I had opened the second letter, and was giving it the eye.
‘Ha!’ I said.
‘Sir?’
‘Once again “Ha!” Jeeves, but this time signifying mild surprise. This letter is from Miss Wickham.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
I sensed – if that is the word I want – the note of concern in the man’s voice, and I knew he was saying to himself ‘Is the young master about to slip?’ You see, there was a time when the Wooster heart was to some extent what you might call ensnared by this Roberta Wickham, and Jeeves had never approved of her. He considered her volatile and frivolous and more or less of a menace to man and beast. And events, I’m bound to say, had rather borne out his view.
‘She wants me to give her lunch to-day.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
‘And two friends of hers.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
‘Here. At one-thirty.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
I was piqued.
‘Correct this parrot-complex, Jeeves,’ I said, waving a slice of bread-and-butter rather sternly at the man. ‘There is no need for you to stand there saying “Indeed, sir?” I know what you’re thinking, and you’re wrong. As far as Miss Wickham is concerned, Bertram Wooster is chilled steel. I see no earthly reason why I should not comply with this request. A Wooster may have ceased to love, but he can still be civil.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘Employ the rest of the morning, then, in buzzing to and fro and collecting provender. The old King Wenceslas touch, Jeeves. You remember? Bring me fish and bring me fowl—’
‘Bring me flesh and bring me wine, sir.’
‘Just as you say. You know best. Oh, and roly-poly pudding, Jeeves.’
‘Sir?’
‘Roly-poly pudding with lots of jam in it. Miss Wickham specifically mentions this. Mysterious, what?’
‘Extremely, sir.’
‘Also oysters, ice-cream, and plenty of chocolates with that goo-ey, slithery stuff in the middle. Makes you sick to think of it, eh?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Me, too. But that’s what she says. I think she must be on some kind of diet. Well, be that as it may, see to it, Jeeves, will you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘At one-thirty of the clock.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘Very good, Jeeves.’
At half-past twelve I took the dog McIntosh for his morning saunter in the Park; and, returning at about one-ten, found young Bobbie Wickham in the sitting-room, smoking a cigarette and chatting to Jeeves, who seemed a bit distant, I thought.
I have an idea I’ve told you about this Bobbie Wickham. She was the red-haired girl who let me down so disgracefully in the sinister affair of Tuppy Glossop and the hot-water bottle, that Christmas when I went to stay at Skeldings Hall, her mother’s place in Hertfordshire. Her mother is Lady Wickham, who writes novels which, I believe, command a ready sale among those who like their literature pretty sloppy. A formidable old bird, rather like my Aunt Agatha in appearance. Bobbie does not resemble her, being constructed more on the lines of Clara Bow. She greeted me cordially as I entered – in fact, so cordially that I saw Jeeves pause at the door before buffing off to mix the cocktails and shoot me the sort of grave, warning look a wise old father might pass out to the effervescent son on seeing him going fairly strong with the local vamp. I nodded back, as much as to say ‘Chilled steel!’ and he oozed out, leaving me to play the sparkling host.
‘It was awfully sporting of you to give us this lunch, Bertie,’ said Bobbie.
‘Don’t mention it, my dear old thing,’ I said. ‘Always a pleasure.’
‘You got all the stuff I told you about?’
‘The garbage, as specified, is in the kitchen. But since when have you become a roly-poly pudding addict?’
‘That isn’t for me. There’s a small boy coming.’
‘What!’
‘I’m awfully sorry,’ she said, noting my agitation. ‘I know just how you feel, and I’m not going to pretend that this child isn’t pretty near the edge. In fact, he has to be seen to be believed. But it’s simply vital that he be cosseted and sucked up to and generally treated as the guest of honour, because everything depends on him.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘I’ll tell you. You know mother?’
‘Whose mother?’
‘My mother.’
‘Oh, yes. I thought you meant the kid’s mother.’
‘He hasn’t got a mother. Only a father, who is a big theatrical manager in America. I met him at a party the other night.’
‘The father?’
‘Yes, the father.’
