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"1914"

JOHN OXENHAM'S NOVELS

VERSE

"1914"

BY JOHN OXENHAM

SECOND EDITION

METHUEN & CO. LTD. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON

"1914"

The early morning of July 25th, 1914, was not at all such as the date might reasonably have led one to expect. It was gray and overcast, with heavy dew lying white on the grass and a quite unseasonable rawness in the air.

The clock on the mantelpiece of the morning-room in The Red House, Willstead, was striking six, in the sonorous Westminster chimes, which were so startlingly inconsistent with its size, as Mr John Dare drew the bolts of the French window and stepped out on to his back lawn.

He had shot the bolts heavily and thoughtfully the night before, long after all the rest had gone up to bed, though he noticed, when he went up himself, that Noel's light still gleamed under his door. His peremptory tap and 'Get to bed, boy!' had produced an instant eclipse, and he determined to speak to him about it in the morning.

He had never believed in reading in bed himself. Bed was a place in which to sleep and recuperate. If it had been a case of midnight oil and the absorption of study now--all well and good. But Noel's attitude towards life in general and towards study in particular permitted no such illusion.

And it was still heavily and thoughtfully that Mr Dare drew back the bolts and stepped out into the gray morning. Not that he knew definitely that this twenty-fifth of July was a day big with the fate of empires and nations, and of the world at large,--simply that he had not slept well; and bed, when you cannot sleep, is the least restful place in the world.

As a rule he slept very soundly and woke refreshed, but for many nights now his burdened brain had neglected its chances, and had chased, and been chased by, shadowy phantoms,--possibilities, doubts, even fears,--which sober daylight scoffed at, but which, nevertheless, seemed to lurk in his pillow and swarm out for his undoing the moment he laid his tired head upon it.

Out here in the fresh of the morning,--which ought by rights to have been full of sunshine and beauty, the cream of a summer day,--he could, as a rule, shake off the shadows and get a fresh grip on realities and himself.

But the very weather was depressing. The year seemed already on the wane. There were fallen leaves on the lawn. The summer flowers were despondent. There was a touch of red in the Virginia creeper which covered the house. The roses wore a downcast look. The hollyhocks and sweet-peas showed signs of decrepitude. It seemed already Autumn, and the chill damp air made one think of coming Winter.

And the unseasonal atmospheric conditions were remarkably akin to his personal feelings.

For days he had had a sense of impending trouble in business matters, all the more irritating because so ill-defined and impalpable. Troubles that one could tackle in the open one faced as a matter of course, and got the better of as a matter of business. But this 'something coming and no knowing what' was very upsetting, and his brows knitted perplexedly as he paced to and fro, from the arch that led to the kitchen-garden to the arch that led to the front path, up which in due course Smith's boy would come whistling with the world's news and possibly something that might cast a light on his shadows.

Mr Dare's business was that of an import and export merchant, chiefly with the Continent, and his offices were in St Mary Axe. He had old connections all over Europe and was affiliated with the Paris firm of Leroux and Cie, Charles Leroux having married his sister.

As a rule his affairs ran full and smooth, with no more than the to-be-expected little surface ruffles. But for some weeks past he had been acutely conscious of a disturbance in the commercial barometer, and so far he had failed to make out what it portended.

Politically, both at home and abroad, matters seemed much as usual, always full of menacing possibilities, to which, however, since nothing came of them, one had grown somewhat calloused.

The Irish brew indeed looked as if it might possibly boil over. That gun-running business was not at all to his mind. But he was inclined to think there was a good deal of bluff about it all. And the suffragettes were ramping about and making fools of themselves in their customary senseless fashion, and doing all the damage they possibly could to their own cause and to the nation at large.

The only trouble of late on the Continent had been the murder of the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife about a month before. And that seemed to be working itself off in acrimonious snappings and yappings by the Austrian and Servian papers. Austria would in due course undoubtedly claim such guarantees of future good behaviour on the part of her troublesome little neighbour as the circumstances, when fully investigated, should call for. The tone of the note she had sent, calling on Servia no longer to permit the brewing of trouble within her borders, was somewhat brusque no doubt but not unnaturally so. And Servia, weary with her late struggles, would, of course, comply and there the matter would end.

Then again the Money Market here showed no more disturbance than was to be expected under such unsettled conditions, and the Bank-rate remained at three per cent. The Berlin and Vienna Bourses were somewhat unsettled. But there were always adventurous spirits abroad ready to take advantage of any little disturbance and reap nefarious harvests.

Anyway he could see no adequate connection between any of these things and the sudden stoppage of his deliveries of beet-sugar from Germany and Austria, and the unusual lapsus in correspondence and remittances from both those countries,--which matters were causing him endless worry and anxiety.

