Blandings Castle and Elsewhere

by P. G. Wodehouse

  Wiggling her tongue as she shaped the letters, she wrote:

  Ursuline Delmaine

  Theodora Trix

  Uvula Gladwyn

  None of them seemed to her quite what she wanted. She pondered. Possibly something a little more foreign and exotic ...

  Greta Garbo

  No, that had been used ...

  And then suddenly inspiration descended upon her and, trembling a little with emotion, she inscribed on the paper the one name that was absolutely and indubitably right.

  Minna Nordstrom

  The more she looked at it, the better she liked it. And she was still regarding it proudly when there came the sound of a car stopping at the door and a few moments later in walked Mr Schnellenhamer, Mr Zizzbaum and Mr Fishbein. They all wore Homburg hats and carried axes.

  Vera Prebble drew herself up.

  'All goods must be delivered in the rear,' she had begun haughtily, when she recognized her former employers and paused, surprised.

  The recognition was mutual. Mr Fishbein started. So did Mr Zizzbaum.

  'Serpent!' said Mr Fishbein.

  'Viper!' said Mr Zizzbaum.

  Mr Schnellenhamer was more diplomatic. Though as deeply moved as his colleagues by the sight of this traitress, he realized that this was no time for invective.

  'Well, well, well,' he said, with a geniality which he strove to render frank and winning, 'I never dreamed it was you on the 'phone, my dear. Well, this certainly makes everything nice and smooth – us all being, as you might say, old friends.'

  'Friends?' retorted Vera Prebble. 'Let me tell you ...'

  'I know, I know. Quite, quite. But listen. I've got to have some liquor to-night ...'

  'What do you mean, you have?' said Mr Fishbein.

  'It's all right, it's all right,' said Mr Schnellenhamer soothingly. 'I was coming to that. I wasn't forgetting you. We're all in this together. The good old spirit of co-operation. You see, my dear,' he went on, 'that little joke you played on us ... oh, I'm not blaming you. Nobody laughed more heartily than myself...'

  'Yes, they did,' said Mr Fishbein, alive now to the fact that this girl before him must be conciliated. 'I did.'

  'So did I,' said Mr Zizzbaum.

  'We all laughed very heartily,' said Mr Schenellenhamer. 'You should have heard us. A girl of spirit, we said to ourselves. Still, the little pleasantry has left us in something of a difficulty, and it will be worth a hundred dollars to you, my dear, to go upstairs and put cotton-wool in your ears while we get at Mr Glutz's cellar door with our axes.'

  Vera Prebble raised her eyebrows.

  'What do you want to break down the cellar door for? I know the combination of the lock.'

  'You do?' said Mr Schnellenhamer joyfully.

  'I withdraw that expression "Serpent,"' said Mr Fishbein.

  'When I used the term "Viper,"' said Mr Zizzbaum, 'I was speaking thoughtlessly.'

  'And I will tell it you,' said Vera Prebble, 'at a price.'

  She drew back her head and extended an arm, twiddling the fingers at the end of it. She was plainly registering something, but they could not discern what it was.

  'There is only one condition on which I will tell you the combination of Mr Glutz's cellar, and that is this. One of you has got to give me a starring contract for five years.'

  The magnates started.

  'Listen,' said Mr Zizzbaum, 'you don't want to star.'

  'You wouldn't like it,' said Mr Fishbein.

  'Of course you wouldn't,' said Mr Schnellenhamer. 'You would look silly, starring – an inexperienced girl like you. Now, if you had said a nice small part ...'

  'Star.'

  'Or featured ...'

  'Star.'

  The three men drew back a pace or two and put their heads together.

  'She means it,' said Mr Fishbein.

  'Her eyes,' said Mr Zizzbaum. 'Like stones.'

  'A dozen times I could have dropped something heavy on that girl's head from an upper landing, and I didn't do it,' said Mr Schnellenhamer remorsefully.

  Mr Fishbein threw up his hands.

  'It's no use. I keep seeing that vision of Mrs Fishbein floating before me with eight cubes of ice on her head. I'm going to star this girl.'

  'You are?' said Mr Zizzbaum. 'And get the stuff? And leave me to go home and tell Mrs Zizzbaum there won't be anything to drink at her party to-night for a hundred and eleven guests including the Vice-President of Switzerland? No, sir! I am going to star her.'

