Scruffy - A Diversion

Free Scruffy - A Diversion by Paul Gallico

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Authors: Paul Gallico
She said, “He’s O.I.C.—Officer in Charge of Apes.”
    Lady French was sometimes afflicted by the tortures of sinus, and found that smelling salts offered a certain relief. She now laid down her tapestry, opened her near-by handbag, took out the bottle of smelling salts, removed the stopper and took two deep whiffs that brought tears to her eyes. By the time she had wiped them away she was able to speak. “Well, I wouldn’t mention this young man to your father if I were you. You know how he feels about the Army. He’s in a state anyway—the Brigadier is coming for dinner tonight. We’re dressing, of course. Do try to do your hair nicely for once, Felicity. I don’t think your father likes the Brigadier very much—he never lets him get a word in edgeways—it’s Army, Army, Army, when he comes.”
    And indeed it was so at the dinner-party that night. The Admiral never did get to hold forth, for the Brigadier was loaded to the back of his teeth with narrative about the depredations committed by one of those confounded Rock apes, a creature by the name of Scruffy, who had invaded the town that day and wrought enough damage as might well cause an investigating committee from Parliament to descend upon them.
    It was apes this, and apes that, filthy destructive beasts, and gradually through the Brigadier’s fulminations the name of Captain Bailey surfaced. Impudent, time-wasting young cub. Just the useless type of officer they were sending out these days. The name of Scruffy receded into the background and that of Captain Timothy Bailey took over. It seemed that everything that was wrong with, on, in, around and about Gibraltar might now safely be laid at the door of a congenital idiot named Bailey.
    Lady French paled beneath her make-up, but never once wavered in the elegant and delicate dissection of the portion of fish upon her plate. She did, however, manage to throw one glance of anguish at her daughter, who sat at the opposite side next to the Brigadier’s handsome young Staff Captain, to whom she was paying not the slightest attention. She had done the best she could with her unruly hair, and had plastered it down with water, but now it was drying and beginning to stick up. Her attention was bent upon the Brigadier. She was drinking in every word he was saying, and absolutely glowing with pride and happiness.
    Lady French suddenly felt she didn’t care for any more fish.

5

Scruffy Lifts a Scalp
    I nfuriated by having been laughed at by a young English girl as well as shaken by this narrow escape, Mr. Ramirez felt the need of a drink and continued on his way to a pub, the Admiral Nelson, where he often stopped for a beer on his way home, there to encounter his second humiliation of the day.
    It was always a lonely beer he had in the Admiral Nelson since no one ever asked him to join up or opened conversation with him. Even strangers who came into the pub in search of companionship as well as drink would not bother to pass the time of day with the unprepossessing little man with the thick lenses, pasty, unhealthy-looking skin, squat body and shoe-brush haircut.
    It was about his usual hour, just past six o’clock, when Ramirez entered the bar which had not yet begun to fill up, although at one end he saw Gunner Lovejoy.
    Ramirez knew the Gunner by sight. Everyone on the Rock knew Gunner Lovejoy, Keeper of the Apes. The Gunner on the other hand, particularly when he was having a drink, saw no one.
    This particular evening Ramirez felt the need of some kind of companionship or human contact to the point where, unfortunately, he chose to force himself upon the Gunner, who was on his third Monkey Juice, a revolting potion he had invented himself. It was Guinness’s Stout, laced with a dash of lime juice. It did something for him.
    As Ramirez entered, Lovejoy turned his head at the noise to see who had arrived and looked directly at and through Ramirez as though he were not there, although they had both been

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