The Little Warrior

bruptly back into the days of our childhood. The logical side of her mind was quite aware that there was nothing remarkable in the fact that Wally Mason, who had been to

had acted well, that-however she might have strayed in those early days from the straight and narrow path-in that one particular crisis she had done the right thing. And now she had taken an instant liking for him. Easily as she made friends, she had seldom befo

ems to herald snow. Across the river, everything was dark and mysterious, except for an occasional lamp-post and the dim illumination of the wharves. It was a depressing prospect, and the thought crossed her mind that to the derelicts whose nightly rest

said Wal

lit

's w

or an instant as if suspended in the sky, then vanished as the trees closed in. A distant barge in the direction of Battersea wailed and was still. It had a mournful and foreboding sound. Jill shivered again. It annoyed her that she co

since I came to London I've had a habit of heading for the Embankment in times of mental stress, but perhaps the middle of winter is not quite the moment

ed magically. Her mercurial

she said

on like you that remark may se

r dear!

nervou

on with the night's events. Her mind went back to something he had said in the theatre. "Wally-" She s

my book of etiquette with me, but I fancy that about eleven gallons of cold

Freddie about putting u

ly play? I did. Every cent. It w

forget what I w

een writing musical comedies for the last few years, and after you've done that for a while your soul rises up within you and says, 'Come, come, my

e lost a great

t make servitors like that in America, worse luck. There is a Swedish lady who looks after my simple needs back there, but instinct tells me that, if I were to approach her on the subject of loosening up

early, and the theatres had not yet emptied themselves, so that the big room was as yet but half full. W

ad gone. "You don't know what it means to one in my condition to have to choose

ne through the perils of the night and with whom she was now about to feast was the sinister figure that had ca

rned the hose on you, I remember you had made yourself tho

nded Jill more than ever of a big, friendly dog. "I can feel it now,-all squashy in my pocket, inextricably mingled with a catapult, a couple of marbles, a box of matches, and som

ise that you are Wally Ma

the b

e. I never knew when you were going to bound out at me from behind a tree or som

to worship you. If I shrieked a little, it was mere

cceeded. I never

y si

d my love, but let concealm

s, you once put

ce. "Not that! I was boisterous, perh

bbery. There had been

nderstanding. I had done with the worm, a

the water-in the winter! Just before Christmas. It was a particularly mean thing to do, because I could

ifferent angle. Your uncle had a whangee with him, and the episode remains photographically lined on the tablets of my mind when a yesterday has fad

s lazy as ever. He's away a

lly. "Dynamic would express it better. But perhaps

k a day older t

gathered-hobnobbed, so to speak-he was behind me most of the time. Ah!" The waiter had returned with a loade

would like a chop or something

bly a little soup. My needs

ging about this man. She felt at home with him. He affected her in much the same way as

conversation-and apparently from his thoughts-that night's fiasco and all that it must have cost him. She wondered how much he had lost. Certainly something very substantial. Yet i

ntedly, and leaned

d and happy about the place than swooning on the floor with starvation. A wonderful thing, food! I am now ready to converse intellige

about y

y be

on? My thoughts, my tastes, my amusements, my career, or what? I can talk abo

Jill. "Oh then yo

to see that darned false ala

ou put it on

!' or 'The Girl from Yonkers'. It would have unsettled their minds to find me breaking out in poetic drama. They are men of coarse fibre and ribald mind and they would ha

you go to Amer

ound about that time and went to live in London." His tone lost its lightness momentarily. "My father died, you know, and that sort of broke things up. He didn't leave any too much money, either

fath

e by sight, and even if he had remembered me, I shouldn't have imagined that the memory would h

like father," s

s a pr

en't in the

od luck to turn it into a success, and after that it was pretty good going. Managers are just like sheep. They know nothing whatever about the show business themselves, and they come flocking after anybody who looks as if he could turn out the right stuff. They never think any one any good except the fellow who had the last hit. So, while you

ou mar

N

to my memory?" said

w

irl and then you'll put a worm down her back or pull her hair or whatever it is you do when you wan

king past her o

wo tables back of you who has been staring at you, with intervals fo

old

of the Difficult Eye. Count ten and turn carelessl

ens!" excl

quickly r

you know her? Somebody

erhill! And De

g his glass. He put i

k?" h

. The man I'm en

a moment

ully. "The man you're eng

again, and drank i