The Surprising Adventures of Sir Toady Lion with Those of General Napoleon Smith

"Course she does," sneered Napoleon; "think she's out screeching like that for fun? Well, let her. I am not going in to be towelled till I'm all over red and scurfy, and get no end of soap in my eyes."

"But Jane wants you; she'll be so cross if you don't come."

"I don't care for Jane," said Napoleon Smith with dignity, but all the same making himself as small as possible behind his gooseberry bush.

"But if you don't come in, Jane will tell father – "

"I don't care for father – " the prone but gallant General was proceeding to declare in the face of Priscilla's horrified protestations that he mustn't speak so, when a slow heavy step was heard on the other side of the hedge, and a deep voice uttered the single syllable, "John!"

"Yes, father," a meek young man standing up behind the gooseberry bush instantly replied: he was trying to brush himself as clean as circumstances would permit. "Yes, father; were you calling me, father?"

Incredible as it seems, the meek and apologetic words were those of that bold enemy of tyrants, General Napoleon Smith.

Priscilla smiled at the General as he emerged from the hands of Jane, "red and scurfy," just as he had said. She smiled meaningly and aggravatingly, so that Napoleon was reduced to shaking his clenched fist covertly at her.

"Wait till I get you out," he said, using the phrase time-honoured by such occasions.

Priscilla Smith only smiled more meaningly still. "First catch your hare!" she said under her breath.

Napoleon Smith stalked in to lunch, the children's dinner at the house of Windy Standard, with an expression of fixed and Byronic gloom on his face, which was only lightened by the sight of his favourite pigeon-pie (with a lovely crust) standing on the side-board.

"Say grace, Hugh John," commanded his father.

And General Napoleon Smith said grace with all the sweet innocence of a budding angel singing in the cherub choir, aiming at the same time a kick at his sister underneath the table, which overturned a footstool and damaged the leg of a chair.

CHAPTER II

THE GOSPEL OF DASHT-MEAN

IT was on the day preceding a great review near the Border town of Edam, that Hugh John Picton Smith first became a soldier and a Napoleon. His father's house was connected by a short avenue with a great main road along which king and beggar had for a thousand years gone posting to town. Now the once celebrated highway lies deserted, for along the heights to the east run certain bars of metal, shining and parallel, over which rush all who can pay the cost of a third-class ticket – a roar like thunder preceding them, white steam and sulphurous reek wreathing after them. The great highway beneath is abandoned to the harmless impecunious bicyclist, and on the North Road the sweeping cloud dust has it all its own way.

But Hugh John loved the great thoroughfare, deserted though it was. To his mind there could be no loneliness upon its eye-taking stretches, for who knew but out of the dust there might come with a clatter Mr. Dick Turpin, late of York and Tyburn; Robert the Bruce, charging south into England with his Galloway garrons, to obtain some fresh English beef wherewithal to feed his scurvy Scots; or (best of all) his Majesty King George's mail-coach Highflyer, the picture of which, coloured and blazoned, hung in his father's workroom.

People told him that all these great folks were long since dead. But Hugh John knew better than to believe any "rot" grown-ups might choose to palm off on him. What did grown-ups know anyway? They were rich, of course. Unlimited shillings were at their command; and as for pennies – well, all the pennies in the world lived in their breeches' pockets. But what use did they make of these god-like gifts? Did you ever meet them at the tuck-shop down in the town buying fourteen cheese-cakes for a shilling, as any sensible person would? Did they play with "real-real trains," drawn by locomotives of shining brass? No! they preferred either one lump of sugar or none at all in their tea. This showed how much they knew about what was good for them.

So if such persons informed him that Robert the Bruce had been dead some time, or showed him the rope with which Turpin was hung, coiled on a pedestal in a horrid dull museum (free on Saturdays, 10 to 4), Hugh John Picton looked and nodded, for he was an intelligent boy. If you didn't nod sometimes as if you were taking it all in, they would explain it all over again to you – with abominable dates and additional particulars, which they would even ask you afterwards if you remembered.

