7 JEEVES AND THE KID CLEMENTINA

IT HAS BEEN well said of Bertram Wooster by those who know him best that, whatever other sporting functions he may see fit to oil out of, you will always find him battling to his sixteen handicap at the annual Golf tournament of the Drones Club. Nevertheless, when I heard that this year they were holding it at Bingley-on-Sea, I confess I hesitated. As I stood gazing out of the window of my suite at the Splendide on the morning of the opening day, I was not exactly a-twitter, if you understand me, but I couldn’t help feeling I might have been rather rash.

‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘now that we have actually arrived, I find myself wondering if it was quite prudent to come here.’

‘It is a pleasant spot, sir.’

‘Where every prospect pleases,’ I agreed. ‘But though the spicy breezes blow fair o’er Bingley-on-Sea, we must never forget that this is where my Aunt Agatha’s old friend, Miss Mapleton, runs a girls’ school. If the relative knew I was here, she would expect me to call on Miss Mapleton.’

‘Very true, sir.’

I shivered somewhat.

‘I met her once, Jeeves. ’Twas on a summer’s evening in my tent, the day I overcame the Nervii. Or, rather, at lunch at Aunt Agatha’s a year ago come Lammas Eve. It is not an experience I would willingly undergo again.’

‘Indeed, sir?’

‘Besides, you remember what happened last time I got into a girls’ school?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Secrecy and silence, then. My visit here must be strictly incog. If Aunt Agatha happens to ask you where I spent this week, tell her I went to Harrogate for the cure.’

‘Very good, sir. Pardon me, sir, are you proposing to appear in those garments in public?’

Up to this point our conversation had been friendly and cordial, but I now perceived that the jarring note had been struck. I had been wondering when my new plus-fours would come under discussion, and I was prepared to battle for them like a tigress for her young.

‘Certainly, Jeeves,’ I said. ‘Why? Don’t you like them?’

‘No, sir.’

‘You think them on the bright side?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘A little vivid, they strike you as?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Well, I think highly of them, Jeeves,’ I said firmly.

There already being a certain amount of chilliness in the air, it seemed to me a suitable moment for springing another item of information which I had been keeping from him for some time.

‘Er – Jeeves,’ I said.

‘Sir?’

‘I ran into Miss Wickham the other day. After chatting of this and that, she invited me to join a party she is getting up to go to Antibes this summer.’

‘Indeed, sir?’

He now looked definitely squiggle-eyed. Jeeves, as I think I have mentioned before, does not approve of Bobbie Wickham.

There was what you might call a tense silence. I braced myself for an exhibition of the good old Wooster determination. I mean to say, one has got to take a firm stand from time to time. The trouble with Jeeves is that he tends occasionally to get above himself. Just because he has surged round and – I admit it freely – done the young master a bit of good in one or two crises, he has a nasty way of conveying the impression that he looks on Bertram Wooster as a sort of idiot child who, but for him, would conk in the first chukka. I resent this.

‘I have accepted, Jeeves,’ I said in a quiet, level voice, lighting a cigarette with a careless flick of the wrist.

‘Indeed, sir?’

‘You will like Antibes.’

‘Yes, sir?’

‘So shall I.’

‘Yes, sir?’

‘That’s settled, then.’

‘Yes, sir.’

I was pleased. The firm stand, I saw, had done its work. It was plain that the man was crushed beneath the iron heel – cowed, if you know what I mean.

‘Right-ho, then, Jeeves.’

‘Very good, sir.’

I had not expected to return from the arena until well on in the evening, but circumstances so arranged themselves that it was barely three o’clock when I found myself back again. I was wandering moodily to and fro on the pier, when I observed Jeeves shimmering towards me.

‘Good afternoon, sir,’ he said. ‘I had not supposed that you would be returning quite so soon, or I would have remained at the hotel.’

‘I had not supposed that I would be returning quite so soon myself, Jeeves,’ I said, sighing somewhat. ‘I was outed in the first round, I regret to say.’

‘Indeed, sir? I am sorry to hear that.’

‘And, to increase the mortification of defeat, Jeeves, by a blighter who had not spared himself at the luncheon-table and was quite noticeably sozzled. I couldn’t seem to do anything right.’

‘Possibly you omitted to keep your eye on the ball with sufficient assiduity, sir?’

