Пэлем Грэнвил Вудхауз. Премного обязан, Дживс (engl)

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     OCR: Rojer, 2002
     (more PGW titles to come, http://rojer.bdo.ru/PGW/) Ў http://rojer.bdo.ru/PGW/
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        P.G.Wodehouse. Much obliged, Jeeves


        1
    As  I slid into my chair at the breakfast table and started  to
deal  with the toothsome eggs and bacon which Jeeves had  given  of
his  plenty, I was conscious of a strange exhilaration, if I've got
the  word right. Pretty good the set-up looked to me. Here  I  was,
back  in the old familiar headquarters, and the thought that I  had
seen  the  last of Totleigh Towers, of Sir Watkyn Bassett,  of  his
daughter Madeline and above all of the unspeakable Spode,  or  Lord
Sidcup as he now calls himself, was like the medium dose for adults
of one of those patent medicines which tone the system and impart a
gentle glow.
    'These eggs, Jeeves,' I said. 'Very good. Very tasty.'
    'Yes, sir?'
    'Laid,  no  doubt, by contented hens. And the coffee,  perfect.
Nor must I omit to give a word of praise to the bacon. I wonder  if
you notice anything about me this morning.'
    'You seem in good spirits, sir.'
    'Yes, Jeeves, I am happy today.'
    'I am very glad to hear it, sir.'
    'You  might say I'm sitting on top of the world with a  rainbow
round my shoulder.'
    'A most satisfactory state of affairs, sir.'
    'What's the word I've heard you use from time to time -  begins
with eu?'
    'Euphoria, sir?'
    'That's  the one. I've seldom had a sharper attack of euphoria.
I  feel  full to the brim of Vitamin B. Mind you, I don't know  how
long it will last. Too often it is when one feels fizziest that the
storm clouds begin doing their stuff.'
    'Very  true,  sir.  Full many a glorious morning  have  I  seen
flatter  the mountain tops with sovereign eye, kissing with  golden
face the meadows green, gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy,
Anon  permit  the  basest clouds to ride  with  ugly  rack  on  his
celestial face and from the forlorn world his visage hide, stealing
unseen to west with this disgrace.'
    'Exactly,'  I said. I couldn't have put it better myself.  'One
always has to budget for a change in the weather. Still, the  thing
to do is to keep on being happy while you can.'
    'Precisely, sir. Carpe diem, the Roman poet Horace advised. The
English poet Herrick expressed the same sentiment when he suggested
that  we should gather rosebuds while we may. Your elbow is in  the
butter, sir.'
    'Oh,  thank you, Jeeves.'Well, all right so far. Off to a  nice
start.  But  now  we  come to something which gives  me  pause.  In
recording  the  latest instalment of the Bertram Wooster  Story,  a
task at which I am about to have a pop, I don't see how I can avoid
delving  into the past a good deal, touching on events  which  took
place  in  previous instalments, and explaining who's who and  what
happened when and where and why, and this will make it heavy  going
for those who have been with me from the start. 'Old hat' they will
cry or, if French, 'Deja vu'.
   On  the  other hand, I must consider the new customers. I  can't
just  leave  the  poor perishers to try to puzzle  things  out  for
themselves. If I did, the exchanges in the present case  would  run
somewhat as follows.
   SELF:    The  relief  I  felt at having  escaped  from  Totleigh
Towers was stupendous.
   NEW C: What's Totleigh Towers?
   SELF:    For one thing it had looked odds on that I should  have
to marry Madeline.
   NEW C: Who's Madeline?
   SELF:  Gussie Fink-Nottle, you see, had eloped with the cook.
   NEW C: Who's Gussie Fink-Nottle?
   SELF:   But most fortunately Spode was in the offing and scooped
her up, saving me from the scaffold.
   NEW C: Who's Spode?
   You  see.  Hopeless. Confusion would be rife, as one  might  put
it. The only way out that I can think of is to ask the old gang  to
let  their  attention wander for a bit - there are heaps of  things
they  can be doing; washing the car, solving the crossword  puzzle,
taking  the  dog  for a run - while I place the  facts  before  the
newcomers.
   Briefly,  then,  owing  to  circumstances  I  needn't  go  into,
Madeline Bassett daughter of Sir Watkyn Bassett of Totleigh Towers,
Glos.  had long been under the impression that I was hopelessly  in
love  with  her and had given to understand that if  ever  she  had
occasion to return her betrothed, Gussie Fink-Nottle, to store, she
would marry me. Which wouldn't have fitted in with my plans at all,
she  though  physically  in the pin-up  class,  being  as  mushy  a
character as ever broke biscuit, convinced that the stars are God's
daisy  chain and that every time a fairy blows its wee nose a  baby
is  born.  The last thing, as you can well imagine, one would  want
about the home.