‘Not the kid?’
‘No, not the kid.’
‘Right. All clear so far. Proceed.’
‘Well, mother – my mother – has dramatized one of her novels, and when I met this father, this theatrical manager father, and, between ourselves, made rather a hit with him, I said to myself, “Why not?”’
‘Why not what?’
‘Why not plant mother’s play on him.’
‘Your mother’s play?’
‘Yes, not his mother’s play. He is like his son, he hasn’t got a mother, either.’
‘These things run in families, don’t they?’
‘You see, Bertie, what with one thing and another, my stock isn’t very high with mother just now. There was that matter of my smashing up the car – oh, and several things. So I thought, here is where I get a chance to put myself right. I cooed to old Blumenfeld—’
‘Name sounds familiar.’
‘Oh, yes, he’s a big man over in America. He has come to London to see if there’s anything in the play line worth buying. So I cooed to him a goodish bit and then asked him if he would listen to mother’s play. He said he would, so I asked him to come to lunch and I’d read it to him.’
‘You’re going to read your mother’s play – here?’ I said, paling.
‘Yes.’
‘My God!’
‘I know what you mean,’ she said. ‘I admit it’s pretty sticky stuff. But I have an idea that I shall put it over. It all depends on how the kid likes it. You see, old Blumenfeld, for some reason, always banks on his verdict. I suppose he thinks the child’s intelligence is exactly the same as an average audience’s and—’
I uttered a slight yelp, causing Jeeves, who had entered with cocktails, to look at me in a pained sort of way. I had remembered.
‘Jeeves!’
‘Sir?’
‘Do you recollect, when we were in New York, a dish-faced kid of the name of Blumenfeld who on a memorable occasion snootered Cyril Bassington-Bassington when the latter tried to go on the stage?’
‘Very vividly, sir.’
‘Well, prepare yourself for a shock. He’s coming to lunch.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
‘I’m glad you can speak in that light, careless way. I only met the young stoup of arsenic for a few brief minutes, but I don’t mind telling you the prospect of hobnobbing with him again makes me tremble like a leaf.’
‘Indeed, sir?’
‘Don’t keep saying “Indeed, sir?” You have seen this kid in action and you know what he’s like. He told Cyril Bassington-Bassington, a fellow to whom he had never been formally introduced, that he had a face like a fish. And this not thirty seconds after their initial meeting. I give you fair warning that, if he tells me I have a face like a fish, I shall clump his head.’
‘Bertie!’ cried the Wickham, contorted with anguish and apprehension and what not.
‘Yes, I shall.’
‘Then you’ll simply ruin the whole thing.’
‘I don’t care. We Woosters have our pride.’
‘Perhaps the young gentleman will not notice that you have a face like a fish, sir,’ suggested Jeeves.
‘Ah! There’s that, of course.’
‘But we can’t just trust to luck,’ said Bobbie. ‘It’s probably the f
irst thing he will notice.’
‘In that case, miss,’ said Jeeves, ‘it might be the best plan if Mr Wooster did not attend the luncheon.’
I beamed on the man. As always, he had found the way.
‘But Mr Blumenfeld will think it so odd.’
‘Well, tell him I’m eccentric. Tell him I have these moods, which come upon me quite suddenly, when I can’t stand the sight of people. Tell him what you like.’
‘He’ll be offended.’
‘Not half so offended as if I socked his son on the upper maxillary bone.’
‘I really think it would be the best plan, miss.’
‘Oh, all right,’ said Bobbie. ‘Push off, then. But I wanted you to be here to listen to the play and laugh in the proper places.’
‘I don’t suppose there are any proper places,’ I said. And with these words I reached the hall in two bounds, grabbed a hat, and made for the street. A cab was just pulling up at the door as I reached it, and inside it were Pop Blumenfeld and his foul son. With a slight sinking of the old heart, I saw that the kid had recognized me.
‘Hullo!’ he said.
‘Hullo!’ I said.
‘Where are you off to?’ said the kid.
‘Ha, ha!’ I said, and legged it for the great open spaces.