‘Something of that nature, no doubt. Anyway, here I am, a game and popular loser and …’ I paused, and scanned the horizon with some interest. ‘Great Scott, Jeeves! Look at that girl just coming on to the pier. I never saw anybody so extraordinarily like Miss Wickham. How do you account for these resemblances?’

‘In the present instance, sir, I attribute the similarity to the fact that the young lady is Miss Wickham.’

‘Eh?’

‘Yes, sir. If you notice, she is waving to you now.’

‘But what on earth is she doing down here?’

‘I am unable to say, sir.’

His voice was chilly and seemed to suggest that, whatever had brought Bobbie Wickham to Bingley-on-Sea, it could not, in his opinion, be anything good. He dropped back into the offing, registering alarm and despondency, and I removed the old Homburg and waggled it genially.

‘What-ho!’ I said.

Bobbie came to anchor alongside.

‘Hullo, Bertie,’ she said. ‘I didn’t know you were here.’

‘I am,’ I assured her.

‘In mourning?’ she asked, eyeing the trouserings.

‘Rather natty, aren’t they?’ I said, following her gaze. ‘Jeeves doesn’t like them, but then he’s notoriously hidebound in the matter of leg-wear. What are you doing in Bingley?’

‘My cousin Clementina is at school here. It’s her birthday and I thought I would come down and see her. I’m just off there now. Are you staying here to-night?’

‘Yes. At the Splendide.’

‘You can give me dinner there if you like.’

Jeeves was behind me, and I couldn’t see him, but at these words I felt his eye slap warningly against the back of my neck. I knew what it was that he was trying to broadcast – viz. that it would be tempting Providence to mix with Bobbie Wickham even to the extent of giving her a bite to eat. Dashed absurd, was my verdict. Get entangled with young Bobbie in the intricate life of a country-house, where almost anything can happen, and I’m not saying. But how any doom or disaster could lurk behind the simple pronging of a spot of dinner together, I failed to see. I ignored the man.

‘Of course. Certainly. Rather. Absolutely,’ I said.

‘That’ll be fine. I’ve got to get back to London to-night for revelry of sorts at the Berkeley, but it doesn’t matter if I’m a bit late. We’ll turn up at about seven-thirty, and you can take us to the movies afterwards.’

‘We? Us?’

‘Clementina and me.’

‘You don’t mean you intend to bring your ghastly cousin?’

‘Of course I do. Don’t you want the child to have a little pleasure on her birthday? And she isn’t ghastly. She’s a dear. She won’t be any trouble. All you’ll have to do is take her back to the school afterwards. You can manage that without straining a sinew, can’t you?’

I eyed her keenly.

‘What does it involve?’

‘How do you mean, what does it involve?’

‘The last time I was lured into a girls’ school, a headmistress with an eye like a gimlet insisted on my addressing the chain-gang on Ideals and the Life To Come. This will not happen to-night?’

‘Of course not. You just go to the front door, ring the bell, and bung her in.’

I mused.

‘That would appear to be well within our scope. Eh, Jeeves?’

‘I should be disposed to imagine so, sir.’

The man’s tone was cold and soupy: and, scanning his face, I observed on it an ‘If-you-would-only-be-guided-by-me’ expression which annoyed me intensely. There are moments when Jeeves looks just like an aunt.

‘Right,’ I said, ignoring him once more – and rather pointedly, at that. ‘Then I’ll expect you at seven-thirty. Don’t be late. And see,’ I added, just to show the girl that beneath the smiling exterior I was a man of iron, ‘that the kid has her hands washed and does not sniff.’

I had not, I confess, looked forward with any great keenness to hobnobbing with Bobbie Wickham’s cousin Clementina, but I’m bound to admit that she might have been considerably worse. Small girls as a rule, I have noticed, are inclined, when confronted with me, to giggle a good deal. They snigger and they stare. I look up and find their eyes glued on me in an incredulous manner, as if they were reluctant to believe that I was really true. I suspect them of being in the process of memorizing any little peculiarities of deportment that I may possess, in order to reproduce them later for the entertainment of their fellow-inmates.

With the kid Clementina there was nothing of this description. She was a quiet, saintlike child of about thirteen – in fact, seeing that this was her birthday, exactly thirteen – and her gaze revealed only silent admiration. Her hands were spotless; she had not a cold in the head; and at dinner, during which her behaviour was unexceptionable, she proved a sympathetic listener, hanging on my lips, so to speak, when with the aid of a fork and two peas I explained to her how my opponent that afternoon had stymied me on the tenth.

