SIMON IN LOVE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21906, 15 September 1934, Page 13 (Supplement)

SIMON IN LOVE

By L. C. DOUTHWAITE

CHAPTER XVll.—(Continued)

"You remember Goldilocks—that cob of mine?" he inquired, and the boy, his freckled face vivid with interest, put down his cup with a chatter.

"Do I not, sir!" he exclaimed reproachfully, " seeing that you gave mo a couple of days on her during the Christmas hols."

The general gave one of his quick nods.

" As she seemed to have carried you so well, I'm givin' you more than an occasional ' day.' " " What's that, sir?" Nobby cried eagerly. " The foal she dropped yesterday morning—if your aunt —' mother ' don't you call her? —can find a stall for her when she's ready to leave her dam," the general said shortly. " Like to go an' look her oveir? You'll find Hobbs in the yard. If you talk to him nicely, p'raps he'll lend you a hand in breakin' her."

Simon discovered his heart going out to this fiery, staunch, little man. A sportsman, if ever there was one, to sacrifice a foal it was easy to tell was very near to his own heart. But while to the last ounce a horse lover, Nobby was nobody's fool. As he got up from his chair his manner was less eager than a moment ago. " Thank you very much, sir," he said quietly. Adding, from tho door: " Will it be all right if I'm back in a quarter of an hour?"

"Splendid!" said the general, and, after the latch had clicked behind the departing Nobby, through the window followed his progress across the terrace and round to the stable yard. " Good lad. that," he said, turning to Simon. " I don't know a better," Simon agreed quickly. " That fella Gordon been round to the Dower House lately?" asked General Bulsrode.

In spite of Bunty's injunction to " tell him as much as you see fit," Simon hesitated. Even with one so obviously her friend, the idea of discussing the lady of tne Dower House and of his heart was not one that made any very strong appeal to him. " Once or twice," he said.

"And it was at Gordon's instigation you were sacked?" the general demanded uncompromisingly. And whilu still Simon hesitated, went on: " You can speak quite freely; you have my word that anything you say is between you and me." And then, quite suddenly, Simon came to his decision. Not only had ho taken a liking to this keen-eyed old soldier with his precise dictiou and outlook, but it was on the cards that ho might prove an ally of considerable value.

" Not so much at his instigation, sir, as by his direct orders,' he said levelly; and saw the fighting light come into the elder man's eyes; watched the firm mouth harden.

"Got to that pitch, has it?" he said grimly. The bushy brows jerked upward. " Not —not —attracted to the fella, is she?" he demanded, half fearfully. Simon hastened to reassure him. " Very much to the reverse, I believe, sir," he said. " Good!" There wasi infinite relief in the word. " Not, of course, that there was much fear —with her. There aro women, of course, who are fascinated by those olive-skinned gigolo fellas—y'ought to see 'em in some of the Continental hotels —enough to make you sick! —but thank God she isn't one of 'em."

Having come to his decision concerning the general, Simon said, quietly: " Little use as she has for him, sir, I can't quite agree about there being nothing to fear. Not to beat about the bush, Gordon's all out to marry hor. And with the hold that, quite obviously, he's got over her . . He broke off, fearful that, already, he had gone too far. If he was any reader of his fellows, the general was one of the last to' discuss with a stranger the intimate affairs of a girl of whom he was as fond as, so obviously, he was fond of Una'. To his relief, however, the general's next words brought reassurance. For, as though rightly interpreting Simon's hesitation, he said:

