"Greg and Jim"

By Gregory Clark, Illustrated by James Frise, June 19, 1937.

“How’d you like,” asked Jimmie Frise, “to come up to Andy’s with me to-night?”

“Aw, Jim,” I said, “you go. But I don’t get along with Andy, you know that. He wants to talk about strikes.”

“I’ve got to go,” said Jim. “And I said I’d bring you.”

“Aw,” I said. “Who wants to spend a whole evening talking about subversive elements?”

“You’ve never been in his home,” pointed out Jimmie. “He has a glass gun case with more swell guns in it than you’ll ever see in your life. Pairs of English guns worth a thousand dollars. And over-and-under Belgian guns.”

“He’s a rich guy,” I protested. “And all he wants to do is get a couple of poor birds at his mercy and talk about Communists.”

“He’s very interested in you,” stated Jim. “He thinks you have the makings of a serious writer if you’d only meet the right people and get some sound ideas.”

“Now I won’t go,” I assured him. “I’ve got along all right so far without any sound ideas and I don’t intend to start at my age.”

“If you would only chum up with some of the important people,” declared Jim, “you might get somewhere. Instead of spending your life with any old tramp so long as he is a fisherman…”

“Jim,” I protested, “I won’t have you calling yourself a tramp. Not in my presence, anyway. You may be only a cartoonist, but if you had mingled with the right people and got some sound ideas, you might easily have been great artist.”

“Now don’t get sarcastic,” said Jim. “Andy has been telephoning me now for about six months, inviting me up to his place. I’ve been ducking and dodging but yesterday he got me and said ‘All right, what night can you come?’ And there he had me.”

“I wish people would stick to a certain night when they invite you,” I agreed. “Then you can say you have an engagement for that night. But this business of saying ‘what night will you come?’ is a lousy trick.”

“It sure is,” said Jim. “And that’s where we stand. I said I’d go to-night.”

“Well, Jim,” I said happily, “tell Andy I’m sorry I had an engagement for to-night.”

“Andy’s a good guy, even if he is rich,” said Jim. “I wish you’d get to know him better. He could be a lot of use to you.”

“I don’t want any friends to be of use to me,” I informed him. “I think that is the trouble with Andy. I have the feeling the only people he wants to know are ones that will be of use to him. He probably has the feeling that he owes it to society to get to know some newspapermen and fill them up with his ideas about Communists and things.”

“He’s got some swell English guns,” said Jim.

“Puh,” said I.

“He’s got one of the most interesting sporting libraries in Canada,” pursued Jim.

“Puh,” I repeated.

“Just lately,” said Jim, “he got a shipment of old books from a sale in England and in it is a copy of the second edition of the Compleat Angler¹.”

The Rare Edition

“Oh, yeah?” I laughed. “Second edition, eh? Do you know how much Andy would have to pay for that?”

“He told me he paid a hundred and ten pounds,” said Jim, quietly. “Five hundred and fifty dollars.”

“Jim,” I said after a moment, “you’re not fooling, are you?”

“I’m just telling you what Andy told me,” said Jim. “Second edition. Is that rare?”

“Rare?” I shouted. “Rare? Second edition of the Compleat Angler, you dummy? Why, Walton rewrote the book entirely for the second edition, and it’s a duodecimo, with ten engraved plates of fish, and there are original sheets of the Angler’s Song, and it’s rarer than the first edition… Jimmie, maybe Walton actually handled this copy, himself, at the printers…”

“Well, if you think so much of it,” said Jim; “why don’t you come up and see it?”

“Come up and see it?” I cried. “Who can stop me? Good old Andy. Now, there’s a true Canadian for you. Using his wealth to obtain for Canada some of the worth-while treasures.”

“I’ll let him know you are coming,” said Jim cheerfully.

And I went home early to spend a little while looking at my poor half-dozen editions of Walton, none of them worth ten dollars or dating farther than 1823, but very friendly in the hand, none the less. By merely touching these noble old books, I prepared my mood for the great honor I was to be accorded in holding in my very hands a copy of the Second Edition.

Jimmie picked me up early to drive to Andy’s, who lives in one of those fashionable neighborhoods above Eglinton Ave. on the fringe of the country.

We drove through districts that had not even been districts the last time I was up this way, depression or no depression. Through handsome streets of spacious homes set sideways to the street instead of endways, which was the old-fashioned and more economical method.

“Here’s Andy’s,” said Jim, slowing and eyeing a fine colonial red brick home with green shutters, the kind that are never shut. “Last time I was here, there were no houses on either side.”

