'She's going to marry Chuffy – Lord Chuffnell – him,' I said, indicating C with a wave of the hand.
'What!'
'Yes. All set.'
Old Stoker gave a powerful snort. He was deeply moved.
'Is this true?'
'Yes, father.'
'Oh! You intend to marry a man who calls your father a pop-eyed old swindler, do you?'
I was intrigued.
'Did you call him a pop-eyed old swindler, Chuffy?'
Chuffy hitched up a lower jaw which had sagged a bit.
'Certainly not,' he said weakly.
'You did,' said Stoker. 'When I told you I was not going to buy this house of yours.'
'Oh, well,' said Chuffy. 'You know how it is.'
Pauline intervened. She seemed to be feeling that the point was being wandered from. Women like to stick to the practical issue.
'Anyway, I'm going to marry him, father.'
'You are not.'
'I am too. I love him.'
'And only yesterday you were in love with this damned sooty-faced imbecile here.'
I drew myself up. We Woosters can make allowances for a father's chagrin, but there is a sharply defined limit.
'Stoker,' I said, 'you forget yourself strangely. I must ask you to preserve the decencies of debate. And it isn't soot – It's boot polish.'
'I wasn't,' cried Pauline.
'You said you were.'
'Well, I wasn't.'
Old Stoker got off another of his snorts.
'The fact of the matter is, you don't know your own mind, and I'm going to make it up for you.'
'I'm not going to marry Bertie, whatever you say.'
'Well, you're certainly not going to marry a fortune-hunting English lord.'
Chuffy took this fairly big.
'What do you mean, a fortune-hunting English lord?'
'I mean what I say. You haven't a cent, and you're trying to marry a girl in Pauline's position. Why, darn it, you're just like that fellow in that musical comedy I saw once ... what was the name ... Lord Wotwotleigh.'
An animal cry escaped Chuffy's ashen lips.
'Wotwotleigh!'
'The living spit of him. Same sort of face, same expression, same way of talking. I've been wondering all along who it was you reminded me of, and now I know. Lord Wotwotleigh.'
Pauline charged in again.
'You're talking perfect nonsense, father. The whole trouble all along was that Marmaduke was so scrupulous and chivalrous that he wouldn't ask me to marry him till he felt he had enough money. I couldn't think what was the matter with him. And then you promised to buy Chuffnell Hall, and five minutes later he came bounding up to me and started proposing. If you didn't mean to buy the Hall, you ought not to have said you would. And I don't see why you won't, either.'
'I was planning to buy it because Glossop asked me to,' said old Stoker. 'The way I feel towards that guy now, I wouldn't buy a peanut stand to please him.'
I felt impelled to put in a word.
'Not a bad sort, old Glossop. I like him.'
'You can have him.'
'What first endeared him to me was the way he set about little Seabury last night. It seemed to me to argue the right outlook.'
Stoker was staring with his left eye. The other had now closed like some tired flower at nightfall. I couldn't help feeling that Brinkley must have been a jolly good shot to have plugged him so squarely. It's not the easiest thing in the world to hit a fellow in the eye with a potato at a longish range. I know, because I've tried it. The very nature of the potato, it being a rummy shape and covered with knobs, renders accurate aiming a tricky business.
'What's that you're saying? Glossop soaked that boy?'
'With a will, they tell me.'
'Well, I'm darned!'
I don't know if you've ever seen one of those films where the tough guy hears the old song his mother used to teach him at her knee and you get a close-up of his face working and before you know where you are he's a melted man and off doing lots of good to all and sundry. A bit sudden I've always looked on it as, but you can take it from me that these lightning softenings do occur. Because now before our very eyes old Stoker was undergoing one of them.
One moment he had been absolutely the man of chilled steel. The next, he was practically human. He stared at me, speechless. Then he licked his lips.
'You really tell me old Glossop did that?'
'I was not present in person, but I have it straight from Jeeves, who got it from Mary, the parlourmaid, who was an eyewitness throughout. He put it across little Seabury properly – at a venture, I should say with the back of a hairbrush.'
