'Spare me the tale of your excesses,' I said distantly.
'I wore a sailor suit.'
'Please,' I said, revolted.
'And you ought to have seen the notice I got in the Bridmouth Argus, with which is incorporated the Somerset Farmer and the South Country Intelligencer. But I can't stop here all day listening to you. Elsa's got some bores coming to tea and wants me to rally round. Entertain the cat when it arrives. I gather that it is rather the Bohemian type and probably prefers whisky, but try it with a spot of milk.'
And with these words she exited left centre, as full of beans as any aunt that ever stepped.
Jeeves entered. He had his arms full.
'We appear to have this cat, sir,' he said.
I gave him a look, lacklustre to the last drop.
'So he brought it?'
'Yes, sir. A few moments ago.'
'To the back door?'
'Yes, sir. He showed a proper feeling in that.'
'Is he here now?'
'No, sir. He has gone to the Goose and Grasshopper.'
I got down to the res. This was no time for beating about the bush. I needed his advice, and I needed it quick.
'I take it, Jeeves,' I said, 'that seeing the cat at this address you have put two and two together, as the expression is, and realize that there has been dirty work at the crossroads?'
'Yes, sir. I had the advantage of hearing Mrs Travers's observations. She is a lady with a very carrying voice.'
'That expresses it to a nicety. I believe that when hunting in her younger days she could make herself heard in several adjoining counties.'
'I can readily credit it, sir.'
'Well, if you know all about it, there's no need to explain the situation. The problem that confronts us now is where do we go from here?'
'Sir?'
'You know what I mean. I can't just sit here . . . what's the word?'
'Supinely, sir?'
'That's it. I can't just sit here supinely and allow the rannygazoo to proceed unchecked. The honour of the Woosters is at stake.'
'You are blameless, sir. You did not purloin the cat.'
'No, but a member of my family did. By the way, could she get jugged if the crime were brought home to her?'
'It is difficult to say without consulting a competent legal authority. But an unpleasant scandal would inevitably result.'
'You mean her name would become a hissing and a byword?'
'Substantially that, sir.'
'With disastrous effects on Uncle Tom's digestion. That's bad, Jeeves. We can't have that. You know how he is after the mildest lobster. We must return this cat to Cook.'
'It would seem advisable, sir.'
'You wouldn't care to do it?'
'No, sir.'
'It would be the feudal thing to do.'
'No doubt, sir.'
'One of those vassals in the Middle Ages would have jumped to it.'
'Very possibly, sir.'
'It would take you ten minutes. You could go in the car.'
'I fear that I must continue to plead a nolle prosequi, sir.'
'Then I shall have to see what I can do. Leave me, Jeeves, I want to think.'
'Very good, sir. Would a whisky and soda be of assistance?'
'Rem acu tetigisti,' I said.
Left alone, I gave my problem the cream of the Wooster brain for some time, but without avail, as they say. Try as I would I couldn't seem to hit on a method of getting the cat back to square one which didn't involve a meeting with Pop Cook and his hunting crop, and I didn't want that whistling about my legs. Courageous though the Woosters are, there are things from which they shrink.
I was still thinking when there was a cheery cry from without and the blood froze in my veins as Plank came bounding in.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The reason why the blood froze in my v. needs little explanation. The dullest eye could have perceived the delicacy of my position. With the cat practically vis-à-vis as you might say and Plank among those present, my predicament was that of a member of the criminal classes who has got away with the Maharajah's ruby and after stashing it among his effects sees a high official of Scotland Yard walk in at the door. Worse, as a matter of fact, because rubies don't talk, whereas cats do. This one had struck me during our brief acquaintance as the taciturn type, content merely to purr, but who knew that, finding itself in unfamiliar surroundings and missing its pal Potato Chip, it would not utter a yowl or two? And a single mew would be enough to plunge me in the soup.