“This city is sure growing,” I confessed.

We parked and strolled up the walk. “Andy said,” remarked Jim, “that he had to drive his wife over to Yonge St. and everybody’s out, so just walk in.”

“Let’s sit on the veranda,” I offered; “I don’t care about walking into people’s homes.”

“Don’t be lower class,” laughed Jim, trying the front door. “Be modern. Be smart. Walk right in.”

However, the door was locked.

“I didn’t think Andy was the kind to leave any doors open,” I said.

“He said walk right in,” said Jim, “and make ourselves at home. I guess it’s the side door.”

We went around the side drive into Andy’s very handsome garden. Jim tried the side door and a small back door that led into a sort of basement recreation room, by the look of it.

“H’m,” said Jim, they being all securely locked.

So we sat on a bench and watched the gentleman next door bent over his flower bed, weeding and forking.

“They’re After Us”

I recited in a low voice for Jimmie some of the lovelier passages of Walton, the one beginning “nevertheless, here I must part with you; here in this now sad place, where I was so happy as first to meet you.” And I gave him the famous passage “and we having still a mile to Tottenham High-Cross, I will, as we walk towards it in the cool shade of this sweet honeysuckle hedge, mention to you some of the thoughts and joys that have possessed…”

But you know Walton. Anyway, a little time passed and Jim got up and walked out the drive to look for Andy.

“You might as well be inside, looking at that old book,” said Jim, “as moaning about it out here.”

He tried the side and little back doors again, and then pushed at a casement window in the cellar room. It gave.

“Ah,” said Jim, “I’ll crawl through and open the door for you.”

“Ah,” said I, rising, for my hands were aching for that old book, and I went and stood at the side door, while Jim vanished through the window.

I heard a dreadful shriek. I heard Jim’s voice loudly speaking. I heard the thud of steps and Jim burst out the door.

“What the…” I demanded.

“An old lady,” said Jim breathlessly. “An old lady. She nearly scared me to death.”

“Well, tell her who you are,” I commanded. “I tried to tell her Andy said to walk in,” said Jim. “But she just let out a shriek and ran down the hall. Just a minute.”

Jim hurried to the edge and called across to the gentleman gardening next door. “Pardon me, sir,” said Jim, “but this is where Mr. Andy Daleberry lives, isn’t it?”

“No,” said the gentleman, “Mr. Daleberry lives one block further….”

But I was already half way down the drive heading for the car. Jim hastened after me.

“Jim,” I snarled, “she’s likely called the police.”

“We can explain,” said Jim, hurriedly starting the engine.

“I’m sick and tired of explaining.” I declared.

I glanced back and saw a small dark car come curving wildly around the corner at the end of the street.

“There’s the police radio car now,” I cried. “Stay still! Explain!”

But Jim had the car slightly in motion at that instant, and such is the ancient fear in the human heart, the first instinct is always to run. And with a rush and a roar, Jim leaped his car into high.

“I’ll shake them in a couple of blocks,” gasped Jim. “They’ll have to stop at the house for a second….”

“Jim, this is a mistake,” I groaned.

“Watch me,” said Jim tensely.

And he slewed around a corner, raced a block, turned another corner, and twisting and doubling back he made his way southward through handsome streets towards Eglinton Ave., that great east and west artery across the top of the city.

I sat facing back, watching anxiously for the police car. I saw it speed past one intersection just as we vanished around the turn, a full block south.

“Jim,” I cried, “they’re after us. What’ll we say now, if they catch us?”

“They’ll not catch us,” muttered Jim. “Here’s Eglinton. We’ll lose ourselves quietly in the traffic.”

But the traffic was thicker, this fine June evening, than could be easily entered. And it was somewhat congested, right at the foot of the block we approached it by, due to the fact that two or three dozen of those marathon runners, in their shorts and jerseys, were at that very moment strung along, running with chins high and arms bent up, westward along the highway.

“Quick,” hissed Jim, starting to tear off his coat.

“What?” I begged.

“Take off your clothes,” yelled Jim, already removing his shirt. “The cops’ll be around that last corner in a jiffy. They can’t miss this car. Quick.”

“What?” I repeated.

“We’re runners, see?” cried Jim.

It was only a couple of sweeps and a swipe for me to remove my clothes.

“Stuff them in the compartment behind the seat,” Jim ordered.

We jammed our clothes out of sight.

“Come on,” snapped he, opening the car door and crouching. “Allright, now head up, arms bent high. Let’s go!”

