P G Wodehouse - Little Nugget

by Little Nugget

  'I want to find out that address you gave the Ford kid this morning out in the stable-yard.'

  It is strange how really literal figurative expressions are. I had read stories in which some astonished character's heart leaped into his mouth. For an instant I could have supposed that mine had actually done so. The illusion of some solid object blocking up my throat was extraordinarily vivid, and there certainly seemed to be a vacuum in the spot where my heart should have been. Not for a substantial reward could I have uttered a word at that moment. I could not even breathe. The horrible unexpectedness of the blow had paralysed me.

  White, however, was apparently prepared to continue the chat without my assistance.

  'I guess you didn't know I was around, or you wouldn't have talked that way. Well, I was, and I heard every word you said. Here was the money, you said, and he was to take it and break for London, and go to the address on this card, and your pal Smith would look after him. I guess there had been some talk before that, but I didn't arrive in time to hear it. But I heard all I wanted, except that address. And that's what I'm going to find out when we get to London.'

  He gave out this appalling information in a rich and soothing voice, as if it were some ordinary commonplace. To me it seemed to end everything. I imagined I was already as good as under arrest. What a fool I had been to discuss such a matter in a place like a stable yard, however apparently empty. I might have known that at a school there are no empty places.

  'I must say it jarred me when I heard you pulling that stuff,' continued White. 'I haven't what you might call a childlike faith in my fellow-man as a rule, but it had never occurred to me for a moment that you could be playing that game. It only shows,' he added philosophically, 'that you've got to suspect everybody when it comes to a gilt-edged proposition like the Little Nugget.'

  The train rattled on. I tried to reduce my mind to working order, to formulate some plan, but could not.

  Beyond the realization that I was in the tightest corner of my life, I seemed to have lost the power of thought.

  White resumed his monologue.

  'You had me guessing,' he admitted. 'I couldn't figure you out. First thing, of course, I thought you must be working in with Buck MacGinnis and his crowd. Then all that happened tonight, and I saw that, whoever you might be working in with, it wasn't Buck. And now I've placed you. You're not in with any one. You're just playing it by yourself. I shouldn't mind betting this was your first job, and that you saw your chance of making a pile by holding up old man Ford, and thought it was better than schoolmastering, and grabbed it.'

  He leaned forward and tapped me on the knee again. There was something indescribably irritating in the action. As one who has had experience, I can state that, while to be arrested at all is bad, to be arrested by a detective with a fatherly manner is maddening.

  'See here,' he said, 'we must get together over this business.'

  I suppose it was the recollection of the same words in the mouth of Buck MacGinnis that made me sit up with a jerk and stare at him.

  'We'll make a great team,' he said, still in that same cosy voice. 'If ever there was a case of fifty-fifty, this is it. You've got the kid, and I've got you. I can't get away with him without your help, and you can't get away with him unless you square me. It's a stand-off. The only thing is to sit in at the game together and share out. Does it go?'

  He beamed kindly on my bewilderment during the space of time it takes to select a cigarette and light a match. Then, blowing a contented puff of smoke, he crossed his legs and leaned back.

  'When I told you I was a Pinkerton's man, sonny,' he said, 'I missed the cold truth by about a mile. But you caught me shooting off guns in the grounds, and it was up to me to say something.'

  He blew a smoke-ring and watched it dreamily till it melted in the draught from the ventilator.

  'I'm Smooth Sam Fisher,' he said.

  II

  When two emotions clash, the weaker goes to the wall. Any surprise I might have felt was swallowed up in my relief. If I had been at liberty to be astonished, my companion's information would no doubt have astonished me. But I was not. I was so relieved that he was not a Pinkerton's man that I did not really care what else he might be.

  'It's always been a habit of mine, in these little matters,' he went on, 'to let other folks do the rough work, and chip in myself when they've cleared the way. It saves trouble and expense. I don't travel with a gang, like that bone-headed Buck. What's the use of a gang? They only get tumbling over each other and spoiling everything. Look at Buck! Where is he? Down and out. While I--'

  He smiled complacently. His manner annoyed me. I objected to being looked upon as a humble cat's paw by this bland scoundrel.

