_ PART II. THE AWAKENING
CHAPTER XX. PEACE HATH HER VICTORIES
Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs,
And the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns.
--TENNYSON.
I had hoped to be the bearer of the Alliance news to Constance, and seeing how deeply she was moved by it made me the more regretful that I had not arrived at the flat before her morning paper. Constance had been the first to give me the news of the American offer of help at the beginning of the war; she had been the first to give me any serious understanding of the invasion, there in that very room of the little South Kensington flat, on the fateful Sunday of the Disarmament Demonstration. Now she raised her gleaming eyes to me as I entered:
"A thing like this makes up for all the ills one's ever known, Dick," she said, and dropped one hand on the paper in her lap.
"Yes, it's something like a piece of news, is it not? I had hoped to bring it you, but I might have known you would be at your paper betimes."
"Oh, it's magnificent, Dick, magnificent! I have no words to tell you how glad I am about this. I see John Crondall's hand here, don't you?"
"Yes," I said; and thought: "Naturally! You see John Crondall everywhere."
"He was dead against any sort of an Alliance while we were under a cloud. And he was right. The British people couldn't afford to enter any compact upon terms of less than perfect equality and independence. But now--why, Dick, it's a dream come true: the English-speaking peoples against the world. It's Imperial Federation founded on solid rock. No! With its roots in the beds of all the seven seas. And never a hint of condescension, but just an honourable pact between equals of one stock."
"Yes; and a couple of years ago----"
"A couple of years ago, there were Englishmen who spat at the British Flag."
"There was a paper called
The Mass."
Constance smiled up at me. "Do you remember the Disarmament Demonstration?" she said.
"Do you remember going down Fleet Street into a wretched den, to call on the person who was assistant editor of
The Mass?"
"The person! Come! I found him rather nice."
"Ah, Constance, how sweet you were to me!"
"Now, there," she said, with a little smile, "I think you might have changed your tense."
"But I was talking of two years ago, before---- Well, you see, I thought of you, then, as just an unattached angel from South Africa."
"And now you have learned that my angelic qualities never existed outside your imagination. Ah, Dick, your explanations make matters much worse."
"But, no; I didn't say you were the less an angel; only that I thought of you as unattached, then--you see."
Constance looked down at her paper, and a silence fell between us. The silence was intolerable to me. I was standing beside her chair, and I cannot explain just what I felt in looking down at her. I know that the very outline of her figure and the loose hair of her head seemed at once intimately familiar and inexpressibly sacred and beautiful to me. Looking down upon them caused a kind of mist to rise before my eyes. It was as though I feared to lose possession of my faculties. That must end, I felt, or an end would come to all reserve and loyalty to John Crondall. And yet--yet something in the curve of her cheek--she was looking down--held me, drew me out of myself, as it might be into a tranced state in which a man is moved to contempt of all risks.
"Dear, I loved you, even then," I said; "but then I thought you free."
"So I was." She did not look at me, and her voice was very low; but there was some quality in it which thrilled me through and through, as I stood at her side.
"But now, of course, I know---- But why have you never told me, Constance?"
"I am just as free now as then, Dick."
"Why, Constance! But, John Crondall?"
"He is my friend, just as he is yours."
"But I--but he----"
"Dick, I asked him if I might tell you, and he said, yes. John asked me to marry him, and when I said I couldn't, he asked me to wait till our work was done, and let him ask me again. Can't you see, Dick, how hard it was for me? And John is--he is such a splendid man. I could not deny him, and--that was when you came into the room--don't you remember--Dick?"
The mist was thickening about me; it seemed my mind swam in clouds. I only said: "Yes?"
"Oh, Dick, I am ashamed! You know how I respect him--how I like him. He did ask me again, before he went to America."
"And now--now, you----"
"It hurt dreadfully; but I had to say no, because----"
And there she stopped. She was not engaged to John Crondall. She had refused him--refused John Crondall! Yet I knew how high he stood in her eyes. Could it be that there was some one else--some one in Africa? The suggestion spelled panic. It seemed to me that I must know--that I could not bear to leave her without knowing.
"Forgive me, Constance," I said, "but is there some one else who--is there some one else?" To see into her dear face, I dropped on one knee beside her chair.
"I--I thought there was," she said very sweetly. And as she spoke she raised her head, and I saw her beautiful eyes, through tears. It was there I read my happiness. I am not sure that any words could have given it me, though I found it sweeter than anything else I had known in my life to have her tell me afterwards in words. It was an unforgettable morning.
Why did she love him? Curious fool! be still;
Is human love the growth of human will?
John Crondall was my best man, as he has been always my best friend. He insisted on my taking over the permanent secretaryship of
The Citizens when he went to the War Office. And since then I hope I have not ceased to take my part in making our history; but it is true that there is not much to tell that is not known equally well to everybody.
Assuredly peace hath her victories. Our national life has been a daily succession of victories since we fought for and won real peace and overcame the slavish notion that mere indolent quiescence could ever give security. Our daily victory as a race is the triumph of race loyalty over individual self-seeking; and I can conceive of no real danger for the British Empire unless the day came, which God forbid, when Englishmen forgot the gospel of our "New Century Puritanism"--the Canadian preachers' teaching of Duty and simple living. And that day can never come while our
Citizens' watchword endures:
"FOR GOD, OUR RACE, AND DUTY!"
For me, I feel that my share of happiness, since those sombre days of our national chastisement, since those stern, strenuous months of England's awakening to the new life and faith of the twentieth century, has been more, far more, than my deserts. But I think we all feel that in these days; I hope we do. If we should ever again forget, punishment would surely come. But it is part of my happiness to believe that, at long last, our now really united race, our whole family, four hundred and twenty millions strong, has truly learned the lesson which our great patriot poet tried to teach in the wild years before discipline came to us, in the mailed hand of our one-time enemy:
God of our fathers, known of old,
Lord of our far-flung battle-line,
Beneath Whose awful Hand we hold
Dominion over palm and pine--
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget! The tumult and the shouting dies;
The captains and the kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget--lest we forget! . . . . .
For heathen heart that puts her trust
In reeking tube and iron shard,
All valiant dust that builds on dust,
And guarding, calls not Thee to guard,
For frantic boast and foolish word--
Thy Mercy on Thy People, Lord! Amen! [THE END]
Alec John Dawson's Novel: Message
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