At last managing to free my tongue from the uvula with which it had become entangled, I found speech, as I dare say those Darien fellows did eventually.
‘But I don’t understand!’
‘What don’t you understand?’
‘I thought you were going to marry Orlo Porter.’
She uttered a sound rather like an elephant taking its foot out of a mud hole in a Burmese teak forest. The name appeared to have touched an exposed nerve.
‘You did, did you? You were mistaken. Would any girl with an ounce of sense marry a man who refuses to do the least little thing she asks him because he is afraid of her father? I shall always be glad to see Orlo Porter fall downstairs and break his neck. Nothing would give me greater pleasure than to read his name in The Times obituary column. But marry him? What an idea! No, I am quite content with you, Bertie. By the way, I do dislike that name Bertie. I think I shall call you Harold. Yes, I am perfectly satisfied with you. You have many faults, of course. I shall be pointing some of them out when I am at leisure. For one thing,’ she said, not waiting till she was at leisure, ‘you smoke too much. You must give that up when we are married. Smoking is just a habit. Tolstoy,’ she said, mentioning someone I had not met, ‘says that just as much pleasure can be got from twirling the fingers.’
My impulse was to tell her Tolstoy was off his onion, but I choked down the heated words. For all I knew, the man might be a bosom pal of hers and she might resent criticism of him, however justified. And one knew what happened to people, policemen for instance, whose criticism she resented.
‘And that silly laugh of yours, you must correct that. If you are amused, a quiet smile is ample. Lord Chesterfield said that since he had had the full use of his reason nobody had ever heard him laugh. I don’t suppose you have read Lord Chesterfield’s Letters To His Son?’
… Well, of course I hadn’t. Bertram Wooster does not read other people’s letters. If I were employed in the post office, I wouldn’t even read the postcards.
‘I will draft out a whole course of reading for you.’
She would probably have gone on to name a few of the authors she had in mind, but at this moment Angelica Briscoe came bursting in.
‘Has he brought it yet?’ she yipped.
Then she saw Vanessa, added the word ‘Golly’, and disappeared like an eel into mud. Vanessa followed her with an indulgent eye.
‘Eccentric child,’ she said.
I agreed that Angelica Briscoe moved in a mysterious way her wonders to perform, and shortly after Vanessa went off, leaving me to totter to a chair and bury my face in my hands.
I was doing this, and very natural, too, considering that I had just become engaged to a girl who was going to try to make me stop smoking, when from outside the front door there came the unmistakable sound of an aunt tripping over a door mat. The next moment, my late father’s sister Dahlia staggered in, pirouetted awhile, cursed a bit, recovered her equilibrium and said:
‘Has he brought it yet?’
11
* * *
I AM NOT, I think, an irascible man, particularly in my dealings with the gentler sex, but when every ruddy female you meet bellows ‘Has he brought it yet?’ at you, it does something to your aplomb. I gave her a look which I suppose no nephew should have given an aunt, and it was with no little asperity that I said:
‘If some of you girls would stop talking as if you were characters in By Order Of The Czar, the world would be a better place. Brought what?’
‘The cat, of course, you poor dumb-bell,’ she responded in the breezy manner which had made her the popular toast of both the Quorn and the Pytchley fox-hunting organizations. ‘Cook’s cat. I’m kidnapping it. Or, rather, my agent is acting for me. I told him to bring it here.’
I was reft, as they say, of speech. If there is one thing that affects a nephew’s vocal cords, it is the discovery that a loved aunt is all foggy about the difference between right and wrong. Experience over the years ought to have taught me that where this aunt was concerned anything went and the sky was the limit, but nevertheless I was … I know there’s a word that just describes it … Ah, yes, I thought I’d get it … I was dumb-founded.
Well, of course, what every woman wants when she has a tale to tell is a dumbfounded audience, and it did not surprise me when she took advantage of my silence to carry on. Naturally aware that her goings-on required a bit of explanation, she made quite a production number of it. I won’t say that she omitted no detail however slight, but she certainly didn’t condense. She started off at 75 m.p.h. thus:
‘I must begin by making clear to the meanest intelligence – yours, to take an instance at random – how extremely sticky my position was on coming to stay with the Briscoes. Jimmy, when inviting me to Eggesford Hall, had written in the most enthusiastic terms of his horse Simla’s chances in the forthcoming race. He said he was a snip and putting a large bet on him would be like finding money in the street. And I, poor weak woman, allowed myself to be persuaded. I wagered everything I possessed, down to my more intimate garments. It was only after I got here and canvassed local opinion that I realized that Simla was not a snip or anything like a snip. Cook’s Potato Chip was just as fast and had just as much staying power. In fact, the thing would probably end in a dead-heat unless, get this, Bertie, unless one of the two animals blew up in its training. And then you came along with your special information about Potato Chip not being able to keep his mind on the race without this cat there to egg him on, and a bright light shone on me. “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings!” I said to myself. “Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings!”’
I could have wished that she had phrased it differently, but there was no chance of telling her so. When the aged relative collars the conversation, she collars it.