She was equally above criticism at the movies, and at the conclusion of the proceedings thanked me for the treat with visible emotion. I was pleased with the child, and said as much to Bobbie while assisting her into her two-seater.

‘Yes, I told you she was a dear,’ said Bobbie, treading on the self-starter in preparation for the dash to London. ‘I always insist that they misjudge her at that school. They’re always misjudging people. They misjudged me when I was there.’

‘Misjudge her? How?’

‘Oh, in various ways. But, then, what can you expect of a dump like St Monica’s?’

I started.

‘St Monica’s?’

‘That’s the name of the place.’

‘You don’t mean the kid is at Miss Mapleton’s school?’

‘Why shouldn’t she be?’

‘But Miss Mapleton is my Aunt Agatha’s oldest friend.’

‘I know. It was your Aunt Agatha who got mother to send me there when I was a kid.’

‘I say,’ I said earnestly, ‘when you were there this afternoon you didn’t mention having met me down here?’

‘No.’

‘That’s all right.’ I was relieved. ‘You see, if Miss Mapleton knew I was in Bingley, she would expect me to call. I shall be leaving to-morrow morning, so all will be well. But, dash it,’ I said, spotting the snag, ‘how about to-night?’

‘What about to-night?’

‘Well, shan’t I have to see her? I can’t just ring the front-door bell, sling the kid in, and leg it. I should never hear the last of it from Aunt Agatha.’

Bobbie looked at me in an odd, meditative sort of way.

‘As a matter of fact, Bertie,’ she said, ‘I had been meaning to touch on that point. I think, if I were you, I wouldn’t ring the front-door bell.’

‘Eh? Why not?’

‘Well, it’s like this, you see. Clementina is supposed to be in bed. They sent her there just as I was leaving this afternoon. Think of it! On her birthday – right plumb spang in the middle of her birthday – and all for putting sherbet in the ink to make it fizz!’

I reeled.

‘You aren’t telling me that this foul kid came out without leave?’

‘Yes, I am. That’s exactly it. She got up and sneaked out when nobody was looking. She had set her heart on getting a square meal. I suppose I really ought to have told you right at the start, but I didn’t want to spoil your evening.’

As a general rule, in my dealings with the delicately-nurtured, I am the soul of knightly chivalry – suave, genial and polished. But I can on occasion say the bitter, cutting thing, and I said it now.

‘Oh?’ I said.

‘But it’s all right.’

‘Yes,’ I said, speaking, if I recollect, between my clenched teeth, ‘nothing could be sweeter, could it? The situation is one which it would be impossible to view with concern, what? I shall turn up with the kid, get looked at through steel-rimmed spectacles by the Mapleton, and after an agreeable five minutes shall back out, leaving the Mapleton to go to her escritoire and write a full account of the proceedings to my Aunt Agatha. And, contemplating what will happen after that, the imagination totters. I confidently expect my Aunt Agatha to beat all previous records.’

The girl clicked her tongue chidingly.

‘Don’t make such heavy weather, Bertie. You must learn not to fuss so.’

‘I must, must I?’

‘Everything’s going to be all right. I’m not saying it won’t be necessary to exercise a little strategy in getting Clem into the house, but it will be perfectly simple, if you’ll only listen carefully to what I’m going to tell you. First, you will need a good long piece of string.’

‘String?’

‘String. Surely even you know what string is?’

I stiffened rather haughtily.

‘Certainly,’ I replied. ‘You mean string.’

‘That’s right. String. You take this with you—’

‘And soften the Mapleton’s heart by doing tricks with it, I suppose?’

Bitter, I know. But I was deeply stirred.

‘You take this string with you,’ proceeded Bobbie patiently, ‘and when you get into the garden you go through it till you come to a conservatory near the house. Inside it you will find a lot of flower-pots. How are you on recognizing a flower-pot when you see one, Bertie?’

‘I am thoroughly familiar with flower-pots. If, as I suppose, you mean those sort of pot things they put flowers in.’

