Part 9

"Possibly, sir. On the other hand, she alluded to you in terms suggestive of disapprobation, sir."

"She--what?"

"'Feckless idiot' was one of the expressions she employed, sir."

"'Feckless idiot'?"

"Yes, sir."

I couldn't make it out. I simply couldn't see what the woman had based her judgment on. My aunt Agatha has frequently said that sort of thing about me, but she has known me from a boy.

"I must look into this, Jeeves. Is Mr. Pim asleep?"

"No, sir. He rang the bell a moment ago to inquire if we had not a better brand of cigarette in the flat."

"He did, did he?"

"Yes, sir."

"The accident doesn't seem to have affected his nerve."

"No, sir."

I found Lucius Pim propped up among the pillows, reading his detective story.

"Ah, Wooster," he said. "Welcome home. I say, in case you were worrying, it's all right about that cobra. The hero had got at it without the villain's knowledge and extracted its poison fangs. With the result that when it fell down the chimney and started trying to bite the heroine its efforts were null and void. I doubt if a cobra has ever felt so silly."

"Never mind about cobras."

"It's no good saying, 'Never mind about cobras,'" said Lucius Pim in a gentle, rebuking sort of voice. "You've jolly well _got_ to mind about cobras, if they haven't had their poison fangs extracted. Ask anyone. By the way, my sister looked in. She wants to have a word with you."

"And I want to have a word with her."

"Two minds with but a single thought. What she wants to talk to you about is this accident of mine. You remember that story I was to tell her--about the car driving on? Well, the understanding was, if you recollect, that I was only to tell it if I couldn't think of something better. Fortunately, I thought of something much better.

"You see, that driving-on story was thin. People don't knock fellows down and break their legs and go driving on. The thing wouldn't have held water for a minute. So I told her you did it."

"What!"

"I said it was you who did it in your car. Much more likely. Makes the whole thing neat and well rounded. I knew you would approve. At all costs we have got to keep it from her that I was outed by Gwladys.

"I made it as easy for you as I could, saying you were a bit pickled at the time and so not to be blamed for what you did. Some fellows wouldn't have thought of that. Still," said Lucius Pim, "I'm afraid she's none too pleased with you."

"She isn't, isn't she?"

"No, she is not. And I strongly recommend you, if you want anything like a pleasant interview to-morrow, to sweeten her a bit overnight."

"How do you mean, 'sweeten her'?"

"I'd suggest you send her some flowers. It would be a graceful gesture. Roses are her favourites. Shoot her in a few roses--Number Three, Hill Street, is the address--and it may make all the difference. I think it my duty to inform you, old man, that my sister Beatrice is rather a tough egg, when roused.

"My brother-in-law is due back from New York at any moment, and the danger, as I see it, is that Beatrice, unless sweetened, will get at him and make him bring actions against you for torts and malfeasances and what not and get thumping damages. He isn't overfond of me and, left to himself, would rather approve than otherwise of people who broke my legs; but he's crazy about Beatrice and will do anything she asks him to.

"So my advice is, Gather ye rosebuds while ye may and bung them in to Number Three, Hill Street. Otherwise, the case of Slingsby _versus_ Wooster will be on the calendar before you can say What-ho."

I gave the fellow a look. Lost on him, of course.

"It's a pity you didn't think of all that before," I said. And it wasn't so much the actual words, if you know what I mean, as the way I said it.

"I thought of it, all right," said Lucius Pim. "But as we were both agreed that at all costs----"

"Oh, all right," I said. "All right."

"You aren't annoyed?" said Lucius Pim, looking at me in surprise.

"Oh, no!"

"Splendid," said Lucius Pim, relieved. "I knew you would feel that I had done the only possible thing. It would have been awful if Beatrice had found out about Gwladys. I dare say you have noticed, Wooster, that when women find themselves in a position to take a running kick at one of their own sex they are twice as rough on her as they would be on a man.

"Now, you, being of the male persuasion, will find everything made nice and smooth for you. A quart of assorted roses, a few smiles, a tactful word or two, and she'll have melted before you know where you are. Play your cards properly, and you and Beatrice will be laughing merrily together in about five minutes.

"Better not let Slingsby's Soups catch you at it, however. He's very jealous where Beatrice is concerned. And now you'll forgive me, old chap, if I send you away. The doctor says I ought not to talk too much for a day or two. Besides, it's time for beddy-by."

The more I thought it over, the better that idea of sending those roses looked. Lucius Pim was not a man I was fond of--in fact, if I had had to choose between him and a cockroach as a companion for a walking tour, the cockroach would have had it by a short head--but there was no doubt that he had outlined the right policy. His advice was good, and I decided to follow it.

Rising next morning at ten-fifteen, I swallowed a strengthening breakfast and legged it off to that flower shop in Piccadilly. I couldn't leave the thing to Jeeves. It was essentially a mission that demanded the personal touch.

I laid out a couple of quid on a sizable bouquet, sent it with my card to Hill Street, and then looked in at the Drones' for a refresher. It is a thing I don't often do in the morning, but this threatened to be rather a special morning.

It was about noon when I got back to the flat. I went into the sitting room and tried to adjust the mind to the coming interview. It had to be faced, of course, but it wasn't any good my telling myself that it was going to be a jolly scene.

I stood or fell by the roses. If they sweetened the Slingsby, all would be well. If they failed to sweeten her, Bertram was undoubtedly for it.

The clock ticked on, but she did not come. A late riser, I took it, and was slightly encouraged by the reflection. My experience of women has been that the earlier they leave the hay the more vicious specimens they are apt to be. My aunt Agatha, for instance, is always up with the lark, and look at her.

Still, you couldn't be sure that this rule always worked, and after a while the suspense began to get in amongst me a bit. To divert the mind, I fetched the old putter out of its bag and began to practice putts into a glass. After all, even if the Slingsby turned out to be all that I had pictured her in my gloomier moments, I should have improved my close-to-the-hole work on the green and be that much up, at any rate.

It was while I was shaping for a trick shot that the doorbell went.

I picked up the glass and shoved the putter behind the settee. It struck me that if the woman found me engaged on what you might call a frivolous pursuit she might take it to indicate lack of remorse and proper feeling.

I straightened the collar, pulled down the waistcoat, and managed to fasten on the face a sort of sad half smile which was welcoming without being actually jovial. It looked all right in the mirror, and I held it as the door opened.

"Mr. Slingsby," announced Jeeves.

And having spoken these words, he closed the door and left us together.

For quite a time there wasn't anything in the way of chit-chat. The shock of expecting Mrs. Slingsby and finding myself confronted by something entirely different--in fact, not the same thing at all--seemed to have affected the vocal cords.

And the visitor didn't appear to be disposed to make light conversation himself. He stood there looking strong and silent. I suppose you have to be like that if you want to manufacture a really convincing soup.

Slingsby's Superb Soups was a Roman-emperor-looking sort of bird, with keen, penetrating eyes and one of those jutting chins. The eyes seemed to me to be fixed on me in a dashed unpleasant stare and, unless I was mistaken, he was grinding his teeth a trifle. For some reason he appeared to have taken a strong dislike to me at sight, and I'm bound to say this rather puzzled me.

I don't pretend to have one of those Fascinating Personalities which you get from studying the booklets advertised in the back pages of the magazines, but I couldn't recall another case in the whole of my career where a single glimpse of the old map had been enough to make anyone look as if he wanted to foam at the mouth. Usually, when people meet me for the first time, they don't seem to know I'm there.

However, I exerted myself to play the host. "Mr. Slingsby?"

"That is my name."

"Just got back from America?"

"I landed this morning."

"Sooner than expected, what?"

"So I imagine."

"Very glad to see you."

"You will not be long."

I took time off to do a bit of gulping. I saw now what had happened. This bloke had been home, seen his wife, heard the story of the accident, and had hastened round to slip it across me.

Evidently those roses had not sweetened the female of the species. The only thing to do now seemed to be to take a stab at sweetening the male.

"Have a drink?" I said.

"No!"

"A cigarette?"

"No!"

"A chair?"

"No!"

I went into the silence once more. These non-drinking, non-smoking, non-sitters are hard birds to handle.

"Don't grin at me, sir!"

I shot a glance at myself in the mirror and saw what he meant. The sad half smile _had_ slopped over a bit. I adjusted it, and there was another pause.

