Ask anyone at the Drones', and they will tell you that Bertram Wooster
is a fellow whom it is dashed difficult to deceive. Old Lynx-Eye is
about what it amounts to. I observe and deduce. I weigh the evidence
and draw my conclusions. And that is why Uncle George had not been in
my midst more than about two minutes before I, so to speak, saw all. To
my trained eye the thing stuck out a mile.
And yet it seemed so dashed absurd. Consider the facts, if you know
what I mean.
I mean to say, for years, right back to the time when I first went to
Eton, this bulging relative had been one of the recognized eyesores of
London. He was fat then, and day by day in every way has been getting
fatter ever since, till now tailors measure him just for the sake of
the exercise. He is what they call a prominent London clubman--one
of those birds in tight morning coats and gray toppers whom you see
toddling along St. James's Street on fine afternoons, puffing a bit
as they make the grade. Slip a ferret into any good club between
Piccadilly and Pall Mall, and you would start half a dozen Uncle
Georges.
He spends his time lunching and dining at the Buffers' and, between
meals, sucking down spots in the smoking room and talking about the
lining of his stomach to anyone who will listen. About twice a year
his liver lodges a formal protest and he goes off to Harrogate or
Carlsbad to get planed down. Then back again and on with the programme.
The last bloke in the world, in short, who you would think would ever
fall a victim to the divine pash. And yet, if you will believe me, that
was absolutely the strength of it.
This old pestilence blew in on me one morning at about the hour of the
after-breakfast cigarette.
"Oh, Bertie," he said.
"Hullo?"
"You know those ties you've been wearing. Where did you get them?"
"Blucher's, in the Burlington Arcade."
"Thanks."
He walked across to the mirror and stood in front of it, gazing at
himself in an earnest manner.
"Smut on your nose?" I asked courteously.
Then I suddenly perceived that he was wearing a sort of horrible
simper, and I confess it chilled the blood to no little extent. Uncle
George, with face in repose, is hard enough on the eye. Simpering, he
goes right above the odds.
"Ha!" he said.
He heaved a long sigh, and turned away. Not too soon, for the mirror
was on the point of cracking.
"I'm not so old," he said, in a musing sort of voice.
"So old as what?"
"Properly considered, I'm in my prime. Besides, what a young and
inexperienced girl needs is a man of weight and years to lean on. The
sturdy oak, not the sapling."
It was at this point that, as I said above, I saw all.
"Great Scott, Uncle George!" I said. "You aren't thinking of getting
married?"
"Who isn't?" he said.
"You aren't," I said.
"Yes, I am. Why not?"
"Oh, well...."
"Marriage is an honourable state."
"Oh, absolutely."
"It might make you a better man, Bertie."
"Who says so?"
"I say so. Marriage might turn you from a frivolous young scallywag
into--er--a non-scallywag. Yes, confound you, I _am_ thinking
of getting married, and if Agatha comes sticking her oar in
I'll--I'll--well, I shall know what to do about it."
He exited on the big line, and I rang the bell for Jeeves. The
situation seemed to me one that called for a cozy talk.
"Jeeves," I said.
"Sir?"
"You know my uncle George?"
"Yes, sir. His lordship has been familiar to me for some years."
"I don't mean do you know my uncle George. I mean do you know what my
uncle George is thinking of doing?"
"Contracting a matrimonial alliance, sir."
"Good Lord! Did he tell you?"
"No, sir. Oddly enough, I chance to be acquainted with the other party
in the matter."
"The girl?"
"The young person, yes, sir. It was from her aunt, with whom she
resides, that I received the information that his lordship was
contemplating matrimony."
"Who is she?"
"A Miss Platt, sir. Miss Rhoda Platt. Of Wistaria Lodge, Kitchener
Road, East Dulwich."
"Young?"
"Yes, sir."
"The old fathead!"
"Yes, sir. The expression is one which I would, of course, not have
ventured to employ myself, but I confess to thinking his lordship
somewhat ill advised. One must remember, however, that it is not
unusual to find gentlemen of a certain age yielding to what might be
described as a 'sentimental urge.' They appear to experience what I may
term a sort of 'Indian summer,' a kind of temporarily renewed youth.
The phenomenon is particularly noticeable, I am given to understand,
in the United States of America among the wealthier inhabitants of the
city of Pittsburgh. It is notorious, I am told, that sooner or later,
unless restrained, they always endeavour to marry chorus girls. Why
this should be so, I am at a loss to say, but...."