‘That’s exactly what I do mean. All right, then. Grab an armful of these flower-pots and go round the conservatory till you come to a tree. Climb this, tie a string to one of the pots, balance it on a handy branch which you will find overhangs the conservatory, and then, having stationed Clem near the front door, retire into the middle distance and jerk the string. The flower-pot will fall and smash the glass, someone in the house will hear the noise and come out to investigate, and while the door is open and nobody near Clem will sneak in and go up to bed.’

‘But suppose no one comes out?’

‘Then you repeat the process with another pot.’

It seemed sound enough.

‘You’re sure it will work?’

‘It’s never failed yet. That’s the way I always used to get in after lock-up when I was at St Monica’s. Now, you’re sure you’ve got it clear, Bertie? Let’s have a quick run-through to make certain, and then I really must be off. String.’

‘String.’

‘Conservatory.’

‘Or greenhouse.’

‘Flower-pot.’

‘Flower-pot.’

‘Tree. Climb. Branch. Climb down. Jerk. Smash. And then off to beddy-bye. Got it?’

‘I’ve got it. But,’ I said sternly, ‘let me tell you just one thing—’

‘I haven’t time. I must rush. Write to me about it, using one side of the paper only. Good-bye.’

She rolled off, and after following her with burning eyes for a moment I returned to Jeeves, who was in the background showing the kid Clementina how to make a rabbit with a pocket handkerchief. I drew him aside. I was feeling a little better now, for I perceived that an admirable opportunity had presented itself for putting the man in his place and correcting his view that he is the only member of our establishment with brains and resource.

‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘you will doubtless be surprised to learn that something in the nature of a hitch has occurred.’

‘Not at all, sir.’

‘No?’

‘No, sir. In matters where Miss Wickham is involved, I am, if I may take the liberty of saying so, always on the alert for hitches. If you recollect, sir, I have frequently observed that Miss Wickham, while a charming young lady, is apt—’

‘Yes, yes, Jeeves. I know.’

‘What would the precise nature of the trouble be this time, sir?’

I explained the circs.

‘The kid is A.W.O.L. They sent her to bed for putting sherbet in the ink, and in bed they imagine her to have spent the evening. Instead of which, she was out with me, wolfing the eight-course table-d’hôte dinner at seven and six, and then going on to the Marine Plaza to enjoy an entertainment on the silver screen. It is our task to get her back into the house without anyone knowing. I may mention, Jeeves, that the school in which this young excrescence is serving her sentence is the one run by my Aunt Agatha’s old friend, Miss Mapleton.’

‘Indeed, sir?’

‘A problem, Jeeves, what?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘In fact, one might say a pretty problem?’

‘Undoubtedly, sir. If I might suggest—’

I was expecting this. I raised a hand.

‘I do not require any suggestions, Jeeves. I can handle this matter myself.’

‘I was merely about to propose—’

I raised the hand again.

‘Peace, Jeeves. I have the situation well under control. I have had one of my ideas. It may interest you to hear how my brain worked. It occurred to me, thinking the thing over, that a house like St Monica’s would be likely to have near it a conservatory containing flower-pots. Then, like a flash, the whole thing came to me. I propose to procure some string, to tie it to a flowerpot, to balance the pot on a branch – there will, no doubt, be a tree near the conservatory with a branch overhanging it – and to retire to a distance, holding the string. You will station yourself with the kid near the front door, taking care to keep carefully concealed. I shall then jerk the string, the pot will smash the glass, the noise will bring someone out, and while the front door is open you will shoot the kid in and leave the rest to her personal judgement. Your share in the proceedings, you will notice, is simplicity itself – mere routine-work – and should not tax you unduly. How about it?’

‘Well, sir—’

‘Jeeves, I have had occasion before to comment on this habit of yours of saying “Well, sir” whenever I suggest anything in the nature of a ruse or piece of strategy. I dislike it more every time you do it. But I shall be glad to hear what possible criticism you can find to make.’

‘I was merely about to express the opinion, sir, that the plan seems a trifle elaborate.’

‘In a place as tight as this you have got to be elaborate.’

‘Not necessarily, sir. The alternative scheme which I was about to propose—’

I shushed the man.

‘There will be no need for alternative schemes, Jeeves. We will carry on along the lines I have indicated. I will give you ten minutes’ start. That will enable you to take up your position near the front door and self to collect the string. At the conclusion of that period I will come along and do all the difficult part. So no more discussion. Snap into it, Jeeves.’

‘Very good, sir.’

