"I removed the parcel this morning, sir."
"Oh--ah--why?"
"I considered it more prudent, sir."
I mused for a while.
"Of course, I suppose all this seems tolerably rummy to you, Jeeves?"
"Not at all, sir. I chanced to overhear you and Lady Florence speaking
of the matter the other evening, sir."
"Did you, by Jove?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well--er--Jeeves, I think that, on the whole, if you were to--as it
were--freeze on to that parcel until we get back to London----"
"Exactly, sir."
"And then we might--er--so to speak--chuck it away somewhere--what?"
"Precisely, sir."
"I'll leave it in your hands."
"Entirely, sir."
"You know, Jeeves, you're by way of being rather a topper."
"I endeavour to give satisfaction, sir."
"One in a million, by Jove!"
"It is very kind of you to say so, sir."
"Well, that's about all, then, I think."
"Very good, sir."
Florence came back on Monday. I didn't see her till we were all having
tea in the hall. It wasn't till the crowd had cleared away a bit that
we got a chance of having a word together.
"Well, Bertie?" she said.
"It's all right."
"You have destroyed the manuscript?"
"Not exactly; but----"
"What do you mean?"
"I mean I haven't absolutely----"
"Bertie, your manner is furtive!"
"It's all right. It's this way----"
And I was just going to explain how things stood when out of the
library came leaping Uncle Willoughby looking as braced as a
two-year-old. The old boy was a changed man.
"A most remarkable thing, Bertie! I have just been speaking with Mr.
Riggs on the telephone, and he tells me he received my manuscript by
the first post this morning. I cannot imagine what can have caused the
delay. Our postal facilities are extremely inadequate in the rural
districts. I shall write to headquarters about it. It is insufferable
if valuable parcels are to be delayed in this fashion."
I happened to be looking at Florence's profile at the moment, and at
this juncture she swung round and gave me a look that went right
through me like a knife. Uncle Willoughby meandered back to the
library, and there was a silence that you could have dug bits out of
with a spoon.
"I can't understand it," I said at last. "I can't understand it, by
Jove!"
"I can. I can understand it perfectly, Bertie. Your heart failed you.
Rather than risk offending your uncle you----"
"No, no! Absolutely!"
"You preferred to lose me rather than risk losing the money. Perhaps
you did not think I meant what I said. I meant every word. Our
engagement is ended."
"But--I say!"
"Not another word!"
"But, Florence, old thing!"
"I do not wish to hear any more. I see now that your Aunt Agatha was
perfectly right. I consider that I have had a very lucky escape. There
was a time when I thought that, with patience, you might be moulded
into something worth while. I see now that you are impossible!"
And she popped off, leaving me to pick up the pieces. When I had
collected the debris to some extent I went to my room and rang for
Jeeves. He came in looking as if nothing had happened or was ever
going to happen. He was the calmest thing in captivity.
"Jeeves!" I yelled. "Jeeves, that parcel has arrived in London!"
"Yes, sir?"
"Did you send it?"
"Yes, sir. I acted for the best, sir. I think that both you and Lady
Florence overestimated the danger of people being offended at being
mentioned in Sir Willoughby's Recollections. It has been my
experience, sir, that the normal person enjoys seeing his or her name
in print, irrespective of what is said about them. I have an aunt,
sir, who a few years ago was a martyr to swollen limbs. She tried
Walkinshaw's Supreme Ointment and obtained considerable relief--so
much so that she sent them an unsolicited testimonial. Her pride at
seeing her photograph in the daily papers in connection with
descriptions of her lower limbs before taking, which were nothing less
than revolting, was so intense that it led me to believe that
publicity, of whatever sort, is what nearly everybody desires.
Moreover, if you have ever studied psychology, sir, you will know that
respectable old gentlemen are by no means averse to having it
advertised that they were extremely wild in their youth. I have an
uncle----"
I cursed his aunts and his uncles and him and all the rest of the
family.
"Do you know that Lady Florence has broken off her engagement with
me?"
"Indeed, sir?"
Not a bit of sympathy! I might have been telling him it was a fine
day.
"You're sacked!"
"Very good, sir."
He coughed gently.
"As I am no longer in your employment, sir, I can speak freely without
appearing to take a liberty. In my opinion you and Lady Florence were
quite unsuitably matched. Her ladyship is of a highly determined and
arbitrary temperament, quite opposed to your own. I was in Lord
Worplesdon's service for nearly a year, during which time I had ample
opportunities of studying her ladyship. The opinion of the servants'
hall was far from favourable to her. Her ladyship's temper caused a
good deal of adverse comment among us. It was at times quite
impossible. You would not have been happy, sir!"