"Now, sir," said the Superb Souper, "to business. I think I need scarcely tell you why I am here."

"No. Of course. Absolutely. It's about that little matter----"

He gave a snort which nearly upset a vase on the mantelpiece. "Little matter? You consider it a little matter, do you?"

"Well----"

"Let me tell you, sir, that when I find that during my absence from the country a man has been annoying my wife with his importunities I regard it as anything but a little matter. And I shall endeavour," said the Souper, as he rubbed his hands together in a hideous, menacing way, "to make you see the thing in the same light."

I couldn't make head or tail of this. I simply couldn't follow him. The lemon began to swim.

"Eh?" I said. "Your wife?"

"You heard me."

"There must be some mistake."

"There is. You made it."

"But I don't know your wife."

"Ha!"

"I've never even met her."

"Pshaw!"

"Honestly, I haven't."

"Bah!" He drank me in for a moment. "Do you deny you sent her flowers?"

I felt the heart turn a double somersault. I began to catch his drift.

"Flowers!" he proceeded. "Roses, sir. Great, fat, beastly roses. Enough of them to sink a ship. Your card was attached to them by a small pin."

His voice died away in a sort of gurgle, and I saw that he was staring at something behind me. I spun round, and there, in the doorway--I hadn't seen it open, because during the last spasm of dialogue I had been backing cautiously toward it--stood a female.

One glance was enough to tell me who she was. No woman could look so like Lucius Pim who hadn't the misfortune to be related to him. It was Sister Beatrice, the tough egg.

I saw all. She had left her home before the flowers arrived; she had sneaked, unsweetened, into the flat while I was fortifying the system at the Drones'; and here she was.

"Er----" I said.

"Alexander!" said the female.

"Goo!" said the Souper. Or it may have been "Coo!"

Whatever it was, it was in the nature of a battle cry or slogan of war. The Souper's worst suspicions had obviously been confirmed. His eyes shone with a strange light. His chin pushed itself out another couple of inches. He clenched and unclenched his fingers once or twice, as if to make sure that they were working properly and could be relied on to do a good clean job of strangling.

Then, once more observing "Coo!" (or "Goo!") he sprang forward, trod on the golf ball I had been practising putting with, and took one of the finest tosses I have ever witnessed. The purler of a lifetime. For a moment the air seemed to be full of arms and legs, and then, with a thud that nearly dislocated the flat, he made a forced landing.

And feeling I had had about all I wanted, I oiled from the room and was in the act of grabbing my hat from the rack in the hall, when Jeeves appeared.

"I fancied I heard a noise, sir," said Jeeves.

"Possibly," I said. "It was Mr. Slingsby."

"Sir?"

"Mr. Slingsby practising Russian dances," I explained. "I rather think he has fractured an assortment of limbs. Better go in and see."

"Very good, sir."

"If he is the wreck I imagine, put him in my room and send for a doctor. The flat is filling up nicely with the various units of the Pim family and its connections, eh, Jeeves?"

"Yes, sir."

"I think the supply is about exhausted, but should any aunts or uncles by marriage come along and break their limbs, bed them out on the Chesterfield."

"Very good, sir."

"I, personally, Jeeves," I said, opening the front door and pausing on the threshold, "am off to Paris. I will wire you the address. Notify me in due course when the place is free from Pims and completely purged of Slingsbys, and I will return. Oh, and Jeeves."

"Sir?"

"Spare no effort to mollify these birds. They think--at least, Slingsby (female) thinks--that it was I who ran over Mr. Pim in my car. Endeavour during my absence to sweeten them."

"Very good, sir."

"And now, perhaps you had better be going in and viewing the body. I shall proceed to the Drones', where I shall lunch, subsequently catching the two-o'clock train at Charing Cross. Meet me there with an assortment of luggage."

* * * * *

It was a matter of three weeks or so before Jeeves sent me the "All clear" signal. I spent the time pottering pretty perturbedly about Paris and environs. It is a city I am fairly fond of, but I was glad to be able to return to the old home.

I hopped on a passing airplane and a couple of hours later was bowling through Croydon on my way to the centre of things. It was somewhere in the Sloane Square neighbourhood that I first caught sight of the posters.

A traffic block had occurred, and I was glancing idly this way and that, when suddenly my eye was caught by something that looked familiar. And then I saw what it was.

