'She doesn't say that?' I gasped.
'She certainly does. And when I tell you that I selected that
particular quotation because it's about the only one I can stand
hearing spoken, you will realize what I'm up against.'
* * * * *
I picked at the coverlet. I had been a pal of Bingo's for many years,
and we Woosters stand by our pals.
'Jeeves,' I said, 'you have heard?'
'Yes, sir.'
'The position is serious.'
'Yes, sir.'
'We must cluster round.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Does anything suggest itself to you?'
'Yes, sir.'
'What! You don't really mean that?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Bingo,' I said, 'the sun is still shining. Something suggests itself
to Jeeves.'
'Jeeves,' said young Bingo in a quivering voice, 'if you see me through
this fearful crisis, ask of me what you will even unto half my kingdom.'
'The matter,' said Jeeves, 'fits in very nicely, sir, with another
mission which was entrusted to me this morning.'
'What do you mean?'
'Mrs Travers rang me up on the telephone shortly before I brought you
your tea, sir, and was most urgent that I should endeavour to persuade
Mr Little's cook to leave Mr Little's service and join her staff. It
appears that Mr Travers was fascinated by the man's ability, sir, and
talked far into the night of his astonishing gifts.'
Young Bingo uttered a frightful cry of agony.
'What! Is that--that buzzard trying to pinch our cook?'
'Yes, sir.'
'After eating our bread and salt, dammit?'
'I fear, sir,' sighed Jeeves, 'that when it comes to a matter of cooks,
ladies have but a rudimentary sense of morality.'
'Half a second, Bingo,' I said, as the fellow seemed about to plunge
into something of an oration. 'How does this fit in with the other
thing, Jeeves?'
'Well, sir, it has been my experience that no lady can ever forgive
another lady for taking a really good cook away from her. I am
convinced that, if I am able to accomplish the mission which Mrs
Travers entrusted to me, an instant breach of cordial relations must
inevitably ensue. Mrs Little will, I feel certain, be so aggrieved with
Mrs Travers that she will decline to contribute to her paper. We shall
therefore not only bring happiness to Mr Travers, but also suppress
the article. Thus killing two birds with one stone, if I may use the
expression, sir.'
'Certainly you may use the expression, Jeeves,' I said cordially. 'And
I may add that in my opinion this is one of your best and ripest.'
'Yes, but I say, you know,' bleated young Bingo. 'I mean to say--old
Anatole, I mean--what I'm driving at is that he's a cook in a million.'
'You poor chump, if he wasn't there would be no point in the scheme.'
'Yes, but what I mean--I shall miss him, you know. Miss him fearfully.'
'Good heavens!' I cried. 'Don't tell me that you are thinking of your
tummy in a crisis like this?'
Bingo sighed heavily.
'Oh, all right,' he said. 'I suppose it's a case of the surgeon's
knife. All right, Jeeves, you may carry on. Yes, carry on, Jeeves. Yes,
yes, Jeeves, carry on. I'll look in tomorrow morning and hear what you
have to report.'
And with bowed head young Bingo biffed off.
* * * * *
He was bright and early next morning. In fact, he turned up at such an
indecent hour that Jeeves very properly refused to allow him to break
in on my slumbers.
By the time I was awake and receiving, he and Jeeves had had a
heart-to-heart chat in the kitchen; and when Bingo eventually crept
into my room I could see by the look on his face that something had
gone wrong.
'It's all off,' he said, slumping down on the bed.
'Off?'
'Yes; that cook-pinching business. Jeeves tells me he saw Anatole last
night, and Anatole refused to leave.'
'But surely Aunt Dahlia had the sense to offer him more than he was
getting with you?'
'The sky was the limit, as far as she was concerned. Nevertheless, he
refused to skid. It seems he's in love with our parlourmaid.'
'But you haven't got a parlourmaid.'
'We have got a parlourmaid.'
'I've never seen her. A sort of bloke who looked like a provincial
undertaker waited at table the night before last.'
'That was the local greengrocer, who comes to help out when desired.
The parlourmaid is away on her holiday--or was till last night. She
returned about ten minutes before Jeeves made his call, and Anatole, I
take it, was in such a state of elation and devotion and what-not on
seeing her again that the contents of the Mint wouldn't have bribed him
to part from her.'
'But look here, Bingo,' I said, 'this is all rot. I see the solution
right off. I'm surprised that a bloke of Jeeves's mentality overlooked
it. Aunt Dahlia must engage the parlourmaid as well as Anatole. Then
they won't be parted.'
'I thought of that, too. Naturally.'
'I bet you didn't.'
'I certainly did.'
'Well, what's wrong with the scheme?'
'It can't be worked. If your aunt engaged our parlourmaid she would
have to sack her own, wouldn't she?'
'Well?'
'Well, if she sacks her parlourmaid, it will mean that the chauffeur
will quit. He's in love with her.'
'With my aunt?'
'No, with the parlourmaid. And apparently he's the only chauffeur your
uncle has ever found who drives carefully enough for him.'
I gave it up. I had never imagined before that life below stairs was so
frightfully mixed up with what these coves call the sex complex. The
personnel of domestic staffs seemed to pair off like characters in a
musical comedy.
'Oh!' I said. 'Well, that being so, we do seem to be more or less
stymied. That article will have to appear after all, what?'
'No, it won't.'
'Has Jeeves thought of another scheme?'
'No, but I have.' Bingo bent forward and patted my knee affectionately.
'Look here, Bertie,' he said, 'you and I were at school together.
You'll admit that?'
'Yes, but--'
'And you're a fellow who never lets a pal down. That's well known,
isn't it?'
'Yes, but listen--'
'You'll cluster round. Of course you will. As if,' said Bingo with a
scornful laugh, 'I ever doubted it! You won't let an old school-friend
down in his hour of need. Not you. Not Bertie Wooster. No, no!'
'Yes, but just one moment. What is this scheme of yours?'
Bingo massaged my shoulder soothingly.
'It's something right in your line, Bertie, old man; something that'll
come as easy as pie to you. As a matter of fact, you've done very much
the same thing before--that time you were telling me about when you
pinched your uncle's Memoirs at Easeby. I suddenly remembered that, and
it gave me the idea. It's--'
'Here! Listen!'
'It's all settled, Bertie. Nothing for you to worry about. Nothing
whatever. I see now that we made a big mistake in ever trying to tackle
this job in Jeeves's silly, roundabout way. Much better to charge
straight ahead without any of that finesse and fooling about. And so--'
'Yes, but listen--'
'And so this afternoon I'm going to take Rosie to a matinee. I shall
leave the window of her study open, and when we have got well away you
will climb in, pinch the cylinder and pop off again. It's absurdly
simple--'
'Yes, but half a second--'
'I know what you are going to say,' said Bingo, raising his hand. 'How
are you to find the cylinder? That's what is bothering you, isn't it?
Well, it will be quite easy. Not a chance of a mistake. The thing is
in the top left-hand drawer of the desk, and the drawer will be left
unlocked because Rosie's stenographer is to come round at four o'clock
and type the article.'
'Now listen, Bingo,' I said. 'I'm frightfully sorry for you and all
that, but I must firmly draw the line at burglary.'
'But, dash it, I'm only asking you to do what you did at Easeby.'
'No, you aren't. I was staying at Easeby. It was simply a case of
having to lift a parcel off the hall table. I hadn't got to break into
a house. I'm sorry but I simply will not break into your beastly house
on any consideration whatever.'
He gazed at me, astonished and hurt. 'Is this Bertie Wooster speaking?'
he said in a low voice.
'Yes, it is!'
'But, Bertie,' he said gently, 'we agreed that you were at school with
me.'
'I don't care.'
'At school, Bertie. The dear old school.'
'I don't care. I will not--'
'Bertie!'
'I will not--'
'Bertie!'
'No!'
'Bertie!'
'Oh, all right,' I said.
'There,' said young Bingo, patting me on the shoulder, 'spoke the true
Bertram Wooster!'