"Get out!"
"I think you would also have found her educational methods a little
trying, sir. I have glanced at the book her ladyship gave you--it has
been lying on your table since our arrival--and it is, in my opinion,
quite unsuitable. You would not have enjoyed it. And I have it from
her ladyship's own maid, who happened to overhear a conversation
between her ladyship and one of the gentlemen staying here--Mr.
Maxwell, who is employed in an editorial capacity by one of the
reviews--that it was her intention to start you almost immediately
upon Nietzsche. You would not enjoy Nietzsche, sir. He is
fundamentally unsound."
"Get out!"
"Very good, sir."
* * * * *
It's rummy how sleeping on a thing often makes you feel quite
different about it. It's happened to me over and over again. Somehow
or other, when I woke next morning the old heart didn't feel half so
broken as it had done. It was a perfectly topping day, and there was
something about the way the sun came in at the window and the row the
birds were kicking up in the ivy that made me half wonder whether
Jeeves wasn't right. After all, though she had a wonderful profile,
was it such a catch being engaged to Florence Craye as the casual
observer might imagine? Wasn't there something in what Jeeves had said
about her character? I began to realise that my ideal wife was
something quite different, something a lot more clinging and drooping
and prattling, and what not.
I had got as far as this in thinking the thing out when that "Types of
Ethical Theory" caught my eye. I opened it, and I give you my honest
word this was what hit me:
_Of the two antithetic terms in the Greek philosophy one only
was real and self-subsisting; and that one was Ideal Thought as
opposed to that which it has to penetrate and mould. The other,
corresponding to our Nature, was in itself phenomenal, unreal,
without any permanent footing, having no predicates that held
true for two moments together, in short, redeemed from negation
only by including indwelling realities appearing through_.
Well--I mean to say--what? And Nietzsche, from all accounts, a lot
worse than that!
"Jeeves," I said, when he came in with my morning tea, "I've been
thinking it over. You're engaged again."
"Thank you, sir."
I sucked down a cheerful mouthful. A great respect for this bloke's
judgment began to soak through me.
"Oh, Jeeves," I said; "about that check suit."
"Yes, sir?"
"Is it really a frost?"
"A trifle too bizarre, sir, in my opinion."
"But lots of fellows have asked me who my tailor is."
"Doubtless in order to avoid him, sir."
"He's supposed to be one of the best men in London."
"I am saying nothing against his moral character, sir."
I hesitated a bit. I had a feeling that I was passing into this
chappie's clutches, and that if I gave in now I should become just
like poor old Aubrey Fothergill, unable to call my soul my own. On the
other hand, this was obviously a cove of rare intelligence, and it
would be a comfort in a lot of ways to have him doing the thinking for
me. I made up my mind.
"All right, Jeeves," I said. "You know! Give the bally thing away to
somebody!"
He looked down at me like a father gazing tenderly at the wayward
child.
"Thank you, sir. I gave it to the under-gardener last night. A little
more tea, sir?"
DISENTANGLING OLD DUGGIE
Doesn't some poet or philosopher fellow say that it's when our
intentions are best that we always make the worst breaks? I can't put
my hand on the passage, but you'll find it in Shakespeare or
somewhere, I'm pretty certain.
At any rate, it's always that way with me. And the affair of Douglas
Craye is a case in point.
I had dined with Duggie (a dear old pal of mine) one night at his
club, and as he was seeing me out he said: "Reggie, old top"--my
name's Reggie Pepper--"Reggie, old top, I'm rather worried."
"Are you, Duggie, old pal?" I said.
"Yes, Reggie, old fellow," he said, "I am. It's like this. The Booles
have asked me down to their place for the week-end, and I don't know
whether to go or not. You see, they have early breakfast, and besides
that there's a frightful risk of music after dinner. On the other
hand, young Roderick Boole thinks he can play piquet."
"I should go," I said.
"But I'm not sure Roderick's going to be there this time."
It was a problem, and I didn't wonder poor old Dug had looked pale and
tired at dinner.
Then I had the idea which really started all the trouble.
"Why don't you consult a palmist?" I said.
"That sounds a good idea," said Duggie.
"Go and see Dorothea in Forty-second Street. She's a wonder. She'll
settle it for you in a second. She'll see from your lines that you are
thinking of making a journey, and she'll either tell you to get a move
on, which will mean that Roderick will be there, or else to keep away
because she sees disaster."