   So  when Gussie unexpectedly eloped with the cook, it looked  as
though Bertram was for it. If a girl thinks you're in love with her
and says she will marry you, you can't very well voice a preference
for  being  dead  in a ditch. Not, I mean, if you  want  to  regard
yourself  as  a  preux chevalier, as the expression  is,  which  is
always  my  aim.  But just as I was about to put in  my  order  for
sackcloth  and ashes, up, as I say, popped Spode, now  going  about
under  the alias of Lord Sidcup. He had loved her since she was  so
high but had never got around to mentioning it, and when he did  so
now,  they clicked immediately. And the thought that she was safely
out  of  circulation and no longer a menace was possibly the  prime
ingredient in my current euphoria.
   I   think   that   makes  everything  clear   to   the   meanest
intelligence, does it not? Right ho, so we can go ahead. Where were
we? Ah yes, I had just told Jeeves that I was sitting on top of the
world  with a rainbow round my shoulder, but expressing a doubt  as
to  whether  this state of things would last, and how  well-founded
that doubt proved to be; for scarcely a forkful of eggs and b later
it  was  borne in upon me that life was not the grand sweet song  I
had supposed it to be, but, as you might say, stern and earnest and
full of bumps.
   'Was I mistaken, Jeeves,' I said, making idle conversation as  I
sipped  my  coffee,  'or as the mists of sleep shredded  away  this
morning did I hear your typewriter going?'
   'Yes, sir. I was engaged in composition.'
   'A  dutiful letter to Charlie Silversmith?' I said, alluding  to
his  uncle who held the post of butler at Deverill Hall,  where  we
had once been pleasant visitors. 'Or possibly a lyric in the manner
of the bloke who advocates gathering rosebuds?'
   'Neither,  sir.  I  was  recording  the  recent  happenings   at
Totleigh Towers for the club book.'
   And  here, dash it, I must once more ask what I may call the old
sweats  to let their attention wander while I put the new  arrivals
abreast.
   Jeeves,  you  must  know  (I am addressing  the  new  arrivals),
belongs  to  a  club  for butlers and gentlemen's  gentlemen  round
Curzon  Street way, and one of the rules there is that every member
must  contribute to the club book the latest information concerning
the fellow he's working for, the idea being to inform those seeking
employment of the sort of thing they will be taking on. If a member
is  contemplating signing up with someone, he looks him up  in  the
club  book, and if he finds that he puts out crumbs for the birdies
every  morning  and  repeatedly saves golden-haired  children  from
being  run over by automobiles, he knows he is on a good thing  and
has  no hesitation in accepting office. Whereas if the book informs
him  that  the fellow habitually kicks starving dogs and  generally
begins  the day by throwing the breakfast porridge at his  personal
attendant, he is warned in time to steer clear of him.
   Which  is  all very well and one follows the train  of  thought,
but in my opinion such a book is pure dynamite and ought not to  be
permitted.  There are, Jeeves has informed me, eleven pages  in  it
about me; and what will the harvest be, I ask him, if it falls into
the  hands of my Aunt Agatha, with whom my standing is already low.
She  spoke her mind freely enough some years ago when - against  my
personal wishes - I was found with twenty-three cats in my  bedroom
and  again when I was accused - unjustly, I need hardly  say  -  of
having marooned A. B. Filmer, the Cabinet minister, on an island in
her  lake.  To  what heights of eloquence would she  not  soar,  if
informed  of  my  vicissitudes at Totleigh Towers? The  imagination
boggles, Jeeves, I tell him.
   To  which  he  replies that it won't fall into the hands  of  my
Aunt  Agatha,  she  not  being likely to  drop  in  at  the  Junior
Ganymede,  which is what his club is called, and there  the  matter
rests.  His reasoning is specious and he has more or less succeeded
in  soothing my tremors, but I still can't help feeling uneasy, and
my  manner, as I addressed him now, had quite a bit of agitation in
it.
   'Good  Lord!'  I ejaculated, if ejaculated is the word  I  want.
'Are you really writing up that Totleigh business?'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'All  the  stuff  about my being supposed to  have  pinched  old
Bassett's amber statuette?'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'And the night I spent in a prison cell? Is this necessary?  Why
not let the dead past bury its dead? Why not forget all about it?'
   'Impossible, sir.'
   'Why  impossible?  Don't tell me you can't  forget  things.  You
aren't an elephant.'
   I thought I had him there, but no.
   'It  is my membership in the Junior Ganymede which restrains  me
from  obliging you, sir. The rules with reference to the club  book
are  very strict and the penalty for omitting to contribute  to  it
severe. Actual expulsion has sometimes resulted.'
   'I  see,' I said. I could appreciate that this put him in  quite
a spot, the feudal spirit making him wish to do the square thing by
the  young master, while a natural disinclination to get bunged out
of  a  well-loved club urged him to let the young master  boil  his
head.  The  situation seemed to me to call for what is known  as  a
compromise.
   'Well, couldn't you water the thing down a bit? Omit one or  two
of the juiciest episodes?'
