is never  happier
than when curled up with his Spinoza or his Shakespeare. I, on  the
other  hand,  go in mostly for who-dun-its and novels of  suspense.
For  the  who-dun-it Agatha Christie is always a safe bet. For  the
novel of suspense ...'
   Here  I  paused,  for he had called me an opprobrious  name  and
told  me  to  stop  babbling, and it is always my  policy  to  stop
babbling  when  a  man  eight  foot six  in  height  and  broad  in
proportion  tells me to. I went into the silence, and he  continued
to say on.
   'I  said that I could read you like a book, Wooster. I know what
your game is.'
   'I don't understand you, Lord Sidcup.'
   'Then  you must be as big an ass as you look, which is saying  a
good  deal. I am referring to your behaviour towards my fiancee.  I
come into this room and I find you fondling her face.'
   I  had  to  correct  him here. One likes  to  get  these  things
straight.
   'Only her chin.'
   'Pah!' he said, or something that sounded like that.
   'And  I  had  to get a grip on it in order to extract  the  gnat
from her eye. I was merely steadying it.'
   'You were steadying it gloatingly.'
   'I wasn't!'
   'Pardon  me.  I have eyes and can see when a man is steadying  a
chin gloatingly and when he isn't. You were obviously delighted  to
have an excuse for soiling her chin with your foul fingers.'
   'You are wrong, Lord Spodecup.'
   'And,  as  I  say, I know what your game is. You are  trying  to
undermine  me,  to win her from me with your insidious  guile,  and
what  I  want  to  impress upon you with all  the  emphasis  at  my
disposal is that if anything of this sort is going to occur  again,
you  would  do well to take out an accident policy with  some  good
insurance company at the earliest possible date. You probably think
that  being a guest in your aunt's house I would hesitate to butter
you  over  the  front lawn and dance on the fragments in  hobnailed
boots, but you are mistaken. It will be a genuine pleasure.  By  an
odd coincidence I brought a pair of hobnailed boots with me!'
   So  saying, and recognizing a good exit line when he saw one, he
strode  out, and after an interval of tense meditation  I  followed
him.  Repairing  to  my  bedroom, I  found  Jeeves  there,  looking
reproachful.  He knows I can dress for dinner in ten  minutes,  but
regards  haste askance, for he thinks it results in  a  tie  which,
even if adequate, falls short of the perfect butterfly effect.
   I  ignored the silent rebuke in his eyes. After meeting  Spode's
eyes, I was dashed if I was going to be intimidated by Jeeves's.
   'Jeeves,'  I  said, 'you're fairly well up in Hymns Ancient  and
Modern, I should imagine. Who were the fellows in the hymn who used
to prowl and prowl around?'
   'The troops of Midian, sir.'
   'That's right. Was Spode mentioned as one of them?'
   'Sir?'
   'I  ask  because he's prowling around as if Midian was his  home
town. Let me tell you all about it.'
   'I fear it will not be feasible, sir. The gong is sounding.'
   'So it is. Who's sounding it? You said Seppings was in bed.'
   'The parlourmaid, sir, deputizing for Mr Seppings.'
   'I like her wrist work. Well, I'll tell you later.'
   'Very good, sir. Pardon me, your tie.'
   'What's wrong with it?'
   'Everything, sir. If you will allow me.'
   'All  right,  go ahead. But I can't help asking myself  if  ties
really matter at a time like this.'
   There is no time when ties do not matter, sir.'
   My  mood  was  sombre as I went down to dinner. Anatole,  I  was
thinking, would no doubt give us of his best, possibly his  Timbale
de   ris   de  veau  Toulousaine  or  his  Sylphides  a  la   creme
d'ecrevisses, but Spode would be there and Madeline would be  there
and Florence would be there and L. P. Runkle would be there.
   There was, I reflected, always something.

        8
   It  has been well said of Bertram Wooster that when he sets  his
hand  to  the plough he does not stop to pick daisies and  let  the
grass  grow  under  his  feet.  Many men  in  my  position,  having
undertaken  to canvass for a friend anxious to get into Parliament,
would  have waited till after lunch next day to get rolling, saying
to themselves Oh, what difference do a few hours make and going off
to  the  billiard-room for a game or two of snooker.  I,  in  sharp
contradistinction as I have heard Jeeves call it,  was  on  my  way
shortly  after  breakfast. It can't have  been  much  more  than  a
quarter  to  eleven when, fortified by a couple of kippers,  toast,
marmalade  and  three cups of coffee, I might  have  been  observed
approaching a row of houses down by the river to which someone with
a  flair  for the mot juste had given the name of River  Row.  From
long  acquaintance with the town I knew that this was  one  of  the
posher parts of Market Snodsbury, stiff with householders likely to
favour  the Conservative cause, and it was for that reason  that  I
was  making it my first port of call. No sense, I mean, in starting
off  with  the  less highly priced localities where  everybody  was
bound  to  vote Labour and would not only turn a deaf ear to  one's
reasoning but might even bung a brick at one. Ginger no doubt had a
special posse of tough supporters, talking and spitting out of  the
side  of  their  mouths, and they would attend to the brick-bunging
portion of the electorate.
   Jeeves was at my side, but whereas I had selected Number One  as
my  objective, his intention was to push on to Number Two. I  would
then  give  Number Three the treatment, while he did  the  same  to
Number Four. Talking it over, we had decided that if we made  it  a
double  act  and  blew into a house together,  it  might  give  the
occupant  the  impression that he was receiving a  visit  from  the
plain  clothes police and excite him unduly. Many of  the  men  who
live in places like River Row have a tendency to apoplectic fits as
the  result of high living, and a voter expiring on the floor  from
shock  means a voter less on the voting list. One has to  think  of
these things.
   'What  beats me, Jeeves,' I said, for I was in thoughtful  mood,
'is  why people don't object to somebody they don't know from  Adam
muscling into their homes without a ... without a what? It's on the
tip of my tongue.'
   'A With-your-leave or a By-your-leave, sir?'
   'That's right. Without a With-your-leave or a By-your-leave  and
telling  them  which way to vote. Taking a liberty, it  strikes  me
as.'
   'It  is  the custom at election time, sir. Custom reconciles  us
to everything, a wise man once said.'
   'Shakespeare?'
   'Burke,  sir. You will find the apothegm in his On  The  Sublime
And  Beautiful. I think the electors, conditioned by many years  of
canvassing, would be disappointed if nobody called on them.'
   'So  we  shall  be  bringing a ray of sunshine into  their  drab
lives?'
   'Something on that order, sir.'
   'Well,  you may be right. Have you ever done this sort of  thing
before?'
   'Once or twice, sir, before I entered your employment.'
   'What were your methods?'
   'I  outlined  as  briefly as possible  the  main  facets  of  my
argument, bade my auditors goodbye, and withdrew.'
   'No preliminaries?'
   'Sir?'
   'You  didn't  make a speech of any sort before getting  down  to
brass tacks? No mention of Burke or Shakespeare or the poet Burns?'
   'No, sir. It might have caused exasperation.'
   I  disagreed  with him. I felt that he was on  the  wrong  track
altogether and couldn't expect anything in the nature of a  triumph
at  Number Two. There is probably nothing a voter enjoys more  than
hearing  the  latest  about  Burke  and  his  On  The  Sublime  And
Beautiful,  and  here  he  was,  deliberately  chucking  away   the
advantages  his learning gave him. I had half a mind  to  draw  his
attention  to the Parable of the Talents, with which I  had  become
familiar when doing research for that Scripture Knowledge  prize  I
won at school. Time, however, was getting along, so I passed it up.
But  I  told  him  I  thought  he was  mistaken.  Preliminaries,  I
maintained,  were  of the essence. Breaking the ice  is  what  it's
called.  I mean, you can't just barge in on a perfect stranger  and
get off the mark with an abrupt 'Hoy there. I hope you're going  to
vote  for my candidate!' How much better to say 'Good morning, sir.
I can see at a glance that you are a man of culture, probably never
happier  than when reading your Burke. I wonder if you are familiar
with his On The Sublime And Beautiful?' Then away you go, off to  a
nice start.
   'You  must have an approach,' I said. 'I myself am all  for  the
jolly, genial. I propose, on meeting my householder, to begin  with
a  jovial  "Hullo  there,  Mr Whatever-it-is,  hullo  there",  thus
ingratiating myself with him from the kick-off. I shall  then  tell
him  a  funny story. Then, and only then, will I get to the  nub  -
waiting, of course, till he has stopped laughing. I can't fail.'
   'I  am sure you will not, sir. The system would not suit me, but
it is merely a matter of personal taste.'
   'The psychology of the individual, what?'
   'Precisely, sir. By different methods different men excel.'
   'Burke?'
   'Charles  Churchill,  sir, a poet who flourished  in  the  early
eighteenth  century.  The words occur in  his  Epistle  To  William
Hogarth.'
   We  halted. Cutting out a good pace, we had arrived at the  door
of Number One. I pressed the bell.
   'Zero hour, Jeeves,' I said gravely.
   'Yes, sir.'
   'Carry on.'
   'Very good, sir.'
   'Heaven speed your canvassing.'
   'Thank you, sir.'
   'And mine.'
   'Yes, sir.'
   He  pushed along and mounted the steps of Number Two, leaving me
feeling  rather  as I had done in my younger days  at  a  clergyman
uncle's  place  in  Kent when about to compete in  the  Choir  Boys
Bicycle  Handicap open to all those whose voices had not broken  by
the  first  Sunday in Epiphany - nervous, but full of the  will  to
win.
   The  door opened as I was running through the high spots of  the
laughable story I planned to unleash when I got inside. A maid  was
standing  there, and conceive my emotion when I recognized  her  as
one  who  had  held office under Aunt Dahlia the last  time  I  had
enjoyed the latter's hospitality; the one with whom, the old sweats
will  recall,  I  had  chewed the fat on the  subject  of  the  cat
Augustus  and  his  tendency to pass his days in sleep  instead  of
bustling about and catching mice.
   The  sight  of  her friendly face was like a tonic.  My  morale,
which  had  begun  to  sag a bit after Jeeves  had  left  me,  rose
sharply,  closing at nearly par. I felt that even if the  fellow  I
was  going to see kicked me downstairs, she would be there to  show
me  out and tell me that these things are sent to try us, with  the
general idea of making us more spiritual.
   'Why, hullo!' I said.
   'Good morning, sir.'
   'We meet again.'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'You remember me?'
   'Oh yes, sir.'
   'And you have not forgotten Augustus?'
   'Oh no, sir.'
   'He's  still  as  lethargic as ever. He joined me  at  breakfast
this morning, fust managed to keep awake while getting outside  his
portion of kipper, then fell into a dreamless sleep at the  end  of
the  bed  with  his  head hanging down. So you have  resigned  your
portfolio at Aunt Dahlia's since we last met. Too bad. We shall all
miss you. Do you like it here?'
   'Oh yes, sir.'
   'That's  the spirit. Well, getting down to business,  I've  come
to  see your boss on a matter of considerable importance. What sort
of chap is he? Not too short-tempered? Not too apt to be cross with
callers, I hope?'
   'It isn't a gentleman, sir, it's a lady. Mrs McCorkadale.'
   This  chipped quite a bit off the euphoria I was feeling. I  had
been  relying  on the story I had prepared to put me  over  with  a
bang, carrying me safely through the first awkward moments when the
fellow you've called on without an invitation is staring at you  as
if  wondering to what he owes the honour of this visit, and now  it
would  have to remain untold. It was one I had heard from  Catsmeat
Potter-Pirbright at the Drones and it was essentially a conte whose
spiritual  home was the smoking-room of a London club or the  men's
wash-room on an American train - in short, one by no means  adapted
to  the ears of the gentle sex; especially a member of that sex who
probably ran the local Watch Committee.
