THE INIMITABLE JEEVES
PART 4
CHAPTER IV
PEARLS MEAN TEARS
I remember—it
must have been when I was at school because I don't go in for that sort of
thing very largely nowadays—reading a poem or something about something or
other in which there was a line which went, if I've got it rightly,
"Shades of the prison house begin to close upon the growing boy."
Well, what I'm driving at is that during the next two weeks that's exactly how
it was with me. I mean to say, I could hear the wedding bells chiming faintly
in the distance and getting louder and louder every day, and how the deuce to
slide out of it was more than I could think. Jeeves, no doubt, could have dug
up a dozen brainy schemes in a couple of minutes, but he was still aloof and
chilly and I couldn't bring myself to ask him point-blank. I mean, he could see
easily enough that the young master was in a bad way and, if that wasn't enough
to make him overlook the fact that I was still gleaming brightly about the
waistband, well, what it amounted to was that the old feudal spirit was dead in
the blighter's bosom and there was nothing to be done about it.
It really was
rummy the way the Hemmingway family had taken to me. I wouldn't have said
off-hand that there was anything particularly fascinating about me—in fact,
most people look on me as rather an ass; but there was no getting away from the
fact that I went like a breeze with this girl and her brother. They didn't seem happy
if they were away from me. I couldn't move a step, dash it, without one of them
popping out from somewhere and freezing on. In fact, I'd got into the habit now
of retiring to my room when I wanted to take it easy for a bit. I had managed
to get a rather decent suite on the third floor, looking down on to the
promenade.
I had gone to
earth in my suite one evening and for the first time that day was feeling that
life wasn't so bad after all. Right through the day from lunch time I'd had the
Hemmingway girl on my hands, Aunt Agatha having shooed us off together
immediately after the midday meal. The result was, as I looked down on the
lighted promenade and saw all the people popping happily about on their way to
dinner and the Casino and what not, a kind of wistful feeling came over me. I
couldn't help thinking how dashed happy I could have contrived to be in this
place if only Aunt Agatha and the other blisters had been elsewhere.
I heaved a
sigh, and at that moment there was a knock at the door.
"Someone
at the door, Jeeves," I said.
"Yes,
sir."
He opened the
door, and in popped Aline Hemmingway and her brother. The last person I had
expected. I really had thought that I could be alone for a minute in my own
room.
"Oh,
hallo!" I said.
"Oh, Mr.
Wooster!" said the girl in a gasping sort of way. "I don't know how
to begin."
Then I noticed
that she appeared considerably rattled, and as for the brother, he looked like
a sheep with a secret sorrow.
This made me
sit up a bit and take notice. I had supposed that this was just a social call,
but apparently something had happened to give them
a jolt. Though I couldn't see why they should come to me about it.
"Is
anything up?" I said.
"Poor
Sidney—it was my fault—I ought never to have let him go there alone," said
the girl. Dashed agitated.
At this point the
brother, who after shedding a floppy overcoat and parking his hat on a chair
had been standing by wrapped in the silence, gave a little cough, like a sheep
caught in the mist on a mountain top.
"The fact
is, Mr. Wooster," he said, "a sad, a most deplorable thing has
occurred. This afternoon, while you were so kindly escorting my sist-ah, I
found the time hang a little heavy upon my hands and I was tempted to—ah—gamble
at the Casino."
I looked at the
man in a kindlier spirit than I had been able to up to date. This evidence that
he had sporting blood in his veins made him seem more human, I'm bound to say.
If only I'd known earlier that he went in for that sort of thing, I felt that
we might have had a better time together.
"Oh!"
I said. "Did you click?"
He sighed
heavily.
"If you
mean was I successful, I must answer in the negative. I rashly persisted in the
view that the colour red, having appeared no fewer than seven times in
succession, must inevitably at no distant date give place to black. I was in
error. I lost my little all, Mr. Wooster."
"Tough
luck," I said.
"I left
the Casino," proceeded the chappie, "and returned to the hotel. There
I encountered one of my parishioners, a Colonel Musgrave, who chanced to be
holiday-making over here. I—er—induced him to cash me a cheque for one hundred
pounds on my little account in my London bank."
"Well,
that was all to the good, what?" I said, hoping to induce the poor fish to
look on the bright side. "I mean, bit of luck finding someone to slip it
into first crack out of the box."
"On the
contrary, Mr. Wooster, it did but make matters worse. I burn with shame as I
make the confession, but I immediately went back to the Casino and lost the
entire sum—this time under the mistaken supposition that the colour black was,
as I believe the expression is, due for a run."