And ducking around two or three cars waiting to turn into Eglinton Ave., Jim and I sprinted out and joined the parade of marathon runners. Fortunately, they were strung out, in groups and pairs and singles, and Jim and I, neck and neck, formed only one unit in the long and straggling parade.

“How, far,” I puffed, “do we go.”

“We’ll have to go,” puffed Jim “all the way home.”

“But Jim,” I panted, “we can’t run five miles.”

“Take it easy,” said Jim. “We don’t have to win this race. All we got to do is keep in it.”

“Jim,” I gasped, “we’ll have to rest pretty soon.”

“Can’t rest,” whuffed Jim. “In these underclothes. Long as we are running it’s proper. Once we stop it’s indecent.”

“Oooooh,” I said, slackening.

So we slackened, and runner after runner went by us, with long, easy legs, many of them turning a brief surprised glance at us as they passed.

Slower and slower our feet went, as we passed Dufferin St. and saw ahead in the sunset the towering tops of the packing houses; and our socks worked down over our shoes and our eyes bulged and our lungs ached I but we slowly and methodically lifted them and put them down, while at length no more runners passed us in the growing twilight, and the lights came on and still down past the packing houses we panted and plodded.

A couple of curious motor cars slowed and followed us short distances. Some car horns were tooted at us. A few groups of young summer people on street corners hailed us with modernistic cheers. Several small dogs yipped at our heels. But by now we could cut down the quieter streets and the streets we knew as nigh unto home. And with a last leaden terrible quarter mile, we came down a lane and into Jim’s yard and there we fell.

“Got to get inside,” said Jim, sitting up and gulping air. “Phone police.”

“What for?” I gasped.

But Jim staggered up and, much as I loved that soft green sod, I followed him. He sat by the phone a couple of minutes until his breath grew more normal. And then he dialled the phone.

“Police?” said Jim, angrily. “Say, my car has been stolen from in front of my house. Frise is the name.”

And he gave his address and there was some waiting until they switched him to another police station.

“Yes,” Jim shouted hotly. “Stolen from right in front here.”

Pause.

“You’ve been phoning me? Here? Oh,” said Jim, “I’ve been out in the garden watering. I guess I couldn’t hear the phone for the hose. You’ve got the car? Good! Splendid! Where is it? On Eglinton, eh? Is it damaged?”

Another pause.

“Clothes?” cried Jim. “Behind the back seat? Oh, those are our fishing clothes. Sure. My friend and I always keep a suit of old clothes in the car for going fishing.”

“Now that’s kind of you,” said Jim.

He hung up.

“They’re bringing the car here,” said Jim. “Beat it home and get some clothes on.”

Which I did, and when the police arrived, Jim and I were sitting on his veranda and I was reciting some more swell bits out of Walton, the one about “the salmon is accounted the King of freshwater fish; and is ever bred in rivers relating to the sea.”

And we thanked the police most warmly for the way they look after stodgy old booklovers like us.

---

Editor’s Notes: This story was repeated on June 10, 1944 as “Hoofing It”. It appeared in the book Greg Clark & Jimmie Frise Go Fishing (1980).

1. The Compleat Angler is a book by Izaak Walton, first published in 1653. It is a celebration, in prose and verse, of the art and spirit of fishing. ↩︎

By Gregory Clark, illustrated by James Frise, June 17, 1933.

“Nothing,” said Jimmie Frise, “demonstrates the general stupidity of mankind like hitch hiking.”

“How do you mean?”

“Well, every hitch hiker goes through the same motions. They even use the same thumb. They thumb with the same gesture. They stand the same way, look the same way, all have the same expressions on their faces. You take a thousand different men, all ages, sizes and shapes, and set them along the side of a road, and instantly, they become as alike as posts in a fence.”

“That’s true,” I admitted.

“The nature of man,” said Jim,” “is to be as alike as dandelions. But the way man has got anywhere has been by being different. Why don’t hitch hikers realize that the way to attract notice and get a lift is by being different?”

“I guess there isn’t much difference possible,” I suggested.

“I bet,” said Jim, “I could get a lift from here to Montreal in less time than it would take me to drive myself.”

“You would make a poor hitch hiker,” I said. “If the first fellow picked you up was going to North Bay and you wanted to go to Buffalo, you’d go to North Bay with him just to be agreeable.”

“No, I’ve got a great idea,” said Jim. “I have a contribution to make to the hitch hiking public, and if you haven’t anything better to do this afternoon, we could investigate the hitchery business.”

“It’s all work,” I said, reaching for my hat.

