Collected Fiction (1940-1963)

by William P. McGivern

  “I say!” he said once more.

  “Yes, sir?” Clive paused in the act of putting down a fork.

  “You’re in good form, what?” Reggie said, attacking the puzzle obliquely.

  “Why thank you, sir,” Clive said, and placed the fork exactly one-and-one-eighth inch from the plate.

  “Bounded out of the right side of the old bed, eh?”

  “Quite, sir.”

  “Always do, don’t you? I mean, bound of the right side of the old downy.”

  “Oh yes, sir. The bed, you see, is against the wall.”

  Reggie frowned, peering into the remark for significance. Finding none, he sighed and climbed out of bed. Then he got the joke. It was quite a time before he could bring himself to stop laughing. And by then he had shaved, showered and finished his breakfast.

  BUT over his second cup of coffee he remembered what had been bothering him before Clive’s uproarious sally had knocked him completely out of control.

  “I say!” he said for the third time, and pointed a fork accusingly at Clive’s chest.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You were smiling this morning.”

  “Perhaps I was, sir. It’s a rather special day, I think. Or have you forgotten?”

  “Forgotten what? Don’t beat about the old bush.”

  “The lawyers are coming this morning, sir. It’s your twenty-sixth birthday, and today you will inherit the money which has been held in trust for you by the firm of God penny, Overreach, Hensdrake and Wellington. It is a day that calls for a certain levity, sir.”

  “Yes, of course, of course,” Reggie said peevishly. He had forgotten the whole business, and remembering it was enough to envelop his spirits in a vast dank pall. Lawyers! Godpenny, Overreach, Hensdrake and Wellington—the names were a litany of disaster, an awesome echo of past flubs and foibles. Every bit of unpleasantness in his life had been connected with lawyers. They were always lecturing him, treating him as if he didn’t have enough sense to come in out of the rain. As a matter of fact, Reggie recalled, they did have a point in that particular instance. He and his boon friend Ferdie Myrtlehead had been involved in that business—actually it had all been Ferdie’s fault. But the lawyers for all their talk of justice couldn’t see it that way. It had started with a cheery talk at the club bar about coming in out of the rain. Ferdie had scored a smashing stroke by saying that the remark made no sense, because whether or not people came in out of the rain it always stopped raining eventually and therefore the end results were identical. Come in or stay out was all the same. You got dry either way. Reggie hadn’t agreed. And so they had packed a lunch containing two thermos bottles of Martinis and repaired to the park to wait for rain. On the first try Ferdie’s theory was completely vindicated. They sat in the rain for four hours while Reggie grew increasingly giddy with the prospect of showing Ferdie up as cotton-headed young ass. But then, humiliatingly, the rain stopped, and Ferdie’s point was proven.

  “You see, old man,” Ferdie had said, in a nauseatingly sympathetic manner, “You aren’t grounded in good old logic. But observe: the rain has stopped, the sun is out, in a matter of an hour or so we will be dry. Therefore, the remark, about not having enough sense to come out of the rain is just a lot of empty nonsense. Handed down from father to son like stories about kind fairies and pots of gold under rainbows. Just a fake, that’s all.”

  “I don’t know about fairies,” Reggie said, stung.

  “Kind fairies,” Ferdie said sharply. “Everyone knows about fairies. But no kind ones. Not one bloody kind fairy in the whole world.”

  BUT Reggie hadn’t taken the experiment in the park as conclusive, and for several years he had worked diligently to prove that Ferdie was wrong. The two of them had travelled quite a bit—particularly in India—trying to find a place where it never stopped raining. And Reggie, hating himself for a sneak, even got mixed-up with some rainmakers in various countries. He had been on the verge of exposing Ferdie as an errant, un-schooled pop-off when the lawyers—all of them—had caught him in a market in Port Said. What followed was a nightmarish business, full of namecalling and recrimination. It had left Reggie moody for hours. And now they were upon him once more, trapping him here in his own sanctum.

  “You don’t seem pleased, if I may say so, sir,” Clive remarked.

  “Say it a hundred times,” Reggie said, gnawing at his lip. “What’re they up to now?”

  “They merely require your signature on a few forms,” Clive said. “And then, until noon, you will be a millionaire. May I congratulate you, sir.”

  “Until noon?”

  “Quite, sir. Another firm of lawyers—Muddle, Shackhead, Toobottom, Egbert, Clarkson, Lessfit and Never play—will be in charge of your finances.”

  “Why the old switcheroo?” Clive cleared his throat elegantly. “Taking an advantage of a technicality, Godpenny, Overreach, Hensdrake and Wellington are resigning as your legal custodians.”

  “Dropping me, eh?” Reggie muttered. For some reason he didn’t feel as elated as he should have; it wasn’t cheery to be thrown away by a pack of lawyers. “I suppose they think I’m not good enough for them,” he said, gesturing moodily with a piece of buttered toast.

  “I shouldn’t put it that way, sir,” Clive said kindly. “However, as an old and respectable firm, I feel they may not be spiritually equipped to manage the—ah—livelier aspects of your affairs.”

  “Of course,” Reggie said. He hadn’t the foggiest notion of what Clive was talking about, but the cadence of Clive’s prose and the mellifluous tone of his voice soothed him like the strains of beautiful music.

  “I think a glass of champagne might be in order, sir,” Clive went on. “If that is agreeable to you, I’ll chill a bottle now.”

  “Fine, grand,” Reggie said. The morning was picking up, he thought, returning to his usual state of bland and mindless good humor. “I’ll pop into the old threads meanwhile.”

  “Very well, sir.”

  When he had dressed himself Reggie strolled into the drawing room. Everything looked top-hole; the sun was shining smartly through the terrace windows and Clive had brought all the bric-a-brac up to a state of high gloss. It was a grand room really, he thought. View of the park, comfortable chairs, all the rest of it. Strolling about he patted a table and sofa affectionately. Good old friends, he was thinking. Stout and true. Like Ferdie. Like—He paused, a small frown gathering on his pleasantly vacant features. Like whom? The name—whose ever it had been—had just popped out of his mind. Who was it? Reggie felt a twinge of dismay. Hardly a way to treat a stout and true friend. Forget all about him. A chap didn’t have that many friends. Devil of a note. Losing friends as if they were carkeys or postage stamps. Reggie put a hand to his forehead, weighted down by a sudden and definite sense of less. “I may have lost my stoutest friend,” he muttered to the floor. “Good old whoever-it-was, gone forever.” Sighing he threw both hands in the air. “Well, farewell old bean, nothing to do but carry on, bite the bullet,” he said, making an effort to dismiss the gloomy business.

  IT was then the doorbell rang. Reggie hurried to answer it and found his fiancé, Sari, standing in the corridor. And when he saw her a dazzling light broke on him. She was the stout old friend he’d forgot, she was the true-blue buddy he’d thought he’d lost.

  “Ah, welcome back,” he said, embracing her fondly.

  Sari kissed him on the cheek and then drew back and looked at him with a small but skeptical smile. “Am I supposed to have been away?” she said.

  “Yes, it was all very tragic,” Reggie said, taking her by the arm and leading her to a chair. “You see, I forget your name. Silly of me, but there it is.”

  “How droll,” Sari said lightly. “Has it come back to you now?”

  “But of course,” Reggie said, highly pleased with himself. “I was thinking of these stout old chairs and tables in this room, and that made me think of my best friends. Well, Ferdie came first, naturally, and—”r />
  “Naturally Ferdie was first,” Sari said, nodding pleasantly.

  “Of course. Then I thought of another great old friend, but the name just wouldn’t come. But it was you! Hilarious, what?”

  Sari drummed her fingers on the arms of the chair and studied Reggie with an Inquisitor’s smile. “I am going to count up to ten,” she said slowly and distinctly.

  “That’s an awfully good trick,” Reggie said and sighed. “I’ve tried it, but six and seven get me all tangled up.”

  Sari was a small, and elegantly curved young woman with vivid red hair and green eyes. In spite of her pocket-sized specifications she had a temper and intelligence that could lend her the stature of a female Goliath. And now, as she crossed her slim, exquisitely, molded legs and looked up at Reggie, he had the odd sensation that she was looking down on him.

  “You couldn’t remember my name,” she said thoughtfully. “Ferdie’s yes, mine no. You forgot old true-blue Sari, Eh?”

