"Carry on, Jeeves" - читать интересную книгу автора (P. G. Wodehouse)
 |
Jeeves Takes Charge
Now, touching this business of old Jeeves – my man, you know – how do we stand?
Lots of people think I’m much too dependent on him. My Aunt Agatha, in fact, has gone so far as to
call him my keeper. Well, what I say is: Why not? The man’s a genius. From the collar upward he
stands alone. I gave up trying to run my own affairs within a week of his coming to me. That was
about half a dozen years ago, directly after the rather rummy business of Florence Craye, my Uncle
Willoughby’s book, and Edwin, the Boy Scout.
The thing really began when I got back to Easeby, my uncle’s place in Shropshire. I was spending a
week or so there, as I generally did in the summer; and I had had to break my visit to come back to
London to get a new valet. I had found Meadowes, the fellow I had taken to Easeby with me, sneaking
my silk socks, a thing no bloke of spirit could stick at any price. It transpiring, moreover, that he had
looted a lot of other things here and there about the place, I was reluctantly compelled to hand the
misguided blighter the mitten and go to London to ask the registry office to dig up another specimen
for my approval. They sent me Jeeves.
I shall always remember the morning he came. It so happened that the night before I had been present
at a rather cheery little supper, and I was feeling pretty rocky. On top of this I was reading a book
Florence Craye had given me. She had been one of the house-party at Easeby, and two or three days
before I left we had got engaged. I was due back at the end of the week, and I knew she would expect
me to have finished the book by then. You see, she was particularly keen on boosting me up a bit
nearer her own plane of intellect. She was a girl with a wonderful profile, but steeped to the gill in
serious purpose. I can’t give you a better idea of the way things stood than by telling you that the book
she’d given me to read was called ‘Types of Ethical Theory’, and that when I opened it at random I
struck a page beginning:
The postulate in common understanding involved in speech is certainly co-extensive, in the obligation it
carries, with the social organism of which language is the instrument, and the ends of which it is an
effort to subserve.
All perfectly true, no doubt; but not the sort of thing to spring on a lad with a morning head.
I was doing my best to skim through this bright little volume when the bell rang. I crawled off the sofa
and opened the door. A kind of darkish Johnnie stood without.
“I was sent by the agency, sir,” he said. “I was given to understand that you required a valet.”
I’d have preferred an undertaker; but I told him to stagger in, and he floated noiselessly through the
doorway like a healing zephyr. That impressed me from the start. Meadowes had had flat feet and
used to clump. This fellow didn’t seem to have any feet at all. He just streamed in. He had a grave,
sympathetic face, as if he, too, knew what it was to sup with the lads.
“Excuse me, sir,” he said gently.
Then he seemed to flicker, and wasn’t there any longer. I heard him moving around in the kitchen, and
presently he came back with a glass on a tray.
‘If you would drink this, sir,” he said, with a kind of bedside manner, rather like the royal doctor
shooting the bracer into the sick prince. “It is a little preparation of my own invention. It is the
Worcester Sauce that gives its colour. The raw egg makes it nutritious. The red pepper gives it its bite.
Gentlemen have told me they have found it extremely invigorating after a late evening.”
I would have clutched at anything that looked like a lifeline that morning.
I swallowed the stuff. For a moment I felt as if somebody had touched off a bomb inside the old bean
and was strolling down my throat with a lighted torch, and then everything seemed suddenly to get all
right. The sun shone in through the window; birds twittered in the tree-tops and, generally speaking,
hope dawned once more.
“You’re engaged!” I said, as soon as I could say anything.
I perceived dearly that this cove was one of the world’s workers, the sort no home should be without.
“Thank you, sir. My name is Jeeves.”
“You can start in at once?”
“Immediately, sir.”
“Because I’m due down at Easeby, in Shropshire, the day after tomorrow.”
“Very good, sir.” He looked past me at the mantelpiece. “That is an excellent likeness of Lady
Florence Craye, sir. It is two years since I saw her ladyship. I was at one time in Lord Worplesdon’s
employment. I tendered my resignation because I could not see eye to eye with his lordship in his
desire to dine in dress trousers, a flannel shirt, and a shooting coat.”
He couldn’t tell me I didn’t know about the old boy’s eccentricity. This Lord Worplesdon was
Florence’s father. He was the old buster who, a few years later, came down to breakfast one morning,
lifted the first cover he saw, said “Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Damn all eggs!” in an overwrought sort of voice,
and instantly legged it for France, never to return to the bosom of his family. This, mind you, being a
bit of luck for the bosom of the family, for old Worplesdon had the worst temper in the county.
I had known the family ever since I was a kid, and from boyhood up this old boy had put the fear of
death into me. Time, the great healer, could never remove from my memory the occasion when he
found me – then a stripling of fifteen – smoking one of his special cigars in the stables. He got after me
with a hunting-crop just at the moment when I was beginning to realise that what I wanted most on
earth was solitude and repose, and chased me more than a mile across difficult country. If there was a
flaw, so to speak, in the pure joy of being engaged to Florence, it was the fact that she rather took after
her father, and one was never certain when she might erupt. She had a wonderful profile, though.
“Lady Florence and I are engaged, Jeeves.” I said.
“Indeed, sir.”
You know, there was a kind of rummy something about his manner. Perfectly all right and all that, but
not what you’d call chirpy. It somehow gave me the impression that he wasn’t keen on Florence. Well,
of course, it wasn’t my business.
I supposed that while he had been valeting old Worplesdon she must have trodden on his toes in some
way. Florence was a dear girl, and seen sideways, most awfully good-looking; but if she had a fault it
was a tendency to be a bit imperious with the domestic staff.
At this point in the proceedings there was another ring at the front door.
Jeeves shimmered out and came back with a telegram. I opened it. It ran
Return immediately. Extremely urgent. Catch first train.
Florence.
“Rum!” I said.
“Sir?”
“Oh, nothing.”
It shows how little I knew Jeeves in those days that I didn’t go a bit deeper into the matter with him.
Nowadays I would never dream of reading a rummy communication without asking him what he
thought of it. And this one was devilish
odd. What I mean is, Florence knew I was going back the Easeby the day after tomorrow, anyway; so
why the hurry call? Something must have happened, of course; but I couldn’t see what on earth it
could be.
“Jeeves,” I said, “we shall be going down to Easeby this afternoon. Can you manage it?”
“Certainly, sir.”
“You can get your packing done and all that?”
“Without any difficulty, sir. Which suit will you wear for the journey?”
“This one.”
I had on a rather sprightly young check that morning, to which I was a good deal attached. I fancied it,
in fact, a more than a little. It was perhaps rather sudden till you get used to it, but, nevertheless, an
extremely sound effort, which many lads at the club and elsewhere had admired unrestrainedly.
“Very good, sir.”
Again there was that kind of rummy something in his manner. It was the way he said it, don’t you
know? He didn’t like the suit. I pulled myself together to assert myself. Something seemed to tell me
that, unless I was jolly careful and nipped this lad in the bud, he would be starting to boss me. He had
the aspect of a distinctly resolute blighter.
Well, I wasn’t going to have any of that sort of thing, by Jove! I’d seen so many cases of fellows who
had become perfect slaves to their valets. I remember poor old Aubrey Fothergill telling me – with
absolute tears in his eyes, poor chap! – one night at the club, that he had been compelled to give up a
favourite pair of brown shoes simply because Meekyn, his man, disapproved of them. You have to
keep these fellows in place, don’t you know? You have to work the good old iron-hand-in-the -velvet-
glove wheeze. If you give them a what’s-its-name, they take a thingummy.
“Don’t you like the suit, Jeeves?” I said coldly.
“Oh, yes, sir.”
“Well, what don’t you like about it?”
“It is a very nice suit, sir.”
“Well, what’s wrong with it? Out with it, dash it!”
“If I might make the suggestion, sir, a simple brown or blue, with a hint of some quiet twill –“
“What absolute rot!”
“Very good, sir.”
“Perfectly blithering. My dear man!”
“As you say, sir.”
I felt as if I had stepped on a place where the last stair ought to have been, but wasn’t. I felt defiant, if
you know what I mean, and there didn’t seem anything to defy.
“All right, then,” I said.
“Yes, sir.”
And then he went away to collect his kit, while I started in again on ‘Types of Ethical Theory’ and
took a stab at a chapter headed ‘Idiopsychological Ethics’.
Most of the way down the train that afternoon, I was wondering what could be up at the other end. I
simply couldn’t see what could have happened. Easeby wasn’t one of those country house you read
about in the society novels, where young girls are lured on to play baccarat and then skinned to the
bone of their jewellery, and so on.
The house-party that I had left had consisted entirely of law-abiding birds like myself.
Besides, my uncle wouldn’t have let anything of that kind to go on in his house.
He was a rather stiff, precise sort of old boy, who liked a quiet life. He was just finishing a history of
the family or something, which he had been working on for the last year, and didn’t stir much from the
library. He was a rather good instance of what they say about it being a good scheme for a fellow to
sow his wild oats. I’d been told that in his youth Uncle Willoughby had been a bit of a bounder. You
would never have thought it to look at him now.
When I got to the house, Oakshott, the butler told me that Florence was in her room watching her
maid pack. Apparently there was a dance on at a house about twenty miles away that night, and she
was motoring over with some of the Easeby lot and would be away some nights. Oakshott said she had
told him to tell her the moment I arrived; so I trickled into the smoking-room and waited, and presently
in she came. A glance showed me that she was perturbed, and even peeved. Her eyes had a goggly
look, and altogether she appeared considerably pipped.
“Darling!” I said, and attempted the good old embrace; but she side-stepped like a bantam-weight.
“Don’t!”
“What’s the matter?”
“Everything’s the matter! Bertie, you remember asking me, when you left, to make myself pleasant to
your uncle?”
“Yes.”
The idea being, of course, that as at that time I was more or less dependent on Uncle Willoughby I
couldn’t marry without his approval. And though I knew he wouldn’t have any objection to Florence,
having known her father since they were at Oxford together, I hadn’t wanted to take any chances; so I
had told her to make an effort to fascinate the old boy.
“You told me it would please him particularly if I asked him to read me some of his history of the
family.”
“Wasn’t he pleased?”
“He was delighted. He finished writing the thing yesterday afternoon, and read me nearly all of it last
night. I have never had such a shock in my life. The book is an outrage. It is horrible!”
“But, dash it, the family weren’t so bad as all that.”
“It is not a history of the family at all. Your uncle has written his reminiscences! He calls them
‘Recollections of a Long Life’!”
I began to understand. As I say, Uncle Willoughby had been somewhat on the tabasco side as a young
man, and it began to look as if he might have turned out something pretty fruity if he had started
recollecting his long life.
“If half of what he has written is true,” said Florence, “your uncle’s youth must have been perfectly
appalling. The moment we began to read he plunged straight into a most scandalous story of how he
and my father were thrown out of a music-hall in 1887!”
“Why?”
“I decline to tell you why.”
It must have been something pretty bad. It took a lot to make them chuck people out of music-halls in
1887.
“Your uncle specifically states that father had drunk a quart and a half of champagne before beginning
the evening,” she went on. “The book is full of stories like that. There is a dreadful one about Lord
Emsworth.”
“Lord Emsworth? Not the one we know? Not the one at Blandings?”
A most respectful old Johnnie, don’t you know? Doesn’t do a thing nowadays but dig in the garden
with a spud.
“The very same. That is what makes the book so unspeakable. It is full of stories about people one
knows are essence of propriety today, but who seem to have behaved, when they were in London in
the eighties, in a manner that would
not have been tolerated in the fo’c’sle of a whaler. Your uncle seems to remember everything
disgraceful that happened to anybody when he was in his early twenties. There is a story about Sir
Stanley Gervase-Gervase at Rosherville Gardens which is ghastly in its perfection of details. It seems
that Sir Stanley – but I can’t tell you!”
“Have a dash!”
“No!”
“Oh, well, I shouldn’t worry. No publisher will print the book if it’s as bad as all that.”
“On the contrary, your uncle told me that all negotiations are settled with Riggs and Ballinger, and he’s
sending off the manuscript tomorrow for immediate publication. They make a special thing of that sort
of book. They published Lady
Carnaby’s ‘Memories of Eighty Interesting Years’.”
“I read ‘em!”
“Well, then, when I tell you that Lady Carnaby’s Memories are simply not to be compared with your
uncle’s Recollections, you will understand my state of my mind. And father appears in nearly every
story in the book. I am horrified at the things he did when he was a young man!”
“What’s to be done?”
“The manuscript must be intercepted before it reaches Riggs and Ballinger, and destroyed!”
I sat up.
This sounded rather sporting.
“How are you going to do it?” I inquired.
“How can I do it? Didn’t I tell you the parcel goes off tomorrow? I am going to the Murgatroyds’
dance tonight and shall not be back till Monday. You must do it. That is why I telegraphed to you.”
“What!”
She gave me a look.
“Do you mean to say you refuse to help me, Bertie?”
“No, but – I say!”
“It’s quite simple.”
“But even if I – What I mean is – Of course, anything I can do – but – if you know what I mean –”
“You say you want to marry me, Bertie?”
“Yes of course; but still –”
For a moment she looked exactly like her old father.
“I will never marry you if those Recollections are published.”
“But, Florence, old thing!”
“I mean it. You may look on it as a test, Bertie. If you have the resource and courage to carry this
thing through, I will take it as evidence that you are not the vapid and shiftless person most people
think you. If you fail, I shall know that your Aunt Agatha was right when she called you a spineless
invertebrate and advised me not to marry you. It will be perfectly simple for you to intercept the
manuscript, Bertie. It only requires a little resolution.”
“But suppose Uncle Willoughby catches me at it? He’d cut me off with a bob.”
“If you care more for your uncle’s money than for me –”
“No, no! Rather not!”
“Very well, then. The parcel containing the manuscript will, of course, be placed on the hall table
tomorrow for Oakshott to take to the village post office with the letters. All you have to do is to take it
away and destroy it. Then your uncle will think it has been lost in the post.”
It sounded thin to me.
“Hasn’t he got a copy of it?”
“No, it has not been typed. He is sending the manuscript just as he wrote it.”
“But he could write it over again.”
“As if he would have the energy!”
“But –”
“If you are going to do nothing but make absurd objections, Bertie –”
“I was only pointing things out.”
“Well, don’t! Once and for all, will you do me this quite simple act of kindness?”
The way she put it gave me an idea.
“Why not get Edwin to do it? Keep it in the family, kind of, don’t you know? Besides, it would be a
boon to the kid.”
A jolly bright idea it seemed to me. Edwin was her younger brother, who was spending his holidays at
Easeby. He was a ferret-faced kid, whom I had disliked since birth. As a matter of fact, talking of
Recollections and Memories, it was young blighted Edwin who, nine years before, had led his father to
where I was smoking his cigar and caused all the unpleasantness. He was fourteen now and had just
joined the Boy Scouts. He was one of those thorough kids, and took his responsibilities pretty
seriously. He was always in a sort of fever because he was dropping behind schedule with his daily
acts of kindness. However hard he tried, he’d fall behind; and then you would find him prowling about
the house, setting such a clip to try and catch up with himself that Easeby was rapidly becoming a
perfect hell for man and beast.
The idea didn’t seem to strike Florence.
“I shall do nothing of the kind, Bertie. I wonder you can’t appreciate the compliment I am paying you
– trusting you like this.”
“Oh, I see that all right, but what I mean is, Edwin would do it so much better than I would. These
Boy Scouts are up to all sorts of dodges. They spoor, don’t you know, and take cover and creep
about, and what not.”
“Bertie, will you or will you not do this perfectly trivial thing for me? If not, say so now, and let us end
this farce of pretending that you care a snap of finger for me.”
“Dear old soul, I love you devotedly!”
“Then will you or will you not –”
“Oh, all right,” I said. “All right! All right! All right!”
Then I tottered forth to think it over. I met Jeeves in the passage outside.
“I beg your pardon, sir. I was endeavouring to find you.”
“What’s the matter?”
“I felt that I should tell you, sir, that somebody has been putting black polish on your brown walking
shoes.”
“What? Who? Why?”
“I could not say, sir.”
“Can anything be done with them?”
“Nothing, sir.”
“Damn!”
“Very good, sir.”
I’ve often wondered since then how these murderer fellows manage to keep in shape while they’re
contemplating their next effort. I had a much simpler sort of job on hand, and the thought of it rattled
me to such an extent in the night that I was a perfect wreck next day. Dark circles under the eyes – I
give you my word! I had to call on Jeeves to rally round with one of those life-savers of his.
From breakfast on I felt like a bag-snatcher at a railway station. I had to hang about waiting for the
parcel to be put on the hall table, and it wasn’t put.
Uncle Willoughby was a fixture in the library, adding the finishing touches to the great work, I
supposed, and the more I thought the thing over the less I liked it.
The chances against my pulling it off seemed about three to two, and the thought of what would
happen if I didn’t – gave me cold shivers down the spine.
Uncle Willoughby was a pretty mild sort of old boy, as a rule, but I’ve known him to cut up rough,
and, by Jove, he was scheduled to extend himself if he caught me trying to get away with his life’s
work.
It wasn’t till nearly four that he toddled out of the library with the parcel under his arm, put it on the
table, and toddled off again. I was hiding a bit to the south-east at the moment, behind a suit of
armour. I bounded out and legged it for the table. Then I nipped upstairs to hide the swag. I charged in
like a mustang and nearly stubbed my toe on young blighted Edwin, the Boy Scout. He was standing at
the chest of drawers, confound him, messing about with my ties.
“Hallo!” he said.
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m tidying your room. It’s my last Saturday’s act of kindness.”
“Last Saturday’s?”
“I’m five days behind. I was six till last night, but I polished your shoes.”
“Was it you –”
“Yes. Did you see them? I just happened to think of it. I was in here, looking around. Mr Berkeley had
this room while you were away. He left this morning. I thought perhaps he might have left something
in it that I could have sent on. I’ve often done acts of kindness that way.”
“You must be a comfort to one and all!”
It became more and more apparent to me that this infernal kid must somehow be turned out eftsoons
or right speedily. I had hidden the parcel behind my back, and I didn’t think he had seen it; but I
wanted to get at that chest of drawers quick, before anyone came along.
“I shouldn’t bother about tidying the room,” I said.
“I like tidying it. It’s not a bit of trouble – really.”
“But it’s quite tidy now.”
“Not so tidy as I shall make it.”
This was getting perfectly rotten. I didn’t want to murder the kid, and yet there didn’t seem any other
way of shifting him. I pressed down the mental accelerator. The old lemon throbbed fiercely. I got an
idea.
“There’s something much kinder than that which you could do,” I said.
“You see that box of cigars? Take it down to the smoking-room and snip off the ends for me. That
would save me no end of trouble. Stagger along, laddie.”
He seemed a bit doubtful; but he staggered. I shoved the parcel into a drawer, locked it, trousered the
key, and felt better. I might be a chump, but, dash it, I could out-general a mere kid with a face like a
ferret. I went downstairs again. Just as I was passing the smoking-room door out curveted Edwin. It
seemed to me that if he wanted to do a real act of kindness he would commit suicide.
“I’m snipping them,” he said.
“Snip on! Snip on!”
“Do you like them snipped much, or only a bit?”
“Medium.”
“All right. I’ll get on then.”
“I should.”
And we parted.
Fellows who know all about that sort of thing – detectives, and so on – will tell you that the most
difficult thing in the world is to get rid of the body. I remember, as a kid, having to learn by heart a
poem about a bird by the name of Eugene Adam, who had the deuce of a job in this respect. All I can
recall of the actual poetry is the bit that goes:
Tum-tum, tum-tum, tum-tumty-tum,
I slew him, tum-tum-tum!
But I recollect that the poor blighter spent much of his valuable time dumping the corpse into the ponds
and burying it, and what not, only to have it pop out at him again. It was about an hour after I had
shoved the parcel into the drawer when I realised that I had let myself in for just the same sort of
thing.
Florence had talked in an airy sort of way about destroying the manuscript; but when one came down
to it, how the deuce can a chap destroy a great chunky mass of paper in somebody else’s house in the
middle of summer? I couldn’t ask to have a fire in my bedroom, with the thermometer in the eighties.
And if I didn’t burn the thing, how else could I get rid of it? Fellows on the battlefield eat dispatches to
keep them from falling into the hands of the enemy, but it would have taken me a year to eat Uncle
Willoughby’s Recollections.
I’m bound to say that the problem absolutely baffled me. The only thing seemed to be to leave the
parcel in the drawer and hope for the best. I don’t know whether you have ever experienced it, but it’s
dashed unpleasant thing having a crime one one’s conscience. Towards the end of the day the mere
sight of the drawer began to depress me. I found myself getting all on edges; and once when Uncle
Willoughby trickled silently into the smoking-room when I was alone there and spoke to me before I
knew he was there, I broke the record of sitting high jump.
I was wondering all the time when Uncle Willoughby would sit up and take notice. I didn’t think he
would have the time to suspect that anything had gone wrong till Saturday morning, when he would be
expecting, of course, to get the acknowledgement of the manuscript from the publishers. But early on
Friday evening he came out of the library as I was passing and asked me to step in. he was looking
completely rattled.
“Bertie,” he said – he always spoke in a precise sort of pompous kind of way – “an exceedingly
disturbing thing has happened. As you know, I dispatched the manuscript of my book to Messrs Riggs
and Ballinger, the publishers, yesterday afternoon. It should have reached them by the first post this
morning. Why I should have been uneasy I cannot say, but my mind was not altogether at rest
respecting the safety of parcel. I therefore telephoned to Messrs Riggs and Ballinger a few moments
back to make inquiries. To my consternation they informed me that they were not yet in receipt of my
manuscript.”
“Very rum!”
“I recollect distinctly placing it myself on the hall table in good time to be taken to the village. But there
is a sinister thing. I have spoken to Oakshott, who took the rest of the letters to the post office, and he
cannot recall seeing it there. He is, indeed, unswerving in his assertions that when he went to the hall to
collect the letters there was no parcel among them.”
“Sounds funny!”
“Bertie, shall I tell you what I suspect?”
“What’s that?”
“The suspicion will no doubt sound to you incredible, but it alone fits the facts as we know them. I
incline to the belief that the parcel has been stolen.”
“Oh, I say! Surely not!”
“Wait! Hear me out. Though I have said nothing to you before, or to anyone else, concerning the
matter, the fact remains that during the past few weeks a number of objects – some valuable, others
not – have disappeared in this house. The conclusion to that we have a kleptomaniac in our midst. It is
a peculiarity of kleptomania, as you are no doubt aware, that the subject is unable to differentiate
between the intrinsic values of objects. He will purloin an old coat as readily as a diamond ring, or a
tobacco pipe costing but a few shillings with the same eagerness as a purse of gold. The fact that this
manuscript of mine could be of no possible value to any outside person convinces me that –”
“But uncle, one moment; I know all about those things that were stolen. It was Meadowes, my man,
who pinched them. I caught him snaffling my silk socks. Right in the act, by Jove!”
He was tremendously impressed.
“You amaze me, Bertie! Send for the man and question him.”
“But he isn’t here. You see, directly I found that he was a sock-sneaker I gave him the boot. That’s
why I went to London – to get a new man.”
“Then, if the man Meadowes is no longer in the house it could not be he who purloined my
manuscript. The whole thing is inexplicable.”
After which he brooded for a bit. Uncle Willoughby pottered about the room, registering baffledness.
