‘Haven’t you been listening?’ I demanded.
She came back at me with equal heat.
‘Of course I haven’t been listening. Do you think that when I am faced with the prospect of losing the finest cook in the Midland counties I have time to pay attention to your vapid conversation? What were you babbling about?’
I drew myself up. The word ‘babbling’ had wounded me.
‘I was merely mentioning that, owing to that ass L.G. Trotter having shut the door of the safe before I could deposit the fatal necklace, I am landed with the thing. I described it as hot ice.’
‘Oh, that was what you were saying about ice?’
‘That was what. I also hazarded the prediction that in about two shakes of a duck’s tail inspectors and sergeants would come scooping me up and taking me off to chokey.’
‘What nonsense. Why should anyone think you had anything to do with it?’
I laughed. One of those short, bitter ones.
‘You don’t think it may arouse their suspicions when they find the ruddy thing in my trouser pocket? At any moment I may be caught with the goods on me, and you don’t have to read many thrillers to know what happens to unfortunate slobs who are caught with the goods on them. They get it in the neck.’
I could see she was profoundly moved. In my hours of ease this aunt is sometimes uncertain, coy and hard to please and, when I was younger, not infrequently sloshed me on the earhole if my behaviour seemed to her to call for the gesture, but let real peril threaten Bertram and she is in there swinging every time.
‘This isn’t so good,’ she said, picking up a small footstool and throwing it at a china shepherdess on the mantelpiece.
I endorsed this view, expressing the opinion that it was dashed awful.
‘You’ll have to –’
‘Hist!’
‘Eh?’
‘Hist!’
‘What do you mean, Hist?’
What I had meant by the monosyllable was that I had heard footsteps approaching the door. Before I could explain this, the handle turned sharply and Uncle Tom came in.
My ear told me at once that all was not well with this relative by marriage. When Uncle Tom has anything on his mind, he rattles his keys. He was jingling now like a xylophone. His face had the haggard, careworn look which it wears when he hears that week-end guests are expected.
‘It’s a judgment!’ he said, bursting into speech with a whoosh.
Aunt Dahlia masked her agitation with what I imagine she thought to be a genial smile.
‘Hullo, Tom, come and join the party. What’s a judgment?’
‘This is. On me. For weakly allowing you to invite those infernal Trotters here. I knew something awful would happen. I felt it in my bones. You can’t fill the house up with people like that without courting disaster. Stands to reason. He’s got a face like a weasel, she’s twenty pounds overweight, and that son of hers wears whiskers. It was madness ever to let them cross the threshold. Do you know what’s happened?’
‘No, what?’
‘Somebody’s pinched her necklace!’
‘Good heavens!’
‘I thought that would make you sit up,’ said Uncle Tom, with gloomy triumph. ‘She collared me in the hall just now and said she wanted the thing to wear at dinner tonight, and I took her to the safe and opened it and it wasn’t there.’
I told myself that I must keep very cool.
‘You mean,’ I said, ‘that it had gone?’
He gave me rather an unpleasant look.
‘You’ve got a lightning brain!’ he said.
Well, I have, of course.
‘But how could it have gone?’ I asked. ‘Was the safe open?’
‘No, shut. But I must have left it open. All that fuss of putting that frightful fellow Sidcup to bed distracted my attention.’
I think he was about to say that it just showed what happened when you let people like that into the house, but checked himself on remembering that he was the one who had invited him.
‘Well, there it is,’ he said. ‘Somebody seems to have come along while we were upstairs, seen the safe door open and improved the shining hour. The Trotter woman is raising Cain, and it was only my urgent entreaties that kept her from sending for the police there and then. I told her we could get much better results by making secret inquiries. Didn’t want a scandal, I said. But I doubt if I could have persuaded her if it hadn’t been that young Gorringe came along and backed me up. Quite an intelligent young fellow, that, though he does wear whiskers.’
I cleared my throat nonchalantly. At least, I tried to do it nonchalantly.
‘Then what steps are you taking, Uncle Tom?’
‘I’m going to excuse myself during dinner on the plea of a headache – which I’ve got, I don’t mind telling you – and go and search the rooms. Just possible I might dig up something. Meanwhile, I’m off to get a drink. The whole thing has upset me considerably. Will you join me in a quick one, Bertie, me boy?’