   'I  fear  not,  sir. The full facts are required. The  committee
insists on this.'
   I  suppose  I ought not at this point to have expressed  a  hope
that  his blasted committee would trip over banana skins and  break
their  ruddy necks, for I seemed to detect on his face a  momentary
look of pain. But he was broadminded and condoned it.
   'Your  chagrin  does  not surprise me, sir.  One  can,  however,
understand their point of view. The Junior Ganymede club book is  a
historic  document.  It  has  been in existence  more  than  eighty
years.'
   'It must be the size of a house.'
   'No,  sir,  the records are in several volumes. The present  one
dates back some twelve years. And one must remember that it is  not
every employer who demands a great deal of space.'
   'Demands!'
   'I  should have said "requires". As a rule, a few lines suffice.
Your eighteen pages are quite exceptional.'
   'Eighteen? I thought it was eleven.'
   'You  are omitting to take into your calculations the report  of
your   misadventures  at  Totleigh  Towers,  which  I  have  nearly
completed. I anticipate that this will run to approximately  seven.
If you will permit me, sir, I will pat your back.'
   He  made this kindly offer because I had choked on a swallow  of
coffee.  A few pats and I was myself again and more than  a  little
incensed,  as  always happens when we are discussing  his  literary
work.  Eighteen pages, I mean to say, and every page full of  stuff
calculated,  if thrown open to the public, to give my prestige  the
blackest  of  eyes.  Conscious  of a  strong  desire  to  kick  the
responsible  parties  in the seat of the  pants,  I  spoke  with  a
generous warmth.
   'Well,  I  call it monstrous. There's no other word for  it.  Do
you  know  what  that  blasted committee  of  yours  are  inviting?
Blackmail, that's what they're inviting. Let some man of  ill  will
get  his  hooks  on  that book, and what'll be  the  upshot?  Ruin,
Jeeves, that's what'll be the upshot.'
   I  don't  know if he drew himself to his full height, because  I
was  lighting a cigarette at the moment and wasn't looking,  but  I
think  he  must  have done, for his voice, when he spoke,  was  the
chilly voice of one who has drawn himself to his full height.
   'There are no men of ill will in the Junior Ganymede, sir.'
    I contested this statement hotly.
   That's  what you think. How about Brinkley?' I said, my allusion
being to a fellow the agency had sent me some years previously when
Jeeves and I had parted company temporarily because he didn't  like
me playing the banjolele. 'He's a member, isn't he?'
   'A  county member, sir. He rarely comes to the club. In passing,
sir, his name is not Brinkley, it is Bingley.'
   I  waved  an  impatient cigarette holder. I was in  no  mood  to
split straws. Or is it hairs?
   'His  name is not of the essence, Jeeves. What is of  the  e  is
that  he  went off on his afternoon out, came back in  an  advanced
state of intoxication, set the house on fire and tried to dismember
me with a carving knife.'
   'A most unpleasant experience, sir.'
   'Having  heard  noises down below, I emerged from  my  room  and
found  him  wrestling  with the grandfather clock,  with  which  he
appeared to have had a difference. He then knocked over a lamp  and
leaped  up the stairs at me, complete with cutlass. By a miracle  I
avoided  becoming the late Bertram Wooster, but only by a  miracle.
And  you  say  there are no men of ill will in the Junior  Ganymede
club.  Tchah!' I said. It is an expression I don't often  use,  but
the situation seemed to call for it.
   Things  had  become difficult. Angry passions  were  rising  and
dudgeon  bubbling up a bit. It was fortunate that at this  juncture
the telephone should have tootled, causing a diversion.
   'Mrs Travers, sir,' said Jeeves, having gone to the instrument.

        2
   I  had already divined who was at the other end of the wire,  my
good  and  deserving Aunt Dahlia having a habit of talking  on  the
telephone with the breezy vehemence of a hog-caller in the  western
states of America calling his hogs to come and get it. She got this
way  through  hunting a lot in her youth with  the  Quorn  and  the
Pytchley.  What  with people riding over hounds and  hounds  taking
time  off  to chase rabbits, a girl who hunts soon learns  to  make
herself  audible. I believe that she, when in good voice, could  be
heard in several adjoining counties.

   I  stepped  to the telephone, well pleased. There are few  males
or  females  whose society I enjoy more than that  of  this  genial
sister  of  my  late father, and it was quite a time since  we  had
foregathered.  She  lives  near the town  of  Market  Snodsbury  in
Worcestershire and sticks pretty closely to the rural  seat,  while
I,  as  Jeeves had just recorded in the club book, had had my  time
rather  full elsewhere of late. I was smiling sunnily as I took  up
the receiver. Not much good, of course, as she couldn't see me, but
it's the spirit that counts.
   'Hullo, aged relative.'
   'Hullo to you, you young blot. Are you sober?'