While I sat sucking at a cigarette, feeling like a chappie I’d once read about in a book, who murdered
another cove and hid the body under the dining-room table, and then had to be the life and soul of the
dinner party, with it there all the time. My guilty secret oppressed me to such an extent that after a
while I couldn’t stick it any longer. I lit another cigarette and started for a stroll in the grounds, by way
of cooling off. It was one of those still evenings you get in the summer, when you can hear a snail clear
its throat a mile away. The sun was sinking over the hills and gnats were fooling about all over the
place, and everything smelled rather topping – what with the falling dew and so on – and I was just
beginning to feel a bit soothed by the peace of it all when suddenly I heard my name spoken.
“It’s about Bertie.”
It was the loathsome voice of young blighted Edwin! For a moment I couldn’t locate it. Then I realised
it came from the library. My stroll had taken me within a few yards of the open window.
I had often wondered how those Johnnies in the books did it – I mean the fellows with whom it was
the work of a moment to do about a dozen things that ought to have taken them about ten minutes.
But, as a matter of fact, it was the work of a moment with me to chuck away my cigarette, swear a
bit, leap about ten yards, dive into a bush that stood near the library window, and stand there with my
ears flapping. I was as certain as I’ve ever been of anything that all sorts of rotten things were in the
offing.
“About Bertie?” I heard Uncle Willoughby say.
“About Bertie and your parcel. I heard you talking to him just now. I believe he’s got it.”
When I tell you that just as I heard these frightful words a fairly substantial beetle of sorts dropped
from the bush down the back of my neck, and I couldn’t even steer to squash the same, you will
understand that I felt pretty rotten.
Everything seemed against me.
“What do you mean, boy? I was discussing the disappearance of my manuscript with Bertie only a
moment back, and he professed himself as perplexed by the mystery as myself.”
“Well, I was in his room yesterday afternoon, doing him an act of kindness, and he came in with a
parcel. I could see it, though he tried to keep it behind his back. And then he asked me to go to the
smoking-room and snip some cigars for him; and about two minutes afterwards he came down – and
he wasn’t carrying anything. So it must be in his room.”
I understand they deliberately teach these dashed Boy Scouts to cultivate their powers of observation
and deduction and what not. Devilish thoughtless and inconsiderate of them, I call it. Look at the
trouble it causes.
“It sounds incredible,” said Uncle Willoughby, thereby bucking me up a trifle.
“Shall I go and look in his room?” asked young blighted Edwin. “I’m sure the parcel’s there.”
“But what could be his motive for perpetrating this extraordinary theft?”
“Perhaps he’s a – what you said just now?”
“A kleptomaniac? Impossible?”
“It might have been Bertie who took all those things from the very start,”
suggested the little brute hopefully. “He may be like Raffles.”
“Raffles?”
“He’s a chap in a book who went about pinching things.”
“I cannot believe Bertie would – ah – go about pinching things.”
“Well, I’m sure he’s got the parcel. I’ll tell you what you might do. You might say that Mr Berkeley
wired that he had left something here. He had Bertie’s room, you know. You might say you wanted to
look for it.”
“That would be possible. I –”
I didn’t wait to hear any more. Things were getting too hot. I sneaked softly out of my bush and raced
for the front door. I sprinted up to my room and made for the drawer where I had put the parcel. And
then I found I hadn’t the key. It wasn’t for the deuce of a time that I recollected I had shifted it to my
evening trousers the night before and must have forgotten to take it out again. Where the dickens were
my evening things? I had looked all over the place before I remembered that Jeeves must have taken
them away to brush. To leap at the bell and ring it was, with me, the work of a moment. I had just
rung it when there was a footstep outside, and in came Uncle Willoughby.
“Oh, Bertie,” he said without a blush, “I have – ah – received a telegram from Berkeley, who occupied
this room in your absence, asking me to forward his – er – his cigarette-case, which, it would appear,
he inadvertently omitted to take with him when he left the house. I cannot find it downstairs and it has,
occurred to me that he may have left it in his room. I will – er – just take a look round.”
It was one of the most disgusting spectacles I’ve ever seen. This white-haired man – who should have
been thinking of the hereafter – was standing here and lying like an actor.
“I haven’t seen it anywhere,” I said.
“Nevertheless, I will search. I must – ah – spare no effort.”
“I should have seen it if it had been here – what?”
“It may have escaped your notice. It is – er – possibly in one of the drawers.”
He began to nose about. He pulled drawer after drawer, pottering round like an old bloodhound, and
babbling from time to time about Berkeley and his cigarette-case in a way that it struck me as perfectly
ghastly. I just stood there, losing weight every moment.
Then he came to the drawer where the parcel was.
“This appears to be locked,” he said, rattling the handle.
“Yes, I shouldn’t bother about that one. It – it’s – locked, and all that sort of thing.”
“You don’t have the key?”
A soft, respectful voice spoke behind me.
“I fancy, sir, that this must be the key you require. It was in the pocket of your evening trousers.”
It was Jeeves. He had shimmered in, carrying my evening things, and was standing there holding out
the key. I could have massacred the man.
“Thank you,” said my uncle.
“Not at all, sir.”
The next moment Uncle Willoughby had opened the drawer. I shut my eyes.
“No,” said Uncle Willoughby. “there is nothing here. The drawer is empty.
Thank you, Bertie. I fancy – er – Berkeley must have taken his case with him after all.”
When he had gone I shut the door carefully, then I turned to Jeeves. The man was putting my evening
things out on a chair.
“Er – Jeeves!”
“Sir!”
“Oh, nothing.”
It was deuced difficult to know how to begin.
“Er – Jeeves!”
“Sir?”
“Did you – Was there – Have you by chance –”
“I removed the parcel this morning, sir.”
“Oh – ah – why?”
“I considered it more prudent, sir.”
I mused for a while.
“Of course, I suppose all these seems tolerably rummy to you, Jeeves?”
“Not at all, sir. I chanced to overhear you and Lady Florence speaking of the matter other evening,
sir.”
“Did you, by Jove?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well – er – Jeeves, I think that, on the whole, if you were to – as it were – freeze on to that parcel
until we get back to London –”
“Exactly, sir.”
“And then we might – er – so to speak – chuck it away somewhere – what?
“Precisely, sir.”
“I’ll leave it in your hands.”
“Entirely, sir.”
“You know, Jeeves, you’re by way of being rather a topper.”
“I endeavour to give satisfaction, sir.”
“One in a million, by Jove!”
“It is very kind of you to say so, sir.”
“Well, that’s about all, I think.”
“Very good, sir.”
Florence came back on Monday. I didn’t see her till we were all having tea in the hall. It wasn’t till the
crowd had cleared away a bit that we got a chance of having a word together.
“Well, Bertie?” she said.
“It’s all right.”
“You have destroyed the manuscript?”
“Not exactly; but –”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I haven’t absolutely –”
“Bertie, your manner is furtive!”
“It’s all right. It’s this way –”
And I was just going to explain how things stood when out of the library came leaping Uncle
Willoughby, looking as braced as a two-year-old. The old boy was a changed man.
“A most remarkable thing, Bertie! I have just been speaking with Mr Riggs on the telephone, and he
tells me he received my manuscript by the first post this morning. I cannot imagine what can have
caused the delay. Our postal facilities are extremely inadequate in the rural districts. I shall write to
headquarters about it. It is insufferable if valuable parcels are to be delayed in this fashion.”
I happened to be looking at Florence’s profile at the moment, and at this juncture she swung round and
gave me a look that went right through me like a knife. Uncle Willoughby meandered back to the
library, and there was a silence that
you could have dug bits out of it with a spoon.
“I can’t understand it,” I said at last. “I can’t understand it, by Jove!”
“I can. I can understand it perfectly, Bertie. Your heart failed you. Rather than risk offending your
uncle, you –”
“No, no! Absolutely!”
“You preferred to lose me rather than risk losing the money. Perhaps you did not think I meant what I
said. I meant every word. Our engagement is ended.”
“But – I say!”
“Not another word!”
“But, Florence, old thing!”
“I do not wish to hear any more. I see now that your Aunt Agatha was perfectly right. I consider that I
have had a very lucky escape. There was a time when I thought that, with patience, you might be
moulded into something worthwhile.
I see now that you are impossible!”
And she popped off, leaving me to pick up the pieces. When I had collected the debris to some extent,
I went to my room and rang for Jeeves. He came in looking as if nothing had happened or was ever
going to happen. He was the calmest thing in captivity.
“Jeeves!” I yelled. “Jeeves, that parcel has arrived in London!”
“Yes, sir?”
“Did you send it?”
“Yes, sir. I acted for the best, sir. I think that both you and Lady Florence overestimated the danger of
people being offended at being mentioned in Sir Willoughby’s Recollections. It has been my
experience, sir, that the normal person enjoys seeing his or her name in print, irrespective of what is
said about them. I have an aunt, sir, who a few years ago was a martyr to swollen limbs.
She tried Walkinshaw’s Supreme Ointment and obtained considerable relief – so much so that she sent
them an unsolicited testimonial. Her pride at seeing her photograph in the daily papers in connection
with descriptions of her lower limbs before taking, which were nothing less than revolting, was so
intense that it led me to believe that publicity, of whatever sort, is what nearly everybody desires.
Moreover, if you have ever studied psychology, sir, you will know that old gentlemen are by no means
averse to having it being advertised that they were extremely wild
in their youth. I have an uncle –”
I cursed his aunts and his uncles and him and all the rest of his family.
“Do you know that Lady Florence has broken off her engagement with me?”
“Indeed, sir?”
Not a bit of sympathy! I might have been telling him it was a fine day.
“You’re sacked!”
“Very good, sir.”
He coughed gently.
“As I am no longer in your employment, sir, I can speak freely without appearing to take a liberty. In
my opinion you and Lady Florence were quite unsuitably matched. Her ladyship is of a highly
determined and arbitrary temperament, quite opposed to your own. I was in lord Worplesdon’s service
for nearly a year, during which time I had ample opportunities of studying her ladyship. The opinion of
servants’ hall was far from favourable to her. Her ladyship’s temper caused a good deal of adverse
comment among us. It was at times quite impossible. You would not have been happy, sir.”
“Get out!”
“I think you would also have found her educational methods a bit trying, sir. I have glanced at the
book her ladyship gave you – it has been lying on your table since our arrival – and it is, in my opinion,
quite unsuitable. You would not have enjoyed it. And I have from her ladyship’s own maid, who
happened to overhear a conversation between her ladyship and one of the gentlemen staying here –
Mr Maxwell, who is employed in an editorial capacity by one of the reviews – that it was her intention
to start you almost immediately upon Nietzsche. You would not enjoyed Nietzsche, sir. He is
fundamentally unsound.”
“Get out!”
“Very good, sir.”
It’s rummy how sleeping on a thing often makes you feel quite different about it. It’s happened to me
over and over again. Somehow or other, when I woke next morning the old heart didn’t feel half so
broken as it had done. It was a perfectly topping day, and there was something about the way the sun
came in through the window and the row of birds were kicking up in the ivy that made me half wonder
whether Jeeves wasn’t right. After all, though she had a wonderful profile, was it such a catch being
engaged to Florence Craye as the casual observer might imagine?
Wasn’t there something in what Jeeves had said about her character? I began to realise that my ideal
wife was something quite different, something a lot more clinging and drooping and prattling and what
not.
I had got as far as this in thinking the thing out when that book ‘Types of Ethical Theory’ caught my
eye. I opened it, and I give you my honest word this was what hit me:
Of the two antithetic terms in the Greek philosophy only one was real and self-subsisting; and that one
was Ideal Thoughts as opposed to that which it has to penetrate and mould. The other, corresponding
to our Nature, was in itself phenomenal, unreal, without any permanent footing, having no predicates
that held true for two moments together; in short. Redeemed from negation only by including
indwelling realities appearing through.
Well – I mean to say – what? And Nietzsche, from all accounts, a lot worse than that!
“Jeeves,” I said when he came with my morning yea, “I’ve been thinking it over. You’re engaged
again.”
“Thank you, sir.”
I sucked down a cheerful mouthful. A great respect for this bloke’s judgement began to soak through
me.
“Oh, Jeeves,” I said. “about that check suit.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is it really a frost?”
“A trifle too bizarre, sir, in my opinion.”
“But lots of fellows have asked me who my tailor is.”
“Doubtless in order to avoid him, sir.”
“He’s supposed to be one of the best men in London.”
“I am saying nothing against his moral character, sir.”
I hesitated a bit. I had a feeling that I was passing into this chappie's clutches, and that if I gave in now
I should become lust like poor old Aubrey Fothergill, unable to call my soul my own. On the other
hand, this was obviously a cove of rare intelligence, and it would be a comfort in a lot of ways to have
him doing the thinking for me. I made up my mind.
“All right, Jeeves,” I said. “You know! Give the bally thing away to somebody!”
He looked down at me like a father gazing tenderly at the wayward child.
“Thank you, sir. I gave it to the under-gardener last night. A little more tea, sir?”
The Artistic Career of Corky
You may notice, as you read these reminiscences of mine, that from time to time things happen in and
around the city of New York. It is just possible that this may cause you to look surprised, and ask
yourselves, ‘What is Bertram doing so far from England, the land he loves so well?’
Well, to cut a long story short, what happened was that my Aunt Agatha once sent me over to America. My
orders were to try to stop young Gussie, my cousin, marrying a girl who was an actress. I managed the
whole thing so badly that I decided I had better stay in New York instead of going back and having long
cosy conversations with Aunt Agatha about it.
So I sent Jeeves out to find a reasonable flat, and made myself as comfortable as I could, for a long stay. I
must say, New York is a most cheerful place to live in, if things are too hot for you at home. Fellows
introduced me to other fellows and so on, and it wasn’t long before I knew large numbers of the right sort.
Some of them -the wealthy types- lived in big houses up by Central Park, and others -the not-so-wealthy
artists and writers and so on- lived mostly around
Washington Square.
Corky, whose real name was Bruce Corcoran, was one of the artists. A portrait-painter, he called himself,
but in fact his score up to now had been zero. You see, the difficulty about portrait painting -I’ve looked
into the thing a bit- is that you can’t start painting portraits until people come along and ask you to, and they
won’t come and ask you until you’ve painted a lot first. This makes
it kind of difficult, not to say tough, for the ambitious young man.
Corky managed to make a little money by drawing an occasional funny picture for the newspapers -he could
produce something quite amusing when he got a good idea. But his main income came from his rich uncle,
Alexander Worple, who was in the jute business. I’m not quite sure what jute is, exactly, but it seems that
people are very keen on it, because Mr Worple had made a huge fortune out of selling it.
Now, a lot of fellows think that having a rich uncle makes life easy, but Corky tells me this is not true.
Worple was only fifty-one, a strong, healthy sort of chap, who looked capable of living for ever. It was not
this, however, that worried poor Corky, who did not mind his uncle going on living.
What really annoyed Corky was the way old Worple used to bother him constantly. Corky’s uncle, you see,
didn’t want him to be an artist. He didn’t thing Corky was good enough. He was always trying to persuade
him to give up Art and go into the jute business, starting at the bottom and working up. But Corky said that,
although he didn’t know what people did at the bottom of the jute business, he felt sure it was something
too horrible for words. He believed in his future as an artist, and wanted to make a career of Art.
Meanwhile, his uncle, rather unwillingly, paid him a small allowance four times a year.
Corky wouldn’t even have received this if his uncle hadn’t had a hobby. In his spare time Mr Worple
studied birds. He had written a book called American Birds, and was writing another, which would be
called More American Birds . When he had finished that one, he was expected to begin a third, and go on
until there were no more American birds left. Corky used to visit him once every three months, and just sat
there, while his uncle talked about birds. As long as Corky listened politely for an hour or so, he felt more or
less sure he would receive his allowance. But it was rather unpleasant for the poor chap. He never really
knew for certain if he would get the money, you see, and anyway, he was only interested in birds served on
a dish, with a good bottle of cold dry white wine.
Mr Worple was a man of extremely uncertain temper. He also seemed to think that Corky was a poor fool
who could not manage anything successfully. I expect Jeeves feels very much the same about me. So when
Corky staggered into my apartment one afternoon, pushing a girl gently in front of him, and said, ‘Bertie, I
want you to meet my fiancée, Miss Singer,’ I immediately realized what his problem was.
‘Corky, what about your uncle?’ I asked. The poor chap gave a shaky laugh.
‘We’re so worried,’ said the girl. ‘We were hoping you could suggest a way of breaking the news gently to
Mr Worple.’
Muriel Singer was one of those quiet, good-looking girls, who have a way of looking at you with their big
eyes. ‘You are the greatest thing on earth,’ they seem to say. ‘You big strong man, you!’ She gave a fellow
a wonderful feeling, made him want to take her hand and say, ‘Don’t worry, little one!’ or something like
that. What I mean is, she made me feel brave and clever and capable, all at the same time.
‘I should think your uncle would be delighted to hear you’re engaged,’ I said to Corky. He’ll consider Miss
Singer the perfect wife for you.’
Corky didn’t look any happier, ‘You don’t know him. He’s got a very strange character. If he liked Muriel,
he’d still pretend he didn’t. If I tell him I’m engaged, he’ll just think I’ve decided something important
without asking him, and he’ll automatically lose his temper. He’s always done that.’
My brain was working overtime to meet this emergency. ‘You want to arrange for him to meet Miss Singer
without knowing that you know her. Then you come along-‘
‘But how can I arrange that?’
I saw his point. That was the difficulty. ‘There’s only one thing to do,’ I said.
‘What’s that?’
‘Leave it to Jeeves.’ And I rang the bell.
‘Sir?’ said Jeeves, appearing from nowhere. One of the rummy things about Jeeves is that, unless you
watch him closely, you rarely see him come into a room. He’s like one of those strange chaps in India who
can disappear into thin air and then reappear in another place.
The moment I saw him standing there, listening politely, I felt hugely relieved, like a lost child who sees his
father in the distance.
‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘we want your advice.’
‘Very good, sir.’
I told him Corky’s painful story in a few well-chosen words. ‘So you see the problem, Jeeves.
How can Mr Worple get to know Miss Singer, without realizing that Mr Corcoran already knows her? Can
you try to think of something?’
‘I have thought of something already, sir.’
‘You have, by Jove!’
‘My plan is certain to succeed, sir, but I am afraid the costs will be considerable.’
This made poor Corky look depressed. But I was still under the influence of the girl’s melting look, and I
saw that I could help. ‘Don’t worry about that, Corky,’ I said. ‘I’ll be only too glad to be of assistance.
Carry on, Jeeves.’
‘I suggest, sir, that Mr Corcoran should take advantage of the fact that Mr Worple is so fond of birds. The
young lady could write a small book, called, for example, The Children’s Book of American Birds. All the
way through the work there would be frequent and enthusiastic remarks about Mr Worple’s own book on
birds, You, sir, would pay to have a limited number of copies of this book published. Then we would send a
copy to Mr Worple, with a letter from the young lady, in which she asks to meet the author to whom she
owes so much. This, I imagine, would produce the result you wish for.’
I felt extremely proud of Jeeves. What a brain that man has!
‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘that is absolutely wonderful. One of your very best ideas.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
The girl said, ‘But I couldn’t write a book about anything. I can’t even write good letters.’
‘You see, Bertie,’ said Corky, ‘Muriel is more of a dancer and a singer, than a writer. In fact, she’s
appearing in Choose your Exit at the Manhattan Theatre. I didn’t mention it before, but that’s why we feel
a little worried about how Uncle Alexander will receive the news. He’s so unreasonable!’
But Jeeves had the answer, of course. ‘I imagine it would be a simple matter, sir, to find some author in
need of money who would be glad to do the actual writing.’
‘That’s true,’ said Corky. ‘Sam Patterson would do it for a hundred dollars. I’ll get in touch with him at
once.’
‘Fine!’ I said.
‘Will that be all, sir?’ said Jeeves. ‘Very good, sir.’
I always used to think that publishers were extremely brainy fellows, but I know better now.
All a publisher has to do is write occasional cheques, while a lot of hard-working chappies do the real work.
I know, because I’ve been a publisher myself. I simply sat in the old flat with a pen and a chequebook, and
one day a lovely shiny new book appeared.
The girl’s name was written in gold letters on the red cover. I opened it and read:
Often on a spring morning, as you walk through the fields, you will hear the sweet, carelessly-flowing
song of the Eastern Bluebird. When you are older, you must read all about him in Mr Alexander Worple’s
wonderful book, ‘American Birds’.
You see. And only a few pages later there was another mention of the uncle, connected to the Yellow-
headed Blackbird. It was great writing. I didn’t see how the uncle could fail to feel warmly towards Miss
Singer.
And a day or so later Corky staggered up to my flat to tell me that all was well. Mr Worple had written
Muriel a letter so full of the milk of human kindness that Corky almost refused to believe his uncle had
written it. Any time it suited Miss Singer to call, said the uncle, he would be delighted to meet her.
Soon after this I had to leave New York, to visit several of my new friends at their country places. So it
wasn’t until some months later that I came back to the city again. I hadn’t heard from Corky, and had been
wondering how things had gone in my absence. On my first evening back in New York, I happened to go
into a quiet sort of little restaurant, and there, sitting alone at a table, was Muriel Singer. I greeted her.
‘Why, Mr Wooster! How are you?’ she replied.
‘Where’s Corky?’
’I beg your pardon?’
‘You’re waiting for Corky, aren’t you?’
‘Oh, I didn’t understand. No, I’m not waiting for him.’
It seemed to me that there was a sort of something in her voice. ‘I say, you and Corky haven’t been
arguing, have you?’
‘Why, whatever makes you think that?’
‘Oh, well, what I mean is - I thought you usually had dinner with him before you went to the theatre.’
‘I don’t work in the theatre any more.’
Suddenly the whole thing was clear to me. I had forgotten what a long time I had been away.
‘Why, of course, I see now! You’re married!’
‘Yes.’
‘How perfectly wonderful! I wish you every happiness.’
‘Thank you so much. Oh, Alexander,’ she said, looking past me, ‘this is a friend of mine – Mr Wooster.’ I
turned past quickly. A fellow with a lot of stiff grey hair and a red sort of healthy face was standing there. ‘I
want you to meet my husband, Mr Wooster. This is a friend of Bruce’s, Alexander.’
The old boy shook my hand warmly. and that was all that prevented me from falling to the floor.
‘So you know my nephew, Mr Wooster?’ I heard him say. ‘I wish you would try to make him give up this
playing at painting. But I think perhaps he’s less wild these days. I noticed it that night he came to dinner
with us, my dear, when he was first introduced to you. He seemed quieter and more serious than before.
Now, Mr Wooster, will you have dinner with us tonight? It would be a pleasure for us.’
I said I had already had dinner, and left. What I needed than was air, not food. When I reached my flat, I
called Jeeves.
‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘this is urgent. A stiff brandy for me, first of all, and you’d better have one yourself. I’ve
got some news that will shock you.’
‘I won’t have one just now, thank you, sir. Perhaps later.’
‘All right. But prepare yourself. You remember Mr Corcoran? And the girl who was supposed to slide
smoothly into his uncle’s circle of friends, by writing the book on birds?’
‘I remember perfectly, sir.’
‘Well, she’s slid. She’s married the uncle.’
He took it without showing any surprise. You can’t shock Jeeves. ‘That was always a possible
development, sir.’
‘Really, by Jove! I think you could have warned us.’
‘I didn’t like to take the liberty, sir.’