‘I was saying,’ she proceeded, ‘that I wagered on Simla everything I possessed. Correction. Change that to considerably more than I possessed. If I lost, it would mean touching Tom for a goodish bit before I could brass up, and you know how parting with money always gives him indigestion. You can picture my state of mind. If it hadn’t been for Angelica Briscoe, I think I would have had a nervous breakdown. There were moments when only my iron will kept me from shooting up to the ceiling, shrieking like a banshee. The suspense was so terrific.’
I was still dumbfounded, but I managed to say ‘Angelica Briscoe?’, at a loss to see where she got into the act, and the speaker spoke on.
‘Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten her. I would have thought by this time you would have asked her to marry you, which seems to be your normal practice five minutes after you’ve met any girl who isn’t actually repulsive. But I suppose you couldn’t see straight after all that port. Angelica, daughter of the Rev Briscoe. I had a long talk with her after you had left, and I found that she, too, had betted heavily on Simla and was wondering how she could pay up if he lost. I told her about the cat and she was enthusiastically in favour of stealing it, and she solved the problem which had been bothering me, the question of how it could be done. You see, it’s not a job that’s up everybody’s street. Mine, for instance. You have to be like one of those Red Indians I used to read about in Fenimore Cooper’s books when I was a child, the fellows who never let a twig snap beneath their feet, and I’m not built for that.’
There was justice in this. I believe the old relative was sylphlike in her youth, but the years have brought with them a certain solidity, and any twig trodden on by her in the evening of her life would go off like the explosion of a gas main.
‘But Angelica pointed the way. There’s a girl, that Angelica. Only a clergyman’s daughter, but with all the executive qualities of a great statesman. She didn’t hesitate a moment. Her face lighting up and her eyes sparkling. She said:
‘“This is a job for Billy Graham.”’
I could not follow her here. The name was familiar to me, but I never associated it with proficiency in the art of removing cats from Spot A to Spot B, especially cats belonging t
o someone else. Indeed, I should have thought that that was the sort of activity Mr Graham would rather have frowned on, being in his particular line of business.
I mentioned this to the old ancestor, and she told me I had fallen into a natural error.
‘His real name is Herbert Graham, but everyone calls him Billy.’
‘Why?’
‘Rustic humour. There’s a lot of that around here. He’s the king of the local poachers, and you don’t find any twigs snapping beneath his feet. All the gamekeepers for miles around have been trying for years to catch him with the goods, but they haven’t a hope. It is estimated that seventy-six point eight per cent of the beer sold in the Goose and Grasshopper is bought by haggard gamekeepers trying to drown their sorrows after being baffled by Billy. I have this on the authority of Angelica, who is a great buddy of his. She told him about our anxiety, and he said he would attend to the matter immediately. He is particularly well situated to carry out operations at the Court, as his niece Marlene is the scullery maid there, so it arouses no suspicion if he is caught hanging around. He can always say he has come to see if she’s getting on all right. Really, the whole thing has worked out so smoothly that one feels one is being watched over by Providence.’
I went on being appalled. Her scheme of engaging the services of a hired bravo who would probably blackmail her for the rest of her life shook me to the core. As for Angelica Briscoe, one asked oneself what clergymen’s daughters were coming to.
I tried to reason with her.
‘You can’t do this, old blood relation. It’s as bad as nobbling a horse.’
If you think that caused the blush of shame to mantle her cheek, you don’t know much about aunts.
‘Well, isn’t nobbling a horse an ordinary business precaution everyone would take if only they could manage it?’ she riposted.
The Woosters never give up. I tried again.
‘How about the purity of the turf?’
‘No good to me. I like my turf impure. More genuine excitement.’
‘What would the Quorn say of this? Or, for the matter of that, the Pytchley?’
‘They would send me a telegram wishing me luck. You don’t understand these small country meetings. It’s not like Epsom or Ascot. A little finesse from time to time is taken for granted. It’s expected of you. A couple of years ago Jimmy had a horse called Poonah running at Bridmouth, and a minion of Cook’s got hold of the jockey on the eve of the race, lured him into the Goose and Grasshopper and filled him up with strong drink, sending him to the starting post next day with such a hangover that all he wanted to do was sit down and cry. He came in fifth, sobbing bitterly, and went to sleep before he was out of the saddle. Of course Jimmy guessed what had happened, but nothing was ever said about it. No hard feelings on either side. It wasn’t till Jimmy fined Cook for moving pigs without a permit that relations became strained.’
I put another point, a shrewd one.
‘What happens if this fellow of yours does get caught? His first move will be to give you away, blackening your reputation in Maiden Eggesford beyond repair.’
‘He’s never caught. He’s the local Scarlet Pimpernel. And nothing could blacken my reputation in Maiden Eggesford. I’m much too much the popular pet ever since I sang “Every Nice Girl Loves A Sailor” at the village concert last year. I had them rolling in the aisles. Three encores, and so many bows that I got a crick in the back.’
‘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.
12
* * *
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 itse
lf 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: