Heavy Weather

by P. G. Wodehouse

  'Do,' said Lord Emsworth.

  'I can read Parsloe's mind like a book. A day or two after young Monty's arrival, there will be a mysterious stranger sneaking about the grounds in the vicinity of the Empress's sty. He will be there because Parsloe, taking it for granted that our attention will be riveted on young Monty, will imagine that the coast is clear.'

  'God bless my soul!'

  'And apparently the coast will be clear. We must arrange that. From now on, Clarence, you must not loaf about the Empress openly. You must conceal yourself in the background. And you must instruct Pirbright to conceal himself in the background. This fellow must be led to suppose that vigilance has been relaxed. By these means, we shall catch him red-handed.'

  In Lord Emsworth's eye, as he gazed at his brother, there was the reverential look of a disciple at the feet of his master. He had always known, he told himself, that as a practical adviser in matters having to do with the seamier side of life the other was unsurpassed. It was the result, he supposed of the environment in which he had spent his formative years. Membership of the old Pelican Club might not elevate a man socially, but there was no doubt about its educative properties. If it dulled the moral sense, it undoubtedly sharpened the intellect.

  4 You have taken a great weight off my mind, Galahad,' he said. 'I feel sure you are perfectly right. The only mistake I think you make is in supposing that this young Bodkin is harmless. I am convinced that he will require watching.'

  'Well, watch him, then, if it will make you any happier.'

  'It will,' said Lord Emsworth decidedly. 'And meanwhile I will be giving Pirbright his instructions.'

  'Tell him to lurk.'

  'Exactly.'

  'Some rude disguise such as a tree or a pail of potato-peel would help.'

  Lord Emsworth reflected.

  'I don't think Pirbright could disguise himself as a tree.' " Nonsense. What do you pay him for ?'

  Lord Emsworth continued dubious. Only God, he seemed to be feeling, can make a tree. 'Well, at any rate, tell him to lurk.' 'Oh, he shall certainly lurk.'

  'From now on . . .' began the Hon. Galahad, and broke off to wave at some object in his companion's rear. The latter turned.

  'Ah, that nice little Smith girl,' he said.

  Sue had appeared on the edge of the lawn. Lord Emsworth beamed vaguely in her direction.

  "By the way, Galahad,' he said, 'is a chorus-girl the same as a ballet-girl?'

  'Certainly not. Different thing altogether.'

  ‘I thought so,' said Lord Emsworth. 'Connie's an ass.'

  He pottered away, and Sue crossed the turf to where the Hon. Galahad sat.

  The author of the Reminiscences scanned her affectionately through his monocle. Amazing, he was thinking, how like her mother she was. He noticed it more every day. Dolly's walk, and just that way of tilting her chin and smiling at you that Dolly had had. For an instant the years fell away from the Hon. Galahad Threepwood, and something that was not of this world went whispering through the garden.

  Sue stood looking down at him. She placed a maternal finger on top of his head, and began to twist the grey hair round it.

  "Well, young Gally.'

  'Well, young Sue.'

  'You look very comfortable.'

  'I am comfortable.'

  'You won't be long. The luncheon gong will be going in a minute.'

  The Hon. Galahad sighed. There was always something, he reflected.

  ' What a curse meals are! Don't let's go in.'

  ' I'm going in, all right. My good child, I'm starving.'

  'Pure imagination.'

  'Do you mean to say you're not hungry, Gally?'

  'Of course I'm not. No healthy person really needs food. If people would only stick to drinking, doctors would go out of business. I can state you a case that proves it. Old Freddie Potts in the year '98.'

  'Old Freddie Potts in the year '98, did you say, Mister Bones?'

  'Old Freddie Potts in the year '98,' repeated the Hon. Galahad firmly. 'He lived almost entirely on Scotch whisky, and in the year '98 this prudent habit saved him from an exceedingly unpleasant attack of hedgehog poisoning.'

  'What poisoning?'