Of course, after I had had a bite to eat and was in a calmer mood, I realized that what had happened wasn’t
my fault. But all the same, I must say I didn’t look forward to meeting Corky again until time had lessened
his pain a bit. I avoided Washington Square absolutely for the next few months. And then, just when I was
beginning to think I could safely stagger in that direction, the most awful thing happened. Opening the paper
one morning, I read that Mr and Mrs Alexander Worple had just had a son. I was so dashed sorry for poor
old Corky that I hadn’t the heart to touch my breakfast. It was the end. Absolutely. He had lost the girl he
loved, and now he had lost the Worple jute millions as well!
I wanted, of course, to hurry down to Washington Square and show the poor fellow how sympathetic I felt,
but when I thought about it, absence seemed the best medicine. I gave him litres of it.
But after a month or so, I began to realize that the poor chap probably needed his friends even more at a
moment like this. I imagined him sitting in his lonely room with nothing but his bitter thoughts, and this
made me so sad that I jumped into a taxi and told the driver to drive there at once.
When I arrived, I found Corky at work. He was painting, while on a chair in the middle of the room sat a
cross-looking woman holding a baby.
‘Hallo, Bertie,’ said Corky. ‘We’re just finishing for the day. That will be all this afternoon – the same time
tomorrow, please,’ he told the nurse, who got up with the baby and left.
Corky turned to me and began to pour out his feelings. ‘It’s my uncle’s idea. The portrait will be a surprise
for Muriel on her birthday. Just think, Bertie! It’s the first time anyone’s ever asked me to paint a portrait,
and the sitter is that human boiled egg, who’s stolen my uncle’s fortune from me! Can you believe it! Now I
have to spend my afternoons staring into that little kid’s ugly face! I can’t refuse to paint the portrait,
because if I did, my uncle would stop my allowance. But I tell you, Bertie, sometimes when that kid turns
and looks unpleasantly at me, I come close to murdering him. There are moments when I can almost see
the front page of the evening newspaper:
“Promising Young Artist Kills Baby With Hammer”.’
I touched his shoulder silently. My sympathy for the poor old fellow was too deep for words.
For some time after that, I kept away from his flat, because it didn’t seem right to disturb the poor chappie
in his misery. Anyway, that dashed nurse reminded me of Aunt Agatha. She had the same cold stare.
But one afternoon Corky phoned me. ‘Bertie, could you come down here this afternoon? I’ve finished the
portrait.’
‘Good boy! Great work!’
‘Yes.’ He sounded doubtful. ‘The fact is, Bertie, it doesn’t look quite right to me. My uncle’s coming in
half an hour to inspect it, and - I don’t know why, but I feel I’d like your support!’
‘You think he’ll get nasty?’
‘He may.’
I remembered the red-faced chappie I had met in the restaurant. It was only too easy to imagine him getting
nasty.
‘I’ll come,’ I told Corky, ‘but only if I can bring Jeeves.’
‘Why Jeeves? Jeeves was the fool who suggested…’
‘Listen, Corky, old thing! If you think I’m going to meet that uncle of yours without Jeeves’ support, you’re
wrong! I’d rather go up to a tiger and bite it on the back of the neck.’
‘Oh, all right,’ said Corky, unwillingly.
So Jeeves and I went round to Corky’s flat. We found him looking worriedly at the picture.
The light from the big window fell right on the portrait. I took a good look at it, then went closer to examine
it. Then I went back to where I had been at first, because it hadn’t seemed quite so bad from there.
‘Well?’ said Corky, anxiously.
I hesitated a bit. ‘Of course, old man, I only saw the kid once, but - but it was an ugly sort of kid, wasn’t
it?’
‘As ugly as that?’
I looked again, and honestly forced me to be truthful. ‘I don’t see how it could have been, old chap.’
Poor Corky looked miserable. ‘You’re quite right, Bertie. Something’s gone wrong with the dashed thing. I
think I must have got through the kid’s outward appearance, and painted his soul.’
‘But he’s so young! Could a child of that age have a soul as bad as that? What do you think, Jeeves?’
‘I doubt it, sir. The child’s expression is most unpleasant, and he has a decidedly inebriated manner, sir.’
Just then the door opened and the uncle came in. For about three seconds all was sweetness and light. ‘Nice
to see you, Mr Wooster. How are you, Bruce, my boy? So, the portrait is really finished, is it? Well, bring it
out. Let’s have a look. This will be a wonderful surprise for your aunt -‘
Then he saw it, suddenly, before he was ready. He stepped quickly backwards. For perhaps a minute there
was one of the worst silences I’ve ever experienced.
‘Is this a joke?’ he asked, turning violently on Corky, like a wild animal that smells red meat.
‘You call yourself a painter! I wouldn’t let you paint a house of mine! I asked you to paint a portrait, and
this - this - this is the result! Well, let me tell you something. Unless you come to my office on Monday,
prepared to give up all these stupid ideas and ready to start at the bottom of the business, I won’t give you
another cent - not another cent!’ The door opened and closed behind him.
‘Corky, old man!’ I whispered sympathetically.
‘Well, that finishes it,’ said Corky in a broken voice. ‘What can I do? I can’t keep on painting if he cuts my
allowance. You heard what he said. I’ll have to go to the office on Monday.’
I couldn’t think of a thing to say. I knew exactly how he felt about the office - it would be like going to
prison.
And then a calm voice broke the silence.
‘If I could suggest something, sir?’
It was Jeeves. He had slid from the shadows and was looking seriously at the portrait. ‘It seems to me, sir,
that if Mr Corcoran looks into the matter, he will find a way of solving the problem. The picture may not
please Mr Worple as a portrait of his only child, but it is fresh and lively, and catches the attention. I have
no doubt that newspaper and magazine publishers would pay well for a number of amusing drawings, with
this baby as the central character. I feel sure it would be highly popular.’
Corky was staring angrily at the picture. Suddenly he began to laugh wildly and stagger all over the floor. I
feared the poor chap had gone mad.
‘He’s right! Absolutely right! Jeeves, you’re a lifesaver! Go to the office on Monday! Start at the bottom of
the business! I’ll buy the business if I feel like it! I know a publisher who’ll pay me anything I like for this!
Where’s my hat? Lend me five dollars, Bertie. I’ll take a taxi to Park Row!’
Jeeves smiled in a fatherly way. Or rather, he moved his mouth a bit, which is the nearest he ever gets to
smiling.
‘May I suggest a name, Mr Corcoran, for these drawings you are planning? “The Adventures of Baby
Blobby”.’
Corky and I looked at the picture, then at each other. Jeeves was absolutely right. There could be no other
name.
A few weeks later, I was having breakfast in bed and smiling at Corky’s drawings in The Sunday Star.
‘You know, Jeeves,’ I said, ‘you really are wonderful. Look how well Corky’s doing, and it’s because of
you.’
‘I am pleased to say that Mr Corcoran has been most generous to me, sir. I am putting out the brown suit
for you, sir.’
‘No, I think I’ll wear the blue with the thin red stripe.’
‘Not the blue with the thin red stripe, sir.’
‘But I think it suits me rather well.’
‘Not the blue with the thin red stripe, sir.’
‘Oh, all right, have it your own way.’
‘Very good, sir. Thank you, sir.’
Jeeves and the Unbidden Guest
I'm not absolutely certain of my facts, but I rather fancy it's Shakespeare--or, if not, it's some equally brainy
lad--who says that it's always just when a chappie is feeling particularly top-hole, and more than usually
braced with things in general that Fate sneaks up behind him with a bit of lead piping. There's no doubt the
man's right.
It's absolutely that way with me. Take, for instance, the fairly rummy matter of Lady Malvern and her son
Wilmot. A moment before they turned up, I was just thinking how thoroughly all right everything was.
It was one of those topping mornings, and I had just climbed out from under the cold shower, feeling like a
two-year-old. As a matter of fact, I was especially bucked just then because the day before I had asserted
myself with Jeeves--absolutely asserted myself, don't you know. You see, the way things had been going on
I was rapidly becoming a dashed serf. The man had jolly well oppressed me. I didn't so much mind when
he made me give up one of my new suits, because, Jeeves's judgment about suits is sound. But I as near as
a toucher rebelled when he wouldn't let me wear a pair of cloth-topped boots which I loved like a couple of
brothers. And when he tried to tread on me like a worm in the matter of a hat, I jolly well put my foot down
and showed him who was who. It's a long story, and I haven't time to tell you now, but the point is that he
wanted me to wear the Longacre--as worn by John Drew--when I had set my heart on the Country
Gentleman--as worn by another famous actor chappie--and the end of the matter was that, after a rather
painful scene, I bought the Country Gentleman. So that's how things stood on this particular morning, and I
was feeling kind of manly and independent.
Well, I was in the bathroom, wondering what there was going to be for breakfast while I massaged the good
old spine with a rough towel and sang slightly, when there was a tap at the door. I stopped singing and
opened the door an inch.
"What ho without there!"
"Lady Malvern wishes to see you, sir," said Jeeves.
"Eh?"
"Lady Malvern, sir. She is waiting in the sitting-room."
"Pull yourself together, Jeeves, my man," I said, rather severely, for I bar practical jokes before breakfast.
"You know perfectly well there's no one waiting for me in the sitting-room. How could there be when it's
barely ten o'clock yet?"
"I gathered from her ladyship, sir, that she had landed from an ocean liner at an early hour this morning."
This made the thing a bit more plausible. I remembered that when I had arrived in America about a year
before, the proceedings had begun at some ghastly hour like six, and that I had been shot out on to a foreign
shore considerably before eight.
"Who the deuce is Lady Malvern, Jeeves?"
"Her ladyship did not confide in me, sir."
"Is she alone?"
"Her ladyship is accompanied by a Lord Pershore, sir. I fancy that his lordship would be her ladyship's
son."
"Oh, well, put out rich raiment of sorts, and I'll be dressing."
"Our heather-mixture lounge is in readiness, sir."
"Then lead me to it."
While I was dressing I kept trying to think who on earth Lady Malvern could be. It wasn't till I had climbed
through the top of my shirt and was reaching out for the studs that I remembered.
"I've placed her, Jeeves. She's a pal of my Aunt Agatha."
"Indeed, sir?"
"Yes. I met her at lunch one Sunday before I left London. A very vicious specimen. Writes books. She
wrote a book on social conditions in India when she came back from the Durbar."
"Yes, sir? Pardon me, sir, but not that tie!"
"Eh?"
"Not that tie with the heather-mixture lounge, sir!"
It was a shock to me. I thought I had quelled the fellow. It was rather a solemn moment. What I mean is, if
I weakened now, all my good work the night before would be thrown away. I braced myself.
"What's wrong with this tie? I've seen you give it a nasty look before. Speak out like a man! What's the
matter with it?"
"Too ornate, sir."
"Nonsense! A cheerful pink. Nothing more."
"Unsuitable, sir."
"Jeeves, this is the tie I wear!"
"Very good, sir."
Dashed unpleasant. I could see that the man was wounded. But I was firm. I tied the tie, got into the coat
and waistcoat, and went into the sitting-room.
"Halloa! Halloa! Halloa!" I said. "What?"
"Ah! How do you do, Mr. Wooster? You have never met my son, Wilmot, I think? Motty, darling, this is
Mr. Wooster."
Lady Malvern was a hearty, happy, healthy, overpowering sort of dashed female, not so very tall but
making up for it by measuring about six feet from the O.P. to the Prompt Side. She fitted into my biggest
arm-chair as if it had been built round her by someone who knew they were wearing arm-chairs tight about
the hips that season. She had bright, bulging eyes and a lot of yellow hair, and when she spoke she showed
about fifty-seven front teeth. She was one of those women who kind of numb a fellow's faculties. She made
me feel as if I were ten years old and had been brought into the drawing-room in my Sunday clothes to say
how-d'you-do. Altogether by no means the sort of thing a chappie would wish to find in his sitting-room
before breakfast.
Motty, the son, was about twenty-three, tall and thin and meek-looking. He had the same yellow hair as his
mother, but he wore it plastered down and parted in the middle. His eyes bulged, too, but they weren't…
bright. They were a dull grey with pink rims. His chin gave up the struggle about half-way down, and he
didn't appear to have any eyelashes. A mild, furtive, sheepish sort of blighter, in short.
"Awfully glad to see you," I said. "So you've popped over, eh? Making a long stay in America?"
"About a month. Your aunt gave me your address and told me to be sure and call on you."
I was glad to hear this, as it showed that Aunt Agatha was beginning to come round a bit. There had been
some unpleasantness a year before, when she had sent me over to New York to disentangle my Cousin
Gussie from the clutches of a girl on the music-hall stage. When I tell you that by the time I had finished my
operations, Gussie had not only married the girl but had gone on the stage himself, and was doing well,
you'll understand that Aunt Agatha was upset to no small extent. I simply hadn't dared go back and face her,
and it was a relief to find that time had healed the wound and all that sort of thing enough to make her tell
her pals to look me up. What I mean is, much as I liked America, I didn't want to have England barred to
me for the rest of my natural; and, believe me, England is a jolly sight too small for anyone to live in with
Aunt Agatha, if she's really on the warpath. So I
braced on hearing these kind words and smiled genially on the assemblage.
"Your aunt said that you would do anything that was in your power to be of assistance to us."
"Rather? Oh, rather! Absolutely!"
"Thank you so much. I want you to put dear Motty up for a little while."
I didn't get this for a moment.
"Put him up? For my clubs?"
"No, no! Darling Motty is essentially a home bird. Aren't you, Motty darling?"
Motty, who was sucking the knob of his stick, uncorked himself.
"Yes, mother," he said, and corked himself up again.
"I should not like him to belong to clubs. I mean put him up here. Have him to live with you while I am
away."
These frightful words trickled out of her like honey. The woman simply didn't seem to understand the
ghastly nature of her proposal. I gave Motty the swift east-to-west. He was sitting with his mouth nuzzling
the stick, blinking at the wall. The thought of having this planted on me for an indefinite period appalled me.
Absolutely appalled me, don't you know. I was just starting to say that the shot wasn't on the board at any
price, and that the first sign Motty gave of trying to nestle into my little home I would yell for the police,
when she went on, rolling placidly over me, as it were.
There was something about this woman that sapped a chappie's will-power.
"I am leaving New York by the midday train, as I have to pay a visit to Sing-Sing prison. I am extremely
interested in prison conditions in America. After that I work my way gradually across to the coast, visiting
the points of interest on the journey. You see, Mr. Wooster, I am in America principally on business. No
doubt you read my book, India and the Indians? My publishers are anxious for me to write a companion
volume on the United States. I shall not be able to spend more than a month in the country, as I have to get
back for the season, but a month should be ample. I was less than a month in India, and my dear friend Sir
Roger Cremorne wrote his America from Within after a stay of only two weeks. I should love to take dear
Motty with me, but the poor boy gets so sick when he travels by train. I shall have to pick him up on my
return."
From where I sat I could see Jeeves in the dining-room, laying the breakfast-table. I wished I could have
had a minute with him alone. I felt certain that he would have been able to think of some way of putting a
stop to this woman.
"It will be such a relief to know that Motty is safe with you, Mr. Wooster. I know what the temptations of a
great city are. Hitherto dear Motty has been sheltered from them. He has lived quietly with me in the
country. I know that you will look after him carefully, Mr. Wooster. He will give very little trouble." She
talked about the poor blighter as if he wasn't there. Not that Motty seemed to mind. He had stopped
chewing his walking-stick and was sitting there with his mouth open.
"He is a vegetarian and a teetotaller and is devoted to reading. Give him a nice book and he will be quite
contented." She got up. "Thank you so much, Mr. Wooster! I don't know what I should have done without
your help. Come, Motty! We have just time to see a few of the sights before my train goes. But I shall have
to rely on you for most of my information about New York, darling. Be sure to keep your eyes open and
take notes of your impressions! It will be such a help. Good-bye, Mr. Wooster. I will send Motty back early
in the afternoon."
They went out, and I howled for Jeeves.
"Jeeves! What about it?"
"Sir?"
"What's to be done? You heard it all, didn't you? You were in the dining-room most of the time. That pill is
coming to stay here."
"Pill, sir?"
"The excrescence."
"I beg your pardon, sir?"
I looked at Jeeves sharply. This sort of thing wasn't like him. It was as if he were deliberately trying to give
me the pip. Then I understood. The man was really upset about that tie. He was trying to get his own back.
"Lord Pershore will be staying here from to-night, Jeeves," I said coldly.
"Very good, sir. Breakfast is ready, sir."
I could have sobbed into the bacon and eggs. That there wasn't any sympathy to be got out of Jeeves was
what put the lid on it. For a moment I almost weakened and told him to destroy the hat and tie if he didn't
like them, but I pulled myself together again. I was dashed if I was going to let Jeeves treat me like a bally
one-man chain-gang!
But, what with brooding on Jeeves and brooding on Motty, I was in a pretty reduced sort of state. The
more I examined the situation, the more blighted it became. There was nothing I could do. If I slung Motty
out, he would report to his mother, and she would pass it on to Aunt Agatha, and I didn't like to think what
would happen then. Sooner or later, I should be wanting to go back to England, and I didn't want to get
there and find Aunt Agatha waiting on the quay for me with a stuffed eelskin. There was absolutely nothing
for it but to put the fellow up and make the best of it.
About midday Motty's luggage arrived, and soon afterward a large parcel of what I took to be nice books. I
brightened up a little when I saw it. It was one of those massive parcels and looked as if it had enough in it
to keep the chappie busy for a year. I felt a trifle more cheerful, and I got my Country Gentleman hat and
stuck it on my head, and gave the pink tie a twist, and reeled out to take a bite of lunch with one or two of
the lads at a neighbouring hostelry; and what with excellent browsing and sluicing and cheery conversation
and what-not, the afternoon passed quite happily. By dinner-time I had almost forgotten blighted Motty's
existence.
I dined at the club and looked in at a show afterward, and it wasn't till fairly late that I got back to the flat.
There were no signs of Motty, and I took it that he had gone to bed.
It seemed rummy to me, though, that the parcel of nice books was still there with the string and paper on it.
It looked as if Motty, after seeing mother off at the station, had decided to call it a day.
Jeeves came in with the nightly whisky-and-soda. I could tell by the chappie's manner that he was still
upset.
"Lord Pershore gone to bed, Jeeves?" I asked, with reserved hauteur and what-not.
"No, sir. His lordship has not yet returned."
"Not returned? What do you mean?"
"His lordship came in shortly after six-thirty, and, having dressed, went out again."
At this moment there was a noise outside the front door, a sort of scrabbling noise, as if somebody were
trying to paw his way through the woodwork. Then a sort of thud.
"Better go and see what that is, Jeeves."
"Very good, sir."
He went out and came back again.
"If you would not mind stepping this way, sir, I think we might be able to carry him in."
"Carry him in?"
"His lordship is lying on the mat, sir."
I went to the front door. The man was right. There was Motty huddled up outside on the floor. He was
moaning a bit.
"He's had some sort of dashed fit," I said. I took another look. "Jeeves! Someone's been feeding him meat!"
"Sir?"
"He's a vegetarian, you know. He must have been digging into a steak or something. Call up a doctor!"
"I hardly think it will be necessary, sir. If you would take his lordship's legs, while I----"
"Great Scot, Jeeves! You don't think--he can't be----"
"I am inclined to think so, sir."
And, by Jove, he was right! Once on the right track, you couldn't mistake it. Motty was under the surface.
It was the deuce of a shock.
"You never can tell, Jeeves!"
"Very seldom, sir."
"Remove the eye of authority and where are you?"
"Precisely, sir."
"Where is my wandering boy to-night and all that sort of thing, what?"
"It would seem so, sir."
"Well, we had better bring him in, eh?"
"Yes, sir."
So we lugged him in, and Jeeves put him to bed, and I lit a cigarette and sat down to think the thing over. I
had a kind of foreboding. It seemed to me that I had let myself in for something pretty rocky.
Next morning, after I had sucked down a thoughtful cup of tea, I went into Motty's room to investigate. I
expected to find the fellow a wreck, but there he was, sitting up in bed, quite chirpy, reading Gingery
stories.
"What ho!" I said.
"What ho!" said Motty.
"What ho! What ho!"
"What ho! What ho! What ho!"
After that it seemed rather difficult to go on with the conversation.
"How are you feeling this morning?" I asked.
"Topping!" replied Motty, blithely and with abandon. "I say, you know, that fellow of yours--Jeeves, you
know--is a corker. I had a most frightful headache when I woke up, and he brought me a sort of rummy
dark drink, and it put me right again at once. Said it was his own invention. I must see more of that lad. He
seems to me distinctly one of the ones!"
I couldn't believe that this was the same blighter who had sat and sucked his stick the day before.
"You ate something that disagreed with you last night, didn't you?" I said, by way of giving him a chance to
slide out of it if he wanted to. But he wouldn't have it, at any price.
"No!" he replied firmly. "I didn't do anything of the kind. I drank too much! Much too much. Lots and lots
too much! And, what's more, I'm going to do it again! I'm going to do it every night. If ever you see me
sober, old top," he said, with a kind of holy exaltation, "tap me on the shoulder and say, 'Tut! Tut!' and I'll
apologize and remedy the defect."
"But I say, you know, what about me?"
"What about you?"
"Well, I'm so to speak, as it were, kind of responsible for you. What I mean to say is, if you go doing this
sort of thing I'm apt to get in the soup somewhat."
"I can't help your troubles," said Motty firmly. "Listen to me, old thing: this is the first time in my life that
I've had a real chance to yield to the temptations of a great city. What's the use of a great city having
temptations if fellows don't yield to them? Makes it so bally discouraging for a great city. Besides, mother
told me to keep my
eyes open and collect impressions."
I sat on the edge of the bed. I felt dizzy.
"I know just how you feel, old dear," said Motty consolingly. "And, if my principles would permit it, I
would simmer down for your sake. But duty first! This is the first time I've been let out alone, and I mean
to make the most of it. We're only young once. Why interfere with life's morning? Young man, rejoice in
thy youth! Tra-la! What ho!"
Put like that, it did seem reasonable.
"All my bally life, dear boy," Motty went on, "I've been cooped up in the ancestral home at Much
Middlefold, in Shropshire, and till you've been cooped up in Much Middlefold you don't know what cooping
is! The only time we get any excitement is when one of the choir-boys is caught sucking chocolate during
the sermon. When that happens, we talk about it for days. I've got about a month of New York, and I mean
to store up a few happy memories for the long winter evenings. This is my only chance to collect a past,
and I'm going to do it. Now tell me, old sport, as man to man, how does one get in touch with that very
decent chappie Jeeves? Does one ring a bell or shout a bit? I should like to discuss the subject of a good stiff
b.-and-s. with him!"
* * * * *
I had had a sort of vague idea, don't you know, that if I stuck close to Motty and went about the place with
him, I might act as a bit of a damper on the gaiety. What I mean is, I thought that if, when he was being the
life and soul of the party, he were to catch my reproving eye he might ease up a trifle on the revelry. So the
next night I took him along to supper with me. It was the last time. I'm a quiet, peaceful sort of chappie who
has lived all his life in London, and I can't stand the pace these swift sportsmen from the rural districts set.
What I mean to say is this, I'm all for rational enjoyment and so forth, but I think a chappie makes himself
conspicuous when he throws soft-boiled eggs at the electric fan. And decent mirth and all that sort of thing
are all right, but I do bar dancing on tables and having to dash all over the place dodging waiters, managers,
and chuckers-out, just when you want to sit still and digest.