  'While you--what?' I said.

  He looked at me in mild surprise.

  'Why, I come in with you, sonny, and take my share like a gentleman.'

  'Do you!'

  'Well, don't I?'

  He looked at me in the half-reproachful half-affectionate manner of the kind old uncle who reasons with a headstrong nephew.

  'Young man,' he said, 'you surely aren't thinking you can put one over on me in this business? Tell me, you don't take me for that sort of ivory-skulled boob? Do you imagine for one instant, sonny, that I'm not next to every move in this game? Are you deluding yourself with the idea that this thing isn't a perfect cinch for me? Let's hear what's troubling you. You seem to have gotten some foolish ideas in your head. Let's talk it over quietly.'

  'If you have no objection,' I said, 'no. I don't want to talk to you, Mr Fisher. I don't like you, and I don't like your way of earning your living. Buck MacGinnis was bad enough, but at least he was a straightforward tough. There's no excuse for you.'

  'Surely we are unusually righteous this p.m., are we not?' said Sam suavely.

  I did not answer.

  'Is this not mere professional jealousy?'

  This was too much for me.

  'Do you imagine for a moment that I'm doing this for money?'

  'I did have that impression. Was I wrong? Do you kidnap the sons of millionaires for your health?'

  'I promised that I would get this boy back to his mother. That is why I gave him the money to go to London. And that is why my valet was to have taken him to--to where Mrs Ford is.'

  He did not reply in words, but if ever eyebrows spoke, his said, 'My dear sir, really!' I could not remain silent under their patent disbelief.

  'That's the simple truth,' I said.

  He shrugged his shoulders, as who would say, 'Have it your own way. Let us change the subject.'

  'You say "was to have taken". Have you changed your plans?'

  'Yes, I'm going to take the boy back to the school.'

  He laughed--a rich, rolling laugh. His double chin shook comfortably.

  'It won't do,' he said, shaking his head with humorous reproach. 'It won't do.'

  'You don't believe me?'

  'Frankly, I do not.'

  'Very well,' I said, and began to read my book.

  'If you want to give me the slip,' he chuckled, 'you must do better than that. I can see you bringing the Nugget back to the school.'

  'You will, if you wait,' I said.

  'I wonder what that address was that you gave him,' he mused. 'Well, I shall soon know.'

  He lapsed into silence. The train rolled on. I looked at my watch. London was not far off now.

  'The present arrangement of equal division,' said Sam, breaking a long silence, 'holds good, of course, only in the event of your quitting this fool game and doing the square thing by me. Let me put it plainly. We are either partners or competitors. It is for you to decide. If you will be sensible and tell me that address, I will pledge my word--'

  'Your word!' I said scornfully.

  'Honour among thieves!' replied Sam, with unruffled geniality. 'I wouldn't double-cross you for worlds. If, however, you think you can manage without my assistance, it will then be my melancholy duty to beat you to the
kid, and collect him and the money entirely on my own account. Am I to take it,' he said, as I was silent, 'that you prefer war to an alliance?'

  I turned a page of my book and went on reading.

  'If Youth but knew!' he sighed. 'Young man, I am nearly twice your age, and I have, at a modest estimate, about ten times as much sense. Yet, in your overweening self-confidence, with your ungovernable gall, you fancy you can hand me a lemon. -Me!- I should smile!'

  'Do,' I said. 'Do, while you can.'

  He shook his head reprovingly.

  'You will not be so fresh, sonny, in a few hours. You will be biting pieces out of yourself, I fear. And later on, when my automobile splashes you with mud in Piccadilly, you will taste the full bitterness of remorse. Well, Youth must buy its experience, I suppose!'

  I looked across at him as he sat, plump and rosy and complacent, puffing at his cigarette, and my heart warmed to the old ruffian. It was impossible to maintain an attitude of righteous iciness with him. I might loathe his mode of life, and hate him as a representative--and a leading representative--of one of the most contemptible trades on earth, but there was a sunny charm about the man himself which made it hard to feel hostile to him as an individual.