   It  was,  consequently, a somewhat damped Bertram  Wooster  whom
the  maid ushered into the drawing-room, and my pep was in  no  way
augmented by the first sight I had of mine hostess. Mrs McCorkadale
was  what I would call a grim woman. Not so grim as my Aunt Agatha,
perhaps, for that could hardly be expected, but certainly  well  up
in  the  class of Jael the wife of Heber and the Madame Whoever-it-
was  who used to sit and knit at the foot of the guillotine  during
the  French Revolution. She had a beaky nose, tight thin lips,  and
her eye could have been used for splitting logs in the teak forests
of  Borneo.  Seeing  her  steadily and seeing  her  whole,  as  the
expression  is, one marvelled at the intrepidity of Mr  McCorkadale
in marrying her - a man obviously whom nothing could daunt.
   However, I had come there to be jolly and genial, and jolly  and
genial  I  was resolved to be. Actors will tell you that  on  these
occasions,  when the soul is a-twitter and the nervous  system  not
like  mother makes it, the thing to do is to take a deep breath.  I
took three, and immediately felt much better.
   'Good  morning,  good  morning, good  morning,'  I  said.  'Good
morning,' I added, rubbing it in, for it was my policy to let there
be no stint.
   'Good  morning,' she replied, and one might have  totted  things
up as so far, so good. But if I said she said it cordially, I would
be  deceiving my public. The impression I got was that the sight of
me hurt her in some sensitive spot. The woman, it was plain, shared
Spode's  view  of what was needed to make England a  land  fit  for
heroes to live in.
   Not  being able to uncork the story and finding the way her  eye
was going through me like a dose of salts more than a little trying
to my already dented sangfroid, I might have had some difficulty in
getting the conversation going, but fortunately I was full of  good
material just waiting to be decanted. Over an after-dinner smoke on
the  previous  night  Ginger had filled me in  on  what  his  crowd
proposed to do when they got down to it. They were going, he  said,
to cut taxes to the bone, straighten out our foreign policy, double
our  export trade, have two cars in the garage and two chickens  in
the  pot for everyone and give the pound the shot in the arm it had
been  clamouring for for years. Than which, we both agreed, nothing
could  be  sweeter,  and  I  saw no  reason  to  suppose  that  the
McCorkadale  gargoyle would not feel the same. I began,  therefore,
by asking her if she had a vote, and she said Yes, of course, and I
said  Well, that was fine, because if she hadn't had, the point  of
my arguments would have been largely lost.
   'An  excellent  thing,  I've always thought,  giving  women  the
vote,'  I  proceeded  heartily, and she said  -rather  nastily,  it
seemed  to me - that she was glad I approved. 'When you cast yours,
if  cast  is the word I want, I strongly advise you to cast  it  in
favour of Ginger Winship.'
   'On what do you base that advice?'
   She  couldn't have given me a better cue. She had handed  it  to
me on a plate with watercress round it. Like a flash I went into my
sales talk, mentioning Ginger's attitude towards taxes, our foreign
policy,  our export trade, cars in the garage, chickens in the  pot
and first aid for the poor old pound, and was shocked to observe an
entire absence of enthusiasm on her part. Not a ripple appeared  on
the  stern  and  rockbound coast of her map. She looked  like  Aunt
Agatha  listening  to  the boy Wooster trying  to  explain  away  a
drawing-room window broken by a cricket ball.
   I pressed her closely, or do I mean keenly.
   'You want taxes cut, don't you?'
   'I do.'
   'And our foreign policy bumped up?'
   'Certainly.'
   'And  our exports doubled and a stick of dynamite put under  the
pound?  I'll bet you do. Then vote for Ginger Winship, the man  who
with  his hand on the helm of the ship of state will steer  England
to  prosperity and happiness, bringing back once more the  spacious
days  of Good Queen Bess.' This was a line of talk that Jeeves  had
roughed out for my use. There was also some rather good stuff about
this  sceptred isle and this other Eden, demi-something, but I  had
forgotten it. 'You can't say that wouldn't be nice,' I said.
   A  moment  before, I wouldn't have thought it possible that  she
could  look more like Aunt Agatha than she had been doing, but  she
now  achieved this breathtaking feat. She sniffed, if not  snorted,
and spoke as follows:
   'Young  man, don't be idiotic. Hand on the helm of the  ship  of
state,  indeed! If Mr Winship performs the miracle of winning  this
election,  which  he  won't, he will be an  ordinary  humble  back-
bencher,  doing nothing more notable than saying "Hear, hear"  when
his  superiors  are  speaking  and "Oh"  and  "Question"  when  the
opposition have the floor. As,' she went on, 'I shall if I win this
election, as I intend to.'
   I  blinked. A sharp 'Whatwasthatyousaid?' escaped my  lips,  and
she proceeded to explain or, as Jeeves would say, elucidate.
   'You  are not very quick at noticing things, are you? I  imagine
not,  or  you  would have seen that Market Snodsbury  is  liberally
plastered with posters bearing the words "Vote for McCorkadale". An
abrupt  way of putting it, but one that is certainly successful  in
conveying its meaning.'
   It  was  a  blow,  I confess, and I swayed beneath  it  like  an
aspen, if aspens are those things that sway. The Woosters can  take
a  good  deal,  but only so much. My most coherent thought  at  the
moment was that it was just like my luck, when I sallied forth as a
canvasser,  to  collide first crack out of the box with  the  rival
candidate.  I  also  had the feeling that if Jeeves  had  taken  on
Number  One instead of Number Two, he would probably have persuaded
Ma McCorkadale to vote against herself.
   I  suppose if you had asked Napoleon how he had managed  to  get
out  of Moscow, he would have been a bit vague about it, and it was
the  same  with me. I found myself on the front steps with  only  a
sketchy notion of how I had got there, and I was in the poorest  of
shapes.  To  try to restore the shattered system I lit a  cigarette
and  had begun to puff, when a cheery voice hailed me and I  became
aware  that some foreign substance was sharing my doorstep. 'Hullo,
Wooster old chap' it was saying and, the mists clearing from before
my eyes, I saw that it was Bingley.
   I  gave  the blighter a distant look. Knowing that this blot  on
the  species  resided in Market Snodsbury, I had  foreseen  that  I
might  run into him sooner or later, so I was not surprised to  see
him. But I certainly wasn't pleased. The last thing I wanted in the
delicate  state  to  which  the  McCorkadale  had  reduced  me  was
conversation  with a man who set cottages on fire  and  chased  the
hand that fed him hither and thither with a carving knife.
   He   was  as  unduly  intimate,  forward,  bold,  intrusive  and
deficient in due respect as he had been at the Junior Ganymede.  He
gave my back a cordial slap and would, I think, have prodded me  in
the  ribs if it had occurred to him. You wouldn't have thought that
carving knives had ever come between us.
   'And what are you doing in these parts, cocky?' he asked.
   I  said  I was visiting my aunt Mrs Travers, who had a house  in
the  vicinity, and he said he knew the place, though he  had  never
met the old geezer to whom I referred.
   'I've seen her around. Red-faced old girl, isn't she?'
   'Fairly vermilion.'
   'High blood pressure, probably.'
   'Or caused by going in a lot for hunting. It chaps the cheeks.'
   'Different from a barmaid. She cheeks the chaps.'
   If he had supposed that his crude humour would get so much as  a
simper  out  of  me,  he  was disappointed. I  preserved  the  cold
aloofness of a Wednesday matinee audience, and he proceeded.
   'Yes, that might be it. She looks a sport. Making a long stay?'
   'I  don't know,' I said, for the length of my visits to the  old
ancestor is always uncertain. So much depends on whether she throws
me  out  or not. 'Actually I'm here to canvass for the Conservative
candidate. He's a pal of mine.'
   He   whistled  sharply.  He  had  been  looking  repulsive   and
cheerful;  he  now looked repulsive and grave. Seeming  to  realize
that he had omitted a social gesture, he prodded me in the ribs.
   'You're  wasting  your time, Wooster, old  man,'  he  said.  'He
hasn't an earthly.'
   'No?'  I  quavered. It was simply one man's opinion, of  course,
but  the  earnestness with which he had spoken  was  unquestionably
impressive. 'What makes you think that?'
   'Never you mind what makes me think it. Take my word for it.  If
you're  sensible, you'll phone your bookie and have a  big  bet  on
McCorkadale.  You'll never regret it. You'll come to me  later  and
thank me for the tip with tears in your -'
   At  some point in this formal interchange of thoughts by  spoken
word,  as  Jeeves's Dictionary of Synonyms puts it,  he  must  have
pressed  the bell, for at this moment the door opened  and  my  old
buddy  the maid appeared. Quickly adding the word 'eyes', he turned
to her.
   'Mrs  McCorkadale in, dear?' he asked, and having been responded
to  in  the affirmative he left me, and I headed for home. I ought,
of  course,  to  have carried on along River Row,  taking  the  odd
numbers while Jeeves attended to the even, but I didn't feel in the
vein.
   I  was  uneasy. You might say, if you happened to know the word,
that  the  prognostications of a human wart like  Bingley  deserved
little  credence, but he had spoken with such conviction,  so  like
someone who has heard something, that I couldn't pass them off with
a light laugh.
   Brooding  tensely,  I reached the old homestead  and  found  the
ancestor  lying  on  a chaise longue, doing the Observer  crossword
puzzle.


        9
   There  was  a  time  when  this worthy housewife,  tackling  the
Observer  crossword puzzle, would snort and tear her hair and  fill
the  air  with strange oaths picked up from cronies on the  hunting
field,  but consistent inability to solve more than about an eighth
of  the clues has brought a sort of dull resignation and today  she
merely  sits and stares at it, knowing that however much she  licks
the end of her pencil little or no business will result.
   As  I came in, I heard her mutter, soliloquizing like someone in
Shakespeare,  'Measured tread of saint round St Paul's,  for  God's
sake', seeming to indicate that she had come up against a hot  one,
and  I  think  it  was  a relief to her to become  aware  that  her
favourite nephew was at her side and that she could conscientiously
abandon  her  distasteful task, for she looked up  and  greeted  me
cheerily.  She  wears tortoiseshell-rimmed spectacles  for  reading
which  make her look like a fish in an aquarium. She peered  at  me
through these.
   'Hullo, my bounding Bertie.'
   'Good morning, old ancestor.'
   'Up already?'
   'I have been up some time.'
   'Then  why  aren't you out canvassing? And why are  you  looking
like something the cat brought in?'
   I  winced.  I had not intended to disclose the recent past,  but
with  an  aunt's perception she had somehow spotted  that  in  some
manner I had passed through the furnace and she would go on probing
and  questioning  till  I came clean. Any  capable  aunt  can  give
Scotland  Yard  inspectors strokes and bisques  in  the  matter  of
interrogating  a  suspect,  and  I  knew  that  all   attempts   at
concealment would be fruitless. Or is it bootless? I would have  to
check with Jeeves.
   'I  am  looking like something the cat brought in because  I  am
feeling like something the c.b. in,' I said. 'Aged relative, I have
a  strange story to relate. Do you know a local blister of the name
of Mrs McCorkadale?'
   'Who lives in River Row?'
   'That's the one.'
   'She's a barrister.'
   'She looks it.'
   'You've met her?'
   'I've met her.'
   'She's Ginger's opponent in this election.'
   'I know. Is Mr McCorkadale still alive?'
   'Died years ago. He got run over by a municipal tram.'
   'I  don't blame him. I'd have done the same myself in his place.
It's  the only course to pursue when you're married to a woman like
that.'
   'How did you meet her?'
   'I  called  on her to urge her to vote for Ginger,' I said,  and
in a few broken words I related my strange story.
   It  went  well.  In fact, it went like a breeze. Myself,  I  was
unable to see anything humorous in it, but there was no doubt about
it  entertaining  the blood relation. She guffawed  more  liberally
than  I  had ever heard a woman guffaw. If there had been an aisle,
she  would have rolled in it. I couldn't help feeling how  ironical
it  was  that,  having  failed so often to be  well  received  when
telling  a funny story, I should have aroused such gales  of  mirth
with one that was so essentially tragic.