Directly I managed to tear myself away that night and get home, I made up my mind that this was jolly well
the last time that I went about with Motty. The only time I met him late at night after that was once when I
passed the door of a fairly low-down sort of restaurant and had to step aside to dodge him as he sailed
through the air en route for the opposite pavement, with a muscular sort of looking chappie peering out after
him with a kind of gloomy satisfaction.
In a way, I couldn't help sympathizing with the fellow. He had about four weeks to have the good time that
ought to have been spread over about ten years, and I didn't wonder at his wanting to be pretty busy.
I should have been just the same in his place. Still, there was no denying that it was a bit thick. If it hadn't
been for the thought of Lady Malvern and Aunt Agatha in the background, I should have regarded Motty's
rapid work with an indulgent smile. But I couldn't get rid of the feeling that, sooner or later, I was the lad
who was scheduled to get it behind the ear. And what with brooding on this prospect, and sitting up in the
old flat waiting for the familiar footstep, and putting it to bed when it got there, and stealing into the sick-
chamber next morning to contemplate the wreckage, I was beginning to lose weight. Absolutely becoming
the good old shadow, I give you my honest word. Starting at sudden noises and what-not.
And no sympathy from Jeeves. That was what cut me to the quick. The man was still thoroughly pipped
about the hat and tie, and simply wouldn't rally round. One morning I wanted comforting so much that I
sank the pride of the Woosters and appealed to the fellow direct.
"Jeeves," I said, "this is getting a bit thick!"
"Sir?" Business and cold respectfulness.
"You know what I mean. This lad seems to have chucked all the principles of a well-spent boyhood. He has
got it up his nose!"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, I shall get blamed, don't you know. You know what my Aunt Agatha is!"
"Yes, sir."
"Very well, then."
I waited a moment, but he wouldn't unbend.
"Jeeves," I said, "haven't you any scheme up your sleeve for coping with this blighter?"
"No, sir."
And he shimmered off to his lair. Obstinate devil! So dashed absurd, don't you know. It wasn't as if there
was anything wrong with that Country Gentleman hat. It was a remarkably priceless effort, and much
admired by the lads. But, just because he preferred the Longacre, he left me flat.
It was shortly after this that young Motty got the idea of bringing pals back in the small hours to continue
the gay revels in the home.
This was where I began to crack under the strain. You see, the part of town where I was living wasn't the
right place for that sort of thing.
I knew lots of chappies down Washington Square way who started the evening at about 2 a.m.--artists and
writers and what-not, who frolicked considerably till checked by the arrival of the morning milk.
That was all right. They like that sort of thing down there. The neighbours can't get to sleep unless there's
someone dancing Hawaiian dances over their heads. But on Fifty-seventh Street the atmosphere wasn't
right, and when Motty turned up at three in the morning with a collection of hearty lads, who only stopped
singing their college song when they started singing "The Old Oaken Bucket," there was a marked
peevishness among the old settlers in the flats. The management was extremely terse over the telephone at
breakfast-time, and took a lot of soothing.
The next night I came home early, after a lonely dinner at a place which I'd chosen because there didn't
seem any chance of meeting Motty there. The sitting-room was quite dark, and I was just moving to switch
on the light, when there was a sort of explosion and something collared hold of my trouser-leg. Living with
Motty had reduced me to such an extent that I was simply unable to cope with this thing. I jumped
backward with a loud yell of anguish, and tumbled out into the hall just as Jeeves came out of his den to see
what the matter was.
"Did you call, sir?"
"Jeeves! There's something in there that grabs you by the leg!"
"That would be Rollo, sir."
"Eh?"
"I would have warned you of his presence, but I did not hear you come in. His temper is a little uncertain at
present, as he has not yet settled down."
"Who the deuce is Rollo?"
"His lordship's bull-terrier, sir. His lordship won him in a raffle, and tied him to the leg of the table. If you
will allow me, sir, I will go in and switch on the light."
There really is nobody like Jeeves. He walked straight into the sitting-room, the biggest feat since Daniel and
the lions' den, without a quiver. What's more, his magnetism or whatever they call it was such that the
dashed animal, instead of pinning him by the leg, calmed down as if he had had a bromide, and rolled over
on his back with all his paws in the air. If Jeeves had been his rich uncle he couldn't have been more
chummy. Yet directly he caught sight of me again, he got all worked up and seemed to have only one idea
in life--to start chewing me where he had left off.
"Rollo is not used to you yet, sir," said Jeeves, regarding the bally quadruped in an admiring sort of way.
"He is an excellent watchdog."
"I don't want a watchdog to keep me out of my rooms."
"No, sir."
"Well, what am I to do?"
"No doubt in time the animal will learn to discriminate, sir. He will learn to distinguish your peculiar scent."
"What do you mean--my peculiar scent? Correct the impression that I intend to hang about in the hall while
life slips by, in the hope that one of these days that dashed animal will decide that I smell all
right." I thought for a bit. "Jeeves!"
"Sir?"
"I'm going away--to-morrow morning by the first train. I shall go and stop with Mr. Todd in the country."
"Do you wish me to accompany you, sir?"
"No."
"Very good, sir."
"I don't know when I shall be back. Forward my letters."
"Yes, sir."
* * * * *
As a matter of fact, I was back within the week. Rocky Todd, the pal I went to stay with, is a rummy sort
of a chap who lives all alone in the wilds of Long Island, and likes it; but a little of that sort of thing goes a
long way with me. Dear old Rocky is one of the best, but after a few days in his cottage in the woods, miles
away from anywhere, New York, even with Motty on the premises, began to look pretty good to me.
The days down on Long Island have forty-eight hours in them; you can't get to sleep at night because of the
bellowing of the crickets; and you have to walk two miles for a drink and six for an evening paper. I
thanked Rocky for his kind hospitality, and caught the only train they have down in those parts. It landed
me in New York about dinner-time. I went straight to the old flat. Jeeves came out of his lair. I looked
round cautiously for Rollo.
"Where's that dog, Jeeves? Have you got him tied up?"
"The animal is no longer here, sir. His lordship gave him to the porter, who sold him. His lordship took a
prejudice against the animal on account of being bitten by him in the calf of the leg."
I don't think I've ever been so bucked by a bit of news. I felt I had misjudged Rollo. Evidently, when you
got to know him better, he had a lot of intelligence in him.
"Ripping!" I said. "Is Lord Pershore in, Jeeves?"
"No, sir."
"Do you expect him back to dinner?"
"No, sir."
"Where is he?"
"In prison, sir."
Have you ever trodden on a rake and had the handle jump up and hit you? That's how I felt then.
"In prison!"
"Yes, sir."
"You don't mean--in prison?"
"Yes, sir."
I lowered myself into a chair.
"Why?" I said.
"He assaulted a constable, sir."
"Lord Pershore assaulted a constable!"
"Yes, sir."
I digested this.
"But, Jeeves, I say! This is frightful!"
"Sir?"
"What will Lady Malvern say when she finds out?"
"I do not fancy that her ladyship will find out, sir."
"But she'll come back and want to know where he is."
"I rather fancy, sir, that his lordship's bit of time will have run out by then."
"But supposing it hasn't?"
"In that event, sir, it may be judicious to prevaricate a little."
"How?"
"If I might make the suggestion, sir, I should inform her ladyship that his lordship has left for a short visit to
Boston."
"Why Boston?"
"Very interesting and respectable centre, sir."
"Jeeves, I believe you've hit it."
"I fancy so, sir."
"Why, this is really the best thing that could have happened. If this hadn't turned up to prevent him, young
Motty would have been in a sanatorium by the time Lady Malvern got back."
"Exactly, sir."
The more I looked at it in that way, the sounder this prison wheeze seemed to me. There was no doubt in
the world that prison was just what the doctor ordered for Motty. It was the only thing that could have
pulled him up. I was sorry for the poor blighter, but, after all, I reflected, a chappie who had lived all his life
with Lady Malvern, in a small village in the interior of Shropshire, wouldn't have much to kick
at in a prison. Altogether, I began to feel absolutely braced again.
Life became like what the poet Johnnie says--one grand, sweet song.
Things went on so comfortably and peacefully for a couple of weeks that I give you my word that I'd
almost forgotten such a person as Motty existed. The only flaw in the scheme of things was that Jeeves was
still pained and distant. It wasn't anything he said or did, mind you, but there was a rummy something about
him all the time. Once when I was tying the pink tie I caught sight of him in the looking-glass. There was a
kind of grieved look in his eye.
And then Lady Malvern came back, a good bit ahead of schedule. I hadn't been expecting her for days. I'd
forgotten how time had been slipping along. She turned up one morning while I was still in bed sipping tea
and thinking of this and that. Jeeves flowed in with the announcement that he had just loosed her into the
sitting-room. I draped a few garments round me and went in.
There she was, sitting in the same arm-chair, looking as massive as ever. The only difference was that she
didn't uncover the teeth, as she had done the first time.
"Good morning," I said. "So you've got back, what?"
"I have got back."
There was something sort of bleak about her tone, rather as if she had swallowed an east wind. This I took
to be due to the fact that she probably hadn't breakfasted. It's only after a bit of breakfast that I'm able to
regard the world with that sunny cheeriness which makes a fellow the universal favourite. I'm never much
of a lad till I've engulfed an egg or two and a beaker of coffee.
"I suppose you haven't breakfasted?"
"I have not yet breakfasted."
"Won't you have an egg or something? Or a sausage or something? Or something?"
"No, thank you."
She spoke as if she belonged to an anti-sausage society or a league for the suppression of eggs. There was a
bit of a silence.
"I called on you last night," she said, "but you were out."
"Awfully sorry! Had a pleasant trip?"
"Extremely, thank you."
"See everything? Niag'ra Falls, Yellowstone Park, and the jolly old Grand Canyon, and what-not?"
"I saw a great deal."
There was another slightly frappe silence. Jeeves floated silently into the dining-room and began to lay the
breakfast-table.
"I hope Wilmot was not in your way, Mr. Wooster?"
I had been wondering when she was going to mention Motty.
"Rather not! Great pals! Hit it off splendidly."
"You were his constant companion, then?"
"Absolutely! We were always together. Saw all the sights, don't you know. We'd take in the Museum of Art
in the morning, and have a bit of lunch at some good vegetarian place, and then toddle along to a sacred
concert in the afternoon, and home to an early dinner. We usually played dominoes after dinner. And then
the early bed and the refreshing sleep. We had a great time. I was awfully sorry when he went away to
Boston."
"Oh! Wilmot is in Boston?"
"Yes. I ought to have let you know, but of course we didn't know where you were. You were dodging all
over the place like a snipe--I mean, don't you know, dodging all over the place, and we couldn't get at you.
Yes, Motty went off to Boston."
"You're sure he went to Boston?"
"Oh, absolutely." I called out to Jeeves, who was now messing about in the next room with forks and so
forth: "Jeeves, Lord Pershore didn't change his mind about going to Boston, did he?"
"No, sir."
"I thought I was right. Yes, Motty went to Boston."
"Then how do you account, Mr. Wooster, for the fact that when I went yesterday afternoon to Blackwell's
Island prison, to secure material for my book, I saw poor, dear Wilmot there, dressed in a striped suit,
seated beside a pile of stones with a hammer in his hands?"
I tried to think of something to say, but nothing came. A chappie has to be a lot broader about the forehead
than I am to handle a jolt like this. I strained the old bean till it creaked, but between the collar and the hair
parting nothing stirred. I was dumb. Which was lucky, because I wouldn't have had a chance to get any
persiflage out of my system. Lady Malvern collared the conversation. She had been bottling it up, and now
it came out with a rush:
"So this is how you have looked after my poor, dear boy, Mr. Wooster! So this is how you have abused my
trust! I left him in your charge, thinking that I could rely on you to shield him from evil. He came to you
innocent, unversed in the ways of the world, confiding, unused to the temptations of a large city, and you
led him astray!"
I hadn't any remarks to make. All I could think of was the picture of Aunt Agatha drinking all this in and
reaching out to sharpen the hatchet against my return.
"You deliberately----"
Far away in the misty distance a soft voice spoke:
"If I might explain, your ladyship."
Jeeves had projected himself in from the dining-room and materialized on the rug. Lady Malvern tried to
freeze him with a look, but you can't do that sort of thing to Jeeves. He is look-proof.
"I fancy, your ladyship, that you have misunderstood Mr. Wooster, and that he may have given you the
impression that he was in New York when his lordship--was removed. When Mr. Wooster informed your
ladyship that his lordship had gone to Boston, he was relying on the version I had given him of his lordship's
movements. Mr. Wooster was away, visiting a friend in the country, at the time, and knew nothing of the
matter till your ladyship informed him."
Lady Malvern gave a kind of grunt. It didn't rattle Jeeves.
"I feared Mr. Wooster might be disturbed if he knew the truth, as he is so attached to his lordship and has
taken such pains to look after him, so I took the liberty of telling him that his lordship had gone away for a
visit. It might have been hard for Mr. Wooster to believe that his lordship had gone to prison voluntarily and
from the best motives, but your ladyship, knowing him better, will readily understand."
"What!" Lady Malvern goggled at him. "Did you say that Lord Pershore went to prison voluntarily?"
"If I might explain, your ladyship. I think that your ladyship's parting words made a deep impression on his
lordship. I have frequently heard him speak to Mr. Wooster of his desire to do something to follow your
ladyship's instructions and collect material for your ladyship's book on America. Mr. Wooster will bear me
out when I say that his lordship was frequently extremely depressed at the thought that he was
doing so little to help."
"Absolutely, by Jove! Quite pipped about it!" I said.
"The idea of making a personal examination into the prison system of the country--from within--occurred to
his lordship very suddenly one night. He embraced it eagerly. There was no restraining him."
Lady Malvern looked at Jeeves, then at me, then at Jeeves again. I could see her struggling with the thing.
"Surely, your ladyship," said Jeeves, "it is more reasonable to suppose that a gentleman of his lordship's
character went to prison of his own volition than that he committed some breach of the law which
necessitated his arrest?"
Lady Malvern blinked. Then she got up.
"Mr. Wooster," she said, "I apologize. I have done you an injustice. I should have known Wilmot better. I
should have had more faith in his pure, fine spirit."
"Absolutely!" I said.
"Your breakfast is ready, sir," said Jeeves.
I sat down and dallied in a dazed sort of way with a poached egg.
"Jeeves," I said, "you are certainly a life-saver!"
"Thank you, sir."
"Nothing would have convinced my Aunt Agatha that I hadn't lured that blighter into riotous living."
"I fancy you are right, sir."
I champed my egg for a bit. I was most awfully moved, don't you know, by the way Jeeves had rallied
round. Something seemed to tell me that this was an occasion that called for rich rewards. For a moment I
hesitated. Then I made up my mind.
"Jeeves!"
"Sir?"
"That pink tie!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Burn it!"
"Thank you, sir."
"And, Jeeves!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Take a taxi and get me that Longacre hat, as worn by John Drew!"
"Thank you very much, sir."
I felt most awfully braced. I felt as if the clouds had rolled away and all was as it used to be. I felt like one
of those chappies in the novels who calls off the fight with his wife in the last chapter and decides to forget
and forgive. I felt I wanted to do all sorts of other things to show Jeeves that I appreciated him.
"Jeeves," I said, "it isn't enough. Is there anything else you would like?"
"Yes, sir. If I may make the suggestion--fifty dollars."
"Fifty dollars?"
"It will enable me to pay a debt of honour, sir. I owe it to his lordship."
"You owe Lord Pershore fifty dollars?"
"Yes, sir. I happened to meet him in the street the night his lordship was arrested. I had been thinking a
good deal about the most suitable method of inducing him to abandon his mode of living, sir. His lordship
was a little over-excited at the time and I fancy that he mistook me for a friend of his. At any rate when I
took the liberty of wagering him fifty dollars that he would not punch a passing policeman in the eye, he
accepted the bet very cordially and won it."
I produced my pocket-book and counted out a hundred.
"Take this, Jeeves," I said; "fifty isn't enough. Do you know, Jeeves, you're--well, you absolutely stand
alone!"
"I endeavour to give satisfaction, sir," said Jeeves.
Jeeves and the Hard-Boiled Egg
Sometimes of a morning, as I've sat in bed sucking down the early cup of tea and watched my man Jeeves
flitting about the room and putting out the raiment for the day, I've wondered what the deuce I should do if
the fellow ever took it into his head to leave me. It's not so bad now I'm in New York, but in London the
anxiety was frightful. There used to be all sorts of attempts on the part of low blighters to sneak him away
from me. Young Reggie Foljambe to my certain knowledge offered
him double what I was giving him, and Alistair Bingham-Reeves, who's got a valet who had been known to
press his trousers sideways, used to look at him, when he came to see me, with a kind of glittering hungry
eye which disturbed me deucedly. Bally pirates!
The thing, you see, is that Jeeves is so dashed competent. You can spot it even in the way he shoves studs
into a shirt.
I rely on him absolutely in every crisis, and he never lets me down.
And, what's more, he can always be counted on to extend himself on behalf of any pal of mine who
happens to be to all appearances knee-deep in the bouillon. Take the rather rummy case, for instance, of
dear old Bicky and his uncle, the hard-boiled egg.
It happened after I had been in America for a few months. I got back to the flat latish one night, and when
Jeeves brought me the final drink he said:
"Mr. Bickersteth called to see you this evening, sir, while you were out."
"Oh?" I said.
"Twice, sir. He appeared a trifle agitated."
"What, pipped?"
"He gave that impression, sir."
I sipped the whisky. I was sorry if Bicky was in trouble, but, as a matter of fact, I was rather glad to have
something I could discuss freely with Jeeves just then, because things had been a bit strained between us for
some time, and it had been rather difficult to hit on anything to talk about that wasn't apt to take a personal
turn. You see, I had decided--rightly or wrongly--to grow a moustache and this had cut Jeeves to the quick.
He couldn't stick the thing at any price, and I had been living ever since in an atmosphere of bally
disapproval till I was getting jolly well fed up with it. What I mean is, while there's no doubt that in certain
matters of dress Jeeves's judgment is absolutely sound and should be followed, it seemed to me that it was
getting a bit too thick if he was going to edit my face as well as my costume. No one can call me an
unreasonable chappie, and many's the time I've given in like a lamb when Jeeves has voted against one of
my pet suits or ties; but when it comes to a valet's staking out a claim on your upper lip you've simply got to
have a bit of the good old bulldog pluck and defy the blighter.
"He said that he would call again later, sir."
"Something must be up, Jeeves."
"Yes, sir."
I gave the moustache a thoughtful twirl. It seemed to hurt Jeeves a good deal, so I chucked it.
"I see by the paper, sir, that Mr. Bickersteth's uncle is arriving on the _Carmantic_."
"Yes?"
"His Grace the Duke of Chiswick, sir."
This was news to me, that Bicky's uncle was a duke. Rum, how little one knows about one's pals! I had
met Bicky for the first time at a species of beano or jamboree down in Washington Square, not long after
my arrival in New York. I suppose I was a bit homesick at the time, and I rather took to Bicky when I
found that he was an Englishman and had, in fact, been up at Oxford with me. Besides, he was a frightful
chump, so we naturally drifted together; and while we were taking a quiet snort in a corner that wasn't all
cluttered up with artists and sculptors and what-not, he furthermore endeared himself to me by a most
extraordinarily gifted imitation of a bull-terrier chasing a cat up a tree. But, though we had subsequently
become extremely pally, all I really knew about him was that he was generally hard up, and had an uncle
who relieved the strain a bit from time to time by sending him monthly remittances.
"If the Duke of Chiswick is his uncle," I said, "why hasn't he a title? Why isn't he Lord What-Not?"
"Mr. Bickersteth is the son of his grace's late sister, sir, who married Captain Rollo Bickersteth of the
Coldstream Guards."
Jeeves knows everything.
"Is Mr. Bickersteth's father dead, too?"
"Yes, sir."
"Leave any money?"
"No, sir."
I began to understand why poor old Bicky was always more or less on the rocks. To the casual and
irreflective observer, if you know what I mean, it may sound a pretty good wheeze having a duke for an
uncle, but the trouble about old Chiswick was that, though an extremely wealthy old buster, owning half
London and about five counties up north, he was notoriously the most prudent spender in England. He was
what American chappies would call a hard-boiled egg. If Bicky's people hadn't left him anything and he
depended on what he could prise out of the old duke, he was in a pretty bad way. Not that that explained
why he was hunting me like this, because he was a chap who never borrowed money.
He said he wanted to keep his pals, so never bit any one's ear on principle.
At this juncture the door bell rang. Jeeves floated out to answer it.
"Yes, sir. Mr. Wooster has just returned," I heard him say. And Bicky came trickling in, looking pretty sorry
for himself.
"Halloa, Bicky!" I said. "Jeeves told me you had been trying to get me. Jeeves, bring another glass, and let
the revels commence. What's the trouble, Bicky?"
"I'm in a hole, Bertie. I want your advice."
"Say on, old lad!"
"My uncle's turning up to-morrow, Bertie."
"So Jeeves told me."
"The Duke of Chiswick, you know."
"So Jeeves told me."
Bicky seemed a bit surprised.
"Jeeves seems to know everything."
"Rather rummily, that's exactly what I was thinking just now myself."
"Well, I wish," said Bicky gloomily, "that he knew a way to get me out of the hole I'm in."
Jeeves shimmered in with the glass, and stuck it competently on the table.
"Mr. Bickersteth is in a bit of a hole, Jeeves," I said, "and wants you to rally round."
"Very good, sir."
Bicky looked a bit doubtful.
"Well, of course, you know, Bertie, this thing is by way of being a bit private and all that."
"I shouldn't worry about that, old top. I bet Jeeves knows all about it already. Don't you, Jeeves?"
"Yes, sir."
"Eh!" said Bicky, rattled.
"I am open to correction, sir, but is not your dilemma due to the fact that you are at a loss to explain to his
grace why you are in New York instead of in Colorado?"
Bicky rocked like a jelly in a high wind.
"How the deuce do you know anything about it?"
"I chanced to meet his grace's butler before we left England. He informed me that he happened to overhear
his grace speaking to you on the matter, sir, as he passed the library door."
Bicky gave a hollow sort of laugh.
"Well, as everybody seems to know all about it, there's no need to try to keep it dark. The old boy turfed
me out, Bertie, because he said I was a brainless nincompoop. The idea was that he would give me a
remittance on condition that I dashed out to some blighted locality of the name of Colorado and learned
farming or ranching, or whatever they call it, at some bally ranch or farm or whatever it's called. I didn't
fancy the idea a bit. I should have had to ride horses and pursue cows, and so forth. I hate horses. They
bite at you. I was all against the scheme. At the same time, don't you know, I had to have that remittance."
"I get you absolutely, dear boy."
"Well, when I got to New York it looked a decent sort of place to me, so I thought it would be a pretty
sound notion to stop here. So I cabled to my uncle telling him that I had dropped into a good business
wheeze in the city and wanted to chuck the ranch idea. He wrote back that it was all right, and here I've
been ever since. He thinks I'm doing well at something or other over here. I never dreamed, don't you
know, that he would ever come out here. What on earth am I to do?"
"Jeeves," I said, "what on earth is Mr. Bickersteth to do?"
"You see," said Bicky, "I had a wireless from him to say that he was coming to stay with me--to save hotel
bills, I suppose. I've always given him the impression that I was living in pretty good style. I can't have him
to stay at my boarding-house."
"Thought of anything, Jeeves?" I said.
