Big Game - A Story for Girls

The boy looked up eagerly.

"Strategy! Plans! What plans? What can we possibly do out of the

ordinary course?"

But Margot only laughed mischievously, and refused to be drawn.

The cruel parent in the case of Ronald Vane was exemplified by an

exceedingly worthy and kind-hearted gentleman, who followed the

profession of underwriter at Lloyd's. His family had consisted of three

daughters before Ronald appeared to gratify a long ambition. Now, Mr

Vane was a widower, and his son engrossed a large share in his

affections, being at once his pride, his hope, and his despair. The lad

was a good lad; upright, honourable, and clean-living; everything, in

fact, that a father could wish, if only,--but that "if" was the

mischief! It was hard lines on a steady-going City man, who was famed

for his level-headed sobriety, to possess a son who eschewed fact in

favour of fancy, and preferred rather to roam the countryside composing

rhymes and couplets, than to step into a junior partnership in an

established and prosperous firm.

It is part of an Englishman's creed to appreciate the great singers of

his race,--Shakespeare, Milton, Tennyson, not to mention a dozen lesser

fry; but, strange to say, though he feels a due pride in the row of

poets on his library shelves, he yet regards a poet by his own fireside

as a humiliation and an offence. A budding painter, a sculptor, a

musician, may be the boast of a proud family circle, but to give a youth

the reputation of writing verses is at once to call down upon his head a

storm of ridicule and patronising disdain! He is credited with being

effeminate, sentimental, and feeble-minded; his failure is taken as a

preordained fact; he becomes a butt and a jest.

Mr Vane profoundly hoped that none of the underwriters at Lloyd's would

hear of Ronald's scribbling. It would handicap the boy in his future

work, and make it harder for him to get rid of his "slips"! No one

could guess from the lad's appearances that there was anything wrong,--

that was one comfort! He kept his hair well cropped, and wore as high

and glossy collars as any fellow in his right mind.

"You don't know when you are well off!" cried the irate father. "How

many thousands would be thankful to be in your shoes, with a place kept

warm to step into, and an income assured from the start! I am not

asking you to sit mewed up at a desk all day. If you want to use your

gift of words, you couldn't have a better chance than as a writer at

Lloyd's. There's scope for imagination too,--judiciously applied! And

you would have your evenings free for scribbling, if you haven't had

enough of it in the daytime."