   I  felt  a  natural  resentment at being considered  capable  of
falling under the influence of the sauce at ten in the morning, but
I  reminded myself that aunts will be aunts. Show me an aunt,  I've
often said, and I will show you someone who doesn't give a hoot how
much  her obiter dicta may wound a nephew's sensibilities.  With  a
touch  of  hauteur I reassured her on the point she had raised  and
asked her in what way I could serve her.
   'How about lunch?'
   'I'm  not in London. I'm at home. And you can serve me,  as  you
call it, by coming here. Today, if possible.'
   'Your  words  are music to my ears, old ancestor. Nothing  could
tickle  me  pinker,'  I said, for I am always glad  to  accept  her
hospitality  and  to  renew  my acquaintance  with  the  unbeatable
eatables dished up by her superb French chef Anatole, God's gift to
the  gastric  juices. I have often regretted that I  have  but  one
stomach to put at his disposal. 'Staying how long?'
   'As  long  as you like, my beamish boy. I'll let you  know  when
the  time  comes to throw you out. The great thing is  to  get  you
here.'
   I  was touched, as who would not have been, by the eagerness she
showed  for my company. Too many of my circle are apt when inviting
me  to  their homes to stress the fact that they are only expecting
me  for  the week-end and to dwell with too much enthusiasm on  the
excellence of the earlier trains back to the metropolis  on  Monday
morning. The sunny smile widened an inch or two.
   'Awfully good of you to have me, old blood relation.'
   'It is, rather.'
   'I look forward to seeing you.'
   'Who wouldn't?'
   'Each  minute  will  seem  like an  hour  till  we  meet.  How's
Anatole?'
   'Greedy young pig, always thinking of Anatole.'
   'Difficult to help it. The taste lingers. How is his  art  these
days?'
   'At its peak.'
   'That's good.'
   'Ginger says his output has been a revelation to him.'
   I  asked her to repeat this. It had sounded to me just as if she
had said 'Ginger says his output has been a revelation to him', and
I  knew this couldn't be the case. It turned out, however, that  it
was.
   'Ginger?' I said, not abreast.
   'Harold  Winship.  He told me to call him Ginger.  He's  staying
here. He says he's a friend of yours, which he would scarcely admit
unless  he  knew it could be proved against him. You do  know  him,
don't you? He speaks of having been at Oxford with you.'
   I  uttered  a  joyful cry, and she said if I did it  again,  she
would  sue  me,  it  having nearly cracked her eardrum.  A  notable
instance of the pot calling the kettle black, as the old saying has
it,   she  having  been  cracking  mine  since  the  start  of  the
proceedings.
   'Know  him?'  I  said. 'You bet I know him.  We  were  like  ...
Jeeves!'
   'Sir?'
   'Who were those two fellows?'
   'Sir?'
   'Greek,  if  I  remember correctly. Always  mentioned  when  the
subject of bosom pals comes up.'
   'Would you be referring to Damon and Pythias, sir?'
   'That's  right.  We were like Damon and Pythias,  old  ancestor.
But  what's he doing chez you? I wasn't aware that you and  he  had
ever met.'
   'We hadn't. But his mother was an old school friend of mine.'
   'I see.'
   'And  when  I heard he was standing for Parliament  in  the  by-
election at Market Snodsbury, I wrote to him and told him  to  make
my house his base. Much more comfortable than dossing at a pub.'
   'Oh, you've got a by-election at Market Snodsbury, have you?'
   'Under full steam.'
   'And Ginger's one of the candidates?'
   'The Conservative one. You seem surprised.'
   'I  am.  You might say stunned. I wouldn't have thought  it  was
his dish at all. How's he doing?'
   'Difficult to say so far. Anyway, he needs all the help  he  can
get, so I want you to come and canvass for him.'
   This  made  me  chew  the lower lip for a  moment.  One  has  to
exercise caution at a time like this, or where is one?
   'What  does  it involve?' I asked guardedly. 'I shan't  have  to
kiss babies, shall I?'
   'Of course you won't, you abysmal chump.'
   'I've  always  heard  that kissing babies entered  largely  into
these things.'
   'Yes,  but  it's the candidate who does it, poor  blighter.  All
you have to do is go from house to house urging the inmates to vote
for Ginger.'
   'Then  rely on me. Such an assignment should be well  within  my
scope.  Old Ginger!' I said, feeling emotional. 'It will  warm  the
what-d'you-call-its of my heart to see him again.'
   'Well, you'll have the opportunity of hotting them up this  very
afternoon. He's gone to London for the day and wants you  to  lunch
with him.'
   'Does he, egad! That's fine. What time?'
   'One-thirty.'
   'At what spot?'
   'Barribault's grill-room.'
   'I'll  be  there.  Jeeves,' I said, hanging  up,  'You  remember
Ginger Winship, who used to play Damon to my Pythias?'
   'Yes, indeed, sir.'
   'They've  got  an  election  on at Market  Snodsbury,  and  he's
standing in the Conservative interest.'
