Act Iii. Late Afternoon

SCENE. As before. CECIL is discovered reading a letter from home.

CECIL (to himself). Tom dead. Good Lord! What times we have had together! Where are all the good fellows I used to know? Half of them dead, and the rest condemned to die! No more yachting on the broads! No more convivial evenings at the Troc.! No more long nights spinning yarns in Tom's old rooms in the Temple! Curse this blasted war that robs one of everything worth having, that dulls every sense of decency and kills all feeling for beauty, destroys the joy of life, and mutilates one's dearest friends. Curse it!

(A sound as of an express train is heard, followed by the roar of an explosion, while a dense cloud of smoke and dust rises immediately in view of the trench.)

PORTENTOUS VOICE. Prepare to face eternity!

CECIL (clenching his fists). Beast, loathsome beast! Don't think I am afraid of you.

(The sounds are repeated as a second shell drops, rather nearer. A Shadow appears round the dug-out, and hesitates.)

CECIL (to the Shadow). Who is that? Is that the Shadow of Fear?

A THIN, QUAVERING VOICE. Yes, shall I come in?

CECIL (furiously). Out of my sight, vile, cringing wretch! Not even your shadow will I tolerate in my presence!

(A third shell bursts nearer still.)

PORTENTOUS VOICE (thunderously). Set not your affections on things below.

(CECIL pauses in a listening attitude).

CECIL (more quietly, and with a new look in his eyes). I think I have forgotten something,--something rather important.

(Enter the twin Spirits of HONOUR and DUTY, Spirits of a very noble and courtly mien.)

CECIL (simply and humbly). Gentlemen, to my sorrow and loss I had forgotten you. You are doubly welcome.

THE SPIRIT OF DUTY. Young sir, we thank you. After all, it is but right that in this hour of danger and dismay we should be with you.

THE SPIRIT OF HONOUR. I am so old a friend of you and yours, Cecil, that you may surely trust me. I was your father's friend. Side by side we stood in every crisis of his varied life. Together faced the Dervish rush at Abu Klea, and afterwards in India took our part in many a desperate unnamed frontier tussle. I helped him woo your mother, spoke for him when he put up for Parliament, advised him when he visited the city. In fact, I was his companion all through life, and I stood beside his bed at death.

THE SPIRIT OF DUTY. I too may claim to have been as much your father's friend as was my brother. Indeed, where one is, the other is never far away. We do agree most wonderfully, and since our birth, no quarrel has ever disturbed the harmony of our ways.

CECIL. Gentlemen, you have recalled me to myself. I had forgotten that I was no more a child. I wanted to dance in the sun with the flowers, and sing with the birds, to swim in the pool with yonder newt, and lie down to dry in the long meadow grass among the poppies. Because I might not do this and other things as fond and foolish, I was petulant and peevish, like a spoilt child. I look to you, gentlemen, to help me to be a man, and play a man's part in the world.

HONOUR. We will remain at hand, call us when you need us, we shall not fail you.

(The bombardment increases in intensity. Shrapnel bursts overhead. Shells with increasing rapidity and accuracy explode both short and over the trench. The hail of bullets is continuous. An N.C.O. rushes by shouting "Stand to"; men rush from the dug-outs and seize their rifles; CECIL, like the others, grasps his rifle and sees that it is fully loaded.)

(Curtain.)