I lunched at the Drones, doing myself fairly well and lingering pretty considerably over the coffee and cigarettes. At four o’clock I thought it would be safe to think about getting back; but, not wishing to take any chances, I went to the ’phone and rang up the flat.
‘All clear, Jeeves?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Blumenfeld junior nowhere about?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Not hiding in any nook or cranny, what?’
‘No, sir.’
‘How did everything go off?’
‘Quite satisfactorily, I fancy, sir.’
‘Was I missed?’
‘I think Mr Blumenfeld and young Master Blumenfeld were somewhat surprised at your absence, sir. Apparently they encountered you as you were leaving the building.’
‘They did. An awkward moment, Jeeves. The kid appeared to desire speech with me, but I laughed hollowly and passed on. Did they comment on this at all?’
‘Yes, sir. Indeed, young Master Blumenfeld was somewhat outspoken.’
‘What did he say?’
‘I cannot recall his exact words, sir, but he drew a comparison between your mentality and that of a cuckoo.’
‘A cuckoo, eh?’
‘Yes, sir. To the bird’s advantage.’
‘He did, did he? Now you see how right I was to come away. Just one crack like that out of him face to face, and I should infallibly have done his upper maxillary a bit of no good. It was wise of you to suggest that I should lunch out.’
‘Thank you, sir.’
‘Well, the coast being clear, I will now return home.’
‘Before you start, sir, perhaps you would ring Miss Wickham up. She instructed me to desire you to do so.’
‘You mean she asked you to ask me?’
‘Precisely, sir.’
‘Right-ho. And the number?’
‘Sloane 8090. I fancy it is the residence of Miss Wickham’s aunt, in Eaton Square.’
I got the number. And presently young Bobbie’s voice came floating over the wire. From the timbre I gathered that she was extremely bucked.
‘Hullo? Is that you, Bertie?’
‘In person. What’s the news?’
‘Wonderful. Everything went off splendidly. The lunch was just right. The child stuffed himself to the eyebrows and got more and more amiable, till by the time he had had his third go of ice-cream he was ready to say that any play – even one of mother’s – was the goods. I fired it at him before he could come out from under the influence, and he sat there absorbing it in a sort of gorged way, and at the end old Blumenfeld said “Well, sonny, how about it?” and the child gave a sort of faint smile, as if he was thinking about roly-poly pudding, and said “O.K., pop,” and that’s all there was to it. Old Blumenfeld has taken him off to the movies, and I’m to look in at the Savoy at five-thirty to sign the contract. I’ve just been talking to mother on the ’phone, and she’s quite consumedly braced.’
‘Terrific!’
‘I knew you’d be pleased. Oh, Bertie, there’s just one other thing. You remember saying to me once that there wasn’t anything in the world you wouldn’t do for me?’
I paused a trifle warily. It is true that I had expressed myself in some such terms as she had indicated, but that was before the affair of Tuppy and the hot-water bottle, and in the calmer frame of mind induced by that episode I wasn’t feeling quite so spacious. You know how it is. Love’s flame flickers and dies, Reason returns to her throne, and you aren’t nearly as ready to hop about and jump through hoops as in the first pristine glow of the divine passion.
‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Well, it’s nothing I actually want you to do. It’s something I’ve done that I hope you won’t be sticky about. Just before I began reading the play, that dog of yours, the Aberdeen terrier, came into the room. The child Blumenfeld was very much taken with it and said he wished he had a dog like that, looking at me in a meaning sort of way. So naturally, I had to say “Oh, I’ll give you this one!”’
I swayed somewhat.
‘You … You … What was that?’
‘I gave him the dog. I knew you wouldn’t mind. You see, it was vital to keep cosseting him. If I’d refused, he would have cut up rough and all that roly-poly pudding and stuff would have been thrown away. You see—’
I hung up. The jaw had fallen, the eyes were protruding. I tottered from the booth and, reeling out of the club, hailed a taxi. I got to the flat and yelled for Jeeves.
‘Jeeves!’
‘Sir?’
‘Do you know what?’
