If you win a battle, 'It is nothing' If you lose one, 'It
is nothing'. If you are nearly killed in an air-raid, 'It is nothing'.
And if you were killed outright and could yet speak, you would say,
with your eternal sneer, 'It is nothing'. You other men, you make love
with the air of turning on a tap. As for your women, god knows--! But
I have a horror of Englishwomen. Prudes but wantons. Can I not guess?
Always hypocrites. Always holding themselves in. My god, that pinched
smile! And your women of the world especially. Have they a natural
gesture? Yet does not everyone know that they are rotten with vice and
perversity? And your actresses!... And they talk of us! Ah, well! For
me, I can say that I earn my living honestly, every son of it. For all
that I receive, I give. And they would throw me on to the pavement to
starve, me whose function in society--"
She collapsed in sobs, and with averted face held out her arms in
appeal. G.J., at once admiring and stricken with compassion, bent
and clasped her neck, and kissed her, and kept his mouth on hers.
Her tears dropped freely on his cheeks. Her sobs shook both of them.
Gradually the sobs decreased in violence and frequency. In an infant's
broken voice she murmured into his mouth:
"My wolf! Is it true--that thou didst carry me here in thy arms? I am
so proud.
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