Pasted on a blank wall and measuring about a hundred feet each way was an enormous poster, mostly red and blue. At the top of it were the words:

SLINGSBY'S SUPERB SOUPS

and at the bottom:

SUCCULENT AND STRENGTHENING

And in between, me. Yes, dash it, Bertram Wooster in person. A reproduction of the Pendlebury portrait, perfect in every detail.

Of all the absolutely foul sights I have ever seen, this took the biscuit with ridiculous ease. The thing was a bally libel on the Wooster face, and yet it was as unmistakable as if it had had my name under it.

I saw now what Jeeves had meant when he said that the portrait had given me a hungry look. In the poster this look had become one of bestial greed.

There I sat, absolutely slavering through a monocle about six inches in circumference at a plateful of soup, looking as if I hadn't had a meal for weeks. The thing seemed to take one into a different and a dreadful world.

I awoke from a species of trance or coma to find myself at the door of my flat. To buzz upstairs and charge into the home was the work of a moment.

Jeeves came shimmering down the hall, the respectful beam of welcome on the face. "I am glad to see you back, sir."

"Never mind about that," I yipped. "What about----?"

"The posters, sir? I was wondering if you might have observed them."

"I observed them!"

"Striking, sir?"

"Very striking. Now, perhaps you'll kindly explain."

"You instructed me, if you recollect, sir, to spare no effort to mollify Mr. Slingsby."

"Yes, but----"

"It proved a somewhat difficult task, sir. For some time Mr. Slingsby, on the advice and owing to the persuasion of Mrs. Slingsby, appeared to be resolved to institute an action in law against you--a procedure which I knew you would find most distasteful."

"Yes, but----"

"And then, the first day he was able to leave his bed, he observed the portrait, and it seemed to me judicious to point out to him its possibilities as an advertising medium. He readily fell in with the suggestion and on my assurance that, should he abandon the projected action in law, you would willingly permit the use of the portrait, he entered into negotiations with Miss Pendlebury for the purchase of the copyright."

"Oh? Well, I hope she got something out of it, at any rate?"

"Yes, sir. Mr. Pim, acting as Miss Pendlebury's agent, drove, I understand, an extremely satisfactory bargain."

"He acted as her agent, eh?"

"Yes, sir. In his capacity as fiancé to the young lady, sir."

"Fiancé!"

"Yes, sir."

It shows how the sight of that poster had got into my ribs when I state that instead of being laid out cold by this announcement I merely said, "Ha!" or "Ho!" or it may have been "H'm." After the poster, nothing seemed to matter.

"After that poster, Jeeves," I said, "nothing seems to matter."

"No, sir?"

"No, Jeeves. A woman has tossed my heart lightly away, but what of it?"

"Exactly, sir."

"The voice of Love seemed to call to me, but it was a wrong number. Is that going to crush me?"

"No, sir."

"No, Jeeves. It is not. But what does matter is this ghastly business of my face being spread from end to end of the metropolis with the eyes fixed on a plate of Slingsby's Superb Soup. I must leave London. The lads at the Drones' will kid me without ceasing."

"Yes, sir. And Mrs. Spenser Gregson----"

I paled visibly. I hadn't thought of Aunt Agatha and what she might say about letting down the family prestige.

"You don't mean she has been ringing up?"

"Several times daily, sir."

"Jeeves, flight is the only recourse. Back to Paris, what?"

"I should not recommend the move, sir. The posters are, I understand, shortly to appear in that city also. Advertising the Bouillon Suprême. Mr. Slingsby's products command a large sale in France. The sight would be painful for you, sir."

"Then where?"

"If I might make a suggestion, sir, why not adhere to your original intention of cruising in Mrs. Travers's yacht in the Mediterranean? On the yacht you would be free from the annoyance of these advertising displays."

The man seemed to me to be drivelling. "But the yacht started weeks ago. It may be anywhere by now."

"No, sir. The cruise was postponed for a month owing to the illness of Mrs. Travers's chef, Anatole, who contracted influenza. Mrs. Travers refused to sail without him."

"You mean they haven't started?"

"Not yet, sir. The yacht sails from Southampton on Tuesday next."

"Why, dash it, nothing could be sweeter."

"No, sir."

