The Jeeves Omnibus (54 page)

‘It is a little difficult to say, sir. A really effective hiding place for so bulky an object does not readily present itself.’

‘No. The damn thing seems to fill the room, doesn’t it?’

‘It unquestionably takes the eye, sir.’

‘Yes. The authorities wrought well when they shaped this helmet for Constable Oates. They aimed to finish him off impressively, not to give him something which would balance on top of his head like a peanut, and they succeeded. You couldn’t hide a lid like this in an impenetrable jungle. Ah, well,’ I said, ‘we will just have to see what tact and suavity will do. I wonder when these birds are going to arrive. I suppose we may expect them very shortly. Ah! That would be the hand of doom now, if I mistake not, Jeeves.’

But in assuming that the knocker who had just knocked on the door was Sir Watkyn Bassett, I had erred. It was Stiffy’s voice that spoke.

‘Bertie, let me in.’

There was nobody I was more anxious to see, but I did not immediately fling wide the gates. Prudence dictated a preliminary inquiry.

‘Have you got that bally dog of yours with you?’

‘No. He’s being aired by the butler.’

‘In that case, you may enter.’

When she did so, it was to find Bertram confronting her with folded arms and a hard look. She appeared, however, not to note my forbidding exterior.

‘Bertie, darling –’

She broke off, checked by a fairly animal snarl from the Wooster lips.

‘Not so much of the “Bertie, darling”. I have just one thing to say to you, young Stiffy, and it is this: Was it you who put that helmet in my suitcase?’

‘Of course it was. That’s what I was coming to talk to you about. You remember I was trying to think of a good place. I racked the brain quite a bit, and then suddenly I got it.’

‘And now I’ve got it.’

The acidity of my tone seemed to surprise her. She regarded me with girlish wonder – the wide-eyed kind.

‘But you don’t mind, do you, Bertie, darling?’

‘Ha!’

‘But why? I thought you would be so glad to help me out.’

‘Oh, yes?’ I said, and I meant it to sting.

‘I couldn’t risk having Uncle Watkyn find it in my room.’

‘You preferred to have him find it in mine?’

‘But how can he? He can’t come searching your room.’

‘He can’t, eh?’

‘Of course not. You’re his guest.’

‘And you suppose that that will cause him to hold his hand?’ I smiled one of those bitter, sardonic smiles. ‘I think you are attributing to the old poison germ a niceness of feeling and a respect for the laws of hospitality which nothing in his record suggests that he possesses. You can take it from me that he definitely is going to search the room, and I imagine that the only reason he hasn’t arrived already is that he is still scouring the house for Gussie.’

‘Gussie?’

‘He is at the moment chasing Gussie with a hunting crop. But a man cannot go on doing that indefinitely. Sooner or later he will give it up, and then we shall have him here, complete with magnifying glass and bloodhounds.’

The gravity of the situash had at last impressed itself upon her.
She
uttered a squeak of dismay, and her eyes became a bit soup-platey.

‘Oh, Bertie! Then I’m afraid I’ve put you in rather a spot.’

‘That covers the facts like a dust-sheet.’

‘I’m sorry now I ever asked Harold to pinch the thing. It was a mistake. I admit it. Still, after all, even if Uncle Watkyn does come here and find it, it doesn’t matter much, does it?’

‘Did you hear that, Jeeves?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘So did I. I see. It doesn’t matter, you feel?’

‘Well, what I mean is your reputation won’t really suffer much, will it? Everybody knows that you can’t keep your hands off policemen’s helmets. This’ll be just another one.’

‘Ha! And what leads you to suppose, young Stiffy, that when the Assyrian comes down like a wolf on the fold I shall meekly assume the guilt and not blazon the truth – what, Jeeves?’

‘Forth to the world, sir.’

‘Thank you, Jeeves. What makes you suppose that I shall meekly assume the guilt and not blazon the truth forth to the world?’

I wouldn’t have supposed that her eyes could have widened any more, but they did perceptibly. Another dismayed squeak escaped her. Indeed, such was its volume that it might perhaps be better to call it a squeal.

‘But, Bertie!’

‘Well?’

‘Bertie, listen!’

‘I’m listening.’

‘Surely you will take the rap? You can’t let Harold get it in the neck. You were telling me this afternoon that he would be unfrocked. I won’t have him unfrocked. Where is he going to get if they unfrock him? That sort of thing gives a curate a frightful black eye. Why can’t you say you did it? All it would mean is that you would be kicked out of the house, and I don’t suppose you’re so anxious to stay on, are you?’

‘Possibly you are not aware that your bally uncle is proposing to send the perpetrator of this outrage to chokey.’

‘Oh, no. At the worst, just a fine.’

‘Nothing of the kind. He specifically told me chokey.’

‘He didn’t mean it. I expect there was –’

‘No, there was not a twinkle in his eye.’

‘Then that settles it. I can’t have my precious, angel Harold doing a stretch.’

‘How about your precious, angel Bertram?’

‘But Harold’s so sensitive.’

‘So am I sensitive.’

‘Not half so sensitive as Harold. Bertie, surely you aren’t going to be difficult about this? You’re much too good a sport. Didn’t you tell me once that the Code of the Woosters was “Never let a pal down”?’

She had found the talking point. People who appeal to the Code of the Woosters rarely fail to touch a chord in Bertram. My iron front began to crumble.

‘That’s all very fine –’

‘Bertie, darling!’

‘Yes, I know, but, dash it all –’

‘Bertie!’

‘Oh, well!’

‘You will take the rap?’

‘I suppose so.’

She yodelled ecstatically, and I think that if I had not sidestepped she would have flung her arms about my neck. Certainly she came leaping forward with some such purpose apparently in view. Foiled by my agility, she began to tear off a few steps of that spring dance to which she was so addicted.

‘Thank you, Bertie, darling. I knew you would be sweet about it. I can’t tell you how grateful I am, and how much I admire you. You remind me of Carter Paterson … no, that’s not it … Nick Carter … no, not Nick Carter … Who does Mr Wooster remind me of, Jeeves?’

‘Sidney Carton, miss.’

‘That’s right. Sidney Carton. But he was smalltime stuff compared with you, Bertie. And, anyway, I expect we are getting the wind up quite unnecessarily. Why are we taking it for granted that Uncle Watkyn will find the helmet, if he comes and searches the room? There are a hundred places where you can hide it.’

And before I could say ‘Name three!’ she had pirouetted to the door and pirouetted out. I could hear her dying away in the distance with a song on her lips.

My own, as I turned to Jeeves, were twisted in a bitter smile.

‘Women, Jeeves!’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Well, Jeeves,’ I said, my hand stealing towards the decanter, ‘this is the end!’

‘No, sir.’

I started with a violence that nearly unshipped my front uppers.

‘Not the end?’

‘No, sir.’

‘You don’t mean you have an idea?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘But you told me just now you hadn’t.’

‘Yes, sir. But since then I have been giving the matter some thought, and am now in a position to say “Eureka!”’

‘Say what?’

‘Eureka, sir. Like Archimedes.’

‘Did he say Eureka? I thought it was Shakespeare.’

‘No, sir. Archimedes. What I would recommend is that you drop the helmet out of the window. It is most improbable that it will occur to Sir Watkyn to search the exterior of the premises, and we shall be able to recover it at our leisure.’ He paused, and stood listening. ‘Should this suggestion meet with your approval, sir, I feel that a certain haste would be advisable. I fancy I can hear the sound of approaching footsteps.’

He was right. The air was vibrant with their clumping. Assuming that a herd of bison was not making its way along the second-floor passage of Totleigh Towers, the enemy were upon us. With the nippiness of a lamb in the fold on observing the approach of Assyrians, I snatched up the helmet, bounded to the window and loosed the thing into the night. And scarcely had I done so, when the door opened, and through it came – in the order named – Aunt Dahlia, wearing an amused and indulgent look, as if she were joining in some game to please the children, Pop Bassett, in a purple dressing gown, and Police Constable Oates, who was dabbing at his nose with a pocket-handkerchief.

‘So sorry to disturb you, Bertie,’ said the aged relative courteously.

‘Not at all,’ I replied with equal suavity. ‘Is there something I can do for the multitude?’

‘Sir Watkyn has got some extraordinary idea into his head about wanting to search your room.’

‘Search my room?’

‘I intend to search it from top to bottom,’ said old Bassett, looking very Bosher Street-y.

I glanced at Aunt Dahlia, raising the eyebrows.

‘I don’t understand. What’s all this about?’

She laughed indulgently.

‘You will scarcely believe it, Bertie, but he thinks that cow-creamer is here.’

‘Is it missing?’

‘It’s been stolen.’

‘You don’t say!’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, well, well.’

‘He’s very upset about it.’

‘I don’t wonder.’

‘Most distressed.’

‘Poor old bloke.’

