Nuns and Soldiers Read Online Free

out. His scored forehead was a dome from which all else fell away. The big head had shrunk and sharpened, accentuating his Jewish features. A glittering-eyed rabbinical ancestor glared out through his face. Guy was half Jewish, his forebears Christianized Jews, wealthy men, Englishmen. The Count contemplated Guy’s Jewish mask. The Count’s father had been ferociously anti-Semitic. For this, and for much else, the Count (who was Polish) did constant penance.
    Trying at last to assert ordinariness the Count said, ‘Are you all right for books? Can I bring you anything?’
    ‘No, The Odyssey will see me out. I always thought of myself as Odysseus. Only now-I won’t get back-I hope I’ll have time to finish it. Though it’s so awfully cruel at the end ... Are they coming this evening - ?’
    ‘You mean - ?’
    ‘Les cousins et les tantes.’
    ‘Yes, I imagine so.’
    ‘They flee from me that some time did me seek.’
    ‘On the contrary,’ said the Count, ‘if there is anyone whom you would like to see, I can guarantee that that person would like to see you.’ He had picked up from Guy a certain almost awkward precision of speech.
    ‘No one understands Pindar. No one knows where Mozart’s grave is. What does it prove that Wittgenstein never thought we’d reach the moon? If Hannibal had marched on Rome after the battle of Cannae he would have taken it. Ah well. Poscimur. It sounds different tonight.’
    ‘What does?’
    ‘The world.’
    ‘It’s snowing.’
    ‘I’d like to see -’
    ‘The snow?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘Manfred?’
    ‘No.’
    ‘It’s nearly time for the nurse.’
    ‘You’re bored, Peter.’
    This was the only real remark which Guy had addressed to him tonight, one of the last precious signs, in the midst of that appalling privileged monologue, of a continuing connection between them. It was almost too much for the Count, he nearly exclaimed with pity and distress. But he answered as Guy required him to do, as Guy had taught him to do. ‘No. It isn’t boredom. I just can’t pick up your ideas, perhaps I don’t want to. And not to allow you to lead the conversation - would be fearfully impolite.’
    Guy acknowledged this with the quick grimace which was now his smile. He lay quiet at last, propped up. Their eyes met, then shied away from the spark of pain.
    ‘Ah well - ah well - she shouldn’t have sold the ring -’
    ‘Who - ?’
    ‘En fin de compte - ça revient au même -’
    ‘De s’enivrer solitairement ou de conduire les peuples.’ The Count completed the quotation, one of Guy’s favourites.
    ‘Everything’s gone wrong since Aristotle, we can see why now. Liberty died with Cicero. Where’s Gerald?’
    ‘In Australia with the big telescope. Would you - ?’
    ‘I used to believe my thoughts would wander in infinite spaces, but that was a dream. Gerald talks about the cosmos, but that’s impossible, you can’t talk about everything. That one knows anything at all ... is not guaranteed ... by the game ...’
    ‘What - ?’
    ‘Our worlds wax and wane with a difference. We belong to different tribes.’
    ‘We have always done so,’ said the Count.
    ‘No - only now - Oh - how ill’s all here. How much I wish I could -’
    ‘Could - ?’
    ‘See it -’
    ‘See?’
    ‘See it ... the whole ... of logical space ... the upper side ... of the cube ...’
     
     
    Through the door which Guy’s wife Gertrude had quietly opened, the Count could see the Night Nurse sitting in the hall. She rose now and came promptly forward, smiling, a sturdy brunette with almost dusky red cheeks. She had changed her boots for slippers but still smelt of the open air and the cold. She gave out an unfocused friendliness, her fine dark eyes rather vaguely danced and twinkled, she was thinking of other things, satisfactions, plans. She tossed and patted her wavy dark hair, and had a little air of capable self-satisfaction which would have been pleasing, even reassuring, in a situation which