"To what extent, sir, if the question is not a delicate one, are you prepared to assist Mr. Bickersteth?"
"I'll do anything I can for you, of course, Bicky, old man."
"Then, if I might make the suggestion, sir, you might lend Mr. Bickersteth----"
"No, by Jove!" said Bicky firmly. "I never have touched you, Bertie, and I'm not going to start now. I may
be a chump, but it's my boast that I don't owe a penny to a single soul--not counting tradesmen, of course."
"I was about to suggest, sir, that you might lend Mr. Bickersteth this flat. Mr. Bickersteth could give his
grace the impression that he was the owner of it. With your permission I could convey the notion that I was
in Mr. Bickersteth's employment, and not in yours. You would be residing here temporarily as Mr.
Bickersteth's guest. His grace would occupy the second spare bedroom. I fancy that you would find this
answer satisfactorily, sir."
Bicky had stopped rocking himself and was staring at Jeeves in an awed sort of way.
"I would advocate the dispatching of a wireless message to his grace on board the vessel, notifying him of
the change of address. Mr. Bickersteth could meet his grace at the dock and proceed directly here. Will that
meet the situation, sir?"
"Absolutely."
"Thank you, sir."
Bicky followed him with his eye till the door closed.
"How does he do it, Bertie?" he said. "I'll tell you what I think it is. I believe it's something to do with the
shape of his head. Have you ever noticed his head, Bertie, old man? It sort of sticks out at the back!"
* * * * *
I hopped out of bed early next morning, so as to be among those present when the old boy should arrive. I
knew from experience that these ocean liners fetch up at the dock at a deucedly ungodly hour. It wasn't
much after nine by the time I'd dressed and had my morning tea and was leaning out of the window,
watching the street for Bicky and his uncle. It was one of those jolly, peaceful mornings that make a
chappie wish he'd got a soul or something, and I was just brooding on life in general when I became aware
of the dickens of a spate in progress down below. A taxi had driven up, and an old boy in a top hat had got
out and was kicking up a frightful row about the fare. As far as I could make out, he was trying to get the
cab chappie to switch from New York to London prices, and the cab chappie had apparently never heard of
London before, and didn't seem to think a lot of it now. The old boy said that in London the trip would
have set him back eightpence; and
the cabby said he should worry. I called to Jeeves.
"The duke has arrived, Jeeves."
"Yes, sir?"
"That'll be him at the door now."
Jeeves made a long arm and opened the front door, and the old boy crawled in, looking licked to a splinter.
"How do you do, sir?" I said, bustling up and being the ray of sunshine. "Your nephew went down to the
dock to meet you, but you must have missed him. My name's Wooster, don't you know. Great pal of
Bicky's, and all that sort of thing. I'm staying with him, you know. Would you like a cup of tea? Jeeves,
bring a cup of tea."
Old Chiswick had sunk into an arm-chair and was looking about the room.
"Does this luxurious flat belong to my nephew Francis?"
"Absolutely."
"It must be terribly expensive."
"Pretty well, of course. Everything costs a lot over here, you know."
He moaned. Jeeves filtered in with the tea. Old Chiswick took a stab at it to restore his tissues, and nodded.
"A terrible country, Mr. Wooster! A terrible country! Nearly eight shillings for a short cab-drive!
Iniquitous!" He took another look round the room. It seemed to fascinate him. "Have you any idea how
much my nephew pays for this flat, Mr. Wooster?"
"About two hundred dollars a month, I believe."
"What! Forty pounds a month!"
I began to see that, unless I made the thing a bit more plausible, the scheme might turn out a frost. I could
guess what the old boy was thinking. He was trying to square all this prosperity with what he knew of poor
old Bicky. And one had to admit that it took a lot of squaring, for dear old Bicky, though a stout fellow and
absolutely unrivalled as an imitator of bull-terriers and cats, was in many ways one of the most pronounced
fatheads that ever pulled on a suit of gent's underwear.
"I suppose it seems rummy to you," I said, "but the fact is New York often bucks chappies up and makes
them show a flash of speed that you wouldn't have imagined them capable of. It sort of develops them.
Something in the air, don't you know. I imagine that Bicky in the past, when you knew him, may have been
something of a chump, but it's quite different now. Devilish efficient sort of chappie, and looked on in
commercial circles as quite the nib!"
"I am amazed! What is the nature of my nephew's business, Mr. Wooster?"
"Oh, just business, don't you know. The same sort of thing Carnegie and Rockefeller and all these coves do,
you know." I slid for the door.
"Awfully sorry to leave you, but I've got to meet some of the lads elsewhere."
Coming out of the lift I met Bicky bustling in from the street.
"Halloa, Bertie! I missed him. Has he turned up?"
"He's upstairs now, having some tea."
"What does he think of it all?"
"He's absolutely rattled."
"Ripping! I'll be toddling up, then. Toodle-oo, Bertie, old man. See you later."
"Pip-pip, Bicky, dear boy."
He trotted off, full of merriment and good cheer, and I went off to the club to sit in the window and watch
the traffic coming up one way and going down the other. It was latish in the evening when I looked in at the
flat to dress for dinner.
"Where's everybody, Jeeves?" I said, finding no little feet pattering about the place. "Gone out?"
"His grace desired to see some of the sights of the city, sir. Mr. Bickersteth is acting as his escort. I fancy
their immediate objective was Grant's Tomb."
"I suppose Mr. Bickersteth is a bit braced at the way things are going--what?"
"Sir?"
"I say, I take it that Mr. Bickersteth is tolerably full of beans."
"Not altogether, sir."
"What's his trouble now?"
"The scheme which I took the liberty of suggesting to Mr. Bickersteth and yourself has, unfortunately, not
answered entirely satisfactorily, sir."
"Surely the duke believes that Mr. Bickersteth is doing well in business, and all that sort of thing?"
"Exactly, sir. With the result that he has decided to cancel Mr. Bickersteth's monthly allowance, on the
ground that, as Mr. Bickersteth is doing so well on his own account, he no longer requires pecuniary
assistance."
"Great Scot, Jeeves! This is awful."
"Somewhat disturbing, sir."
"I never expected anything like this!"
"I confess I scarcely anticipated the contingency myself, sir."
"I suppose it bowled the poor blighter over absolutely?"
"Mr. Bickersteth appeared somewhat taken aback, sir."
My heart bled for Bicky.
"We must do something, Jeeves."
"Yes, sir."
"Can you think of anything?"
"Not at the moment, sir."
"There must be something we can do."
"It was a maxim of one of my former employers, sir--as I believe I mentioned to you once before--the
present Lord Bridgnorth, that there is always a way. I remember his lordship using the expression on the
occasion--he was then a business gentleman and had not yet received his title--when a patent hair-restorer
which he chanced to be promoting failed to attract the public. He put it on the market under another name
as a depilatory, and amassed a substantial fortune. I have generally found his lordship's aphorism based on
sound foundations. No doubt we shall be able to discover some solution of Mr. Bickersteth's difficulty, sir."
"Well, have a stab at it, Jeeves!"
"I will spare no pains, sir."
I went and dressed sadly. It will show you pretty well how pipped I was when I tell you that I near as a
toucher put on a white tie with a dinner-jacket. I sallied out for a bit of food more to pass the time than
because I wanted it. It seemed brutal to be wading into the bill of fare with poor old Bicky headed for the
breadline.
When I got back old Chiswick had gone to bed, but Bicky was there, hunched up in an arm-chair, brooding
pretty tensely, with a cigarette hanging out of the corner of his mouth and a more or less glassy stare in his
eyes. He had the aspect of one who had been soaked with what the newspaper chappies call "some blunt
instrument."
"This is a bit thick, old thing--what!" I said.
He picked up his glass and drained it feverishly, overlooking the fact that it hadn't anything in it.
"I'm done, Bertie!" he said.
He had another go at the glass. It didn't seem to do him any good.
"If only this had happened a week later, Bertie! My next month's money was due to roll in on Saturday. I
could have worked a wheeze I've been reading about in the magazine advertisements. It seems that you can
make a dashed amount of money if you can only collect a few dollars and start a chicken-farm. Jolly sound
scheme, Bertie! Say you buy a hen--call it one hen for the sake of argument. It lays an egg every day of the
week. You sell the eggs seven for twenty-five cents. Keep of hen costs nothing. Profit practically twenty-
five cents on every seven eggs. Or look at it another way: Suppose you have a dozen eggs. Each of the hens
has a dozen chickens. The chickens grow up and have more chickens. Why, in no time you'd have the
place covered knee-deep in hens, all laying eggs, at twenty-five cents for every seven. You'd make a
fortune. Jolly life, too, keeping hens!" He had begun to get quite worked up at the thought of it, but he
slopped back in his chair at this juncture with a good deal of gloom. "But, of course, it's no good," he said,
"because I haven't the cash."
"You've only to say the word, you know, Bicky, old top."
"Thanks awfully, Bertie, but I'm not going to sponge on you."
That's always the way in this world. The chappies you'd like to lend money to won't let you, whereas the
chappies you don't want to lend it to will do everything except actually stand you on your head and lift the
specie out of your pockets. As a lad who has always rolled tolerably free in the right stuff, I've had lots of
experience of the second class. Many's the time, back in London, I've hurried along Piccadilly and felt the
hot breath of the toucher on the back of my neck and heard his sharp, excited yapping as he closed in on
me. I've simply spent my life scattering largesse to blighters I didn't care a hang for; yet here was I now,
dripping doubloons and pieces of eight and longing to hand them over, and Bicky, poor fish, absolutely on
his uppers, not taking any at any price.
"Well, there's only one hope, then."
"What's that?"
"Jeeves."
"Sir?"
There was Jeeves, standing behind me, full of zeal. In this matter of shimmering into rooms the chappie is
rummy to a degree. You're sitting in the old armchair, thinking of this and that, and then suddenly you look
up, and there he is. He moves from point to point with as little uproar as a jelly fish. The thing startled poor
old Bicky considerably.
He rose from his seat like a rocketing pheasant. I'm used to Jeeves now, but often in the days when he first
came to me I've bitten my tongue freely on finding him unexpectedly in my midst.
"Did you call, sir?"
"Oh, there you are, Jeeves!"
"Precisely, sir."
"Jeeves, Mr. Bickersteth is still up the pole. Any ideas?"
"Why, yes, sir. Since we had our recent conversation I fancy I have found what may prove a solution. I do
not wish to appear to be taking a liberty, sir, but I think that we have overlooked his grace's potentialities as
a source of revenue."
Bicky laughed, what I have sometimes seen described as a hollow, mocking laugh, a sort of bitter cackle
from the back of the throat, rather like a gargle.
"I do not allude, sir," explained Jeeves, "to the possibility of inducing his grace to part with money. I am
taking the liberty of regarding his grace in the light of an at present--if I may say so--useless property, which
is capable of being developed."
Bicky looked at me in a helpless kind of way. I'm bound to say I didn't get it myself.
"Couldn't you make it a bit easier, Jeeves!"
"In a nutshell, sir, what I mean is this: His grace is, in a sense, a prominent personage. The inhabitants of
this country, as no doubt you are aware, sir, are peculiarly addicted to shaking hands with prominent
personages. It occurred to me that Mr. Bickersteth or yourself might know of persons who would be willing
to pay a small fee--let us say two dollars or three--for the privilege of an introduction, including handshake,
to his grace."
Bicky didn't seem to think much of it.
"Do you mean to say that anyone would be mug enough to part with solid cash just to shake hands with my
uncle?"
"I have an aunt, sir, who paid five shillings to a young fellow for bringing a moving-picture actor to tea at
her house one Sunday. It gave her social standing among the neighbours."
Bicky wavered.
"If you think it could be done----"
"I feel convinced of it, sir."
"What do you think, Bertie?"
"I'm for it, old boy, absolutely. A very brainy wheeze."
"Thank you, sir. Will there be anything further? Good night, sir."
And he floated out, leaving us to discuss details.
Until we started this business of floating old Chiswick as a money-making proposition I had never realized
what a perfectly foul time those Stock Exchange chappies must have when the public isn't biting freely.
Nowadays I read that bit they put in the financial reports about "The market opened quietly" with a
sympathetic eye, for, by Jove, it certainly opened quietly for us! You'd hardly believe how difficult it was to
interest the public and make them take a flutter on the old boy. By the end of the week the only name we
had on our list was a delicatessen-store keeper down in Bicky's part of the town, and as he wanted us to
take it out in sliced ham instead of cash that didn't help much. There was a gleam of light when the brother
of Bicky's pawnbroker offered ten dollars, money down, for an introduction to old Chiswick, but the deal
fell through, owing to its turning out that the chap was an anarchist and intended to kick the old boy instead
of shaking hands with him. At that, it took me the deuce of a time to persuade Bicky not to grab the cash
and let things take their course. He seemed to regard the pawnbroker's brother rather as a sportsman and
benefactor of his species than otherwise.
The whole thing, I'm inclined to think, would have been off if it hadn't been for Jeeves. There is no doubt
that Jeeves is in a class of his own. In the matter of brain and resource I don't think I have ever met a
chappie so supremely like mother made. He trickled into my room one morning with a good old cup of tea,
and intimated that there was something doing.
"Might I speak to you with regard to that matter of his grace, sir?"
"It's all off. We've decided to chuck it."
"Sir?"
"It won't work. We can't get anybody to come."
"I fancy I can arrange that aspect of the matter, sir."
"Do you mean to say you've managed to get anybody?"
"Yes, sir. Eighty-seven gentlemen from Birdsburg, sir."
I sat up in bed and spilt the tea.
"Birdsburg?"
"Birdsburg, Missouri, sir."
"How did you get them?"
"I happened last night, sir, as you had intimated that you would be absent from home, to attend a theatrical
performance, and entered into conversation between the acts with the occupant of the adjoining seat.
I had observed that he was wearing a somewhat ornate decoration in his buttonhole, sir--a large blue button
with the words 'Boost for Birdsburg' upon it in red letters, scarcely a judicious addition to a gentleman's
evening costume. To my surprise I noticed that the auditorium was full of persons similarly decorated. I
ventured to inquire the explanation, and was informed that these gentlemen, forming a party of eighty-
seven, are a convention from a town of the name if Birdsburg, in the State of Missouri. Their visit, I
gathered, was purely of a social and pleasurable nature, and my informant spoke at some length of the
entertainments arranged for their stay in the city.
It was when he related with a considerable amount of satisfaction and pride, that a deputation of their
number had been introduced to and had shaken hands with a well-known prizefighter, that it occurred to me
to broach the subject of his grace. To make a long story short, sir, I have arranged, subject to your
approval, that the entire convention shall be presented to his grace to-morrow afternoon."
I was amazed. This chappie was a Napoleon.
"Eighty-seven, Jeeves. At how much a head?"
"I was obliged to agree to a reduction for quantity, sir. The terms finally arrived at were one hundred and
fifty dollars for the party."
I thought a bit.
"Payable in advance?"
"No, sir. I endeavoured to obtain payment in advance, but was not successful."
"Well, any way, when we get it I'll make it up to five hundred. Bicky'll never know. Do you suspect Mr.
Bickersteth would suspect anything, Jeeves, if I made it up to five hundred?"
"I fancy not, sir. Mr. Bickersteth is an agreeable gentleman, but not bright."
"All right, then. After breakfast run down to the bank and get me some money."
"Yes, sir."
"You know, you're a bit of a marvel, Jeeves."
"Thank you, sir."
"Right-o!"
"Very good, sir."
When I took dear old Bicky aside in the course of the morning and told him what had happened he nearly
broke down. He tottered into the sitting-room and buttonholed old Chiswick, who was reading the comic
section of the morning paper with a kind of grim resolution.
"Uncle," he said, "are you doing anything special to-morrow afternoon? I mean to say, I've asked a few of
my pals in to meet you, don't you know."
The old boy cocked a speculative eye at him.
"There will be no reporters among them?"
"Reporters? Rather not! Why?"
"I refuse to be badgered by reporters. There were a number of adhesive young men who endeavoured to
elicit from me my views on America while the boat was approaching the dock. I will not be subjected to this
persecution again."
"That'll be absolutely all right, uncle. There won't be a newspaper-man in the place."
"In that case I shall be glad to make the acquaintance of your friends."
"You'll shake hands with them and so forth?"
"I shall naturally order my behaviour according to the accepted rules of civilized intercourse."
Bicky thanked him heartily and came off to lunch with me at the club, where he babbled freely of hens,
incubators, and other rotten things. After mature consideration we had decided to unleash the Birdsburg
contingent on the old boy ten at a time. Jeeves brought his theatre pal round to see us, and we arranged the
whole thing with him. A very decent chappie, but rather inclined to collar the conversation and turn it in the
direction of his home-town's new water-supply system. We settled that, as an hour was about all he would
be likely to stand, each gang should consider itself entitled to seven minutes of the duke's society by
Jeeves's stop-watch, and that when their time was up Jeeves should slide into the room and cough
meaningly. Then we parted with what I believe are called mutual expressions of goodwill, the Birdsburg
chappie extending a cordial invitation to us all to pop out some day and take a look at the new water-supply
system, for which we thanked him.
Next day the deputation rolled in. The first shift consisted of the cove we had met and nine others almost
exactly like him in every respect. They all looked deuced keen and businesslike, as if from youth up they
had been working in the office and catching the boss's eye and what-not. They shook hands with the old
boy with a good deal of apparent satisfaction--all except one chappie, who seemed to be brooding about
something--and then they stood off and became chatty.
"What message have you for Birdsburg, Duke?" asked our pal.
The old boy seemed a bit rattled.
"I have never been to Birdsburg."
The chappie seemed pained.
"You should pay it a visit," he said. "The most rapidly-growing city in the country. Boost for Birdsburg!"
"Boost for Birdsburg!" said the other chappies reverently.
The chappie who had been brooding suddenly gave tongue.
"Say!"
He was a stout sort of well-fed cove with one of those determined chins and a cold eye.
The assemblage looked at him.
"As a matter of business," said the chappie--"mind you, I'm not questioning anybody's good faith, but, as a
matter of strict business--I think this gentleman here ought to put himself on record before witnesses as
stating that he really is a duke."
"What do you mean, sir?" cried the old boy, getting purple.
"No offence, simply business. I'm not saying anything, mind you, but there's one thing that seems kind of
funny to me. This gentleman here says his name's Mr. Bickersteth, as I understand it. Well, if you're the
Duke of Chiswick, why isn't he Lord Percy Something? I've read English novels, and I know all about it."
"This is monstrous!"
"Now don't get hot under the collar. I'm only asking. I've a right to know. You're going to take our money,
so it's only fair that we should see that we get our money's worth."
The water-supply cove chipped in:
"You're quite right, Simms. I overlooked that when making the agreement. You see, gentlemen, as business
men we've a right to reasonable guarantees of good faith. We are paying Mr. Bickersteth here a hundred
and fifty dollars for this reception, and we naturally want to know----"
Old Chiswick gave Bicky a searching look; then he turned to the water-supply chappie. He was frightfully
calm.
"I can assure you that I know nothing of this," he said, quite politely. "I should be grateful if you would
explain."
"Well, we arranged with Mr. Bickersteth that eighty-seven citizens of Birdsburg should have the privilege of
meeting and shaking hands with you for a financial consideration mutually arranged, and what my friend
Simms here means--and I'm with him--is that we have only Mr. Bickersteth's word for it--and he is a
stranger to us--that you are the Duke of Chiswick at all."
Old Chiswick gulped.
"Allow me to assure you, sir," he said, in a rummy kind of voice, "that I am the Duke of Chiswick."
"Then that's all right," said the chappie heartily. "That was all we wanted to know. Let the thing go on."
"I am sorry to say," said old Chiswick, "that it cannot go on. I am feeling a little tired. I fear I must ask to be
excused."
"But there are seventy-seven of the boys waiting round the corner at this moment, Duke, to be introduced
to you."
"I fear I must disappoint them."
"But in that case the deal would have to be off."
"That is a matter for you and my nephew to discuss."
The chappie seemed troubled.
"You really won't meet the rest of them?"
"No!"
"Well, then, I guess we'll be going."
They went out, and there was a pretty solid silence. Then old Chiswick turned to Bicky:
"Well?"
Bicky didn't seem to have anything to say.
"Was it true what that man said?"
"Yes, uncle."
"What do you mean by playing this trick?"
Bicky seemed pretty well knocked out, so I put in a word.
"I think you'd better explain the whole thing, Bicky, old top."
Bicky's Adam's-apple jumped about a bit; then he started:
"You see, you had cut off my allowance, uncle, and I wanted a bit of money to start a chicken farm. I mean
to say it's an absolute cert if you once get a bit of capital. You buy a hen, and it lays an egg every day of the
week, and you sell the eggs, say, seven for twenty-five cents.
"Keep of hens cost nothing. Profit practically----"
"What is all this nonsense about hens? You led me to suppose you were a substantial business man."
"Old Bicky rather exaggerated, sir," I said, helping the chappie out.
"The fact is, the poor old lad is absolutely dependent on that remittance of yours, and when you cut it off,
don't you know, he was pretty solidly in the soup, and had to think of some way of closing in on a bit of the
ready pretty quick. That's why we thought of this handshaking scheme."
Old Chiswick foamed at the mouth.
"So you have lied to me! You have deliberately deceived me as to your financial status!"
"Poor old Bicky didn't want to go to that ranch," I explained. "He doesn't like cows and horses, but he
rather thinks he would be hot stuff among the hens. All he wants is a bit of capital. Don't you think it would
be rather a wheeze if you were to----"
"After what has happened? After this--this deceit and foolery? Not a penny!"
"But----"
"Not a penny!"
There was a respectful cough in the background.
"If I might make a suggestion, sir?"
Jeeves was standing on the horizon, looking devilish brainy.
"Go ahead, Jeeves!" I said.
"I would merely suggest, sir, that if Mr. Bickersteth is in need of a little ready money, and is at a loss to
obtain it elsewhere, he might secure the sum he requires by describing the occurrences of this afternoon for
the Sunday issue of one of the more spirited and enterprising newspapers."
"By Jove!" I said.
"By George!" said Bicky.
"Great heavens!" said old Chiswick.
"Very good, sir," said Jeeves.
Bicky turned to old Chiswick with a gleaming eye.
"Jeeves is right. I'll do it! The Chronicle would jump at it. They eat that sort of stuff."
Old Chiswick gave a kind of moaning howl.
"I absolutely forbid you, Francis, to do this thing!"
"That's all very well," said Bicky, wonderfully braced, "but if I can't get the money any other way----"
"Wait! Er--wait, my boy! You are so impetuous! We might arrange something."
"I won't go to that bally ranch."
"No, no! No, no, my boy! I would not suggest it. I would not for a moment suggest it. I--I think----"
He seemed to have a bit of a struggle with himself. "I--I think that, on the whole, it would be best if you
returned with me to England. I—I might--in fact, I think I see my way to doing--to--I might be able to utilize
your services in some secretarial position."
"I shouldn't mind that."
"I should not be able to offer you a salary, but, as you know, in English political life the unpaid secretary is
a recognized figure----"
"The only figure I'll recognize," said Bicky firmly, "is five hundred quid a year, paid quarterly."
"My dear boy!"
"Absolutely!"
"But your recompense, my dear Francis, would consist in the unrivalled opportunities you would have, as
my secretary, to gain experience, to accustom yourself to the intricacies of political life, to--in fact, you
would be in an exceedingly advantageous position."