“Just a minute,” said Jim, setting to work at his drawing board. He took two large sheets of heavy drawing paper, and in bold black printed letters, six inches high, he wrote:

“Give us a lift to Prescott¹.”

“Now,” said Jim, “we take a string, and we fasten these two notices on our backs.”

“Great!”

“And we just get out on the highway, walk right down in the middle of traffic, heading east. Everybody coming from behind sees these signs. It won’t be long until somebody comes along who is going to Prescott. He will see the sign, and instantly, his reaction will be to take us with him. The average driver is not inclined to pick up hitch hikers, because they may be only going to the next village, or a couple of miles down the road. A driver headed for distant parts hates to waste the time stopping to pick up short haul passengers, whereas, if he knows we are going to the same place he is headed, he will be immediately interested in us.”

“By George, Jimmie, I think you have hit on a wonderful idea. It will revolutionize hitch hiking.”

We took our two big signs and got Jim’s car and drove out the highway well beyond the city limits, and then parked at a gas station we know.

“We’ll be back in an hour or two,” said Jim to the gas man.

“Aren’t we going to Prescott?” I asked.

“No, no,” said Jim. “This is an experiment. My idea is that we should see how many times we can get picked up for Prescott between here and Whitby.”

“Won’t the people be sore at us for stopping them?”

“We’ll explain it to them.”

Cars were snoring eastward as we stepped out on the pavement and side by side walked off, our signs staring boldly back at the oncoming traffic.

Fifteen cars went by, and in every case, the cars slowed up while passengers turned and stared back at us.

“We are certainly attracting attention,” I said.

“Sixteen, seventeen,” said Jim. “I’m counting the cars.”

Eighteen came roaring from behind and just as it swept past us, we heard the brakes go on and the big sedan slowed to a stop on the side of the road ahead.

“We’ll take a little ride with him,” said Jimmie. “To get his reactions.”

We ran ahead to the car and the driver, who was alone opened the door with a grin.

“That’s a new idea, boys,” he cried. “And a swell one.”

“Going to Prescott?” asked Jim.

“Through Prescott,” said the driver, who was a small, weasel faced man with glittering eyes. “Do either of you drive a car?”

“We can both drive,” we said.

“This is swell,” said the weasely man.

“You boys might give me a rest by taking the wheel for a spell after we get going.”

“Sure,” said Jim, who loves to drive other people’s cars.

“Hop in,” said the driver.

We hopped in the front seat with him.

He slammed the gears and the big car leaped away.

“What are you boys going to do in Prescott?” asked the stranger.

“As a matter of fact,” said Jim, “we aren’t going to Prescott at all. We are a couple of newspaper men and we are experimenting with this hitch hiking business. We are introducing some new ideas.”

The stranger looked sideways at us.

“Newspaper boys, eh?” he said. “H’m, h’m!”

He put on more speed.

“How far were you figuring on going?” he asked.

“We thought we would see how many lifts we could interest between here and Oshawa or some place.”

The big car started to slow, but instead of taking to the side of the road to let us out, it turned down a side road towards the lake, and as soon as we were out of sight of the highway, the weasely man stopped it, slid quickly and smoothly out of the driver’s seat and when Jim and I looked out at him, he was holding something in his coat pocket. And pointing it in at us!

“I Got a Gun Here”

“Boys,” said the little man, “you are going for a little longer ride than you intended. I got a gun here. I’m getting in the back seat. You two are going to take turns driving me until I get ready to kick you out.”

“Just a minute,” said Jim. But I slid smartly into the driver’s seat.

“That’s right,” said the little man, opening the rear door and hopping nimbly in. “Now no fooling. We are not going through any towns. We are going around all of them. I know the side roads. When I tell you to turn, you turn, get me?”

“Yes, sir,” said I.

“Just a minute,” said Jim.

But the small man tapped him on the back in some way that caused Jim to sit up very straight in the car and close his mouth tightly.

“Now, start her,” said the little man, “and we’ll go down here and around Whitby, see?”

We jogged around the country road, making a detour past both Whitby and Oshawa.

Then we regained the highway and headed east.

“Make it fifty,” said the little man in the back seat.

I made it fifty.

He sat hunched forward, and kept peering in the reverse mirror over my head. Whenever cars overtook us, the little man crouched down in the seat until they were past. He detoured us around Bowmanville, even around the little gas station towns along the highway.

“Slow up,” he commanded sharply. Ahead we could see a brown uniformed man on a motorcycle. “Go around him.”

We took to the country roads again and went right around a township to avoid the motorcycle cop.