   While  she  was still giving her impersonation of a hyena  which
has  just  heard  a  good one from another hyena,  Spode  came  in,
choosing  the wrong moment as usual. One never wants to see  Spode,
but  least  of  all when someone is having a hearty laugh  at  your
expense.
   'I'm  looking  for the notes for my speech tomorrow,'  he  said.
'Hullo, what's the joke?'
   Convulsed  as  she  was, it was not easy  for  the  ancestor  to
articulate, but she managed a couple of words.
   'It's Bertie.'
   'Oh?'  said Spode, looking at me as if he found it difficult  to
believe  that  any word or act of mine could excite mirth  and  not
horror and disgust.
   'He's just been calling on Mrs McCorkadale.'
   'Oh?'
   'And asking her to vote for Ginger Winship.'
   'Oh?'  said Spode again. I have already indicated that he was  a
compulsive  Oh-sayer. 'Well, it is what I would  have  expected  of
him,'  and  with  another look in which scorn  and  animosity  were
nicely  blended  and a word to the effect that he might  have  left
those  notes  in  the  summerhouse  by  the  lake  he  removed  his
distasteful presence.
   That  he  and  I were not on Damon and Pythias terms  seemed  to
have  impressed itself on the aged relative. She switched  off  the
hyena sound effects.
   'Not a bonhomous type, Spode.'
   'No.'
   'He doesn't like you.'
   'No.'
   'And I don't think he likes me.'
   'No,'  I  said,  and  it occurred to me, for  the  Woosters  are
essentially  fairminded, that it was hardly  for  me  to  criticize
Spode's Oh's when my No's were equally frequent. Why beholdest thou
the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam
that is in thine own eye, Wooster? I found myself asking myself, it
having  been  one  of the many good things I had picked  up  in  my
researches when I won that Scripture Knowledge prize.
   'Does  he  like anyone?' said the relative. 'Except, presumably,
Madeline Bassett.'
   'He seems fond of L. P. Runkle.'
   'What makes you think that?'
   'I overheard them exchanging confidences.'
   'Oh?'  said the relative, for these things are catching.  'Well,
I suppose one ought not to be surprised. Birds of a feather -'
   'Flock together?'
   'Exactly. And even the dregs of pond life fraternize with  other
dregs  of  pond  life. By the way, remind me to tell you  something
about L. P. Runkle.'
   'Right ho.'
   'We  will come to L. P. Runkle later. This animosity of Spode's,
is  it  just  the  memory of old Totleigh days, or  have  you  done
anything lately to incur his displeasure?'
   This  time  I had no hesitation in telling her all. I  felt  she
would  be  sympathetic.  I laid the facts  before  her  with  every
confidence that an aunt's condolences would result.
   'There was this gnat.'
   'I don't follow you.'
   'I had to rally round.'
   'You've still lost me.'
   'Spode didn't like it.'
   'So  he  doesn't like gnats either. Which gnat? What gnat?  Will
you  get  on with your story, curse you, starting at the  beginning
and carrying on to the end.'
   'Certainly, if you wish. Here is the scenario.'
   I  told  her  about the gnat in Madeline's eye, the part  I  had
played in restoring her vision to mid-season form and the exception
Spode  had  taken to my well-meant efforts. She whistled.  Everyone
seemed  to  be  whistling  at me today. Even  the  recent  maid  on
recognizing me had puckered up her lips as if about to.
   'I wouldn't do that sort of thing again,' she said.
   'If the necessity arose I would have no option.'
   'Then you'd better get one as soon as possible.
   Because if you keep on taking things out of Madeline's eye,  you
may have to marry the girl.'
   'But  surely  the  peril has passed now that  she's  engaged  to
Spode.'
   'I  don't  know  so much. I think there's some  trouble  between
Spode and Madeline.'
   I  would  be  surprised to learn that in the  whole  W.1  postal
section  of London there is a man more capable than Bertram Wooster
of bearing up with a stiff upper lip under what I have heard Jeeves
call  the  slings and arrows of outrageous fortune;  but  at  these
frightful  words  I confess that I went into my old  aspen  routine
even  more  wholeheartedly than I had done during  my  get-together
with the relict of the late McCorkadale.
   And  not  without reason. My whole foreign policy was  based  on
the  supposition that the solidarity of these two consenting adults
was  something that couldn't be broken or even cracked. He, on  his
own statement, had worshipped her since she was so high, while she,
as  I  have already recorded, would not lightly throw a man of  his
eligibility into the discard. If ever there was a union  which  you
could  have  betted with perfect confidence would  culminate  in  a
golden wedding with all the trimmings, this was the one.
   'Trouble?' I whispered hoarsely. 'You mean there's a what-d'you-
call-it?'
   'What would that be?'
   'A  rift  within the lute which widens soon and makes the  music
mute. Not my own, Jeeves's.'
   'The  evidence points in that direction. At dinner last night  I
noticed  that he was refusing Anatole's best, while she looked  wan
and  saintlike  and crumbled bread. And talking of Anatole's  best,
what I wanted to tell you about L. P. Runkle was that zero hour  is
approaching.  I  am crouching for my spring and have  strong  hopes
that Tuppy will soon be in the money.'
   I  clicked  the tongue. Nobody could be keener than I on  seeing
Tuppy  dip  into L. P. Runkle's millions, but this was no  time  to
change the subject.
   'Never  mind  about  Tuppy for the moment.  Concentrate  on  the
sticky affairs of Bertram Wilberforce Wooster.'
   'Wilberforce,'  she  murmured,  as  far  as  a  woman   of   her
outstanding lung power could murmur. 'Did I ever tell you  how  you
got that label? It was your father's doing. The day before you were
lugged to the font looking like a minor actor playing a bit part in
a  gangster  film  he  won a packet on an  outsider  in  the  Grand
National called that, and he insisted on you carrying on the  name.
Tough  on you, but we all have our cross to bear. Your Uncle  Tom's
second  name  is Portarlington, and I came within an ace  of  being
christened Phyllis.'
   I  rapped  her  sharply on the top-knot with  a  paper-knife  of
Oriental  design, the sort that people in novels  of  suspense  are
always getting stabbed in the back with.
   'Don't  wander  from  the  res. The fact  that  you  nearly  got
christened  Phyllis  will, no doubt, figure in your  autobiography,
but  we  need not discuss it now. What we are talking about is  the
ghastly peril that confronts me if the Madeline-Spode axis blows  a
fuse.'
   'You  mean that if she breaks her engagement, you will  have  to
fill the vacuum?'
   'Exactly.'
   'She won't. Not a chance.'
   'But you said -'
   'I  only  wanted to emphasize my warning to you not to  keep  on
taking gnats out of Madeline's eyes. Perhaps I overdid it.'
   'You chilled me to the marrow.'
   'Sorry I was so dramatic. You needn't worry. They've only had  a
lovers' tiff such as occurs with the mushiest couples.'
   'What about?'
   'How  do I know? Perhaps he queried her statement that the stars
were God's daisy chain.'
   I  had  to  admit  that  there  was something  in  this  theory.
Madeline's  breach with Gussie Fink-Nottle had been caused  by  her
drawing his attention to the sunset and saying sunsets always  made
her  think of the Blessed Damozel leaning out from the gold bar  of
heaven,  and  he said, 'Who?' and she said, 'The Blessed  Damozel',
and  he  said, 'Never heard of her', adding that sunsets  made  him
sick, and so did the Blessed Damozel. A girl with her outlook would
be bound to be touchy about stars and daisy chains.
   'It's  probably over by now,' said the ancestor. 'All the  same,
you'd better keep away from the girl. Spode's an impulsive man.  He
might slosh you.'
   'He said he would.'
   'He used the word slosh?'
   'No,  but  he assured me he would butter me over the front  lawn
and dance on the remains with hobnailed boots.'
   'Much  the  same  thing. So I would be careful if  I  were  you.
Treat  her with distant civility. If you see any more gnats  headed
in her direction, hold their coats and wish them luck, but restrain
the impulse to mix in.'
   'I will.'
   'I hope I have relieved your fears?'
   'You have, old flesh-and-blood.'
   'Then why the furrows in your brow?'
   'Oh, those? It's Ginger.'
   'What's Ginger?'
   'He's why my brow is furrowed.'
   It   shows  how  profoundly  the  thought  of  Madeline  Bassett
possibly  coming into circulation again had moved me  that  it  was
only  now that I had remembered Bingley and what he had said  about
the certainty of Ginger finishing as an also-ran in the election. I
burned  with  shame  and  remorse that I  should  have  allowed  my
personal  troubles to make me shove him down to  the  foot  of  the
agenda  paper in this scurvy manner. Long ere this I ought to  have
been  inviting Aunt Dahlia's views on his prospects. Not  doing  so
amounted  to  letting a pal down, a thing I pride myself  on  never
being guilty of. Little wonder that I b.'d with s. and r.
   I  hastened to make amends, if those are what you make when  you
have done the dirty on a fellow you love like a brother.
   'Did I ever mention a bloke called Bingley to you?'
   'If you did. I've forgotten.'
   'He  was my personal attendant for a brief space when Jeeves and
I  differed about me playing the banjolele. That time when I had  a
cottage down at Chufnell Regis.'
   'Oh yes, he set it on fire, didn't he?'
   'While  tight as an owl. It was burned to a cinder,  as  was  my
banjolele.'
   'I've got him placed now. What about him?'
   'He  lives  in  Market  Snodsbury. I met him  this  morning  and
happened to mention that I was canvassing for Ginger.'
   'If you can call it canvassing.'
   'And  he told me I was wasting my time. He advised me to have  a
substantial  bet  on  Ma  McCorkadale. He  said  Ginger  hadn't  an
earthly.'
   'He's a fool.'
   'I  must say I've always thought so, but he spoke as if  he  had
inside information.'
   'What  on earth information could he have? An election  isn't  a
horse  race where you get tips from the stable cat. I don't say  it
may not be a close thing, but Ginger ought to win all right. He has
a secret weapon.'
   'Repeat that, if you wouldn't mind. I don't think I got it.'
   'Ginger defies competition because he has a secret weapon.'
   'Which is?'
   'Spode.'
   'Spode?'
   'My lord Sidcup. Have you ever heard him speak?'
   'I did just now.'
   'In public, fool.'
   'Oh, in public. No, I haven't.'
   'He's  a  terrific orator, as I told you, only  you've  probably
forgotten.'
   This seemed likely enough to me. Spode at one time had been  one
of those Dictators, going about at the head of a band of supporters
in footer shorts shouting 'Heil Spode', and to succeed in that line
you have to be able to make speeches.
   'You  aren't  fond of him, nor am I, but nobody  can  deny  that
he's  eloquent.  Audiences hang on his every word,  and  when  he's
finished cheer him to the echo.'
   I  nodded.  I  had had the same experience myself  when  singing
'The  Yeoman's  Wedding  Song' at village concerts.  Two  or  three
encores sometimes, even when I blew up in the words and had to fill
in  with 'Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong, I hurry along'. I  began
to  feel  easier  in my mind. I told her this, and she  said  'Your
what?'
   'You  have put new heart into me, old blood relation,'  I  said,
ignoring  the crack. 'You see, it means everything to  him  to  win
this election.'
   'Is   he  so  bent  on  representing  Market  Snodsbury  in  the
Westminster menagerie?'
   'It  isn't  that  so much. Left to himself, I imagine  he  could
take Parliament or leave it alone. But he thinks Florence will give
him the bum's rush if he loses.'
   'He's probably right. She can't stand a loser.'
   'So he told me. Remember what happened to Percy Gorringe.'
   'And  others. England is strewn with ex-fiances whom she bounced
because they didn't come up to her specifications. Dozens of  them.
I believe they form clubs and societies.'
   'Perhaps calling themselves the Old Florentians.'
   'And having an annual dinner!'
   We  mused on Florence for awhile; then she said she ought to  be
going  to confer with Anatole about dinner tonight, urging  him  to
dish  up something special. It was vital, she said, that he  should
excel his always high standard.
