"But your guv'nor will have to know some time."
"That'll be all right. I shall be the jolly old star by then, and he
won't have a leg to stand on."
"It seems to me he'll have one leg to stand on while he kicks me with
the other."
"Why, where do you come in? What have you got to do with it?"
"I introduced you to George Caffyn."
"So you did, old top, so you did. I'd quite forgotten. I ought to have
thanked you before. Well, so long. There's an early rehearsal of 'Ask
Dad' to-morrow morning, and I must be toddling. Rummy the thing should
be called 'Ask Dad,' when that's just what I'm not going to do. See
what I mean, what, what? Well, pip-pip!"
"Toodle-oo!" I said sadly, and the blighter scudded off. I dived for
the phone and called up George Caffyn.
"I say, George, what's all this about Cyril Bassington-Bassington?"
"What about him?"
"He tells me you've given him a part in your show."
"Oh, yes. Just a few lines."
"But I've just had fifty-seven cables from home telling me on no
account to let him go on the stage."
"I'm sorry. But Cyril is just the type I need for that part. He's
simply got to be himself."
"It's pretty tough on me, George, old man. My Aunt Agatha sent this
blighter over with a letter of introduction to me, and she will hold me
responsible."
"She'll cut you out of her will?"
"It isn't a question of money. But--of course, you've never met my Aunt
Agatha, so it's rather hard to explain. But she's a sort of human
vampire-bat, and she'll make things most fearfully unpleasant for me
when I go back to England. She's the kind of woman who comes and rags
you before breakfast, don't you know."
"Well, don't go back to England, then. Stick here and become
President."
"But, George, old top----!"
"Good night!"
"But, I say, George, old man!"
"You didn't get my last remark. It was 'Good night!' You Idle Rich may
not need any sleep, but I've got to be bright and fresh in the morning.
God bless you!"
I felt as if I hadn't a friend in the world. I was so jolly well worked
up that I went and banged on Jeeves's door. It wasn't a thing I'd have
cared to do as a rule, but it seemed to me that now was the time for
all good men to come to the aid of the party, so to speak, and that it
was up to Jeeves to rally round the young master, even if it broke up
his beauty-sleep.
Jeeves emerged in a brown dressing-gown.
"Sir?"
"Deuced sorry to wake you up, Jeeves, and what not, but all sorts of
dashed disturbing things have been happening."
"I was not asleep. It is my practice, on retiring, to read a few pages
of some instructive book."
"That's good! What I mean to say is, if you've just finished exercising
the old bean, it's probably in mid-season form for tackling problems.
Jeeves, Mr. Bassington-Bassington is going on the stage!"
"Indeed, sir?"
"Ah! The thing doesn't hit you! You don't get it properly! Here's the
point. All his family are most fearfully dead against his going on the
stage. There's going to be no end of trouble if he isn't headed off.
And, what's worse, my Aunt Agatha will blame me, you see."
"I see, sir."
"Well, can't you think of some way of stopping him?"
"Not, I confess, at the moment, sir."
"Well, have a stab at it."
"I will give the matter my best consideration, sir. Will there be
anything further to-night?"
"I hope not! I've had all I can stand already."
"Very good, sir."
He popped off.
* * * * *
The part which old George had written for the chump Cyril took up about
two pages of typescript; but it might have been Hamlet, the way that
poor, misguided pinhead worked himself to the bone over it. I suppose,
if I heard him his lines once, I did it a dozen times in the first
couple of days. He seemed to think that my only feeling about the whole
affair was one of enthusiastic admiration, and that he could rely on my
support and sympathy. What with trying to imagine how Aunt Agatha was
going to take this thing, and being woken up out of the dreamless in
the small hours every other night to give my opinion of some new bit of
business which Cyril had invented, I became more or less the good old
shadow. And all the time Jeeves remained still pretty cold and distant
about the purple socks. It's this sort of thing that ages a chappie,
don't you know, and makes his youthful _joie-de-vivre_ go a bit
groggy at the knees.
In the middle of it Aunt Agatha's letter arrived. It took her about six
pages to do justice to Cyril's father's feelings in regard to his going
on the stage and about six more to give me a kind of sketch of what she
would say, think, and do if I didn't keep him clear of injurious
influences while he was in America. The letter came by the afternoon
mail, and left me with a pretty firm conviction that it wasn't a thing
I ought to keep to myself. I didn't even wait to ring the bell: I
whizzed for the kitchen, bleating for Jeeves, and butted into the
middle of a regular tea-party of sorts. Seated at the table were a
depressed-looking cove who might have been a valet or something, and a
boy in a Norfolk suit. The valet-chappie was drinking a whisky and
soda, and the boy was being tolerably rough with some jam and cake.
"Oh, I say, Jeeves!" I said. "Sorry to interrupt the feast of reason
and flow of soul and so forth, but----"
At this juncture the small boy's eye hit me like a bullet and stopped
me in my tracks. It was one of those cold, clammy, accusing sort of
eyes--the kind that makes you reach up to see if your tie is straight:
and he looked at me as if I were some sort of unnecessary product which
Cuthbert the Cat had brought in after a ramble among the local ash-cans.
He was a stoutish infant with a lot of freckles and a good deal of jam
on his face.
"Halloa! Halloa! Halloa!" I said. "What?" There didn't seem much else to
say.
The stripling stared at me in a nasty sort of way through the jam. He
may have loved me at first sight, but the impression he gave me was
that he didn't think a lot of me and wasn't betting much that I would
improve a great deal on acquaintance. I had a kind of feeling that I
was about as popular with him as a cold Welsh rabbit.
"What's your name?" he asked.
"My name? Oh, Wooster, don't you know, and what not."
"My pop's richer than you are!"
That seemed to be all about me. The child having said his say, started
in on the jam again. I turned to Jeeves.
"I say, Jeeves, can you spare a moment? I want to show you something."
"Very good, sir." We toddled into the sitting-room.
"Who is your little friend, Sidney the Sunbeam, Jeeves?"
"The young gentleman, sir?"
"It's a loose way of describing him, but I know what you mean."
"I trust I was not taking a liberty in entertaining him, sir?"
"Not a bit. If that's your idea of a large afternoon, go ahead."
"I happened to meet the young gentleman taking a walk with his father's
valet, sir, whom I used to know somewhat intimately in London, and I
ventured to invite them both to join me here."
"Well, never mind about him, Jeeves. Read this letter."
He gave it the up-and-down.
"Very disturbing, sir!" was all he could find to say.
"What are we going to do about it?"
"Time may provide a solution, sir."
"On the other hand, it mayn't, what?"
"Extremely true, sir.".
We'd got as far as this, when there was a ring at the door. Jeeves
shimmered off, and Cyril blew in, full of good cheer and
blitheringness.
"I say, Wooster, old thing," he said, "I want your advice. You know
this jolly old part of mine. How ought I to dress it? What I mean is,
the first act scene is laid in an hotel of sorts, at about three in the
afternoon. What ought I to wear, do you think?"