"As a matter of fact, Forrestier, there's quite a number of us about hero who've been watchin' the trend of events at the Dower House, an' not liking the look of 'em. I've known Una ever since she left Yorkshire to join her sister —whose husband, Bill Bower, was my greatest friend. A mem-sahib to her finger-tips, that girl; the more I've seen of her and of the fight she's Eut up since Bill's death, the more I've >arnt to respect her. But lately, as I've told you, I've been worried about her relations with Gordon. A bad hat, that fella, if I'm any judge. That's why I welcome the opportunity of gaining first-hand information from one in a position to know. Particularly, if you'll allow me to say so, as I happen to know a gentleman when I see one. An out-of-date word, that m'lad, but the old meaning still, holds." To Simon this frankness put an entirely different complexion on the situation. Upon that foundation, then, and omitting only those things that were essentially intimate to himself, he went on to tell not only of events at the Dower House as they had occurred, but of the impression each one had mado on him. Additionally, he handed over for his host's inspection the report concerning the antecedents of Julius Gordon. With the conviction, however, that the general would not look favourably upon his friend's integrity even having been called into question, he made no mention of tho one that concerned Major Bower. To it all, apart from an occasional query, the general listened grimly and in silence, " Put it right out of your mind," ho said definitely when the tale was complete, " that Gordon knows anything to the detriment of Major Bower. 11l all niy experience I never knew a man of more honourable life." " Whatever it is, sir," Simon said. " I'd give my eye teeth to discover what Miss Venables is afraid of." "Is it to find out that," the general said, quietly direct, " that—-you're staying in the neighbourhood?" There was no evading this, and Simon made no attempt to do so. " Yes, sir. Definitely," he said, and for a little while there was a silence, in which, quite obviously, the older man was putting in some intensive thought. When, eventually, he looked up, his glance was more direct and penetrating even than before. " Care to tell me anything about yourself?" he demanded abruptly. " How you've lived and why you're here? I'm not asking out of curiosity, and of course you needn't answer if you don't want to." It was only for a moment Simon hesitated. Not only would it be a relief so to unburden himself, but, in dealing with one whoso life so obviously was as an open book, frankness was the first essential. " Though there's one episode, at least, I'm not particularly proud of, certainly I'll tell you," he said, and categorically and in detail proceeded to do so. When, at last, the tale was complete: " You can move into the cottage as soon as you like," the general said, and for tho moment that was his only comment. " It's partly furnished, _ and anything elso you need don't hesitate to ask for; I've more stuff packed away than I know what to do with,

(COPTRIGBT)

AN ENTHRALLING TALE OF MYSTERY AND ROMANCE

When you're settled, come over and dine one night, will ya ? See if together, we can't work out some plan to settle the hash of that fella Gordon. . . Now we'll go and join Nobby. . . ."

Apart from that he had gained a place of habitation, nothing, perhaps, especially constructive in the interview. Nevertheless when, half an hour or so later, Simon left the Chase, he had the feeling that no longer was he engaged in a single-handed fight; in any new doubt or difficulty there was one, at least, to whom he could turn.

The remainder of the day, assisted enthusiastically by Nobby, he spent in installing himself in the Cottage. Except for linen and cutlery—and these he sent for from one of the big London stores, in the meanwhile making do with supplies Nobby brought over from Bunty's ample store— there was everything to meet his needs. It was during this informal association he was given an insight into the hitherto unplumbed deeps of Nobby's mind and character that, for him, was a new and grateful experience. One also, that had such stimulus been necessary, w&uld have stiffened his resolution to. free Una from the ornate Julius Gordon. " Do you remember saying, last Sunday," Nobby said, following a long period of silence over their scratch lunch together, " that it was rather decent—to have that—that memorial to my father to live up to?" " 1 sure do, brother," Simon said quietly. " What I meant was, it sort of gives you a foundation to build on."

There was another short silence. Nobby seemed to be turning over that last phrase in his mind. " Foundation," he said at last, " is just what it is. I hadn't thought of it in that way. At any rate, not to know it, though I expect all the time it was somewhere at the back of my mind. . It gives a chap an awful long start if his father's been—been —what he can be proud of, don't you think? What I mean is, when it comes to his turn, he'd have to be a pretty poor sort of chap not to —to—play the game in the same way."

