Plum Pie

  It was captioned

  THE HON. MABEL MURGATROYD AND FRIENDS

  and he sat gazing at it with his eyes protruding in the manner popularised by snails, looking like something stuffed by a taxidermist who had learned his job from a correspondence course and had only got as far as Lesson Three. He had had nasty jars before in his time, for he was one of those unfortunate young men whom Fate seems to enjoy kicking in the seat of the pants, but never one so devastating as this.

  Eventually life returned to the rigid limbs, and there swept over him an intense desire for a couple of quick ones. He had got, he realized, to do some very quick thinking and he had long ago learned the lesson that nothing so stimulates the thought processes as a drop of the right stuff. To grab his. hat and hasten to the Drones Club was with him the work of an instant. It was not that the stuff was any righter at the Drones than at a dozen other resorts that sprang to the mind, but at these ready money had to pass from hand to hand before the pouring started and at the Drones there were no such tedious formalities. You just signed your name.

  It occurred to him, moreover, that at the Drones he might find someone who would have something to suggest. And as luck would have it the first person he ran into in the bar was Freddie Widgeon, not only one of the finest minds in the club but a man who all his adult life had been thinking up ingenious ways of getting himself out of trouble with the other sex.

  He related his story, and Freddie, listening sympathetically, said he had frequently been in the same sort of jam himself. There was, he said, only one thing to do, and Bingo said that one would be ample.

  "I am assuming," said Freddie, "that you haven't the nerve to come the heavy he-man over the little woman?"

  "The what?"

  "You know. Looking her in the eye and making her wilt. Shoving your chin out and saying 'Oh, yeah?' and 'So what?'."

  Bingo assured him that he was not in error. The suggested procedure was not within the range of practical politics.

  "I thought not," said Freddie. "I have seldom been able to function along those lines myself. It's never easy for the man of sensibility and refinement. Then what you must do is have an accident."

  Bingo said he did not grasp the gist, and Freddie explained.

  "You know the old gag about women being tough babies in the ordinary run of things but becoming ministering angels when pain and anguish wring the brow. There's a lot in it. Arrange a meeting with Mrs. Bingo in your normal robust state with not even a cold in the head to help you out, and she will unquestionably reduce you to a spot of grease. But go to her all bunged up with splints and bandages, and her heart will melt. All will be forgiven and forgotten. She will cry 'Oh, Bingo darling!' and weep buckets."

  Bingo passed a thoughtful finger over his chin.

  "Splints?"

  "That's right."

  "Bandages?"

  "Bandages is correct. If possible, bloodstained. The best thing to do would be to go and get knocked over by a taxi cab."

  "What's the next best thing?"

  "I have sometimes obtained excellent results by falling down a coal hole and spraining an ankle, but it's not easy to find a good coal hole these days, so I think you should settle for the taxi."

  "I'm not sure I like the idea of being knocked over by a taxi."

  "You would prefer a lorry?"

  "A lorry would be worse."

  "Then I'll tell you what. Go back to the office and drop a typewriter on your foot."

  "But I should break a toe."

  "Exactly. You couldn't do better. Break two or even three. No sense in spoiling the ship for a ha'porth of tar."

  A shudder passed through Bingo.

  "I couldn't do it, Freddie old man," he said, and Freddie clicked his tongue censoriously.

  "You're a difficult fellow to help. Then the only thing I can suggest is that you have a double."

  "I've already had one."

  "I don't mean that sort of double. Tell Mrs. Bingo that there must be someone going about the place so like you that the keenest eye is deceived."

  Bingo blossomed like a flower in June. Almost anything that did not involve getting mixed up with taxi cabs and typewriters would have seemed good to him, and this seemed particularly good.

  "This business of doubles," Freddie continued, "is happening every day. You read books about it. I remember one by Phillips Oppenheim where there was an English bloke who looked just like a German bloke, and the English bloke posed as the German bloke or vice versa, I've forgotten which."

  "And got away with it?"

  "With his hair in a braid."