‘I think I’ll stick on here, if you don’t mind,’ I said. ‘Aunt Dahlia and I are talking of this and that.’
He produced a final obligato on the keys.
‘Well, suit yourself. But it seems odd to me in my present frame of mind that anyone can refuse a drink. I wouldn’t have thought it possible.’
As the door closed behind him, Aunt Dahlia expelled her breath like a death-rattle.
‘Golly!’ she said.
It seemed to me the mot juste.
‘What should we do now, do you think?’ I queried.
‘I know what I’d like to do. I’d like to put the whole thing up to Jeeves, if certain fatheads hadn’t let him go off on toots in London just when we need him most.’
‘He may be back by now.’
‘Ring for Seppings, and ask.’
I pressed the bell.
‘Oh, Seppings,’ I said, as he entered and You-rang-madam-ed. ‘Has Jeeves got back yet?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Then send him here with all speed,’ I said.
And a few moments later the man was with us, looking so brainy and intelligent that my heart leaped up as if I had beheld a rainbow in the sky.
‘Oh, Jeeves,’ I yipped.
‘Oh, Jeeves,’ yipped Aunt Dahlia, dead-heating with me.
‘After you,’ I said.
‘No, go ahead,’ she replied, courteously yielding the floor. ‘Your predicament is worse than my predicament. Mine can wait.’
I was touched.
‘Very handsome of you, old egg,’ I said. ‘Much appreciated. Jeeves, your close attention, if you please. Certain problems have arisen.’
‘Yes, sir?’
‘Two in all.’
‘Yes, sir?’
‘Shall we call them Problem A and Problem B?’
‘Certainly, sir, if you wish.’
‘Then here is Problem A, the one affecting me.’
I ran through the scenario, putting the facts clearly and well.
‘So there you are, Jeeves. Bend the brain to it. If you wish to pace the corridor, by all means do so.’
‘It will not be necessary, sir. One sees what must be done.’
I said I would be glad if he could arrange it so that two could.
‘You must restore the necklace to Mrs. Trotter, sir.’
‘Give it back to her, you mean?’
‘Precisely, sir.’
‘But, Jeeves,’ I said, my voice shaking a little, ‘isn’t she going to wonder how I come to have my hooks on the thing? Will she not probe and question, and having probed and questioned rush to the telephone and put in her order for inspectors and sergeants?’
A muscle at the side of his mouth twitched indulgently.
‘The restoration would, of course, have to be accomplished with secrecy, sir. I would advocate placing the piece of jewellery in the lady’s bedchamber at a moment when it was unoccupied. Possibly while she was at the dinner table.’
‘But I should
be at the dinner table, too. I can’t say “Oh, excuse me” and dash upstairs in the middle of the fish course.’
‘I was about to suggest that you allow me to attend to the matter, sir. My movements will be less circumscribed.’
‘You mean you’ll handle the whole binge?’
‘If you will give me the piece of jewellery, sir, I shall be most happy to do so.’
I was overcome. I burned with remorse and shame. I saw how mistaken I had been in supposing that he had been talking through the back of his neck.
‘Golly, Jeeves! This is pretty feudal.’
‘Not at all, sir.’
‘You’ve solved the whole thing. Rem … what’s that expression of yours?’
‘Rem acu tetigisti, sir?’
‘That’s it. It does mean “You have put your finger on the nub”, doesn’t it?’
‘That would be a rough translation of the Latin, sir. I am happy to have given satisfaction. But did I understand you to say that there was a further matter that was troubling you, sir?’
‘Problem B is mine, Jeeves,’ said Aunt Dahlia, who during the slice of dialogue had been waiting in the wings, chafing a bit at being withheld from taking the stage. ‘It’s about Anatole.’
‘Yes, madam?’
‘Mrs. Trotter wants him.’
‘Indeed, madam?’
‘And she says she won’t let Trotter buy the Boudoir unless she gets him. And you know how vital it is that I sell the Boudoir. Sweet spirits of nitre!’ cried the old relative passionately. ‘If only there was some way of inserting a bit of backbone into L.G. Trotter and making him stand up to the woman and defy her!’
