RIGHT UP MY STREET

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23719, 27 July 1940, Page 9 (Supplement)

RIGHT UP MY STREET

By DENIS DUNN, Illustrated by MINHINNICK

MAJOR Alaric Shotgunne took me firmly by the arm and led me into the long gallery. >' \ "Bull moose," he said, proudly, pointing at a mounted head ; 1 and added: — "I shot it." "Why?" I asked. "Did it insult you V I like Shotgunne. He is a good friend and neighbour, but 1 can never break liim of his habit of boasting about the various fauna he has slaughtered during his travels round the world. If I see anything on four feet I want to pat it. Shotgunne wants to plug it. The only .'rift in our friendship. "That's a fine snub-faced wallapod!" he said, pointing again. "Where?" I grunted. "There/ man!" he said, irritably; "next to the crossed rifles." "Fierce-looking thing," !• agreed, examining it closely. "That," said Shotgunne, coldly, "is an oil-painting of my grandfather." But the crudest sarcasm does not shako hi in. He stopped before one-third of a rhinoceros hung over tho fireplace. "Finest/ sport 1 ever had," he said, enthusiastically. "He charged me." "How much?" T asked, interestedly. "I was on safari ..." he began. "Beastly stuff," 1 said, sympathetically. ')i remember when I was on sluvdded wheat. Man. . . "

"I was hunting," lie snarled, "when I noticed something keeping pace with me wherever 1 went in the darkness." "Well, you ought to have paid your hotel bill before you left," I said, sternly.

"It was that rhinoceros!" lie said, dramatically.. i; Coo!" I said. "Before I could collect myself . . . "

"Being scattered about," I nodded. "Before I could collect myself, the bushes parted and that chap was coming down like an express! I fired blind." 'j "I thought you didn't drink when hunting?" I asked.

"And gave him both barrels!" "Good heavens! How much beer had you with you?" I marvelled. But it was no use. As before, the tale of death went on far into the niglit. Such a pity, because I really do like Shotgunne. I merely loathe his shooting stories.

wi V ? n K '° A -' ent 1 to the Zo ° together, ill nil en J°yed it. I was marvelling at all you could see for a shilling, and he was mafficking at the thought of Slif being ° sho,4! ""- A said' 1 -^ GI P rtss " ,{ = 0110 paddock and »m 'if » ncos ' Johnson's Zebra myself. "What did Johnson do?" I asked, lou have no romance, Dunn," said .Shotgunne, piously, "but von are amusingly ignorant, it is t-Lc cachet of benst ? mto y ' VO ,I ' S " anie to a wild "Oh, is it!" I snarled. "Well, what about the Denis Dunn. Bumble Bee? J lie one that stung me in the so-and-so at the picnic? "Ptih!" said Shotgunne. .that's the way it was. Two good friends with but a single curse.

v Then the war broke out! Shotgunne made awful letlial noises and went about the War Office in all directions. They gave him something frightfully secret and subtle to do, and lie had to go to one of the smaller warring nations to do it. We,had a jovial farewell party, and with tears in his eyes Shotgunne told mo confidentially how he once missed a crocodile through haste and excitement. , ( v But I was sorry indeed to see him go. The suburb was empty without him. And then lie came home on leave and asked me to dinner. He-looked as fit as a fiddle and there was a new light in his eye. Most marvellous of all, he had lost his habit, of discussing his kills;! The evening went splendidly without a glance at the corpse-packed walls. 1 glowed. ."What a war!" Jio said, suddenly. "New tactics and evcrythiii'! Up my street, old man, up my street!" "Ugh?" I gulped."Parachute troops, old boy," he beamed. "Bippin' sport! Look here, the wind was blowing from the east'ard and I was badly placed . . . but damme, Dunn . . . L got a Rittmeister with my right and two staff-sergeants with ni3 r left! On the Thursday there was a covey of engineer: I . . ." I burst into tears.

Hitler, we read, is determined,, to silter the fneo of Europe. By lifting it, of course. Sitting for long periods almost invariably causes loss of figure, says a writer. We must tell our hens. In North London a tennis club for vegetarians only is being formed. The chop service, we take it, will he barred? "A dachshund's legs seem very inadequate," says a writer. We disagree. After all j they easily reach the ground. A sailor home on leave heard a burglar in his house and threw the intruder over his shoulder. This is called the half-Nelson touch. A Dorset couple who became engaged on Armistice Day, 1918, were married last week. Let's hope it's not merely a passing infatuation. A member of a Scottish golf club holed out in one three times in a week. This is stark tragedy, considering the present price of the stuff. DON'T SPOIL IT "Ellen, will you be my wife?" "No." "Good! Then please do not tell your sister 1 asked you first!" LIKE FATHER— Father (at "1 a.m. to restless son): "Now what do you want?" Infant: "Wanta drink." Father: "So do i. Go to sleep."