Читать книгу The Leithen Stories - Buchan John - Страница 10

TO MAJOR-GENERAL

SIR FRANCIS LLOYD, K.C.P.

My Dear General,

A recent tale of mine has, I am told, found favour in the dugouts and billets of the British front, as being sufficiently short and sufficiently exciting for men who have little leisure to read. My friends in that uneasy region have asked for more. So I have printed this story, written in the smooth days before the war, in the hope that it may enable an honest man here and there to forget for an hour the too urgent realities. I have put your name on it, because among the many tastes which we share, one is a liking for precipitous yarns.

J.B.