Page:Love and Learn (1924).pdf/149

 picture. Grenadier Tompkins took leave of us with a snarling: "You arsked for h'action, you blighters, h'and you got it!"

Really, I could have been given thirty years at hard labor for what I thought of Mr. Grenadier Tompkins after that exhibition of sportsmanship! Hazel was as burnt up as I was and we talked about hardly anything else all the way up to London, in those little trick trains that look like something you'd bring home to Sonny for Xmas. A couple of medicos fixed up the battered leading man and the company came up to King George's home town with us, all of us fussing over Delancey and making him as comfortable as it's possible for anyone to be with a sirloin steak over each eye. Darn it, I liked the way he took it! Not a whine out of him; he was just sorry the picture would have to be held up. Mr. Daft, the director, kept swearing he'd murder Grenadier Tompkins in cold blood, and all of a sudden while he was madly raving, a scheme to get even with the middleweight champion struck me like a flash. It was a daring plan, and, yes, a crazy one—but I was satisfied if it was successful it would mark Grenadier Tompkins "Paid!"

I took Mr. Daft away from the others and told him about it. He didn't say a word for a full minute, and then he suddenly slapped my knee, immediately apologizing—oh, he was all right.