That would fix up everything, wouldn't it?"
"Unquestionably, m'lord. Even a sale at a sacrifice price would enable your lordship to do—"
"The square thing?"
"Precisely, m'lord. I may add that while on our way to the ruined chapel last night, Mrs. Spottsworth spoke in high terms of the charms of Rowcester Abbey and was equally cordial in her remarks as we were returning. All in all, m'lord, I would say that the prospects were distinctly favourable, and if I might offer the suggestion, I think that your lordship should now withdraw to the library and obtain material for what is termed a sales talk by skimming through the advertisements in Country Life, in which, as your lordship is possibly aware, virtually every large house which has been refused as a gift by the National Trust is offered for sale. The language is extremely persuasive."
"Yes, I know the sort of thing. "This lordly demesne, with its avenues of historic oaks, its tumbling streams alive with trout and tench, its breath-taking vistas lined with flowering shrubs ...'
Yes, I'll bone up."
"It might possibly assist your lordship if I were to bring a small bottle of champagne to the library."
"You think of everything, Jeeves."
"Your lordship is too kind."
"Half a bot should do the trick."
"I think so, m'lord, if adequately iced."
It was some minutes later, as Jeeves was passing through the living-room with the brain-restorer on a small tray, that Jill came in through the French window.
It is a characteristic of women as a sex, and one that does credit to their gentle hearts, that—unless they are gangster's molls or something of that kind— they shrink from the thought of violence. Even when love is dead, they dislike the idea of the man to whom they were once betrothed receiving a series of juicy ones from a horsewhip in the competent hands of an elderly, but still muscular, Chief Constable of a county. When they hear such a Chief Constable sketching out plans for an operation of this nature, their instinct is to hurry to the prospective victim's residence and warn him of his peril by outlining the shape of things to come.
It was to apprise Bill of her father's hopes and dreams that Jill had come to Rowcester Abbey and, not being on speaking terms with her former fianc`e, she had been wondering a little how the information she was bringing could be conveyed to him. The sight of Jeeves cleared up this point. A few words of explanation to Jeeves, coupled with the suggestion that he should advise Bill to lie low till the old gentleman had blown over, would accomplish what she had in mind, and she could then go home again, her duty done and the whole unpleasant affair disposed of.
"Oh, Jeeves," she said.
Jeeves had turned, and was regarding her with respectful benevolence.
"Good afternoon, miss. You will find his lordship in the library."
Jill stiffened haughtily. There was not much of her, but what there was she drew to its full height.
"No, I won't," she replied in a voice straight from the frigidaire, "because I'm jolly well not going there. I haven't the slightest wish to speak to Lord Rowcester. I want you to give him a message."
"Very good, miss."
"Tell him my father is coming here to borrow his horsewhip to horsewhip him with."
"Miss?"
"It's quite simple, isn't it? You know my father?"
"Yes, miss."
"And you know what a horsewhip is?"
"Yes, miss."
"Well, tell Lord Rowcester the combination is on its way over."
"And if his lordship should express curiosity as to the reason for Colonel Wyvern's annoyance?"
"You may say it's because I told him about what happened last night. Or this morning, to be absolutely accurate. At two o'clock this morning. He'll understand."
"At two o'clock this morning, miss? That would have been at about the hour when I was escorting Mrs.
Spottsworth to the ruined chapel. The lady had expressed a wish to establish contact with the apparition of Lady Agatha. The wife of Sir Caradoc the Crusader, miss, who did well, I believe, at the Battle of Joppa. She is reputed to haunt the ruined chapel."
Jill collapsed into a chair. A sudden wild hope, surging through the cracks in her broken heart, had shaken her from stem to stern, making her feel boneless.
"What ... what did you say?"
Jeeves was a kindly man, and not only a kindly man but a man who could open a bottle of champagne as quick as a flash. It was in something of the spirit of the Sir Philip Sidney who gave the water to the stretcher case that he now whisked the cork from the bottle he was carrying. Jill's need, he felt, was greater than Bill's.
"Permit me, miss."
Jill drank gratefully. Her eyes had widened, and the colour was returning to her face.
"Jeeves, this is a matter of life and death," she said. "At two o'clock this morning I saw Lord Rowcester coming out of Mrs.
Spottsworth's room looking perfectly frightful in mauve pyjamas. Are you telling me that Mrs. Spottsworth was not there?"
"Precisely, miss. She was with me in the ruined chapel, holding me spellbound with her account of recent investigations of the Society of Psychical Research."
"Then what was Lord Rowcester doing in her room?"
"Purloining the lady's pendant, miss."
It was unfortunate that as he said these words Jill should have been taking a sip of champagne, for she choked. And as her companion would have considered it a liberty to slap her on the back, it was some moments before she was able to speak.
"Purloining Mrs. Spottsworth's pendant?"
"Yes, miss. It is a long and somewhat intricate story, but if you would care for me to run through the salient points, I should be delighted to do so. Would it interest you to hear the inside history of his lordship's recent activities, culminating, as I have indicated, in the abstracting of Mrs.
Spottsworth's ornament?"
Jill drew in her breath with a hiss.
"Yes, Jeeves, it would."
"Very good, miss. Then must I speak of one who loved not wisely but too well, of one whose subdued eyes, albeit unused to the melting mood, drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees their medicinal gum."
"Jeeves!"
"Miss?"
"What on earth are you talking about?"
Jeeves looked a little hurt.
"I was endeavouring to explain that it was for love of you, miss, that his lordship became a Silver Ring bookmaker."
"A what?"
"Having plighted his troth to you, miss, his lordship felt—rightly, in my opinion—that in order to support a wife he would require a considerably larger income than he had been enjoying up to that moment. After weighing and rejecting the claims of other professions, he decided to embark on the career of a bookmaker in the Silver Ring, trading under the name of Honest Patch Perkins. I officiated as his lordship's clerk. We wore false moustaches."
Jill opened her mouth, then, as if feeling that any form of speech would be inadequate, closed it again.
"For a time the venture paid very handsomely. In three days at Doncaster we were so fortunate as to amass no less a sum than four hundred and twenty pounds, and it was in optimistic mood that we proceeded to Epsom for the Oaks. But disaster was lurking in wait for his lordship. To use the metaphor that the tide turned would be inaccurate.
What smote his lordship was not so much the tide as a single tidal wave. Captain Biggar, miss.
He won a double at his lordship's expense— five pounds on Lucy Glitters at a hundred to six, all to come on Whistler's Mother, S.p."
Jill spoke faintly.
"What was the S.p.?"
"I deeply regret to say, miss, thirty-three to one. And as he had rashly refused to lay the wager off, this cataclysm left his lordship in the unfortunate position of owing Captain Biggar in excess of three thousand pounds, with no assets with which to meet his obligations."