Port Hope, Cobourg, Grafton were neatly circled, the towns and villages ticking by as the big car snored on. Jim sat rigid beside me, never opening his mouth. The little man in the rear had nothing to say beyond giving me directions.

“Prescott,” he said, softly. “Give us a lift to Prescott, heh, heh, heh!”

“This is a good joke on us,” I laughed.

“Shut up.” said the little man.

I attended to my driving.

“Anyway-” I said.

“Shut up,” repeated the little man.

He was half standing up staring in the reverse mirror. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see another big car overtaking us.

“Put her up to sixty,” said the little man.

I put her up. It was a good car.

The car continued to crawl nearer.

“Step on it,” said the little man.

“We’re coming to a town,” I called.

“Shut up,” said the little man.

I reached out with my foot and shoved down. The car seemed to lift.

We went through a town that was just a blur of red gas tanks and white shop fronts.

I heard the car behind sounding its horn in a long, steady blast, faint over the sound of the racing engine.

Then the little man placed his hand on my shoulder.

“Easy now,” he said. “We are coming to a bush. As we come into it, I want you to slow her down. Take the left side of the road and make these guys come up on our right side. Easy now.”

The woods swept up to us. I slowed the car, veering to the left of the road, and the car behind rushed alongside of us. I caught a glimpse of men waving and shouting in it, and at the same time felt the draft as the left-hand door opened, and the little man took a flying leap. Just as I slowed to a stop, he vanished like a rabbit into the brush.

In an instant we were being boarded by big angry men who put handcuffs on Jim and me and locked us together.

“Well, hitch hiker?” I sneered at Jimmie.

“Where’s your partner?” asked one of the big fellows.

But already three of them were shouting off into the bush.

Jim and I were sat down on the roadside.

“What’s the idea of them signs?” asked our new boss, examining our backs.

“We’re a couple of hitch hikers and this bird picked us up,” said Jim. “Then he pulled a gun on us and made us drive.”

“That’s a good story,” said the boss.

“As a matter of fact,” I said, “we are not hitch hikers at all. We are a couple of newspapermen out getting a story about hitch hiking.”

“Yeah? Why don’t you think up a story that both of you can be stuck with?” asked the boss, taking out a cigar.

“We can prove it,” said I.

“Well, maybe so. But I can prove you were driving a stolen car.”

“Do you think your friends will catch that little guy?” I asked anxiously.

“You’ll do, even if they don’t catch him,” said the boss.

Presently, the three other men came out of the woods bringing the little weasely man with them.

“Here,” I commanded, as they brought him close, “tell these gentlemen to turn us loose! Tell them you picked us up on the highway.”

“What are giving us?” cried the little man in astonishment. “I tell you, gentlemen, these two men picked me up outside of Oshawa where I signalled them for a lift. When I saw by their actions and their conversation that they were crooks, I naturally jumped out of the car when it slowed, and tried to hide on you. Just human instinct.”

“He had a gun.” I yelled.

“Nonsense,” said the little man, angrily. “If I’d had a gun I would have forced them to stop, wouldn’t I?”

He looked the picture of outraged innocence.

“These birds,” said the big man who had stayed with Jim and me, “say they are hitch hikers. Then they say they are newspaper guys. Now, gents, just reach in and show us some identification.”

Jim reached into his pocket and felt around. The first thing he found was his little pass to the race track, a sort of little round book on a string.

“Here you are,” he said.

The cop took the pass and read the name on it.

“Lou Marsh²!” he read, staring at Jim.

“Wait a minute,” cried Jim. “I borrowed Lou’s pass.”

“Oh, you borrowed it, huh!”

They put another set of handcuffs on Jimmie and pushed us into the stolen car.

“This is Clark and I’m Frise,” shouted Jim, as we were being bundled in. “We can prove it.”

“Never heard of you,” said the boss cop. “Get in and tell it to the judge.”

“Can I go now?” asked the weasely little man in an injured voice. “I got to be in Prescott to see my old mother who is dying. I’m just a poor man hitch hiking my way home to see my old mother.”

“Do we need this guy?” the cops asked each other, sympathetically.

“Bring him along just as evidence against these two,” they decided.

It was supper time, so we stopped in Grafton for sandwiches. The cops brought them out to us in the car.

Jim always makes sketches in villages for use in Birdseye Center. He took the card off my back and with his handcuffs on, made a few sketches on the back of it.

The cop sitting in with us sat up and watched. He called the others over.

“What did you say your name was?” asked the boss.

“Frise,” said Jim.

“Oh, I thought you pronounced that Freeze,” said the boss³. “I didn’t get you at first. Wait a minute till I take off them bracelets so you can draw better.”

