Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit

1

As I sat in the bath tub,
soaping a meditative foot and singing, if I remember correctly, ‘Pale Hands I
Loved Beside the Shalimar’, it would be deceiving my public to say that I was
feeling boomps-a-daisy. The evening that lay before me promised to be one of
those sticky evenings, no good to man or beast. My Aunt Dahlia, writing from
her country residence, Brinkley Court down in Worcestershire, had asked me as a
personal favour to take some acquaintances of hers out to dinner, a couple of
the name of Trotter.

They
were, she said, creeps of the first water and would bore the pants
off
me,
but it was imperative that they be given the old oil, because she was in the
middle of a very tricky business deal with the male half of the sketch and at
such times every little helps. ‘Don’t fail me, my beautiful bountiful Bertie’,
her letter had concluded, on a note of poignant appeal.

Well,
this Dahlia is my good and deserving aunt, not to be confused with Aunt Agatha,
the one who kills rats with her teeth and devours her young, so when she says Don’t
fail me, I don’t fail her. But, as I say, I was in no sense looking forward to
the binge. The view I took of it was that the curse had come upon me.

It had
done so, moreover, at a moment when I was already lowered spiritually by the
fact that for the last couple of weeks or so Jeeves had been away on his summer
holiday. Round about the beginning of July each year he downs tools, the
slacker, and goes off to Bognor Regis for the shrimping, leaving me in much the
same position as those poets one used to have to read at school who were always
beefing about losing gazelles. For without this right-hand man at his side
Bertram Wooster becomes a mere shadow of his former self and in no condition to
cope with any ruddy Trotters.

Brooding
darkly on these Trotters, whoever they might be, I was starting to scour the
left elbow and had switched to ‘Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life’, when my reverie was
interrupted by the sound of a soft footstep in the bedroom, and I sat up, alert
and, as you might say, agog, the soap frozen in my grasp. If feet were stepping
softly in my sleeping quarters, it could only mean, I felt, unless of course a
burglar had happened to drop in, that the prop of the establishment had
returned from his vacation, no doubt looking bronzed and fit.

A quiet
cough told me that I had reasoned astutely, and I gave tongue.

‘Is
that you, Jeeves?’

‘Yes,
sir.’

‘Home
again, what?’

‘Yes,
sir.’

‘Welcome
to 3a Berkeley Mansions, London, W. 1,’ I said, feeling like a shepherd when a
strayed sheep comes trickling back to the fold. ‘Did you have a good time?’

‘Most
agreeable, thank you, sir.’

‘You
must tell me all about it.

‘Certainly,
sir, at your convenience.’

‘I’ll
bet you hold me spellbound. What are you doing in there?’

‘A
letter has just arrived for you, sir. I was placing it on the dressing—table.
Will you be dining in, sir?’

‘No,
out, blast it! A blind date with some slabs of gorgonzola sponsored by Aunt
Dahlia. So if you want to go to the club, carry on.’

As I
have mentioned elsewhere in these memoirs of mine, Jeeves belongs to a rather
posh club for butlers and valets called the Junior Ganymede, situated somewhere
in Curzon Street, and I knew that after his absence from the metropolis he
would be all eagerness to buzz round there and hobnob with the boys, picking up
the threads and all that sort of thing. When I’ve been away for a week or two,
my first move is always to make a beeline for the Drones.

‘I can
see you getting a rousing welcome from the members, with a hey-nonny-nonny and
a hot cha-cha,’ I said. ‘Did I hear you say something about there being a
letter for me?’

‘Yes,
sir. It was delivered a moment ago by special messenger. ‘‘Important, do you
think?’

‘One
can only conjecture, sir.’

‘Better
open it and read contents.’

‘Very
good, sir.’

There
was a stage wait of about a minute and a half, during which, my moodiness now
much lightened, I rendered ‘Roll Out the Barrel’, ‘I Love a Lassie’, and ‘Every
Day I Bring Thee Violets’, in the order named. In due season his voice filtered
through the woodwork.

‘The
letter is of considerable length, sir. Perhaps if I were to give you its
substance?’

‘Do so,
Jeeves. All ready at this end.’

‘It is
from a Mr. Percy Gorringe, sir. Omitting extraneous matter and concentrating on
essentials, Mr. Gorringe wishes to borrow a thousand pounds from you.’

I
started sharply, causing the soap to shoot from my hand and fall with a dull
thud on the bath mat. With no preliminary warning to soften the shock, his
words had momentarily unmanned me. It is not often that one is confronted with
ear-biting on so majestic a scale, a flyer till next Wednesday being about the
normal tariff.

‘You
said…
what,
Jeeves? A thousand pounds? But who is this hound of hell?
I don’t know any Gorringes.’

‘I
gather from his communication that you and the gentleman have not met, sir. But
he mentions that he is the stepson of a Mr. L.G. Trotter, with whom Mrs.
Travers appears to be acquainted.’

I
nodded. Not much use, of course, as he couldn’t see me.

‘Yes,
he’s on solid ground there,’ I admitted. ‘Aunt Dahlia does know Trotter. He’s
the bloke she has asked me to put the nosebag on with tonight. So far, so good.
But I don’t see that being Trotter’s stepson entitles this Gorringe to think he
can sit on my lap and help himself to the contents of my wallet. I mean, it
isn’t a case of “Any stepson of yours, L.G. Trotter, is a stepson of mine”.
Dash it, Jeeves, once start letting yourself be touched by stepsons, and where
are you? The word flies round the family circle that you’re a good provider,
and up roll all the sisters and cousins and aunts and nephews and uncles to
stake out their claims, several being injured in the crush. The place becomes a
shambles.’