  I closed my book with a bang and burst out laughing.

  'You're a wonder!' I said.

  He beamed at what he took to be evidence that I was coming round to the friendly and sensible view of the matter.

  'Then you think, on consideration--' he said. 'Excellent! Now, my dear young man, all joking aside, you will take me with you to that address, will you not? You observe that I do not ask you to give it to me. Let there be not so much as the faintest odour of the double-cross about this business. All I ask is that you allow me to accompany you to where the Nugget is hidden, and then rely on my wider experience of this sort of game to get him safely away and open negotiations with the dad.'

  'I suppose your experience has been wide?' I said.

  'Quite tolerably--quite tolerably.'

  'Doesn't it ever worry you the anxiety and misery you cause?'

  'Purely temporary, both. And then, look at it in another way. Think of the joy and relief of the bereaved parents when sonny comes toddling home again! Surely it is worth some temporary distress to taste that supreme happiness? In a sense, you might call me a human benefactor. I teach parents to appreciate their children. You know what parents are. Father gets caught short in steel rails one morning. When he reaches home, what does he do? He eases his mind by snapping at little Willie. Mrs Van First-Family forgets to invite mother to her freak-dinner. What happens? Mother takes it out of William. They love him, maybe, but they are too used to him. They do not realize all he is to them. And then, one afternoon, he disappears. The agony! The remorse! "How could I ever have told our lost angel to stop his darned noise!" moans father. "I struck him!" sobs mother. "With this jewelled hand I spanked our vanished darling!" "We were not worthy to have him," they wail together. "But oh, if we could but get him back!" Well they do. They get him back as soon as ever they care to come across in unmarked hundred-dollar bills. And after that they think twice before working off their grouches on the poor kid. So I bring universal happiness into the home. I don't say father doesn't get a twinge every now and then when he catches sight of the hole in his bank balance, but, darn it, what's money for if it's not to spend?'

  He snorted with altruistic fervour.

  'What makes you so set on kidnapping Ogden Ford?' I asked. 'I know he is valuable, but you must have made your pile by this time. I gather that you have been practising your particular brand of philanthropy for a good many years. Why don't you retire?'

  He sighed.

  'It is the dream of my life to retire, young man. You may not believe me, but my instincts are thoroughly domestic. When I have the leisure to weave day-dreams, they centre around a cosy little home with a nice porch and stationary washtubs.'

  He regarded me closely, as if to decide whether I was worthy of these confidences. There was something wistful in his brown eyes. I suppose the inspection must have been favourable, or he was in a mood when a man must unbosom himself to someone, for he proceeded to open his heart to me. A man in his particular line of business, I imagine, finds few confidants, and the strain probably becomes intolerable at times.

  'Have you ever experienced the love of a good woman, sonny? It's a wonderful thing.' He brooded sentimentally for a moment, then continued, and--to my mind--somewhat spoiled the impressiveness of his opening words. 'The love of a good woman,' he said, 'is about the darnedest wonderful lay-out that ever came down the pike. I know. I've had some.'

  A spark from his cigarette fell on his hand. He swore a startled oath.

  'We came from the same old town,' he resumed, having recovered from this interlude. 'Used to be kids at the same school... Walked to school together... me carrying her luncheon-basket and helping her over the fences... Ah!... Just the same when we grew up. Still pals. And that was twenty years ago... The arrangement was that I should go out and make the money to buy the home, and then come back and marry her.'

  'Then why the devil haven't you done it?' I said severely.

  He shook his head.

  'If you know anything about crooks, young man,' he said, 'you'll know that outside of their own line they are the easiest marks that ever happened. They fall for anything. At least, it's always been that way with me. No sooner did I get together a sort of pile and start out for the old town, when some smooth stranger would come along and steer me up against some skin-game, and back I'd have to go to work. That happened a few times, and when I did manage at last to get home with the dough I found she had married another guy. It's hard on women, you see,' he explained chivalrously. 'They get lonesome and Roving Rupert doesn't show up, so they have to marry Stay-at-Home Henry just to keep from getting the horrors.'