He unlocked the cuffs.

“Draw him,” said the boss, referring to one of his large colleagues. “Make him look like Pigskin Peters in that derby.”

There we were parked on the roadside, with several of the villagers coming and looking in the windows.

“Draw old Archie,” said another of the cops.

And that was the way Jimmie drew us out of the jam.

“You say this little bird here picked you two up in this car?” asked the boss.

“He did,” we said.

The little weasely man knew when he was cooked. He had art, but it wasn’t as good as Jimmie’s.

“Oh, all right,” he said. They took the handcuffs off me and put them on him.

So they drove us home to Toronto, and on the way, I took the sign off Jim’s back, turned it over and printed on it:

“Give us a lift to TORONTO.”

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Editor’s Notes: This story was repeated on June 22, 1940 as “Sign Language”.

1. Prescott Ontario is about 350 km east of Toronto. ↩︎
2. Lou Marsh was the Sports Editor of the Toronto Star in 1933. Since he died in 1936, they had to change the name to Andy Lytle for the 1940 reprint. ↩︎
3. I make the note on the website that it is pronounced “fries”. ↩︎

By Gregory Clark, Illustrated by James Frise, June 6, 1942.

“Hey, look,” interrupted Jimmie Frise, “your gas gauge shows empty!”

“Aw, that,” I said. “I fixed it so it always shows empty. It keeps me worried all the time about how little gas I have. And, besides, it’s a useful dodge for your friends. You can always show your friends that you haven’t any gas, in case they suggest you drive them places.”

“It’s very good of you to drive me,” said Jim humbly.

“It isn’t my gas I’m wasting on you,” I informed him. “It’s my tires. There are 20 miles in a gallon of gas, and that worries us terribly. But there are only 15,000 miles in a tire, with luck. But that doesn’t worry us at all. Yet every mile you roll a tire, you are one mile nearer the end of your driving days.”

“Of course, we can all live in hope of the war being over,” mused Jimmie, “before our tires give out.”

“Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,” I quoted.

“And some day,” sighed Jimmie, “the war will be over. All things come to an end.”

“And I wonder where the peace conference will be held,” I idled. “London, Berlin, Washington, Tokyo or Moscow?”

“Maybe in Ottawa,” suggested Jim. “Or maybe in Rio de de Janeiro. There is a lot of war ahead of us yet.”

“And doubtless a lot of surprises,” I said. “The surprises, with the exception of Russia, have mostly been against us. According to the law of averages we ought to be getting a few pleasant surprises any day now.”

“We sure can take it,” declared Jim. “Think of this time just two years ago. Let’s see: Dunkirk was just over. The whirlwind in France was coming to an end. The last of the British army was being rescued from Belgium. We were holding our breath the way we hold it when we watch our house burn down.”

“What immense changes,” I added, “have come over us all since that day! Think of how we felt about the United States then. And how we thought about Russia. Think how alone we felt then. Think how great a company we feel today. Yet not only are the people with us utterly, completely different from what we thought they were two years ago, but we ourselves are different. Not one of us is the same person he was two years ago. The only thing that is not changed is the mere skin which contains us.”

“I don’t know who I feel sorrier for in this war,” said Jimmie, “the young people or the old people. I feel sorry for the young men and women because their lives are interrupted, broken, altered, sometimes shattered, by the war. Yet the young ones at least have the thrill, the adventure.”

“And the pain and the death,” I reminded.

“Everything Taken From Us”

“But the middle-aged and old people,” went on Jim, “have the uprooting, the surrender, the change, the loss, the sense of guilt. It was our generation that stood by while the world slowly toppled into hell.”

“It is the young ones I feel sorry for,” I asserted. “Think of the lovers parted. Think of the young years wasted in hard, stupid soldiering…”

“Aw, rats,” cried Jimmie. “Do you realize that there are tens of thousands of young Canadian boys today flying airplanes? And not one of them would likely ever have been in an airplane, let alone flying one, if it hadn’t been for war?”

“Are you in favor of war?” I demanded hotly.

“Certainly not,” replied Jim, “but I am not being stupid. I am looking at what can be said in favor of things as they are. For all except the favored few, in this world, life is a pretty drab adventure. During a man’s early twenties he has a little fun, a little romance, a little adventure. He falls in love. He gets his job and starts the battle of working up. But soon he has to settle down to the humdrum round of life, the job no longer exciting, the sodden round of days, up in the morning, off to work, back home to bed.”

“Let me tell you, sir,” I informed him, “that very thing is what we are fighting so fiercely now to re-establish!”