For many years Hugh John had gone every day down to the porter's lodge at the end of the avenue, and though old Betty the rheumaticky warder was not allowed to let him out, he stared happily enough through the bars. It was a white gate of strong wood, lovely to swing on if you happened to be there when it was opened for a carriageful of calling-folk in the afternoon, or for Hugh John's father when he went out a-riding.

But you had to hide pretty quick behind the laurels, and rush out in that strictly limited period before old Betty found her key, and yet after the tail of Agincourt, his father's great grey horse, had switched round the corner. If you were the least late, Betty would get ahead of you, and the gates of Paradise would be shut. If you were a moment too soon, it was just as bad – or even worse. For then the voice of "He-whom-it-was-decidedly-most-healthy-to-obey" would sound up the road, commanding instant return to the Sandheap or the High Garden.

So on these occasions Hugh John mostly brought Sir Toady Lion with him – otherwise Arthur George the Sturdy, and at yet other times variously denominated Prince Murat, the Old Guard, the mob that was scattered with the whiff of grapeshot, and (generally) the whole Grand Army of the First Empire. Toady Lion (his own first effort at the name of his favourite hero Richard Cœur-de-Lion) had his orders, and with guile and blandishments held Betty in check till the last frisk of Agincourt's tail had disappeared round the corner. Then Hugh John developed his plans of assault, and was soon swinging on the gate.

"Out of the way with you, Betty," he would cry, "or you will get hurt – sure."

For the white gate shut of itself, and you had only to push it open, jump on, check it at the proper place on the return journey, and with your foot shove off again to have scores and scores of lovely swings. Then Betty would go up the avenue and shout for her husband, who was the aforesaid crusty old gardener. She would have laid down her life for Toady Lion, but by no means even a part of it for Hugh John, which was unfair. Old Betty had once been upset by the slam of the gate on a windy day, and so was easily intimidated by the shouts of the horseman and the appalling motion of his white five-barred charger.

Such bliss, however, was transient, and might have to be expiated in various ways – at best with a slap from the hand of Betty (which was as good as nothing at all), at worst, by a visit to father's workroom – which could not be thought upon without a certain sense of solemnity, as if Sunday had turned up once too often in the middle of the week.

But upon this great day of which I have to tell, Hugh John had been honourably digging all the morning in the sand-hole. He had on his red coat, which was his most secret pride, and he was devising a still more elaborate system of fortification. Bastion and trench, scarp and counter-scarp, lunette and ravelenta (a good word), Hugh John had made them all, and he was now besieging his own creation with the latest thing in artillery, calling "Boom!" when he fired off his cannon, and "Bang-whack!" as often as the projectile hit the wall and brought down a foot of the noble fortification, lately so laboriously constructed and so tenderly patted into shape.

Suddenly there came a sound which always made the heart of Hugh John beat in his side. It was the low thrilling reverberation of the drum. He had only time to dash for his cap, which he had filled with sand and old nails in order to "be a bomb-shell"; empty it, put it on his head, gird on his London sword-with-the-gold-hilt, and fly.

As he ran down the avenue the shrill fifes kept stinging his ears and making him feel as if needles were running up and down his back. It was at this point that Hugh John had a great struggle with himself. Priscilla and Toady Lion were playing at "House" and "Tea-parties" under the weeping elm on the front lawn. It was a debasing taste, certainly, but after all blood was thicker than water. And – well, he could not bear that they should miss the soldiers. But then, on the other hand, if he went back the troops might be past before he reached the gate, and Betty, he knew well, would not let him out to run after them, and the park wall was high.

In this desperate strait Hugh John called all the resources of religion to his aid.

"It would," he said, "be dasht-mean to go off without telling them."

Hugh John did not know exactly what "dasht-mean" meant. But he had heard his cousin Fred (who was grown up, had been a year at school, and wore a tall hat on Sundays) tell how all the fellows said that it was better to die-and-rot than to be "dasht-mean"; and also how those who in spite of warnings proved themselves "dasht-mean" were sent to a place called Coventry – which from all accounts seemed to be a "dasht-mean" locality.

So Hugh John resolved that he would never get sent there, and whenever a little thing tugged down in his stomach and told him "not to," Hugh John said, "Hang it! I won't be dasht-mean." – And wasn't.

