Funny Ha, Ha

by Paul Merton

  The vicar bit his lip. The bishop bowed his head.

  ‘Listen,’ proceeded Augustine, placing a hand on the shoulder of each. ‘I hate to see you two dear good chaps quarrelling like this.’

  ‘He started it,’ said the vicar, sullenly.

  ‘Never mind who started it.’ Augustine silenced the bishop with a curt gesture as he made to speak. ‘Be sensible, my dear fellows. Respect the decencies of debate. Exercise a little good-humoured give-and-take. You say,’ he went on, turning to the bishop, ‘that our good friend here has too many orphreys on his chasuble?’

  ‘I do. And I stick to it.’

  ‘Yes, yes, yes. But what,’ said Augustine, soothingly, ‘are a few orphreys between friends? Reflect! You and our worthy vicar here were at school together. You are bound by the sacred ties of the old Alma Mater. With him you sported on the green. With him you shared a crib and threw inked darts in the hour supposed to be devoted to the study of French. Do these things mean nothing to you? Do these memories touch no chord?’ He turned appealingly from one to the other. ‘Vicar! Bish!’

  The vicar had moved away and was wiping his eyes. The bishop fumbled for a pocket-handkerchief. There was a silence.

  ‘Sorry, Pieface,’ said the bishop, in a choking voice.

  ‘Shouldn’t have spoken as I did, Boko,’ mumbled the vicar.

  ‘If you want to know what I think,’ said the bishop, ‘you are right in attributing your indisposition at the house supper to something wrong with the turkey. I recollect saying at the time that the bird should never have been served in such a condition.’

  ‘And when you put that white mouse in the French master’s desk,’ said the vicar, ‘you performed one of the noblest services to humanity of which there is any record. They ought to have made you a bishop on the spot.’

  ‘Pieface!’

  ‘Boko!’

  The two men clasped hands.

  ‘Splendid!’ said Augustine. ‘Everything hotsy-totsy now?’

  ‘Quite, quite,’ said the vicar.

  ‘As far as I am concerned, completely hotsy-totsy,’ said the bishop. He turned to his old friend solicitously. ‘You will continue to wear all the orphreys you want – will you not, Pieface?’

  ‘No, no. I see now that I was wrong. From now on, Boko, I abandon orphreys altogether.’

  ‘But, Pieface—’

  ‘It’s all right,’ the vicar assured him. ‘I can take them or leave them alone.’

  ‘Splendid fellow!’ The bishop coughed to hide his emotion, and there was another silence. ‘I think, perhaps,’ he went on, after a pause, ‘I should be leaving you now, my dear chap, and going in search of my wife. She is with your daughter, I believe, somewhere in the village.’

  ‘They are coming up the drive now.’

  ‘Ah, yes, I see them. A charming girl, your daughter.’

  Augustine clapped him on the shoulder.

  ‘Bish,’ he exclaimed, ‘you said a mouthful. She is the dearest, sweetest girl in the whole world. And I should be glad, vicar, if you would give your consent to our immediate union. I love Jane with a good man’s fervour, and I am happy to inform you that my sentiments are returned. Assure us, therefore, of your approval, and I will go at once and have the banns put up.’

  The vicar leaped as though he had been stung. Like so many vicars, he had a poor opinion of curates, and he had always regarded Augustine as rather below than above the general norm or level of the despised class.

  ‘What!’ he cried.

  ‘A most excellent idea,’ said the bishop, beaming. ‘A very happy notion, I call it.’

  ‘My daughter!’ The vicar seemed dazed. ‘My daughter marry a curate.’

  ‘You were a curate once yourself, Pieface.’

  ‘Yes, but not a curate like that.’

  ‘No!’ said the bishop. ‘You were not. Nor was I. Better for us both had we been. This young man, I would have you know, is the most outstandingly excellent young man I have ever encountered. Are you aware that scarcely an hour ago he saved me with the most consummate address from a large shaggy dog with black spots and a kink in his tail? I was sorely pressed, Pieface, when this young man came up and, with a readiness of resource and an accuracy of aim which it would be impossible to over-praise, got that dog in the short ribs with a rock and sent him flying.’

  The vicar seemed to be struggling with some powerful emotion. His eyes had widened.

  ‘A dog with black spots?’

  ‘Very black spots. But no blacker, I fear, than the heart they hid.’

  ‘And he really plugged him in the short ribs?’

  ‘As far as I could see, squarely in the short ribs.’

  The vicar held out his hand.

  ‘Mulliner,’ he said, ‘I was not aware of this. In the light of the facts which have just been drawn to my attention, I have no hesitation in saying that my objections are removed. I have had it in for that dog since the second Sunday before Septuagesima, when he pinned me by the ankle as I paced beside the river composing a sermon on Certain Alarming Manifestations of the So-called Modern Spirit. Take Jane. I give my consent freely. And may she be as happy as any girl with such a husband ought to be.’

  A few more affecting words were exchanged, and then the bishop and Augustine left the house. The bishop was silent and thoughtful.

  ‘I owe you a great deal, Mulliner,’ he said at length.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Augustine. ‘Would you say that?’

  ‘A very great deal. You saved me from a terrible disaster. Had you not leaped through that window at that precise juncture and intervened, I really believe I should have pasted my dear old friend Brandon in the eye. I was sorely exasperated.’

  ‘Our good vicar can be trying at times,’ agreed Augustine.

  ‘My fist was already clenched, and I was just hauling off for the swing when you checked me. What the result would have been, had you not exhibited a tact and discretion beyond your years, I do not like to think. I might have been unfrocked.’ He shivered at the thought, though the weather was mild. ‘I could never have shown my face at the Athenaeum again. But, tut, tut!’ went on the bishop, patting Augustine on the shoulder, ‘let us not dwell on what might have been. Speak to me of yourself. The vicar’s charming daughter you really love her?’

  ‘I do, indeed.’

  The bishop’s face had grown grave.

  ‘Think well, Mulliner,’ he said. ‘Marriage is a serious affair. Do not plunge into it without due reflection. I myself am a husband, and, though singularly blessed in the possession of a devoted helpmeet, cannot but feel sometimes that a man is better off as a bachelor. Women, Mulliner, are odd.’

  ‘True,’ said Augustine.

  ‘My own dear wife is the best of women. And, as I never weary of saying, a good woman is a wondrous creature, cleaving to the right and the good under all change; lovely in youthful comeliness, lovely all her life in comeliness of heart. And yet—’

  ‘And yet?’ said Augustine.

  The bishop mused for a moment. He wriggled a little with an expression of pain, and scratched himself between the shoulder blades.

  ‘Well, I’ll tell you,’ said the bishop. ‘It is a warm and pleasant day today, is it not?’

  ‘Exceptionally clement,’ said Augustine.

  ‘A fair, sunny day, made gracious by a temperate westerly breeze. And yet, Mulliner, if you will credit my statement, my wife insisted on my putting on my thick winter woollies this morning. Truly,’ sighed the bishop, ‘as a jewel of gold in a swine’s snout, so is a fair woman which is without discretion. Proverbs xi. 21.’

  ‘Twenty-two,’ corrected Augustine.

  ‘I should have said twenty-two. They are made of thick flannel, and I have an exceptionally sensitive skin. Oblige me, my dear fellow, by rubbing me in the small of the back with the ferrule of your stick. I think it will ease the irritation.’

  ‘But, my poor dear old Bish,’ said Augustine, sympathetically, ‘this must
not be.’

  The bishop shook his head ruefully.

  ‘You would not speak so hardily, Mulliner, if you knew my wife. There is no appeal from her decrees.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ cried Augustine, cheerily. He looked through the trees to where the lady bishopess, escorted by Jane, was examining a lobelia through her lorgnette with just the right blend of cordiality and condescension. ‘I’ll fix that for you in a second.’

  The bishop clutched at his arm.

  ‘My boy! What are you going to do?’

  ‘I’m just going to have a word with your wife and put the matter up to her as a reasonable woman. Thick winter woollies on a day like this! Absurd!’ said Augustine. ‘Preposterous! I never heard such rot,’

  The bishop gazed after him with a laden heart. Already he had come to love this young man like a son: and to see him charging so lightheartedly into the very jaws of destruction afflicted him with a deep and poignant sadness. He knew what his wife was like when even the highest in the land attempted to thwart her; and this brave lad was but a curate. In another moment she would be looking at him through her lorgnette: and England was littered with the shrivelled remains of curates at whom the lady bishopess had looked through her lorgnette. He had seen them wilt like salted slugs at the episcopal breakfast-table.

  He held his breath. Augustine had reached the lady bishopess, and the lady bishopess was even now raising her lorgnette.

  The bishop shut his eyes and turned away. And then – years afterwards, it seemed to him – a cheery voice hailed him: and, turning, he perceived Augustine bounding back through the trees.

  ‘It’s all right, bish,’ said Augustine.

  ‘All – all right?’ faltered the bishop.

  ‘Yes. She says you can go and change into the thin cashmere.’

  The bishop reeled.

  ‘But – but – but what did you say to her? What arguments did you employ?’

  ‘Oh, I just pointed out what a warm day it was and jollied her along a bit

  ‘Jollied her along a bit!’

  ‘And she agreed in the most friendly and cordial manner. She has asked me to call at the Palace one of these days.’

  The bishop seized Augustine’s hand.

  ‘My boy,’ he said in a broken voice, ‘you shall do more than call at the Palace. You shall come and live at the Palace. Become my secretary, Mulliner, and name your own salary. If you intend to marry, you will require an increased stipend. Become my secretary, boy, and never leave my side. I have needed somebody like you for years.’

  *

  It was late in the afternoon when Augustine returned to his rooms, for he had been invited to lunch at the vicarage and had been the life and soul of the cheery little party.

  ‘A letter for you, sir,’ said Mrs Wardle, obsequiously.

  Augustine took the letter.

  ‘I am sorry to say I shall be leaving you shortly, Mrs Wardle.’

  ‘Oh, sir! If there’s anything I can do—’

  ‘Oh, it’s not that. The fact is, the bishop has made me his secretary, and I shall have to shift my toothbrush and spats to the Palace, you see.’

  ‘Well, fancy that, sir! Why, you’ll be a bishop yourself one of these days.’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Augustine. ‘Possibly. And now let me read this.’

  He opened the letter. A thoughtful frown appeared on his face as he read.

  My dear Augustine,

  I am writing in some haste to tell you that the impulsiveness of your aunt has led to a rather serious mistake.

  She tells me that she dispatched to you yesterday by parcels post a sample bottle of my new Buck-U-Uppo, which she obtained without my knowledge from my laboratory. Had she mentioned what she was intending to do, I could have prevented a very unfortunate occurrence.

  Mulliner’s Buck-U-Uppo is of two grades or qualities – the A and the B. The A is a mild, but strengthening, tonic designed for human invalids. The B, on the other hand, is purely for circulation in the animal kingdom, and was invented to fill a long-felt want throughout our Indian possessions.

  As you are doubtless aware, the favourite pastime of the Indian Maharajahs is the hunting of the tiger of the jungle from the backs of elephants; and it has happened frequently in the past that hunts have been spoiled by the failure of the elephant to see eye to eye with its owner in the matter of what constitutes sport.

  Too often elephants, on sighting the tiger, have turned and galloped home: and it was to correct this tendency on their part that I invented Mulliner’s Buck-U-Uppo B. One teaspoonful of the Buck-U-Uppo B administered in its morning bran-mash will cause the most timid elephant to trumpet loudly and charge the fiercest tiger without a qualm.

  Abstain, therefore, from taking any of the contents of the bottle you now possess.

  And believe me.

  Your affectionate uncle,

  Wilfred Mulliner.

  Augustine remained for some time in deep thought after perusing this communication. Then, rising, he whistled a few bars of the psalm appointed for the twenty-sixth of June and left the room.

  Half an hour later a telegraphic message was speeding over the wires.

  It ran as follows:

  Wilfred Mulliner,

  The Gables,

  Lesser Lossingham,

  Salop.

  Letter received. Send immediately, COD, three cases of the B. ‘Blessed shall be thy basket and thy store’ Deuteronomy xxviii 5.

  Augustine.

  A DAY WITH THE SWATTESMORE

  P.G. Wodehouse

  P.G. Wodehouse (1881–1975) was the author of almost a hundred books and the creator of Jeeves, Blandings Castle, Psmith, Ukridge, Uncle Fred and Mr Mulliner. Born in London, he spent two years in banking before becoming a full-time writer, contributing to periodicals including Punch and the Globe. 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.

  Whit-Monday, which to so many means merely one more opportunity of strewing Beauty Spots with paper bags, has a deeper significance for the hunting man. For, if you look in your diary, you will find the following entry:

  May 20 (Whit-Monday) – Fly Swatting Begins.

  Simple words, but how much they imply. What magic memories of past delights they conjure up, what roseate visions of happy days to come.

  English poetry is rich in allusions to this king of sports. Every schoolboy is familiar with those lines of Coleridge:

  It is the Ancient Mariner,

  He swatteth one in three.

  These have been taken by some to suggest a slur on the efficiency of the British Merchant Service, but I do not think that Coleridge had any such interpretation in mind.

  Mark the word ‘ancient’. ‘It is the ancient Mariner.’ That is to say, he was past his prime, possibly even of an age when he might have been expected to abandon the sport altogether. Yet, such was the accuracy of eye and suppleness of limb resulting from the clean, fresh life of the open sea that he was still bagging one out of every three – a record which many a younger man would be glad to achieve.

  It is Chaucer who is responsible for the old saw:

  When noone is highe.

  Then swatte ye flye,

  which has led some to hold that the proper time for a meet is after lunch. Others, of whom I am one, prefer the after breakfast theory. It seems to me that a fly which has just risen from its bed and taken a cold plunge in the milk-jug is in far better fettle for a sporting run than one which has spent the morning gorging jam and bacon and wants nothing more than a quiet nap on the ceiling.

  The Swattesmore, the hunt to which I belong, always meets directly after breakfast. And a jovial gathering it is. Tough old Admiral Bludyer has his rolled-up copy of Country Life, while young Reggie Bootle carries the lighter and more easily wielded Daily Mail.

  There i
s a good deal of genial chaff and laughter because some youngster who is new to the game has armed himself with a patent steel-wire swatter, for it is contrary to all the etiquette of the chase to use these things. Your true sportsman would as soon shoot a sitting bird.

  Meanwhile Sigsbee, our host’s butler – specially engaged for his round and shiny head, which no fly has ever been known to resist – has opened the window. There is a hush of anticipation, and the talk and laughter are stilled. Presently you hear a little gasp of excitement from some newly joined member, who has not been at the sport long enough to acquire the iron self-control on which we of the Swattesmore pride ourselves. A fine fly is peering in.

  This is the crucial moment. Will he be lured in by Sigsbee’s bald head, or will he pursue his original intention of going down to the potting-shed to breakfast on the dead rat? Another moment, and he has made his decision. He hurries in and seats himself on the butler’s glistening cupola. Instantaneously, Francis, the footman, slams the window. The fly rockets to the ceiling. ‘Gone away, sir, thank you, sir,’ says Sigsbee respectfully, and with a crashing ‘Yoicks!’ and ‘Tally-ho!’ the hunt is up.

  *

  Ah me! How many wonderful runs that old library has seen. I remember once a tough old dog fly leading us without a check from ten in the morning till five minutes before lunch.

  We found on Sigsbee’s head, and a moment later he had made a line across country for the south window. From there he worked round to the bookshelves. Bertie Whistler took a fearful toss over a whatnot, and poor old General Griggs, who is not so keen-sighted as he used to be, came to grief on a sunken art-nouveau footstool.

  By the end of a couple of hours only ‘Binks’ Bodger and myself were on the active list. All the rest were nursing bruised shins in the background. At a quarter to one the fly doubled back from the portrait of our host’s grandmother, and in trying to intercept him poor ‘Binks’ fell foul of the head of a bearskin rug and had to retire.

  A few minutes later I had the good luck to come up with the brute as he rested on a magnificent Corot near the fireplace. I was using a bedroom slipper that day, and it unfortunately damaged the Corot beyond recognition. But I have my consolation in the superb brush which hangs over my mantelpiece, and the memory of one of the finest runs a swatter ever had.