  'Hedgehog poisoning. It was down in the south of France that it happened. Freddie had gone to stay with his brother Eustace at his villa at Grasse. Practically a teetotaller, this brother, and in consequence passionately addicted to food.'

  'Still, I can't see why he wanted to eat hedgehogs.'

  'He did not want to eat hedgehogs. Nothing was farther from his intentions. But on the second day of old Freddie's visit he gave his chef twenty francs to go to market and buy a chicken for dinner, and the chef, wandering along, happened to see a dead hedgehog lying in the road. It had been there some days, as a matter of fact, but this was the first time he had noticed it. So, feeling that here was where he pouched twenty francs . . .'

  'I wish you wouldn't tell me stories like this just before lunch.'

  'If it puts you off your food, so much the better. Bring the roses to your cheeks. Well, as I was saying, the chef, who was a thrifty sort of chap and knew that he could make a dainty dinner dish out of his old grandmother, if allowed to mess about with a few sauces, added the twenty francs to his savings and gave Freddie and Eustace the hedgehog next day en casserole. Mark the sequel. At two-thirty prompt, Eustace, the teetotaller, turned nile-green, started groaning like a lost soul, and continued to do so for the remainder of the week, when he was pronounced out of danger. Freddie, on the other hand, his system having been healthfully pickled in alcohol, throve on the dish and finished it up cold next day.'

  'I call that the most disgusting story I ever heard.'

  'The most moral story you ever heard. If I had my way, it would be carved up in letters of gold over the door of every school and college in the kingdom, as a warning to the young. Well, what have you been doing with yourself all the morning, my dear ? I expected you earlier.'

  ‘I was talking to my precious Ronnie most of the time. He went off to catch his train about half an hour ago.'

  'Ah, yes, he's going to young George Fish's wedding, isn't he? I could tell you a good story about George Fish's father, the Bishop.'

  'If it's like the one about old Freddie Potts, I don't want to hear it. Well, after that I went to look for Lord Emsworth, because I had promised Ronnie to talk pig to him. But I saw Lady Constance with him, so I kept away. And then I came to see you, and found you talking together. You seemed to be having a very earnest conversation about something.'

  The Hon. Galahad chuckled.

  'Clarence has got the wind up, poor chap. About that pig of his. He thinks Parsloe is trying to put it on the spot or kidnap it.' Sue looked round cautiously.

  'You know who stole it that first time, don't you, Gally?' 'Baxter, wasn't it? The thing was found in his caravan. 'It was Ronnie.'

  'What!' This was news to the Hon. Galahad. 'That young Fish?' She gave his hair a tug.

  'You are not to call him "that young Fish".'

  'I apologize. But what on earth did he do it for?'

  'He was going to find it and bring it back. So as to make Lord Emsworth grateful, you see.'

  'You don't mean that young cloth-head had the intelligence to think up a scheme like that?' said the Hon. Galahad, amazed.

  'And I won't have you calling my darling Ronnie a cloth-head either. He's very clever. As a matter of fact, though, he says he got the idea from you.'

  'From me?'

  'He says you told him you once stole a pig.'

  'That's right,' said the Hon. Galahad. 'Puffy Benger and I stole old Wivenhoe's pig the night of the Bachelors' Ball at Hammer's Easton in the year '95. We put it in Plug Basham's bedroom. I never heard what happened when Plug met it. No doubt they found some formula. Wivenhoe, I remember, was rather annoyed about the affair. He was a good deal like Clarence in that respect. Worshipped his pig.'

  'What makes Lord Emsworth think that Sir Gregory is going to hurt t
he Empress?'

  'Apparently Connie has gone and engaged his nephew as Clarence's secretary, and he thinks it's a plot. So do I. But personally, as I told Clarence, I feel that Parsloe is using young Monty Bodkin purely as a cat's paw.'

  'Monty Bodkin!'

  'The nephew. I'm convinced, from what I remember of him, that he isn't at all the sort of fellow . ..' 'Oh, Gally!' cried Sue. 'Eh?'