  “Just for a few minutes,” Reggie said scratching his head. He had a vague feeling that something was wrong. “It’s not serious, really. Sometimes I forget my name. Damned nuisance. It always happened in the army. At roll call.”

  “I won’t be side-tracked,” Sari said.

  “Not side-tracking you. Just telling you I couldn’t remember my name at roll call.”

  “Well, what in Heaven’s name did you do?”

  “I yelled ‘Here’ to every name. Only thing to do. Couldn’t take a chance.” Reggie chuckled and sat down on the arm of Sari’s chair. “Funniest thing was my outfit didn’t have an AWOL all the time I was there. Fellows were over the hill for days, weeks, but there was old Reggie shouting out a ‘Here’ for them. Ran up a perfect record. Company Commander got a citation. Ill wind and the rest of it, what?”

  Sari tried very hard not to laugh, but she gave up the struggle after a few seconds. “I don’t know what it is,” she said, patting his cheek. “I really don’t know. Sometimes I think to myself, ‘You are nuttier than he is if you marry him,’ but I can’t take myself seriously. How do you do it, Reggie? Do you drop some kind of pills in my cocktails?”

  Reggie didn’t know what she was talking about, but this was one of the things he liked about Sari, and all girls for that matter—their dear, bubbling little feminine minds. “Come, come now,” he said, which was a phrase he had been using successfully for years in moments of confusion.

  “All right, we won’t quibble,” Sari said. “When are the lawyers arriving, by the way? That’s why I’m here, you know. I want to look at a millionaire in the flesh, even if he’s going to disappear at noon sharp, like a daytime Cinderella.”

  “Oh, they’ll be along pretty soon, I suppose. Look, Sari, you’ve got a good head for figures. Counting up to ten is no mean trick, eh? Well, how about this? Why won’t they let me keep my million dollars?”

  Sari smiled at him. “I wouldn’t worry about it. They’ll probably explain all that to you, in any case.”

  SARI’S words were prophetic. The Messrs. Godpenny, Overreach, Hensdrake and Wellington arrived ten minutes later, and five minutes after Clive had taken their black Homburgs and black overcoats, the president of the firm—Darius Godpenny—was providing clues to Reggie’s query.

  “Your worthy grandfather did not think that you should be entrusted with the sum of one million dollars,” Godpenny said, wagging his spectacles at Reggie. Darius Godpenny was a small, compactly built man in his middle-fifties, with neat gray hair, a high unfurrowed forehead, and a look about the eyes that is peculiar to financial Peeping Toms. “In truth, your grandfather did not feel that you were equipped to manage one dollar, let alone one million,” he went on with relish. “In his opinion you were non compos mentis.”

  “Is that a direct quote?” Sari asked coldly. “Did the old boy usually chat with you in Latin?”

  Godpenny gave her a severe glance. “I took the liberty, the poetic license, you might away, of putting his words in an older and more succinct tongue.”

  “You’re liable to get your poetic license revoked,” Sari muttered.

  “To continue,” Godpenny said, clearing his throat. “I must say that our firm has found your grandfather’s estimate of you, rather temperate. In the thirteen years we have managed your affairs there has been nothing but one crisis after another, and all of them have been precipitated by your appalling lack of responsibility and judgment. Short of theft, I can think of no fiscal impropriety you have not committed.”

  “That must worry the old boy,” Reggie said moodily. “That theft business, I mean. He was a great old thief. Mines, railroads, whole states, he slipped ’em into his pocket when no one was looking. Great old boy. Wonderful touch for larceny. He’s probably stewing about bad blood in the family. No more thieves. Whole line going to pot.”

  God penny drew himself up to his full and unimpressive height. “Your grandfather was one of the pioneers who built this country, young man.”

  “That’s right,” Reggie said, shaking his head. “Great old boy. You know, he once stole a hot stove from the Union League club, because he heard someone say he’d stolen everything but a hot stove. Full of pride. That was grandfather.”

  “I think it best to terminate our business,” Godpenny said, after gnawing at his lips for a few seconds in silence. “Sign this form here, here and here, if you please.”

  “Righto,” Reggie said.

  When the lawyers had filed out Reggie turned and patted Sari on the cheek. “Thank goodness that’s over,” he said. “Terrible strain.”

