gly accepted, so the bets proposed by Taffy were of a
modest nature. Once he brought off a forty to one chance. Taffy rushed
to him with the news, dancing with excitement. Doggie's stoical
indifference to the winning of twenty pounds, a year's army pay, gave
him cause for great wonder. As Doggie showed similar equanimity when
he lost, Taffy put him down as a born sportsman. He began to admire
him tremendously.

This friendship with Taffy is worth special record, for it was
indirectly the cause of a little revolution in Doggie's regimental
life. Taffy was an earnest though indifferent performer on the penny
whistle. It was his constant companion, the solace of his leisure
moments and one of the minor tortures of Doggie's existence. His
version of the _Marseillaise_ was peculiarly excruciating.

One day, when Taffy was playing it with dreadful variations of his own
to an admiring group in the Y.M.C.A. hut, Doggie, his nerves rasped to
the raw by the false notes and maddening intervals, snatched it out of
his hand and began to play himself. Hitherto, shrinking morbidly from
any form of notoriety, he had shown no sign of musical accomplishment.
But to-day the musician's impulse was irresistible. He played the
_Marseillaise_ as no one there had heard it on penny whistle before.
The hut recognized a master's touch, for Doggie was a fine executant
musician. When he stopped there was a roar: "Go on!" Doggie went on.
They kept him whistling till the hut was crowded.

Thenceforward he was penny-whistler, by excellence, to the battalion.
He whistled himself into quite a useful popularity.

CHAPTER XI

"We're all very proud of you, Marmaduke," said the Dean.

"I think you're just splendid," said Peggy.

They were sitting in Doggie's rooms in Woburn Place, Doggie having
been given his three days' leave before going to France. Once again
Durdlebury had come to Doggie and not Doggie to Durdlebury. Aunt
Sophia, however, somewhat ailing, had stayed at home.

Doggie stood awkwardly before them, conscious of swollen hands and
broken nails, shapeless ammunition boots and ill-fitting slacks;
morbidly conscious, too, of his original failure.

"You're about ten inches more round the chest than you were," said the
Dean admiringly.

"And the picture of health," cried Peggy.

"For anyone who has a sound constitution," answered Doggie, "it is
quite a healthy life."

"Now that you've got into the way, I'm sure you must reall