   'So I understood Madam to say, sir.'
   'Oh, you caught her remarks?'
   'With  little  or  no difficulty, sir. Madam has  a  penetrating
voice.'
   'It  does  penetrate, doesn't it,' I said, massaging the  ear  I
had been holding to the receiver. 'Good lung power.'
   'Extremely, sir.'
   'I  wonder  whether she ever sang lullabies to me in my  cradle.
If  so,  it must have scared me cross-eyed, giving me the  illusion
that  the boiler had exploded. However, that is not germane to  the
issue, which is that we leave for her abode this afternoon. I shall
be  lunching  with  Ginger. In my absence, pack  a  few  socks  and
toothbrushes, will you.'
   'Very  good,  sir,'  he replied, and we did not  return  to  the
subject of the club book.


        3
   It  was with no little gusto and animation that some hours later
I  set out for the tryst. This Ginger was one of my oldest buddies,
not  quite  so  old as Kipper Herring or Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright,
with  whom  I  had plucked the gowans fine at prep  school,  public
school  and University, but definitely ancient. Our rooms at Oxford
had  been  adjacent, and it would not be too much to say that  from
the  moment he looked in to borrow a syphon of soda water we became
more  like  brothers than anything, and this state  of  things  had
continued after we had both left the seat of learning.

   For  quite a while he had been a prominent member of the  Drones
Club, widely known for his effervescence and vivacity, but all of a
sudden  he  had tendered his resignation and gone to  live  in  the
country, oddly enough at Steeple Bumpleigh in Essex, where my  Aunt
Agatha  has  her  lair. This, somebody told  me,  was  due  to  the
circumstance that he had got engaged to a girl of strong  character
who  disapproved of the Drones Club. You get girls like that  every
now and then, and in my opinion they are best avoided.
   Well,  naturally  this had parted us. He never came  to  London,
and I of course never went to Steeple Bumpleigh. You don't catch me
going  anywhere  near Aunt Agatha unless I have  to.  No  sense  in
sticking  one's neck out. But I had missed him sorely. Oh  for  the
touch of a vanished hand, is how you might put it.
   Arriving  at  Barribault's, I found him in the lobby  where  you
have  the  pre-luncheon gargle before proceeding to the grill-room,
and  after the initial What-ho-ing and What-a-time-since-we-met-ing
inevitable when two vanished hands who haven't seen each other  for
ages re-establish contact, he asked me if I would like one for  the
tonsils.
   'I won't join you,' he said. 'I'm not actually on the waggon,  I
have  a  little light wine at dinner now and then, but  my  fiancee
wants me to stay off cocktails. She says they harden the arteries.'
   If  you  are  about to ask me if this didn't make me  purse  the
lips a bit, I can assure you that it did. It seemed to point to his
having gone and got hitched up with a popsy totally lacking in  the
proper spirit, and it bore out what I had been told about her being
a girl of strong character. No one who wasn't could have dashed the
cup  from his lips in this manner. She had apparently made him like
it, too, for he had spoken of her not with the sullen bitterness of
one  crushed  beneath  the iron heel but  with  devotion  in  every
syllable.  Plainly he had got it up his nose and didn't  object  to
being bossed.
   How  different  from  me, I reflected,  that  time  when  I  was
engaged  to  my  Uncle Percy's bossy daughter  Florence  Craye.  It
didn't  last  long,  because  she gave  me  the  heave-ho  and  got
betrothed  to  a fellow called Gorringe who wrote vers  libre,  but
while it lasted I felt like one of those Ethiopian slaves Cleopatra
used  to  push  around,  and I chafed more than  somewhat.  Whereas
Ginger  obviously hadn't even started to chafe. It isn't  difficult
to  spot  when a fellow's chafing, and I could detect none  of  the
symptoms. He seemed to think that putting the presidential veto  on
cocktails  showed  what  an angel of mercy  the  girl  was,  always
working with his good at heart.
   The  Woosters  do not like drinking alone, particularly  with  a
critical  eye watching them to see if their arteries are hardening,
so I declined the proffered snort -reluctantly, for I was athirst -
and  came straight to the main item on the agenda paper. On my  way
to  Barribault's I had, as you may suppose, pondered deeply on this
business  of him standing for Parliament, and I wanted to know  the
motives behind the move. It looked cock-eyed to me.
   'Aunt  Dahlia tells me you are staying with her in order  to  be
handy  to Market Snodsbury while giving the electors there the  old
oil,' I said.
   'Yes,  she very decently invited me. She was at school  with  my
mother.'
   'So  she told me. I wonder if her face was as red in those days.
How do you like it there?'
   'It's a wonderful place.'
   'Grade  A.  Gravel  soil, main drainage, spreading  grounds  and
Company's own water. And, of course, Anatole's cooking.'
   'Ah!'  he  said, and I think he would have bared his head,  only
he hadn't a hat on. 'Very gifted, that man.'