I placed a kindly hand on Pop Bassett’s shoulder. Probably the wrong thing to do, I can see, looking back, for it did not soothe.

‘I can do without your condolences, Mr Wooster, and I should be glad if you would not refer to me as a bloke. I have every reason to believe that not only is my cow-creamer in your possession, but Constable Oates’s helmet, as well.’

A cheery guffaw seemed in order. I uttered it.

‘Ha, ha!’

Aunt Dahlia came across with another.

‘Ha, ha!’

‘How dashed absurd!’

‘Perfectly ridiculous.’

‘What on earth would I be doing with cow-creamers?’

‘Or policemen’s helmets?’

‘Quite.’

‘Did you ever hear such a weird idea?’

‘Never. My dear old host,’ I said, ‘let us keep perfectly calm and cool and get all this straightened out. In the kindliest spirit, I must point out that you are on the verge – if not slightly past the verge – of making an ass of yourself. This sort of thing won’t do, you know. You can’t dash about accusing people of nameless crimes without a shadow of evidence.’

‘I have all the evidence I require, Mr Wooster.’

‘That’s what you think. And that, I maintain, is where you are making the floater of a lifetime. When was this modern Dutch gadget of yours abstracted?’

He quivered beneath the thrust, pinkening at the tip of the nose.

‘It is not modern Dutch!’

‘Well, we can thresh that out later. The point is: When did it leave the premises?’

‘It has not left the premises.’

‘That, again, is what you think. Well, when was it stolen?’

‘About twenty minutes ago.’

‘Then there you are. Twenty minutes ago I was up here in my room.’

This rattled him. I had thought it would.

‘You were in your room?’

‘In my room.’

‘Alone?’

‘On the contrary. Jeeves was here.’

‘Who is Jeeves?’

‘Don’t you know Jeeves? This is Jeeves. Jeeves … Sir Watkyn Bassett.’

‘And who may you be, my man?’

‘That’s exactly what he is – my man. May I say my right-hand man?’

‘Thank you, sir.’

‘Not at all, Jeeves. Well-earned tribute.’

Pop Bassett’s face was disfigured, if you could disfigure a face like his, by an ugly sneer.

‘I regret, Mr Wooster, that I am not prepared to accept as conclusive evidence of your innocence the unsupported word of your manservant.’

‘Unsupported, eh? Jeeves, go and page Mr Spode. Tell him I want him to come and put a bit of stuffing into my alibi.’

‘Very good, sir.’

He shimmered away, and Pop Bassett seemed to swallow something hard and jagged.

‘Was Roderick Spode with you?’

‘Certainly he was. Perhaps you will believe him?’

‘Yes, I would believe Roderick Spode.’

‘Very well, then. He’ll be here in a moment.’

He appeared to muse.

‘I see. Well, apparently I was wrong, then, in supposing that you are concealing my cow-creamer. It must have been purloined by somebody else.’

‘Outside job, if you ask me,’ said Aunt Dahlia.

‘Possibly the work of an international gang,’ I hazarded.

‘Very likely.’

‘I expect it was all over the place that Sir Watkyn had bought the thing. You remember Uncle Tom had been counting on getting it, and no doubt he told all sorts of people where it had gone. It wouldn’t take long for the news to filter through to the international gangs. They keep their ear to the ground.’

‘Damn clever, those gangs,’ assented the aged relative.

Pop Bassett had seemed to me to wince a trifle at the mention of Uncle Tom’s name. Guilty conscience doing its stuff, no doubt – gnawing, as these guilty consciences do.

‘Well, we need not discuss the matter further,’ he said. ‘As regards the cow-creamer, I admit that you have established your case. We will now turn to Constable Oates’s helmet. That, Mr Wooster, I happen to know positively, is in your possession.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘Yes. The constable received specific information on the point from an eyewitness. I will proceed, therefore, to search your room without delay.’

‘You really feel you want to?’

‘I do.’

I shrugged the shoulders.

‘Very well,’ I said, ‘very well. If that is the spirit in which you interpret the duties of a host, carry on. We invite inspection. I can only say that you appear to have extraordinarily rummy views on making your guests comfortable over the weekend. Don’t count on my coming here again.’

I had expressed the opinion to Jeeves that it would be entertaining to stand by and watch this blighter and his colleague ferret about, and so it proved. I don’t know when I have extracted more solid amusement from anything. But all these good things have to come to an end at last. About ten minutes later, it was plain that the bloodhounds were planning to call it off and pack up.