replied that nothing would induce me to take her out, that I'd promised
Jimmy she shouldn't go.

She said that didn't matter. Jimmy'd know I couldn't keep a silly promise
like that, and if I wouldn't take her she'd simply go by herself.

I tried to explain to her very gently that her going--at all--was out of
the question. She would do no good to anybody by going; she would annoy
Jimmy most frightfully; untrained women were not wanted at the front.

Untrained? She had got her certificate three days ago. What did I suppose
she had wanted it for--if it wasn't to go out with Jimmy if he went?

"You knew he was going, then?" I said.

"I knew he wanted to go. But I didn't think he'd go so soon. I didn't
really think he'd go at all. They told me I needn't worry, that he hadn't
a chance."

"Who told you?"

"Oh, everybody. The General and Colonel Braithwaite and Charlie, and
Bertie, and Reggie--at least he told Norah--and the people at the War
Office and the Admiralty and the Embassies."

"You _went_ to them? You went to the War Office?"

"I went everywhere where he did, or as near as I could get. And they all
told me the same thing--he hadn't a chance. Not the ghost of a chance. I
really thought he hadn't. When you think of the men--men who can do
things, who are dying to go and are being kept back--"

"You were helping him to go?" I said. I saw a vision, or I tried to see
it, a pathetic vision of Viola following poor Jimmy in his pursuit of
secretaries and ambassadors, doing insane, impossible things to help him.

And then I saw Viola herself. She was looking at me, with all her
features tilted in that funny way she had.

"Well--no," she said; "I wasn't exactly _helping_."

"What _were_ you doing, then?"

"I'm afraid I was trying to stop him."

The sheer folly of it took my breath away.

"Surely," I said, "if he hadn't the ghost of a chance, it wasn't
necessary?"

"Well--it _was_ necessary, you see. He's so awfully clever. He was very
nearly off once or twice. Only we just managed to get in in time."

"Who got in in time?"

"Oh, it wasn't only me, Furny, it was all of us. We were all out trying
to stop him--Charlie and Reggie and Uncle Billy--_he_ pulled all the
ropes--we couldn't do much."

"But what--what did General Thesiger do?"

"He didn't 'do' anything. He hadn't got to. He just said things. Told
them _about_ Jimmy."

I don't know whether my face expressed horror or admiration. It must have