her laughter, and the opinion it represented, were to him the merest crackling of thorns under a pot.
The fine afternoon had come – a few days before Christmas – and he sat, side by side with Mr. Naylor, both warmly wrapped in coats and rugs, watching the lawn tennis at Old Place. Doctor Mary and Beaumaroy were playing together, the latter accustoming himself to a finger short in gripping his racquet, against Cynthia and Captain Alec. The Captain could not cover the court yet in his old fashion, but his height and reach made him formidable at the net, and Cynthia was very active. Ten days of Inkston air had made a vast difference to Cynthia. And something else was helping. It required no common loyalty to lost causes and ruined ideals – it is surely not harsh to indicate Captain Cranster by these terms? – to resist Alec Naylor. In fact he had almost taken Cynthia's breath away at their first meeting; she thought that she had never seen anything quite so magnificent, or all round and from all points of view – so romantic; his stature, handsomeness, limp, renown. Who can be surprised at it? Moreover, he was modest and simple, and no fool within the bounds of his experience.
"She seems a nice little girl, that, and uncommonly pretty," Naylor remarked.
"Yes, but he's a queer fish, I fancy," the Doctor answered, also rather absently. Their minds were not running on parallel lines.
"My boy a queer fish?" Naylor expostulated humorously.
Irechester smiled; his lips shut close and tight, his smile was quick but narrow. "You're match-making. I was diagnosing," he said.
Naylor apologized. "I've a desperate instinct to fit all these young fellows up with mates as soon as possible. Isn't it only fair?"
"And also extremely expedient. But it's the sort of thing you can leave to them, can't you?"
"As to Beaumaroy – I suppose you meant him, not Alec – I think you must have been talking to old Tom Punnit – or, rather, hearing him talk."
"Punnit's general view is sound enough, I think, as to the man's characteristics; but he doesn't appreciate his cunning."
"Cunning?" Naylor was openly astonished. "He doesn't strike me as a cunning man, not in the least."
"Possibly – possibly, I say – not in his ends, but in his means and expedients. That's my view. I just put it on record, Naylor. I never like talking too much about my cases."
"Beaumaroy's not your patient, is he?"
"His employer – I suppose he's his employer – Saffron is. Well, I thought it advisable to see Saffron alone. I tried to. Saffron was reluctant, this man here openly against it. Next time I shall insist. Because I think – mind you, at present I no more than think – that there's more in Saffron's case than meets the eye."
Naylor glanced at him, smiling. "You fellows are always starting hares," he said.
"Game and set!" cried Captain Alec, and – to his partner – "Thank you very much for carrying a cripple."
But Irechester's attention remained fixed on Beaumaroy – and consequently on Doctor Mary; for the partners did not separate at the end of their game, but, after putting on their coats, began to walk up and down together on the other side of the court, in animated conversation, though Beaumaroy did most of the talking, Mary listening in her usual grave and composed manner. Now and then a word or two reached Irechester's ears – old Naylor seemed to have fallen into a reverie over his cigar – and it must be confessed that he took no pains not to overhear. Once at least he plainly heard "Saffron" from Beaumaroy; he thought that the same lips spoke his own name, and he was sure that Doctor Mary's did. Beaumaroy was speaking rather urgently, and making gestures with his hands; it seemed as though he were appealing to his companion in some difficulty or perplexity. Irechester's mouth was severely compressed and his glance suspicious as he watched.
The scene was ended by Gertie Naylor calling these laggards in to tea, to which meal the rest of the company had already betaken itself.
At the tea-table they found General Punnit discoursing on war, and giving "idealists" what idealists usually get. The General believed in war; he pressed the biological argument, did not flinch when Mr. Naylor dubbed him the "British Bernhardi," and invoked the support of "these medical gentlemen" (this with a smile at Doctor Mary's expense) for his point of view. War tested, proved, braced, hardened; it was nature's crucible; it was the antidote to softness and sentimentality; it was the vindication of the strong, the elimination of the weak.
"I suppose there's a lot in all that, sir," said Alec Naylor, "but I don't think the effect on one's character is always what you say. I think I've come out of this awful business a good deal softer than I went in." He laughed in an apologetic way. "More – more sentimental, if you like – with more feeling, don't you know, for human life, and suffering, and so on. I've seen a great many men killed, but the sight hasn't made me any more ready to kill men. In fact, quite the reverse." He smiled again. "Really sometimes, for a row of pins, I'd have turned conscientious objector."
Mrs. Naylor looked apprehensively at the General: would he explode? No, he took it quite quietly. "You're a man who can afford to say it, Alec," he remarked, with a nod that was almost approving.
Naylor looked affectionately at his son and turned to Beaumaroy. "And what's the war done to you?" he asked. And this question did draw from the General, if not an explosion, at least a rather contemptuous smile: Beaumaroy had earned no right to express opinions!
But express one he did, and with his habitual air of candour. "I believe it's destroyed every scruple I ever had!
"Mr. Beaumaroy!" exclaimed his hostess, scandalized; while the two girls, Cynthia and Gertie, laughed.
"I mean it. Can you see human life treated as dirt – absolutely as cheap as dirt – for three years, and come out thinking it worth anything? Can you fight for your own hand, right or wrong? Oh, yes, right or wrong, in the end, and it's no good blinking it. Can you do that for three years in war, and then hesitate to fight for your own hand, right or wrong, in peace? Who really cares for right or wrong, anyhow?"
A pause ensued – rather an uncomfortable pause. There was a raw sincerity in Beaumaroy's utterance that made it a challenge.
"I honestly think we did care about the rights and wrongs – we in England," said Naylor.
"That was certainly so at the beginning," Irechester agreed.
Beaumaroy took him up smartly. "Aye, at the beginning. But what about when our blood got up? What then? Would we, in our hearts, rather have been right and got a licking, or wrong and given one?"
"A searching question!" mused old Naylor. "What say you, Tom Punnit?"
"It never occurred to me to put the question," the General answered brusquely.
"May I ask why not, sir?" said Beaumaroy respectfully.
"Because I believed in God. I knew that we were right, and I knew that we should win."
"Are we in theology now, or still in biology?" asked Irechester, rather acidly.
"You're getting out of my depth anyhow," smiled Mrs. Naylor. "And I'm sure the girls must be bewildered."
"Mamma, I've done biology!"
"And many people think they've done theology!" chuckled Naylor. "Done it completely!"
"I've raised a pretty argument!" said Beaumaroy, smiling. "I'm sorry! I only meant to answer your question about the effect the whole thing