‘There is, madam.’
Aunt Dahlia leaped about a foot and a quarter. It was as though that calm response had been a dagger of Oriental design thrust into the fleshy part of her leg.
‘What did you say, Jeeves? Did you say there was?’
‘Yes, madam. I think it will be a reasonably simple matter to induce Mr. Trotter to override the lady’s wishes.’
I didn’t want to cast a damper over the proceedings, but I had to put in a word here.
‘Frightfully sorry to have to dash the cup of joy from your lips, old tortured spirit,’ I said, ‘but I fear that all this comes under the head of wishful thinking. Pull yourself together, Jeeves. You speak … is it airily?’
‘Airily or glibly, sir.’
‘Thank you, Jeeves. You speak airily or glibly of inducing L.G. Trotter to throw off the yoke and defy his considerably better half, but are you not too … dash it, I’ve forgotten the word.’
‘Sanguine, sir?’
‘That’s it. Sanguine. Brief though my acquaintance with these twain has been, I have got L.G. Trotter’s number, all right. His attitude towards Ma Trotter is that of an exceptionally diffident worm towards a sinewy Plymouth Rock or Orpington. A word from her, and he curls up into a ball. So where do you get off with that simple-matter-to-override-wishes stuff?’
I thought I had him there, but no.
‘If I might explain. I gather from Mr. Seppings, who has had opportunities of overhearing the lady’s conversation, that Mrs. Trotter, being socially ambitious, is extremely anxious to see Mr. Trotter knighted, madam.’
Aunt Dahlia nodded.
‘Yes, that’s right. She’s always talking about it. She thinks it would be one in the eye for Mrs. Alderman Blenkinsop.’
‘Precisely, madam.’
I was rather surprised.
‘Do they knight birds like him?’
‘Oh, yes, sir. A gentleman of Mr. Trotter’s prominence in the world of publishing is always in imminent danger of receiving the accolade.’
‘Danger? Don’t these bozos like being knighted?’
‘Not when they are of Mr. Trotter’s retiring disposition, sir. He would find it a very testing ordeal. It involves wearing satin knee-breeches and walking backwards with a sword between the legs, not at all the sort of thing a sensitive gentleman of regular habits would enjoy. And he shrinks, no doubt, from the prospect of being addressed for the remainder of his life as Sir Lemuel.’
‘His name’s not Lemuel?’
‘I fear so, sir.’
‘Couldn’t he use his second name?’
‘His second name is Gengulphus.’
‘Golly, Jeeves,’ I said, thinking of old Uncle Tom Portarlington, ‘there’s some raw work pulled at the font from time to time, is there not?’
‘There is, indeed, sir.’
Aunt Dahlia seemed perplexed, like one who strives in vain to put her finger on the nub.
‘Is this all leading up to something, Jeeves?’
‘Yes, madam. I was about to hazard the suggestion that were Mr. Trotter to become aware that the alternative to buying Milady’s Boudoir was the discovery by Mrs. Trotter that he had been offered a knighthood and had declined it, you might find the gentleman more easily moulded than in the past, madam.’
It took Aunt Dahlia right between the eyes like a sock full of wet sand. She tottered, and grabbed for support at the upper part of my right arm, giving it the dickens of a pinch. The anguish caused her next remark to escape me, though as it was no doubt merely ‘Gosh!’ or ‘Lord love a duck!’ or something of that sort, I suppose I didn’t miss much. When the mists had cleared from my eyes and I was myself again, Jeeves was speaking.
‘It appears that Mrs. Trotter some months ago insisted on Mr. Trotter engaging the services of a gentleman’s personal gentleman, a young fellow named Worple, and Worple contrived to secure the rough draft of Mr. Trotter’s letter of refusal from the wastepaper basket. He had recently become a member of the Junior Ganymede, and in accordance with Rule Eleven he forwarded the document to the secretary for inclusion in the club archives. Through the courtesy of the secretary I was enabled to peruse it after luncheon, and a photo-static copy is to be dispatched to me through the medium of the post. I think that if you were to mention this to Mr. Trotter, madam –’
Aunt Dahlia uttered a whoop similar in timbre to those which she had been accustomed to emit in the old Quorn and Pytchley days when encouraging a bevy of hounds to get on the scent and give it both nostrils.
