Some Do Not . . ._ A Novel - Ford Madox Ford [123]
'One of the best,' Mark said. 'A fellow who never told a lie or did a dishonourable thing in his life. Let him down easy, there's a good girl. You ought to, you know.'
The girl, her face turned away, said:
'I'd lay down my life for him!'
Mark said:
'I know you would. I know a good woman when I see one. And think! He probably considers that he is...offering his life, you know, for you. And me, too, of course!...It's a different way of looking at things.' He gripped her awkwardly but irresistibly by the upper arm. It was very thin under her blue cloth coat. He said to himself:
'By Jove! Christopher likes them skinny. It's the athletic sort that attracts him. This girl is as clean run as...He couldn't think of anything as clean run as Miss Wannop, but he felt a warm satisfaction at having achieved an intimacy with her and his brother. He said:
'You aren't going away? Not without a kinder word to him. You think! He might be killed...Besides. Probably he's never killed a German. He was a liaison officer. Since then he's been in charge of a dump where they sift army dustbins. To see how they can give the men less to eat. That means that the civilians get more. You don't object to his giving civilians more meat?...It isn't even helping to kill Germans...
He felt her arm press his hand against her warm side. 'What's he going to do now?' she asked. Her voice wavered.
'That's what I'm here about,' Mark said. 'I'm going in to see old Hogarth. You don't know Hogarth? Old General Hogarth? I think I can get him to give Christopher a job with the transport. A safe job. Safeish! No beastly glory business about it. No killing beastly Germans either...I beg your pardon, if you like Germans.'
She drew her arm from his hand in order to look him in the face.
'Oh!' she said, 'you don't want him to have any beastly military glory!' The colour came back into her face: she looked at him open-eyed.
He said:
'No! Why the devil should he?' He said to himself: 'She's got enormous eyes: a good neck: good shoulders: good breasts: clean hips: small hands. She isn't knockkneed: neat ankles. She stands well on her feet. Feet not too large! Five foot four, say! A real good filly!' He went on aloud: 'Why in the world should he want to be a beastly soldier? He's the heir to Groby. That ought to be enough for one man.'
Having stood still sufficiently long for what she knew to be his critical inspection, she put her hand in turn, precipitately, under his arm and moved him towards the entrance steps.
'Let's be quick then,' she said. 'Let's get him into your transport at once. Before he goes to-morrow. Then we'll know he's safe.'
He was puzzled by her dress. It was very business-like, dark blue and very short. A white blouse with a black silk, man's tie. A wide-awake, with, on the front of the band, a cipher.
'You're in uniform yourself,' he said. 'Does your conscience let you do war work?'
She said:
'No. We're hard up. I'm taking the gym classes in a great big school to turn an honest penny...Do be quick!'
Her pressure on his elbow flattered him. He resisted it a little, hanging back, to make her more insistent. He liked being pleaded with by a pretty woman: Christopher's girl at that.
He said:
'Oh, it's not a matter of minutes. They keep 'em weeks at the base before they send 'em up...We'll fix him up all right, I've no doubt. We'll wait in the hall till he comes down.'
He told the benevolent commissionaire, one of two in a pulpit in the crowded grim hall, that he was going up to see General Hogarth in a minute or two. But not to send a bellboy. He might be some time yet.
He sat himself beside Miss Wannop, clumsily, on a wooden bench, humanity surging over their toes as if they had been on a beach. She moved a little to make room for him and that, too, made him feel good. He said:
'You said just now: "we" are hard up. Does "we" mean you and Christopher?'
She said:
'I and Mr Tietjens. Oh, no! I and mother! The paper she used to write for stopped. When your father died, I believe. He found money for it, I think. And mother isn't suited