I remember my Aunt Agatha once making me take her revolting son, young Thos, to a play at the Old Vic by the name of Macbeth. Thos slept throughout, but I thought it rather good and the reason I bring it up is because there was a scene in it where Macbeth is giving a big dinner party and the ghost of a fellow called Banquo, whom he has recently murdered, crashes the gate all covered with blood. Macbeth took it big, and the point I'm trying to make is that my feelings on seeing Plank were much the same as his on that occasion. I goggled at him as he would have goggled at a scorpion or tarantula or whatever they have in Africa if on going to bed one night he had found it nestling in his pyjamas.
Plank was very merry and bright.
'I thought I'd come and tell you,' he said, 'that I'm getting my memory back. Pretty soon I'll be remembering every detail of that first meeting of ours. Wrapped in mist at the moment, but light is beginning to seep through. It's often that way with malaria.'
I didn't like the sound of this at all. As I explained earlier, the meeting to which he referred had been one fraught with embarrassment for me, and I would have preferred to let the dead past bury its dead as the fellow said. Well, when I remind you that it concluded with a suggestion on his part that he hit me over the head with a Zulu knob-kerrie, you will probably gather that it had not been conducted throughout in an atmosphere of the utmost cordiality.
'One thing I remember,' he proceeded, 'is that you were very keen on Rugby football, which of course is the great interest of my life, and I told you my village team was shaping well and showed great promise. And by an extraordinary stroke of luck I've got a new vicar, chap called Pinker, who was an international prop forward. Played for Oxford four years and got I don't know how many English caps. He pulls the whole side together, besides preaching an excellent sermon.'
Nothing could have pleased me more than to hear that my old friend Stinker Pinker was giving satisfaction, and if it had not been for the dark shadow of the cat brooding over us I might quite have enjoyed this little get-together. For he was an entertaining companion, as these far-flung chaps so often are, and told me a lot I hadn't known before about tsetse flies and what to do if cornered by a charging rhinoceros. But in the middle of one of his best stories – he had just got to where the natives seemed friendly, so he decided to stay the night – he broke off, cocked his head sideways, and said:
'What was that?'
I had heard it, too, of course. But I preserved my poise.
'What was what?' I said.
'I heard a cat.'
I continued to wear the mask. I laughed a light laugh.
'Oh, that was my man Jeeves. He imitates cats.'
'He does, eh?'
'It gives him a passing pleasure.'
'And, I suppose, gets a laugh if he does it at the pub near closing time when everyone's fairly tight. I had a native bearer once who could imitate the mating call of the male puma.'
'Really?'
'So that even female pumas were deceived. They used to come flocking round the camp in dozens, and were as sick as mud when they found it was only a native bearer. He was the one I was telling you we had to bury before sundown. Which reminds me. How are those spots of yours?'
'Completely disappeared.'
'Not always a good sign. It's bad if they work inward and get mixed up with the blood stream.'
'Doctor Murgatroyd expected them to disappear.'
'He ought to know.'
'I have grea
t confidence in him.'
'So have I, in spite of those whiskers.' He paused, and laughed amusedly. 'Odd, the passage of time.'
'Pretty odd,' I conceded.
'Old Jimpy Murgatroyd. You'd never think, to look at him now, that when I knew him as a boy he was about the best wing-three we ever had at Haileybury. Fast as a streak and never failed to give the reverse pass. He scored two tries against Bedford, one of them from our twenty-five, and dropped a goal against Tonbridge.'
Though not having a clue to what he was talking about, I said 'Really?' and he said 'Absolutely', and I think we should have had a lot more about E. Jimpson Murgatroyd the boy, but at this moment the cat came on the air again and he changed the subject.
'Listen. Wouldn't you swear that was a cat? That man of yours certainly makes it lifelike.'
'Just a knack.'
'A gift, I'd call it. Good animal-impersonators don't grow on every bush. I never had another bearer like the puma chap. Plenty of fellows who could do you a passable screech owl, but that's not the same thing. It's lucky Cook isn't here.'
'Why do you say that?'