‘We’ve got him cold!’
‘So one is disposed to imagine, madam.’
‘I’ll tackle him right away.’
‘You can’t,’ I pointed out. ‘He’s gone to bed. Touch of dyspepsia.’
‘Then tomorrow directly after breakfast,’ said Aunt Dahlia. ‘Oh, Jeeves!’
Emotion overcame her, and she grabbed at my arm again. It was like being bitten by an alligator.
20
* * *
AT ABOUT THE hour of nine next morning a singular spectacle might have been observed on the main staircase of Brinkley Court. It was Bertram Wooster coming down to breakfast.
It is a fact well known to my circle that only on very rare occasions do I squash in at the communal morning meal, preferring to chew the kipper or whatever it may be in the seclusion of my bedchamber. But a determined man can nerve himself to almost anything, if necessary, and I was resolved at all cost not to miss the dramatic moment when Aunt Dahlia tore off her whiskers and told a cowering L.G. Trotter that she knew all. It would, I felt, be value for money.
Though slightly on the somnambulistic side, I don’t know when I have felt more strongly that the lark was on the wing and the snail on the thorn and God in His Heaven and all right with the world. Thanks to Jeeves’s outstanding acumen, Aunt Dahlia’s problem was solved, and I was in a position – if I cared to be rude enough – to laugh in the faces of any inspectors and sergeants who might blow in. Furthermore, before retiring to rest on the previous night I had taken the precaution to recover the cosh from the old relative and it was securely on my person once more. Little wonder that, as I entered the dining-room, I was within an ace of bursting into song and piping as the linnets do, as I have heard Jeeves put it.
The first thing I saw on crossing the threshold was Stilton wolfing ham, the n
ext Daphne Dolores Morehead finishing off her repast with toast and marmalade.
‘Ah, Bertie, old man,’ cried the former, waving a fork in the friendliest manner. ‘So there you are, Bertie, old fellow. Come in, Bertie, old chap, come in. Splendid to see you looking so rosy.’
His cordiality would have surprised me more, if I hadn’t seen in it a ruse or stratagem designed to put me off my guard and lull me into a false sense of security. Keenly alert, I went to the sideboard and helped myself with my left hand to sausages and bacon, keeping the right hand on the cosh in my side pocket. This jungle warfare teaches a man to take no chances.
‘Nice morning,’ I said, having taken my seat and dipped the lips into a cup of coffee.
‘Lovely,’ agreed the Morehead, who was looking more than ever like a dewy flower at daybreak. ‘D’Arcy is going to take me for a row on the river.’
‘Yes,’ said Stilton, giving her a burning glance. ‘One feels that Daphne ought to see the river. You might tell your aunt we shall not be back for lunch. Sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs are being provided.’
‘By that nice butler.’
‘By, as you say, that nice butler, who also thought it might run to a bottle of the best from the oldest bin. We shall be starting almost immediately.’
‘I’ll be going and getting ready,’ said the Morehead.
She rose with a bright smile, and Stilton, full though he was of ham, bounded gallantly to open the door for her. When he returned to the table, he found me rather ostentatiously brandishing the cosh. It seemed to surprise him.
‘Hullo!’ he said. ‘What are you doing with that thing?’
‘Oh, nothing,’ I replied nonchalantly, resting it by my plate. ‘I just thought I would like to have it handy.’
He swallowed a chunk of ham in a puzzled way. Then his face cleared.
‘Good Lord! You didn’t think I was going to set about you?’
I said that some such idea had crossed my mind, and he uttered an amused laugh.
‘Good heavens, no! Why, I look on you as my dearest pal, old man.’
It seemed to me that if yesterday’s session was a specimen of the way he comported himself towards his dearest pals, the ones who weren’t quite so dear must have a pretty thin time of it. I said as much, and he laughed again as heartily as if he had been standing in the dock at Vinton Street police court with His Worship getting off those nifties of his which convulsed all and sundry.