  'I'll outbid you.'

  'You won't outbid me. Not till they bring me word that Mrs Zizzbaum has lost the use of her vocal chords.'

  'Listen,' said the other tensely. 'When it comes to using vocal chords, Mrs Fishbein begins where Mrs Zizzbaum leaves off.'

  Mr Schnellenhamer, that cool head, saw the peril that loomed.

  'Boys,' he said, 'if we once start bidding against one another, there'll be no limit. There's only one thing to be done. We must merge.'

  His powerful personality carried the day. It was the President of the newly-formed Perfecto-Zizzbaum Corporation who a few moments later stepped forward and approached the girl.

  'We agree.'

  And, as he spoke, there came the sound of some heavy vehicle stopping in the road outside. Vera Prebble uttered a stricken exclamation.

  'Well, of all the silly girls!' she cried distractedly. 'I've just remembered that an hour ago I telephoned the police, informing them of Mr Glutz's cellar. And here they are!'

  Mr Fishbein uttered a cry, and began to look round for something to bang his head against. Mr Zizzbaum gave a short, sharp moan, and started to lower himself to the floor. But Mr Schnellenhamer was made of sterner stuff.

  'Pull yourselves together, boys,' he begged them. 'Leave all this to me. Everything is going to be all right. Things have come to a pretty pass,' he said, with a dignity as impressive as it was simple, 'if a free-born American citizen cannot bribe the police of his native country.'

  'True,' said Mr Fishbein, arresting his head when within an inch and a quarter of a handsome Oriental vase.

  'True, true,' said Mr Zizzbaum, getting up and dusting his knees.

  'Just let me handle the whole affair,' said Mr Schnellenhamer. Ah, boys!' he went on, genially.

  Three policemen had entered the room – a sergeant, a patrolman, and another patrolman. Their faces wore a wooden, hard-boiled look.

  'Mr Glutz?' said the sergeant.

  'Mr Schnellenhamer,' corrected the great man. 'But Jacob to you, old friend.'

  The sergeant seemed in no wise mollified by this amiability.

  'Prebble, Vera?' he asked, addressing the girl.

  'Nordstrom, Minna,' she replied.

  'Got the name wrong, then. Anyway, it was you who 'phoned us that there was alcoholic liquor on the premises?'

  Mr Schnellenhamer laughed amusedly.

  'You mustn't believe everything that girl tells you, sergeant. She's a great ladder. Always was. If she said that, it was just one of her little jokes. I know Glutz. I know his views. And many is the time I have heard him say that the laws of his country are good enough for him and that he would scorn not to obey them. You will find nothing here, sergeant.'

  'Well, we'll try,' said the other. 'Show us the way to the cellar,' he added, turning to Vera Prebble

  Mr Schnellenhamer smiled a winning smile.

  'Now, listen,' he said. 'I've just remembered I'm wrong. Silly mistake to make, and I don't know how I made it. There is a certain amount of the stuff in the house, but I'm sure you dear chaps don't want to cause any unpleasantness. You're broadminded. Listen. Your name's Murphy, isn't it?'

  'Donahue.'

  'I thought so. Well, you'll laugh at this. Only this morning I was saying to Mrs Schnellenhamer that I must really slip down to head-quarters and give my old friend Donahue that ten dollars I owed him.'

  'What ten dollars?'

  'I didn't say ten. I said a hundred. One hundred dollars, Donny, old man, and I'm not
saying there mightn't be a little over for these two gentlemen here. How about it?'

  The sergeant drew himself up. There was no sign of softening in his glance.

  'Jacob Schnellenhamer,' he said coldly, 'you can't square me. When I tried for a job at the Colossal-Exquisite last spring I was turned down on account you said I had no sex-appeal.'

  The first patrolman, who had hitherto taken no part in the conversation, started.

  'Is that so, Chief?'

  'Yessir. No sex-appeal.'

  'Well, can you tie that!' said the first patrolman. 'When I tried to crash the Colossal-Exquisite, they said my voice wasn't right.'

  'Me,' said the second patrolman, eyeing Mr Schnellenhamer sourly, 'they had the nerve to beef at my left profile. Lookout, boys,' he said, turning, 'can you see anything wrong with that profile?'

  His companions studied him closely. The sergeant raised a hand and peered between his fingers with his head tilted back and his eyes half closed.

  'Not a thing,' he said.