'Well, I'm darned!'
Pauline was doing a bit of eye-sparkling. You could see that hope had dawned once more. I'm not sure she didn't clap her hands in girlish glee.
'You see, father. You got him all wrong. He's really a splendid man. You'll have to go to him and tell him you're sorry you were so snooty and that you're going to buy the house for him, after all.'
Well, I could have told the poor cloth-head that she was doing the wrong thing, butting in like this. Girls have no idea of handling any situation that calls for nice tact. I mean to say, Jeeves will tell you that on these occasions the whole thing is to study the psychology of the individual, and an owl could have seen what old Stoker's psychology was like. A male owl, that is. He was one of those fellows who get their backs up the minute they think their nearest and dearest are trying to shove them into anything; a chap who, as the Bible puts it, if you say Go, he cometh, and if you say Come, he goeth; a fellow, in a word, who, if he came to a door with 'Push' on it, would always pull.
And I was right. Left to himself, this Stoker in about another half-minute would have been dancing round the room, strewing roses out of his hat. He was within a short jump of becoming a thing compact entirely of sweetness and light. Now he suddenly stiffened, and a mulish look came into his eye. You could see his haughty spirit resented being rushed.
'I won't do anything of the sort!'
'Oh, father!'
'Telling me what I'm to do and what I'm not to do.'
'I didn't mean it like that.'
'Never mind how you meant it.'
Affairs had taken an unpleasant turn. Old Stoker was gruffling to himself like a not too sunny bulldog. Pauline was looking as if she had recently taken a short-arm punch in the solar plexus. Chuffy had the air of a man who has not yet recovered from being compared to Lord Wotwotleigh. And, as for me, while I could see that it was a moment that called for the intervention of a silver-tongued orator, I felt it wasn't much use having a pop at being a silver-tongued orator if one hadn't anything to say, and I hadn't.
So all that occurred was a good deal of silence, and this silence was still in progress and getting momentarily stickier, when there was a knock at the door and in floated Jeeves.
'Excuse me, sir,' he said, shimmering towards old Stoker and presenting an envelope on a salver. A seaman from your yacht has just brought this cablegram, which arrived shortly after your departure this morning. The captain of the vessel, fancying that it might be of an urgent nature, instructed him to convey it to this house. I took it from him at the back door and hastened hither with it in order to deliver it to you personally.'
The way he put it made the whole thing seem like one of those great epics you read about. You followed the procedure step by step, and the interest and drama worked up to the big moment. Old Stoker, however, instead of being thrilled, seemed somewhat on the impatient side.
'What you mean is, there's a cable for me.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Then why not say so, damn it, instead of making a song about it. Do you think you're singing in opera, or something? Gimme.'
Jeeves handed over the missive with a dignified reserve, and drifted out with salver. Stoker started to rip open the envelope.
'I shall certainly not say anything of the kind to Glossop,' he said, resuming the discussion. '
If he cares to come to me and apologize, I may possibly...'
His voice died away with a sort of sound not unlike the last utterance of one of those toy ducks you inflate and then let the air out of. His jaw had dropped, and he was staring at the cable as if he had suddenly discovered he was fondling a tarantula. The next moment there proceeded from his lips an observation which even in these lax modern days I should certainly not have considered suitable for mixed company.
Pauline hopped towards him. Solicitous. When pain and anguish racks the brow stuff.
'What's the matter, father?'
Old Stoker was making gulping noises.
'It's happened!'
'What has happened?'
'What? What?' I saw Chuffy start. 'What? What? I'll tell you what. They're contesting old George's will!'
'You don't mean that!'
'I do mean that. Read it for yourself
Pauline studied the document. She looked up, rattled.
'But if this goes through, bang goes our fifty million.'
'Of course it does.'
'We shan't have a cent, hardly.'
Chuffy came to life with a jerk.
'Say that again! Do you mean you've lost all your money?'
'It looks like it.'
