‘Probably. Katherine tells me he seems to be infatuated with her. She says he follows her about like one of her dogs, looking like a tame cat and bleating like a sheep.’
‘Quite the private zoo, what?’
‘Bertie,’ said Aunt Dahlia – and I could see her generous nature was stirred to its depths – ‘one more crack like that out of you, and I shall forget that I am an aunt and hand you one.’
I became soothing. I gave her the old oil.
‘I shouldn’t worry,’ I said. ‘There’s probably nothing in it. Whole thing no doubt much exaggerated.’
‘You think so, eh? Well, you know what he’s like. You remember the trouble we had when he ran after that singing-woman.’
I recollected the case. You will find it elsewhere in the archives. Cora Bellinger was the female’s name. She was studying for Opera, and young Tuppy thought highly of her. Fortunately, however, she punched him in the eye during Beefy Bingham’s clean, bright entertainment in Bermondsey East, and love died.
‘Besides,’ said Aunt Dahlia, ‘There’s something I haven’t told you. Just before he went to Bleaching, he and Angela quarrelled.’
‘They did?’
‘Yes. I got it out of Angela this morning. She was crying her eyes out, poor angel. It was something about her last hat. As far as I could gather, he told her it made her look like a Pekingese, and she told him she never wanted to see him again in this world or the next. And he said “Right ho!” and breezed off. I can see what has happened. This dog-girl has caught him on the rebound and, unless something is done quick, anything may happen. So place the facts before Jeeves, and tell him to take action the moment you get down there.’
I am always a little piqued, if you know what I mean, at this assumption on the relative’s part that Jeeves is so dashed essential on these occasions. My manner, therefore, as I replied, was a bit on the crisp side.
‘Jeeve’s services will not be required,’ I said. ‘I can handle this business. The programme which I have laid out will be quite sufficient to take young Tuppy’s mind off love-making. It is my intention to insert the Luminous Rabbit in his room at the first opportunity that presents itself. The Luminous Rabbit shines in the dark and jumps about, making odd, squeaking noises. It will sound to young Tuppy like the Voice of Conscience, and I anticipate that a single treatment will make him retire into a nursing-home for a couple of weeks or so. At the end of which period he will have forgotten all about the bally girl.’
‘Bertie,’ said Aunt Dahlia, with a sort of frozen calm, ‘You are the Abysmal Chump. Listen to me. It’s simply because I am fond of you and have influence with the Lunacy Commissioners that you weren’t put in a padded cell years ago. Bungle this business, and I withdraw my protection. Can’t you understand that this thing is far too serious for any fooling about? Angela’s whole happiness is at stake. Do as I tell you, and put it up to Jeeves.’
‘Just as you say, Aunt Dahlia,’ I said stiffly.
‘All right, then. Do it now.’
I went back to the bedroom.
‘Jeeves,’ I said, and I did not trouble to conceal my chagrin, ‘you need not pack the Luminous Rabbit.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘Nor the Giant Squirt.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘They have been subjected to destructive criticism, and the zest has gone. Oh, and, Jeeves.’
‘Sir?’
‘Mrs Travers wishes you, on arriving at Bleaching Court, to disentangle Mr Glossop from a dog-girl.’
‘Very good, sir. I will attend to the matter and will do my best to give satisfaction.’
That Aunt Dahlia had not exaggerated the perilous nature of the situation was made clear to me on the following afternoon. Jeeves and I drove down to Bleaching in the two-seater, and we were tooling along about half-way between the village and the Court when suddenly there appeared ahead of us a sea of dogs and in the middle of it young Tuppy frisking round one of those largish, corn-fed girls. He was bending towards her in a devout sort of way, and even at a considerable distance I could see that his ears were pink. His attitude, in short, was unmistakably that of a man endeavouring to push a good thing along; and when I came closer and noted that the girl wore tailor-made tweeds and thick boots, I had no further doubts.
‘You observe, Jeeves?’ I said in a low, significant voice.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘The girl, what?’
‘Yes, sir.’
I tooted amiably on the horn and yodelled a bit. They turned – Tuppy, I fancied, not any too pleased.