  'Why, Basil, it's a lovely profile,' said the first patrolman.

  'Well, that's how it goes,' said the second patrolman moodily.

  The sergeant had returned to his own grievance.

  'No sex-appeal!' he said with a rasping laugh. 'And me that had specially taken sex-appeal in the College of Eastern Iowa course of Motion Picture Acting.'

  'Who says my voice ain't right?' demanded the first patrolman. 'Listen. Mi-mi-mi-mi-mi.'

  'Swell,' said the sergeant.

  'Like a nightingale or something,' said the second patrolman.

  The sergeant flexed his muscles.

  'Ready, boys?'

  'Kayo, Chief.'

  'Wait!' cried Mr Schnellenhamer. 'Wait! Give me one more chance. I'm sure I can find parts for you all.'

  The sergeant shook his head.

  'No. It's too late. You've got us mad now. You don't appreciate the sensitiveness of the artist. Does he, boys?'

  'You're darned right he doesn't,' said the first patrolman.

  'I wouldn't work for the Colossal-Exquisite now,' said the second patrolman with a petulant twitch of his shoulder, 'not if they wanted me to play Romeo opposite Jean Harlow.'

  'Then let's go,' said the sergeant. 'Come along, lady, you show us where this cellar is.'

  For some moments after the officers of the Law, preceded by Vera Prebble, had left, nothing was to be heard in the silent sitting-room but the rhythmic beating of Mr Fishbein's head against the wall and the rustling sound of Mr Zizzbaum rolling round the floor. Mr Schnellenhamer sat brooding with his chin in his hands, merely moving his legs slightly each time Mr Zizzbaum came round. The failure of his diplomatic efforts had stunned him.

  A vision rose before his eyes of Mrs Schnellenhamer waiting in their sunlit patio for his return. As clearly as if he had been there now, he could see her swooning, slipping into the goldfish pond, and blowing bubbles with her head beneath the surface. And he was asking himself whether in such an event it would be better to raise her gently or just leave Nature to take its course. She would, he knew, be extremely full of that stormy emotion of which she had once been queen.

  It was as he still debated this difficult point that a light step caught his ear. Vera Prebble was standing in the doorway.

  'Mr Schnellenhamer.'

  The magnate waved a weary hand.

  'Leave me,' he said. 'I am thinking.'

  'I thought you would like to know,' said Vera Prebble, 'that I've just locked those cops in the coal-cellar.'

  As in the final reel of a super-super-film eyes brighten and faces light up at the entry of the United States Marines, so at these words did Mr Schnellenhamer, Mr Fishbein and Mr Zizzbaum perk up as if after a draught of some magic elixir.

  'In the coal-cellar?' gasped Mr Schnellenhamer.

  'In the coal-cellar.'

  'Then if we work quick ...'

  Vera Prebble coughed.

  'One moment,' she said. 'Just one moment. Before you go, I have drawn up a little letter, covering our recent agreement. Perhaps you will all three just sign it.'

  Mr Schnellenhamer clicked his tongue impatiently.

  'No time for that now. Come to my office tomorrow. Where are you going?' he asked, as the girl started to withdraw.

  'Just to the coal-cellar,' said Vera Prebble. 'I think those fellows may want to come out.'

  Mr Schnellenhamer sighed. It had been worth trying, of course, but he had never really had much hope.

  'Gimme,' he said resignedly.

  The girl watched as the three men attached their signatures. She took the document and folded it carefully.

  'Would any of you like to hear me recite "The Bells," by Edgar Allan Poe?' she asked.

  'No!' said Mr Fishbein.

  'No!' said Mr Zizzbaum.

  'No!' said Mr Schnellenhamer. 'We have no desire to hear you recite "The Bells," Miss Prebble.'

  The girl's eyes flashed haughtily.

  'Miss Nordstrom,' she corrected. 'And just for that you'll get "The Charge of the Light Brigade," and like it.'

  12 THE CASTAWAYS

  MONDAY night in the bar-parlour of the Angler's Rest is usually Book Night. This is due to the fact that on Sunday afternoon it is the practice of Miss Postlethwaite, our literature-loving barmaid, to retire to her room with a box of caramels and a novel from the circulating library and, having removed her shoes, to lie down on the bed and indulge in what she calls a good old read. On the following evening she places the results of her researches before us and invites our judgment.

