Helping Hand

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23145, 17 September 1938, Page 17 (Supplement)

Helping Hand

Humorous Short By Denis ☆ ' Illustrated by Minhinnick 1

EILEEN whs ill town that evening, the maid was at the pictures, and the dog was at the vet 's. I was lonely. I was also bored. 1 considered taking a stroll round the beauty spots of the neighbourhood, but, remembering that they all close at 6 p.m., I decided not to bother. I decided to dig in the garden. More truthfully, I decided to dig on the garden. A generation of Whipples lias not vet succeeded in making more than a dent in the crust. I took off my jacket, £ot a spado, and went outside. The first thing I saw was Our Tomato Can. I say it is bonder's, and he says it is mine. I throw it over his wall on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and lie throws it back again on Tuesdavs, Thursdays and Saturdays. Wearily I picked it up and tossed it over the wall. Thero was a shrill feminine scream. I looked over the wall, and there was a mdst delightful young woman with a brown suitcase. " I'm frightfully sorry! I blurted. •• I hope " ~ "It whizzed right past my eye! she said, indignantly. "You might have put it out."" >f " I had no idea ... I said, miserably. ~ „ nl , She unbent a little. She was adorably pretty. She sat on her suitcase ami said, "Are you Mr. Whipple of 1 How did you know? " I inquired. " I asked the grocer at the corner, she said, " and be said that Mr. Ponder's house was next door to Mr. Whipple's, the little fat man of No. "Indeed?" 1 said, icily, making a mental note to order my groceries elsewhere in future. " Oh. it was just his way of putting it," she laughed. "Personally, I like stocky, muscular men."

An intelligent girl. I wondered what 6he was doing in Ponder's garden. " Are you- I —er —is it —er I stammered. "I'm Mr. Ponder's niece," f>he explained. "1 can't get any reply from the front, so I came round to the back. I've tapped on the windows, but nothing's happened." " Was he expecting you? " I asked. "No," she said, just popped down for the week-end to surprise them." . . "If you would care to wait in my house," I suggested, " I would " " But that is too charming of you! she replied. "If it would not be any trouble, I "

I was bored."

" Not a bit, not a hit." 1 cried. The next moment she uttered a pleased little-' "0! " A roguish expression came over her pretty face. "Mr. Whipple, look! " she exclaimed. "There's a window ajar on the floor above the little shed. Give mo a bunk up!" "A what? I gulped. "Yes," she giggled, "you bunk me up. I'll get through that window and when they come home I'll bo able to jump out and surpriso them. What fun! "* I could not have looked very enthusiastic, because she pouted and said:— " "Without you I couldn't do it. Those shoulders of yours! Why, I'll bo up in a jiffy." I glanced nervously up and down the road, but nobody waa in sight. I capitulated. I bent down and she started to climb upon my back, carrying her suitcase. When 1 had got up and levered my nose out of a clump of weeds, I brushed myself down and said, " I was not quite braced enough. Now- try." Again I bent down. This time we succeeded. She ga/e mo a fearful smack on the left temple with the cape as she swung up, and then I heard a shout of triumph. "Straighten up!" she called. ' I ve got my arms over the sill." I straightened up. With an athletic heave she was up and over in a flash of silken leg and a froth of —of—anyway, she was over and inside. " All set? " I shouted. "Okol" she grinned, and blew me I returned slowly indoors and began a little poem, starting, " Amid the garden where the blooms." Eileen came home about an hour later. I did not mention the incident to her. After all, a man should not trouble his wife with every little trifle. I dressed rather carefully next morning. I thought it would be amusing to go over and see how the joke had gone

' off at Ponder's. Coming down to breakfast, I found Eileen gazing at our local paper with bulging eyes. / " Darling! she gasped. "What do you think ? The Ponders have been burgled! The paper says it is the work of ' First Floor Freda, the woman who has been terrorising the suburbs. She got through a first-floor window. There was no ladder and the police think she must have had an accomplice." " A what? " I gulped, weakly. "An accomplice," said Eileen. Th®y say here it must have been somebody who knows the neighbourhood and the habits of the residents. I wonder who it could have been? " "Who, indeed? " I muttered.