   'A  wizard,'  I agreed. 'His dinners must fortify  you  for  the
tasks you have to face. How's the election coming along?'
   'All right.'
   'Kissed any babies lately?'
   'Ah!' he said again, this time with a shudder. I could see  that
I had touched an exposed nerve. 'What blighters babies are, Bertie,
dribbling, as they do, at the side of the mouth. Still, it  has  to
be  done. My agent tells me to leave no stone unturned if I want to
win the election.'
   'But  why do you want to win the election? I'd have thought  you
wouldn't have touched Parliament with a ten-foot pole,' I said, for
I knew the society there was very mixed. 'What made you commit this
rash act?'
   'My  fiancee wanted me to,' he said, and as his lips framed  the
word  'fiancee' his voice took on a sort of tremolo like that of  a
male  turtle  dove cooing to a female turtle dove. 'She  thought  I
ought to be carving out a career for myself.'
   'Do you want a career?'
   'Not much, but she insisted.'
   The  uneasiness I had felt when he told me the beasel  had  made
him  knock off cocktails deepened. His every utterance rendered  it
more apparent to an experienced man like myself that he had run  up
against something too hot to handle, and for a moment I thought  of
advising him to send her a telegram saying it was all off and, this
done, to pack a suitcase and catch the next boat to Australia.  But
feeling  that this might give offence I merely asked him  what  the
procedure  was when you stood for Parliament - or ran  for  it,  as
they  would say in America. Not that I particularly wanted to know,
but  it  was  something  to  talk about other  than  his  frightful
fiancee.
   A  cloud  passed over his face, which I ought to have  mentioned
earlier  was  well  worth looking at, the eyes  clear,  the  cheeks
tanned,  the  chin firm, the hair ginger and the nose  shapely.  It
topped  off,  moreover, a body which also repaid inspection,  being
muscular  and well knit. His general aspect, as a matter  of  fact,
was  rather  like that presented by Esmond Haddock, the  squire  of
Deverill  Hall, where Jeeves's Uncle Charlie Silversmith  drew  his
monthly envelope. He had the same poetic look, as if at any  moment
about  to rhyme June with moon, yet gave the impression, as  Esmond
did,  of  being able, if he cared to, to fell an ox with  a  single
blow.  I don't know if he had ever actually done this, for  one  so
seldom  meets  an ox, but in his undergraduate days he  had  felled
people  right  and left, having represented the University  in  the
ring as a heavyweight a matter of three years. He may have included
oxen among his victims.
   'You  go  through hell,' he said, the map still  clouded  as  he
recalled  the past. 'I had to sit in a room where you could  hardly
breathe because it was as crowded as the Black Hole of Calcutta and
listen  to  addresses of welcome till midnight. After that  I  went
about making speeches.'
   'Well,  why  aren't you down there, making speeches,  now?  Have
they given you a day off?'
   'I came up to get a secretary.'
   'Surely you didn't go there without one?'
   'No,  I  had one all right, but my fiancee fired her.  They  had
some sort of disagreement.'
   I  had  pursed the lips a goodish bit when he had told me  about
his fiancee and the cocktails, and I pursed them to an even greater
extent  now.  The more I heard of this girl he had got engaged  to,
the  less  I  liked the sound of her. I was thinking how  well  she
would  get  on with Florence Craye if they happened to  meet.  Twin
souls,  I  mean to say, each what a housemaid I used to know  would
have called an overbearing dishpot.
   I  didn't say so, of course. There is a time to call someone  an
overbearing  dishpot, and a time not to. Criticism of the  girl  he
loved  might  be taken in ill part, as the expression is,  and  you
don't want an ex-Oxford boxing Blue taking things in ill part  with
you.
   'Have you anyone in mind?' I asked. 'Or are you just going to  a
secretary bin, accepting what they have in stock?'
   'I'm  hoping to get hold of an American girl I saw something  of
before  I  left London. I was sharing a flat with Boko  Fittleworth
when he was writing a novel, and she came every day and worked with
him.  Boko  dictates  his stuff, and he said  she  was  tops  as  a
shorthand  typist. I have her address, but I don't  know  if  she's
still there. I'm going round there after lunch. Her name's Magnolia
Glendennon.'
   'It can't be.'
   'Why not?'
   'Nobody could have a name like Magnolia.'
   'They  could  if they came from South Carolina, as she  did.  In
the  southern  states of America you can't throw  a  brick  without
hitting  a  Magnolia. But I was telling you about this business  of
standing  for  Parliament. First, of course, you have  to  get  the
nomination.'
   'How did you manage that?'
   'My  fiancee  fixed it. She knows one of the Cabinet  ministers,
and he pulled strings. A man named Filmer.'
   'Not A. B. Filmer?'
   'That's right. Is he a friend of yours?'
   'I  wouldn't  say exactly a friend. I came to know him  slightly
owing  to being chased with him on to the roof of a sort of summer-
house by an angry swan. This drew us rather close together for  the
moment, but we never became really chummy.'
