“What is the matter?” he asked.
“We’re ruined! Listen to this!”
I read him the note:
The Vicarage,.
Twing, Glos.
My Dear Wooster,
As you may have heard, circumstances over which I have no control will prevent my preaching the sermon on Brotherly Love for which you made such a flattering request. I am unwilling, however, that you shall be disappointed, so, if you will attend divine service at Gandle-by-the-Hill this morning, you will hear my sermon preached by young Bates, my nephew. I have lent him the manuscript at his urgent desire. My nephew is one of the candidates for the headmastership of a well-known public school, and the choice is between him and one rival.
Late yesterday evening James received private information that the head of the Board of Governors of the school proposed to sit under him this Sunday in order to judge of the merits of his preaching, a most important item in swaying the Board’s choice. I acceded to his plea that I lend him my sermon on Brotherly Love, of which, like you, he apparently retains a vivid recollection. I just wished to help the boy.
I remain,
Cordially yours,
F. Heppenstall.
PS—Because of the hay-fever, I am dictating this letter to my butler, Brookfield, who will convey it to you.
I don’t know when I’ve experienced a more massive silence than the one that followed my reading of this epistle. Young Bingo gulped once or twice. Jeeves coughed one soft, low, gentle cough, and then stood gazing serenely at the landscape. Finally young Bingo spoke.
“Great Lord!” he whispered hoarsely. “So you had inside information, dash it!”
“Why, yes, sir,” said Jeeves. “Brookfield mentioned the contents of the note to me when he brought it. We are old friends.”
“Well, all I can say,” Bingo cried, “is that it’s unfair! Preaching another man’s sermon! Do you call that honest? Do you call that playing the game?”
“Well, my dear old man,” I said, “be fair. It’s quite within the rules. Clergymen do it all the time. They aren’t expected always to make up the sermons they preach.”
Jeeves coughed again, and fixed me with an expressionless eye.
“And in the present case, sir, if I may be permitted to take the liberty of making the observation, we should remember that the securing of this headmastership meant everything to the young couple.”
“Young couple? What young couple?”
“The Reverend James Bates, sir, and Lady Cynthia. I am informed by her ladyship’s maid that they have been engaged to be married for some weeks; and his lordship made his consent conditional on Mr Bates securing a really important and remunerative position.’
Young Bingo turned a light green.
“Engaged to be married!”
“Yes, sir.”
There was a silence.
“I think I’ll go for a walk,” said Bingo.
“But, my dear old man,” I said, “it’s just lunchtime.”
“I don’t want any lunch!” said Bingo.
14
The Metropolitan Tricks
Young Bingo Little is in many respects a good guy. In one way and another he has made life pretty interesting for me at intervals ever since we were at school. As a companion for a good time I think I would choose him before anybody. On the other hand, I’m bound to say that there are things about him that could be improved. His habit of falling in love with every second girl he sees is one of them; and another is his way of letting the world in on the secrets of his heart.
I mean to say—well, here’s the telegram I got from him one evening in November, about a month after I’d got back to town from my visit to Twing Halclass="underline"
I say Bertie old man I am in love at last. She is the most wonderful girl Bertie old man. This is the real thing at last Bertie. Come here at once and bring Jeeves. Oh I say you know that tobacco shop in Bond Street on the left side as you go up. Will you get me a hundred of their special cigarettes and send them to me here. I know when you see her you will think she is the most wonderful girl. Don’t forget the cigarettes.
Jeeves had brought the telegram in with the evening drink, and I read it to him.
“Of course,” I said. “Young Bingo hasn’t been in love for at least a couple of months. I wonder who it is this time?”
“Miss Mary Burgess[193], sir,” said Jeeves, “the niece of the Reverend Mr Heppenstall. She is staying at Twing Vicarage.”
“Great Lord!” I knew that Jeeves knew practically everything in the world, but this sounded like secondsight. “How do you know that?”
“When we were visiting Twing Hall in the summer, sir, I formed close friendship with Mr Heppenstall’s butler. He told me local news from time to time. From his account, sir, the young lady appears to be a very estimable young lady. Of a somewhat serious nature, I understand. Brookfield[194], my correspondent, writes that last week he observed Mr Little in the moonlight gazing up at his window.”
“Whose window? Brookfield’s?”
“Yes, sir. I think, he was under the impression that it was the young lady’s window.”
“But what is he doing at Twing?”
“Mr Little resumed his old position as tutor to Lord Wickhammersley’s son at Twing Hall, sir.”
“Good Lord, Jeeves! Is there anything you don’t know?”
“I couldn’t say, sir.”
I picked up the telegram.
“I suppose he wants us to help him. Well, what shall we do? Go?”
“I would advocate it, sir. If I may say so, I think that Mr Little should be encouraged.”
“You think he’s picked a winner[195] this time?”
“I hear nothing but excellent reports of the young lady, sir. I think it is beyond question that she would be an admirable influence for Mr Little, should the affair come to a happy conclusion. Such a union would also, I think, restore Mr Little to the good graces of his uncle. The young lady is from a good family and possess private means. In short, sir, I think that if there is anything that we can do we should do it.”
Bingo met us at Twing station next day, and insisted on my sending Jeeves on in the car with the bags while he and I walked. He began:
“She is very wonderful, Bertie. She is not one of these flippant, shallow-minded modern girls. She is sweetly grave and beautifully earnest. She reminds me of Saint Cecilia[196]. She makes me yearn to be a better, nobler, deeper, broader man.”
“What puzzles me,” I said, “is what principle you pick them on. The girls you fall in love with, I mean. I mean to say, what’s your system? As far as I can see, no two of them are alike. First it was Mabel the waitress, then Honoria Glossop, then that fearful Charlotte Corday Rowbotham—”
Bingo shuddered. Thinking of Charlotte always made me shudder, too.
“You don’t seriously mean, Bertie, that you are intending to compare the feeling I have for Mary Burgess, the holy devotion, the spiritual—”
“Oh, all right, let it go,” I said. “I say, old lad, aren’t we going rather a long way round?”
The Hall is about two miles from the station by the main road, and we had gone across country for a bit, climbed a stile or two, and were now working our way across a field that ended in another lane.
“She sometimes takes her little brother for a walk round this way,” explained Bingo. “I thought we would meet her, and you could see her, you know, and then we would walk on.”
“Of course,” I said, “that’s exciting for anyone, but why didn’t we do anything else? Why didn’t we just knock at her door and talk to her?”
“Good Lord!” said Bingo, honestly amazed. “You don’t suppose I’ve got nerve enough for that, do you? I just look at her from afar off and all that sort of thing. Quick! Here she comes! No, I’m wrong!”