obsession with apes. People simply can’t stand him. He doesn’t appear to have a single, solitary friend.”
Felicity considered this revelation too without rancour, and murmured, “Perhaps that’s why he appeals to me. Mother instinct! And I wouldn’t be surprised if he turned out to be a very famous man some day.” She turned off the prophecy and discussion with, “I shall wear my pink tonight. Don’t worry, Mummy, I shan’t keep you waiting.” She got up, went over, took her mother’s face between her hands and kissed one cheek with extraordinary tenderness, and then went out.
Dinner that night at the Brigadier’s was identical with the evening the Brigadier and his wife had dined at the Mount with the Admiral, except for the difference in quarters, the Brigadier occupying a villa on the heights on the way to Europa Point. The same people were there, the same food was served, and Lady French was in the process of dissecting an identical slice of fish enveloped in gluey white sauce, when she heard her husband say, “What’s all this about one of your apes to be named after Princess Elizabeth, Brigadier? Read about it in the papers. One of your chaps supposed to have written to the King about it. Bit cheeky, what?”
“Eh?” said the Brigadier. “What’s that? You mean Captain Bailey? Not at all. Only carrying out my instructions. Thought it was about time we had a bit of favourable publicity and attention here on the Rock. Clever chap, that Bailey. Just the right touch. ‘Put it in your own words,’ I said to him. By Jove, the story’s gone out all over the world. Impressive.”
Lady French felt her head drawn up as though by a magnet. She did not wish at this moment to look at her daughter, but she was unable to control the turn of her head upon her neck. Felicity was again sitting next to Staff Captain Quennel, to whom she was still paying no attention. At that moment she was glowing like a hundred-watt incandescent bulb, and in addition managing to look like a cat who has swallowed a whole pet shop supply of canaries.
Lady French once more desisted from the fish course.
“Hmm—yes, I see,” said the Admiral, somewhat disappointed that his dig at the Brigadier had not turned out as well as expected. He had thought to set him off again. He then asked the question which was on all lips, and which was bound to come up during the evening: “Do you think there’s going to be a war, Brigadier?”
And in this he was also disappointed, for the Commander of the Artillery Brigade this time did not fuff and huff and pontificate, but suddenly looked a little grey, worried and tired as he replied with the earnestness of a man who has been thinking about little else, “Yes, I am afraid there will be. And very soon, too soon for us.”
7
Wherefore Art Thou Juliette
A nd then the war was no longer a matter of conjecture, but one of fact.
It was a strange one at the beginning, particularly for Gibraltar. It was far off. It was phoney. And outside of a few minor restrictions it appeared to have little effect upon the lives of those dwelling on the Rock. Horse-racing went on, the theatre, concerts and cinema and the Saturday-night dances at the Rock Hotel; the Garden Club continued to exhibit and make plans, as did the amateur theatrical group. After a preliminary black-out trial lights blazed; transatlantic liners came and went and ten thousand Spanish workmen continued daily to cross the line from La Linea and enter the fortress to go to their jobs in and about the dockyards and military installations, turning any idea of security into a vast joke.
This was the surface of Gibraltar. Beneath this surface there was an anxiety and a ceaseless coming and going of men in command growing haggard over the essential dangers of a position which rested upon a number of ifs. In London office lights were burning late at night considering these same potentialities, which included the possible entry of Mussolini
Felicity considered this revelation too without rancour, and murmured, “Perhaps that’s why he appeals to me. Mother instinct! And I wouldn’t be surprised if he turned out to be a very famous man some day.” She turned off the prophecy and discussion with, “I shall wear my pink tonight. Don’t worry, Mummy, I shan’t keep you waiting.” She got up, went over, took her mother’s face between her hands and kissed one cheek with extraordinary tenderness, and then went out.
Dinner that night at the Brigadier’s was identical with the evening the Brigadier and his wife had dined at the Mount with the Admiral, except for the difference in quarters, the Brigadier occupying a villa on the heights on the way to Europa Point. The same people were there, the same food was served, and Lady French was in the process of dissecting an identical slice of fish enveloped in gluey white sauce, when she heard her husband say, “What’s all this about one of your apes to be named after Princess Elizabeth, Brigadier? Read about it in the papers. One of your chaps supposed to have written to the King about it. Bit cheeky, what?”
“Eh?” said the Brigadier. “What’s that? You mean Captain Bailey? Not at all. Only carrying out my instructions. Thought it was about time we had a bit of favourable publicity and attention here on the Rock. Clever chap, that Bailey. Just the right touch. ‘Put it in your own words,’ I said to him. By Jove, the story’s gone out all over the world. Impressive.”
Lady French felt her head drawn up as though by a magnet. She did not wish at this moment to look at her daughter, but she was unable to control the turn of her head upon her neck. Felicity was again sitting next to Staff Captain Quennel, to whom she was still paying no attention. At that moment she was glowing like a hundred-watt incandescent bulb, and in addition managing to look like a cat who has swallowed a whole pet shop supply of canaries.
Lady French once more desisted from the fish course.
“Hmm—yes, I see,” said the Admiral, somewhat disappointed that his dig at the Brigadier had not turned out as well as expected. He had thought to set him off again. He then asked the question which was on all lips, and which was bound to come up during the evening: “Do you think there’s going to be a war, Brigadier?”
And in this he was also disappointed, for the Commander of the Artillery Brigade this time did not fuff and huff and pontificate, but suddenly looked a little grey, worried and tired as he replied with the earnestness of a man who has been thinking about little else, “Yes, I am afraid there will be. And very soon, too soon for us.”
7
Wherefore Art Thou Juliette
A nd then the war was no longer a matter of conjecture, but one of fact.
It was a strange one at the beginning, particularly for Gibraltar. It was far off. It was phoney. And outside of a few minor restrictions it appeared to have little effect upon the lives of those dwelling on the Rock. Horse-racing went on, the theatre, concerts and cinema and the Saturday-night dances at the Rock Hotel; the Garden Club continued to exhibit and make plans, as did the amateur theatrical group. After a preliminary black-out trial lights blazed; transatlantic liners came and went and ten thousand Spanish workmen continued daily to cross the line from La Linea and enter the fortress to go to their jobs in and about the dockyards and military installations, turning any idea of security into a vast joke.
This was the surface of Gibraltar. Beneath this surface there was an anxiety and a ceaseless coming and going of men in command growing haggard over the essential dangers of a position which rested upon a number of ifs. In London office lights were burning late at night considering these same potentialities, which included the possible entry of Mussolini
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