  “You were just wonderful, and I hated those nasty little men,” Sari said.

  Clive entered the room with a tray of glasses and a definitely gay smile on his noble face. “Champagne, sir,” he announced in tones of pure gold . . .

  “Well, you’ve still got ten minutes left,” Sari said, a good bit later. “The new lawyers will take over at noon.”

  “I wish I could buy you one little present first,” Reggie said.

  “Never mind, I only want the moon with a fence around it,” Sari said fondly. “You can pick that up anytime.”

  THEY were sitting on the sofa before the fire, cozily holding hands. Sari’s red head rested against Reggie’s shoulder, and her expression was dreaming and peaceful.

  “You know, money doesn’t make any difference,” Reggie said.

  “Not to me it doesn’t,” Sari said, hugging his arm.

  “But look,” Reggie said. “I always live the same way. But sometimes Clive says we’re stony, and other times he’s actually cheerful about the old ready. But nothing ever changes. So how does he know?”

  “Clive’s a genius,” Sari said cheerfully. “He just knows.”

  “No doubt of that. Supposing I go find another bottle of the old bubbly? Thirsty business, talking.”

  “What an unexpected but heavenly thought!”

  Reggie patted her silken knee. “Wait right here. I want to explore this money thing.” He patted her knee absently. “Or something. Funny. Slipped my mind. But I’ll try to remember.”

  “I’ll help you,” Sari said. “Go get the old bubbly, to use your fine and noble phrase.”

  Reggie found a bottle of champagne waiting for him in an ice bucket. He was loosening the stopper when an anxious knock sounded on the back door. Reggie hesitated, then sighed and opened the door. Ferdie Myrtlehead stood in the corridor, a tipsy little smile on his round and foolish face. “Reggie, old bean,” he said. “What ho!” Reggie said. He wasn’t surprised to find Ferdie at the rear door. Ferdie had a quirk about front doors, he knew. The idiosyncrasy dated to his youth; as a teen-ager he had read of a trapper who was killed by a shotgun that was rigged up to the front door of a cabin. That had done it for Ferdie. No more barging through front doors.

  Ferdie smiled at the bottle of champagne. “I say, the old bubbly,” he murmured. “Saving it for anything special?”

  Reggie thought a moment. “Well, no,” he said.

&nb
sp; “Grand. Let’s have a touch.”

  “Righto.”

  They sat down at the kitchen table and had a pleasant, ruminative drink. “Well, well,” Ferdie said.

  “Quite,” Reggie nodded.

  Ferdie scratched his head. “I had something to tell you,” he said. “Hurried over from the club. But it’s gone.”

  “Well, have a drink. Sometimes a boost like that helps.”

  “Righto.”

  After the second drink Ferdie snapped his fingers. His pink and plump face relaxed into a smile. “Ah, yes,” he said. “You remember my Uncle Algernon?”

  “Well, no.”

  “I’ve told you about him anyway. A rare old crackpot. Thinks horses are plotting to overthrow society. Really! Mad as a loon. Always attacking poor old nags pulling milk wagons. Filthy rows with judges all over the country for trying to run horses down in his car. Goes to western movies and cheers when horses are shot.” Ferdie chuckled and slapped Reggie on the shoulder. “Quite a peppy old character.”

  “Sounds great,” Reggie said approvingly.

  “Well, he just popped into the club. That’s why I came over here. Thought you’d like to meet him.”

  “I say, that was decent of you,” Reggie said, touched by Ferdie’s generosity.

  “Well, let’s be off then.”

  At twelve o’clock the six lawyers from the new firm arrived at Reggie’s front door. Clive let them in, took their hats and coats, and then glanced inquiringly at Sari, who was still seated on the sofa before the fire.

  “Excuse me, but have you seen the master?” he asked her.

  “Reggie? He went out to the kitchen a while ago to get a bottle of champagne. Didn’t you see him?”

  “I was in my room doing the accounts,” Clive said. His voice was even and deep, but its timbre suggested the battlefield rather than the drawingroom. “Excuse me, I’ll tell him the lawyers are here.”

  In twenty seconds he re-entered the room. “Won’t you sit down?” he said to the attorneys. “There may be a slight delay.”