   'I  was  speaking, just now, when you interrupted me and  turned
my thoughts to the name Wilberforce, of L. P. Runkle.'
   'You said you had an idea he might be going to cooperate.'
   'Exactly.  Have you ever seen a python after a series of  hearty
meals?'
   'Not to my knowledge.'
   'It  gets all softened up. It becomes a kindlier, gentler,  more
lovable python. And if I am not greatly mistaken, the same thing is
happening  to L. P. Runkle as the result of Anatole's cooking.  You
saw him at dinner last night.'
   'Sorry,  no,  I  wasn't looking. Every fibre  of  my  being  was
concentrated  on  the foodstuffs. He would have repaid  inspection,
would he? Worth seeing, eh?'
   'He  was  positively beaming. He was too busy to utter,  but  it
was plain that he had become all amiability and benevolence. He had
the  air  of a man who would start scattering largesse if  given  a
word  of  encouragement. It is for Anatole to see to it  that  this
Christmas spirit does not evaporate but comes more and more to  the
boil. And I know that I can rely on him.'
   'Good old Anatole,' I said, lighting a cigarette.
   'Amen,'  said the ancestor reverently; then, touching on another
subject, 'Take that foul cigarette outside, you young hellhound. It
smells like an escape of sewer gas.'
   Always  glad to indulge her lightest whim, I passed through  the
French  window, in a far different mood from that in  which  I  had
entered  the  room.  Optimism now reigned  in  the  Wooster  bosom.
Ginger,  I told myself, was going to be all right, Tuppy was  going
to  be all right, and it would not be long before the laughing love
god straightened things out between Madeline and Spode, even if  he
had talked out of turn about stars and daisy chains.
   Having  finished  the gasper, I was about to return  and  resume
conversation  with the aged relative, when from within  there  came
the  voice of Seppings, now apparently restored to health, and what
he  was  saying  froze  me in every limb. I  couldn't  have  become
stiffer if I had been Lot's wife, whose painful story I had had  to
read up when I won that Scripture Knowledge prize.
   What he was saying ran as follows:
   'Mrs McCorkadale, madam.'


        1O
   Leaning against the side of the house, I breathed rather in  the
manner copyrighted by the hart which pants for cooling streams when
heated  in the chase. The realization of how narrowly I had  missed
having to mingle again with this blockbusting female barrister kept
me  Lot's-wifed for what seemed an hour or so, though I suppose  it
can't have been more than a few seconds. Then gradually I ceased to
be a pillar of salt and was able to concentrate on finding out what
on  earth Ma McCorkadale's motive was in paying us this visit.  The
last  place, I mean to say, where you would have expected  to  find
her.  Considering how she stood in regard to Ginger, it was  as  if
Napoleon  had dropped in for a chat with Wellington on the  eve  of
Waterloo.
   I  have  had  occasion to mention earlier the  advantages  as  a
listening-post afforded by the just-outside-the-French-window  spot
where  I  was standing. Invisible to those within, I could take  in
all  they  were saying, as I had done with Spode and L. P.  Runkle.
Both  had come through loud and clear, and neither had had a notion
that Bertram Wooster was on the outskirts, hearing all.
   As  I  could  hardly step in and ask her to repeat  any  of  her
remarks  which  I  didn't quite catch, it was  fortunate  that  the
McCorkadale's voice was so robust, while Aunt Dahlia's, of  course,
would  be  audible  if  you were at Hyde Park  Corner  and  she  in
Piccadilly Circus. I have often thought that the deaf adder I  read
about  when I won my Scripture Knowledge prize would have  got  the
message  right  enough if the aged relative had  been  one  of  the
charmers.  I was able to continue leaning against the side  of  the
house in full confidence that I shouldn't miss a syllable of either
protagonist's words.
   The  proceedings  started with a couple of Good  mornings,  Aunt
Dahlia's  the  equivalent  of  'What  the  hell?',  and  then   the
McCorkadale, as if aware that it was up to her to offer a  word  of
explanation, said she had called to see Mr Winship on a  matter  of
great importance.
   'Is he in?'
   Here  was  a chance for the ancestor to get one up by  retorting
that  he jolly well would be after the votes had been counted,  but
she  let  it  go,  merely  saying No, he  had  gone  out,  and  the
McCorkadale said she was sorry.
   'I  would have preferred to see him in person, but you,  I  take
it, are his hostess, so I can tell you and you will tell him.'
   This  seemed  fair  enough to me, and I remember  thinking  that
these barristers put things well, but it appeared to annoy the aged
relative.
   'I  am afraid I do not understand you,' she said, and I knew she
was  getting  steamed up, for if she had been her  calm  self,  she
would have said 'Sorry, I don't get you.'
   'If  you  will allow me to explain. I can do so in a few  simple
words. I have just had a visit from a slimy slinking slug.'
   I  drew  myself up haughtily. Not much good, of course,  in  the
circs,  but the gesture seemed called for. One does not  object  to
fair  criticism, but this was mere abuse. I could think of  nothing
in our relations which justified such a description of me. My views
on barristers and their way of putting things changed sharply.
   Whether  or  not  Aunt Dahlia bridled, as the expression  is,  I
couldn't  say, but I think she must have done, for her  next  words
were straight from the deep freeze.
   'Are you referring to my nephew Bertram Wooster?'
   The  McCorkadale  did  much to remove  the  bad  impression  her
previous  words had made on me. She said her caller had  not  given
his  name,  but  she was sure he could not have been Mrs  Travers's
nephew.
   'He  was  a  very common man,' she said, and with the  quickness
which  is so characteristic of me I suddenly got on to it that  she
must be alluding to Bingley, who had been ushered into her presence
immediately after I had left. I could understand her applying those
derogatory  adjectives to Bingley. And the noun slug,  just  right.
Once again I found myself thinking how well barristers put things.
   The  old  ancestor,  too, appeared - what's the  word  beginning
with m and meaning less hot under the collar? Mollified, that's it.
The  suggestion that she could not have a nephew capable  of  being
described as a common man mollified her. I don't say that even  now
she  would have asked Ma McCorkadale to come on a long walking tour
with her, but her voice was definitely matier.
   'Why  do  you  call him a slug?' she asked, and the  McCorkadale
had her answer to that.
   'For the same reason that I call a spade a spade, because it  is
the  best  way  of conveying a verbal image of him. He  made  me  a
disgraceful proposition.'
   'WHAT?' said Aunt Dahlia rather tactlessly.
   I  could  understand her being surprised. It  was  difficult  to
envisage  a  man  so  eager  to collect girl  friends  as  to  make
disgraceful  propositions to Mrs McCorkadale.  It  amazed  me  that
Bingley  could  have done it. I had never liked  him,  but  I  must
confess  to  a  certain  admiration for his  temerity.  Our  humble
heroes, I felt.
   'You're pulling my leg,' said the aged relative.
   The McCorkadale came back at her briskly.
   'I  am  doing  nothing of the kind. I am telling  you  precisely
what  occurred. I was in my drawing-room going over  the  speech  I
have  prepared  for the debate tomorrow, when I was interrupted  by
the  incursion of this man. Naturally annoyed, I asked him what his
business  was, and he said with a most offensive leer that  he  was
Father Christmas bringing me manna in the wilderness and tidings of
great joy. I was about to ring the bell to have him shown out,  for
of  course I assumed that he was intoxicated, when he made me  this
extraordinary  proposition. He had contrived to obtain  information
to  the detriment of my opponent, and this he wished to sell to me.
He said it would make my victory in the election certain. It would,
as he phrased it, 'be a snip'.
   I  stirred  on  my  base. If I hadn't been  afraid  I  might  be
overheard, I would have said 'Aha!' Had circs been other than  they
were,  I  would have stepped into the room, tapped the ancestor  on
the  shoulder  and said 'Didn't I tell you Bingley had information?
Perhaps  another  time you'll believe me'. But as this  would  have
involved  renewing  my acquaintance with a  woman  of  whom  I  had
already  seen sufficient to last a lifetime, it was not within  the
sphere of practical politics. I remained, accordingly, where I was,
merely  hitching my ears up another couple of notches in order  not
to miss the rest of the dialogue.
   After  the ancestor had said 'For heaven's sake!' or 'Gorblimey'
or  whatever it was, indicating that her visitor's story interested
her  strongly, the McCorkadale resumed. And what she resumed  about
unquestionably put the frosting on the cake. Words of doom  is  the
only way I can think of to describe the words she spoke as.
   'The  man, it appeared, was a retired valet, and he belonged  to
a  club for butlers and valets in London, one of the rules of which
was  that  all  members were obliged to record  in  the  club  book
information about their employers. My visitor explained that he had
been  at  one  time in the employment of Mr Winship  and  had  duly
recorded  a number of the latter's escapades which if made  public,
would  be  certain to make the worst impression on  the  voters  of
Market Snodsbury.'
   This  surprised me. I hadn't had a notion that Bingley had  ever
worked  for Ginger. It just shows the truth of the old saying  that
half the world doesn't know how the other three-quarters live.
   'He  then  told me without a blush of shame that on  his  latest
visit  to London he had purloined this book and now had it  in  his
possession.'
   I  gasped  with horror. I don't know why, but the  thought  that
Bingley  must have been pinching the thing at the very moment  when
Jeeves and I were sipping our snootfuls in the next room seemed  to
make  it  so particularly poignant. Not that it wouldn't have  been
pretty  poignant anyway. For years I had been haunted by  the  fear
that  the  Junior  Ganymede club book, with  all  the  dynamite  it
contained, would get into the wrong hands, and the hands it had got
into  couldn't  have  been more the sort of hands  you  would  have
wished it hadn't. I don't know if I make myself clear, but what I'm
driving  at  is that if I had been picking a degraded character  to
get  away  with that book, Bingley was the last character  I  would
have picked. I remember Jeeves speaking of someone who was fit  for
treasons, stratagems and spoils, and that was Bingley all over. The
man was wholly without finer feelings, and when you come up against
someone without finer feelings, you've had it.
   The  aged  relative was not blind to the drama of the situation.
She  uttered an awed 'Lord love a duck!', and the McCorkadale  said
she  might  well  say  'Lord love a duck', though  it  was  not  an
expression she would have used herself.
   'What  did  you  do?'  the ancestor asked,  all  agog,  and  the
McCorkadale gave that sniffing snort of hers. It was partly like an
escape  of  steam  and partly like two or three  cats  unexpectedly
encountering two or three dogs, with just a suggestion of  a  cobra
waking up cross in the morning. I wondered how it had affected  the
late  Mr  McCorkadale. Probably made him feel that there are  worse
things than being run over by a municipal tram.
   'I  sent  him  away with a flea in his ear. I  pride  myself  on
being a fair fighter, and his proposition revolted me. If you  want
to have him arrested, though I am afraid I cannot see how it can be
done,  he  lives at 5 Ormond Crescent. He appears to have asked  my
maid  to look in and see his etchings on her afternoon off, and  he
gave  her  his address. But, as I say, there would seem not  to  be
sufficient  evidence  for an arrest. Our conversation  was  without
witnesses, and he would simply have to deny possession of the book.
A  pity. I would have enjoyed seeing a man like that hanged,  drawn
and quartered.'
   She  snorted again, and the ancestor, who always knows what  the
book  of  etiquette  would advise, came across  with  the  soothing
syrup. She said Ma McCorkadale deserved a medal.
   'Not at all.'
   'It was splendid of you to turn the man down.'
   'As I said, I am a fair fighter.'
   'Apart  from  your revulsion at his proposition,  it  must  have
been  very annoying for you to be interrupted when you were working
on your speech.'
   'Especially as a few moments before this person appeared  I  had
been  interrupted by an extraordinary young man  who  gave  me  the
impression of being half-witted.'
   'That would have been my nephew, Bertram Wooster.'
   'Oh, I beg your pardon.'
   'Quite all right.'
   'I  may  have  formed  a wrong estimate of  his  mentality.  Our
interview  was very brief. I just thought it odd that he should  be
trying to persuade me to vote for my opponent.'