"Five hundred a year!" said Bicky, rolling it round his tongue. "Why, that would be nothing to what I could
make if I started a chicken farm. It stands to reason. Suppose you have a dozen hens. Each of the hens has
a dozen chickens. After a bit the chickens grow up and have a dozen chickens each themselves, and then
they all start laying eggs! There's a fortune in it. You can get anything you like for eggs in America.
Chappies keep them on ice for years and years, and don't sell them till they fetch about a dollar a whirl. You
don't think I'm going to chuck a future like this for anything under five hundred o' goblins a year--what?"
A look of anguish passed over old Chiswick's face, then he seemed to be resigned to it. "Very well, my
boy," he said.
"What-o!" said Bicky. "All right, then."
"Jeeves," I said. Bicky had taken the old boy off to dinner to celebrate, and we were alone. "Jeeves, this has
been one of your best efforts."
"Thank you, sir."
"It beats me how you do it."
"Yes, sir."
"The only trouble is you haven't got much out of it--what!"
"I fancy Mr. Bickersteth intends--I judge from his remarks--to signify his appreciation of anything I have
been fortunate enough to do to assist him, at some later date when he is in a more favourable position to do
so."
"It isn't enough, Jeeves!"
"Sir?"
It was a wrench, but I felt it was the only possible thing to be done.
"Bring my shaving things."
A gleam of hope shone in the chappie's eye, mixed with doubt.
"You mean, sir?"
"And shave off my moustache."
There was a moment's silence. I could see the fellow was deeply moved.
"Thank you very much indeed, sir," he said, in a low voice, and popped off.
The Aunt and the Sluggard
Now that it's all over, I may as well admit that there was a time during the rather funny affair of
Rockmetteller Todd when I thought that Jeeves was going to let me down. The man had the appearance of
being baffled.
Jeeves is my man, you know. Officially he pulls in his weekly wages for pressing my clothes and all that
sort of thing; but actually he's more like what the poet Johnnie called some bird of his acquaintance who
was apt to rally round him in times of need--a guide, don't you know; philosopher, if I remember rightly,
and--I rather fancy--friend. I rely on him at every turn.
So naturally, when Rocky Todd told me about his aunt, I didn't hesitate. Jeeves was in on the thing from
the start.
The affair of Rocky Todd broke loose early one morning of spring. I was in bed, restoring the good old
tissues with about nine hours of the dreamless, when the door flew open and somebody prodded me in the
lower ribs and began to shake the bedclothes. After blinking a bit and generally pulling myself together, I
located Rocky, and my first impression was that it was some horrid dream.
Rocky, you see, lived down on Long Island somewhere, miles away from New York; and not only that, but
he had told me himself more than once that he never got up before twelve, and seldom earlier than one.
Constitutionally the laziest young devil in America, he had hit on a walk in life which enabled him to go the
limit in that direction. He was a poet. At least, he wrote poems when he did anything; but most of his time,
as far as I could make out, he spent in a sort of trance. He told me once that he could sit on a fence,
watching a worm and wondering what on earth it was up to, for hours at a stretch.
He had his scheme of life worked out to a fine point. About once a month he would take three days writing
a few poems; the other three hundred and twenty-nine days of the year he rested. I didn't know there was
enough money in poetry to support a chappie, even in the way in which Rocky lived; but it seems that, if
you stick to exhortations to young men to lead the strenuous life and don't shove in any rhymes, American
editors fight for the stuff. Rocky showed me one of his things once. It began:
Be!
Be!
The past is dead.
To-morrow is not born.
Be to-day!
To-day!
Be with every nerve,
With every muscle,
With every drop of your red blood!
Be!
It was printed opposite the frontispiece of a magazine with a sort of scroll round it, and a picture in the
middle of a fairly-nude chappie, with bulging muscles, giving the rising sun the glad eye. Rocky said they
gave him a hundred dollars for it, and he stayed in bed till four in the afternoon for over a month.
As regarded the future he was pretty solid, owing to the fact that he had a moneyed aunt tucked away
somewhere in Illinois; and, as he had been named Rockmetteller after her, and was her only nephew, his
position was pretty sound. He told me that when he did come into the money he meant to do no work at all,
except perhaps an occasional poem recommending the young man with life opening out before him, with all
its splendid possibilities, to light a pipe and shove his feet upon the mantelpiece.
And this was the man who was prodding me in the ribs in the grey dawn!
"Read this, Bertie!" I could just see that he was waving a letter or something equally foul in my face. "Wake
up and read this!"
I can't read before I've had my morning tea and a cigarette. I groped for the bell.
Jeeves came in looking as fresh as a dewy violet. It's a mystery to me how he does it.
"Tea, Jeeves."
"Very good, sir."
He flowed silently out of the room--he always gives you the impression of being some liquid substance
when he moves; and I found that Rocky was surging round with his beastly letter again.
"What is it?" I said. "What on earth's the matter?"
"Read it!"
"I can't. I haven't had my tea."
"Well, listen then."
"Who's it from?"
"My aunt."
At this point I fell asleep again. I woke to hear him saying:
"So what on earth am I to do?"
Jeeves trickled in with the tray, like some silent stream meandering over its mossy bed; and I saw daylight.
"Read it again, Rocky, old top," I said. "I want Jeeves to hear it. Mr. Todd's aunt has written him a rather
rummy letter, Jeeves, and we want your advice."
"Very good, sir."
He stood in the middle of the room, registering devotion to the cause, and Rocky started again:
"MY DEAR ROCKMETTELLER.--I have been thinking things over for a long while, and I have come to
the conclusion that I have been very thoughtless to wait so long before doing what I have made up my mind
to do now."
"What do you make of that, Jeeves?"
"It seems a little obscure at present, sir, but no doubt it becomes cleared at a later point in the
communication."
"It becomes as clear as mud!" said Rocky.
"Proceed, old scout," I said, champing my bread and butter.
"You know how all my life I have longed to visit New York and see for myself the wonderful gay life of
which I have read so much. I fear that now it will be impossible for me to fulfil my dream. I am old and
worn out. I seem to have no strength left in me."
"Sad, Jeeves, what?"
"Extremely, sir."
"Sad nothing!" said Rocky. "It's sheer laziness. I went to see her last Christmas and she was bursting with
health. Her doctor told me himself that there was nothing wrong with her whatever. But she will insist that
she's a hopeless invalid, so he has to agree with her. She's got a fixed idea that the trip to New York would
kill her; so, though it's been her ambition all her life to come here, she stays where she is."
"Rather like the chappie whose heart was 'in the Highlands a-chasing of the deer,' Jeeves?"
"The cases are in some respects parallel, sir."
"Carry on, Rocky, dear boy."
"So I have decided that, if I cannot enjoy all the marvels of the city myself, I can at least enjoy them
through you. I suddenly thought of this yesterday after reading a beautiful poem in the Sunday paper about
a young man who had longed all his life for a certain thing and won it in the end only when he was too old
to enjoy it. It was very sad, and it touched me."
"A thing," interpolated Rocky bitterly, "that I've not been able to do in ten years."
"As you know, you will have my money when I am gone; but until now I have never been able to see my
way to giving you an allowance. I have now decided to do so--on one condition. I have written to a firm of
lawyers in New York, giving them instructions to pay you quite a substantial sum each month. My one
condition is that you live in New York and enjoy yourself as I have always wished to do.
I want you to be my representative, to spend this money for me as I should do myself. I want you to plunge
into the gay, prismatic life of New York. I want you to be the life and soul of brilliant supper parties.
"Above all, I want you--indeed, I insist on this--to write me letters at least once a week giving me a full
description of all you are doing and all that is going on in the city, so that I may enjoy at second-hand what
my wretched health prevents my enjoying for myself. Remember that I shall expect full details, and that no
detail is too trivial to interest.--Your affectionate Aunt, "ISABEL ROCKMETTELLER."
"What about it?" said Rocky.
"What about it?" I said.
"Yes. What on earth am I going to do?"
It was only then that I really got on to the extremely rummy attitude of the chappie, in view of the fact that
a quite unexpected mess of the right stuff had suddenly descended on him from a blue sky. To my mind it
was an occasion for the beaming smile and the joyous whoop; yet here the man was, looking and talking as
if Fate had swung on his solar plexus. It amazed me.
"Aren't you bucked?" I said.
"Bucked!"
"If I were in your place I should be frightfully braced. I consider this pretty soft for you."
He gave a kind of yelp, stared at me for a moment, and then began to talk of New York in a way that
reminded me of Jimmy Mundy, the reformer chappie. Jimmy had just come to New York on a hit-the-trail
campaign, and I had popped in at the Garden a couple of days before, for half an hour or so, to hear him.
He had certainly told New York some pretty straight things about itself, having apparently taken a dislike to
the place, but, by Jove, you know, dear old Rocky made him look like a publicity agent for the old metrop.!
"Pretty soft!" he cried. "To have to come and live in New York! To have to leave my little cottage and take
a stuffy, smelly, over-heated hole of an apartment in this Heaven-forsaken, festering Gehenna. To have to
mix night after night with a mob who think that life is a sort of St. Vitus's dance, and imagine that they're
having a good time because they're making enough noise for six and drinking too much for ten. I loathe
New York, Bertie. I wouldn't come near the place if I hadn't got to see editors occasionally. There's a blight
on it. It's got moral delirium tremens. It's the limit. The very thought of staying more than a day in it makes
me sick. And you call this thing pretty soft for me!"
I felt rather like Lot's friends must have done when they dropped in for a quiet chat and their genial host
began to criticise the Cities of the Plain. I had no idea old Rocky could be so eloquent.
"It would kill me to have to live in New York," he went on. "To have to share the air with six million
people! To have to wear stiff collars and decent clothes all the time! To----" He started. "Good Lord! I
suppose I should have to dress for dinner in the evenings. What a ghastly notion!"
I was shocked, absolutely shocked.
"My dear chap!" I said reproachfully.
"Do you dress for dinner every night, Bertie?"
"Jeeves," I said coldly. The man was still standing like a statue by the door. "How many suits of evening
clothes have I?"
"We have three suits full of evening dress, sir; two dinner jackets----"
"Three."
"For practical purposes two only, sir. If you remember we cannot wear the third. We have also seven white
waistcoats."
"And shirts?"
"Four dozen, sir."
"And white ties?"
"The first two shallow shelves in the chest of drawers are completely filled with our white ties, sir."
I turned to Rocky.
"You see?"
The chappie writhed like an electric fan.
"I won't do it! I can't do it! I'll be hanged if I'll do it! How on earth can I dress up like that? Do you realize
that most days I don't get out of my pyjamas till five in the afternoon, and then I just put on an old
sweater?"
I saw Jeeves wince, poor chap! This sort of revelation shocked his finest feelings.
"Then, what are you going to do about it?" I said.
"That's what I want to know."
"You might write and explain to your aunt."
"I might--if I wanted her to get round to her lawyer's in two rapid leaps and cut me out of her will."
I saw his point.
"What do you suggest, Jeeves?" I said.
Jeeves cleared his throat respectfully.
"The crux of the matter would appear to be, sir, that Mr. Todd is obliged by the conditions under which the
money is delivered into his possession to write Miss Rockmetteller long and detailed letters relating to his
movements, and the only method by which this can be accomplished, if Mr. Todd adheres to his expressed
intention of remaining in the country, is for Mr. Todd to induce some second party to gather the actual
experiences which Miss Rockmetteller wishes reported to her, and to convey these to him in the shape of a
careful report, on which it would be possible for him, with the aid of his imagination, to base the suggested
correspondence."
Having got which off the old diaphragm, Jeeves was silent. Rocky looked at me in a helpless sort of way.
He hasn't been brought up on Jeeves as I have, and he isn't on to his curves.
"Could he put it a little clearer, Bertie?" he said. "I thought at the start it was going to make sense, but it
kind of flickered. What's the idea?"
"My dear old man, perfectly simple. I knew we could stand on Jeeves.
All you've got to do is to get somebody to go round the town for you and take a few notes, and then you
work the notes up into letters.
That's it, isn't it, Jeeves?"
"Precisely, sir."
The light of hope gleamed in Rocky's eyes. He looked at Jeeves in a startled way, dazed by the man's vast
intellect.
"But who would do it?" he said. "It would have to be a pretty smart sort of man, a man who would notice
things."
"Jeeves!" I said. "Let Jeeves do it."
"But would he?"
"You would do it, wouldn't you, Jeeves?"
For the first time in our long connection I observed Jeeves almost smile. The corner of his mouth curved
quite a quarter of an inch, and for a moment his eye ceased to look like a meditative fish's.
"I should be delighted to oblige, sir. As a matter of fact, I have already visited some of New York's places
of interest on my evening out, and it would be most enjoyable to make a practice of the pursuit."
"Fine! I know exactly what your aunt wants to hear about, Rocky. She wants an earful of cabaret stuff. The
place you ought to go to first, Jeeves, is Reigelheimer's. It's on Forty-second Street. Anybody will show you
the way."
Jeeves shook his head.
"Pardon me, sir. People are no longer going to Reigelheimer's. The place at the moment is Frolics on the
Roof."
"You see?" I said to Rocky. "Leave it to Jeeves. He knows."
It isn't often that you find an entire group of your fellow-humans happy in this world; but our little circle
was certainly an example of the fact that it can be done. We were all full of beans. Everything went
absolutely right from the start.
Jeeves was happy, partly because he loves to exercise his giant brain, and partly because he was having a
corking time among the bright lights.
I saw him one night at the Midnight Revels. He was sitting at a table on the edge of the dancing floor, doing
himself remarkably well with a fat cigar and a bottle of the best. I'd never imagined he could look so nearly
human. His face wore an expression of austere benevolence, and he was making notes in a small book.
As for the rest of us, I was feeling pretty good, because I was fond of old Rocky and glad to be able to do
him a good turn. Rocky was perfectly contented, because he was still able to sit on fences in his pyjamas
and watch worms. And, as for the aunt, she seemed tickled to death. She was getting Broadway at pretty
long range, but it seemed to be hitting her just right. I read one of her letters to Rocky, and it was full of life.
But then Rocky's letters, based on Jeeves's notes, were enough to buck anybody up. It was rummy when
you came to think of it. There was I, loving the life, while the mere mention of it gave Rocky a tired feeling;
yet here is a letter I wrote to a pal of mine in London:
"DEAR FREDDIE,--Well, here I am in New York. It's not a bad place. I'm not having a bad time.
Everything's pretty all right. The cabarets aren't bad. Don't know when I shall be back. How's everybody?
Cheer-o!--Yours,
"BERTIE.
"PS.--Seen old Ted lately?"
Not that I cared about Ted; but if I hadn't dragged him in I couldn't have got the confounded thing on to the
second page. Now here's old Rocky on exactly the same subject:
"DEAREST AUNT ISABEL,--How can I ever thank you enough for giving me the opportunity to live in
this astounding city! New York seems more wonderful every day. "Fifth Avenue is at its best, of course,
just now. The dresses are magnificent!"
Wads of stuff about the dresses. I didn't know Jeeves was such an authority.
"I was out with some of the crowd at the Midnight Revels the other night. We took in a show first, after a
little dinner at a new place on Forty-third Street. We were quite a gay party. Georgie Cohan looked in about
midnight and got off a good one about Willie Collier. Fred Stone could only stay a minute, but Doug.
Fairbanks did all sorts of stunts and made us roar. Diamond Jim Brady was there, as usual, and Laurette
Taylor showed up with a party. The show at the Revels is quite good. I am enclosing a programme. "Last
night a few of us went round to Frolics on the Roof----"
And so on and so forth, yards of it. I suppose it's the artistic temperament or something. What I mean is, it's
easier for a chappie who's used to writing poems and that sort of tosh to put a bit of a punch into a letter
than it is for a chappie like me. Anyway, there's no doubt that Rocky's correspondence was hot stuff. I
called Jeeves in and congratulated him.
"Jeeves, you're a wonder!"
"Thank you, sir."
"How you notice everything at these places beats me. I couldn't tell you a thing about them, except that I've
had a good time."
"It's just a knack, sir."
"Well, Mr. Todd's letters ought to brace Miss Rockmetteller all right, what?"
"Undoubtedly, sir," agreed Jeeves.
And, by Jove, they did! They certainly did, by George! What I mean to say is, I was sitting in the apartment
one afternoon, about a month after the thing had started, smoking a cigarette and resting the old bean, when
the door opened and the voice of Jeeves burst the silence like a bomb.
It wasn't that he spoke loud. He has one of those soft, soothing voices that slide through the atmosphere like
the note of a far-off sheep. It was what he said made me leap like a young gazelle.
"Miss Rockmetteller!"
And in came a large, solid female.
The situation floored me. I'm not denying it. Hamlet must have felt much as I did when his father's ghost
bobbed up in the fairway. I'd come to look on Rocky's aunt as such a permanency at her own home that it
didn't seem possible that she could really be here in New York. I stared at her. Then I looked at Jeeves. He
was standing there in an attitude of dignified detachment, the chump, when, if ever he should have been
rallying round the young master, it was now.
Rocky's aunt looked less like an invalid than any one I've ever seen, except my Aunt Agatha. She had a
good deal of Aunt Agatha about her, as a matter of fact. She looked as if she might be deucedly dangerous
if put upon; and something seemed to tell me that she would certainly regard herself as put upon if she ever
found out the game which poor old Rocky had been pulling on her.
"Good afternoon," I managed to say.
"How do you do?" she said. "Mr. Cohan?"
"Er--no."
"Mr. Fred Stone?"
"Not absolutely. As a matter of fact, my name's Wooster—Bertie Wooster."
She seemed disappointed. The fine old name of Wooster appeared to mean nothing in her life.
"Isn't Rockmetteller home?" she said. "Where is he?"
She had me with the first shot. I couldn't think of anything to say. I couldn't tell her that Rocky was down
in the country, watching worms.
There was the faintest flutter of sound in the background. It was the respectful cough with which Jeeves
announces that he is about to speak without having been spoken to.
"If you remember, sir, Mr. Todd went out in the automobile with a party in the afternoon."
"So he did, Jeeves; so he did," I said, looking at my watch. "Did he say when he would be back?"
"He gave me to understand, sir, that he would be somewhat late in returning."
He vanished; and the aunt took the chair which I'd forgotten to offer her. She looked at me in rather a
rummy way. It was a nasty look. It made me feel as if I were something the dog had brought in and
intended to bury later on, when he had time. My own Aunt Agatha, back in England, has looked at me in
exactly the same way many a time, and it never fails to make my spine curl.
"You seem very much at home here, young man. Are you a great friend of Rockmetteller's?"
"Oh, yes, rather!"
She frowned as if she had expected better things of old Rocky.
"Well, you need to be," she said, "the way you treat his flat as your own!"
I give you my word, this quite unforeseen slam simply robbed me of the power of speech. I'd been looking
on myself in the light of the dashing host, and suddenly to be treated as an intruder jarred me. It wasn't,
mark you, as if she had spoken in a way to suggest that she considered my presence in the place as an
ordinary social call. She obviously looked on me as a cross between a burglar and the plumber's man come
to fix the leak in the bathroom. It hurt her--my being there. At this juncture, with the conversation showing
every sign of being about to die in awful agonies, an idea came to me. Tea--the good old stand-by.
"Would you care for a cup of tea?" I said.
"Tea?"
She spoke as if she had never heard of the stuff.
"Nothing like a cup after a journey," I said. "Bucks you up! Puts a bit of zip into you. What I mean is,
restores you, and so on, don't you know. I'll go and tell Jeeves."
I tottered down the passage to Jeeves's lair. The man was reading the evening paper as if he hadn't a care in
the world.
"Jeeves," I said, "we want some tea."
"Very good, sir."
"I say, Jeeves, this is a bit thick, what?"
I wanted sympathy, don't you know--sympathy and kindness. The old nerve centres had had the deuce of a
shock.
"She's got the idea this place belongs to Mr. Todd. What on earth put that into her head?"
Jeeves filled the kettle with a restrained dignity.
"No doubt because of Mr. Todd's letters, sir," he said. "It was my suggestion, sir, if you remember, that
they should be addressed from this apartment in order that Mr. Todd should appear to possess a good
central residence in the city."
I remembered. We had thought it a brainy scheme at the time.
"Well, it's bally awkward, you know, Jeeves. She looks on me as an intruder. By Jove! I suppose she thinks
I'm someone who hangs about here, touching Mr. Todd for free meals and borrowing his shirts."
"Yes, sir."
"It's pretty rotten, you know."
"Most disturbing, sir."
"And there's another thing: What are we to do about Mr. Todd? We've got to get him up here as soon as
ever we can. When you have brought the tea you had better go out and send him a telegram, telling him to
come up by the next train."
"I have already done so, sir. I took the liberty of writing the message and dispatching it by the lift attendant."
"By Jove, you think of everything, Jeeves!"
"Thank you, sir. A little buttered toast with the tea? Just so, sir. Thank you."
I went back to the sitting-room. She hadn't moved an inch. She was still bolt upright on the edge of her
chair, gripping her umbrella like a hammer-thrower. She gave me another of those looks as I came in. There
was no doubt about it; for some reason she had taken a dislike to me. I suppose because I wasn't George
M. Cohan. It was a bit hard on a chap.
"This is a surprise, what?" I said, after about five minutes' restful silence, trying to crank the conversation
up again.
"What is a surprise?"
"Your coming here, don't you know, and so on."
She raised her eyebrows and drank me in a bit more through her glasses.
"Why is it surprising that I should visit my only nephew?" she said.
Put like that, of course, it did seem reasonable.
"Oh, rather," I said. "Of course! Certainly. What I mean is----"
Jeeves projected himself into the room with the tea. I was jolly glad to see him. There's nothing like having
a bit of business arranged for one when one isn't certain of one's lines. With the teapot to fool about with I
felt happier.
"Tea, tea, tea--what? What?" I said.
It wasn't what I had meant to say. My idea had been to be a good deal more formal, and so on. Still, it
covered the situation. I poured her out a cup. She sipped it and put the cup down with a shudder.
"Do you mean to say, young man," she said frostily, "that you expect me to drink this stuff?"
"Rather! Bucks you up, you know."
"What do you mean by the expression 'Bucks you up'?"
"Well, makes you full of beans, you know. Makes you fizz."
"I don't understand a word you say. You're English, aren't you?"
I admitted it. She didn't say a word. And somehow she did it in a way that made it worse than if she had
spoken for hours. Somehow it was brought home to me that she didn't like Englishmen, and that if she had
had to meet an Englishman, I was the one she'd have chosen last.
Conversation languished again after that.
Then I tried again. I was becoming more convinced every moment that you can't make a real lively salon
with a couple of people, especially if one of them lets it go a word at a time.
"Are you comfortable at your hotel?" I said.
"At which hotel?"
"The hotel you're staying at."
"I am not staying at an hotel."
"Stopping with friends--what?"
"I am naturally stopping with my nephew."
I didn't get it for the moment; then it hit me.
"What! Here?" I gurgled.
"Certainly! Where else should I go?"
The full horror of the situation rolled over me like a wave. I couldn't see what on earth I was to do. I
couldn't explain that this wasn't Rocky's flat without giving the poor old chap away hopelessly, because she
would then ask me where he did live, and then he would be right in the soup. I was trying to induce the old
bean to recover from the shock and produce some results when she spoke again.
"Will you kindly tell my nephew's man-servant to prepare my room? I wish to lie down."
"Your nephew's man-servant?"
"The man you call Jeeves. If Rockmetteller has gone for an automobile ride, there is no need for you to wait
for him. He will naturally wish to be alone with me when he returns."