* * * * *
I don't know if it has ever occurred to you, but to the thoughtful cove
there is something dashed reassuring in all the reports of burglaries
you read in the papers. I mean, if you're keen on Great Britain
maintaining her prestige and all that. I mean, there can't be much
wrong with the morale of a country whose sons go in to such a large
extent for housebreaking, because you can take it from me that the job
requires a nerve of the most cast-iron description. I suppose I was
walking up and down in front of that house for half an hour before I
could bring myself to dash in at the front gate and slide round to the
side where the study window was. And even then I stood for about ten
minutes cowering against the wall and listening for police-whistles.
Eventually, however, I braced myself up and got to business. The study
was on the ground floor and the window was nice and large, and, what is
more, wide open. I got the old knee over the sill, gave a jerk which
took an inch of skin off my ankle, and hopped down into the room. And
there I was, if you follow me.
I stood for a moment, listening. Everything seemed to be all right. I
was apparently alone in the world.
In fact, I was so much alone that the atmosphere seemed positively
creepy. You know how it is on these occasions. There was a clock on the
mantelpiece that ticked in a slow, shocked sort of way that was dashed
unpleasant. And over the clock a large portrait stared at me with a
good deal of dislike and suspicion. It was a portrait of somebody's
grandfather. Whether he was Rosie's or Bingo's I didn't know, but he
was certainly a grandfather. In fact, I wouldn't be prepared to swear
that he wasn't a great-grandfather. He was a big, stout old buffer in
a high collar that seemed to hurt his neck, for he had drawn his chin
back a goodish way and was looking down his nose as much as to say,
'You made me put this dam' thing on!'
Well, it was only a step to the desk, and nothing between me and it but
a brown shaggy rug; so I avoided grandfather's eye and, summoning up
the good old bulldog courage of the Woosters, moved forward and started
to navigate the rug. And I had hardly taken a step when the south-east
corner of it suddenly detached itself from the rest and sat up with a
snuffle.
Well, I mean to say, to bear yourself fittingly in the face of an
occurrence of this sort you want to be one of those strong, silent,
phlegmatic birds who are ready for anything. This type of bloke, I
imagine, would simply have cocked an eye at the rug, said to himself,
'Ah, a Pekingese dog, and quite a good one, too!' and started at once
to make cordial overtures to the animal in order to win its sympathy
and moral support. I suppose I must be one of the neurotic younger
generation you read about in the papers nowadays, because it was
pretty plain within half a second that I wasn't strong and I wasn't
phlegmatic. This wouldn't have mattered so much, but I wasn't silent
either. In the emotion of the moment I let out a sort of sharp yowl and
leaped about four feet in a north-westerly direction. And there was a
crash that sounded as though somebody had touched off a bomb.
What a female novelist wants with an occasional table in her study
containing a vase, two framed photographs, a saucer, a lacquer box,
and a jar of potpourri, I don't know; but that was what Bingo's Rosie
had, and I caught it squarely with my right hip and knocked it endways.
It seemed to me for a moment as if the whole world had dissolved into
a kind of cataract of glass and china. A few years ago, when I legged
it to America to elude my Aunt Agatha, who was out with her hatchet, I
remember going to Niagara and listening to the Falls. They made much
the same sort of row, but not so loud.
And at the same instant the dog began to bark.
It was a small dog--the sort of animal from which you would have
expected a noise like a squeaking slate-pencil; but it was simply
baying. It had retired into a corner, and was leaning against the wall
with bulging eyes; and every two seconds it chucked its head back in a
kind of pained way and let out another terrific bellow.
Well, I know when I'm licked. I was sorry for Bingo and regretted the
necessity of having to let him down; but the time had come, I felt, to
shift. 'Outside for Bertram!' was the slogan, and I took a running leap
at the window and scrambled through.
And there on the path, as if they had been waiting for me by
appointment, stood a policeman and a parlourmaid.
It was an embarrassing moment.
'Oh--er--there you are!' I said. And there was what you might call a
contemplative silence for a moment.
'I told you I heard something,' said the parlourmaid.
The policeman was regarding me in a boiled way.
'What's all this?' he asked.