With an exact realisation of boyhood's inherent sensitiveness, Simon was aware, behind the assumed casualness of Nobby's tone, of a steadilyburning pride in inheritance. Realised too, and with humility, the tribute to himself in this sinking of reticence, so that he breathed thanksgiving that, with the backing of Tommy Royle's report and the tribute paid to the dead soldier by General Bulstrode, ho was able, without reservation, to respond. " I guess that's what the poets mean when they talk about ' handing on the torch,' " he said. " As you say, it's up to the one it's passed to, to keep the flame burning; if there's anything to him, it's his privilege as well as his responsibility." The colour mounting beneath his tan, he broke off. " If I'm not blame careful," he said, " I'll be in danger of going all poetic myself." "I think it's fine!" Nobby's voice was eager; in that momentary unveiling Simon bad revealed what brought forth an immediate and spontaneous response, f That torch idea, 1 mean; handed on by a father who's given his life to it, because, in his turn, it'd been passed down by his father. It —it kind of gets hold of you. With —all that—behind him, a chap just couldn't let down those who'd gone before him." Simon found himself wondering if this sense of tradition was universal among the nations; such a spirit, he thought, couldn't be the prerogative only of the Anglo-Saxon. A further and more heartening thought still was that, despite poverty and unrest, misrepresentation and discontent, while there remained any considerable proportion of the coming generation in whom that spirit burned, always this traditionsoaked Old Country would be the despair of the sedition monger and that baseborn intelligentsia whose pose it is to regard anything that approximates to love of country as, ipso facto, reactionary. For in those talks over the ale and cider mugs, that during his leisurely pilgrimage from Plymouth, he had exchanged with all sorts and conditions of men, so often he had been impressed by this self-same spirit—however inarticulate its expression. But before he could put anything of this into words, Nobby's voice broke in. Less vibrant, this time, however, and more sober. " That's why I'm always so frightfully 6orry for anyone whose father has —well, done something rotten," he said. "The father of one of the fellows in my House —he was a solicitor or something —was arrested for playing about with money that wasn't his own. And though the chap at school was rather a 4 wet,' I'd have given anything I had to've been able to help him. He was all broken up. . . . Nobby ceased speaking; with narrowed eyes stared into vacancy. "It must," be said, the words coming haltingly, " be simply rotten—to have the torch gone cold before it can be handed to you." He paused, and then blurted out passionately: " I don't think I could stick it!" And thankfulness came to Simon that this last calamity, at least, tho lad would not be required to face. CHAPTER XVIII. That same evening, in response to a note from Cocky, Simon cycled over to Bediscombe. There, in the oak-panelled parlour of the King's Arms, a mug of ale in front of him, ho saw, from tho gleam in his eye, that tho Cockney was seething with excitement. But as, equally, he knew that half Cocky's pleasure in disclosure would be discounted by premature revelation, he was careful not to give any hint of this perception. Thus, as soon as Simon, too, had been served with beer, he gave his honchman a more or less detailed account of what had transpired since their last meeting. Cocky, his eyes still alight, laughed shortly. " Hum, that, sir," he observed; " you gettin' the sack. Sort of one down t'other comes on, if you know what I mean.' " And what, precisely, do you mean?" Simon demanded, realising that disclosure was imminent. " As cold water to a thirsty soul," Cocky remarked, "so is good news from a far country—if you call four miles or so away far, that is. Anyway, I've taken on a new job." " Does that mean you're throwing up the one you have with me?" demanded Simon, who knew perfectly well that it did not. Cocky, exultation temporarily quenched, looked at him with reproach. " Well—would I?" ho exclaimed, hurt. "I ask you, sir; would IP No, sir! As 'eretofore, 1 shall in all my best obey you. The job I've took with Mm is, as you may say, in furtherance of the job I took with you, sir. Tliauks to the gods, this boy 'as done 'is duty." "The job you've taken with whoP" Simon demanded, too interested to be quite responsible for his grammar. "With tho Lord of the Manor of Charteris Regis," said Cocky. Momentarily forgetful of the extensive and peculiar faculty for applied machination that, as a soldier-servant, had been his most invaluable quality, Simon stared speechlessly into the selflaudatory face of the Cockney. " With Gordon!" he exclaimed incredulously. Enjoying himself prodigiously, Cocky nodded. (To be continued next week)