His brother-in-law, Leroux, in Paris, had hinted at no gathering clouds, as he certainly would have done had any been perceptible. And the sensitive pulse of international affairs on the Bourse there would have perceived them instantly if they had existed. The very fact that M. Poincar?, the President, was away in Russia was proof positive that the sky was clear.

The only actual hint of anything at all out of the common was in that last letter from his eldest girl, Lois, who had been studying at the Conservatorium in Leipsic for the last two years.

She had written, about a week before,--"What is brewing? There is a spirit of suppressed excitement abroad here, but I cannot learn what it means. They tell me it is the usual preparation for the Autumn manoeuvres. It may be so, but all the time I have been here I have never seen anything quite like it. If they were preparing for war I could understand it, but that is of course out of the question, since the Kaiser's heart is set on peace, as everyone knows."

There was not much in that in itself, though Lois was an unusually level-headed girl and not likely to lay stress on imaginary things. But that, and the evasiveness, when it was not silence, of his German correspondents, and the non-arrival of his contracted-for supplies of beet-sugar, had set his mind running on possibilities from which it recoiled but could not shake itself entirely free.

Presently, as he paced the well-defined track he had by this time made across the dewy lawn, he heard the rattle of the kitchen grate as heavy-handed Sarah lit the fire, and the gush of homely smoke from the chimney had in it a suggestion of breakfast that put some of his shadows to flight. Sarah and breakfast were substantial every-day facts before which the blue devils born of broken sleep temporarily withdrew.

Then from behind Honor's wide-open window and drawn curtains he heard her cheerful humming as she dressed. And then her curtains were switched aside with a strenuous rattle, and at sight of him she stuck out her head with a saucy,

Smith's boy's exuberant whistle sounded in the front garden, and Honor chimed in, "Good-bye, Piccadilly!"--as her father hastened to the gate to get his paper.

Smith's boy was just preparing to fold and hurl it at the porch--a thing he had been strictly forbidden to do, since on wet and windy days it resulted in an unreadable rag retrieved from various corners of the garden instead of a reputable news-sheet. At the unexpected appearance of Mr Dare in the archway, his merry pipe broke off short at the farewell to Leicester Square, and Honor's clear voice round the corner carried them triumphantly to the conclusion that it was "a long long way to Tipperary," without obbligato accompaniment. The boy grinned, and producing a less-folded paper from his sheaf, retired in good order through the further gate, and piped himself bravely up the Oakdene path next door, while Mr Dare shook the paper inside out and stood searching for anything that might in any way bear upon his puzzle.

His anxious eye leaped at once to the summary of foreign news, and his lips tightened.

"The Austrian Minister has been instructed to leave Belgrade unless the Servian Government complies with the Austrian demand by 6 p.m. this evening."

An ultimatum!... Bad!... Dangerous things, ultimatums!

"It is stated that Russia has decided to intervene on behalf of Servia."

Then the front door opened and his wife came out into the porch.

"Breakfast's ready, father," she said briskly. "Any news?"

She was a very comely woman of fifty or so, without a gray hair yet and of an unusually pleasing and cheerful countenance. The girls got their good looks from her, the boys took more after their father.

"Any light on matters?" asked Mrs Dare hopefully again, as he came slowly along the path towards her. And then, at sight of his face, "Whatever is it, John?"

He had made it a rule to leave ordinary business worries behind him in town where they properly belonged. But matters of moment he frequently discussed with his wife and had found her aloof point of view and clear common-sense of great assistance at times. His late disturbance of mind had been very patent to her, but, beyond the simple facts, he had been able to satisfy her no more than himself.

"Very grave news, I'm afraid," he said soberly. "Austria and Servia look like coming to blows."

"Oh?" said Mrs Dare, in a tone which implied no more than interested surprise. "I should have thought Servia had had enough fighting to last her for some time to come."

"John!"--very much on the alert now.--"It is not possible."

"I'm afraid it's even probable, my dear. And if it comes it will mean disaster to a great many people."

"What about Lois? Will she be safe out there?"

"We must consider that. I've hardly got round to her yet. Let us make sure of one more comfortable breakfast anyway," he said, with an attempt at lightness which he was far from feeling, and as they went together to the breakfast-room, Honor came dancing down the stairs.

"Hello, Dad! Did they give extra prizes for early rising at your school?" she asked merrily, and ran on without waiting for an answer,--"And did you choke that boy who was whistling 'Tipperary'? I had to finish without accompaniment and he was doing it fine. He has a musical soul. It was Jimmy Snaggs. He's in my class at Sunday School. You should hear him sing."

"You tell him again from me that if he can't deliver papers properly he'd better find some other walk in life," said Mr Dare, as he chipped an egg and proceeded with his breakfast.

"Honor!" said her mother reprovingly.

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