I found myself tottering out of the room. The thing was too much for me. I crept into Jeeves's den.
"Jeeves!" I whispered.
"Sir?"
"Mix me a b.-and-s., Jeeves. I feel weak."
"Very good, sir."
"This is getting thicker every minute, Jeeves."
"Sir?"
"She thinks you're Mr. Todd's man. She thinks the whole place is his, and everything in it. I don't see what
you're to do, except stay on and keep it up. We can't say anything or she'll get on to the whole thing, and I
don't want to let Mr. Todd down. By the way, Jeeves, she wants you to prepare her bed."
He looked wounded.
"It is hardly my place, sir----"
"I know--I know. But do it as a personal favour to me. If you come to that, it's hardly my place to be flung
out of the flat like this and have to go to an hotel, what?"
"Is it your intention to go to an hotel, sir? What will you do for clothes?"
"Good Lord! I hadn't thought of that. Can you put a few things in a bag when she isn't looking, and sneak
them down to me at the St. Aurea?"
"I will endeavour to do so, sir."
"Well, I don't think there's anything more, is there? Tell Mr. Todd where I am when he gets here."
"Very good, sir."
I looked round the place. The moment of parting had come. I felt sad. The whole thing reminded me of one
of those melodramas where they drive chappies out of the old homestead into the snow.
"Good-bye, Jeeves," I said.
"Good-bye, sir."
And I staggered out.
* * * * *
You know, I rather think I agree with those poet-and-philosopher Johnnies who insist that a fellow ought to
be devilish pleased if he has a bit of trouble. All that stuff about being refined by suffering, you know.
Suffering does give a chap a sort of broader and more sympathetic outlook. It helps you to understand other
people's
misfortunes if you've been through the same thing yourself.
As I stood in my lonely bedroom at the hotel, trying to tie my white tie myself, it struck me for the first time
that there must be whole squads of chappies in the world who had to get along without a man to look after
them. I'd always thought of Jeeves as a kind of natural phenomenon; but, by Jove! of course, when you
come to think of it, there must be quite a lot of fellows who have to press their own clothes themselves and
haven't got anybody to bring them tea in the morning, and so on. It was rather a solemn thought, don't you
know. I mean to say, ever since then I've been able to appreciate the frightful privations the poor have to
stick.
I got dressed somehow. Jeeves hadn't forgotten a thing in his packing.
Everything was there, down to the final stud. I'm not sure this didn't make me feel worse. It kind of
deepened the pathos. It was like what somebody or other wrote about the touch of a vanished hand.
I had a bit of dinner somewhere and went to a show of some kind; but nothing seemed to make any
difference. I simply hadn't the heart to go on to supper anywhere. I just sucked down a whisky-and-soda in
the hotel smoking-room and went straight up to bed. I don't know when I've felt so rotten. Somehow I
found myself moving about the room softly, as if there had been a death in the family. If I had anybody to
talk to I should have talked in a whisper; in fact, when the telephone-bell rang I answered in such a sad,
hushed voice that the fellow at the other end of the wire said "Halloa!" five times, thinking he hadn't got me.
It was Rocky. The poor old scout was deeply agitated.
"Bertie! Is that you, Bertie! Oh, gosh? I'm having a time!"
"Where are you speaking from?"
"The Midnight Revels. We've been here an hour, and I think we're a fixture for the night. I've told Aunt
Isabel I've gone out to call up a friend to join us. She's glued to a chair, with this-is-the-life written all over
her, taking it in through the pores. She loves it, and I'm nearly crazy."
"Tell me all, old top," I said.
"A little more of this," he said, "and I shall sneak quietly off to the river and end it all. Do you mean to say
you go through this sort of thing every night, Bertie, and enjoy it? It's simply infernal! I was just snatching a
wink of sleep behind the bill of fare just now when about a million yelling girls swooped down, with toy
balloons. There are two orchestras here, each trying to see if it can't play louder than the other. I'm a mental
and physical wreck. When your telegram arrived I was just lying down for a quiet pipe, with a sense of
absolute peace stealing over me. I had to get dressed and sprint two miles to catch the train. It nearly gave
me heart-failure; and on top of that I almost got brain fever inventing lies to tell Aunt Isabel.
And then I had to cram myself into these confounded evening clothes of yours."
I gave a sharp wail of agony. It hadn't struck me till then that Rocky was depending on my wardrobe to see
him through.
"You'll ruin them!"
"I hope so," said Rocky, in the most unpleasant way. His troubles seemed to have had the worst effect on
his character. "I should like to get back at them somehow; they've given me a bad enough time. They're
about three sizes too small, and something's apt to give at any moment.
I wish to goodness it would, and give me a chance to breathe. I haven't breathed since half-past seven.
Thank Heaven, Jeeves managed to get out and buy me a collar that fitted, or I should be a strangled corpse
by now! It was touch and go till the stud broke. Bertie, this is pure Hades! Aunt Isabel keeps on urging me
to dance. How on earth can I dance when I don't know a soul to dance with? And how the deuce could I,
even if I knew every girl in the place? It's taking big chances even to move in these trousers. I had to tell her
I've hurt my ankle. She keeps asking me when Cohan and Stone are going to turn up; and it's simply a
question of time before she discovers that Stone is sitting two tables away. Something's got to be done,
Bertie! You've got to think up some way of getting me out of this mess. It was you who got me into it."
"Me! What do you mean?"
"Well, Jeeves, then. It's all the same. It was you who suggested leaving it to Jeeves. It was those letters I
wrote from his notes that did the mischief. I made them too good! My aunt's just been telling me about it.
She says she had resigned herself to ending her life where she was, and then my letters began to arrive,
describing the joys of New York; and they stimulated her to such an extent that she pulled herself together
and made the trip. She seems to think she's had some miraculous kind of faith cure. I tell you I can't stand
it, Bertie!
It's got to end!"
"Can't Jeeves think of anything?"
"No. He just hangs round saying: 'Most disturbing, sir!' A fat lot of help that is!"
"Well, old lad," I said, "after all, it's far worse for me than it is for you. You've got a comfortable home and
Jeeves. And you're saving a lot of money."
"Saving money? What do you mean--saving money?"
"Why, the allowance your aunt was giving you. I suppose she's paying all the expenses now, isn't she?"
"Certainly she is; but she's stopped the allowance. She wrote the lawyers to-night. She says that, now she's
in New York, there is no necessity for it to go on, as we shall always be together, and it's simpler for her to
look after that end of it. I tell you, Bertie, I've examined the darned cloud with a microscope, and if it's got a
silver lining it's some little dissembler!"
"But, Rocky, old top, it's too bally awful! You've no notion of what I'm going through in this beastly hotel,
without Jeeves. I must get back to the flat."
"Don't come near the flat."
"But it's my own flat."
"I can't help that. Aunt Isabel doesn't like you. She asked me what you did for a living. And when I told her
you didn't do anything she said she thought as much, and that you were a typical specimen of a useless and
decaying aristocracy. So if you think you have made a hit, forget it. Now I must be going back, or she'll be
coming out here after me. Good-bye."
* * * * *
Next morning Jeeves came round. It was all so home-like when he floated noiselessly into the room that I
nearly broke down. "Good morning, sir," he said. "I have brought a few more of your personal belongings."
He began to unstrap the suit-case he was carrying.
"Did you have any trouble sneaking them away?"
"It was not easy, sir. I had to watch my chance. Miss Rockmetteller is a remarkably alert lady."
"You know, Jeeves, say what you like--this is a bit thick, isn't it?"
"The situation is certainly one that has never before come under my notice, sir. I have brought the heather-
mixture suit, as the climatic conditions are congenial. To-morrow, if not prevented, I will endeavour to add
the brown lounge with the faint green twill."
"It can't go on--this sort of thing--Jeeves."
"We must hope for the best, sir."
"Can't you think of anything to do?"
"I have been giving the matter considerable thought, sir, but so far without success. I am placing three silk
shirts--the dove-coloured, the light blue, and the mauve--in the first long drawer, sir."
"You don't mean to say you can't think of anything, Jeeves?"
"For the moment, sir, no. You will find a dozen handkerchiefs and the tan socks in the upper drawer on the
left." He strapped the suit-case and put it on a chair. "A curious lady, Miss Rockmetteller, sir."
"You understate it, Jeeves."
He gazed meditatively out of the window.
"In many ways, sir, Miss Rockmetteller reminds me of an aunt of mine who resides in the south-east
portion of London. Their temperaments are much alike. My aunt has the same taste for the pleasures of the
great city. It is a passion with her to ride in hansom cabs, sir. Whenever the family take their eyes off her
she escapes from the house and spends the day riding about in cabs. On several occasions she has
broken into the children's savings bank to secure the means to enable her to gratify this desire."
"I love to have these little chats with you about your female relatives, Jeeves," I said coldly, for I felt that
the man had let me down, and I was fed up with him. "But I don't see what all this has got to do with my
trouble."
"I beg your pardon, sir. I am leaving a small assortment of neckties on the mantelpiece, sir, for you to select
according to your preference. I should recommend the blue with the red domino pattern, sir."
Then he streamed imperceptibly toward the door and flowed silently out.
* * * * *
I've often heard that chappies, after some great shock or loss, have a habit, after they've been on the floor
for a while wondering what hit them, of picking themselves up and piecing themselves together, and sort of
taking a whirl at beginning a new life. Time, the great healer, and Nature, adjusting itself, and so on and so
forth. There's a lot in it. I know, because in my own case, after a day or two of what you might call
prostration, I began to recover. The frightful loss of Jeeves made any thought of pleasure more or less a
mockery, but at least I found that I was able to have a dash at enjoying life again.
What I mean is, I braced up to the extent of going round the cabarets once more, so as to try to forget, if
only for the moment.
New York's a small place when it comes to the part of it that wakes up just as the rest is going to bed, and it
wasn't long before my tracks began to cross old Rocky's. I saw him once at Peale's, and again at Frolics on
the roof. There wasn't anybody with him either time except the aunt, and, though he was trying to look as if
he had struck the ideal life, it wasn't difficult for me, knowing the circumstances, to see that beneath the
mask the poor chap was suffering. My heart bled for the fellow. At least, what there was of it that wasn't
bleeding for myself bled for him. He had the air of one who was about to crack under the strain.
It seemed to me that the aunt was looking slightly upset also. I took it that she was beginning to wonder
when the celebrities were going to surge round, and what had suddenly become of all those wild, careless
spirits Rocky used to mix with in his letters. I didn't blame her. I had only read a couple of his letters, but
they certainly gave the impression that poor old Rocky was by way of being the hub of New York
night life, and that, if by any chance he failed to show up at a cabaret, the management said: "What's the
use?" and put up the shutters.
The next two nights I didn't come across them, but the night after that I was sitting by myself at the Maison
Pierre when somebody tapped me on the shoulder-blade, and I found Rocky standing beside me, with a sort
of mixed expression of wistfulness and apoplexy on his face. How the chappie had contrived to wear my
evening clothes so many times without disaster was a mystery to me. He confided later that early in the
proceedings he had slit the waistcoat up the back and that that had helped a bit.
For a moment I had the idea that he had managed to get away from his aunt for the evening; but, looking
past him, I saw that she was in again. She was at a table over by the wall, looking at me as if I were
something the management ought to be complained to about.
"Bertie, old scout," said Rocky, in a quiet, sort of crushed voice, "we've always been pals, haven't we? I
mean, you know I'd do you a good turn if you asked me?"
"My dear old lad," I said. The man had moved me.
"Then, for Heaven's sake, come over and sit at our table for the rest of the evening."
Well, you know, there are limits to the sacred claims of friendship.
"My dear chap," I said, "you know I'd do anything in reason; but----"
"You must come, Bertie. You've got to. Something's got to be done to divert her mind. She's brooding
about something. She's been like that for the last two days. I think she's beginning to suspect. She can't
understand why we never seem to meet anyone I know at these joints. A few nights ago I happened to run
into two newspaper men I used to know fairly well. That kept me going for a while. I introduced them to
Aunt Isabel as David Belasco and Jim Corbett, and it went well. But the effect has worn off now, and she's
beginning to wonder again. Something's got to be done, or she will find out everything, and if she does I'd
take a nickel for my chance of getting a cent from her later on. So, for the love of Mike, come across to our
table and help things along."
I went along. One has to rally round a pal in distress. Aunt Isabel was sitting bolt upright, as usual. It
certainly did seem as if she had lost a bit of the zest with which she had started out to explore Broadway.
She looked as if she had been thinking a good deal about rather unpleasant things.
"You've met Bertie Wooster, Aunt Isabel?" said Rocky.
"I have."
There was something in her eye that seemed to say:
"Out of a city of six million people, why did you pick on me?"
"Take a seat, Bertie. What'll you have?" said Rocky.
And so the merry party began. It was one of those jolly, happy, bread-crumbling parties where you cough
twice before you speak, and then decide not to say it after all. After we had had an hour of this wild
dissipation, Aunt Isabel said she wanted to go home. In the light of what Rocky had been telling me, this
struck me as sinister. I had gathered that at the beginning of her visit she had had to be dragged home with
ropes.
It must have hit Rocky the same way, for he gave me a pleading look.
"You'll come along, won't you, Bertie, and have a drink at the flat?"
I had a feeling that this wasn't in the contract, but there wasn't anything to be done. It seemed brutal to
leave the poor chap alone with the woman, so I went along.
Right from the start, from the moment we stepped into the taxi, the feeling began to grow that something
was about to break loose. A massive silence prevailed in the corner where the aunt sat, and, though Rocky,
balancing himself on the little seat in front, did his best to supply dialogue, we weren't a chatty party.
I had a glimpse of Jeeves as we went into the flat, sitting in his lair, and I wished I could have called to him
to rally round. Something told me that I was about to need him. The stuff was on the table in the sitting-
room. Rocky took up the decanter.
"Say when, Bertie."
"Stop!" barked the aunt, and he dropped it.
I caught Rocky's eye as he stooped to pick up the ruins. It was the eye of one who sees it coming.
"Leave it there, Rockmetteller!" said Aunt Isabel; and Rocky left it there.
"The time has come to speak," she said. "I cannot stand idly by and see a young man going to perdition!"
Poor old Rocky gave a sort of gurgle, a kind of sound rather like the whisky had made running out of the
decanter on to my carpet.
"Eh?" he said, blinking.
The aunt proceeded.
"The fault," she said, "was mine. I had not then seen the light. But now my eyes are open. I see the hideous
mistake I have made. I shudder at the thought of the wrong I did you, Rockmetteller, by urging you into
contact with this wicked city."
I saw Rocky grope feebly for the table. His fingers touched it, and a look of relief came into the poor
chappie's face. I understood his feelings.
"But when I wrote you that letter, Rockmetteller, instructing you to go to the city and live its life, I had not
had the privilege of hearing Mr. Mundy speak on the subject of New York."
"Jimmy Mundy!" I cried.
You know how it is sometimes when everything seems all mixed up and you suddenly get a clue. When she
mentioned Jimmy Mundy I began to understand more or less what had happened. I'd seen it happen before.
I remember, back in England, the man I had before Jeeves sneaked off to a meeting on his evening out and
came back and denounced me in front of a crowd of chappies I was giving a bit of supper to as a moral
leper.
The aunt gave me a withering up and down.
"Yes; Jimmy Mundy!" she said. "I am surprised at a man of your stamp having heard of him. There is no
music, there are no drunken, dancing men, no shameless, flaunting women at his meetings; so for you they
would have no attraction. But for others, less dead in sin, he has his message. He has come to save New
York from itself; to force it--in his picturesque phrase--to hit the trail. It was three days ago, Rockmetteller,
that I first heard him. It was an accident that took me to his meeting. How often in this life a mere accident
may shape our whole future!
"You had been called away by that telephone message from Mr. Belasco; so you could not take me to the
Hippodrome, as we had arranged. I asked your manservant, Jeeves, to take me there. The man has very
little intelligence. He seems to have misunderstood me. I am thankful that he did. He took me to what I
subsequently learned was Madison Square Garden, where Mr. Mundy is holding his meetings. He escorted
me to a seat and then left me. And it was not till the meeting had begun that I discovered the mistake which
had been made. My seat was in the middle of a row. I could not leave without inconveniencing a great
many
people, so I remained."
She gulped.
"Rockmetteller, I have never been so thankful for anything else. Mr. Mundy was wonderful! He was like
some prophet of old, scourging the sins of the people. He leaped about in a frenzy of inspiration till I feared
he would do himself an injury. Sometimes he expressed himself in a somewhat odd manner, but every word
carried conviction. He showed me New York in its true colours. He showed me the vanity and wickedness
of sitting in gilded haunts of vice, eating lobster when decent people should be in bed.
"He said that the tango and the fox-trot were devices of the devil to drag people down into the Bottomless
Pit. He said that there was more sin in ten minutes with a negro banjo orchestra than in all the ancient revels
of Nineveh and Babylon. And when he stood on one leg and pointed right at where I was sitting and
shouted, 'This means you!' I could have sunk through the floor. I came away a changed woman. Surely you
must have noticed the change in me, Rockmetteller? You must have seen that I was no longer the careless,
thoughtless person who had urged you to dance in those places of wickedness?"
Rocky was holding on to the table as if it was his only friend.
"Y-yes," he stammered; "I--I thought something was wrong."
"Wrong? Something was right! Everything was right! Rockmetteller, it is not too late for you to be saved.
You have only sipped of the evil cup. You have not drained it. It will be hard at first, but you will find that
you can do it if you fight with a stout heart against the glamour and fascination of this dreadful city. Won't
you, for my sake, try, Rockmetteller? Won't you go back to the country to-morrow and begin the struggle?
Little by little, if you use your will----"
I can't help thinking it must have been that word "will" that roused dear old Rocky like a trumpet call. It
must have brought home to him the realisation that a miracle had come off and saved him from being cut
out of Aunt Isabel's. At any rate, as she said it he perked up, let go of the table, and faced her with gleaming
eyes.
"Do you want me to go back to the country, Aunt Isabel?"
"Yes."
"Not to live in the country?"
"Yes, Rockmetteller."
"Stay in the country all the time, do you mean? Never come to New York?"
"Yes, Rockmetteller; I mean just that. It is the only way. Only there can you be safe from temptation. Will
you do it, Rockmetteller? Will you--for my sake?"
Rocky grabbed the table again. He seemed to draw a lot of encouragement from that table.
"I will!" he said.
* * * * *
"Jeeves," I said. It was next day, and I was back in the old flat, lying in the old arm-chair, with my feet
upon the good old table. I had just come from seeing dear old Rocky off to his country cottage, and an hour
before he had seen his aunt off to whatever hamlet it was that she was the curse of; so we were alone at
last. "Jeeves, there's no place like home--what?"
"Very true, sir."
"The jolly old roof-tree, and all that sort of thing--what?"
"Precisely, sir."
I lit another cigarette.
"Jeeves."
"Sir?"
"Do you know, at one point in the business I really thought you were baffled."
"Indeed, sir?"
"When did you get the idea of taking Miss Rockmetteller to the meeting? It was pure genius!"
"Thank you, sir. It came to me a little suddenly, one morning when I was thinking of my aunt, sir."
"Your aunt? The hansom cab one?"
"Yes, sir. I recollected that, whenever we observed one of her attacks coming on, we used to send for the
clergyman of the parish. We always found that if he talked to her a while of higher things it diverted her
mind from hansom cabs. It occurred to me that the same treatment might prove efficacious in the case of
Miss Rockmetteller."
I was stunned by the man's resource.
"It's brain," I said; "pure brain! What do you do to get like that, Jeeves? I believe you must eat a lot of fish,
or something. Do you eat a lot of fish, Jeeves?"
"No, sir."
"Oh, well, then, it's just a gift, I take it; and if you aren't born that way there's no use worrying."
"Precisely, sir," said Jeeves. "If I might make the suggestion, sir, I should not continue to wear your present
tie. The green shade gives you a slightly bilious air. I should strongly advocate the blue with the red domino
pattern instead, sir."
"All right, Jeeves." I said humbly. "You know!"
Bertie Changes His Mind
IT has happened so frequently in the past few years that young fellows starting in my profession have come
to me for a word of advice, that I’ve found it convenient now to condense my system into a brief formula.
“Resource and Tact”—that is my motto. Tact, of course, has always been with me a sine qua non: while as
for resource, I think I may say that I have usually contrived to show a certain modicum of what I might call
finesse in handling those little contretemps which inevitably arise from time to time in the daily life of a
gentleman’s personal gentleman. I am reminded, just by way of an instance, of the Episode of the School
for Young Ladies down Brighton way. Now, there was a case. The very moment I observed the small child
waving to us in the road, I said to myself—— But perhaps it will be more satisfactory to relate the affair
from the beginning. And I think it may be said to have commenced one evening at the moment when I
brought the guv’nor his whisky and siphon and he burst out at me with such remarkable petulance.
Kind of moody the guv’nor had been for some days. Not at all his usual bright self. I had put it down to
reaction from a slight attack of influenza which he’d been having: and, of course, I took no notice, just
performing my duties as usual, until this evening which I’m talking about, when I brought him his whisky
and siphon as was customary and he burst out at me.
“Oh, dash it, Jeeves!” he said, sort of overwrought. “I wish at least you’d put it on another table for a
change.”
“Sir?” I said.
“Every night, hang it all,” proceeded the guv’nor, “you come in at exactly the same old time with the same
old tray and put it on the same dashed old table. I’m fed up, I tell you. It’s the bally monotony of it that
makes it all seem so frightfully bally.”
I confess that his words filled me with a certain apprehension. I had heard gentlemen in whose employment
I’ve been talk in very much the same way before, and it had almost invariably meant that they were
contemplating matrimony. It disturbed me, therefore, I’m free to admit, when Mr. Wooster spoke in this
fashion. I had no desire to sever a connection so pleasant in every respect as his and mine had been, and my
experience is that when the wife comes in at the front door the valet of bachelor days goes out at the back.
“It’s not your fault, of course,” went on the guv’nor, calming down a trifle. “I’m not blaming you. But, by
Jove, I mean, you must acknowledge, I mean to say—I’ve been thinking pretty deeply these last few days,
Jeeves, and I’ve come to the conclusion mine is an empty life. I’m lonely, Jeeves.”
“You have a great many friends, sir,” I pointed out.
“What’s the good of friends?”
“Emerson says a friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of Nature, sir.”
“Well, you can tell Emerson from me next time you see him that he’s an ass.”
“Very good, sir.”
“What I want—Jeeves, have you seen that play called I-forget-its-dashed-name?”
“No, sir.”
“It’s on at the What-d’you-call-it. I went last night. The hero’s a chap who’s buzzing along, you know,
quite merry and bright, and suddenly a kid turns up and says she’s his daughter. Left over from act one,
you know—absolutely the first he’d heard of it. Well, of course, there’s a bit of a fuss and they say to him:
‘What-ho?’ and he says: ‘Well, what about it?’ and they say: ‘Well, what about it?’ and he says: ‘Oh, all
right, then, if that’s the way you feel!’ and he takes the kid and goes off with her out into the world
together, you know. Well, what I’m driving at, Jeeves, is that I envied that chappie. Most awfully jolly little
girl, you know, clinging to him trustingly and what not. Something to look after, if you know what I mean.
Jeeves, I wish I had a daughter. I wonder what the procedure is?”
“Marriage is, I believe, considered the preliminary step, sir.”
“No, I mean about adopting a kid. You can adopt kids, you know, Jeeves. I’ve seen it in the papers, often.