‘Oh, hullo, Bertie,’ he said.
‘Hullo,’ I said.
‘My friend, Bertie Wooster,’ said Tuppy to the girl, in what seemed to me rather an apologetic manner. You know – as if he would have preferred to hush me up.
‘Hullo,’ said the girl.
‘Hullo,’ I said.
‘Hullo, Jeeves,’ said Tuppy.
‘Good afternoon, sir,’ said Jeeves.
There was a somewhat constrained silence.
‘Well, goodbye, Bertie,’ said young Tuppy. ‘You’ll be wanting to push along, I expect.’
We Woosters can take a hint as well as the next man.
‘See you later,’ I said.
‘Oh, rather,’ said Tuppy.
I set the machinery in motion again, and we rolled off.
‘Sinister, Jeeves,’ I said. ‘You noticed that the subject was looking like a stuffed frog?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And gave no indication of wanting us to stop and join the party?’
‘No, sir.’
‘I think Aunt Dahlia’s fears are justified. The thing seems serious.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Well, strain the brain, Jeeves.’
‘Very good, sir.’
It wasn’t till I was dressing for dinner that night that I saw young Tuppy again. He trickled in just as I was arranging the tie.
‘Hullo!’ I said.
‘Hullo!’ said Tuppy.
‘Who was the girl?’ I asked, in that casual, snaky way of mine – off-hand, I mean.
‘A Miss Dalgleish,’ said Tuppy, and I noticed that he blushed a spot.
‘Staying here?’
‘No. She lives in that house just before you come to the gates of this place. Did you bring my football boots?’
‘Yes. Jeeves has got them somewhere.’
‘And the water-spaniel?’
‘Sorry. No water-spaniel.’
‘Dashed nuisance. She’s set her heart on an Irish water-spaniel.’
‘Well, what do you care?’
‘I wanted to give her one.’
‘Why?’
Tuppy became a trifle haughty. Frigid. The rebuking eye.
‘Colonel and Mrs Dalgleish,’ he said, ‘have been extremely kind to me since I got here. They have entertained me. I naturally wish to make some return for their hospitality. I don’t want them to look upon me as one of those ill-mannered modern young men you read about in the papers who grab everything they can lay their hooks on and never buy back. If people ask you to lunch and tea and what not, they appreciate it if you make them some little present in return.’
‘Well, give them your football boots. In passing, why did you want the bally things?’
‘I’m playing in a match next Thursday.’
‘Down here?’
‘Yes. Upper Bleaching versus Hockley-cum-Meston. Apparently it’s the big game of the year.’
‘How did you get roped in?’
‘I happened to mention in the course of conversation the other day that, when in London, I generally turn out on Saturdays for the Old Austinians, and Miss Dalgleish seemed rather keen that I should help the village.’
‘Which village?’
‘Upper Bleaching, of course.’
‘Ah, then you’re going to play for Hockley?’
‘You needn’t be funny, Bertie. You may not know it, but I’m pretty hot stuff on the football fiel
d. Oh, Jeeves.’
‘Sir?’ said Jeeves, entering right centre.
‘Mr Wooster tells me you have my football boots.’
‘Yes, sir. I have placed them in your room.’
‘Thanks. Jeeves, do you want to make a bit of money?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Then put a trifle on Upper Bleaching for the annual encounter with Hockley-cum-Meston next Thursday,’ said Tuppy, exiting with swelling bosom.
‘Mr Glossop is going to play on Thursday,’ I explained as the door closed.
‘So I was informed in the Servants’ Hall, sir.’
‘Oh? And what’s the general feeling there about it?’
‘The impression I gathered, sir, was that the Servants’ Hall considers Mr Glossop ill-advised.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘I am informed by Mr Mulready, Sir Reginald’s butler, sir, that this contest differs in some respects from the ordinary football game. Owing to the fact that there has existed for many years considerable animus between the two villages, the struggle is conducted, it appears, on somewhat looser and more primitive lines than is usually the case when two teams meet in friendly rivalry. The primary object of the players, I am given to understand, is not so much to score points as to inflict violence.’
‘Good Lord, Jeeves!’
