Atdtda36: As if desire were all it would take, 1021-1026 #3

[Paul Nightingale]

On 1022 we are given the year, 1914, and a reference to Tsarism; the reader
is encouraged to impose historical knowledge. Down the page there is
'something very peculiar indeed', followed by trenches and 'unexpected
shortages when making commissary purchases'. At the start of this section we
have been reminded that the Chums shouldn't 'interfere in the affairs of the
"groundhogs"' (1021); here, it seems, they are on the receiving end of
interference, all the while their ignorance allowing the narrative to
distance the reader from them. And then, 'some additional months later'
(1023), Miles 'abruptly recall[s]' his meeting with Ryder Thorn in Ch39.
That chapter opens with Darby recalling Candlebrow (548); Thorn is
introduced via Miles' description on 551, and they meet a page later. By 554
Thorn is 'about to blurt a secret' in revealing what he knows of the future
and war. In the current chapter, Thorn is given, in retrospect, a 'tragic
air of prophecy', and Miles insists he 'knew we'd come back here' (1023). On
554 Thorn calls Flanders 'the mass grave of History'; here, it appears to be
the location (1023) that provokes Miles' recollection, as though it is,
somehow the same place (ie 'gaz[ing], as if desire were all it would take').
Miles goes on to describe 'poor innocents' who are asked to stand in for the
Chums: '... they must have been boys so much like us ...' etc, then
'juvenile heroes ... unreflective and free' (1024), ie Miles himself back on
554. Miles now stands in for Thorn, the one who sees and author of what he
sees: the 'desire' to see on 1023 has become, a page later, his sighting of
the Bolshai'a Igra via the 'red smear' (1024). On 1019, Inconvenience has
'expand[ed] to considerable size'; on 1024, its Russian counterpart has
'grown by now to dozens of times its former size'. This passage begins on
1023 with Miles conjuring up Ryder Thorn and ends on 1024 with the
appearance of Padzhitnoff and an update of his ship's activities, 'no longer
dropping brickwork but sending food ...' etc (cf the Chums' Foundational
Memorandum on 1021), and even 'fugitives, declared enemies of whatever is in
power now' (1025).