   'Where was this?'
   'On  an  island on the lake at my Aunt Agatha's place at Steeple
Bumpleigh.  Living  at  Steeple  Bumpleigh,  you've  probably  been
there.'
   He  looked  at  me with a wild surmise, much as  those  soldiers
Jeeves  has told me about looked on each other when on  a  peak  in
Darien, wherever that is.
   'Is Lady Worpledon your aunt?'
   'And how.'
   'She's never mentioned it.'
   'She wouldn't. Her impulse would be to hush it up.'
   'Then, good Lord, she must be your cousin.'
   'No, my aunt. You can't be both.'
   'I mean Florence. Florence Craye, my fiancee.'
   It  was a shock, I don't mind telling you, and if I hadn't  been
seated  I  would probably have reeled. Though I ought not  to  have
been  so surprised. Florence was one of those girls who are  always
getting   engaged  to  someone,  first  teaming  up  with   Stilton
Cheesewright,  then  me,  and  finally  Percy  Gorringe,  who   was
dramatizing her novel Spindrift. The play, by the way, had recently
been presented to the public at the Duke of York's theatre and  had
laid  an  instantaneous egg, coming off on the following  Saturday.
One  of  the  critics said he had perhaps seen it at a disadvantage
because  when he saw it the curtain was up. I had wondered  a  good
deal what effect this had had on Florence's haughty spirit.
   'You're  engaged to Florence?' I yipped, looking at him  with  a
wild surmise.
   'Yes. Didn't you know?'
   'Nobody  tells  me  anything. Engaged  to  Florence,  eh?  Well,
well.'
   A  less tactful man than Bertram Wooster might have gone  on  to
add 'Oh, tough luck!' or something along those lines, for there was
no  question  but that the unhappy man was properly up against  it,
but  if there's one thing the Woosters have in heaping measure,  it
is  tact. I merely gripped his hand, gave it a shake and wished him
happiness. He thanked me for this.
   'You're lucky,' I said, wearing the mask.
   'Don't I know it!'
   'She's a charming girl,' I said, still wearing as above.
   'That just describes her.'
   'Intellectual, too.'
   'Distinctly. Writes novels.'
   'Always at it.'
   'Did you read Spindrift?'
   'Couldn't put it down,' I said, cunningly not revealing  that  I
hadn't been able to take it up. 'Did you see the play?'
   'Twice.  Too  bad it didn't run. Gorringe's adaptation  was  the
work of an ass.'
   'I spotted him as an ass the first time I saw him.'
   'It's a pity Florence didn't.'
   'Yes.  By the way, what became of Gorringe? When last heard  of,
she was engaged to him.'
   'She broke it off.'
   'Very wise of her. He had long side-whiskers.'
   'She considered him responsible for the failure of the play  and
told him so.'
   'She would.'
   'What do you mean she would?'
   'Her nature is so frank, honest and forthright.'
   'It is, isn't it.'
   'She speaks her mind.'
   'Invariably.'
   'It's an admirable trait.'
   'Oh, most.'
   'You can't get away with much with a girl like Florence.'
   'No.'
   We  fell into a silence. He was twiddling his fingers and a sort
of  what-d'you-call-it had come into his manner, as if he wanted to
say  something  but  was  having  trouble  in  getting  it  out.  I
remembered  encountering a similar diffidence in the  Rev.  Stinker
Pinker  when he was trying to nerve himself to ask me  to  come  to
Totleigh Towers, and you find the same thing in dogs when they  put
a  paw  on  your knee and look up into your face but  don't  utter,
though  making it clear that there is a subject on which  they  are
anxious to touch.
   'Bertie,' he said at length.
   'Hullo?'
   'Bertie.'
   'Yes?'
   'Bertie.'
   'Still  here.  Excuse  me  asking,  but  have  you  any  cracked
gramophone  record blood in you? Perhaps your mother was frightened
by one?'
   And  then  it  all  came out in a rush as if  a  cork  had  been
pulled.
   'Bertie,  there's  something I must  tell  you  about  Florence,
though you probably know it already, being a cousin of hers.  She's
a  wonderful girl and practically perfect in every respect, but she
has  one  characteristic which makes it awkward for those who  love
her and are engaged to her. Don't think I'm criticizing her.'
   'No, no.'
   'I'm just mentioning it.'
   'Exactly.'
   'Well,  she has no use for a loser. To keep her esteem you  have
to  be  a  winner. She's like one of those princesses in the  fairy
tales  who set fellows some task to perform, as it might be scaling
a  mountain of glass or bringing her a hair from the beard  of  the
Great  Cham  of  Tartary,  and gave them the  brush-off  when  they
couldn't make the grade.'
   I  recalled  the princesses of whom he spoke, and I  had  always
thought  them  rather  fatheads.  I  mean  to  say,  what  sort  of
foundation  for  a  happy marriage is the bridegroom's  ability  to
scale  mountains of glass? A fellow probably wouldn't be called  on
to do it more than about once every ten years, if that.
