THE FIGHTING MAN
He clapped on his hat.
"And now the first thing to be done is to hold a Council of War with
old Piper."
The boy looked up shyly.
"Could I have something to eat first, sir? I haven't tasted food for
twenty-four hours."
The Parson fussed off to the cupboard.
"Just like me. Just like a man. No thought--no consideration. All
comes of there being no woman about the place."
He brought out a knuckle of ham, a loaf, a pot of jam, and a jug of
milk.
As he did so there came a groaning gurgle from the corner.
The Parson whirled round and shot a denouncing finger at the piled
bed.
"You dare!" he roared.
"I was ony sniffin, sir," whimpered a cockney voice.
Then for the first time Kit saw that in the bed lay a man. A shaven
head, pert and pug-like, and a face shining with sweat protruded. All
the rest was lost beneath that mountain of clothes.
As Kit stared, the man winked a merry brown eye at him.
The boy approached.
"Isn't it rather stuffy under all those clothes?" he asked
compassionately.
"It's like a h'oven, sir--that ot!" chirped the little man.
"You'll go to a much hotter place when you die, if you so much as stir
a finger out," called the Parson with firm cheerfulness. "I'm a
Parson, mind you. I know what I'm talkin about."
"Ah, I know you wouldn't go for to put a pore bloke away for fetchin
his thumb to mop a drop o sweat off his conk," whined the other.
"Ha! you sweat, Knapp?"
"I spouts pushpiration, sir!"
"Capital, capital!" The Parson hopped across the room and bent his ear
to the bed. "I can almost hear him simmer!" He twinkled up at Kit.
"It's the very weather for him. He's in a sweet muck-sweat. Lying
between two feather-beds, ain't you, me boy?"
He sat down on the table beside the eating lad.
"That's Nipper Knapp. He was my batman in the Borderers. I brought him
down here to train, while I was waiting for the French. Such a pretty
little bit o stuff! Arms like legs, and legs like bodies. I'll strip
him for you one day. Only thing is I have to sweat the meat off him
so. Get a belly on him in a day, little pig, if I'd let him."
He spoke of the man much as a farmer speaks of his beasts. The boy's
sensitive soul recoiled.
"He can hear every word," he whispered.
"I don't mind," replied the Parson cheerfully.
"Nor don't I," chirped the voice from the bed.
"And what are you training him for?" asked Kit--"the Church, like
yourself?"
"No, sir!" retorted the Parson shortly. "I'm training him to make the
best use he can of the gifts God has given him--that's his hands and
his feet. He can rattle his dukes, and chuck his trotters, as I never
saw man yet. Strips ten six. All good, too; all guts. You can't glut
him.... I'm backing him to run ten miles in the hour against any man
in England, and fight him to a finish in a 24-ft. ring at the end."
The boy shoved back his plate.
"And have you any other spiritual duties, sir?" he asked.
"I stand over Blob while Piper teaches him his prayers," replied the
Parson sullenly.
"Who is Piper?"
The Parson was staring out of the window.
It was some time before he answered.
"I once asked Nelson who was the bravest man he'd ever met. He
answered like a flash, 'My captain of the foretop aboard the
_Agamemnon_--Ralph Piper. The bravest man,' said Nelson, 'because
the best. He's my hero!' And I remember the voice in which he said it
now."
Kit had risen to his feet.
All his life Nelson had been his hero; and now he was within touch of
his hero's hero.
"Where is he?" with glowing eyes.
"Out there--under the sycamores."
Kit recalled the voice humming the hymn that had welcomed him.