   'It's  the  sort  of  thing that would seem  a  bright  idea  to
Bertie.  He's like that. Whimsical. Moving in a mysterious way  his
wonders  to  perform. But he ought not to have butted in  when  you
were busy with your speech. Is it coming out well?'
   'I am satisfied with it.'
   'Good for you. I suppose you're looking forward to the debate?'
   'Very  keenly.  I  am  greatly in favour of  it.  It  simplifies
things  so much if the two opponents face one another on  the  same
platform  and  give  the voters a chance to  compare  their  views.
Provided, of course, that both observe the decencies of debate. But
I really must be getting back to my work.'
   'Just  a  moment.' No doubt it was the word 'observe'  that  had
rung  a  bell with the ancestor. 'Do you do the Observer  crossword
puzzle by any chance?'
   'I solve it at breakfast on Sunday mornings.'
   'Not the whole lot?'
   'Oh yes.'
   'Every clue?'
   'I have never failed yet. I find it ridiculously simple.'
   'Then  what's  all that song and dance about the measured  tread
of saints round St Paul's?'
   'Oh,  I  guessed  that immediately. The answer,  of  course,  is
pedometer.  You  measure tread with a pedometer. Dome,  meaning  St
Paul's, comes in the middle and Peter, for St Peter, round it. Very
simple.'
   'Oh,  very.  Well, thank you. You have taken a great weight  off
my  mind,' said Aunt Dahlia, and they parted in complete  amity,  a
thing I wouldn't have thought possible when Ma McCorkadale was  one
of the parters.
   For  perhaps  a  quarter of a minute after I  had  rejoined  the
human  herd,  as represented by my late father's sister  Dahlia,  I
wasn't able to get a word in, the old ancestor being fully occupied
with  saying  what  she  thought of the compiler  of  the  Observer
crossword   puzzle,  with  particular  reference   to   domes   and
pedometers.  And  when she had said her say  on  that  subject  she
embarked on a rueful tribute to the McCorkadale, giving it  as  her
opinion  that against a woman with a brain like that Ginger  hadn't
the meagre chance of a toupee in a high wind. Though, she added  in
more  hopeful vein, now that the menace of the Ganymede  Club  book
had  been  squashed there was just a possibility that the eloquence
of Spode might get his nose in front.
   All  this  while  I had been trying to cut in  with  my  opening
remark,  which was to the effect that the current situation  was  a
bit  above the odds, but it was only when I had repeated  this  for
the third time that I succeeded in obtaining her attention.
   'This  is  a  bit  thick,  what,' I said,  varying  my  approach
slightly.
   She seemed surprised as if the idea had not occurred to her.
   'Thick?'
   'Well, isn't it?'
   'Why?  If  you were listening, you heard her say that,  being  a
fair fighter, she had scorned the tempter and sent him away with  a
flea  in his ear, which must be a most uncomfortable thing to have.
Bingley was baffled.'
   'Only for the nonce.'
   'Nonsense.'
   'Not  nonsense, nonce, which isn't at all the same thing. I feel
that  Bingley, though crushed to earth, will rise again. How  about
if  he  sells that book with all its ghastly contents to the Market
Snodsbury Argus-Reminder?'
   I  was alluding to the powerful bi-weekly sheet which falls over
itself  in its efforts to do down the Conservative cause,  omitting
no  word or act to make anyone with Conservative leanings feel like
a  piece  of  cheese. Coming out every Wednesday and Saturday  with
proofs  of Ginger's past, I did not see how it could fail  to  give
his candidature the sleeve across the windpipe.
   I  put  this to the old blood relation in no uncertain terms.  I
might have added that that would wipe the silly smile off her face,
but there was no necessity. She saw at once that I spoke sooth, and
a crisp hunting-field expletive escaped her. She goggled at me with
all the open dismay of an aunt who has inadvertently bitten into  a
bad oyster.
   'I never thought of that!'
   'Give it your attention now.'
   'Those Argus-Reminder hounds stick at nothing.'
   'The sky is notoriously their limit.'
   'Did you tell me Ginger had done time?'
   'I  said  he was always in the hands of the police on Boat  Race
night. And, of course, on Rugger night.'
   'What's Rugger night?'
   'The  night  of the annual Rugby football encounter between  the
universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Many blithe spirits get  even
more  effervescent then than when celebrating the Boat Race. Ginger
was one of them.'
   'He really got jugged?'
   'Invariably.  His  practice  of  pinching  policemen's   helmets
ensured  this.  Released next morning on payment  of  a  fine,  but
definitely after spending the night in a dungeon cell.'
   There  was  no doubt that I had impressed on her the gravity  of
the  situation.  She  gave a sharp cry like that  of  a  stepped-on
dachshund, and her face took on the purple tinge it always  assumes
in moments of strong emotion.
   'This does it!'
   'Fairly serious, I agree.'
   'Fairly  serious! The merest whisper of such goings-on  will  be
enough to alienate every voter in the town. Ginger's done for.'
   'You  don't  think they might excuse him because his  blood  was
young at the time?'
   'Not  a hope. They won't be worrying about his ruddy blood.  You
don't  know  what these blighters here are like. Most of  them  are
chapel folk with a moral code that would have struck Torquemada  as
too rigid.'
   'Torquemada?'
   'The Spanish Inquisition man.'
   'Oh, that Torquemada.'
   'How many Torquemadas did you think there were?'
   I admitted that it was not a common name, and she carried on.
   'We must act!'
   'But how?'
   'Or,  rather, you must act. You must go to this man  and  reason
with him.'
   I  h'med  a  bit  at  this.  I doubted  whether  a  fellow  with
Bingley's lust for gold would listen to reason.
   'What shall I say?'
   'You'll know what to say.'
   'Oh, shall I?'
   'Appeal to his better instincts.'
   'He hasn't got any.'
   'Now  don't  make  difficulties, Bertie. That's  your  besetting
sin, always arguing. You want to help Ginger, don't you?'
   'Of course I do.'
   'Very well, then.'
   When an aunt has set her mind on a thing, it's no use trying  to
put in a nolle prosequi. I turned to the door.
   Half-way there a thought occurred to me. I said:
   'How about Jeeves?'
   'What about him?'
   'We  ought  to  spare  his  feelings  as  far  as  possible.   I
repeatedly warned him that that club book was high-level  explosive
and  ought  not to be in existence. What if it fell into the  wrong
hands, I said, and he said it couldn't possibly fall into the wrong
hands. And now it has fallen into about the wrongest hands it could
have  fallen into. I haven't the heart to say "I told you  so"  and
watch  him  writhe with shame and confusion. You see, up  till  now
Jeeves  has always been right. His agony on finding that he has  at
last  made  a floater will be frightful. I shouldn't wonder  if  he
might not swoon. I can't face him. You'll have to tell him.'
   'Yes, I'll do it.'
   'Try to break it gently.'
   'I  will. When you were listening outside, did you get this  man
Bingley's address?'
   'I got it.'
   'Then off you go.'
   So off I went.


        11
   Considering how shaky was his moral outlook and how  marked  his
tendency  to weave low plots at the drop of a hat, you  would  have
expected  Bingley's headquarters to have been one of those sinister
underground  dens lit by stumps of candles stuck in the  mouths  of
empty  beer  bottles  such  as abound, I believe,  in  places  like
Whitechapel and Limehouse. But no. Number 5 Ormond Crescent  turned
out  to be quite an expensive-looking joint with a nice little  bit
of  garden in front of it well supplied with geraniums, bird  baths
and  terracotta gnomes, the sort of establishment that  might  have
belonged  to  a blameless retired Colonel or a saintly stockbroker.
Evidently  his late uncle hadn't been just an ordinary  small  town
grocer, weighing out potted meats and raisins to a public that  had
to  watch  the  pennies, but something on a  much  more  impressive
scale.  I learned later that he had owned a chain of shops, one  of
them as far afield as Birmingham, and why the ass had gone and left
his  money  to  a chap like Bingley is more than I  can  tell  you,
though the probability is that Bingley, before bumping him off with
some  little-known  Asiatic poison, had  taken  the  precaution  of
forging the will.

   On  the  threshold I paused. I remember in my early days at  the
private  school  where I won my Scripture Knowledge  prize,  Arnold
Abney  MA, the headmaster, would sometimes announce that he  wished
to  see  Wooster in his study after morning prayers, and  I  always
halted  at  the  study door, a prey to uneasiness and apprehension,
not liking the shape of things to come. It was much the same now. I
shrank from the impending interview. But whereas in the case of  A.
Abney  my disinclination to get things moving had been due  to  the
fear  that the proceedings were going to lead up to six of the best
from a cane that stung like an adder, with Bingley it was a natural
reluctance to ask a favour of a fellow I couldn't stand  the  sight
of. I wouldn't say the Woosters were particularly proud, but we  do
rather jib at having to grovel to the scum of the earth.
   However, it had to be done, and, as I heard Jeeves say once,  if
it  were done, then 'twere well 'twere done quickly. Stiffening the
sinews  and  summoning up the blood, to quote another his  gags,  I
pressed the bell.
   If  I  had any doubts as to Bingley now being in the chips,  the
sight  of the butler who opened the door would have dispelled them.
In  assembling his domestic staff, Bingley had done himself  proud,
sparing  no expense. I don't say his butler was quite in the  class
of  Jeeves's Uncle Charlie Silversmith, but he came so near it that
the  breath was taken. And like Uncle Charlie he believed  in  pomp
and  ceremony when buttling. I asked him if I could see Mr Bingley,
and he said coldly that the master was not receiving.
   'I think he'll see me. I'm an old friend of his.'
   'I will enquire. Your name, sir?'
   'Mr Wooster.'
   He  pushed  off,  to return some moments later to  say  that  Mr
Bingley  would be glad if I would join him in the library. Speaking
in  what  seemed to me a disapproving voice, as though  to  suggest
that,  while  he  was  compelled to carry out the  master's  orders
however eccentric, he would never have admitted a chap like  me  if
it had been left to him.
   'If you would step this way, sir,' he said haughtily.
   What  with one thing and another I had rather got out  of  touch
lately  with that If-you-would-step-this-way-sir stuff, and it  was
in  a somewhat rattled frame of mind that I entered the library and
found  Bingley  in  an armchair with his feet up on  an  occasional
table.  He greeted me cordially enough, but with that touch of  the
patronizing so noticeable at our two previous meetings.
   'Ah,  Wooster, my dear fellow, come in. I told Bastable to  tell
everyone I was not at home, but of course you're different.  Always
glad to see an old pal. And what can I do for you, Wooster?'
   I  had  to  say  for  him that he had made it  easy  for  me  to
introduce the subject I was anxious to discuss. I was about to  get
going, when he asked me if I would like a drink. I said No, thanks,
and he said in an insufferably smug way that I was probably wise.
   'I  often  thought,  when I was staying with  you  at  Chuffnell
Regis,  that you drank too much, Wooster. Remember how  you  burned
that  cottage down? A sober man wouldn't have done that.  You  must
have been stewed to the eyebrows, cocky.'
   A  hot  denial trembled on my lips. I mean to say,  it's  a  bit
thick  to be chided for burning cottages down by the very chap  who
put  them  to  the  flames. But I restrained  myself.  The  man,  I
reminded  myself,  had  to be kept in with.  If  that  was  how  he
remembered that night of terror at Chuffnell Regis, it was not  for
me to destroy his illusions. I refrained from comment, and he asked
me  if I would like a cigar. When I said I wouldn't, he nodded like
a father pleased with a favourite son.
   'I  am  glad to see this improvement in you, Wooster.  I  always
thought  you smoked too much. Moderation, moderation in all things,
that's  the  only way. But you were going to tell me why  you  came
here. Just for a chat about old times, was it?'
   'It's  with  ref  to  that  book you  pinched  from  the  Junior
Ganymede.'
   He  had  been  drinking a whisky-and-soda as  I  spoke,  and  he
drained his glass before replying.
   'I  wish  you wouldn't use that word "pinch",' he said,  looking
puff-faced. It was plain that I had given offence.
   'I  simply  borrowed  it because I needed  it  in  my  business.
They'll get it back all right.'
   'Mrs McCorkadale told my aunt you tried to sell it to her.'
   His annoyance increased. His air was that of a man compelled  to
listen to a tactless oaf who persisted in saying the wrong thing.
   'Not  sell.  I  would have had a clause in the agreement  saying
that she was to return it when she had done with it. The idea I had
in  mind  was  that she would have photostatic copies made  of  the
pages  dealing with young Winship without the book going out of  my
possession.  But the deal didn't come off. She wouldn't  cooperate.
Fortunately  I  have  other  markets. It's  the  sort  of  property
there'll  be  a  lot  of people bidding for. But  why  are  you  so
interested, old man? Nothing to do with you, is it?'
   'I'm a pal of Ginger Winship's.'
   'And  I've no objection to him myself. Nice enough young  fellow
he always seemed to me, though the wrong size.'
   'Wrong size?' I said, not getting this.
   'His  shirts  didn't fit me. Not that I hold that  against  him.
These things are all a matter of luck. Don't run away with the idea
that  I'm  a  man with a grievance, trying to get back at  him  for
something  he  did  to  me when I was staying  at  his  place.  Our
relations  were very pleasant. I quite liked him, and if it  didn't
matter  to me one way or the other who won this election, I'd  just
as  soon  he  came  out  on top. But business  is  business.  After
studying  form I did some pretty heavy betting on McCorkadale,  and
I've  got  to  protect my investments, old man. That's only  common
sense, isn't it?'
   He  paused,  apparently expecting a round of  applause  for  his
prudence.  When  I  remained sotto voce and  the  silent  tomb,  he
proceeded.
   'If  you  want  to  get along in this world, Wooster  old  chap,
you've got to grasp your opportunities. That's what I do. I examine
each  situation that crops up, and I ask myself "What is  there  in
this for me? How," I ask myself, "can I handle this situation so as
to  do  Rupert Bingley a bit of good?", and it's not often I  don't
find  a way. This time I didn't even have to think. There was young
Winship  trying to get into Parliament, and here was I standing  to
win  something  like  a  couple of hundred  quid  if  he  lost  the
election,  and  there was the club book with all the  stuff  in  it
which would make it certain he did lose. I recognized it at once as
money for jam. The only problem was how to get the book, and I soon
solved  that. I don't know if you noticed, that day we met  at  the
Junior  Ganymede, that I had a large briefcase with me? And that  I
said  I'd  got to see the secretary about something? Well,  what  I
wanted to see him about was borrowing the book. And I wouldn't have
to  find some clever way of getting him looking the other way while
I  did  it,  because I knew he'd be out to lunch. So I  popped  in,
popped the book in the briefcase and popped off. Nobody saw  me  go
in.  Nobody  saw me come out. The whole operation was  like  taking
candy from a kid.'
   There  are  some stories which fill the man of sensibility  with
horror,  repugnance, abhorrence and disgust. I don't mean anecdotes
like the one Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright told me at the Drones, I  am
referring to loathsome revelations such as the bit of autobiography
to  which I had just been listening. To say that I felt as  if  the
Wooster soul had been spattered with mud by a passing car would not
be  putting it at all too strongly. I also felt that nothing was to
be  gained by continuing this distasteful interview. I had had some
idea  of  going  into  the possibility of Aunt Agatha  reading  the
contents of the club book and touching on the doom, desolation  and
despair which must inevitably be my portion if she did, but  I  saw
that  it  would  be  fruitless or bootless.  The  man  was  without
something and pity ... ruth, would it be? I know it begins  with  r
...  and  would simply have given me the horse's laugh. I  was  now
quite  certain that he had murdered his uncle and forged the  will.
Such a performance to such a man would have been mere routine.
   I  turned, accordingly, to the door, but before I got  there  he
stopped me, wanting to know if when coming to stay with Aunt Dahlia
I  had brought Reggie Jeeves with me. I said I had, and he said  he
would like to see old Reggie again.
   'What  a  cough drop!' he said mirthfully. The word was  strange
to  me, but weighing it and deciding that it was intended to  be  a
compliment  and a tribute to his many gifts, I agreed  that  Jeeves
was in the deepest and truest sense a cough drop.
   'Tell  Bastable as you go out that if Reggie calls to  send  him
up. But nobody else.'
   'Right ho.'
   'Good  man,  Bastable. He places my bets for me.  Which  reminds
me.  Have you done as I advised and put a bit on Ma McCorkadale for
the  Market  Snodsbury stakes? No? Do it without fail, Wooster  old
man.  You'll  never regret it. It'll be like finding money  in  the
street.'
   I  wasn't feeling any too good as I drove away. I have described
my heart-bowed-down-ness on approaching the Arnold Abney study door
after morning prayers in the days when I was in statu pupillari, as
the  expression is, and I was equally apprehensive now as  I  faced
the  prospect of telling the old ancestor of my failure to  deliver
the goods in the matter of Bingley. I didn't suppose that she would
give  me  six of the best, as A. Abney was so prone to do, but  she
would  certainly  not hesitate to let me know she  was  displeased.
Aunts as a class are like Napoleon, if it was Napoleon; they expect
their orders to be carried out without a hitch and don't listen  to
excuses.
   Nor  was  I  mistaken.  After lunching at  a  pub  in  order  to
postpone  the meeting as long as possible, I returned  to  the  old
homestead and made my report, and was unfortunate enough to make it
while  she was engaged in reading a Rex Stout - in the hard  cover,
not  a  paperback. When she threw this at me with the accurate  aim
which  years of practice have given her, its sharp edge took me  on
the tip of the nose, making me blink not a little.
   'I  might  have  known you would mess the whole thing  up,'  she
boomed.
   'Not  my  fault, aged relative,' I said. 'I did  my  best.  Than
which,' I added, 'no man can do more.'
   I  thought I had her there, but I was wrong. It was the sort  of
line which can generally be counted on to soothe the savage breast,
but  this time it laid an egg. She snorted. Her snorts are not  the
sniffing  snorts snorted by Ma McCorkadale, they resemble  more  an
explosion in the larger type of ammunition dump and send strong men
rocking back on their heels as if struck by lightning.
   'How  do  you mean you did your best? You don't seem  to  me  to
have done anything. Did you threaten to have him arrested?'
   'No, I didn't do that.'
   'Did you grasp him by the throat and shake him like a rat?'
   I admitted that that had not occurred to me.
   'In  other  words, you did absolutely nothing,'  she  said,  and
thinking  it  over I had to own that she was perfectly right.  It's
funny how one doesn't notice these things at the time. It was  only
now that I realized that I had let Bingley do all the talking, self
offering practically nil in the way of a come-back. I could  hardly
have  made less of a contribution to our conversation if I had been
the deaf adder I mentioned earlier.
   She  heaved herself up from the chaise longue on which  she  was
reclining.  Her manner was peevish. In time, of course,  she  would
get over her chagrin and start loving her Bertram again as of yore,
but there was no getting away from it that an aunt's affection was,
as of even date, at its lowest ebb. She said gloomily:
   'I'll have to do it myself.'
   'Are you going to see Bingley?'
   'I  am  going to see Bingley, and I am going to talk to Bingley,
and  I  am  going, if necessary, to take Bingley by the throat  and
shake him -'
   'Like a rat?'
   'Yes,  like  a  rat,' she said with the quiet  confidence  of  a
woman who had been shaking rats by the throat since she was a  slip
of a girl. 'Five Ormond Crescent, here I come!'
   It  shows  to  what  an extent happenings in  and  about  Market
Snodsbury  had affected my mental processes that she had been  gone
at least ten minutes before the thought of Bastable floated into my
mind,  and I wished I had been able to give her a word of  warning.
That zealous employee of Rupert Bingley had been instructed to  see
to  it that no callers were admitted to the presence, and I saw  no
reason  to  suppose  that he would fail in his duty  when  the  old
ancestor  showed up. He would not use physical violence  -  indeed,
with a woman of her physique he would be unwise to attempt it - but
it  would be the work of an instant with him not to ask her to step
this  way,  thus  ensuring her departure with what  Ma  McCorkadale
would  call a flea in her ear. I could see her returning  in,  say,
about a quarter of an hour a baffled and defeated woman.
   I  was right. It was some twenty minutes later, as I sat reading
the  Rex  Stout which she had used as a guided missile, that  heavy
breathing became audible without and shortly afterwards she  became
visible  within, walking with the measured tread of a  saint  going
round  St  Paul's. A far less discerning eye than mine  could  have
spotted that she had been having Bastable trouble.
   It  would have been kinder, perhaps, not to have spoken, but  it
was one of those occasions when you feel you have to say something.
   'Any luck?' I enquired.
   She  sank on to the chaise longue, simmering gently. She punched
a  cushion,  and  I could see she was wishing it  could  have  been
Bastable.  He  was  essentially the  sort  of  man  who  asks,  nay
clamours, to be treated in this manner.
   'No,' she said. 'I couldn't get in.'
   'Why was that?' I asked, wearing the mask.
   'A beefy butler sort of bird slammed the door in my face.'
   'Too bad.'
   'And I was just too late to get my foot in.'
   'Always  necessary  to work quick on these occasions.  The  most
precise timing is called for. Odd that he should have admitted  me.
I  suppose  my air of quiet distinction was what turned the  scale.
What did you do?'
   'I came away. What else could I have done?'
   'No, I can see how difficult it must have been.'
   'The  maddening part of it is that I was all set to try  to  get
that  money  out of L. P. Runkle this afternoon. I felt that  today
was the day. But if my luck's out, as it seems to be, perhaps I had
better postpone it.'
   'Not strike while the iron is hot?'
   'It may not be hot enough.'
   'Well, you're the judge. You know,' I said, getting back to  the
main  issue,  'the  ambassador  to conduct  the  negotiations  with
Bingley  is really Jeeves. It is he who should have been given  the
assignment.  Where I am speechless in Bingley's  presence  and  you
can't  even  get into the house, he would be inside and  talking  a
blue  streak  before you could say What ho. And he  has  the  added
advantage  that Bingley seems fond of him. He thinks he's  a  cough
drop.'
   'What on earth's a cough drop?'
   'I  don't  know,  but it's something Bingley  admires.  When  he
spoke  of  him as one, it was with a genuine ring of enthusiasm  in
his voice. Did you tell Jeeves about Bingley having the book?'
   'Yes, I told him.'
   'How did he take it?'
   'You  know how Jeeves takes things. One of his eyebrows  rose  a
little and he said he was shocked and astounded.'
   'That's strong stuff for him. "Most disturbing" is as far as  he
goes usually.'
   'It's  a  curious  thing,' said the aged relative  thoughtfully.
'As I was driving off in the car I thought I saw Jeeves coming away
from Bingley's place. Though I couldn't be sure it was him.'
   'It  must have been. His first move on getting the low-down from
you about the book would be to go and see Bingley. I wonder if he's
back yet.'
   'Not  likely. I was driving, he was walking. There  wouldn't  be
time.'
   'I'll ring for Seppings and ask. Oh, Seppings,' I said, when  he
answered the bell, 'Is Jeeves downstairs?'
   'No, sir. He went out and has not yet returned.'
   'When he does, tell him to come and see me, will you.'
   'Very good, sir.'
   I  thought of asking if Jeeves, when he left, had had the air of
a  man  going to no. 5 Ormond Crescent, but decided that this might
be  trying Seppings too high, so let it go. He withdrew, and we sat
for  some time talking about Jeeves. Then, feeling that this wasn't
going  to  get us anywhere and that nothing constructive  could  be
accomplished till he returned, we took up again the matter of L. P.
Runkle.  At  least, the aged relative took it up,  and  I  put  the
question I had been wanting to put at an earlier stage.
   'You  say,'  I  said,  'that you felt  today  was  the  day  for
approaching him. What gave you that idea?'