'Fine!' said Chuffy. 'Great. Ripping. Wonderful. Topping. Splendid!'
Pauline gave a sort of jump.
'Why, so it is, isn't it?'
'Of course it is. I'm broke. You're broke. Let's rush off and get married.'
'Of course.'
'This makes everything all right. Nobody can say I'm like Wotwotleigh now.'
'They certainly can't.'
'Wotwotleigh, on hearing the news, would have edged out.'
'I should say so. You wouldn't have been able to see him for dust.'
'It's marvellous!'
'It's magnificent!'
'In all my life, I've never heard of such a bit of luck as this.'
'Nor have I.'
'Coming just at the right time.'
'Exactly at the right time.'
'It's topping!'
'It's simply great!'
Their fresh young enthusiasm seemed to affect old Stoker like a boil on the cheekbone.
'Stop talking that infernal rot and listen to me. Haven't you any sense at all? What do you mean, you've lost your money? Do you think I'm going to lie down and let this go through without making any come-back? They haven't a dog's chance. Old George was as sane as I am, and I've got Sir Roderick Glossop, the greatest alienist in England, to prove it.'
'But you haven't.'
'I've only to put Glossop on the witness stand, and their case collapses like a bubble.'
'But Sir Roderick won't testify for you now you've quarrelled with him.'
Old Stoker sizzled a bit. Or fumed, if you care to put it that way.
'Who says I've quarrelled with him? Show me the half-wit who dares to assert that I'm not on the most cordial terms with Sir Roderick Glossop. Just because we had a trifling, temporary difference such as happens to the closest of friends, does that mean that we're not like brothers?'
'But suppose he won't apologize to you?'
'There has never been any question of his apologizing to me. I shall naturally apologize to him. I suppose I'm man enough to admit it frankly when I realize that I have been in the wrong and have wounded my best friend's feelings, aren't I? Of course I shall apologize to him, and he will accept my apology in the spirit in which it is given. There is nothing small about Sir Roderick Glossop. I'll have him over in New York, testifying his head off, inside of two weeks. What's the name of that place he's staying at? Seaview Hotel, isn't it? I'll get him on the wire at once and arrange a meeting.'
I had to put in a word here.
'He's not at the hotel. I know, because Jeeves was trying to get him just now and drew a blank.'
'Then where is he?'
'I couldn't say.'
'He must be somewhere.'
'Ah!' I said, following the reasoning and finding it sound. 'So he is, no doubt. But where? Quite possibly he's in London by now.'
'Why London?'
'Why not?'
'Was he planning to go to London?'
'He may have been.'
'What's his address in London?'
'I don't know.'
'Don't any of you know?'
'I don't,' said Pauline.
'I don't,' said Chuffy.
'A lot of use you are to a man,' said old Stoker severely. 'Get out! We're busy.'
The remark was addressed to Jeeves, who had come floating in again. It's one of this man's most remarkable properties, that now you see him and now you don't. Or, rather, now you don't see him and now you do. You're talking of this and that and you suddenly sense a presence, so to speak, and there he is.
'I beg your pardon, sir,' said Jeeves. 'I was desirous of speaking to his lordship for a moment.'
Chuffy waved a hand. Distrait.
'Later on, Jeeves.'
'Very good, m'lord.'
'We're a little busy just now.'
'Just so, m'lord.'
'Well, it's not going to be so hard to locate a man of Sir Roderick's eminence,' said old Stoker, resuming. 'His address would be in Who's Who. Have you got a Who's Who?
'No,' said Chuffy.
Old Stoker flung the hands skyward.
'Good God!'
Jeeves coughed.
'If you will pardon me for intruding the observation, sir, I think I can tell you where Sir Roderick is. If I am right in supposing that it is Sir Roderick Glossop that you are anxious to find?'
'Of course it is. How many Sir Rodericks do you think I know? Where is he, then?'
'In the garden, sir.'
