Evening star., 1941-06-29
Il Short Story Co mplete in This Issue
n kAJoR MACNALrY said, What! Again."
W Il thought I'd better mention it"

Sdiu Tic StIllOI SuDdlteIH. Ou asked
some of us to keep an eye on him. Johnnie is
so terribly trustful, sir - and she's very
pretty, sir. Blonde. Very blonde"
"Oh, dear" said Major MacNalty You
think Johnnie is serious?"
We'll, they are around good bit. Her
name is Venetia, Venetia Brown - she says
But she has the most foreign accent, sir. She
claims to come from Yorkshire
The major sighed Anyone would have
thought that after Johnnie's last escapade
he would have learned lesson -"
After the senior subaltern had gone, Major
MacNalty stood for some moments looking
out over the barrack square. A feeling of
having collected raw deal came over him.
For Johnnie really had nothing on earth to
do with him. And yet, he had. A vision of
Johnnie's mother rose in the Majors mind.
Johnnies mother, tear drenched, with quiv-
ering lips. Take care of him for me" she
had said. HE is all have"
Hastily Major MacNalty, who never could
bear to see woman cry. had sworn that he
would. He had labored ever since in the tolls
of that rash vow. Looking after Johnnie had
developed into a full-time job.
Not that Johnnie was vicious. He was mere
ly guileless. Designing women with black
mail in view were forever getting hold of him.
Take the little barmaid at the Cow and Gate.
In the end it turned out that it wasn't
Johnnie's baby at all, but at one time it
was touch and go whether they could prove it.
You would have thought, after all that,
and the way the whole thing had smelled in
the nostrils of the colonel, that Johnnie would
have learned his lesson. But here he was, a
soldier, going around with a very blonde
blonde with foreign accent.
Major MacNalty tapped his own even
white teeth with pencil. and tried to think.
He was thin. saturnine man in the forties,
but looked younger. When the war ended he
intended 10 retire - to buy a country cot
tage. and keep dog, and perhaps bees
A man must have something to love-
AN THE matter of loving women, he had
been disillusioned early. Long ago, as gan
CLING subaltern he had proposed to Johnnie's
mother. First she said she would, and they
had a delirious summer during which he
spent great deal more money than subal-
tern should After that, she Tilted him on pink
note paper with deckle edges. Major Mac
Nalty hated pink to this day.
Isobel was widow now. He had been as
tonshed to find, when he came home several
years later from India, that she expected
him to love her still. She wept on his shoulder
whenever she felt like it, and she pressed
Johnnie on him - literally pressed him on.
She behaved for all the world as though
Johnnie were Major MacNalty's son, which
he wasn't. 1t annoyed him quite bit.
The question now was how to pry Johnnie
apart from the blonde without arousing in
him one of those unreasoning storms of chiv-
airy that have driven so many men into the
arms of the wrong women, and that had so
nearly landed Johnnie with his barmaid for
life. He had been on his way to the Registry
Office to get married when Major MacNalty
thwarted them.
"A lady's name, sir -" said Johnnie, all
white heat and Kipling
First the Major thought he might write
note to Isobel. He dismissed that idea 1t
would involve him in an endless flow of letters
- like opening the hoodgates of Niagara
No. the only thing to do was to find some
way of seeing the girl for himself.
1t was while he was debating this point .
that Johnnie suddenly solved the problem.
His guileless face poked round the door,