I felt pretty bucked as I tooled up the hill to St Monica’s and equally bucked as I pushed open the front gate and stepped into the dark garden. But, just as I started to cross the lawn, there suddenly came upon me a rummy sensation as if all my bones had been removed and spaghetti substituted, and I paused.

I don’t know if you have ever had the experience of starting off on a binge filled with a sort of glow of exhilaration, if that’s the word I want, and then, without a moment’s warning, having it disappear as if somebody had pressed a switch. That is what happened to me at this juncture, and a most unpleasant feeling it was – rather like when you take one of those express elevators in New York at the top of the building and discover, on reaching the twenty-seventh floor, that you have carelessly left all your insides up on the thirty-second, and too late now to stop and fetch them back.

The truth came to me like a bit of ice down the neck. I perceived that I had been a dashed sight too impulsive. Purely in order to score off Jeeves, I had gone and let myself in for what promised to be the mouldiest ordeal of a lifetime. And the nearer I got to the house, the more I wished that I had been a bit less haughty with the man when he had tried to outline that alternative scheme of his. An alternative scheme was just what I felt I could have done with, and the more alternative it was the better I would have liked it.

At this point I found myself at the conservatory door, and a few moments later I was inside, scooping up the pots.

Then ho, for the tree, bearing ’mid snow and ice the banner with the strange device ‘Excelsior!’

I will say for that tree that it might have been placed there for the purpose. My views on the broad, general principle of leaping from branch to branch in a garden belonging to Aunt Agatha’s closest friend remained unaltered; but I had to admit that, if it was to be done, this was undoubtedly the tree to do it on. It was a cedar of sorts; and almost before I knew where I was, I was sitting on top of the world with the conservatory roof gleaming below me. I balanced the flower-pot on my knee and began to tie the string round it.

And, as I tied, my thoughts turned in a moody sort of way to the subject of Woman.

I was suffering from a considerable strain of the old nerves at the moment, of course, and, looking back, it may be that I was too harsh; but the way I felt in that dark, roosting hour was that you can say what you like, but the more a thoughtful man has to do with women, the more extraordinary it seems to him that such a sex should be allowed to clutter up the earth.

Women, the way I looked at it, simply wouldn’t do. Take the females who were mixed up in this present business. Aunt Agatha, to start with, better known as the Pest of Pont Street, the human snapping-turtle. Aunt Agatha’s closest friend, Miss Mapleton, of whom I can only say that on the single occasion on which I had met her she had struck me as just the sort of person who would be Aunt Agatha’s closest friend. Bobbie Wickham, a girl who went about the place letting the pure in heart in for the sort of thing I was doing now. And Bobbie Wickham’s cousin Clementina, who, instead of sticking sedulously to her studies and learning to be a good wife and mother, spent the springtime of her life filling inkpots with sherbet—

What a crew! What a crew!

I mean to say, what a crew!

I had just worked myself up into rather an impressive state of moral indignation, and was preparing to go even further, when a sudden bright light shone upon me from below and a voice spoke.

‘Ho!’ it said.

It was a policeman. Apart from the fact of his having a lantern, I knew it was a policeman because he had said ‘Ho!’ I don’t know if you recollect my telling you of the time I broke into Bingo Little’s house to pinch the dictaphone record of the mushy article his wife had written about him and sailed out of the study window right into the arms of the Force? On that occasion the guardian of the Law had said ‘Ho!’ and kept on saying it, so evidently policemen are taught this as part of their training. And after all, it’s not a bad way of opening conversation in the sort of circs in which they generally have to chat with people.

‘You come on down out of that,’ he said.

I came on down. I had just got the flower-pot balanced on its branch, and I left it there, feeling rather as if I had touched off the time-fuse of a bomb. Much seemed to me to depend on its stability and poise, as it were. If it continued to balance, an easy nonchalance might still get me out of this delicate position. If it fell, I saw things being a bit hard to explain. In fact, even as it was, I couldn’t see my way to any explanation which would be really convincing.

However, I had a stab at it.

‘Ah, officer,’ I said.

It sounded weak. I said it again, this time with the emphasis on the ‘Ah!’ It sounded weaker than ever. I saw that Bertram would have to do better than this.

‘It’s all right, officer,’ I said.

‘All right, is it?’

‘Oh, yes. Oh, yes.’

‘What you doing up there?’

‘Me, officer?’

‘Yes, you.’