  'So she's Mrs Stay-at-Home Henry now?' I said sympathetically.

  'She was till a year ago. She's a widow now. Deceased had a misunderstanding with a hydrophobia skunk, so I'm informed. I believe he was a good man. Outside of licking him at school I didn't know him well. I saw her just before I left to come here. She's as fond of me as ever. It's all settled, if only I can connect with the mazuma. And she don't want much, either. Just enough to keep the home together.'

  'I wish you happiness,' I said.

  'You can do better than that. You can take me with you to that address.'

  I avoided the subject.

  'What does she say to your way of making money?' I asked.

  'She doesn't know, and she ain't going to know. I don't see why a man has got to tell his wife every little thing in his past. She thinks I'm a drummer, travelling in England for a dry-goods firm. She wouldn't stand for the other thing, not for a minute. She's very particular. Always was. That's why I'm going to quit after I've won out over this thing of the Little Nugget.' He looked at me hopefully. 'So you -will- take me along, sonny, won't you?'

  I shook my head.

  'You won't?'

  'I'm sorry to spoil a romance, but I can't. You must look around for some other home into which to bring happiness. The Fords' is barred.'

  'You are very obstinate, young man,' he said, sadly, but without any apparent ill-feeling. 'I can't persuade you?'

  'No.'

  'Ah, well! So we are to be rivals, not allies. You will regret this, sonny. I may say you will regret it very bitterly. When you see me in my automo--'

  'You mentioned your automobile before.'

  'Ah! So I did.'

  The train had stopped, as trains always do on English railways before entering a terminus. Presently it began to move forward hesitatingly, as if saying to itself, 'Now, am I really wanted here? Shall I be welcome?' Eventually, after a second halt, it glided slowly alongside the platform.

  I sprang out and ran to the cab-rank. I was aboard a taxi, bowling out of the station before the train had stopped.

  Peeping out of the window at the back, I was unable to see
Sam. My adroit move, I took it, had baffled him. I had left him standing.

  It was a quarter of an hour's drive to my rooms, but to me, in my anxiety, it seemed more. This was going to be a close thing, and success or failure a matter of minutes. If he followed my instructions Smith would be starting for the Continental boat-train tonight with his companion; and, working out the distances, I saw that, by the time I could arrive, he might already have left my rooms. Sam's supervision at Sanstead Station had made it impossible for me to send a telegram. I had had to trust to chance. Fortunately my train, by a miracle, had been up to time, and at my present rate of progress I ought to catch Smith a few minutes before he left the building.

  The cab pulled up. I ran up the stairs and opened the door of my apartment.

  'Smith!' I called.

  A chair scraped along the floor and a door opened at the end of the passage. Smith came out.

  'Thank goodness you have not started. I thought I should miss you. Where is the boy?'

  'The boy, sir?'

  'The boy I wrote to you about.'

  'He has not arrived, sir.'

  'Not arrived?'

  'No, sir.'

  I stared at him blankly.

  'How long have you been here?'

  'All day, sir.'

  'You have not been out?'

  'Not since the hour of two, sir.'

  'I can't understand it,' I said.

  'Perhaps the young gentleman changed his mind and never started, sir?'

  'I know he started.'

  Smith had no further suggestion to offer.

  'Pending the young gentleman's arrival, sir, I remain in London?'

  A fruity voice spoke at the door behind me.

  'What! Hasn't he arrived?'

  I turned. There, beaming and benevolent, stood Mr Fisher.

  'It occurred to me to look your name out in the telephone directory,' he explained. 'I might have thought of that before.'

  'Come in here,' I said, opening the door of the sitting-room. I did not want to discuss the thing with him before Smith.

  He looked about the room admiringly.

  'So these are your quarters,' he said. 'You do yourself pretty well, young man. So I understand that the Nugget has gone wrong in transit. He has altered his plans on the way?'