Grown-ups call these things conscience and religion; but this is how it felt to Hugh John, and it answered just as well – or even better.

So when the stinging surge of distant pipes sent the wild blood coursing through his veins, and he felt his face grow cold and prickly all over, Napoleon Smith started to run down the avenue. He could not help it. He must see the soldiers or die. But all the same Tug-tug went the little string remorselessly in his stomach.

"I must see them. I must – I must!" he cried, arguing with himself and trying to drown the inner voice.

"Tug-tug-tug!" went the string, worse than that which he once put round his toe and hung out of the window, for Tom Cannon the under-keeper to wake him with at five in the morning to go rabbit-ferreting.

Hugh John turned towards the house and the weeping elm.

"It's a blooming shame," he said, "and they won't care anyway. But I can't be dasht-mean!"

And so he ran with all his might back to the weeping elm, and with a warning cry set Prissy and Sir Toady Lion on the alert. Then with anxious tumultuous heart, and legs almost as invisible as the twinkling spokes of a bicycle, so quickly did they pass one another, Hugh John fairly flung himself in the direction of the White Gate.

CHAPTER III

HOW HUGH JOHN BECAME GENERAL NAPOLEON

EVEN dull Betty had heard the music. The White Gate was open, and with a wild cry Hugh John sprang through. Betty had a son in the army, and her deaf old ears were quickened by the fife and drum.

"Come back, Master Hugh!" she cried, as he passed through and stood on the roadside, just as the head of the column, marching easily, turned the corner of the White Road and came dancing and undulating towards him. Hugh John's heart danced also. It was still going fast with running so far; but at sight of the soldiers it took a new movement, just like little waves on a lake when they jabble in the wind, so nice and funny when you feel it – tickly too – down at the bottom of your throat.

The first who came were soldiers in a dark uniform with very stern, bearded officers, who attended finely to discipline, for they were about to enter the little town of Edam, which lay just below the white gates of Windy Standard.

So intently they marched that no one cast a glance at Hugh John standing with his drawn sword, giving the salute which his friend Sergeant Steel had taught him as each company passed. Not that Hugh John cared, or even knew that they did not see him. They were the crack volunteer regiment of the Grey City beyond the hills, and their standard of efficiency was something tremendous.

Then came red-coats crowned with helmets, red-coats tipped with Glengarry bonnets, and one or two brass bands of scattering volunteer regiments. Hugh John saluted them all. No one paid the least attention to him. He did not indeed expect any one to notice him – a small dusty boy with a sword too big for him standing at the end of the road under the shadow of the elms. Why should these glorious creations deign to notice him – shining blades, shouldered arms, flashing bayonets, white pipe-clayed belts? Were they not as gods, knowing good and evil?

But all the same he saluted every one of them impartially as they came, and the regiments swung past unregarding, dust-choked, and thirsty.

Then at last came the pipes and the waving tartans. Something cracked in Hugh John's throat, and he gave a little cry, so that his old nurse, Janet Sheepshanks, anxious for his welfare, came to take him away. But he struck at her – his own dear Janet – and fled from her grasp to the other side of the road, where he was both safer and nearer to the soldiers. Swinging step, waving plumes, all in review order on came the famous regiment, every man stepping out with a trained elasticity which went to the boy's heart. Thus and not otherwise the Black Watch followed their pipers. Hugh John gave a long sigh when they had passed, and the pipes dulled down the dusky glade.

Then came more volunteers, and yet more and more. Would they never end? And ever the sword of Hugh John Picton flashed to the salute, and his small arm waxed weary as it rose and fell.

Then happened the most astonishing thing in the world, the greatest event of Hugh John's life. For there came to his ear a new sound, the clatter of cavalry hoofs. A bugle rang out, and Hugh John's eyes watched with straining eagerness the white dust rise and swirl behind the columns. Perhaps – who knows? – this was his reward for not being dasht-mean! But now Hugh John had forgotten Prissy and Toady Lion, father and nurse alike, heaven, earth – and everything else. There was no past for him. He was the soldier of all time. His dusty red coat and his flashing sword were the salute of the universal spirit of man to the god of war – also other fine things of which I have no time to write.