“What chance,” continued Jim, “has the average young man of having any fun in life, normally? Only the crafty, the smart, the shrewd, the foxy get any fun in peacetime. The plain, everyday guy is a cog in somebody else’s wheel before he is thirty, as a rule. But along comes war. And every man can be a man. No more does the manly guy have to make way for the foxy guy. No more does the young kid from the sticks have to live little more excitingly than the cows in his pasture. No sir: the foxy guys, the crafty, the shrewd, the wise, find themselves in an awful hole. It is men who are wanted. And men get their innings.”

“What terrible nonsense,” I interrupted.

“So, with nothing but their manhood,” climaxed Jim, “the men of the nation get their innings. They become soldiers, airmen, sailors, fighters. They go forth to see the world. They journey thousands of miles. They mix with their fellow men, and while the foxy guys still have the edge on them in the early stages, the nearer they get to the fight, the less they are troubled or gypped by the wise guys. Until at last, in battle, they are men. They get their promotions, their decorations. They rate as men among men, not as foxes among foxes. If peace had continued throughout their lives, they would have barely lived at all, except as men in a world in which manhood is one of the minor qualifications.”

“You’re a Socialist,” I accused.

“But I feel sorry,” said Jim, without much sorrow,” for all us middle-aged and elderly birds. Everything is being taken from us, our property, our privileges, all the things we have worked so hard to gather around us and snuggle down into. We are like owls, whose nest has been discovered and the tree cut down. In daylight.”

A Flustered Set of Owls

“We weren’t such a bad generation,” I said. “We had our good points.”

“But we’re a pretty flustered lot of owls, right now,” said Jim. “Is there anything more like an owl disturbed in sunlight than one of us who has all his life been contemptuous of the Yankees and hated the Russians trying to reorganize his life-long beliefs? We flop from branch to branch, trying to get a comfortable grip. And we blink so.”

“You’re not really sorry for us older people at all,” I stated. “You are making fun of us.”

“Well, there is one member of the younger generation I feel sorry for,” said Jim, indicating a young air force man who was standing beside a dilapidated old motor car on the far side of the stop-street intersection where I had pulled up.

“He’s in a dither,” I admitted. The young chap was tall and fair-haired. In his cap was the little white stripe, the badge of distinction, which means he is in training for air crew – that, is, to become a pilot, navigator, observer or bomb aimer.

He was standing beside the car, clutching his cap in his hand. And he seemed to be talking to himself. His face was flushed, his hair rumpled, his eyes wild and he was glaring excitedly up street and down the street and turning to look in the car window at the dashboard.

I drove across the intersection and slowed as we passed him.

“Oh, oh, oh,” he moaned as we passed. “Oh, OH, oh!”

Jim opened the car door and stepped out.

“Hey, young man,” said Jim, “what’s up?”

“Oh, oh, OH,” was all the boy could say.

“Here, snap out of it,” said Jim, taking the boy’s sleeve. “What’s the matter.”

“It’s two,” said the brindle-haired boy, in a dazed way,” it’s two minutes to three!”

He raised his wrist and looked at his watch as if it were a rattlesnake.

“Okay,” said Jim. “What’s the matter. It can’t be this bad. Can we help?”

“Married,” said the boy, swallowing. He had one of those large Adam’s apples like a knee cap in his neck, which clunked up and down conspicuously above his air force collar.

“Indeed,” said Jim. “When?”

“Three o’clock,” said the boy. “No gas.”

“Well, hop in” shouted Jimmie, grabbing the boy’s elbow. “Here, hop in! Where to?”

“My best man, my best man,” moaned the young airman, resisting and drawing back. “He’s gone for gas.”

I jumped out of the car and went around the other side of the boy so as to lend Jimmie a hand.

“Come on,” I commanded. “Step lively.”

“Oh, oh, OH,” said the young fellow, fighting us free. “Wait a minute. My best man. He went away 20 minutes ago to get gas at the nearest gas station. He’ll…”

Three o’clock,” I announced firmly, showing my watch. “Do you want the girl or don’t you?”

“My best MAN,” shouted the young fellow fiercely. “How do I…”

“We’ll serve as your best man, kid,” I shouted back, trying to bring order into his chaotic mind.

“We ran out of GAS,” he bellowed back at me, clinging to the car door handle to resist our pulls and pushes. “Of all the silly, bloody things. It’s 3 o’clock. She’ll…”

“Where’s the wedding?” I demanded quietly, to appease, the frantic frame of mind

of the poor boy.