'Because he would insist on being confronted by what he imagined to be his cat and would tear the place apart to get at it. He wouldn't believe for a moment that it was your man practising his art. You see, a very valuable cat belonging to Cook has vanished, and he is convinced that rival interests have stolen it. He talked of calling Scotland Yard in. But I must be getting along. I only stopped by to tell you about the remarkable improvement in my memory. It's all coming back. It won't be long before I shall be remembering why I thought your name was something that began with Al. Could it have been a nickname of some sort?'
'I don't think so.'
'Not short for Alka-Seltzer, or something like that? Well, no good worrying about it now. It'll come. It'll come.'
I couldn't imagine what had given him this idea that my name began with Al, but it was a small point and I didn't linger on it. No sooner had he beetled off than I was calling Jeeves in for a conference.
When he came, he was full of apologies. He seemed to think he had let the young master down.
'I fear you will have thought me remiss, sir, but I found it impossible to stifle the animal's cries completely. I trust they were not overheard by your visitor.'
'They were, and the visitor was none other than Major Plank, from whom you saved me so adroitly at Totleigh-in-the- Wold. He is closely allied to Pop Cook, and I don't mind telling you that when he blew in I was as badly rattled as Macbeth, if you know what I mean, that time he was sitting down to dinner and the ghost turned up.'
'I know the scene well, sir. "Never shake thy gory locks at me," he said.'
'And I don't blame him. Plank heard those yowls.'
'I am extremely sorry, sir.'
'Not your fault. Cats will be cats. I was taken aback at the moment, like Macbeth, but I kept my head. I told him you were a cat-imitator brushing up your cat-imitating.'
'A very ingenious ruse, sir.'
'Yes, I didn't think it was too bad.'
'Did it satisfy the gentleman?'
'It seemed to. But what of Pop Cook?'
'Sir?'
'What's worrying me is the possibility of Cook being less inclined to swallow the story and coming here to search the premises. And when I say the possibility, I mean the certainty. Figure it out for yourself. He finds me up at Eggesford Court apparently swiping the cat. He learns that I am lunching at Eggesford Hall. "Ha!" he says to himself, "one of the Briscoe gang, is he? And I caught him with the cat actually on his person." Do you suppose that when Plank gets back and tells him he heard someone imitating cats chez me, he is going to believe that what Plank heard was a human voice? I doubt it, Jeeves. He will be at my door in ten seconds flat, probably accompanied by the entire local police force.'
My remorseless reasoning had its effect. A slight wiggling of the nose showed that. Nothing could ever make Jeeves say 'Gorblimey!', but I could see that was the word that would have sprung to his lips if he hadn't stopped it halfway. His comment on my obiter dicta was brief and to the point.
'We must act, sir!'
'And without stopping to pick daisies by the wayside. Are you still resolved not to return this cat to status quo?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Sam Weller would have done it like a shot to oblige Mr Pickwick.'
'It is not my place to return cats, sir. But if I might make a suggestion.'
'Speak on, Jeeves.'
'Why should we not place the matter in the hands of the man Graham?'
'Of course! I never thought of that.'
'He is a poacher of established reputation, and a competent poacher is what we need.'
'I see what you mean. His experience enables him to move around without letting a twig snap beneath his feet, which is the first essential when you are returning cats.'
'Precisely, sir. With your permission I will go to the Goose and Grasshopper and tell him that you wish to see him.'
'Do so, Jeeves,' I said, and only a few minutes later I found myself closeted with Herbert (Billy) Graham.
The first thing that impressed itself on me as I gave him the once-over was his air of respectability. I had always supposed that poachers were tough-looking eggs who wore whatever they could borrow from the nearest scarecrow and shaved only once a week. He, to the contrary, was neatly clad in formfitting tweeds and was shaven to the bone. His eyes were frank and blue, his hair a becoming grey. I have seen more raffish Cabinet ministers. He looked like someone who might have sung in the sainted Briscoe's church choir, as I was informed later he did, being the possessor of a musical tenor voice which came in handy for the anthem and when they were doing those 'miserable sinner' bits in the Litany.