‘So-and-so, adopted daughter of Tiddleypush.’ It can be done all right. But what I want to know is how you
start about it.”
“The process, I should imagine, would be highly complicated and laborious, sir. It would cut into your spare
time.”
This seemed to check him for a while. Then he brightened up.
“Well, I’ll tell you what I could do, then. My sister will be back from India next week with her three little
girls. I’ll give up this flat and take a house and have them all to live with me. By Jove, Jeeves, I think that’s
rather a scheme, what? Prattle of childish voices, eh? Little feet pattering hither and thither, yes!”
I concealed my perturbation. The scheme the guv’nor was toying with meant the finish of our cosy bachelor
establishment if it came off: and no doubt some men in my place would at this juncture have voiced their
disapproval and probably got the sack for it, the guv’nor being in what you might call an edgey mood. I
avoided this tracasserie.
“If you will pardon my saying so, sir,” I suggested, tactfully,”I think you are not quite yourself after your
influenza. If I might express the opinion, what you require is a few days by the sea. Brighton is very handy,
sir.”
“Are you suggesting that I’m talking through my hat?”
“By no means, sir. I merely advocate a short stay at Brighton as a physical recuperative.”
The guv’nor thought it over.
“Well, I’m not sure you’re not right. I am feeling more or less of an onion. You might shove a few things in
a suit-case and drive me down in the car to-morrow.”
“Very good, sir.”
“And when we get back I’ll be in the pink and ready to tackle this pattering feet wheeze.”
“Exactly, sir.”
Well, it was a respite, and I welcomed it. But I began to see that a crisis had arisen which would require
adroit handling. Rarely had I observed the guv’nor more set on a thing. Indeed, I could recall no such
exhibition of determination on his part since the time when he had insisted, against my obvious disapproval,
on wearing purple socks. However, I had coped successfully with that outbreak, and I was by no means un-
sanguine that I should eventually be able to bring the present affair to a happy issue. Employers are like
horses. They want managing. Some of us have the knack of managing them, some haven’t. I, I am happy
to say, have no cause for complaint.
FOR myself, I found our stay at Brighton highly enjoyable, and should have been willing to extend it; but
the guv’nor, still restless, had had enough by the end of a couple of days, and on the third afternoon he
instructed me to pack up and bring the car round to the hotel. We started back along the London road at
about five of a fine summer’s day, and had travelled perhaps two miles when this incident of the waving
young lady occurred, to which I have already alluded. I trod on the brake and brought the vehicle to a
standstill.
“What,” inquired the guv’nor, waking from a reverie,”is the big thought at the back of this, Jeeves?”
“I observed a young lady endeavouring to attract our attention with signals a little way down the road, sir,” I
explained. “She is now making her way towards us.”
The guv’nor peered.
“I see her. I expect she wants a lift, Jeeves.”
“That was the interpretation which I placed upon her actions, sir.”
“A jolly-looking kid,” said the guv’nor. “I wonder what she’s doing, biffing about the high road.”
“She has the air to me, sir, of one who has been playing hookey. From school, sir.”
“Hallo-allo-allo!” said the guv’nor, as the child reached us. “Do you want a lift?”
“Oh, I say, can you?” said the child, with marked pleasure.
“Where do you want to go?”
“There’s a turning to the left about a mile farther on. If you’ll put me down there, I’ll walk the rest of the
way. I say, thanks awfully. I’ve got a nail in my shoe.”
She climbed in at the back. A red-haired young person with a snub nose and an extremely large grin. Her
age, I should imagine, would be about twelve. She let down one of the spare seats, and knelt on it to
facilitate conversation
“I’m going to get into a frightful row,” she began. “Miss Tomlinson will be perfectly furious.”
“No, really?” said the guv’nor.
“Per-fectly furious, my dear! It’s a half-holiday, you know, and I sneaked away to Brighton, because I
wanted to go on the pier and put pennies in the slot-machines. 1 thought I could get back in time so that
nobody would notice I’d gone, but I got this nail in my shoe, and now there’ll be a fearful row. Oh, well,”
she said, with a philosophy which, I confess, I admired, “it can’t be helped. What’s your car? A Sunbeam,
isn’t it? We’ve got a Wolseley at home.”
The guv’nor was visibly perturbed. As 1 have indicated, he was at this time in a highly malleable frame of
mind, tender-hearted to a degree where the young of the female sex were concerned. Her sad case touched
him deeply.
“Oh, I say, this is rather rotten,” he observed. “Isn’t there anything to be done? I say, Jeeves, don’t you
think something could be done?”
“It was not my place to make the suggestion, sir,” I replied, “but, as you yourself have brought the matter
up, I fancy the trouble is susceptible of adjustment. I think it would be a legitimate subterfuge were you to
inform the young lady’s school-mistress that you are an old friend of the young lady’s father. In this case
you could inform Miss Tomlinson that you had been passing the school and had seen the young lady at the
gate and taken her for a drive. Miss Tomlinson’s chagrin would no doubt in these circumstances be sensibly
diminished if not altogether dispersed.”
“Well, you are a sportsman!” observed the young person, with great enthusiasm. And she proceeded to kiss
me—in connection with which I have only to say that I was sorry she had just been devouring some sticky
species of sweetmeat.
“Jeeves, you’ve hit it !” said the guv’nor. “A sound, even fruity, scheme. 1 say, I suppose I’d better know
your name and all that, if I’m a friend of your father’s.”
“My name’s Peggy Mainwaring, thanks awfully,” said the young person. “And my father’s Professor
Mainwaring. He’s written a lot of books. You’ll be expected to know that.”
“Author of the well-known series of philosophical treatises, sir,” I said. “They have a great vogue, though, if
the young lady will pardon my saying so, many of the Professor’s opinions strike me personally as
somewhat empirical. Shall I drive on to the school, sir?”
“Yes, carry on. I say, Jeeves, it’s a rummy thing. Do you know, I’ve never been inside a girls’ school in my
life.”
“Indeed, sir?”
“Ought to be a dashed interesting experience, Jeeves, what?”
“I fancy that you may find it so, sir,” I said.
We drove on a matter of half a mile down a lane, and, directed by the young person, I turned in at the gates
of a house of imposing dimensions, bringing the car to a halt at the front door. The guv’nor and the child
went in, and presently a parlourmaid came out.
“You’re to take the car round to the stables, please,” she said.
“Ah! Then everything is satisfactory, eh? Where has the guv’nor got to?”
“Miss Peggy has taken him off to meet her friends. And cook says she hopes you’ll step round to the
kitchen later and have a cup of tea.”
“Inform her that I shall be delighted. Before I take the car to the stables, would it be possible for me to have
a word with Miss Tomlinson?”
A moment later I was following her into the drawing-room.
Handsome but strong-minded—that was how I summed up Miss Tomlinson at first glance. In some ways
she recalled to my mind the guv’nor’s Aunt Agatha. She had the same penetrating gaze and that indefinable
air of being reluctant to stand any nonsense.
“I fear I am possibly taking a liberty, madam,” I began, “but I am hoping that you will allow me to say a
word with respect to my employer. I fancy I am correct in supposing that Mr. Wooster did not tell you a
great deal about himself?”
“He told me nothing about himself, except that he was a friend of Professor Mainwaring.”
“He did not inform you, then, that he was the Mr. Wooster?”
“The Mr. Wooster?”
“Bertram Wooster, madam.”
I will say for the guv’nor that, mentally negligible though he no doubt is, he has a name that suggests almost
infinite possibilities. He sounds like Someone—especially if you’ve just been told he’s an intimate friend of
Professor Mainwaring. You might not be able to say off-hand whether he was Bertram Wooster the
novelist, or Bertram Wooster the founder of a new school of thought; but you would have an uneasy feeling
that you were exposing your ignorance if you did not give the impression of familiarity with the name. Miss
Tomlinson, as I had rather foreseen, nodded brightly.
“Oh, Bertram Wooster!” she said.
“He is an extremely retiring gentleman, madam, and would be the last to suggest it himself, but, knowing
him as I do, I am sure that he would take it as a graceful compliment if you were to ask him to address the
young ladies. He is an excellent extempore speaker.”
“A very good idea!” said Miss Tomlinson, decidedly. “I am very much obliged to you for suggesting it. I
will certainly ask him to talk to the girls.”
“And should he make a pretence— through modesty—of not wishing——?”
“I shall insist!”
“Thank you, madam. I am obliged. You will not mention my share in the matter? Mr. Wooster might think
that I had exceeded my duties.”
I drove round to the stables and halted the car in the yard. As I got out, I looked at it somewhat intently. It
was a good car, and appeared to be in excellent condition, but somehow I seemed to feel that something
was going to go wrong with it—something pretty serious—something that wouldn’t be able to be put right
again for at least a couple of hours.
One gets these presentiments.
IT may have been some half-hour later that the guv’nor came into the stable-yard as I was leaning against
the car and smoking a quiet cigarette.
“No, don’t chuck it away, Jeeves,” he said, as I withdrew the cigarette from my mouth. “As a matter of
fact, I’ve come to touch you for a smoke. Got one to spare?”
“Only gaspers, I fear, sir.”
“They’ll do,” responded the guv’nor, with no little eagerness. I observed that his manner was a trifle
fatigued and his eye somewhat wild. “It’s a rummy thing, Jeeves, I seem to have lost my cigarette-case.
Can’t find it anywhere.”
“I am sorry to hear that, sir. It is not in the car.”
“No? Must have dropped it somewhere, then.” He drew at his gasper with relish. “Jolly creatures, small
girls, Jeeves,” he remarked, after a pause.
“Extremely so, sir.”
“Of course, I can imagine some fellows finding them a bit exhausting in—er——”
“En masse, sir?”
“That’s the word. A bit exhausting en masse.”
“I must confess, sir, that that is how they used to strike me. In my younger days, at the outset of my career,
sir, I was at one time page-boy in a school for young ladies.”
“No, really? I never knew that before. I say, Jeeves—er—did the—er—dear little souls giggle much in your
day?”
“Practically without cessation, sir.”
“Makes a fellow feel a bit of an ass, what? I shouldn’t wonder if they usedn’t to stare at you from time to
time, too, eh?”
“At the school where I was employed, sir, the young ladies had a regular game which they used to play
when a male visitor arrived. They would stare fixedly at him and giggle, and there was a small prize for the
one who made him blush first.”
“Oh, no, I say, Jeeves, not really?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’d no idea small girls were such demons.”
“More deadly than the male, sir.”
The guv’nor passed a handkerchief over his brow.
“Well, we’re going to have tea in a few minutes, Jeeves. I expect I shall feel better after tea.”
“We will hope so, sir.”
But I was by no means sanguine.
I HAD an agreeable tea in the kitchen. The buttered toast was good and the maids nice girls, though with
little conversation. The parlourmaid, who joined us towards the end of the meal, after performing her duties
in the school dining-room, reported that the guv’nor was sticking it pluckily, but seemed feverish. I went
back to the stable-yard, and I was just giving the car another look-over when the small Mainwaring child
appeared.
“Oh, I say,” she said,” will you give this to Mr. Wooster when you see him?” She held out the guv’nor’s
cigarette-case. “He must have dropped it somewhere. I say,” she proceeded, “it’s an awful lark. He’s going
to give a lecture to the school.”
“Indeed, miss?”
“We love it when there are lectures. We sit and stare at the poor dears, and try to make them dry up. There
was a man last term who got hiccoughs. Oh, do you think Mr. Wooster will get hiccoughs?”
“We can but hope for the best, miss.”
“It would be such a lark, wouldn’t it?”
“Highly enjoyable, miss.”
“Well, I must be getting back. I want to get a front seat.”
And she scampered off. An engaging child. Full of spirits.
She had hardly gone when there was an agitated noise, and round the corner came the guv’nor. Perturbed.
Deeply so.
“Jeeves!”
“Sir?”
“Start the car!”
“Sir?”
“I’m off!”
“Sir?”
The guv’nor danced a few steps.
“Don’t stand there saying ‘Sir?’ I tell you I’m off. Bally off! There’s not a moment to waste. The
situation’s desperate. Dash it, Jeeves, do you know what’s happened? The Tomlinson female has just
sprung it on me that I’m expected to make a speech to the girls! Got to stand up there in front of the whole
dashed collection and talk! I can just see myself! Get that car going, Jeeves, dash it all. A little speed, a little
speed!”
“Impossible, I fear, sir. The car is out of order.”
The guv’nor gaped at me. Very glassily he gaped.
“Out of order!”
“Yes, sir. Something is wrong. Trivial, perhaps, but possibly a matter of some little time to repair.” The
guv’nor being one of those easy-going young gentlemen who’ll drive a car but never take the trouble to
learn anything about its mechanism, I felt justified in becoming technical. “I think it is the differential gear,
sir. Either that or the exhaust.”
I’m fond of the guv’nor, and I admit I came very near to melting as I looked at his face. He was staring at
me in a sort of dumb despair that would have touched anybody.
“Then I’m sunk! Or”—a slight gleam of hope flickered across his drawn features—“do you think I could
sneak out and leg it across country, Jeeves?”
“Too late, I fear, sir.” I indicated with a slight gesture the approaching figure of Miss Tomlinson, who was
advancing with a serene determination in his immediate rear.
“Ah, there you are, Mr. Wooster.”
The guv’nor smiled a sickly smile.
“Yes—er—here I am!”
“We are all waiting for you in the large schoolroom.”
“But, I say, look here,” said the guv’nor, “I—I don’t know a bit what to talk about.”
“Why, anything, Mr. Wooster. Anything that comes into, your head. Be bright,” said Miss Tomlinson.
“Bright and amusing.”
“Oh, bright and amusing?”
“Possibly tell them a few entertaining stories. But, at the same time, do not neglect the graver note.
Remember that my girls are on the threshold of life, and will be eager to hear something brave and helpful
and stimulating—something which they can remember in after years. But, of course, you know the sort of
thing, Mr. Wooster. Come. The young people are waiting.”
I HAVE spoken earlier of resource and the part it plays in the life of a gentleman’s personal gentleman. It is
a quality peculiarly necessary if one is to share in scenes not primarily designed for one’s co-operation. So
much that is interesting in life goes on apart behind closed doors that your gentleman’s gentleman, if he is
not to remain hopelessly behind the march of events, should exercise his wits in order to enable himself to
be—if not a spectator—at least an auditor when there is anything of interest toward. I deprecate as both
vulgar and infra dig. the practice of listening at keyholes, but without lowering myself to that, I have
generally contrived to find a way.
In the present case it was simple. The large schoolroom was situated on the ground floor, with commodious
French windows, which, as the weather was clement, remained open throughout the proceedings. By
stationing myself behind a pillar on the porch or veranda which adjoined the room, I was enabled to see and
hear all. It was an experience which I should be sorry to have missed. The guv’nor indubitably excelled
himself.
Mr. Wooster is a young gentleman with practically every desirable quality except one. I do not mean brains,
for in an employer brains are not desirable. The quality to which I allude is hard to define, but perhaps I
might call it the gift of dealing with the Unusual Situation. In the presence of the Unusual, Mr. Wooster is
too prone to smile weakly and allow his eyes to protrude. He lacks Presence. I have often wished that I had
the power to bestow upon him some of the savoir-faire of a former employer of mine, Mr. Montague-
Todd, the well-known financier, now in the second year of his sentence. I have known men call upon Mr.
Todd with the express intention of horsewhipping him and go away half an hour later laughing heartily and
smoking one of his cigars. To Mr. Todd it would have been child’s play to speak a few impromptu words to
a schoolroom full of young ladies; in fact, before he had finished, he would probably have induced them to
invest all their pocket-money in one of his numerous companies; but to the guv’nor it was plainly an ordeal
which had knocked all the stuffing out of him right from the start. He gave one look at the young ladies,
who were all staring at him in an extremely unwinking manner, blinked, and started to pick feebly at his
coat-sleeve. His aspect reminded me of that of a bashful young man who has been persuaded against his
better judgment to go on the platform and assist a conjurer and is having rabbits and hard-boiled eggs taken
out of the top of his head.
The proceeding opened with a short but graceful speech of introduction from Miss Tomlinson.
“Girls, some of you have already met Mr. Wooster—Mr. Bertram Wooster, and you all, I hope, know him
by reputation.” Here the guv’nor gave a hideous, gurgling laugh and, catching Miss Tomlinson’s eye, turned
vermilion. Miss Tomlinson resumed.
“He has very kindly consented to say a few words to you before he leaves, and I am sure that you will all
give him your very earnest attention. Now, please.”
SHE gave a spacious gesture with her right hand as she said the last two words, and the guv’nor, under the
impression that they were addressed to him, cleared his throat and began to say something. But it appeared
that her remark was directed to the young ladies, and was in the nature of a cue or signal, for she had no
sooner spoken them than the whole school rose to its feet in a body and burst into a species of chant, of
which I am glad to say I can remember the words, though the tune eludes me. The lyric ran as follows:—
Many greetings to you!
Many greetings to you!
Many greetings, dear stranger,
Many greetings,
Many greetings,
Many greetings to you!
Many greetings to you!
To you!
Considerable latitude of choice was given to the singers in the matter of key, and there was little of what I
might call team-work. Each child went on till she had reached the end, then stopped and waited for the
stragglers to come up. It was an unusual performance, and I, personally, found it extremely exhilarating. It
seemed to smite the guv’nor, however, like a blow. He recoiled a couple of steps and flung up an arm
defensively. Then the uproar died away, and an air of expectancy fell upon the room. Miss Tomlinson
directed a brightly authoritative gaze upon the guv’nor, and he caught it, gulped somewhat, and tottered
forward.
“Well, you know——” said the guv’nor.
Then it seemed to strike him that this opening lacked the proper formal dignity.
“Ladies——”
A silvery peal of laughter from the front row stopped him again.
“Girls!” said Miss Tomlinson. She spoke in a low, soft voice, but the effect was immediate. Perfect stillness
instantly descended upon all present. I am bound to say that, brief as my acquaintance with Miss Tomlinson
had been, I could recall few women I had admired more. She had grip.
I fancy that Miss Tomlinson had gauged the guv’nor’s oratorical capabilities pretty correctly by this time,
and had come to the conclusion that nothing much in the way of a stirring address was to be expected from
him.
“Perhaps,” she said,” as it is getting late, and he has not very much time to spare, Mr. Wooster will just give
you some little word of advice which may be helpful to you in after-life, and then we will sing the school
song and disperse to our evening lessons.”
She looked at the guv’nor. The guv’nor passed a finger round the inside of his collar.
“Advice? After-life? What? Well, I don’t know——”
“Just some brief word of counsel, Mr. Wooster,” said Miss Tomlinson, firmly.
“Oh, well—— Well, yes—— Well——” It was painful to see the guv’nor’s brain endeavouring to work.
“Well, I’ll tell you something that’s often done me a bit of good, and it’s a thing not many people know. My
old Uncle Henry gave me the tip when I first came to London. ‘Never forget, my boy,’ he said, ‘that, if you
stand outside Romano’s in the Strand, you can see the clock on the wall of the Law Courts down in Fleet
Street. Most people who don’t know don’t believe it’s possible, because there are a couple of churches in
the middle of the road, and you would think they would be in the way. But you can, and it’s worth
knowing. You can win a lot of money betting on it with fellows who haven’t found it out.’ And, by Jove, he
was perfectly right, and it’s a thing to remember. Many a quid have I——”
Miss Tomlinson gave a hard, dry cough, and the guv’nor stopped in the middle of a sentence.
“Perhaps it will be better, Mr. Wooster,” she said, in a cold, even voice,” if you were to tell my girls some
little story. What you say is, no doubt, extremely interesting, but perhaps a little——”
“Oh, ah, yes,” said the guv’nor. “Story? Story?” He appeared completely distraught, poor young gentleman.
“I wonder if you’ve heard the one about the stock-broker and the chorus-girl?”
“We will now sing the school song,” said Miss Tomlinson, rising like an iceberg.
I decided not to remain for the singing of the school song. It seemed probable to me that the guv’nor would
shortly be requiring the car, so I made my way back to the stable-yard, to be in readiness.
I had not long to wait. In a very few moments the guv’nor came tottering up. The guv’nor’s is not one of
those inscrutable faces which it is impossible to read. On the contrary, it is a limpid pool in which is
mirrored each passing emotion. I could read it now like a book, and his first words were very much on the
lines I had anticipated.
“Jeeves,” he said, hoarsely,” is that damned car mended yet?”
“Just this moment, sir. I have been working on it assiduously.”
“Then, for heaven’s sake, let’s go!”
“But I understood that you were to address the young ladies, sir.”
“Oh, I’ve done that!” responded the guv’nor, blinking twice with extraordinary rapidity. “Yes, I’ve done
that.”
“It was a success, I hope, sir?”
“Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Most extraordinarily successful. Went like a breeze. But—er— I think I may as well be
going. No use out-staying one’s welcome, what?”
“Assuredly not, sir.”
I had climbed into my seat and was about to start the engine, when voices made themselves heard; and at
the first sound of them the guv’nor sprang with almost incredible nimbleness into the tonneau, and when I
glanced round he was on the floor covering himself with a rug. The last I saw of him was a pleading eye.
“Have you seen Mr. Wooster, my man?” Miss Tomlinson had entered the stable-yard, accompanied by a
lady of, I should say, judging from her accent, French origin.
“No, madam.”
The French lady uttered some exclamation in her native tongue.
“Is anything wrong, madam?” I inquired.
Miss Tomlinson in normal mood was, I should be disposed to imagine, a lady who would not readily
confide her troubles to the ear of a gentleman’s gentleman, however sympathetic his aspect. That she did so
now was sufficient indication of the depth to which she was stirred.
“Yes, there is! Mademoiselle has just found several of the girls smoking cigarettes in the shrubbery. When
questioned, they stated that Mr. Wooster had given them the horrid things.” She turned. “He must be in the
garden somewhere, or in the house. I think the man is out of his senses. Come, mademoiselle!”
It must have been about a minute later that the guv’nor poked his head out of the rug like a tortoise.
“Jeeves!”
“Sir?”
“Get a move on! Start her up! Get going and keep going!” I trod on the self-starter.
“It would perhaps be safest to drive carefully until we are out of the school-grounds, sir,” I said. “I might
run over one of the young ladies, sir.”
“Well, what’s the objection to that?” demanded the guv’nor, with extraordinary bitterness.
“Or even Miss Tomlinson, sir.”
“Don’t!” said the guv’nor, wistfully. “You make my mouth water!”
“JEEVES,” said the guv’nor, when I brought him his whisky and siphon one night about a week later,” this
is dashed jolly.”
“Sir?”
“Jolly. Cosy and pleasant, you know. I mean, looking at the clock and wondering if you’re going to be late
with the good old drinks, and then you coming in with the tray always exactly on time, never a minute late,
and shoving it down on the table and biffing off, and the next night coming in and shoving it down and
biffing off, and the next night—— I mean, gives you a sort of safe, restful feeling. Soothing! That’s the
word. Soothing!”
“Yes, sir. Oh, by the way, sir——”
“Well?”
“Have you succeeded in finding a suitable house yet, sir?”
“House? What do you mean, house?”
“I understood, sir, that it was your intention to give up the flat and take a house of sufficient size to enable
you to have your sister, Mrs. Scholfield, and her three young ladies to live with you.”
The guv’nor shuddered strongly.
“You do get the damnedest silliest ideas sometimes, Jeeves,” he said.
The End
| © 2024 Библиотека RealLib.org (support [a t] reallib.org) |