‘Such appears to be the case, sir. The game is one that would have a great interest for the antiquarian. It was played first in the reign of King Henry VIII, when it lasted from noon till sundown over an area covering several square miles. Seven deaths resulted on that occasion.’
‘Seven!’
‘Not inclusive of two of the spectators, sir. In recent years, however, the casualties appear to have been confined to broken limbs and other minor injuries. The opinion of the Servants’ Hall is that it would be more judicious on Mr Glossop’s part, were he to refrain from mixing himself up in the affair.’
I was more or less aghast. I mean to say, while I had made it my mission in life to get back at young Tuppy for that business at the Drones, there still remained certain faint vestiges, if vestiges is the word I want, of the old friendship and esteem. Besides, there are limits to one’s thirst for vengeance. Deep as my resentment was for the ghastly outrage he had perpetrated on me, I had no wish to see him toddle unsuspiciously into the arena and get all chewed up by wild villagers. A Tuppy scared stiff by a Luminous Rabbit – yes. Excellent business. The happy ending, in fact. But a Tuppy carried off on a stretcher in half a dozen pieces – no. Quite a different matter. All wrong. Not to be considered for a moment.
Obviously, then, a kindly word of warning while there was yet time, was indicated. I buzzed off to his room forthwith, and found him toying dreamily with the football boots.
I put him in possession of the facts.
‘What you had better do – and the Servants’ Hall thinks the same,’ I said, ‘is fake a sprained ankle on the eve of the match.’
He looked at me in an odd sort of way.
‘You suggest that, when Miss Dalgleish is trusting me, relying on me, looking forward with eager, girlish enthusiasm to seeing me help her village on to victory, I should let her down with a thud?’
I was pleased with his ready intelligence.
‘That’s the idea,’ I said.
‘Faugh!’ said Tuppy – the only time I’ve ever heard the word.
‘How do you mean, “Faugh”?’ I asked.
‘Bertie,’ said Tuppy, ‘what you tell me merely makes me all the keener for the fray. A warm game is what I want. I welcome this sporting spirit on the part of the opposition. I shall enjoy a spot of roughness. It will enable me to go all out and give of my best. Do you realize,’ said young Tuppy, vermilion to the gills, ‘that She will be looking on? And do you know how that will make me feel? It will make me feel like some knight of old jousting under the eyes of his lady. Do you suppose that Sir Lancelot or Sir Galahad, when there was a tourney scheduled for the following Thursday, went and pretended they had sprained their ankles just because the thing was likely to be a bit rough?’
‘Don’t forget that in the reign of King Henry VIII –’
‘Never mind about the reign of King Henry VIII. All I care about is that it’s Upper Bleaching’s turn this year to play in colours, so I shall be able to wear my Old Austinian shirt. Light blue, Bertie, with broad orange stripes. I shall look like something, I tell you.’
‘But what?’
‘Bertie,’ said Tuppy, now becoming purely ga-ga, ‘I may as well tell you that I’m in love at last. This is the real thing. I have found my mate. All my life I have dreamed of meeting some sweet, open-air girl with all the glory of the English countryside in her eyes, and I have found her. How different she is, Bertie, from these hot-house, artificial London girls! Would they stand in the mud on a winter afternoon, watching a football match? Would they know what to give an Alsatian for fits? Would they tramp ten miles a day across the fields and come back as fresh as paint? No!’
‘Well, why should they?’
‘Bertie, I’m staking everything on this game on Thursday. At the moment, I have an idea that she looks on me as something of a weakling, simply because I got a blister on my foot the other afternoon and had to take the bus back from Hockley. But when she sees me going through the rustic opposition like a devouring flame, will that make her think a bit? Will that make her open her eyes? What?’
‘What?’
‘I said “What”?’
‘So did I.’
‘I meant, Won’t it?’
‘Oh, rather.’
Here the dinner-gong sounded, not before I was ready for it.
Judicious enquiries during the next couple of days convinced me that the Servants’ Hall at Bleaching Court, in advancing the suggestion that young Tuppy, born and bred in the gentler atmosphere of the Metropolis, would do well to keep out of local disputes and avoid the football-field on which these were to be settled, had not spoken idly. It had weighed its words and said the sensible thing. Feeling between the two villages undoubtedly ran high, as they say.