‘There
is much in what you say, sir, but it appears to be not so much a loan as an
investment that the gentleman is seeking. He wishes to give you the opportunity
of contributing the money to the production of his dramatization of Lady
Florence Craye’s novel
Spindrift.’

‘Oh,
that’s it, is it? I see. Yes, one begins to follow the trend of thought.’

This
Florence Craye is… well, I suppose you would call her a sort of step-cousin
of mine or cousin once removed or something of that nature. She is Lord
Worplesdon’s daughter, and old W. in a moment of temporary insanity recently
married my Aunt Agatha
en secondes noces,
as I believe the expression
is. She is one of those intellectual girls, her bean crammed to bursting point
with the little grey cells, and about a year ago, possibly because she was full
of the divine fire but more probably because she wanted something to take her
mind off Aunt Agatha, she wrote this novel and it was well received by the
intelligentsia, who notoriously enjoy the most frightful bilge.

‘Did
you ever read
Spindrift?’
I asked, retrieving the soap.

‘I
skimmed through it, sir.’

‘What
did you think of it? Go on, Jeeves, don’t be coy. The word begins with an I.’

‘Well,
sir, I would not go so far as to apply to it the adjective which I fancy you
have in mind, but it seemed to me a somewhat immature production, lacking in
significant form. My personal tastes lie more in the direction of Dostoevsky
and the great Russians. Nevertheless, the story was not wholly devoid of
interest and might quite possibly have its appeal for the theatregoing public.’

I mused
awhile. I was trying to remember something, but couldn’t think what. Then I got
it.

‘But I
don’t understand this,’ I said. ‘I distinctly recall Aunt Dahlia telling me
that Florence had told her that some manager had taken the play and was going
to put it on. Poor misguided sap, I recollect saying. Well, if that is so, why
is Percy dashing about trying to get into people’s ribs like this? What does he
want a thousand quid for? These are deep waters, Jeeves.’

‘That
is explained in the gentleman’s letter, sir. It appears that one of the
syndicate financing the venture, who had promised the sum in question, finds
himself unable to fulfil his obligations. This, I believe, frequently happens
in the world of the theatre.’

I mused
again, letting the moisture from the sponge slide over the torso. Another point
presented itself.

‘But
why didn’t Florence tell Percy to go and have a pop at Stilton Cheesewright?
She being engaged to him, I mean. One would have thought that Stilton, linked
to her by bonds of love, would have been the people’s choice.’

‘Possibly
Mr. Cheesewright has not a thousand pounds at his disposal, sir.

‘That’s
true. I see what you’re driving at. Whereas I have, you mean?’

‘Precisely,
sir.’

The
situation had clarified somewhat. Now that I had the facts, I could discern
that Percy’s move had been based on sound principles. When you are trying to
raise a thousand quid, the first essential, of course, is to go to someone who
has got a thousand quid, and no doubt he had learned from Florence that I was
stagnant with the stuff. But where he had made his error was in supposing that
I was the king of the mugs and in the habit of scattering vast sums like
birdseed to all and sundry.

‘Would
you back a play, Jeeves?’

‘No,
sir.’

‘Nor
would I. I meet him with a firm
nolle prosequi,
I think, don’t you, and
keep the money in the old oak chest?’

‘I
would certainly advocate such a move, sir.

‘Right.
Percy gets the bird. Let him eat cake. And now to a more urgent matter. While
I’m dressing, will you be mixing me a strengthening cocktail?’

‘Certainly,
sir. A martini or one of my specials?’

‘The
latter.’

I spoke
in no uncertain voice. It was not merely the fact that I was up against an
evening with a couple whom Aunt Dahlia, always a good judge, had described as
creeps that influenced this decision on my part. I needed fortifying for
another reason.

These
last few days, with Jeeves apt to return at any moment, it had been borne in
upon me quite a good deal that when the time came for us to stand face to face
I should require something pretty authoritative in the way of bracers to nerve
me for what would inevitably be a testing encounter, calling for all that I had
of determination and the will to win. If I was to emerge from it triumphant,
no stone must be left unturned and no avenue unexplored.

You
know how it is when two strong men live in close juxtaposition, if
juxtaposition is the word I want. Differences arise. Wills clash. Bones of
contention pop up and start turning handsprings. No one was more keenly alive
than I to the fact that one such bone was scheduled to make its début the
instant I swam into his ken, and mere martinis, I felt, despite their numerous
merits, would not be enough to see me through the ordeal that confronted me.

It was
in quite fairly tense mood that I dried and clothed the person, and while it
would perhaps be too much to say that as I entered the sitting-room some
quarter of an hour later I was a—twitter, I was unquestionably conscious of a
certain jumpiness. When Jeeves came in with the shaker, I dived at it like a
seal going after a slice of fish and drained a quick one, scarcely pausing to
say ‘Skin off your nose.

The
effect was magical. That apprehensive feeling left me, to be succeeded by a
quiet sense of power. I cannot put it better than by saying that, as the fire
coursed through my veins, Wooster the timid fawn became in a flash Wooster the
man of iron will, ready for anything. What Jeeves inserts in these specials of
his I have never ascertained, but their morale-building force is extraordinary.
They wake the sleeping tiger in a chap. Well, to give you some idea, I remember
once after a single one of them striking the table with clenched fist and
telling my Aunt Agatha to stop talking rot. And I’m not sure it wasn’t bally
rot.’