“The church,” he said. “The… the big church….on Bloor St. You know the church? It has a steeple.”

“Look,” I soothed. “Hop in our car. Your best man has met some difficulty. Maybe he can’t get gas. Has he got a permit?”

“I gave him mine,” said the boy, biting his lip to pull himself together quietly… “He should have been back in five minutes. We had plenty of time, even as it was. But he hasn’t come back. He hasn’t come BACK. And here I am sitting, watching my watch…”

“Hop to it, lad,” said Jim, firmly taking the boy’s elbow. “Pull yourself together. Never mind your best man. Let’s get to the church.”

“Okay,” said the young man heavily. And he swung into the back seat of the car. And in a swipe, I had her in motion and we were down the street, heading for Bloor.

“Which church?” I inquired again. “The big gray one? On the south side?”

“That’s it,” said the groom. “My best man knows all about it. He was there this morning and last night both, for the rehearsals.”

“Weren’t you?” I demanded.

“I couldn’t get out until noon,” said the boy, exhausted. “I left my leave as late as possible so as to have more time for the honeymoon. So, Bill – that’s my best man – attended to all the details.”

“Listen, son,” I reassured him, “this is all as easy as pie. It’s only five minutes past. Everything will be waiting. The minister will in the vestry. Your bride will be out in the car, in front, waiting for your arrival the signal to enter, on her father’s arm. These church weddings are pie. All that’s going on now is, they are playing the organ a little longer, the guests are having a little longer to sit and look at each other’s hats, and the only guy that is at all excited is your best man, wherever he is…”

“I can’t understand what happened to him,” grated the young flier, who was appreciably calmed now by our soothing talk and the fact that he was en route.

“Two blocks to go,” I cried cheerily.

“And this way,” said Jimmie, “it will be all over quicker.”

I could see, far ahead, the throng of cars in front of the church, the usual gathering of spectators around the steps and pavement in front of the church. We drove to a space left in front of the vestry, and even as the policeman strolled towards us, we all three were out of the car and up the sidewalk to the vestry and in the door.

All was silent.

The vestry was deserted.

I tip-toed over and pushed the swinging green baize doors that led into the church, to peek in the crack.

The sight that met my eyes froze me with horror.

There, in the packed church, the gowned clergyman was in the very act of handing the ring to the bridegroom, with the bride standing there and the best man and all. And the groom was an airman.

It all came to me in a flash.

The best man was perfidiously marrying the bride for himself!

“Quick,” I hissed, beckoning the groom and Jimmie towards me. “Quick!”

“Wha… wha…” said the groom, relapsing into his terror again.

“There’s your best man,” I hissed, “marrying your girl!”

In the Wrong Church

The groom peeked through the crack. He kicked the green baize doors apart. At the very instant the ring was about to be placed on the bride’s finger, he kicked those doors wide open with a great bang and strode into the church.

Jim and I stood transfixed. Talk about romance! Talk about excitement. Oh, to be young once more.

The groom took five terrific paces forward in front of a paralyzed church, minister, bride, and all.

Then he halted. Then he executed the perfect Manning Pool about turn, in the best precision drill style.

And towards us he marched back, his heels ringing on the stone floor.

“Wrong church,” he said, as he passed us.

Wham went the green baize doors. Out the vestry we went, helter skelter, just as the cop was starting to take down our car license number on his nasty little one dollar pad.

Into the car we bounced.

“Hey,” said the cop.

“Wrong church,” I said to him, stepping on starter.

“Oh,” said the cop.

We raced west three blocks.

“Will this be it?” I cried over my shoulder.

“Hey, yes, whoa, wait,” yelled the boy, half opening the door. “There’s my bride, just the way you said, in the car with her father.”

“In the side door,” I yelled, as he streaked across the street heading straight for his bride.

“Okay,” he shouted back, turning to point. “My best man.”

And coming out the vestry door was another airman, as red and tousled and flustered as the groom, waving his arms and gesticulating.

“All’s well that ends well,” sighed Jimmie.

And we blocked traffic for a couple of minutes as we sat and watched the groom and the best man pull themselves together on the vestry sidewalk and then, side by side, in the best Manning Pool tradition, step off by the left and march, stiff, straight and chins high, into the vestry.

Then we heard the organ resounding in the church and still another airman appeared on the church steps and bowed stiffly towards the bride’s car.

And her Daddy got out, poor, bewildered, excited old boy, and bowed his pretty little daughter out, and gave her his arm.

And they went up the church steps, amidst the crowd, all eyes leaping, all mouths open.

Including ours.