“He was not a fellow of whom I thought very highly. But I suppose there was no harm in him.” – Operation Heartbreak, by Duff Cooper

After weeping over this sad, ironic little novel. I returned to the prologue, which is not just sad but cruel. One doesn’t understand it fully until the end of Duff Cooper’s sublime novel, Operation Heartbreak.

The short scene in the prologue is not dramatic, just a dull description of a long drive. A Military Attache is annoyed that he has to take a long trip to the coast to bury a soldier who was supposedly in his regiment. But Willie Maryington, the dead man, was not on the army lists, and to the Military Attache’s knowledge, he was not a major, but a captain in his army days. And so the Military Attache complains about Willie’s mediocrity and then jokingly plays with the Latin saying De mortuis nil nisi bonum… “Nothing except good [should be said] about the dead.” He changes it to De mortuis nil nisi bunkum… (“Nothing but bunk [should be said] about the dead].”)

And that is heartbreaking. Willie Maryington deserved a better eulogy.

Cooper’s understated, skillful style is barely noticeable, the perfect underpinning to the portrayal of Willie. The first sentence is: “Nobody ever had fewer relations than Willie Maryington.” And that is significant: he is adrift; he has no strong ties. After his father, a career soldier, died in 1914, Willie went to public school and was raised by the Osbornes, the family of one of his father’s fellow officers. And he dreamed about joining his father’s regiment as soon as he is old enough.

He is obsessed with his military training, but has one fear. Cooper writes, “What Willie feared was not defeat but that the war should end before he crossed the Channel.” This anxiety haunts him during his long army career, because the First World War ends before he can go overseas. He is anxious for combat, but where are the wars? Although he likes the army, and is stationed abroad for a while, there is no fighting and the work is all routine. He had expected to meet heroes, not ordinary men like himself.

But Willie has a sweet temperament. From boyhood to middle age, Willie is attractive, kind, and affable. Everyone likes him, and he especially is close to the Osbornes, the amusing Horry Osborne (short for Horace), who becomes an actor, and his younger sister Felicity, with whom Willie falls in love. Willie also loves the horses: he co-owns a small racing stable at one point. But is that enough for a warrior?

He would seem to be a natural paterfamilias, but doesn’t have much luck with women. He is jilted by his first fiancée, Daisy, who runs off with another man after a few days. Felicity says she loves him but she is rather like a woman in the novels of Michael Arlen or Aldous Huxley: she refuses to marry him, and honestly treats him very oddly: she seldom makes time to see him.

So Willie is a lonely man who has not achieved his goals. At 40, he has still not fought overseas, nor has he married Felicity. And because Felicity seldom agrees to see him, he has a brief affair with Daisy, the woman who jilted him. Felicity is annoyed, perhaps jealous, though Willie takes her at her word, which is that she is looking out for him.
Cooper explains Willie’s bewilderment and anger.

They parted coldly, as they had never parted before. At the last moment, Willie felt inclined to throw himself on his knees and implore her forgiveness. But he was too angry to do so, and he felt strongly that there was no reason why he should. He could not live forever on the scant charity that Felicity dispensed to him according to her unpredictable moods.

Felicity is a mystery, because we see her only through Willie’s eyes. We can’t imagine why she says she loves him when she can’t be bothered to go out with him. In fact, she sees other men. My only criticism of this otherwise perfect novel is that her character is less developed than any of the men’s. We understand the likable, witty Horry, but Felicity is an enigma. (So felicity – happiness – is an enigma?)

This slim, poignant novel is brilliant, charming, and a bit cynical. It is not only about the simplicity and frustration of Willie, but captures the irony of the concept of heroism. If only the Military Attache could have known his worth!