  "Freddie," said Bingo, "I believe you've hit it. Gosh, it was a stroke of luck for me running into you.

  But, back at the office, he found his enthusiasm waning. Doubts began to creep in, and what he had supposed to be the scheme of a lifetime lost some of its pristine attractiveness. Mrs. Bingo wrote stories about girls who wanted to be loved for themselves alone and strong silent men who went out into the sunset with stiff upper lips, but she was not without a certain rude intelligence and it was more than possible, he felt, that she might fail to swallow an explanation which he could now see was difficult of ingestion. In its broad general principles

  "Not while I have my health and strength they won't," said Lord Ippleton.

  Bingo saw that nothing was to be gained by pursuing this line of thought. Mabel Murgatroyd's parent was plainly in no mood for abstract discussion of the modern girl. Even at this distance he could hear him gnashing his teeth. Unless it was an electric drill working in the street. He changed the subject.

  "I wonder if I could speak to Miss Murgatroyd?"

  "Stop wondering."

  "I can't."

  "No."

  "Why not?"

  "Because I've shipped her off to her aunt in Edinburgh with strict instructions to stay there till she's got some sense into her fat little head."

  "Oh, gosh!"

  "Oh what?"

  "Gosh."

  "Why do you say 'Gosh'?"

  "I couldn't help it."

  "Don't be an ass. Anybody can help saying 'Gosh'. It only requires will-power. What are you, a reporter?"

  "No, just a friend."

  Bingo had never heard the howl of a timber wolf which had stubbed its toe on a rock while hurrying through a Canadian forest, but he thought it must closely resemble the sound that nearly cracked his ear drum.

  "A friend, eh? You are, are you? No doubt one of the friends who have led the ivory-skulled little moron astray and started her off on all this escutcheon-blotting. I'd like to skin the lot of you with a blunt knife and dance on your remains. Bounders with beards! You have a beard, of course?"

  "No, no beard."

  "Don't try to fool me. All you ghastly outsiders are festooned with the fungus. You flaunt it. Why the devil don't you shave?"

  "I shave every day."

  "Is that so? Did you shave today?"

  "As a matter of fact, no. I hadn't time. I had rather a busy morning."

  "Then will you do me a personal favour?"

  "Certainly, certainly."

  "Go back to whatever germ-ridden den you inhabit and do it now. And don't use a safety razor, use one of the old fashioned kind, because then there's a sporting chance that you may sever your carotid artery, which would be what some writer fellow whose name I can't recall described as a consummation devoutly to be wished. Goodbye."

  It was in thoughtful mood that Bingo replaced the receiver. He fancied that he had noticed an animosity in Lord Ippleton's manner—guarded, perhaps, but nevertheless unmistakeably animosity—and he was conscious of that feeling of frustration which comes to those who have failed to make friends and influence people. But this was not the main cause of his despondency. What really made the iron enter into his soul was the realization that with Mabel Murgatroyd in Edinburgh, not to return till the distant date when she had got some sense into her fat little head, he had lost his only chance of putting across that doub
le thing and making it stick. It was, he now saw more clearly than ever, not at all the sort of story a young husband could hope to make convincing without the co-operation of a strong supporting cast. Phillips Oppenheim might have got away with it, but that sort of luck does not happen twice.

  It really began to seem as if Freddie Widgeon's typewriter-on-toe sequence was his only resource, and he stood for some time eyeing the substantial machine on which he was wont to turn out wholesome reading matter for the chicks. He even lifted it and held it for a moment poised. But he could not bring himself to let it fall. He hesitated and delayed. If Shakespeare had happened to come by with Ben Jonson, he would have nudged the latter in the ribs and whispered "See that fellow, rare Ben? He illustrates exactly what I was driving at when I wrote that stuff about letting 'I dare not' wait upon 'I would' like the poor cat in the adage."