  'Monty Bodkin coming here?' Sue stared in dismay. 'Oh, Gally, what a mess! Oh, I knew something was going to happen. I told Ronnie so, I've been feeling it for days.'

  ' My dear child, what's the matter with you ? What's wrong with young Bodkin coming here?'

  ‘I used to be engaged to him!' said Sue.

  It seemed to the Hon. Galahad that advancing years and the comparative abstinence of his later life must have dulled his once keen quickness at the uptake. Sue's face had lost its colour, and 46 anxiety and alarm were clouding her pretty eyes, and he could make nothing of it.

  ' Were you ?' he said.' When was that ?'

  'Two years ago ... Two and a half. . . Three... I can't remember. Before I met Ronnie. But what does that matter? I tell you I used to be engaged to him.'

  The Hon. Galahad was still fogged.

  'But what's your trouble? What's all the agitation about? Why does it upset you so much, the idea of meeting him again? Painful associations, do you mean? Embarrassing? Don't want to awake agonizing memories in the fellow's bosom?'

  'Of course not. It isn't that. It's Ronnie.'

  'Why Ronnie?'

  'He's so jealous. You know how jealous he is.'

  The Hon. Galahad began to understand.

  'He can't help it, poor darling. It's just the way he is. He makes himself miserable about nothing. So what will he do when Monty arrives ? I know Monty so well. He won't mean any harm, but he'll come bounding in, all hearty and bubbling, and start talking of old times. "Do you remember - ?" "I say, Sue, old girl, I wonder if you've forgotten -?"... Ugh! It will drive poor Ronnie crazy.'

  The Hon. Galahad nodded.

  ‘I see what you mean. That touch of Auld Lang Syne is disturbing.'

  'Why, he tries to pretend he isn't, but Ronnie's jealous even of Pilbeam.'

  Once more the Hon. Galahad nodded. A grave nod. He quite realized that a man who could be jealous of the proprietor of the Argus Inquiry Agency was not a man lightly to be introduced to former fiancés, especially of the type of Monty Bodkin.

  'We must give this matter a little earnest consideration,' he said thoughtfully. 'You wouldn't consider taking a firm line and telling Ronnie to go and boil his head and not make a young fool of himself, if he starts kicking up a fuss?'

  'But you don't understand,' wailed Sue. 'He won't kick up a fuss. Ronnie isn't like that. He'll just get very stiff and cold and polite and suffer in a sort of awful Eton and Cambridge silence. And nothing I do will make him any better.'

  An idea struck the Hon. Galahad.

  'You're sure you really are in love with this young Fish?'

  'I wish you wouldn't. . .'

  'I'm sorry. I forgot. But you are?'

  'Of course I am. There's nobody in the world for me but Ronnie. I've told you that before. I suppose what you're wondering is how I came to be engaged to Monty? Looking back, I can't think myself. He's a dear, of course, and when you're about seventeen, you're so flattered at finding that anyone wants to marry you that it seems wrong to refuse him. But it never amounted to anything. It only lasted a couple of weeks, anyhow. But Ronnie will imagine it was one of the world's great romances. He'll brood on it, and worry himself ill, wondering whether I'm still not pining for Monty. He's just like a kid in that way. It'll spoil everything.'

  'And we may take it as pretty certain that Monty will let ii out ?'

  'Of course he will. He's a babbler.'

  'Yes, that's how I remember him. One of those fellows you can count on to say the wrong thing. Reminds me rather of a man I used to know in the old days called Bagshott. Boko Bagshott, we called him. Took a girl to supper once at the Garden. Supper scarcely concluded when angry old gentleman plunges into the room and starts shaking his list in Boko's face. Boko rises with chivalrous gesture. "Have no fear, sir. I am a man of honour. I will marry your daughter." "Daughter?" says old gentleman, foaming a little at the mouth. "Damn it, that's my wife." Took all Boko's tact to pass it off, I believe.'