   'The  way  he tucked into his lunch and the way he talked  about
it  afterwards.  Lyrical was the only word for  it,  and  I  wasn't
surprised. Anatole had surpassed himself.'
   'The Supreme de Foie Gras au Champagne?'
   'And the Neige aux Perles des Alpes.'
   I  heaved  a silent sigh, thinking of what might have been.  The
garbage I had had to insult the Wooster stomach with at the pub had
been  of  a particularly lethal nature. Generally these rural  pubs
are  all  right  in  the matter of browsing,  but  I  had  been  so
unfortunate  as  to pick one run by a branch of the Borgia  family.
The  thought occurred to me as I ate that if Bingley had given  his
uncle  lunch there one day, he wouldn't have had to go to  all  the
bother and expense of buying little-known Asiatic poisons.
   I  would  have told the old relative this, hoping for  sympathy,
but at this moment the door opened, and in came Jeeves. Opening the
conversation with that gentle cough of his that sounds like a  very
old sheep clearing its throat on a misty mountain top, he said:
   'You wished to see me, sir?'
   He  couldn't  have  had a warmer welcome  if  he  had  been  the
prodigal son whose life story I had had to bone up when I won  that
Scripture Knowledge prize. The welkin, what there was of it in  the
drawing-room, rang with our excited yappings.
   'Come in, Jeeves,' bellowed the aged relative.
   'Yes,  come in, Jeeves, come in,' I cried. 'We were waiting  for
you with ... with what?'
   'Bated breath,' said the ancestor.
   'That's right. With bated breath and -'
   'Tense,  quivering nerves. Not to mention twitching muscles  and
bitten  finger nails. Tell me, Jeeves, was that you  I  saw  coming
away from 5 Ormond Crescent about an hour ago?'
   'Yes, madam.'
   'You had been seeing Bingley?'
   'Yes, madam.'
   'About the book?'
   'Yes, madam.'
   'Did you tell him he had jolly well got to return it?'
   'No, madam.'
   'Then why on earth did you go to see him?'
   'To obtain the book, madam.'
   'But you said you didn't tell him -'
   'There  was  no necessity to broach the subject, madam.  He  had
not  yet recovered consciousness. If I might explain. On my arrival
at  his residence he offered me a drink, which I accepted. He  took
one  himself.  We  talked  for awhile of  this  and  that.  Then  I
succeeded  in diverting his attention for a moment, and  while  his
scrutiny was elsewhere I was able to insert a chemical substance in
his  beverage  which  had the effect of rendering  him  temporarily
insensible. I thus had ample time to make a search of the  room.  I
had  assumed that he would be keeping the book there, and I had not
been in error. It was in a lower drawer of the desk. I secured  it,
and took my departure.'
   Stunned  by this latest revelation of his efficiency and  do-it-
yourself-ness, I was unable to utter, but the old ancestor gave the
sort of cry or yowl which must have rung over many a hunting field,
causing  members  of the Quorn and the Pytchley to  leap  in  their
saddles like Mexican jumping beans.
   'You mean you slipped him a Mickey Finn?'
   'I believe that is what they are termed in the argot, madam.'
   'Do you always carry them about with you?'
   'I am seldom without a small supply, madam.'
   'Never know when they won't come in handy, eh?'
   'Precisely,  madam. Opportunities for their use  are  constantly
arising.'
   'Well, I can only say thank you. You have snatched victory  from
the jaws of defeat.'
   'It is kind of you to say so, madam.'
   'Much obliged, Jeeves.'
   'Not at all, madam.'
   I  was  expecting the aged relative to turn to me at this  point
and  tick  me  off for not having had the sense to give  Bingley  a
Mickey  Finn myself, and I knew, for you cannot reason with  aunts,
that  it  would be no use pleading that I hadn't got any;  but  her
jocund mood caused her to abstain. Returning to the subject  of  L.
P. Runkle, she said this had made her realize that her luck was in,
after all, and she was going to press it.
   'I'll  go  and  see  him now,' she yipped,  'and  I  confidently
expect  to play on him as on a stringed instrument. Out of my  way,
young  Bertie,' she cried, heading for the door, 'or  I'll  trample
you to the dust. Yoicks!' she added, reverting to the patois of the
old hunting days. 'Tally ho! Gone away! Hark forrard!'
   Or words to that effect.


        12
   Her  departure - at, I should estimate, some sixty m.p.h. - left
behind  it the sort of quivering stillness you get during hurricane
time  in America, when the howling gale, having shaken you  to  the
back teeth, passes on to tickle up residents in spots further west.
Kind of a dazed feeling it gives you. I turned to Jeeves, and found
him,  of  course, as serene and unmoved as an oyster  on  the  half
shell. He might have been watching yowling aunts shoot out of rooms
like bullets from early boyhood.
   'What was that she said, Jeeves?'
   'Yoicks,  sir, if I am not mistaken. It seemed to me that  Madam
also added Tally-ho, Gone away and Hark forrard.'
   'I  suppose  members  of the Quorn and the Pytchley  are  saying
that sort of thing all the time.'
   'So  I  understand,  sir. It encourages the  hounds  to  renewed
efforts. It must, of course, be trying for the fox.'
   'I'd hate to be a fox, wouldn't you, Jeeves?'
   'Certainly I can imagine more agreeable existences, sir.'
   'Not only being chivvied for miles across difficult country  but
having to listen to men in top hats uttering those uncouth cries.'
   'Precisely, sir. A very wearing life.'
   I  produced  my cambric handkerchief and gave the  brow  a  mop.
Recent  events had caused me to perspire in the manner  popularized
by the fountains at Versailles.
   'Warm work, Jeeves.'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'Opens the pores a bit.'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'How quiet everything seems now.'
   'Yes,  sir. Silence like a poultice comes to heal the  blows  of
sound.'
   'Shakespeare?'
   'No,  sir. The American author Oliver Wendell Holmes. His  poem,
"The  Organ Grinders". An aunt of mine used to read it to me  as  a
child.'
   'I didn't know you had any aunts.'
   'Three,sir.'
   'Are they as jumpy as the one who has just left us?'
   'No, sir. Their outlook on life is uniformly placid.'
   I  had  begun to feel a bit more placid myself. Calmer,  if  you
know  what  I  mean.  And with the calm had  come  more  charitable
thoughts.
   'Well,  I  don't  blame the aged relative for  being  jumpy,'  I
said. 'She's all tied up with an enterprise of pith and something.'
   'Of great pith and moment, sir?'
   'That's right.'
   'Let  us  hope that its current will not turn awry and lose  the
name of action.'
   'Yes, let's. Turn what?'
   'Awry, sir.'
   'Don't you mean agley?'
   'No, sir.'
   'Then it isn't the poet Burns?'
   'No, sir. The words occur in Shakespeare's drama Hamlet.'
   'Oh,  I know Hamlet. Aunt Agatha once made me take her son  Thos
to  it  at  the  Old Vic. Not a bad show, I thought, though  a  bit
highbrow. You're sure the poet Burns didn't write it?'
   'Yes, sir. The fact, I understand, is well established.'
   'Then  that  settles that. But we have wandered from the  point,
which  is that Aunt Dahlia is up to her neck in this enterprise  of
great pith and moment. It's about Tuppy Glossop.'
   'Indeed, sir?'
   'It  ought  to interest you, because I know you've always  liked
Tuppy.'
   'A very pleasant young gentleman, sir.'
   'When  he  isn't  looping back the last  ring  over  the  Drones
swimming-pool, yes. Well, it's too long a story to tell you at  the
moment,  but the gist of it is this. L. P. Runkle, taking advantage
of a legal quibble ... is it quibble?'
   'Yes, sir.'
   'Did  down  Tuppy's  father  over a  business  deal...  no,  not
exactly a business deal, Tuppy's father was working for him, and he
took  advantage of the small print in their contract to rob him  of
the proceeds of something he had invented.'
   'It  is  often the way, sir. The financier is apt to prosper  at
the expense of the inventor.'
   'And  Aunt Dahlia is hoping to get him to cough up a bit of cash
and slip it to Tuppy.'
   'Actuated by remorse, sir?'
   'Not  just by remorse. She's relying more on the fact  that  for
quite a time he has been under the spell of Anatole's cooking,  and
she  feels  that  this  will have made him a  softer  and  kindlier
financier,  readier  to oblige and do the square  thing.  You  look
dubious, Jeeves. Don't you think it will work? She's sure it will.'
   'I wish I could share Madam's confidence, but -'
   'But,  like  me,  you look on her chance of  playing  on  L.  P.
Runkle as on a stringed instrument as ... what? A hundred to  eight
shot?'
   'A  somewhat longer price than that, sir. We have to  take  into
consideration the fact that Mr Runkle is ...'
   'Yes? You hesitate, Jeeves, Mr Runkle is what?'
   'The expression I am trying to find eludes me, sir. It is one  I
have  sometimes heard you use to indicate a deficiency of sweetness
and light in some gentleman of your acquaintance. You have employed
it  of  Mr Spode or, as I should say, Lord Sidcup and, in the  days
before your association with him took on its present cordiality, of
Mr Glossop's uncle, Sir Roderick. It is on the tip of my tongue.'
   'A stinker?'
   No, he said, it wasn't a stinker.
   'A tough baby?'
   'No.'
   'A twenty-minute egg?'
   'That was it, sir. Mr Runkle is a twenty-minute egg.'
   'But  have  you seen enough of him to judge? After  all,  you've
only just met him.'
   'Yes, sir, that is true, but Bingley, on learning that he was  a
guest  of Madam's, told me a number of stories illustrative of  his
hardhearted  and implacable character. Bingley was at one  time  in
his employment.'
   'Good lord, he seems to have been employed by everyone.'
   'Yes,  sir,  he was inclined to flit. He never remained  in  one
post for long.'
   'I don't wonder.'
   'But  his  relationship  with Mr Runkle  was  of  more  extended
duration.  He accompanied him to the United States of America  some
years ago and remained with him for several months.'
   'During which period he found him a twenty-minute egg?'
   'Precisely,  sir. So I very much fear that Madam's efforts  will
produce  no satisfactory results. Would it be a large sum of  money
that she is hoping to persuade Mr Runkle to part with?'
   'Pretty  substantial,  I gather. You see,  what  Tuppy's  father
invented were those Magic Midget things, and Runkle must have  made
a packet out of them. I suppose she aims at a fifty-fifty split.'
   'Then  I  am forced to the opinion that a hundred to one against
is  more the figure a level-headed turf accountant would place upon
the likelihood of her achieving her objective.'
   Not  encouraging, you'll agree. In fact, you might  describe  it
as definitely damping. I would have called him a pessimist, only  I
couldn't  think  of  the word, and while I was  trying  to  hit  on
something other than 'Gloomy Gus', which would scarcely have been a
fitting way to address one of his dignity, Florence came in through
the  French  window  and  he  of course  shimmered  off.  When  our
conversations are interrupted by the arrival of what you might call
the  quality, he always disappears like a family spectre  vanishing
at dawn.
   Except  at  meals I hadn't seen anything of Florence  till  now,
she,  so to speak, having taken the high road while I took the  low
road.  What  I  mean  to  say  is that she  was  always  in  Market
Snodsbury,  bustling about on behalf of the Conservative  candidate
to  whom  she  was  betrothed, while I,  after  that  nerve-racking
encounter  with  the widow of the late McCorkadale,  had  given  up
canvassing  in  favour  of  curling up with  a  good  book.  I  had
apologized  to Ginger for this ... is pusillanimity the  word?  ...
and  he  had  taken  it extraordinarily well,  telling  me  it  was
perfectly all right and he wished he could do the same.
   She  was  looking as beautiful as ever, if not more so,  and  at
least  ninety-six per cent of the members of the Drones Club  would
have  asked nothing better than to be closeted with her like  this.
