ROLLS CALL
Sta.----Last Sunday my nephew Robin told two Daily Mirror reporters from the John Rolls column who visited hiS country cottage that he was not announcing his engagement on Monday or Tuesday. After they had left his prospective mother-in-law telephoned to say that in view of the publicity which had already broken. she felt it better to announce the engagement at once. He therefore telephoned to the editor of the coluam, 'John Rolls,' to inform him of this change of plan. 'John Rolls' asked him to ring back in an hour after he had heard what his reporters had to say. This he duly did, only to..be told that 'John: Rolls' would not speak to hint. The f011oWing (Monday) morning there appeared in the John Robs eolumn in the Doily Mirror a story which my nephew con- sidered to be unfriendly in view of the trouble he had taken to set the matter right. He therefore rang 'John Rolls' again. During the ensuing conversation, to which he had a witness, he informs me that 'John
Wolfs' among others, the following phrases:
• It) Do you treat everyone as office boys?'
(2) 'I don't care if you are a peer's nephew.'
(3) 'You told a pack of lies.' (4) 'I won't he b-------d about by people like you.'
(5) 'If you don't play fair with me. I can't guarantee to present you to the public in the light you would like.'
(6) 'The least you could, do was to ask my reporters in for a drink.'
On receipt of this information from my nephew 1 at once telephoned the Daily Mirror and asked to speak to 'John Rolls.' I was told that he was not available. I therefore informed his deputy that 1 intended to write a letter to the press on the subject and wished to be fair to both participants. Later I rang again detailing the individual quotations and suggest- ing that 'John Rolls' should ring me before 5 p.m. on Tuesday when .1 planned to pen this letter. He duly rang on Tuesday afternoon. I asked him if he had in fact spoken to my nephew in the way detailed above. He replied that the ,quotations were inaccurate and out of context. 1 then remarked that it was unlikely that they could be both and invited him to tell me whether he had said these things or not. He then replied that he was not going to tell nie whether he had said them or whether he had not. Later in the conversation he admitted to having said some parts of the quotations, but continued to protest that they were out of context. Later still he reverted to the earlier plea that they were totally inaccurate. After some -further exchanges, during which he embarked on a diversiOnary counter-argument to the effect that my nephew had been rude to his reporters, which (apart from his emphatic denial supported by two witnesses, one of them a reporter from another news- paper) seems unlikely in view of his having gone out of his way to help the Daily Mirror, I rang off. I leaVe your readers with some confidence to draw their own conclusions.---Yours faithfully,
WILLIAM DOUGLAS ROW.
Drayton House, Liar Won, Hants
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