  Finally he gave up the struggle. Replacing the machine, he flung himself into his chair and with his head in his hands uttered a hollow groan. And as he did so, he got the impression that there was a curious echo in the room, but looking up he saw that he had been in error in attributing this to the acoustics. There had been two groans in all, and the second one had proceeded from the lips of H. C. Purkiss. The proprietor of Wee Tots was standing in the doorway of his private office, propping himself against the woodwork with an outstretched hand, and it was obvious at a glance that he was not the' suave dapper H. C. Purkiss of yesterday. There were dark circles under his eyes, and those eyes could have stepped straight on to any breakfast plate and passed without comment as poached eggs. His nervous system, too, was plainly far from being in midseason form, for when one of the local sparrows, perching on the window sill, uttered a sudden cheep, he quivered in every limb and made what looked to Bingo like a spirited attempt to lower the European record for the standing high jump.

  "Ah, Mr. Little," he said huskily. "Busy at work, I see. Good, good. Is there anything of interest in the morning post bag?"

  "Mostly the usual gibbering," said Bingo. "Amazing how many of our young subscribers seem to have softening of the brain. There is a letter from Wilfred Waterson (aged seven) about his parrot Percy which would serve him as a passport into any but the most choosy lunatic asylum. He seems to think it miraculous that the bird should invite visitors to have a nut, as if that wasn't the first conversational opening every parrot makes."

  Mr. Purkiss took a more tolerant view.

  "I see your point, Mr. Little, but we must not expect old heads on young shoulders. And speaking of heads," he went on, quivering like an Ouled Nail stomach dancer, "I wonder if you could oblige me with a couple of aspirins? Or a glass of tomato juice with a drop of Worcester sauce in it would do. You have none? Too bad. It might have brought a certain relief."

  Illumination flashed upon Bingo. If an editor's respect for his proprietor had been less firmly established, it might have flashed sooner.

  "Good Lord! " he cried. "Were you on a toot last night?" Mr. Purkiss waved a deprecating hand, nearly overbalancing in the process.

  "Toot is a harsh word, Mr. Little. I confess that in Mrs. Purkiss's absence I attempted to alleviate my loneliness by joining a group of friends who wished to play poker. It was a lengthy session, concluding only an hour ago, and it is possible that in the course of the evening I may have exceeded—slightly —my customary intake of alcoholic refreshment. It seemed to be expected of me, and I did not like to refuse. But when you use the word 'toot'..."

  Bingo had no wish to be severe, but except when throwing together stories to tell Mrs. Bingo he liked accuracy.

  "It sounds like a toot to me," he said. "The facts all go to show that..."

  He broke off. An idea of amazing brilliance had struck him. Twenty-four hours ago he would never have had the moral courage to suggest such a thing, but now that H. C. Purkiss had shown himself to be one of the boys—poker parties in the home and all that—he was convinced that if he, Bingo, begged him, Purkiss, to say that he, Bingo, had been with him, Purkiss, last night, he, Purkiss, would not have the inhumanity to deny him, Bingo, a little favour which would cost him, Purkiss, nothing and would put him, Bingo, on velvet. For Mrs. Bingo would not dream of disbelieving a statement from such a source. And he had just opened his lips to speak, when Mr. Purkiss resumed his remarks.

  "Perhaps you are right, Mr. Little. Quite possibly toot may be the mot-juste. But however we describe the episode, one thing is certain, it has placed me in a position of the gravest peril. The party—'party' is surely a nicer word—took place at the house of one of the friends I was mentioning, and I am informed by my maidservant that Mrs. Purkiss made no fewer than five attempts to reach me on the telephone last night—at 10.30 p.m., at 11.15 p.m., shortly after midnight, at 2 a.m. and again at 4.20 p.m., and I greatly fear..."

  "You mean you were away from home all night!"

  "Alas, Mr. Little, I was."

  Bingo's heart sank. He would have reeled beneath the shock, had he not been seated. This was the end. This put the frosting on the cake. Impossible now to assure Mrs. Bingo that he had been with Mr. Purkiss during the hours he had spent in his Bosher Street cell. So poignant was his anguish that he uttered a piercing cry, and Mr. Purkiss rose into the air, dislodging some plaster from the ceiling with the top of his head.

