Ashe drew her to him.
“Scullery maids have few pleasures,” he said. “Theirs is a dull life. Let her see us.”
CHAPTER XII
The Earl of Emsworth sat by the sick bed and regarded the Honorable Freddie almost tenderly.
“I fear, Freddie, my dear boy, this has been a great shock to you.”
“Eh? What? Yes—rather! Deuce of a shock, gov’nor.”
“I have been thinking it over, my boy, and perhaps I have been a little hard on you. When your ankle is better I have decided to renew your allowance; and you may return to London, as you do not seem happy in the country. Though how any reasonable being can prefer—”
The Honorable Freddie started, pop-eyed, to a sitting posture.
“My word! Not really?”
His father nodded.
“I say, gov’nor, you really are a topper! You really are, you know! I know just how you feel about the country and the jolly old birds and trees and chasing the bally slugs off the young geraniums and all that sort of thing, but somehow it’s never quite hit me the same way. It’s the way I’m built, I suppose. I like asphalt streets and crowds and dodging taxis and meeting chappies at the club and popping in at the Empire for half an hour and so forth. And there’s something about having an allowance—I don’t know … sort of makes you chuck your chest out and feel you’re someone. I don’t know how to thank you, gov’nor! You’re—you’re an absolute sportsman! This is the most priceless bit of work you’ve ever done. I feel like a two-year-old. I don’t know when I’ve felt so braced. I—I—really, you know, gov’nor, I’m most awfully grateful.”
“Exactly,” said Lord Emsworth. “Ah—precisely. But, Freddie, my boy,” he added, not without pathos, “there is just one thing more. Do you think that—with an effort—for my sake—you could endeavor this time not to make a—a damned fool of yourself?”
He eyed his offspring wistfully.
“Gov’nor,” said the Honorable Freddie firmly, “I’ll have a jolly good stab at it!”
Table of Contents
Cover
Copyright
About the Author
Also by P.G. Wodehouse
Leave it to Psmith
Contents
1 DARK PLOTTINGS AT BLANDINGS CASTLE
2 ENTER PSMITH
3 EVE BORROWS AN UMBRELLA
4 PAINFUL SCENE AT THE DRONES CLUB
5 PSMITH APPLIES FOR EMPLOYMENT
6 LORD EMSWORTH MEETS A POET
7 BAXTER SUSPECTS
8 CONFIDENCES ON THE LAKE
9 PSMITH ENGAGES A VALET
10 SENSATIONAL OCCURRENCE AT A POETRY READING
11 ALMOST ENTIRELY ABOUT FLOWER-POTS
12 MORE ON THE FLOWER-POT THEME
13 PSMITH RECEIVES GUESTS
14 PSMITH ACCEPTS EMPLOYMENT
Other Books by P.G. Wodehouse
Also Available in Arrow
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Epub ISBN: 9781409064497
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Published by Arrow Books 2008
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Copyright by The Trustees of the Wodehouse Estate
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First published in the United Kingdom in 1923 by Herbert Jenkins Ltd
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The author of almost a hundred books and the creator of Jeeves, Blandings Castle, Psmith, Ukridge, Uncle Fred and Mr Mulliner, P.G. Wodehouse was born in 1881 and educated at Dulwich College. After two years with the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank he became a full-time writer, contributing to a variety of periodicals including Punch and the Globe. He married in 1914. As well as his novels and short stories, he wrote lyrics for musical comedies with Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern, and at one time had five musicals running simultaneously on Broadway. His time in Hollywood also provided much source material for fiction.
At the age of 93, in the New Year’s Honours List of 1975, he received a long-overdue knighthood, only to die on St Valentine’s Day some 45 days later.
To
MY DAUGHTER LEONORA
Queen of her species.
Some of the P.G. Wodehouse titles to be published by Arrow in 2008
JEEVES
The Inimitable Jeeves
Carry On, Jeeves
Very Good, Jeeves
Thank You, Jeeves
Right Ho, Jeeves
The Code of the Woosters
Joy in the Morning
The Mating Season
Ring for Jeeves
Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit
Jeeves in the Offing
Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves
Much Obliged, Jeeves
Aunts Aren’t Gentlemen
BLANDINGS
Something Fresh
Leave it to Psmith
Summer Lightning
Blandings Castle
Uncle Fred in the Springtime
Full Moon
Pigs Have Wings
Service with a Smile
A Pelican at Blandings
MULLINER
Meet Mr Mulliner
Mulliner Nights
Mr Mulliner Speaking
UNCLE FRED
Cocktail Time
Uncle Dynamite
GOLF
The Clicking of Cuthbert
The Heart of a Goof
OTHERS
Piccadilly Jim
Ukridge
The Luck of the Bodkins
Laughing Gas
A Damsel in Distress
The Small Bachelor
Hot Water
Summer Moonshine
The Adventures of Sally
Money for Nothing
The Girl in Blue
Big Money
CONTENTS
1 DARK PLOTTINGS AT BLANDINGS CASTLE
2 ENTER PSMITH
3 EVE BORROWS AN UMBRELLA
4 PAINFUL SCENE AT THE DRONES CLUB
5 PSMITH APPLIES FOR EMPLOYMENT
6 LORD EMSWORTH MEETS A POET
7 BAXTER SUSPECTS
8 CONFIDENCES ON THE LAKE
9 PSMITH ENGAGES A VALET
10 SENSATIONAL OCCURRENCE AT A POETRY READING
11 ALMOST ENTIRELY ABOUT FLOWER-POTS
12 MORE ON THE FLOWER-POT THEME
13 PSMIT
H RECEIVES GUESTS
14 PSMITH ACCEPTS EMPLOYMENT
1 DARK PLOTTINGS AT BLANDINGS CASTLE
§ 1
AT the open window of the great library of Blandings Castle, drooping like a wet sock, as was his habit when he had nothing to prop his spine against, the Earl of Emsworth, that amiable and boneheaded peer, stood gazing out over his domain.
It was a lovely morning and the air was fragrant with gentle summer scents. Yet in his lordship’s pale blue eyes there was a look of melancholy. His brow was furrowed, his mouth peevish. And this was all the more strange in that he was normally as happy as only a fluffy-minded man with excellent health and a large income can be. A writer, describing Blandings Castle in a magazine article, had once said: ‘Tiny mosses have grown in the cavities of the stones, until, viewed near at hand, the place seems shaggy with vegetation.’ It would not have been a bad description of the proprietor. Fifty-odd years of serene and unruffled placidity had given Lord Emsworth a curiously moss-covered look. Very few things had the power to disturb him. Even his younger son, the Hon. Freddie Threepwood, could only do it occasionally.
Yet now he was sad. And – not to make a mystery of it any longer – the reason of his sorrow was the fact that he had mislaid his glasses and without them was as blind, to use his own neat simile, as abat. He was keenly aware of the sunshine that poured down on his gardens, and was yearning to pop out and potter among the flowers he loved. But no man, pop he never so wisely, can hope to potter with any good result if the world is a mere blur.
The door behind him opened, and Beach the butler entered, a dignified procession of one.
‘Who’s that?’ inquired Lord Emsworth, spinning on his axis.
‘It is I, your lordship – Beach.’
‘Have you found them?’
‘Not yet, your lordship,’ sighed the butler.
‘You can’t have looked.’
‘I have searched assiduously, your lordship, but without avail. Thomas and Charles also announce non-success. Stokes has not yet made his report.’
‘Ah!’
‘I am re-despatching Thomas and Charles to your lordship’s bedroom,’ said the Master of the Hunt. ‘I trust that their efforts will be rewarded.’
Beach withdrew, and Lord Emsworth turned to the window again. The scene that spread itself beneath him – though he was unfortunately not able to see it – was a singularly beautiful one, for the castle, which is one of the oldest inhabited houses in England, stands upon a knoll of rising ground at the southern end of the celebrated Vale of Blandings in the county of Shropshire. Away in the blue distance wooded hills ran down to where the Severn gleamed like an unsheathed sword; while up from the river rolling park-land, mounting and dipping, surged in a green wave almost to the castle walls, breaking on the terraces in a many-coloured flurry of flowers as it reached the spot where the province of Angus McAllister, his lordship’s head gardener, began. The day being June the thirtieth, which is the very high-tide time of summer flowers, the immediate neighbourhood of the castle was ablaze with roses, pinks, pansies, carnations, hollyhocks, columbines, larkspurs, London pride, Canterbury bells, and a multitude of other choice blooms of which only Angus could have told you the names. A conscientious man was Angus; and in spite of being a good deal hampered by Lord Emsworth’s amateur assistance, he showed excellent results in his department. In his beds there was much at which to point with pride, little to view with concern.
Scarcely had Beach removed himself when Lord Emsworth was called upon to turn again. The door had opened for the second time, and a young man in a beautifully-cut suit of grey flannel was standing in the doorway. He had a long and vacant face topped by shining hair brushed back and heavily brillian-tined after the prevailing mode, and he was standing on one leg. For Freddie Threepwood was seldom completely at his ease in his parent’s presence.
‘Hallo, guv’nor.’
‘Well, Frederick?’
It would be paltering with the truth to say that Lord Emsworth’s greeting was a warm one. It lacked the note of true affection. A few weeks before he had had to pay a matter of five hundred pounds to settle certain racing debts for his offspring; and, while this had not actually dealt an irretrievable blow at his bank account, it had undeniably tended to diminish Freddie’s charm in his eyes.
‘Hear you’ve lost your glasses, guv’nor.’
‘That is so.’
‘Nuisance, what?’
‘Undeniably.’
‘Ought to have a spare pair.’
‘I have broken my spare pair.’
‘Tough luck! And lost the other?’
‘And, as you say, lost the other.’
