As the lines and luggage were being disembarked, he found tongue.
"Beg y'pardon~ sir," he said, "but would you--would you min' shakin' 'ands
with me, sir?"
"Of course not," said Bobby, and he shook accordingly. Dormer returned to
barracks and Bobby to mess.
"He wanted a little quiet and some fishing, I think," said Bobby. "My aunt,
but he's a filthy sort of animal! Have you ever seen him clean 'them, muchly-
fish with 'is thumbs'?"
"Anyhow," said Revere, three weeks later, "he's doing his best to keep his
things clean."
When the spring died, Bobby joined in the general scramble for Hill leave, and
to his surprise and delight secured three months.
"As good a boy as I want," said Revere, the admiring skipper.
"The best of the batch," said the Adjutant to the Colonel. "Keep back that
young skrim-shanker Porkiss, sir, and let Revere make him sit up."
So Bobby departed joyously to Simla Pahar with a tin box of gorgeous raiment.
'Son of Wick--old Wick of Chota-Buldana? Ask him to dinner, dear," said the
aged men.
"What a nice boy!" said the matrons and the maids.
"First-class place, Simla. Oh, ri-ippmg!" said Bobby Wick, and ordered new
white cord breeches on the strength of it.
"We're in a had way," wrote Revere to Bobby at the end of two months.
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