“I must say this has come as a great shock to me, Jeeves.”
“No doubt, sir.”
“A very great shock. Angela and Tuppy.... Tut, tut! Why, they seemed
like the paper on the wall. Life is full of sadness, Jeeves.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Still, there it is.”
“Undoubtedly, sir.”
“Right ho, then. Switch on the bath.”
“Very good, sir.”
-7-
I meditated pretty freely as I drove down to Brinkley in the old
two-seater that afternoon. The news of this rift or rupture of Angela’s
and Tuppy’s had disturbed me greatly.
The projected match, you see, was one on which I had always looked
with kindly approval. Too often, when a chap of your acquaintance is
planning to marry a girl you know, you find yourself knitting the brow
a bit and chewing the lower lip dubiously, feeling that he or she, or
both, should be warned while there is yet time.
But I have never felt anything of this nature about Tuppy and Angela.
Tuppy, when not making an ass of himself, is a soundish sort of egg.
So is Angela a soundish sort of egg. And, as far as being in love was
concerned, it had always seemed to me that you wouldn’t have been far
out in describing them as two hearts that beat as one.
True, they had had their little tiffs, notably on the occasion when
Tuppy--with what he said was fearless honesty and I considered thorough
goofiness--had told Angela that her new hat made her look like a
Pekingese. But in every romance you have to budget for the occasional
dust-up, and after that incident I had supposed that he had learned his
lesson and that from then on life would be one grand, sweet song.
And now this wholly unforeseen severing of diplomatic relations had
popped up through a trap.
I gave the thing the cream of the Wooster brain all the way down,
but it continued to beat me what could have caused the outbreak of
hostilities, and I bunged my foot sedulously on the accelerator in
order to get to Aunt Dahlia with the greatest possible speed and learn
the inside history straight from the horse’s mouth. And what with
all six cylinders hitting nicely, I made good time and found myself
closeted with the relative shortly before the hour of the evening
cocktail.
She seemed glad to see me. In fact, she actually said she was glad to
see me--a statement no other aunt on the list would have committed
herself to, the customary reaction of these near and dear ones to the
spectacle of Bertram arriving for a visit being a sort of sick horror.
“Decent of you to rally round, Bertie,” she said.
“My place was by your side, Aunt Dahlia,” I responded.
I could see at a g. that the unfortunate affair had got in amongst her
in no uncertain manner. Her usually cheerful map was clouded, and the
genial smile conspic. by its a. I pressed her hand sympathetically, to
indicate that my heart bled for her.
“Bad show this, my dear old flesh and blood,” I said. “I’m afraid
you’ve been having a sticky time. You must be worried.”
She snorted emotionally. She looked like an aunt who has just bitten
into a bad oyster.
“Worried is right. I haven’t had a peaceful moment since I got back
from Cannes. Ever since I put my foot across this blasted threshold,”
said Aunt Dahlia, returning for the nonce to the hearty _argot_ of the
hunting field, “everything’s been at sixes and sevens. First there was
that mix-up about the prize-giving.”
She paused at this point and gave me a look. “I had been meaning to
speak freely to you about your behaviour in that matter, Bertie,” she
said. “I had some good things all stored up. But, as you’ve rallied
round like this, I suppose I shall have to let you off. And, anyway, it
is probably all for the best that you evaded your obligations in that
sickeningly craven way. I have an idea that this Spink-Bottle of yours
is going to be good. If only he can keep off newts.”
“Has he been talking about newts?”
“He has. Fixing me with a glittering eye, like the Ancient Mariner. But
if that was the worst I had to bear, I wouldn’t mind. What I’m worrying
about is what Tom says when he starts talking.”
“Uncle Tom?”
“I wish there was something else you could call him except ‘Uncle
Tom’,” said Aunt Dahlia a little testily. “Every time you do it, I
expect to see him turn black and start playing the banjo. Yes, Uncle
Tom, if you must have it. I shall have to tell him soon about losing
all that money at baccarat, and, when I do, he will go up like a
rocket.”
“Still, no doubt Time, the great healer----”
“Time, the great healer, be blowed. I’ve got to get a cheque for five
hundred pounds out of him for _Milady’s Boudoir_ by August the third at
the latest.”
I was concerned. Apart from a nephew’s natural interest in an aunt’s
refined weekly paper, I had always had a soft spot in my heart for
_Milady’s Boudoir_ ever since I contributed that article to it on What
the Well-Dressed Man is Wearing. Sentimental, possibly, but we old
journalists do have these feelings.
“Is the _Boudoir_ on the rocks?”
“It will be if Tom doesn’t cough up. It needs help till it has turned
the corner.”
“But wasn’t it turning the corner two years ago?”
“It was. And it’s still at it. Till you’ve run a weekly paper for
women, you don’t know what corners are.”
“And you think the chances of getting into uncle--into my uncle by
marriage’s ribs are slight?”
“I’ll tell you, Bertie. Up till now, when these subsidies were
required, I have always been able to come to Tom in the gay, confident
spirit of an only child touching an indulgent father for chocolate
cream. But he’s just had a demand from the income-tax people for an
additional fifty-eight pounds, one and threepence, and all he’s been
talking about since I got back has been ruin and the sinister trend of
socialistic legislation and what will become of us all.”
I could readily believe it. This Tom has a peculiarity I’ve noticed in
other very oofy men. Nick him for the paltriest sum, and he lets out
a squawk you can hear at Land’s End. He has the stuff in gobs, but he
hates giving up.
“If it wasn’t for Anatole’s cooking, I doubt if he would bother to
carry on. Thank God for Anatole, I say.”