‘Nothing, sergeant.’

‘Ho!’

We eased into the silence, but it wasn’t one of those restful silences that occur in talks between old friends. Embarrassing. Awkward.

‘You’d better come along with me,’ said the gendarme.

The last time I had heard those words from a similar source had been in Leicester Square one Boat Race night when, on my advice, my old pal Oliver Randolph Sipperley had endeavoured to steal a policeman’s helmet at a moment when the policeman was inside it. On that occasion they had been addressed to young Sippy, and they hadn’t sounded any too good, even so. Addressed to me, they more or less froze the marrow.

‘No, I say, dash it!’ I said.

And it was at this crisis, when Bertram had frankly shot his bolt and could only have been described as nonplussed, that a soft step sounded beside us and a soft voice broke the silence.

‘Have you got them, officer? No, I see. It is Mr Wooster.’

The policeman switched the lantern round.

‘Who are you?’

‘I am Mr Wooster’s personal gentleman’s gentleman.’

‘Whose?’

‘Mr Wooster’s.’

‘Is this man’s name Wooster?’

‘This gentleman’s name is Mr Wooster. I am in his employment as gentleman’s personal gentleman.’

I think the cop was awed by the man’s majesty of demeanour, but he came back strongly.

‘Ho!’ he said. ‘Not in Miss Mapleton’s employment?’

‘Miss Mapleton does not employ a gentleman’s personal gentleman.’

‘Then what are you doing in her garden?’

‘I was in conference with Miss Mapleton inside the house, and she desired me to step out and ascertain whether Mr Wooster had been successful in apprehending the intruders.’

‘What intruders?’

‘The suspicious characters whom Mr Wooster and I had observed passing through the garden as we entered it.’

‘And what were you doing entering it?’

‘Mr Wooster had come to pay a call on Miss Mapleton, who is a close friend of his family. We noticed suspicious characters crossing the lawn. On perceiving these suspicious characters, Mr Wooster despatched me to warn and reassure Miss Mapleton, he himself remaining to investigate.’

‘I found him up a tree.’

‘If Mr Wooster was up a tree, I have no doubt he was actuated by excellent motives and had only Miss Mapleton’s best interests at heart.’

The policeman brooded.

‘Ho!’ he said. ‘Well, if you want to know, I don’t believe a word of it. We had a telephone call at the station saying there was somebody in Miss Mapleton’s garden, and I found this fellow up a tree. It’s my belief you’re both in this, and I’m going to take you in to the lady for identification.’

Jeeves inclined his head gracefully.

‘I shall be delighted to accompany you, officer, if such is your wish. And I feel sure that in this connection I may speak for Mr Wooster also. He too, I am confident, will interpose no obstacle in the way of your plans. If you consider that circumstances have placed Mr Wooster in a position that may be termed equivocal, or even compromising, it will naturally be his wish to exculpate himself at the earliest possible—’

‘Here!’ said the policeman, slightly rattled.

‘Officer?’

‘Less of it.’

‘Just as you say, officer.’

‘Switch it off and come along.’

‘Very good, officer.’

I must say that I have enjoyed functions more than that walk to the front door. It seemed to me that the doom had come upon me, so to speak, and I thought it hard that a gallant effort like Jeeves’s, well reasoned and nicely planned, should have failed to click. Even to me his story had rung almost true in spots, and it was a great blow that the man behind the lantern had not sucked it in without question. There’s no doubt about it, being a policeman warps a man’s mind and ruins that sunny faith in his fellow human beings which is the foundation of a lovable character. There seems no way of avoiding this.

I could see no gleam of light in the situation. True, the Mapleton would identify me as the nephew of her old friend, thus putting the stopper on the stroll to the police station and the night in the prison cell, but, when you came right down to it, a fat lot of use that was. The kid Clementina was presumably still out in the night somewhere, and she would be lugged in and the full facts revealed, and then the burning glance, the few cold words and the long letter to Aunt Agatha. I wasn’t sure that a good straight term of penal servitude wouldn’t have been a happier ending.

So, what with one consideration and another, the heart, as I toddled in through the front door, was more or less bowed down with weight of woe. We went along the passage and into the study, and there, standing behind a desk with the steel-rimmed spectacles glittering as nastily as on the day when I had seen them across Aunt Agatha’s luncheon-table, was the boss in person. I gave her one swift look, then shut my eyes.