He was about the height and tonnage of Fred Astaire, and he had the lissomness which is such an asset in his chosen profession. One could readily imagine him flitting silently through the undergrowth with a couple of rabbits in his grasp, always two jumps ahead of the gamekeepers who were trying to locate him. The old ancestor had compared him to the Scarlet Pimpernel, and a glance was enough to tell me that the tribute was well deserved. I thought how wise Jeeves had been in suggesting that I entrust to him the delicate mission which I had in mind. When it comes to returning cats that have been snitched from their lawful homes, you need a specialist. Where Lloyd George or Winston Churchill would have failed, this Graham, I knew would succeed.
'Good afternoon, sir,' he said, 'you wished to see me?'
I got down without delay to the nub. No sense in humming or, for the matter of that, hawing.
'It's about this cat.'
'I delivered it according to instructions.'
'And now I want you to take it back.'
He seemed perplexed.
'Back, sir?'
'To where you got it.'
'I do not quite understand, sir.'
'I'll explain.'
I think I outlined the position of affairs rather well, making it abundantly clear that a Wooster could not countenance what was virtually tantamount, if tantamount is the word I want, to nobbling a horse and that the cat under advisement must be restored to its proprietor with all possible slippiness, and he listened attentively. But when I had finished, he shook his head.
'Out of the question, sir.'
'Out of the question? Why? You purloined it.'
'Yes, sir.'
'Then you can put it back.'
'No, sir. You are overlooking certain vital facts.'
'Such as?'
'The theft to which you refer was perpetrated as a personal favour to Miss Briscoe, whom I have known from childhood, and a sweet child she was.'
I thought of trying to move him by saying that I had been a sweet child, too, but I knew that this was not the case, having frequently been informed to that effect by my Aunt Agatha, so I let it go. There was not much chance, of course, that he had ever met my Aunt Agatha and discussed me with her, but it was not worth riskin
g.
'Furthermore,' he proceeded, and I was impressed, as I had been from the start, by the purity of his diction. He had evidently had a good education, though I doubted if he was an Oxford man. 'Furthermore,' he said, 'I have five pounds on Potato Chip with the landlord of the Goose and Grasshopper.'
'Aha!' I said to myself, and I'll tell you why I said 'Aha' to myself. I said it because the scales had fallen from my eyes and I saw all. Plainly that stuff about personal favours to sweet children had been the merest bobbledy-gook. He had been actuated throughout entirely by commercial motives. When Angelica Briscoe had come to him, he would have started with a regretful nolle prosequi on the ground that he had this fiver on Potato Chip and was obliged to protect his investment. She had said, would he do it for ten quid, which would leave him with a nice profit? He had right-hoed. Angelica had then touched Aunt Dahlia for ten and the deal had gone through. I have often thought I would have made a good detective. I can reason and deduce.
Everything was simple now that the matter could be put on a business basis. All that remained was to arrange terms. It would have to be a ready-money transaction, he being the shrewd man he was, and fortunately I had brought wads of cash with me for betting-on-the-course-at-Bridmouth purposes, so there was no problem.
'How much do you want?' I said.
'Sir?'
'To de-cat my premises and restore this feline to the strength.'
A sort of film came over his frank blue eyes, as I suppose it always did when he talked business, though not when singing in the choir. Fellows at the Drones have told me they notice the same thing in Oofy Prosser, the club millionaire, when they try to float a small loan with him to see them through till next Wednesday.
'How much do I want, sir?'
'Yes. Give it a name. We won't haggle.'
He pursed his lips.
'I'm afraid,' he said, having unpursed them, 'I couldn't do it as cheap as I'd like, sir. You see, what with them having discovered the animal's absence by this time, the hue and cry, as you might say, will be up and everybody at Mr Cook's residence on the qui vive or alert. I'd be in the position of a spy in wartime carrying secret dispatches through the enemy's lines with every eye on the look-out for him. I'd have to make it twenty pounds.'