inevitable between Germany and the Slav States. For one thing, there are no more Central European wheats or barleys being offered on Exchange now. Our agents say that the Germans have bought the lot. No British government can permit that interference with normal trade.”

“How do you mean, Peter?”

“Well, it’s obvious, surely. The City exists on trade, and trade exists on free markets. Free markets exist on the freedom of the seas. Grain is a fundamental commodity. The Germans have virtually closed the Baltic. So we’re bound to be at war within a week. Q.E.D.”

Phillip was greatly impressed. He remembered that Peter had got First-Class Honours in the Oxford Senior—“Oh, I see! Well, I must go now. When are you going to camp, with the first or second lot?”

“I’m with the first contingent.”

“I’m with the second.”

Peter Wallace turned on his heel. Phillip felt that Peter had never liked him since the day he had called him a coward. If only he had learned to box! He hurried back to Wine Vaults Lane; and went through the door quietly, a little apprehensive.

“What’s the latest?” asked Downham.

“The German Government has sent a twelve-hour ultimatum to Russia, to stop mobilization. And a friend on the Corn Exchange told me what is not yet in the papers—the Germans have closed the Baltic. So we’ll be at war within a week.”

“Closed the Baltic? What, here in the City?” scoffed Downham. “How did they close it? Padlock the door?”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Howlett’s voice from upstairs. “The Germans are stopping all grain leaving Danzig and other Hanseatic ports.”

“Well, sir,” Downham called up the stairs, in his flattering voice, “Wallis, of the Accident Department, our company Colour-sergeant, telephoned to Regimental Headquarters just
before I left Head Office, and they said that the camp is still on, so it looks as though only the Navy will be involved. For the present, at any rate, sir.”

“Ah,” said the voice of Howlett, from the roost above the stairs.

It was half-past three by the clock on the wall. Phillip thought of Willie’s train arriving at Waterloo in about twenty minutes’ time. He had been trying, all day, to bring himself to ask Mr. Howlett for permission to leave early, in order to meet the train; but ever since his late return after Whitsun, he had, as Mr. Hollis had advised him, been watching his step.

*

“Well,” said Mr. Howlett, who
did
look like an owl as he spoke, peering round the frosted glass door where, amidst much muttered indiarubbering, Phillip had spent the Saturday morning before the tall Remington typewriter. “Well, Maddison, I suppose when we meet next, on Tuesday morning, our fates will have been decided. I’m closing the office now. You’ll appear here on Tuesday, I suppose? Are you staying at home for the Bank Holiday?”