‘Have you looked for the bally things?’
‘I have.’
‘Must be somewhere, I mean.’
‘Quite possibly.’
‘Where,’ asked Freddie, warming to his work, ‘did you see them last?’
‘Go away!’ said Lord Emsworth, on whom his child’s conversation had begun to exercise an oppressive effect.
‘Eh?’
‘Go away!’
‘Go away?’
‘Yes, go away!’
‘Right ho!’
The door closed. His lordship returned to the window once more.
He had been standing there some few minutes when one of those miracles occurred which happen in libraries. Without sound or warning a section of books started to move away from the parent body and, swinging out in a solid chunk into the room, showed a glimpse of a small, study-like apartment. A young man in spectacles came noiselessly through and the books returned to their place.
The contrast between Lord Emsworth and the new-comer, as they stood there, was striking, almost dramatic. Lord Emsworth was so acutely spectacle-less; Rupert Baxter, his secretary, so pronouncedly spectacled. It was his spectacles that struck you first as you saw the man. They gleamed efficiently at you. If you had a guilty conscience, they pierced you through and through; and even if your conscience was one hundred per cent. pure you could not ignore them. ‘Here,’ you said to yourself, ‘is an efficient young man in spectacles.’
In describing Rupert Baxter as efficient, you did not overestimate him. He was essentially that. Technically but a salaried subordinate, he had become by degrees, owing to the limp amiability of his employer, the real master of the house. He was the Brains of Blandings, the man at the switch, the person in charge, and the pilot, so to speak, who weathered the storm. Lord Emsworth left everything to Baxter, only asking to be allowed to potter in peace; and Baxter, more than equal to the task, shouldered it without wincing.
Having got within range, Baxter coughed; and Lord Emsworth, recognising the sound, wheeled round with a faint flicker of hope. It might be that even this apparently insoluble problem of the missing pince-nez would yield before the other’s efficiency.
‘Baxter, my dear fellow, I’ve lost my glasses. My glasses. I have mislaid them. I cannot think where they can have gone to. You haven’t seen them anywhere by any chance?’
‘Yes, Lord Emsworth,’ replied the secretary, quietly equal to the crisis. ‘They are hanging down your back.’
‘Down my back? Why, bless my soul!’ His lordship tested the statement and found it – like all Baxter’s statements – accurate. ‘Why, bless my soul, so they are! Do you know, Baxter, I really believe I must be growing absent-minded.’ He hauled in the slack, secured the pince-nez, adjusted them beamingly. His irritability had vanished like the dew off one of his roses. ‘Thank you, Baxter, thank you. You are invaluable.’
And with a radiant smile Lord Emsworth made buoyantly for the door, en route for God’s air and the society of McAllister. The movement drew from Baxter another cough – a sharp, peremptory cough this time; and his lordship paused, reluctantly, like a dog whistled back from the chase. A cloud fell over the sunniness of his mood. Admirable as Baxter was in so many respects, he had a tendency to worry him at times; and something told Lord Emsworth that he was going to
worry him now.
‘The car will be at the door,’ said Baxter with quiet firmness, ‘at two sharp.’
‘Car? What car?’
‘The car to take you to the station.’
‘Station? What station?’
Rupert Baxter preserved his calm. There were times when he found his employer a little trying, but he never showed it.
‘You have perhaps forgotten, Lord Emsworth, that you arranged with Lady Constance to go to London this afternoon.’
‘Go to London!’ gasped Lord Emsworth, appalled. ‘In weather like this? With a thousand things to attend to in the garden? What a perfectly preposterous notion! Why should I go to London? I hate London.’
‘You arranged with Lady Constance that you would give Mr McTodd lunch to-morrow at your club.’
‘Who the devil is Mr McTodd?’
‘The well-known Canadian poet.’
‘Never heard of him.’
‘Lady Constance has long been a great admirer of his work. She wrote inviting him, should he ever come to England, to pay a visit to Blandings. He is now in London and is to come down to-morrow for two weeks. Lady Constance’s suggestion was that, as a compliment to Mr McTodd’s eminence in the world of literature, you should meet him in London and bring him back here yourself.’
Lord Emsworth remembered now. He also remembered that this positively infernal scheme had not been his sister Constance’s in the first place. It was Baxter who had made the suggestion, and Constance had approved. He made use of the recovered pince-nez to glower through them at his secretary; and not for the first time in recent months was aware of a feeling that this fellow Baxter was becoming a dashed infliction. Baxter was getting above himself, throwing his weight about, making himself a confounded nuisance. He wished he could get rid of the man. But where could he find an adequate successor? That was the trouble. With all his drawbacks, Baxter was efficient. Nevertheless, for a moment Lord Emsworth toyed with the pleasant dream of dismissing him. And it is possible, such was his exasperation, that he might on this occasion have done something practical in that direction, had not the library door at this moment opened for the third time, to admit yet another intruder – at the sight of whom his lordship’s militant mood faded weakly.
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