I,  however, would willingly have avoided the tete-a-tete,  for  my
trained senses told me that she was in one of her tempers, and when
this  happens the instinct of all but the hardiest is  to  climb  a
tree  and  pull  it up after them. The overbearing  dishpotness  to
which  I  alluded earlier and which is so marked a feature  of  her
make-up was plainly to the fore. She said, speaking abruptly:
   'What are you doing in here on a lovely day like this, Bertie?'
   I  explained that I had been in conference with Aunt Dahlia, and
she  riposted that the conference was presumably over by now,  Aunt
D.  being  conspicuous by her absence, so why wasn't I out  getting
fresh air and sunshine.
   'You're much too fond of frowsting indoors. That's why you  have
that sallow look.'
   'I didn't know I had a sallow look.'
   'Of  course  you have a sallow look. What else did  you  expect?
You look like the underside of a dead fish.'
   My  worst  fears seemed to be confirmed. I had anticipated  that
she  would work off her choler on the first innocent bystander  she
met,  and  it  was just my luck that this happened to be  me.  With
bowed  head  I prepared to face the storm, and then to my  surprise
she changed the subject.
   'I'm looking for Harold,' she said.
   'Oh, yes?'
   'Have you seen him.'
   'I don't think I know him.'
   'Don't be a fool. Harold Winship.'
   'Oh,  Ginger,' I said, enlightened. 'No, he hasn't swum into  my
ken. What do you want to see him about? Something important?'
   'It  is  important to me, and it ought to be to him.  Unless  he
takes himself in hand, he is going to lose this election.'
   'What makes you think that?'
   'His behaviour at lunch today.'
   'Oh,  did he take you to lunch? Where did you go? I had mine  at
a  pub, and the garbage there had to be chewed to be believed.  But
perhaps you went to a decent hotel?'
   'It  was  the Chamber of Commerce luncheon at the Town  Hall.  A
vitally important occasion, and he made the feeblest speech I  have
ever heard. A child with water on the brain could have done better.
Even you could have done better.'
   Well,  I  suppose  placing me on a level of  efficiency  with  a
water-on-the-brained  child was quite a stately  compliment  coming
from  Florence,  so I didn't go further into the  matter,  and  she
carried on, puffs of flame emerging from both nostrils.
   'Er, er, er!'
   'I beg your pardon?'
   'He  kept  saying Er. Er, er, er. I could have thrown  a  coffee
spoon at him.'
   Here,  of course, was my chance to work in the old gag about  to
err  being  human, but it didn't seem to me the moment. Instead,  I
said:
   'He was probably nervous.'
   'That  was  his  excuse.  I told him  he  had  no  right  to  be
nervous.'
   'Then you've seen him?'
   'I saw him.'
   'After the lunch?'
   'Immediately after the lunch.'
   'But you want to see him again?'
   'I do.'
   'I'll go and look for him, shall I?'
   'Yes,  and tell him to meet me in Mr Travers's study.  We  shall
not be interrupted there.'
   'He's probably sitting in the summerhouse by the lake.'
   Well,  tell  him  to stop sitting and come to  the  study,'  she
said,  for  all  the  world  as if she had  been  Arnold  Abney  MA
announcing that he would like to see Wooster after morning prayers.
Quite took me back to the old days.
   To  get  to the summerhouse you have to go across the lawn,  the
one  Spode was toying with the idea of buttering me over,  and  the
first  thing  I  saw  as  I did so, apart  from  the  birds,  bees,
butterflies,  and what not which put in their leisure hours  there,
was L. P. Runkle lying in the hammock wrapped in slumber, with Aunt
Dahlia  in  a  chair at his side. When she sighted  me,  she  rose,
headed in my direction and drew me away a yard or two, at the  same
time putting a finger to her lips.

   'He's asleep,' she said.
   A  snore from the hammock bore out the truth of this, and I said
I could see he was and what a revolting spectacle he presented, and
she  told  me  for heaven's sake not to bellow like that.  Somewhat
piqued  at  being  accused of bellowing by a woman  whose  lightest
whisper  was like someone calling the cattle home across the  sands
of Dee, I said I wasn't bellowing, and she said 'Well, don't.'
   'He may be in a nasty mood if he's woken suddenly.'
   It  was  an  astute piece of reasoning, speaking  well  for  her
grasp  of  strategy and tactics, but with my quick  intelligence  I
spotted a flaw in it to which I proceeded to call her attention.
   'On  the  other hand, if you don't wake him, how can  you  plead
Tuppy's cause?'
   'I  said suddenly, ass. It'll be all right if I let Nature  take
its course.'
   'Yes, you may have a point there. Will Nature be long about  it,
do you think?'
   'How do I know?'
   'I  was  only  wondering. You can't sit there the  rest  of  the
afternoon.'
   'I can if necessary.'
   'Then  I'll leave you to it. I've got to go and look for Ginger.
Have you seen him?'
   'He  came  by  just now with his secretary on  his  way  to  the
summerhouse.  He told me he had some dictation to do.  Why  do  you
want him?'
   'I  don't  particularly,  though always  glad  of  his  company.
Florence told me to find him. She has been giving him hell  and  is
anxious to give him some more. Apparently -'
   Here  she interrupted me with a sharp 'Hist!', for L. P.  Runkle
had stirred in his sleep and it looked as if life was returning  to
the  inert frame. But it proved to be a false alarm, and I  resumed
my remarks.
   'Apparently  he  failed to wow the customers at the  Chamber  of
Commerce lunch, where she had been counting on him being a  regular
... who was the Greek chap?'
   'Bertie,  if  I wasn't afraid of waking Runkle, I'd  strike  you
with  a  blunt instrument, if I had a blunt instrument. What  Greek
chap?'
   'That's what I'm asking you. He chewed pebbles.'
   'Do you mean Demosthenes?'
   'You  may  be right. I'll take it up later with Jeeves. Florence
was  expecting Ginger to be a regular Demosthenes, if that was  the
name,  which seems unlikely, though I was at school with  a  fellow
called Gianbattista, and he let her down, and this has annoyed her.
You know how she speaks her mind, when annoyed.'
   'She   speaks  her  mind  much  too  much,'  said  the  relative
severely. 'I wonder Ginger stands it.'
   It  so  happened that I was in a position to solve  the  problem
that  was  perplexing her. The facts governing the relationship  of
guys  and dolls had long been an open book to me. I had given  deep
thought  to  the matter, and when I give deep thought to  a  matter
perplexities are speedily ironed out.
   'He  stands  it, aged relative, because he loves  her,  and  you
wouldn't be far wrong in saying that love conquers all. I know what
you  mean,  of course. It surprises you that a fellow of his  thews
and sinews should curl up in a ball when she looks squiggle-eyed at
him and receive her strictures, if that's the word I want, with the
meekness of a spaniel rebuked for bringing a decaying bone into the
drawing-room. What you overlook is the fact that in the  matter  of
finely  chiselled profile, willowy figure and platinum-blonde  hair
she is well up among the top ten, and these things weigh with a man
like Ginger. You and I, regarding Florence coolly, pencil her in as
too  bossy  for  human consumption, but he gets a different  slant.
It's  the old business of what Jeeves calls the psychology  of  the
individual.  Very possibly the seeds of rebellion start  to  seethe
within  him when she speaks her mind, but he catches sight  of  her
sideways  or  gets a glimpse of her hair, assuming for purposes  of
argument  that she isn't wearing a hat, or notices once again  that
she  has as many curves as a scenic railway, and he feels that it's
worth putting up with a spot of mind-speaking in order to make  her
his  own. His love, you see, is not wholly spiritual. There's a bit
of the carnal mixed up in it.'
   I  would  have  spoken  further, for the subject  was  one  that
always  calls  out  the  best in me, but  at  this  point  the  old
ancestor, who had been fidgeting for some time, asked me to go  and
drown  myself  in  the  lake. I buzzed off,  accordingly,  and  she
returned  to  her  chair beside the hammock, brooding  over  L.  P.
Runkle like a mother over her sleeping child.
   I  don't suppose she had observed it, for aunts seldom give much
attention to the play of expression on the faces of their  nephews,
but all through these exchanges I had been looking grave, making it
pretty  obvious that there was something on my mind. I was thinking
of  what  Jeeves had said about the hundred to one which  a  level-
headed  bookie  would wager against her chance of extracting  money
from  a  man so liberally equipped with one-way pockets  as  L.  P.
Runkle,  and  it  pained  me  deeply  to  picture  her  dismay  and
disappointment  when,  waking  from his  slumbers,  he  refused  to
disgorge.  It  would be a blow calculated to take all the  stuffing
out  of  her, she having been so convinced that she was on  a  sure
thing.
   I  was  also, of course, greatly concerned about Ginger.  Having
been  engaged to Florence myself, I knew what she could do  in  the
way  of  ticking  off the errant male, and the symptoms  seemed  to
point  to  the probability that on the present occasion  she  would
eclipse  all  previous performances. I had not failed to  interpret
the  significance  of that dark frown, that bitten  lip  and  those
flashing  eyes,  nor  the  way  the willowy  figure  had  quivered,
indicating, unless she had caught a chill, that she was as sore  as
a  sunburned neck. I marvelled at the depths to which my old friend
must  have  sunk  as an orator in order to get such stark  emotions
under way, and I intended - delicately, of course - to question him
about this.
   I  had,  however, no opportunity to do so, for on  entering  the
summerhouse  the first thing I saw was him and Magnolia  Glendennon
locked  in  an  embrace so close that it seemed  to  me  that  only
powerful machinery could unglue them.


        13
   In  taking this view, however, I was in error, for scarcely  had
I  uttered the first yip of astonishment when the Glendennon popsy,
echoing it with a yip of her own such as might have proceeded  from
a  nymph  surprised while bathing, disentangled  herself  and  came
whizzing  past me, disappearing into the great world outside  at  a
speed  which  put her in the old ancestor's class as a sprinter  on
the  flat.  It was as though she had said 'Oh for the  wings  of  a
dove' and had got them.

   I,  meanwhile,  stood rooted to the s., the mouth slightly  ajar
and  the  eyes  bulging to their fullest extent. What's  that  word
beginning  with  dis? Disembodied? No, not disembodied.  Distemper?
No,   not   distemper.  Disconcerted,  that's  the   one.   I   was
disconcerted. I should imagine that if you happened  to  wander  by
accident  into  the steam room of a Turkish bath on Ladies'  Night,
you  would  have emotions very similar to those I was  experiencing
now.
   Ginger, too, seemed not altogether at his ease. Indeed, I  would
describe him as definitely taken aback. He breathed heavily, as  if
suffering  from asthma; the eye with which he regarded me contained
practically none of the chumminess you would expect to see  in  the
eye  of an old friend; and his voice, when he spoke, resembled that
of  an annoyed cinnamon bear. Throaty, if you know what I mean, and
on  the peevish side. His opening words consisted of a well-phrased
critique of my tactlessness in selecting that particular moment for
entering the summerhouse. He wished, he said, that I wouldn't creep
about  like  a ruddy detective. Had I, he asked, got my  magnifying
glass  with me and did I propose to go around on all fours, picking
up  small  objects and putting them away carefully in an  envelope?
What, he enquired, was I doing here, anyway?
   To  this  I might have replied that I was perfectly entitled  at
all  times to enter a summerhouse which was the property of my Aunt
Dahlia and so related to me by ties of blood, but something told me
that suavity would be the better policy. In rebuttal, therefore,  I
merely  said  that I wasn't creeping about like a ruddy  detective,
but  navigating with a firm and manly stride, and had  simply  been
looking  for  him  because Florence had ordered me  to  and  I  had
learned from a usually well-informed source that this was where  he
was.
   My  reasoning  had  the soothing effect I  had  hoped  for.  His
manner  changed, losing its cinnamon bear quality and taking  on  a
welcome  all-pals-together-ness. It bore out  what  I  have  always
said,  that  there's nothing like suavity for pouring  oil  on  the
troubled  w.'s. When he spoke again, it was plain that he  regarded
me as a friend and an ally.
   'I suppose all this seems a bit odd to you, Bertie.'
   'Not at all, old man, not at all.'
   'But there is a simple exp