The Essential Works of P. G. Wodehouse. P. G. WodehouseЧитать онлайн книгу.
“Hallo!”
“Things are hotting up.”
“What’s happened now?”
“My uncle has given the little woman’s proofs the once-over, and admits her claim. I’ve just been having five snappy minutes with him on the telephone. He says that you and I made a fool of him, and he could hardly speak, he was so shirty. Still, he made it clear all right that my allowance has gone phut again.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t waste time being sorry for me,” said young Bingo, grimly. “He’s coming to call on you to-day to demand a personal explanation.”
“Great Scott!”
“And the little woman is coming to call on you to demand a personal explanation.”
“Good Lord!”
“I shall watch your future career with some considerable interest,” said young Bingo.
I bellowed for Jeeves.
“Jeeves!”
“Sir?”
“I’m in the soup.”
“Indeed, sir?”
I sketched out the scenario for him.
“What would you advise?”
“I think, if I were you, sir, I would accept Mr. Pitt-Waley’s invitation immediately. If you remember, sir, he invited you to shoot with him in Norfolk this week.”
“So he did! By Jove, Jeeves, you’re always right. Meet me at the station with my things the first train after lunch. I’ll go and lie low at the club for the rest of the morning.”
“Would you require my company on this visit, sir?”
“Do you want to come?”
“If I might suggest it, sir, I think it would be better if I remained here and kept in touch with Mr. Little. I might possibly hit upon some method of pacifying the various parties, sir.”
“Right-o! But, if you do, you’re a marvel.”
I DIDN’T enjoy myself much in Norfolk. It rained most of the time, and, when it wasn’t raining, I was so dashed jumpy I couldn’t hit a thing. By the end of the week I couldn’t stand it any longer. Too bally absurd, I mean, being marooned miles away in the country just because young Bingo’s uncle and wife wanted to have a few words with me. I made up my mind that I would pop back and do the strong, manly thing, by lying low in my flat and telling Jeeves to inform everybody who called that I wasn’t at home.
I sent Jeeves a telegram, saying I was coming, and drove straight to Bingo’s place when I reached town. I wanted to find out the general posish of affairs. But apparently the man was out. I rang a couple of times, but nothing happened, and I was just going to leg it when I heard the sound of footsteps inside, and the door opened. It wasn’t one of the cheeriest moments of my career when I found myself peering into the globular face of Lord Bittlesham.
“Oh, er—hallo!” I said. And there was a bit of a pause.
I don’t quite know what I had been expecting the old boy to do if by bad luck we should ever meet again, but I had a sort of general idea that he would turn fairly purple and start almost immediately to let me have it in the gizzard. It struck me as somewhat rummy, therefore, when he simply smiled weakly. A sort of frozen smile it was. His eyes kind of bulged, and he swallowed once or twice.
“Er——” he said.
I waited for him to continue, but apparently that was all there was.
“Bingo in?” I said, after a rather embarrassing pause.
HE shook his head, and smiled again. And then, suddenly, just as the flow of conversation had begun to slacken once more, I’m dashed if he didn’t make a sort of lumbering leap back into the flat and bang the door.
I couldn’t understand it. But, as it seemed that the interview, such as it was, was over, I thought I might as well be shifting. I had just started down the stairs when I met young Bingo, charging up three steps at a time.
“Hallo, Bertie!” he said. “Where did you spring from? I thought you were out of town.”
“I’ve just got back. I looked in on you to see how the land lay.”
“How do you mean?”
“Why, all that business, you know.”
“Oh, that,” said young Bingo, airily. “That was all settled days ago. The dove of peace is flapping its wings all over the place. Everything’s as right as it can be. Jeeves fixed it all up. He’s a marvel, that man, Bertie, I’ve always said so. Put the whole thing straight in half a minute with one of those brilliant ideas of his.”
“This is topping!”
“I knew you’d be pleased.”
“Congratulate you.”
“Thanks.”
“What did Jeeves do? I couldn’t think of any solution of the bally thing myself.”
“Oh, he took the matter in hand and smoothed it all out in a second. My uncle and the little woman are tremendous pals now. They gas away by the hour together about literature and all that. He’s always dropping in for a chat.”
This reminded me.
“He’s in there now,” I said. “I say, Bingo, how is your uncle these days?”
“Much as usual. How do you mean?”
“I mean he hasn’t been feeling the strain of things a bit, has he? He seemed rather strange in his manner just now.”
“Why, have you met him?”
“He opened the door when I rang. And then, after he had stood goggling at me for a bit, he suddenly banged the door in my face. Puzzled me, you know. I mean, I could have understood it if he’d ticked me off and all that, but, dash it, the man seemed absolutely scared.”
Young Bingo laughed a care-free laugh. “Oh, that’s all right,” he said. “I forgot to tell you about that. Meant to write, but kept putting it off. He thinks you’re a looney.”
“He—what?”
“Yes. That was Jeeves’s idea, you know. It’s solved the whole problem splendidly. He suggested that I should tell my uncle that I had acted in perfect good faith in introducing you to him as Rosie M. Banks; that I had repeatedly had it from your own lips that you were, and that I didn’t see any reason why you shouldn’t be. The idea being that you were subject to hallucinations and generally potty. And then we got hold of Sir Roderick Glossop—you remember, the old boy whose kid you pushed into the lake that day down at Ditteredge Hall—and he rallied round with his story of how he had come to lunch with you once and found your bedroom full up with cats and fish, and how you had pinched his hat while you were driving past his car in a taxi, and all that, you know. It just rounded the whole thing off nicely. I always say, and I always shall say, that you’ve only got to stand on Jeeves and Fate can’t touch you.”
I can put up with a good deal, but there are limits.
“Well, of all the dashed bits of nerve I ever——”
Bingo looked at me, astonished.
“You aren’t annoyed?” he said.
“Annoyed! At having half London going about under the impression that I’m off my chump? Dash it all——”
“Bertie,” said Bingo, “you amaze and wound me. If I had dreamed that you would object to doing a trifling good turn to a fellow who’s been a pal of yours for fifteen years——”
“Yes,