‘Ah!’ said Miss Mapleton.

Now, uttered in a certain way – dragged out, if you know what I mean, and starting high up and going down into the lower register, the word ‘Ah!’ can be as sinister and devastating as the word ‘Ho!’ In fact, it is a very moot question which is the scalier. But what stunned me was that this wasn’t the way she had said it. It had been, or my ears deceived me, a genial ‘Ah!’. A matey ‘Ah!’. The ‘Ah!’ of one old buddy to another. And this startled me so much that, forgetting the dictates of prudence, I actually ventured to look at her again. And a stifled exclamation burst from Bertram’s lips.

The breath-taking exhibit before me was in person a bit on the short side. I mean to say, she didn’t tower above one, or anything like that. But, to compensate for this lack of inches, she possessed to a remarkable degree that sort of quiet air of being unwilling to stand any rannygazoo which females who run schools always have. I had noticed the same thing when in statu pupillari, in my old head master, one glance from whose eye had invariably been sufficient to make me confess all. Sergeant-majors are like that, too. Also traffic-cops and some post office girls. It’s something in the way they purse up their lips and look through you.

In short, through years of disciplining the young – ticking off Isabel and speaking with quiet severity to Gertrude and that sort of thing – Miss Mapleton had acquired in the process of time rather the air of a female lion-tamer; and it was this air which had caused me after the first swift look to shut my eyes and utter a short prayer. But now, though she still resembled a lion-tamer, her bearing had most surprisingly become that of a chummy lion-tamer – a tamer who, after tucking the lions in for the night, relaxes in the society of the boys.

‘So you did not find them, Mr Wooster?’ she said. ‘I am sorry. But I am none the less grateful for the trouble you have taken, nor lacking in appreciation of your courage. I consider that you have behaved splendidly.’

I felt the mouth opening feebly and the vocal cords twitching, but I couldn’t manage to say anything. I was simply unable to follow her train of thought. I was astonished. Amazed. In fact, dumbfounded about sums it up.

The hell-hound of the Law gave a sort of yelp, rather like a wolf that sees its Russian peasant getting away.

‘You identify this man, ma’am?’

‘Identify him? In what way identify him?’

Jeeves joined the symposium.

‘I fancy the officer is under the impression, madam, that Mr Wooster was in your garden for some unlawful purpose. I informed him that Mr Wooster was the nephew of your friend, Mrs Spenser Gregson, but he refused to credit me.’

There was a pause. Miss Mapleton eyed the constable for an instant as if she had caught him sucking acid-drops during the Scripture lesson.

‘Do you mean to tell me, officer,’ she said, in a voice that hit him just under the third button of the tunic and went straight through to the spinal column, ‘that you have had the imbecility to bungle this whole affair by mistaking Mr Wooster for a burglar?’

‘He was up a tree, ma’am.’

‘And why should he not be up a tree? No doubt you had climbed the tree in order to watch the better, Mr Wooster?’

I could answer that. The first shock over, the old sang-froid was beginning to return.

‘Yes. Rather. That’s it. Of course. Certainly. Absolutely,’ I said. ‘Watch the better. That’s it in a nutshell.’

‘I took the liberty of suggesting that to the officer, madam, but he declined to accept the theory as tenable.’

‘The officer is a fool,’ said Miss Mapleton. It seemed a close thing for a moment whether or not she would rap him on the knuckles with a ruler. ‘By this time, no doubt, owing to his idiocy, the miscreants have made good their escape. And it is for this,’ said Miss Mapleton, ‘that we pay rates and taxes!’

‘Awful!’ I said.

‘Iniquitous.’

‘A bally shame.’

‘A crying scandal,’ said Miss Mapleton.

‘A grim show,’ I agreed.

In fact, we were just becoming more like a couple of lovebirds than anything, when through the open window there suddenly breezed a noise.

I’m never at my best at describing things. At school, when we used to do essays and English composition, my report generally read ‘Has little or no ability, but does his best,’ or words to that effect. True, in the course of years I have picked up a vocabulary of sorts from Jeeves, but even so I’m not nearly hot enough to draw a word-picture that would do justice to that extraordinarily hefty crash. Try to imagine the Albert Hall falling on the Crystal Palace, and you will have got the rough idea.

All four of us, even Jeeves, sprang several inches from the floor. The policeman uttered a startled ‘Ho!’