"You seem to be next to the game all right."
"I've been to a good many of them. You'll like Dorothea."
"What did you say her name was--Dorothea? What do I do? Do I just walk
in? Shan't I feel a fearful chump? How much do I give her?"
"Five bucks. You'd better write and make a date."
"All right," said Duggie. "But I know I shall look a frightful fool."
About a week later I ran into him between the acts at the
Knickerbocker. The old boy was beaming.
"Reggie," he said, "you did me the best turn anyone's ever done me,
sending me to Mrs. Darrell."
"Mrs. Darrell?"
"You know. Dorothea. Her real name's Darrell. She's a widow. Her
husband was in some regiment, and left her without a penny. It's a
frightfully pathetic story. Haven't time to tell you now. My boy,
she's a marvel. She had hardly looked at my hand, when she said: 'You
will prosper in any venture you undertake.' And next day, by George, I
went down to the Booles' and separated young Roderick from seventy
dollars. She's a wonderful woman. Did you ever see just that shade of
hair?"
"I didn't notice her hair."
He gaped at me in a sort of petrified astonishment.
"You--didn't--notice--her--hair!" he gasped.
I can't fix the dates exactly, but it must have been about three weeks
after this that I got a telegram:
"Call Madison Avenue immediately--Florence Craye."
She needn't have signed her name. I should have known who it was from
by the wording. Ever since I was a kid, Duggie's sister Florence has
oppressed me to the most fearful extent. Not that I'm the only one.
Her brothers live in terror of her, I know. Especially Edwin. He's
never been able to get away from her and it's absolutely broken his
spirit. He's a mild, hopeless sort of chump who spends all his time at
home--they live near Philadelphia--and has never been known to come to
New York. He's writing a history of the family, or something, I
believe.
You see, events have conspired, so to speak, to let Florence do pretty
much as she likes with them. Originally there was old man Craye,
Duggie's father, who made a fortune out of the Soup Trust; Duggie's
elder brother Edwin; Florence; and Duggie. Mrs. Craye has been dead
some years. Then came the smash. It happened through the old man. Most
people, if you ask them, will tell you that he ought to be in
Bloomingdale; and I'm not sure they're not right. At any rate, one
morning he came down to breakfast, lifted the first cover on the
sideboard, said in a sort of despairing way, "Eggs! Eggs! Eggs! Curse
all eggs!" and walked out of the room. Nobody thought much of it till
about an hour afterward, when they found that he had packed a grip,
left the house, and caught the train to New York. Next day they got a
letter from him, saying that he was off to Europe, never to return,
and that all communications were to be addressed to his lawyers. And
from that day on none of them had seen him. He wrote occasionally,
generally from Paris; and that was all.
Well, directly news of this got about, down swooped a series of aunts
to grab the helm. They didn't stay long. Florence had them out, one
after the other, in no time. If any lingering doubt remained in their
minds, don't you know, as to who was going to be boss at home, it
wasn't her fault. Since then she has run the show.
I went to Madison Avenue. It was one of the aunts' houses. There was
no sign of the aunt when I called--she had probably climbed a tree and
pulled it up after her--but Florence was there.
She is a tall woman with what, I believe, is called "a presence." Her
eyes are bright and black, and have a way of getting right inside you,
don't you know, and running up and down your spine. She has a deep
voice. She is about ten years older than Duggie's brother Edwin, who
is six years older than Duggie.
"Good afternoon," she said. "Sit down."
I poured myself into a chair.
"Reginald," she said, "what is this I hear about Douglas?"
I said I didn't know.
"He says that you introduced him."
"Eh?"
"To this woman--this Mrs. Darrell."
"Mrs. Darrell?"
My memory's pretty rocky, and the name conveyed nothing to me.
She pulled out a letter.
"Yes," she said, "Mrs. Dorothy Darrell."
"Great Scott! Dorothea!"
Her eyes resumed their spine drill.
"Who is she?"
"Only a palmist."
"Only a palmist!" Her voice absolutely boomed. "Well, my brother
Douglas is engaged to be married to her."
"Many happy returns of the day," I said.
I don't know why I said it. It wasn't what I meant to say. I'm not
sure I meant to say anything.
She glared at me. By this time I was pure jelly. I simply flowed about
the chair.
"You are facetious, Reginald," she said.
"No, no, no," I shouted. "It slipped out. I wouldn't be facetious for
worlds."