‘No, sir.’
‘The dog … my Aunt Agatha’s dog … McIntosh …’
‘I have not seen him for some little while, sir. He left me after the conclusion of luncheon. Possibly he is in your bedroom.’
‘Yes, and possibly he jolly dashed well isn’t. If you want to know where he is, he’s in a suite at the Savoy.’
‘Sir?’
‘Miss Wickham has just told me she gave him to Blumenfeld junior.’
‘Sir?’
‘Gave him to Jumenfeld blunior, I tell you. As a present. As a gift. With warm personal regards.’
‘What was her motive in doing that, sir?’
I explained the circs. Jeeves did a bit of respectful tongue-clicking.
‘I have always maintained, if you will remember, sir,’ he said, when I had finished, ‘that Miss Wickham, though a charming young lady—’
‘Yes, yes, never mind about that. What are we going to do? That’s the point. Aunt Agatha is due back between the hours of six and seven. She will find herself short one Aberdeen terrier. And, as she will probably have been considerably sea-sick all the way over, you will readily perceive, Jeeves, that, when I break the news that her dog has been given away to a total stranger, I shall find her in no mood of gentle charity.’
‘I see, sir. Most disturbing.’
‘What did you say it was?’
‘Most disturbing, sir.’
I snorted a trifle.
‘Oh?’ I said. ‘And I suppose, if you had been in San Francisco when the earthquake started, you would just have lifted up your finger and said “Tweet, tweet! Shush, shush! Now, now! Come, come!” The English language, they used to tell me at school, is the richest in the world, crammed full from end to end with about a million red-hot adjectives. Yet the only one you can find to describe this ghastly business is the adjective “disturbing”. It is not disturbing, Jeeves. It is … what’s the word I want?’
‘Cataclysmal, sir?’
‘I shouldn’t wonder. Well, what’s to be done?’
‘I will bring you a whisky-and-soda, sir.’
‘What’s the good of that?’
‘It will refresh you, sir. And in the meantime, if it is your wish, I will give the matter consideration.’
‘Carry on.’
‘Very good, sir. I assume that it is not your desire to do anything that may in any way jeopardize the cordial relations which now exist between Miss Wickham and Mr and Master Blumenfeld?’
‘Eh?’
‘You would not, for example, contemplate proceeding to the Savoy Hotel and demanding the return of the dog?’
It was a tempting thought, but I shook the old onion firmly. There are things which a Wooster can do and things which, if you follow me, a Wooster cannot do. The procedure which he had indicated would undoubtedly have brought home the bacon, but the thwarted kid would have been bound to turn nasty and change his mind about the play. And, while I didn’t think that any drama written by Bobbie’s mother was likely to do the theatre-going public much good, I couldn’t dash the cup of happiness, so to speak, from the blighted girl’s lips, as it were. Noblesse oblige about sums the thing up.
‘No, Jeeves,’ I said. ‘But if you can think of some way by which I can oil privily into the suite and sneak the animal out of it without causing any hard feelings, spill it.’
‘I will endeavour to do so, sir.’
‘Snap into it, then, without delay. They say fish are good for the brain. Have a go at the sardines and come back and report.’
‘Very good, sir.’
It was about ten minutes later that he entered the presence once more.
‘I fancy, sir—’
‘Yes, Jeeves?’
‘I rather fancy, sir, that I have discovered a plan of action.’
‘Or scheme.’
‘Or scheme, sir. A plan of action or scheme which will meet the situation. If I understood you rightly, sir, Mr and Master Blumenfeld have attended a motion-picture performance?’
‘Correct.’
‘In which case, they should not return to the hotel before five-fifteen?’
‘Correct once more. Miss Wickham is scheduled in at five-thirty to sign the contract.’
‘The suite, therefore, is at present unoccupied.’
‘Except for McIntosh.’
‘Except for McIntosh, sir. Everything, accordingly, must depend on whether Mr Blumenfeld left instructions that, in the event of her arriving before he did, Miss Wickham was to be shown straight up to the suite, to await his return.’