  He pondered, staring thoughtfully through his black-rimmed monocle at a spider which was doing its trapeze act from an overhanging bough.

  'Well, it's quite simple, of course.'

  'Simple!'

  'Presents no difficulties of any sort, now that one gives it one's full attention. Ronnie won't be back from that wedding till late tomorrow evening. You must run up to London first thing in the morning and warn young Monty how the land lies. Tell him that when he arrives here he must meet you as a stranger. Pitch it strong. Explain about Ronnie's unfortunate failing. Drive it well into his head that your whole happiness depends on him pretending he's never met you before, and I should think you would have no trouble whatever. I wouldn't call Monty Bodkin particularly

  bright, but he ought to be able to handle a thing like that, if you make it perfectly clear to him what he's got to do.'

  She drew a deep breath.

  'You're wonderful, Gally darling.'

  'Experienced,' corrected the Hon. Galahad modestly.

  'But can I do it ? I mean, the trains.'

  'On your head. Eight-fifty from Market Blandings gets you to London about noon. Interview Monty between then and two-thirty. Catch the two forty-five back, and you get to Market Blandings somewhere around a quarter to seven. Take the station taxi, stop it half-way up the drive, gel out and walk the rest, and you'll be in your room with an hour to dress for dinner, and not a soul knowing a thing about it. No, even better than that, because I remember Connie telling me there's a dinner-party on tomorrow night, so I suppose you won't have to show up till nearly nine.'

  ' But lunch ? Won't they wonder where I am if I'm not at lunch.'

  'Connie's lunching out. You don't suppose Clarence will notice whether you're there or not. No, the only point we haven't covered is, can you find Monty? Do you know his address?'

  ' He's sure to be at the Drones.'

  'Then all is well. Why on earth you worry about these things, when you know you've got an expert like me behind you, I can't imagine. It's a pity about young Ronnie, though. That disposition of his to make heavy weather. Silly to be jealous. He ought to realize by this time that you love him - goodness knows why.'

  'I know why.'

  'I don't. Fellow's a perfect ass.' 'He's not!'

  'My dear child,' said the Hon. Galahad firmly, 'if a man who doesn't know that he can trust you isn't a perfect ass, what sort of ass is he?'

  Chapter Five

  In supposing that she would be able to find her former fiancé at the Drones, Sue had not erred. Telephoning there from Paddington station shortly after twelve next morning, she was rewarded almost immediately by a series of sharp, hyena-like cries at the other end of the wire. To judge from his remarks, this voice from the past was music in Monty Bodkin's ears. Nothing, he gave her to understand, could have given him more pleasure than to get in touch after two years of separation with one whom he esteemed so highly. At his suggestion, Sue had got into a taxi, and now, across a table in the restaurant of the Berkeley Hotel, she was looking at him and congratulating herself on her wisdom in having arranged this meeting. A Monty unprepared for the part he had to play at Blandings Castle would, she felt, beyond a question have crashed into poor darling Ronnie's sensibilities like a high-powered shell. Over the preliminary cocktails and right through the smoked salmon he had been a sheer foaming torrent of 'Do you remembers' and 'That reminds mes'.

  It seemed to Sue that she had a difficult task before her in trying to make clear to this exuberant old friend that on his arrival at the Castle he must regard the dear old days as a sealed book and herself as a compl
ete stranger. Yet when a toothsome truite bleue had induced in him a sudden reverential silence and she was able at length to give a brief exposition of the state of affairs, she was surprised and pleased to gather from a series of understanding nods that he appeared to be following her remarks intelligently.

  He finished the truite bleue and gave a final nod. It indicated a perfect grasp of the situation.

  'My dear old soul,' he said reassuringly, 'say no more. I understand everything, understand it fully. As a matter of fact, Hugo Carmody had already tipped me off.'

  'Oh have you seen Hugo ?'

  'I met him at the club, and he warned me about Ronnie. I had the situation well in hand. On arriving at Blandings I was planning to treat you with distant civility.'