"I am glad. It is no laughing matter. Have you any suggestions?"
"Suggestions?"
"You don't imagine it can be allowed to go on? The engagement must be
broken, of course. But how?"
"Why don't you tell him he mustn't?"
"I shall naturally express my strong disapproval, but it may not be
effective. When out of the reach of my personal influence, my wretched
brother is self-willed to a degree."
I saw what she meant. Good old Duggie wasn't going to have those eyes
patrolling his spine if he knew it. He meant to keep away and conduct
this business by letter. There was going to be no personal interview
with sister, if he had to dodge about America like a snipe.
We sat for a long time without speaking. Then I became rather subtle.
I had a brain-wave and saw my way to making things right for Dug and
at the same time squaring myself with Florence. After all, I thought,
the old boy couldn't keep away from home for the rest of his life. He
would have to go there sooner or later. And my scheme made it pleasant
and easy for him.
"I'll tell you what I should do if I were you," I said. "I'm not sure
I didn't read some book or see some play somewhere or other where they
tried it on, and it worked all right. Fellow got engaged to a girl,
and the family didn't like it, but, instead of kicking, they pretended
to be tickled to pieces, and had the fellow and the girl down to visit
them. And then, after the fellow had seen the girl with the home
circle as a background, don't you know, he came to the conclusion that
it wouldn't do, and broke off the engagement."
It seemed to strike her.
"I hardly expected so sensible a suggestion from you, Reginald," she
said. "It is a very good plan. It shows that you really have a
definite substratum of intelligence; and it is all the more deplorable
that you should idle your way through the world as you do, when you
might be performing some really useful work."
That was Florence all over. Even when she patted you on the head, she
had to do it with her knuckles.
"I will invite them down next week," she went on. "You had better
come, too."
"It's awfully kind of you, but the fact is----"
"Next Wednesday. Take the three-forty-seven."
I met Duggie next day. He was looking happy, but puzzled, like a man
who has found a dime on the street and is wondering if there's a
string tied to it. I congratulated him on his engagement.
"Reggie," he said, "a queer thing has happened. I feel as if I'd
trodden on the last step when it wasn't there. I've just had a letter
from my sister Florence asking me to bring Dorothy home on Wednesday.
Florence doesn't seem to object to the idea of the engagement at all;
and I'd expected that I'd have to call out the police reserves when
she heard of it. I believe there's a catch somewhere."
I tapped him on the breastbone.
"There is, Dug," I said, "and I'll tell you what it is. I saw her
yesterday, and I can put you next to the game. She thinks that if you
see Mrs. Darrell mingling with the home circle, you'll see flaws in
her which you don't see when you don't see her mingling with the home
circle, don't you see? Do you see now?"
He laughed--heroically, don't you know.
"I'm afraid she'll be disappointed. Love like mine is not dependent on
environment."
Which wasn't bad, I thought, if it was his own.
I said good-by to him, and toddled along rather pleased with myself.
It seemed to me that I had handled his affairs in a pretty masterly
manner for a chap who's supposed to be one of the biggest chumps in
New York.
Well, of course, the thing was an absolute fliver, as I ought to have
guessed it would be. Whatever could have induced me to think that a
fellow like poor old Dug stood a dog's chance against a determined
female like his sister Florence, I can't imagine. It was like
expecting a rabbit to put up a show with a python. From the very start
there was only one possible end to the thing. To a woman like
Florence, who had trained herself as tough as whalebone by years of
scrapping with her father and occasional by-battles with aunts, it was
as easy as killing rats with a stick.
I was sorry for Mrs. Darrell. She was a really good sort and, as a
matter of fact, just the kind of wife who would have done old Duggie a
bit of good. And on her own ground I shouldn't wonder if she might not
have made a fight for it. But now she hadn't a chance. Poor old Duggie
was just like so much putty in Florence's hands when he couldn't get
away from her. You could see the sawdust trickling out of Love's Young
Dream in a steady flow.
I took Mrs. Darrell for a walk one afternoon, to see if I couldn't
cheer her up a bit, but it wasn't much good. She hardly spoke a word
till we were on our way home. Then she said with a sort of jerk: "I'm
going back to New York tomorrow, Mr. Pepper."
I suppose I ought to have pretended to be surprised, but I couldn't
work it.
"I'm afraid you've had a bad time," I said. "I'm very sorry."
She laughed.
"Thank you," she said. "It's nice of you to be sympathetic instead of
tactful. You're rather a dear, Mr. Pepper."
