The Soldier's Art - Anthony Powell [87]
“We heard that too.”
“Then you know as much as me.”
“We seem to. Of course, security may be so good, it will really turn out to be Iceland. That sort of thing is always happening.”
“The point is, you could probably – certainly – get out of being sent overseas on grounds of age and medical category.”
“I agree I’m older than the rocks amongst which I sit, and have died infinitely more times than the vampire. Even so, I’d quite like to see the gorgeous East – even the Icelandic geysers, if it comes to that.”
“You’ll go through with it?”
“Not a doubt.”
“I just thought I ought to pass on what was being said – strictly against all the rules.”
“That shan’t go any further. Depend upon it. I suppose Widmerpool saw this coming?”
“So I gather.”
“And all that altruism about F Mess was to get me on the move?”
“That’s about it.”
“He couldn’t have done me a better turn,” said Stringham. “The old boy’s a marvellous example of one of the aspects of this passage I want to read you. Like everything that’s any good, it has about twenty different meanings.”
He stopped and began turning the pages of the book he had brought with him. We stood beside a pillar-box. When he found the place, he began to read aloud:
“I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.
As a man calls for wine before he fights,
I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights
Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.
Think first, fight afterwards – the soldier’s art;
One taste of the old time sets all to rights.”
“Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came?”
“Childe Stringham – in this case.”
“I’m never sure what I feel about Browning.”
“He always gives the impression of writing about people who are wearing very expensive fancy dress. All the same, there’s a lot in what he says. Not that I feel in the least nostalgic about earlier, happier sights. I can’t offhand recall many. The good bit is about thinking first and fighting after.”
“Let’s hope the High Command have taken the words to heart.”
“Odd that Browning should know that was so important.”
“Perhaps he should have been a general.”
“It ought to be equally borne in mind by all ranks. There might be an Order of the Day on the subject. Can’t Widmerpool arrange that?”
“Widmerpool’s leaving Div. H.Q. too.”
“To become a colonel?”
“The Divisional Commander may bitch that up. He’s tumbled on some of Widmerpool’s intriguing and doesn’t approve, but Widmerpool will go either way.”
“How very dramatic.”
“Isn’t it.”
“Then what will happen to you?”
“God knows. The I.T.C., I imagine. Look, I shall have to go back to Cheesman soon, but I must tell you about the hell of a business on my leave the other day.”
I gave some account of the bombing of the Madrid and the Jeavons house.
“The Madrid, fancy that. I once took Peggy there in the early days of our marriage. The evening was a total frost. And then where I used to live in that top floor flat with Tuffy looking after me – where I learnt to be sober. Where Tuffy used to read Browning. Is it all in ashes?”
“Not in the least. The outside of the house looks just the same as usual.”
“Poor Lady Molly – she ought to have stayed doing that job at Dogdene.”
“Much too quiet for her.”
“Poor Ted, too. What on earth will he do with himself now? I used to enjoy occasionally sneaking off to the pub with Ted.”
“He’s going on as before. Camping out in the house and carrying on as an air-raid warden.”
“I chiefly remember your sister-in-law, Priscilla, as making rather good going with some musician for whom my mother once gave an extraordinary party. Weren’t you there, Nick? I associate that night with an odd little woman covered in frills like Little Bo-Peep. I made some sort of dive at her.”
“She was called Mrs. Maclintick. She’s now living with the musician for whom your mother gave the party – Hugh Moreland.”
“Moreland, that was the name. She’s living with him, is she? What lax morals people have these days. The war, I suppose. I do my best to set an example, but no one follows me in my monastic celibacy. That was a strange night. Tuffy arrived to drive