You know how it is in these remote rural districts. Life tends at times to get a bit slow. There’s nothing much to do in the long winter evenings but listen to the radio and brood on what a tick your neighbour is. You find yourself remembering how Farmer Giles did you down over the sale of your pig, and Farmer Giles finds himself remembering that it was your son, Ernest, who bunged the half-brick at his horse on the second Sunday before Septuagesima. And so on and so forth. How this particular feud had started, I don’t know, but the season of peace and goodwill found it in full blast. The only topic of conversation in Upper Bleaching was Thursday’s game, and the citizenry seemed to be looking forward to it in a spirit that can only be described as ghoulish. And it was the same in Hockley-cum-Meston.
I paid a visit to Hockley-cum-Meston on the Wednesday, being rather anxious to take a look at the inhabitants and see how formidable they were. I was shocked to observe that practically every second male might have been the Village Blacksmith’s big brother. The muscles of their brawny arms were obviously strong as iron bands, and the way the company at the Green Pig, where I looked in incognito for a spot of beer, talked about the forthcoming sporting contest was enough to chill the blood of anyone who had a pal who proposed to fling himself into the fray. It sounded rather like Attila and a few of his Huns sketching out their next campaign.
I went back to Jeeves with my mind made up.
‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘you, who had the job of drying and pressing those dress-clothes of mine, are aware that I have suffered much at young Tuppy Glossop’s hands. By rights, I suppose, I ought to be welcoming the fact that the Wrath of Heaven is now hovering over him in this fearful manner. But the view I take of it is that Heaven looks like overdoing it. Heaven’s idea of a fitting retribution is not mine. In my most unrestrained moments I never wanted the poor blighter assassinated. And the idea in Hockley-cum-Meston seems to be that a good opportunity has ar
isen of making it a bumper Christmas for the local undertaker. There was a fellow with red hair at the Green Pig this afternoon who might have been the undertaker’s partner, the way he talked. We must act, and speedily, Jeeves. We must put a bit of a jerk in it and save young Tuppy in spite of himself.’
‘What course would you advocate, sir?’
‘I’ll tell you. He refuses to do the sensible thing and slide out, because the girl will be watching the game and he imagines, poor lizard, that he is going to shine and impress her. So we must employ guile. You must go up to London today, Jeeves, and tomorrow morning you will send a telegram, signed “Angela,” which will run as follows. Jot it down. Ready?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘“So sorry –” …’ I pondered. ‘What would a girl say, Jeeves, who, having had a row with the bird she was practically engaged to because he told her she looked like a Pekingese in her new hat, wanted to extend the olive-branch?’
‘“So sorry I was cross”, sir, would, I fancy, be the expression.’
‘Strong enough, do you think?’
‘Possibly the addition of the word “darling” would give the necessary verisimilitude, sir.’
‘Right. Resume the jotting. “So sorry I was cross, darling …” No, wait, Jeeves. Scratch that out. I see where we have gone off the rails. I see where we are missing a chance to make this the real tabasco. Sign the telegram not “Angela” but “Travers”.’
‘Very good, sir.’
‘Or, rather, “Dahlia Travers”. And this is the body of the communication. “Please return at once.”’
‘“Immediately” would be more economical, sir. Only one word. And it has a strong ring.’
‘True. Jot on, then. “Please return immediately. Angela in a hell of a state.”’
‘I would suggest “Seriously ill”, sir.’
‘All right. “Seriously ill”. “Angela seriously ill. Keeps calling for you and says you were quite right about hat.”’
‘If I might suggest, sir –?’
‘Well, go ahead.’
‘I fancy the following would meet the case. “Please return immediately. Angela seriously ill. High fever and delirium. Keeps calling your name piteously and saying something about a hat and that you were quite right. Please catch earliest possible train. Dahlia Travers.”’
The Jeeves Omnibus - Vol 3: The Mating Season / Ring for Jeeves / Very Good, Jeeves Page 66
