Don't tell me you were contemplating descending to that old he-saved-her-from-drowning gag? I am surprised, Jeeves. Surprised and pained. When I was discussing the matter with Aunt Dahlia on my arrival, she said in a sniffy sort of way that she supposed I was going to shove my Cousin Angela into the lake and push Tuppy in to haul her out, and I let her see pretty clearly that I considered the suggestion an insult to my intelligence. And now, if your words have the meaning I read into them, you are mooting precisely the same drivelling scheme. Really, Jeeves!
No, sir. Not that. But the thought did cross my mind, as I walked in the grounds and passed the building where the fire-bell hangs, that a sudden alarm of fire in the night might result in Mr. Glossop endeavouring to assist Miss Angela to safety.
I shivered.
Rotten, Jeeves.
Well, sir
No good. Not a bit like it.
I fancy, sir
No, Jeeves. No more. Enough has been said. Let us drop the subj.
I finished tying the tie in silence. My emotions were too deep for speech. I knew, of course, that this man had for the time being lost his grip, but I had never suspected that he had gone absolutely to pieces like this. Remembering some of the swift ones he had pulled in the past, I shrank with horror from the spectacle of his present ineptitude. Or is it ineptness? I mean this frightful disposition of his to stick straws in his hair and talk like a perfect ass. It was the old, old story, I supposed. A man's brain whizzes along for years exceeding the speed limit, and something suddenly goes wrong with the steering-gear and it skids and comes a smeller in the ditch.
A bit elaborate, I said, trying to put the thing in as kindly a light as possible. Your old failing. You can see that it's a bit elaborate?
Possibly the plan I suggested might be considered open to that criticism, sir, butfaute de mieux
I don't get you, Jeeves.
A French expression, sir, signifying 'for want of anything better'.
A moment before, I had been feeling for this wreck of a once fine thinker nothing but a gentle pity. These words jarred the Wooster pride, inducing asperity.
I understand perfectly well whatfaute de mieuxmeans, Jeeves. I did not recently spend two months among our Gallic neighbours for nothing. Besides, I remember that one from school. What caused my bewilderment was that you should be employing the expression, well knowing that there is no ballyfaute de mieuxabout it at all. Where do you get thatfaute-de-mieuxstuff? Didn't I tell you I had everything taped out?
Yes, sir, but
What do you meanbut?
Well, sir
Push on, Jeeves. I am ready, even anxious, to hear your views.
Well, sir, if I may take the liberty of reminding you of it, your plans in the past have not always been uniformly successful.
There was a silencerather a throbbing oneduring which I put on my waistcoat in a marked manner. Not till I had got the buckle at the back satisfactorily adjusted did I speak.
It is true, Jeeves, I said formally, that once or twice in the past I may have missed the bus. This, however, I attribute purely to bad luck.
Indeed, sir?
On the present occasion I shall not fail, and I'll tell you why I shall not fail. Because my scheme is rooted in human nature.
Indeed, sir?
It is simple. Not elaborate. And, furthermore, based on the psychology of the individual.
Indeed, sir?
Jeeves, I said, don't keep saying 'Indeed, sir?' No doubt nothing is further from your mind than to convey such a suggestion, but you have a way of stressing the 'in' and then coming down with a thud on the 'deed' which makes it virtually tantamount to 'Oh, yeah?' Correct this, Jeeves.
Very good, sir.
I tell you I have everything nicely lined up. Would you care to hear what steps I have taken?
Very much, sir.
Then listen. Tonight at dinner I have recommended Tuppy to lay off the food.
Sir?
Tut, Jeeves, surely you can follow the idea, even though it is one that would never have occurred to yourself. Have you forgotten that telegram I sent to Gussie Fink-Nottle, steering him away from the sausages and ham? This is the same thing. Pushing the food away untasted is a universally recognized sign of love. It cannot fail to bring home the gravy. You must see that?
Well, sir
I frowned.
I don't want to seem always to be criticizing your methods of voice production, Jeeves, I said, but I must inform you that that 'Well, sir' of yours is in many respects fully as unpleasant as your 'Indeed, sir?' Like the latter, it seems to be tinged with a definite scepticism. It suggests a lack of faith in my vision. The impression I retain after hearing you shoot it at me a couple of times is that you consider me to be talking through the back of my neck, and that only a feudal sense of what is fitting restrains you from substituting for it the words 'Says you!'
Oh, no, sir.
Well, that's what it sounds like. Why don't you think this scheme will work?
I fear Miss Angela will merely attribute Mr. Glossop's abstinence to indigestion, sir.
I hadn't thought of that, and I must confess it shook me for a moment. Then I recovered myself. I saw what was at the bottom of all this. Mortified by the consciousness of his own ineptnessor ineptitudethe fellow was simply trying to hamper and obstruct. I decided to knock the stuffing out of him without further preamble.
Oh? I said. You do, do you? Well, be that as it may, it doesn't alter the fact that you've put out the wrong coat. Be so good, Jeeves, I said, indicating with a gesture the gent's ordinary dinner jacket orsmoking, as we call it on the Cote d'Azur, which was suspended from the hanger on the knob of the wardrobe, as to shove that bally black thing in the cupboard and bring out my white mess-jacket with the brass buttons.
He looked at me in a meaning manner. And when I say a meaning manner, I mean there was a respectful but at the same time uppish glint in his eye and a sort of muscular spasm flickered across his face which wasn't quite a quiet smile and yet wasn't quite not a quiet smile. Also the soft cough.
I regret to say, sir, that I inadvertently omitted to pack the garment to which you refer.
The vision of that parcel in the hall seemed to rise before my eyes, and I exchanged a merry wink with it. I may even have hummed a bar or two. I'm not quite sure.
I know you did, Jeeves, I said, laughing down from lazy eyelids and nicking a speck of dust from the irreproachable Mechlin lace at my wrists. But I didn't. You will find it on a chair in the hall in a brown-paper parcel.
The information that his low manoeuvres had been rendered null and void and that the thing was on the strength after all, must have been the nastiest of jars, but there was no play of expression on his finely chiselled to indicate it. There very seldom is on Jeeves's f-c. In moments of discomfort, as I had told Tuppy, he wears a mask, preserving throughout the quiet stolidity of a stuffed moose.
You might just slide down and fetch it, will you?
Very good, sir.
Right ho, Jeeves.
And presently I was sauntering towards the drawing-room with me good old j. nestling snugly abaft the shoulder blades.
And Dahlia was in the drawing-room. She glanced up at my entrance.
Hullo, eyesore, she said. What do you think you're made up as?
I did not get the purport.
The jacket, you mean? I queried, groping.
I do. You look like one of the chorus of male guests at Abernethy Towers in Act 2 of a touring musical comedy.
You do not admire this jacket?
I do not.
You did at Cannes.
Well, this isn't Cannes.
But, dash it
Oh, never mind. Let it go. If you want to give my butler a laugh, what does it matter? What does anything matter now?