  This week-end it was one of those Desert Island stories which had claimed her attention.

  'It's where this ship is sailing the Pacific Ocean,' explained Miss Postlethwaite, 'and it strikes a reef and the only survivors are Cyril Trevelyan and Eunice Westleigh, and they float ashore on a plank to this uninhabited island. And gradually they find the solitude and what I might call the loneliness drawing them strangely together, and in Chapter Nineteen, which is as far as I've got, they've just fallen into each other's arms and all around was the murmur of the surf and the cry of wheeling sea-birds. And why I don't see how it's all going to come out,' said Miss Postlethwaite, 'is because they don't like each other really and, what's more, Eunice is engaged to be married to a prominent banker in New York and Cyril to the daughter of the Duke of Rotherhithe. Looks like a mix-up to me.'

  A Sherry and Bitters shook his head.

  'Far-fetched,' he said disapprovingly. 'Not the sort of thing that ever really happens.'

  'On the contrary,' said Mr Mulliner. 'It is an almost exact parallel to the case of Genevieve Bootle and my brother Joseph's younger son, Bulstrode.'

  'Were they cast ashore on a desert island?'

  'Practically,' said Mr Mulliner. 'They were in Hollywood, writing dialogue for the talking pictures.'

  Miss Postlethwaite, who prides herself on her encyclopædic knowledge of English Literature, bent her shapely eyebrows.

  'Bulstrode Mulliner? Genevieve Bootle?' she murmured. 'I never read anything by them. What did they write?'

  'My nephew,' Mr Mulliner hastened to explain, 'was not an author. Nor was Miss Bootle. Very few of those employed in writing motion-picture dialogue are. The executives of the studios just haul in anyone they meet and make them sign contracts. Most of the mysterious disappearances you read about are due to this cause. Only the other day they found a plumber who had been missing for years. All the time he had been writing dialogue for the Mishkin Brothers. Once having reached Los Angeles, nobody is safe.'

  'Rather like the old Press Gang,' said the Sherry and Bitters.

  'Just like the old Press Gang,' said Mr Mulliner.

  My nephew Bulstrode (said Mr Mulliner), as is the case with so many English younger sons, had left his native land to seek his fortune abroad, and at the time when this story begins was living in New York, where he had recently become betrothed to a charming girl of the name of Mabelle Ridgway.

  Although naturally eag
er to get married, the young couple were prudent. They agreed that before taking so serious a step they ought to have a little capital put by. And, after talking it over, they decided that the best plan would be for Bulstrode to go to California and try to strike Oil.

  So Bulstrode set out for Los Angeles, all eagerness and enthusiasm, and the first thing that happened to him was that somebody took his new hat, a parting gift from Mabelle, leaving in its place in the club car of the train a Fedora that was a size too small for him.

  The train was running into the station when he discovered his loss, and he hurried out to scan his fellow-passengers, and presently there emerged a stout man with a face rather like that of a vulture which has been doing itself too well on the corpses. On this person's head was the missing hat.

  And, just as Bulstrode was about to accost this stout man there came up a mob of camera-men, who photographed him in various attitudes, and before Bulstrode could get a word in he was bowling off in a canary-coloured automobile bearing on its door in crimson letters the legend 'Jacob Z. Schnellenhamer, President Perfecto-Zizzbaum Motion Picture Corp.'

  All the Mulliners are men of spirit, and Bulstrode did not propose to have his hats sneaked, even by the highest in the land, without lodging a protest. Next morning he called at the offices of the Perfecto-Zizzbaum, and after waiting four hours was admitted to the presence of Mr Schnellenhamer.

  The motion-picture magnate took a quick look at Bulstrode and thrust a paper and a fountain pen towards him.

  'Sign here,' he said.

  A receipt for the hat, no doubt, thought Bulstrode. He scribbled his name at the bottom of the document, and Mr Schnellenhamer pressed the bell.

  'Miss Stern,' he said, addressing his secretary, 'what vacant offices have we on the lot?'

  'There is Room 40 in the Leper Colony.'

  'I thought there was a song-writer there.'

  'He passed away Tuesday.'

  'Has the body been removed?'

  'Yes, sir.'

  'Then Mr Mulliner will occupy the room, starting from to-day. He has just signed a contract to write dialogue for us.'

  Bulstrode would have spoken, but Mr Schnellenhamer silenced him with a gesture.