Part 27 (1/2)
”That's it.”
”Have you been ill this winter?”
”Yes. I was rotten for a bit; Margaret has been awfully good to me.
When she heard of it she fished me out of my lodgings and made me come here. I was in bed a fortnight and must have been a beastly nuisance.
They are splendid, all of them.”
Martin agreed.
”And what about you?” she asked.
He explained his hopes and fears.
”You've no business to mope,” she told him. ”Don't you understand that you're an extremely lucky person? I wish I had your chances.”
”I suppose I'm lucky,” he said without conviction, trying to feel ashamed of his despair.
”Of course you are. Anyhow it's silly to get despondent. Besides, you're bound to do well.”
”Am I? Why?”
”Because I tell you to. Do get firsts and things.”
It pleased him to be ordered. He stopped in the muddy lane between two stark hedges that stood naked against the grey December sky.
”Do you care?” he asked.
”Of course I care.”
”Why? I mean----” he paused awkwardly.
”Don't ask silly questions,” she answered. ”It's too cold to stand about.”
They walked on.
”It must be pretty sickening for you,” he said, ”having to go on with this drudgery.”
”It is rather rotten. But it can't be helped.”
”Can't you get some intelligent kind of work, writing or something?”
”I'm not good enough. Don't make foolish interruptions. It's quite true. And remember I chucked up a teaching post.”
”But routine must be worse for a person like you.”
”It isn't nice. Really I think the most miserable people of all are those who are just too good for dull work and not good enough for real, original, creative work.”
”That's painfully true,” he answered. And there, gloomily, they left it.
That night Martin reflected on the events of the day. What surprised him most was the depth and intensity of his feelings about Freda. It wasn't love, it wasn't mere sympathy: was it just sentimentality? It is a habit of the younger generation in these days to turn their s.e.xual emotions into channels of political reasoning: the result is called feminism. Instead of defending hapless women with strong right arm they are eager to defend underpaid women by strike or Act of Parliament. There is little difference, for the reason that Nature cannot be cheated. The pitchfork of modernity will not keep it out, and chivalry, loathed in name, comes bravely back in disguise. In matters of personal relation feminism is dangerous just because it is insidious. Martin had already formed his picture of Freda, overworked and underpaid, homeless and driven from pillar to post. The image was painful, but it pleased him so to suffer.