"Ring up Aunt Dahlia and tell her we'll be there."

"I ventured to take the liberty of doing that before you arrived, sir."

"You did?"

"Yes, sir. I thought it probable that the plan would appeal to you."

"It does! I've wished all along I was going on that cruise."

"I, too, sir. It should be extremely pleasant."

"The tang of the salt breezes, Jeeves!"

"Yes, sir."

"The moonlight on the water!"

"Precisely, sir."

"The gentle heaving of the waves!"

"Exactly, sir."

I felt absolutely in the pink. Gwladys--pah! The posters--bah! That was the way I looked at it.

"Yo-ho-ho, Jeeves!" I said.

"Yes, sir."

"In fact, I will go further. Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

"Very good, sir. I will bring it immediately."

Jeeves and the Kid Clementina

It has been well said of Bertram Wooster by those who know him best that, whatever other sporting functions he may see fit to oil out of, you will always find him battling to his sixteen handicap at the annual golf tournament of the Drones' Club. Nevertheless, when I heard that this year they were holding it at Bingley-on-Sea, I confess I hesitated; and as I stood gazing out of the window of my suite at the Splendide on the morning of the opening day the brow was a bit knitted. I was not exactly atwitter, if you understand me, but I couldn't help feeling I might have been rather rash.

"Jeeves," I said, "now that we have actually arrived I find myself wondering if it was quite prudent to come here."

"It is a pleasant spot, sir."

"Where every prospect pleases," I agreed. "But though the spicy breezes blow fair o'er Bingley-on-Sea, we must never forget that this is where my aunt Agatha's old friend, Miss Mapleton, runs a girls' school. If the relative knew I was here she would expect me to call on Miss Mapleton."

"Very true, sir."

I shivered somewhat.

"I met her once, Jeeves. 'Twas on a summer evening in my tent, the day I overcame the Nervii. Or, rather, at lunch at Aunt Agatha's a year ago come Lammas Eve. It is not an experience I would willingly undergo again. The Mapleton struck me then, and I have had no reason to alter my opinion since, as one of those women best seen through a telescope.

"She wears steel-rimmed spectacles, and the effect she has on the sensitive male, when faced at close quarters, is to make him feel as if he were being disembowelled. I can't imagine anything I should enjoy less than calling on her."

"Indeed, sir?"

"Besides, you remember what happened last time I got into a girls' school?"

"Yes, sir."

"Secrecy and silence, then. My visit here must be strictly incog. If Aunt Agatha happens to ask you where I spent this week, tell her I went to Harrogate for the cure."

"Very good, sir. Pardon me, sir, are you proposing to appear in those garments in public?"

Up to this point our conversation had been friendly and cordial, but I now perceived that the jarring note had been struck. I had been wondering when my new plus-fours would come under discussion, and I was prepared to battle for them like a tigress for her young.

"Certainly, Jeeves," I said. "Why? Don't you like them?"

"No, sir."

"You think them on the bright side?"

"Yes, sir."

"A little vivid, they strike you as?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, I think highly of them, Jeeves," I said firmly. "Apart from the fact that on the links a certain dash, a certain gayety of exterior, is expected of one, these plus-fours give me confidence. With their assistance I anticipate going through the opposition like a devouring flame. They cannot but exercise an impressive effect on my play. I shall wear these plus-fours, Jeeves."

"Very good, sir."

There already being a certain amount of chilliness in the air, it seemed to me a suitable moment for springing another item of information which I had been keeping from him for some time.

"Er--Jeeves," I said.

"Sir?"

"I ran into Miss Wickham the other day. After chatting of this and that, she invited me to join a party she is getting up to go to Antibes this summer."

"Indeed, sir?"

He now looked definitely squiggle-eyed. Jeeves does not approve of Bobbie Wickham. He thinks her a menace to the community and holds that any extended association with her inevitably leads ere long to the sickening plunge into the soup. And to a certain extent, I'm bound to say, events have borne him out. You may remember my having told you of the perils I had to face owing to her activities in connection with the Episode of the Dog McIntosh and the Sinister Affair of the Punctured Hot-Water Bottle.

There was what you might call a tense silence. I braced myself for an exhibition of the good old Wooster determination. I mean to say, one has got to take a firm stand from time to time.