RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30944, 28 December 1965, Page 18

RANDOM REMINDER

LEG PULL

Duplicity in any sort of form is rarely to be condoned, particularly when it involves the twin terrors of Addington and ale. Yet here and there, among the host of New Zealand's fine young manhood, are those who will willingly, regularly and with considerable skill deceive their wives about their activities. One such of whom we know was supposed to be working back at the office when, in fact, he was at the races and indulging more than he should in the fortifying draughts available there; if they were in smaller measures and at higher prices than most of his contemporaries liked, the fact remains that be came home rather late in the evening feeling, as the saying goes, no pain. But he was well enough aware that he had broken his

bond: and the fact that he had, by one of the outrageous shafts of chance, made himself something like £4O on the horses did not diminish his relief at finding his wife asleep, nor persuade him that he should wake her to share the pleasure he felt in his good fortune. Instead, he got into bed as quietly as he was able, to deceive her on one count—after carefully hiding the money, to fool her on the other. Which was all very well, from his point of view. But the unhappy fact was that next morning, he could not remember where he had put the money. He made a surreptitious search—he obviously could not take his wife into his confidence at that stage, and at any rate he felt he needed the money himself without success. Subsequent

searches in the weeks which followed were equally fruitless, as were his efforts to sit and remember what he had done with the dough. It was many month* later: one morning his wife asked him if he would help her shift their bed. He heaved away, and there found a wad of notes, tightly compressed by a bed leg but obviously in good condition. She was at the far end, busying herself and announcing, without much conviction, that they needed a pair of new pillow slips. It gave her the surprise of her life when he, bending down, apparently to tie a shoelace, told her to go ahead and buy them. Should she happen to read this, she may very well look forward to a happy and prosperous New Year.