I hadn't any remarks to make. I whacked at a nettle with my stick.
"I shall break off my engagement after dinner, so that Douglas can
have a good night's rest. I'm afraid he has been brooding on the
future a good deal. It will be a great relief to him."
"Oh, no," I said.
"Oh, yes. I know exactly how he feels. He thought he could carry me
off, but he finds he overestimated his powers. He has remembered that
he is a Craye. I imagine that the fact has been pointed out to him."
"If you ask my opinion," I said--I was feeling pretty sore about
it--"that woman Florence is an absolute cat."
"My dear Mr. Pepper, I wouldn't have dreamed of asking your opinion on
such a delicate subject. But I'm glad to have it. Thank you very much.
Do I strike you as a vindictive woman, Mr. Pepper?"
"I don't think you do," I said.
"By nature I don't think I am. But I'm feeling a little vindictive
just at present."
She stopped suddenly.
"I don't know why I'm boring you like this, Mr. Pepper," she said.
"For goodness' sake let's be cheerful. Say something bright."
I was going to take a whirl at it, but she started in to talk, and
talked all the rest of the way. She seemed to have cheered up a whole
lot.
She left next day. I gather she fired Duggie as per schedule, for the
old boy looked distinctly brighter, and Florence wore an off-duty
expression and was quite decently civil. Mrs. Darrell bore up all
right. She avoided Duggie, of course, and put in most of the time
talking to Edwin. He evidently appreciated it, for I had never seen
him look so nearly happy before.
I went back to New York directly afterward, and I hadn't been there
much more than a week when a most remarkably queer thing happened.
Turning in at Hammerstein's for half an hour one evening, whom should
I meet but brother Edwin, quite fairly festive, with a fat cigar in
his mouth. "Hello, Reggie," he said.
"What are you doing here?" I said.
"I had to come up to New York to look up a life of Hilary de Craye at
the library. I believe Mister Man was a sort of ancestor."
"This isn't the library."
"I was beginning to guess as much. The difference is subtle but well
marked."
It struck me that there was another difference that was subtle but
well marked, and that was the difference between the Edwin I'd left
messing about over his family history a week before and the jovial
rounder who was blowing smoke in my face now.
"As a matter of fact," he said, "the library would be all the better
for a little of this sort of thing. It's too conservative. That's
what's the trouble with the library. What's the matter with having a
cross-talk team and a few performing dogs there? It would brighten the
place up and attract custom. Reggie, you're looking fatigued. I've
heard there's a place somewhere in this city, if you can only find it,
expressly designed for supplying first-aid to the fatigued. Let's go
and look for it."
I'm not given to thinking much as a rule, but I couldn't help
pondering over this meeting with Edwin. It's hard to make you see the
remarkableness of the whole thing, for, of course, if you look at it,
in one way, there's nothing so record-breaking in smoking a cigar and
drinking a highball. But then you have never seen Edwin. There are
degrees in everything, don't you know. For Edwin to behave as he did
with me that night was simply nothing more nor less than a frightful
outburst, and it disturbed me. Not that I cared what Edwin did, as a
rule, but I couldn't help feeling a sort of what-d'you-call-it--a
presentiment, that somehow, in some way I didn't understand, I was
mixed up in it, or was soon going to be. I think the whole fearful
family had got on my nerves to such an extent that the mere sight of
any of them made me jumpy.
And, by George, I was perfectly right, don't you know. In a day or two
along came the usual telegram from Florence, telling me to come to
Madison Avenue.
The mere idea of Madison Avenue was beginning to give me that tired
feeling, and I made up my mind I wouldn't go near the place. But of
course I did. When it came to the point, I simply hadn't the common
manly courage to keep away.
Florence was there as before.
"Reginald," she said, "I think I shall go raving mad."
This struck me as a mighty happy solution of everybody's troubles, but
I felt it was too good to be true.
"Over a week ago," she went on, "my brother Edwin came up to New York
to consult a book at the library. I anticipated that this would occupy
perhaps an afternoon, and was expecting him back by an early train
next day. He did not arrive. He sent an incoherent telegram. But even
then I suspected nothing." She paused. "Yesterday morning," she said,
"I had a letter from my aunt Augusta."
She paused again. She seemed to think I ought to be impressed.
Her eyes tied a bowknot in my spine.
"Let me read you her letter. No, I will tell you its contents. Aunt
Augusta had seen Edwin lunching at the Waldorf with a creature."
"A what?"