'This garden, do you mean?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Then go and ask him to come here at once. Say that Mr Stoker wishes to see him immediately on a matter of the utmost importance. No, stop. Don't you go. I'll go myself. Whereabouts in the garden did you see him?'
'I did not see him, sir. I was merely informed that he was there.'
Old Stoker clicked the tongue a bit.
'Well, damn it, whereabouts in the garden did whoever merely informed you that he was in the garden merely inform you that he was?'
'In the potting-shed, sir.'
'The potting-shed?'
'Yes, sir.'
'What's he doing in the potting-shed?'
'Sitting, sir, I imagine. As I say, I do not speak from first-hand observation. My informant is Constable Dobson.'
'Eh? What? Constable Dobson? Who's he?'
'The police officer who arrested Sir Roderick last night, sir.'
He bowed slightly from the hips and left the room.
21 JEEVES FINDS THE WAY
Jeeves!' bellowed Chuffy.
'Jeeves!' screamed Pauline.
'Jeeves!' I shouted.
'Hey!' yelled old Stoker.
The door had closed, and I'll swear it hadn't opened again. Nevertheless, there was the man in our midst once more, an expression of courteous inquiry on his face.
'Jeeves!' cried Chuffy.
'M'lord?'
'Jeeves!' shrieked Pauline.
'Miss?'
'Jeeves!' I vociferated.
'Sir?'
'Hey, you!' boomed old Stoker.
Whether Jeeves liked being called 'Hey, you!' I could not say. His well-moulded face betrayed no resentment.
'Sir?' he said.
'What do you mean by going off like that?'
'I was under the impression that his lordship, occupied with more vital matters, was not at leisure to attend to the communication I desired to make, sir. I planned to return later, sir.'
'Well, stay put for a second, won't you?'
'Certainly, sir. Had I been aware that you were desirous of speaking to me, sir, I would not have withdrawn from the room. It was merely the apprehension lest I might be intruding at a moment when my presence was not desired ...'
> 'All right, all right, all right!' I noted, not for the first time, that there was something about Jeeves's conversational methods that seemed to jar upon old Stoker. 'Never mind all that.'
'Your presence is of the essence, Jeeves,' I said.
'Thank you, sir.'
Chuffy took the floor, Stoker being occupied for the nonce with making a noise like a wounded buffalo.
'Jeeves.'
'M'lord?'
'Did you say that Sir Roderick Glossop had been arrested?'
'Yes, m'lord. It was on that point that I wished to speak to your lordship. I came to inform you that Sir Roderick had been apprehended by Constable Dobson last night and placed in the potting-shed in the Hall grounds, the constable remaining on guard at the door. The larger potting-shed, m'lord, not the smaller one. The potting-shed to which I allude is the potting-shed on the right as you enter the kitchen garden. It has a red-tiled roof, in contradistinction to the smaller potting-shed, the roof of which is constructed of...'
I had never been, as you might say, frightfully fond of J. Washburn Stoker, but it seemed only neighbourly at this moment to try to save him from apoplexy.
'Jeeves,' I said.
'Sir?'
'Never mind which potting-shed.'
'No, sir.'
'Not of the essence.'
'I quite understand, sir.'
'Then carry on, Jeeves.'
He cast a glance of respectful commiseration at old Stoker, who seemed to be having a good deal of trouble with his bronchial tubes.
'It appears, m'lord, that Constable Dobson arrested Sir Roderick at an advanced hour last night. He was then in something of a quandary as to what means to take for his disposal. You must understand, m'lord, that in the conflagration which destroyed Mr Wooster's cottage that of Sergeant Voules, which is contiguous, was also burned down. And as this cottage of Sergeant Voules's is also the local police station, Constable Dobson was not unnaturally somewhat at a loss to know where to place his prisoner – the more so as Sergeant Voules was not there to advise him, he, in fighting the flames, having sustained an unfortunate injury to his head and having been removed to the house of his aunt. I refer to his Aunt Maud, who resides in Chuffnell Regis, not ...'
I did the square thing again.
'Never mind which aunt, Jeeves.'