If I May Part 10

I thought for a moment, and then said that I should probably decide not to take my wife to Madrid until things had settled down a bit.

"I'm supposing that you're Prime Minister," said the Colonel, a little annoyed. "What is England going to do?"

"Ah!... Well, one might do nothing. After all, what is one to do? One can't restore them to life."

The Colonel, the Major, even the Adjutant, expressed his contempt for such a cowardly policy. So I tried again.

"Well," I said, "I might decide to murder fifty Spanish women in London, just to even things up."

The Adjutant laughed. But the Colonel was taking it too seriously for that.

"Do you mean it?" he asked.

"Well, what would you do, sir?"

"Land an army in Spain," he said promptly, "and show them what it meant to treat English women like that."

"I see. They would resist of course?"

"No doubt."

"Yes. But equally without doubt we should win in the end?"

"Certainly."

"And so re-establish England's honour."

"Quite so."

"I see. Well, sir, I really think my way is the better. To avenge the fifty murdered English women, you are going to kill (say) 100,000 Spaniards who have had no connexion with the murders, and 50,000 Englishmen who are even less concerned. Indirectly also you will cause the death of hundreds of guiltless Spanish women and children, besides destroying the happiness of thousands of English wives and mothers.

Surely my way--of murdering only fifty innocents--is just as effective and much more humane."

"That's nonsense," said the Colonel shortly.

"And the other is war."

We were silent for a little, and then the Colonel poured himself out a whisky.

"All the same," he said, as he went back to his seat, "you haven't answered my question."

"What was that, sir?"

"What you would do in the case I mentioned. Seriously."

"Oh! Well, I stick to my first answer. I would do nothing--except, of course, ask for an explanation and an apology. If you can apologize for that sort of thing."

"And if they were refused?"

"Have no more official relations with Spain."

"That's all you would do?"

"Yes."

"And you think that that is consistent with the honour of a great nation like England?"

"Perfectly."

"Oh! Well, I don't."

An indignant silence followed.

"May I ask you a question now, sir?" I said at last.

"Well?"