Burned Bridges by Bertrand W. Sinclair (bearly read books txt) 📕

Of His Direction. If He Dropped It And Rushed Off To The War--Well There

Was No Lack Of Men,  Men Who Had No Particular Standing,  Men Who Could

Not Subscribe To War Charities,  To Dominion War-Bond Issues. There Was

Plenty Of Man-Power. There Was Never A Surplus Of Brain-Power. Business

Was Necessary. So A Man With A Live,  Thriving Business Was Fighting In

His Own Way--Doing His Bit To Keep The Wheels Turning--Standing Stoutly

Behind The Fellow With A Bayonet. And A Lot Of Them Let It Go At That. A

Lot Of Them Saw No Pressing Need To Don Khaki And Let Everything Else Go

To Pot. A Lot Of Them Were So Intent Upon Making The Most Of Their

Opportunities That They Never Brought Their Innermost Thoughts Out On

The Table And Asked Themselves Point-Blank: "Should I Go? Why Shouldn't

I?" And There Were Some Who Saw Dimly--As The Months Slid By With Air

Raids And Submarine Sinkings And All The New,  Terrible Devices Of Death

And Destruction Which Transgressed The Old Usages Of War--There Were

Some Who Were Troubled Without Knowing Why. There Were Men Who Hated

Bloodshed,  Who Hated Violence,  Who Wished To Live And Love And Go Their

Ways In Peace,  But Who Began Uneasily To Question Whether These Things

They Valued Were Of Such High Value After All.

And Wes Thompson Was One Of These. Deep In Him His Emotions Were

Stirring. The Old Tribal Instinct--Which Sent A Man Forth To Fight For

The Tribe No Matter The Cause--Was Functioning Under The Layer Of Stuff

That Civilization Imposes On Every Man. His Reason Gainsaid These

Stirrings,  Those Instinctive Urgings,  But There Was A Stirring And It

Troubled Him. He Did Not Desire To Die In A Trench,  Nor Vanish In

Fragments Before A Bursting Shell,  Nor Lie Face To The Stars In No Man's

Land With A Bayonet Hole In His Middle. He Would Not Risk These

Fatalities For Any Such Academic Idea As Saving The World For Democracy.

Always When That Queer,  Semi-Dormant Tribe Instinct Suggested That He Go

Fight With The Tribe Against The Tribal Enemy His Reason Swiftly Choked

The Impulse. He Would Not Fight For A Political Abstraction. He Had Read

History. It Is Littered With Broken Treaties. If He Fought It Would Be

Because He Felt There Was Need To Strike A Blow For Something Righteous.

And His Faith In The Righteousness Of The Allied Cause Was Still

Unfired. He Saw No Mission To Compel Justice,  To Exact Retribution,  Only

A Clash Of Great Powers,  In Which The Common Man Was Fed To The Roaring

Guns.

But He Was Not So Obtuse As To Fail Of Seeing The Near Future. The

Germans Were Proving A Right Hard Nut To Crack. It Might

Be--Remotely--That A Man Would Have No Choice In The Matter Of Fighting.

He Saw That Cloud On The Horizon. Sometimes He Wished That He Could

Muster Up A Genuine Enthusiasm For This Business Of War. He Saw Men Who

Had It And Wondered Privately How They Came By It.

If He Could Have Felt It An Imperative Duty Laid Upon Him,  That Would

Have Settled Certain Matters Out Of Hand. Chief Among These Would Have

Been The Problem Of Sophie Carr.

Sophie Eluded And Mystified Him. Not Wholly In A Physical

Sense--Although,  To Be Exact,  She Did Become Less Accessible In A Purely

Physical Sense. But It Went Deeper Than That. During The Eighteen Months

Following Thompson's Motor-Sales Debut He Never Succeeded In

Establishing Between Them The Same Sense Of Spiritual Communion That He

Had Briefly Glimpsed Those Few Minutes In Carr's Home On The Way He

Opened His Salesroom.

There Was Tommy,  For Instance. Tommy Was Far Closer To Sophie Carr Than

He,  Thompson,  Could Manage To Come,  No Matter How He Tried. He And Tommy

Were Friends. They Had Apartments In The Same House. They Saw Each Other

Constantly. The Matter Of Competition In Business Was Purely Nominal.

They Were Both Too Successful In Business To Be Envious Of Each Other In

That Respect. But Where Sophie Carr Was Concerned It Was A Conflict,  No

Less Existent Because Neither Man Ever Betrayed His Consciousness Of

Such A Conflict. Indeed Thompson Sometimes Wondered Uneasily If Ashe's

Serenity Came From An Understanding With Her. But He Doubted That. Tommy

Had Not Won--Yet. That Intangible Yet Impenetrable Wall Which Was Rising

About Sophie Was Built Of Other,  Sterner Stuff.

She Seldom Touched On The War,  Never More Than A Casual Sentence Or Two.

Perhaps A Phrase Would Flash Like A Sword,  And Then Her Lips Would

Close. Carr Would Discuss The War From Any Angle Whatsoever,  At Any

Time. It Became An Engrossing Topic With Him,  As If There Were Phases

That Puzzled Him,  Upon Which He Desired Light. He Ceased To Be

Positive. But His Daughter Shunned War Talk.

