Simon by Rosemary Sutcliff Page A

turned his attention tothe fashionable boots. ‘Umm, they’re very fine,’ he said at last. ‘How do you walk in them?’
    ‘Why, it took a bit of practice, I’ll admit,’ said Barnaby airily. ‘But I’ve got the knack of it now. Wait a moment, and I’ll show you.’ And he began, with many grimaces, to pull on his treasures. It took him some while to do so, but he managed it at last, and rising, began to walk up and down the cramped room with what was meant to be a careless swagger, but was actually a pigeon-toed waddle; for the turn-down tops of his boots were so wide that he could only get along with his legs almost as wide apart as though he was on horseback.
    The sight was almost too much for Simon. He let out a stifled sound between a snort and a hiccup, and then recovered himself. ‘They—they’re splendid boots.’
    ‘Yes, I think they’re pretty good. Don’t believe there’s another pair like them in the Army,’ said Barnaby, squinting sideways at his legs.
    ‘I—I shouldn’t think there would be,’ agreed Simon.
    ‘Ah, well, even in the Army one can observe the decencies, you know. It’s different with the Ironsides, of course: they mostly pride themselves on dressing like a cross between a parson and a horse-thief.’
    ‘Most of the officers of—of ours are old Ironsides, aren’t they?’ said Simon.
    The other nodded, and sat down on the bed. ‘The senior ones, anyhow. More than half of the men too.’ He reached for the boot-jack and began to rid himself of his boots. ‘The rest of us are Fairfax’s men. Of course, between us, we’re the cream of the Army.’
    Simon sat silent for a few moments, watching him wrestling with his left boot. Then he said, ‘You know, it was a tremendous piece of luck, my running into you like this.’
    ‘’Twas so,’ agreed Barnaby, beginning on the other boot. ‘You’d not have been in Fairfax’s Horse tonight, if you hadn’t. And—well, we
are
the cream of the Army. We’re worthy of the General, and no one can say fairer than that.’
    ‘What is he really like, the General?’ asked Simon.
    ‘How d’you mean?’
    ‘Well—he seems queer somehow: that quiet slow way he has of speaking, when everything he
does
seems so quick; as if you were watching one man and listening to another,’ fumbled Simon.
    ‘Oh, there’s nothing mysterious about that. The moment he slackens the bearing-rein, he starts stammering.’
    ‘Stammering?’
    ‘Like a July cuckoo,’ said Barnaby, setting his boots tenderly in the corner.
    Simon thought this over for a few moments; then he said, ‘Yes, but what is he like?’
    ‘Oh goodness!’ the other said helplessly. ‘How in the name of—’
    The door opened and a young man, evidently the owner of the third bed, came in. Barnaby appealed to him. ‘Fletcher, what’s the Lord-General like? Carey wants to know.’
    ‘Fiery Tom? Oh, he’s all right,’ said the new-comer, yawning. ‘Lord, but I’m tired till my bones ache.’
    ‘Why “Fiery Tom”?’ asked Simon, made stubbornly persistent by his tiredness.
    ‘Wait till you see him in action, then you’ll know.’ Cornet Fletcher turned to drag off his coat, but was checked by a shout from Barnaby.
    ‘Hi! Don’t go trampling over my best boots, you blear-eyed hippopotamus!’
    ‘With all due respect, sir,’ said Cornet Fletcher, continuing to take off his coat, ‘curse your best boots! One can’t move an inch in this dog-hole without falling over them!’
    ‘If you don’t like my boots,’ said Barnaby reasonably, ‘go and share with Bennet and Anderson.’
    ‘Bennet’s such a hell-fire red-hot militant Anabaptist. No stable-mate for a peaceable fellow like me.’
    ‘There’s that, of course.’
    ‘And Anderson plays the recorder under the blankets.’
    ‘
What
? Old Sober-sides? Gammon!’ Boots and the General were instantly forgotten.
    ‘Found him at it, when I went to rouse him out about that sick horse the other night.’
    ‘It