The New Men

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Authors: C. P. Snow
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low sunlight, and began to walk about the patch of derelict garden. The evening scents were growing stronger, mint and wormwood mingled in the scorched aromatic tang of the August night. Irene came to a clearing in the long grass, where a group of autumn crocuses shone out, amethyst and solitary, flowers that in my childhood I had heard called ‘naked ladies’. Irene bent and picked one, and then stood erect, as though she were no longer concealing the curve of her breast.
    ‘When I was a little girl,’ she said, ‘I always thought I should have a brood of children.’
    ‘Should you like them?’ I asked.
    ‘Time is going on,’ she said: but, in the smoothing amber light, she looked younger than I had seen her.
    After Martin returned, and we sat there in the dipping sun, the three of us were at peace together as we had not been before. Our content was so strong that Martin did not disturb it when he began speculating again about transferring to Luke, and speaking out that afternoon; he did not disturb it in us, least of all in himself.
    ‘I don’t see what else I could have done,’ he said.
    Martin went on with his thoughts. It was going to be a near thing whether Luke got his head: wasn’t that true? So if one could do anything to bring it about, one had to.
    ‘I should have been more sorry if I hadn’t spoken.’
    If the luck went wrong, it meant a dim job for the rest of the war and probably after. If the luck went right, no one could tell – Martin smiled, his eyes glinted, and he said: ‘I’m not sorry that I’ve gone in with Luke.’
    We all took it for granted that he was the most prudent of men, always reckoning out the future, not willing to allow himself a rash word, let alone a rash action. Even I assumed that as part of his flesh and bone. In a sense it was true. And yet none of us had made a wilder marriage, and now, over Barford and his career, he was gambling again.

 
     
9:  View of a True Marriage
     
    From Martin’s I went off to an evening party at Drawbell’s. Mrs Drawbell had set herself to catch old Bevill for a social engagement; he had refused tea or dinner, and insisted on returning to London that night, but he had not been able to elude this last invitation, a ‘little party’ before we caught the train.
    Most of the senior Barford staff were already there, and I found my way to a corner next to Walter Luke. From near the window we looked into the centre of the room, where upon the hearthrug Mrs Drawbell, a heavy woman, massive as a monument upon the rug, waited for the Minister.
    ‘Where is this uncle?’ said Luke.
    ‘He’ll come,’ I said. The Minister has not been known to break a social engagement.
    Luke’s thoughts became canalized once more.
    ‘Does he believe in Jojo?’ (Luke’s proposal already had a name.)
    He corrected himself.
    ‘I don’t care whether he believes in it or not. The point is, will he do anything useful about it?’
    I said that I thought he was well disposed, but would not find it easy to put through.
    ‘There are times,’ said Luke, ‘when I get sick and tired of you wise old men.’
    Wholehearted and surgent, he said: ‘Well, I suppose I’d better mobilize some of the chaps who really know against all you stuffed shirts.’
    I was warning him to go carefully (he would still listen to me, even when he was regarding me as a ‘wise old man’) when the Minister entered. With his unobtrusive trip Bevill went towards Mrs Drawbell.
    ‘I am sorry I haven’t been able to get out of the clutches of these fellows,’ he said, smiling innocently.
    ‘I am glad you were able to come to my party, Mr Bevill,’ she replied. Her voice was deep, her expression dense, gratified, and confident. She had looked forward to having him there; he had come. And now – she had nothing to say.
    The Minister said, what a nice room. She agreed. He said, how refreshing to have a drink after a hot, tiring day. She was glad he liked it. He said, it was hard

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