Yet The War Levied High Toll On Her Waking Hours,  And For That Reason

Thompson Seldom Saw Her Save In Company. His Vision Of Little Dinners,

Of Drives Together,  Of Impromptu Luncheons,  Of A Steady Siege In Which

The Sheer Warmth Of That Passion In Him Should Force Capitulation To His

Love--All Those Pleasant Dreams Went A-Glimmering. Sophie Was Always On

Some Committee,  Directing Some Activity Growing Out Of The War,  Red

Cross Work,  Patriotic Fund,  All Those Manifold Avenues Through Which The

Women Fought Their Share Of Canada's Fight. For A Pleasure-Loving

Creature Sophie Carr Seemed To Have Undergone An Astonishing

Metamorphosis. She Spent On These Things,  Quietly,  Without Parade Or

Press-Agenting,  All The Energy In Her,  And She Had No Reserve Left For

Play. War Work Seemed To Mean Something To Sophie Besides Write-Ups In

The Society Column And Pictures Of Her In Sundry Poses. These Things

Besides,  Surrounded Her With All Sorts Of Fussy People,  Both Male And

Female,  And Through This Cordon Thompson Seldom Broke For Confidential

Talk With Her. When He Did Sophie Baffled Him With Her Calm Detachment,

A Profound And Ever-Increasing Reserve--As If She Had Ceased To Be A

Woman And Become A Mere,  Coldly Beautiful Mechanism For Seeing About

Shipments Of Bandage Stuff,  For Collecting Funds,  And Devising Practical

Methods Of Raising More Funds And Creating More Supplies.

Thompson Said As Much To Her One Day. She Looked At Him Unmoved,

Unsmiling. And Something That Lurked In Her Clear Gray Eyes Made Him

Uncomfortable,  Sent Him Away Wondering. It Was As If Somehow She

Disapproved. A Shadowy Impression At Best. He Wondered If Tommy Fared

Any Better,  And He Was Constrained To Think Tommy Did Because Tommy Went

In For Patriotic Work A Good Deal,  Activities That Threw Him In Pretty

Close Contact With Sophie.

"I Can Spare The Time," He Confided To Thompson One Day. "And It's Good

Business. I Meet Some Pretty Influential People. Why Don't You Spread

Yourself A Little More,  Wes? They'll Be Saying You're A Slacker If You

Don't Make A Noise."

"I Don't Fight The Germans With My Mouth," Thompson Responded Shortly.

And Tommy Laughed.

"That's A Popular Weapon These Days," He Returned Lightly. "It Does No

Harm To Go Armed With It."

Thompson Refrained From Further Speech. That Very Morning In The Lobby

Of The Granada Thompson Had Heard One Man Sneer At Another For A

Slacker--And Get Knocked Down For His Pains. He Did Not Want To Inflict

That Indignity On Tommy,  And He Felt That He Would If Tommy Made Any

More Cynical Reflections.

Of Course,  That Was A Mere Flaring-Up Of Resentment At The Fact That,  To

Save His Soul,  He Could Not Get Off The Fence. He Could Not View The War

As A Matter Vital To Himself; Nor Could He Do Like Tommy Ashe,  Play

Patriotic Tunes With One Hand While The Other Reached Slyly Forth To

Grasp Power And Privilege Of Whatever Degree Came Within Reach.

And In The Meantime Both Men,  And Other Men Likewise,  Went About Their

Daily Affairs. Vancouver Grew And Prospered,  And The Growth Of Summit

Sales Left An Increasing Balance On The Profit Side Of Thompson's

Ledger. Moreover The Rapid And Steady Growth Of His Business Kept His

Mind On The Business. It Worked Out--His Business Preoccupation--Much In

The Manner Of The Old Story Of Fleas And Dogs,  To Wit: A Certain Number

Of Fleas Is Good For A Dog. They Keep Him From Brooding Over The Fact

That He _Is_ A Dog.

So,  Save For The Fact That He Continued To Make Money And Was Busy And

Realized Now And Then That He Had Come To A Disheartening Impasse With

Sophie,  The Late Spring Of 1916 Found Thompson Mentally,  Morally And

Spiritually Holding Fast By Certain Props.

He Had Come A Long Way,  And He Had Yet A Long Way To Go. He Had Come To

Lone Moose Very Much After The Fashion Of St. Simeon Stylites All

Prepared To Mount A Spiritual Pillar And Make A Bid For Sainthood. But

Pillar Hermits,  He Discovered,  When Harsh,  Material Facts Tore The

Evangelistic Blinkers Off His Eyes,  Were Neither Useful In The World Nor

Acceptable On High. He Had Been In A Very Bad Way For Awhile. When A Man

Loses His Own Self-Respect And The Faith Of His Fathers At One Stroke He

Is Apt To Suffer Intensely. Thompson Had Not Quite Reached That Pass,

When He Came Down To Wrangel By The Sea,  But He Was Not Far Off. When He

Looked Back,  He Could Scarcely Trace By What Successive Steps He Had

Traveled. But He Had Got Up Out Of That Puddle Into Which A Harsh

Environment And Wounded Egotism Had Cast Him. He Was In A Way To Be What

The World Called A Success.

He Was Not So Sure Of That Himself. But He Stayed Himself With Certain

Props,  As Before Mentioned. The Base Of More Than One Of These Useful

Supports Had Been Undermined Some Time Before By A Sequence Of Events

Which Presented The Paradox Of Being Familiar To Him And Still Beyond

His Comprehension.

He Was A Long Way From Being Aware,  In Those Early Summer Days Of 1916,

That Before Long Some Of The Aforementioned Props Were To Buckle Under

Him With Strange And Disturbing Circumstance.