   'Gorringe,'  said  Ginger, continuing, 'was a  loser,  and  that
dished  him.  And long ago, someone told me, she was engaged  to  a
gentleman jockey and she chucked him because he took a spill at the
canal  turn in the Grand National. She's a perfectionist. I  admire
her for it, of course.'
   'Of course.'
   'A girl like her is entitled to have high standards.'
   'Quite.'
   'But,  as  I  say, it makes it awkward for me. She has  set  her
heart  on  my winning this Market Snodsbury election, heaven  knows
why, for I never thought she had any interest in politics, and if I
lose it, I shall lose her, too. So ...'
   'Now  is  the time for all good men to come to the  aid  of  the
party?'
   'Exactly. You are going to canvass for me. Well, canvass like  a
ton  of bricks, and see that Jeeves does the same. I've simply  got
to win.'
   'You can rely on us.'
   'Thank  you,  Bertie, I knew I could. And now let's  go  in  and
have a bite of lunch.'


        4
   Having  restored  the  tissues with  the  excellent  nourishment
which  Barribault's hotel always provides and arranged that  Ginger
was  to pick me up in his car later in the afternoon, my own sports
model  being at the vet's with some nervous ailment, we parted,  he
to  go  in  search of Magnolia Glendennon, I to walk  back  to  the
Wooster GHQ.

   It  was,  as you may suppose, in thoughtful mood that I made  my
way  through  London's  thoroughfares. I was  reading  a  novel  of
suspense  the other day in which the heroine, having experienced  a
sock  in  the eye or two, was said to be lost in a maze of mumbling
thoughts, and that description would have fitted me like the  paper
on the wall.
   My  heart  was  heavy. When a man is an old  friend  and  pretty
bosom  at  that,  it  depresses you to hear that  he's  engaged  to
Florence Craye. I recalled my own emotions when I had found  myself
in that unpleasant position. I had felt like someone trapped in the
underground den of the Secret Nine.
   Though,  mark  you, there's nothing to beef about in  her  outer
crust.  At the time when she was engaged to Stilton Cheesewright  I
remember  recording in the archives that she was tall  and  willowy
with  a  terrific profile and luxuriant platinum-blonde  hair;  the
sort  of girl who might, as far as looks were concerned, have  been
the  star unit of the harem of one of the better-class Sultans; and
though  I hadn't seen her for quite a while, I presumed that  these
conditions still prevailed. The fact that Ginger, when speaking  of
her,  had gone so readily into his turtle dove impersonation seemed
to indicate as much.
   Looks,  however, aren't everything. Against this pin-up-ness  of
hers  you  had to put the bossiness which would lead her to  expect
the  bloke  she  married to behave like a Hollywood  Yes-man.  From
childhood up she had been ... I can't think of the word ...  begins
with an i... No, it's gone ... but I can give you the idea. When at
my private school I once won a prize for Scripture Knowledge, which
naturally involved a lot of researching into Holy Writ, and in  the
course of my researches I came upon the story of the military  chap
who  used to say 'Come' and they cometh and 'Go' and they goeth.  I
have always thought that that was Florence in a nutshell. She would
have  given short shrift, as the expression is, to anyone  who  had
gone when she said 'Come' or the other way round. Imperious, that's
the  word I was groping for. She was as imperious as a traffic cop.
Little  wonder  that  the  heart was heavy.  I  felt  that  Ginger,
mistaking  it  for a peach, had plucked a lemon in  the  garden  of
love.
   And  then  my  meditations took a less sombre turn.  This  often
happens  after a good lunch, even if you haven't had a cocktail.  I
reminded  myself that many married men positively enjoy being  kept
on their toes by the little woman, and possibly Ginger might be one
of them. He might take the view that when the little w made him sit
up  and  beg  and  snap  lumps of sugar off  his  nose,  it  was  a
compliment  really,  because  it showed  that  she  was  taking  an
interest.
   Feeling  a  bit  more cheerful, I reached for my cigarette  case
and was just going to open it, when like an ass I dropped it and it
fell  into the road. And as I stepped from the pavement to retrieve
it there was a sudden tooting in my rear, and whirling on my axis I
perceived that in about another two ticks I was going to be  rammed
amidships by a taxi.
   The  trouble  about whirling on your axis, in  case  you  didn't
know, is that you're liable, if not an adagio dancer, to trip  over
your  feet, and this was what I proceeded to do. My left  shoe  got
all  mixed up with my right ankle, I tottered, swayed, and after  a
brief  pause  came down like some noble tree beneath the  woodman's
axe,  and  I was sitting there lost in a maze of numbing  thoughts,
when an unseen hand attached itself to my arm and jerked me back to
safety. The taxi went on and turned the corner.
   Well,  of course the first thing the man of sensi