Miss Mapleton was her calm masterful self again in a second.

‘One of the men appears to have fallen through the conservatory roof,’ she said. ‘Perhaps you will endeavour at the eleventh hour to justify your existence, officer, by proceeding there and making investigations.’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

‘And try not to bungle matters this time.’

‘No, ma’am.’

‘Please hurry, then. Do you intend to stand there gaping all night?’

‘Yes, ma’am. No, ma’am. Yes, ma’am.’

It was pretty to hear him.

‘It is an odd coincidence, Mr Wooster,’ said Miss Mapleton, becoming instantly matey once more as the outcast removed himself. ‘I had just finished writing a letter to your aunt when you arrived. I shall certainly reopen it to tell her how gallantly you have behaved to-night. I have not in the past entertained a very high opinion of the modern young man, but you have caused me to alter it. To track these men unarmed through a dark garden argues courage of a high order. And it was most courteous of you to think of calling upon me. I appreciate it. Are you making a long stay in Bingley?’

This was another one I could answer.

‘No,’ I said. ‘Afraid not. Must be in London to-morrow.’

‘Perhaps you could lunch before your departure?’

‘Afraid not. Thanks most awfully. Very important engagement that I can’t get out of. Eh, Jeeves?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Have to catch the ten-thirty train, what?’

‘Without fail, sir.’

‘I am sorry,’ said Miss Mapleton. ‘I had hoped that you would be able to say a few words to my girls. Some other time perhaps?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘You must let me know when you are coming to Bingley again.’

‘When I come to Bingley again,’ I said, ‘I will certainly let you know.’

‘If I remember your plans correctly, sir, you are not likely to be in Bingley for some little time, sir.’

‘Not for some considerable time, Jeeves,’ I said.

* * *

The front door closed. I passed a hand across the brow.

‘Tell me all, Jeeves,’ I said.

‘Sir?’

‘I say, tell me all. I am fogged.’

‘It is quite simple, sir. I ventured to take the liberty, on my own responsibility, of putting into operation the alternative scheme which, if you remember, I wished to outline to you.’

‘What was it?’

‘It occurred to me, sir, that it would be most judicious for me to call at the back door and desire an interview with Miss Mapleton. This, I fancied, would enable me, while the maid had gone to convey my request to Miss Mapleton, to introduce the young lady into the house unobserved.’

‘And did you?’

‘Yes, sir. She proceeded up the back stairs and is now safely in bed.’

I frowned. The thought of the kid Clementina jarred upon me.

‘She is, is she?’ I said. ‘A murrain on her, Jeeves, and may she be stood in the corner next Sunday for not knowing her Collect. And then you saw Miss Mapleton?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And told her that I was out in the garden, chivvying burglars with my bare hands?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And had been on my way to call upon her?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And now she’s busy adding a postscript to her letter to Aunt Agatha, speaking of me in terms of unstinted praise.’

‘Yes, sir.’

I drew a deep breath. It was too dark for me to see the superhuman intelligence which must have been sloshing about all over the surface of the man’s features. I tried to, but couldn’t make it.

‘Jeeves,’ I said, ‘I should have been guided by you from the first.’

‘It might have spared you some temporary unpleasantness, sir.’

‘Unpleasantness is right. When that lantern shone up at me in the silent night, Jeeves, just as I had finished poising the pot, I thought I had unshipped a rib. Jeeves!’

‘Sir?’

‘That Antibes expedition is off.’

‘I am glad to hear it, sir.’

‘If young Bobbie Wickham can get me into a mess like this in a quiet spot like Bingley-on-Sea, what might she not be able to accomplish at a really lively resort like Antibes?’

‘Precisely, sir. Miss Wickham, as I have sometimes said, though a charming—’

‘Yes, yes, Jeeves. There is no necessity to stress the point. The Wooster eyes are definitely opened.’

I hesitated.

‘Jeeves.’

‘Sir?’

‘Those plus-fours.’

‘Yes, sir?’

‘You may give them to the poor.’

‘Thank you very much, sir.’

I sighed.

‘It is my heart’s blood, Jeeves.’

‘I appreciate the sacrifice, sir. But, once the first pang of separation is over, you will feel much easier without them.’

‘You think so?’

‘I am convinced of it, sir.’

‘So be it, then, Jeeves,’ I said, ‘so be it.’