  "So," the stricken man went on, having returned to terra firma, "I should be infinitely grateful to you, Mr. Little, if you would vouch for it that I was with you till an advanced hour at your home. It would, indeed, do no harm if you were to tell Mrs. Purkiss that we sat up so long discussing matters of office policy that you allowed me to spend the night in your spare room."

  Bingo drew a deep breath. It has been sufficiently established that the proprietor of Wee Tots was not as of even date easy on the eye, but to him he seemed a lovely spectacle. He could not have gazed on him with more appreciation if he had been the Taj Mahal by moonlight.

  His manner, however, was austere. A voice had seemed to whisper in his ear that this was where, if he played his cards right, he could do himself a bit of good. There was, so he had learned from a reliable source, a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.

  He frowned, at the same time pursing his lips.

  "Am I to understand, Purkiss, that you are asking me to tell a deliberate falsehood?"

  "You would be doing me a great kindness."

  In order to speak, Bingo had been obliged to unpurse his lips, but he still frowned.

  "I'm not sure," he said coldly, "that I feel like doing you kindnesses. Yesterday I asked you for a raise of salary and you curtly refused."

  "Not curtly. Surely not curtly, Mr. Little."

  "Well, fairly curtly."

  "Yes, I remember. But I have given the matter thought, and I am now prepared to increase your stipend by—shall we say ten pounds a month?"

  "Make it fifty."

  "Fifty!"

  "Well, call it forty."

  "You would not consider thirty?"

  "Certainly not."

  "Very well."

  "You agree?"

  "I do."

  The telephone rang.

  "Ah," said Bingo. "That is probably my wife again. Hullo?"

  Bingo?"

  "Oh, hullo, moon of my delight. What became of you when we were talking before? Why, did you buzz off like a jack rabbit?"

  "I had to go and look after Mrs. Purkiss."

  "Something wrong with her?"

  "She was distracted because Mr. Purkiss was not at home all night."

  Bingo laughed a jolly laugh.

  "Of course he wasn't. He was with me."

  "What!"

  "Certainly. We had office matters to discuss, and I took him home with me. We sat up so long that I put him up in the spare room. He spent the night there."

  There was a long silence at the other end of the wire. Then Mrs. Bingo spoke.

  "But that photograph! "

  "Which photograph? Oh, you mean the one in the pap
er, and I think I know what's in your mind. It looked rather like me, didn't it? I was quite surprised. I've often heard of this thing of fellows having doubles, but I've never come across an instance of it before. Except in books, of course. I remember one by Phillips Oppenheim where there was an English bloke who looked just like a German bloke, and the English bloke posed with complete success as the German bloke or vice versa, I've forgotten which. I believe it caused quite a bit of confusion. But, getting back to that photograph, obviously if I spent the night with Mr. Purkiss I couldn't have spent it in a dungeon cell, as my double presumably did. But perhaps you would care to have a word with Mr. Purkiss, who is here at my side. For you, Purkiss," said Bingo, handing him the telephone.

  Our Man in America

  One seems to be writing a good deal about criminals these days, but owing to the eccentricity of their methods the subject is really too fascinating to leave. A gang—probably international—operating in Gold Hill, North Carolina, have just pulled off a big coup, but not having thought the thing out properly beforehand are finding themselves in a rather aggravating position, unable to establish connection with a fence willing to handle the swag. They got their booty all right, but what is holding everything up is that there seems no way of cashing in on it. There they are, all loaded up with church pews and no market in sight.

  The pews in question were those in St. John's Lutheran church of Gold Hill. The gang got away with ten of them the first time, and in a second and more successful raid collected twenty-five, plus the pulpit. And now—too late—they are beginning to realise that there is no real money in this branch of industry. It is no good lurking in dark street corners and popping out on passers-by with a whispered "Psst! Want a pulpit?". Business almost never results. Even if you shade the price a bit to suit all purses it is only a very occasional customer who is tempted by the offer of a hot pulpit. And the same thing applies to hot pews.

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