"I
say!" I said. "You are having a night out!"
"And,"
concluded the chappie, "the most lamentable feature of the whole affair is
that I have no funds in the bank to meet the cheque when presented."
I'm free to
confess that, though I realised by this time that all this was leading up to a
touch and that my ear was shortly going to be bitten in no uncertain manner, my
heart warmed to the poor prune. Indeed, I gazed at him with no little interest
and admiration. Never before had I encountered a curate so genuinely all to the
mustard. Little as he might look like one of the lads of the village, he
certainly appeared to be the real tabasco, and I wished he had shown me this
side of his character before.
"Colonel
Musgrave," he went on, gulping somewhat, "is not a man who would be
likely to overlook the matter. He is a hard man. He will expose me to my
vic-ah. My vic-ah is a hard man. In short, Mr. Wooster, if Colonel Musgrave
presents that cheque I shall be ruined. And he leaves for England
to-night."
The girl, who
had been standing by biting her handkerchief and gurgling at intervals while
the brother got the above off his chest, now
started in once more.
"Mr.
Wooster," she cried, "won't you, won't you help us? Oh, do say you
will! We must have the money to get back the cheque from Colonel Musgrave
before nine o'clock—he leaves on the nine-twenty. I was at my wits' end what to
do when I remembered how kind you had always been. Mr. Wooster, will you lend
Sidney the money and take these as security?" And before I knew what she
was doing she had dived into her bag, produced a case, and opened it. "My
pearls," she said. "I don't know what they are worth—they were a
present from my poor father——"
"Now,
alas, no more—" chipped in the brother.
"But I
know they must be worth ever so much more than the amount we want."
Dashed
embarrassing. Made me feel like a pawnbroker. More than a touch of popping the
watch about the whole business.
"No, I
say, really," I protested. "There's no need of any security, you
know, or any rot of that kind. Only too glad to let you have the money. I've
got it on me, as a matter of fact. Rather luckily drew some this morning."
And I fished it
out and pushed it across. The brother shook his head.
"Mr.
Wooster," he said, "we appreciate your generosity, your beautiful,
heartening confidence in us, but we cannot permit this."
"What
Sidney means," said the girl, "is that you really don't know anything
about us when you come to think of it. You mustn't risk lending all this money
without any security at all to two people who, after all, are almost strangers.
If I hadn't thought that you would be quite business-like about this I would
never have dared to come to you."
"The idea
of—er—pledging the pearls at the local Mont de Piété? was, you will readily
understand, repugnant to us," said the brother.
"If you
will just give me a receipt, as a matter of form——"
"Oh,
right-o!"
I wrote out the
receipt and handed it over, feeling more or less of an ass.
"Here you
are," I said.
The girl took
the piece of paper, shoved it in her bag, grabbed the money and slipped it to
brother Sidney, and then, before I knew what was happening, she had darted at
me, kissed me, and legged it from the room.
I'm bound to
say the thing rattled me. So dashed sudden and unexpected. I mean, a girl like
that. Always been quiet and demure and what not—by no means the sort of female
you'd have expected to go about the place kissing fellows. Through a sort of
mist I could see that Jeeves had appeared from the background and was helping
the brother on with his coat; and I remember wondering idly how the dickens a
man could bring himself to wear a coat like that, it being more like a sack
than anything else. Then the brother came up to me and grasped my hand.
"I cannot
thank you sufficiently, Mr. Wooster!"
"Oh, not
at all."
"You have
saved my good name. Good name in man or woman, dear my lord," he said,
massaging the fin with some fervour, "is the immediate jewel of their
souls. Who steals my purse steals trash. 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been
slave to thousands. But he that filches from me my good name robs me of that
which enriches not him and makes me poor indeed. I thank you from the bottom of
my heart. Good night, Mr. Wooster."
"Good
night, old thing," I said.
I blinked at
Jeeves as the door shut. "Rather a sad affair, Jeeves," I said.
"Yes,
sir."
"Lucky I
happened to have all that money handy."
"Well—er—yes,
sir."
"You speak
as though you didn't think much of it."
"It is not
my place to criticise your actions, sir, but I will venture to say that I think
you behaved a little rashly."
"What,
lending that money?"
"Yes, sir.
These fashionable French watering places are notoriously infested by dishonest
characters."
This was a bit
too thick.
"Now look
here, Jeeves," I said, "I can stand a lot but when it comes to your
casting asp-whatever-the-word-is on a bird in Holy Orders——"
"Perhaps I
am over-suspicious, sir. But I have seen a great deal of these resorts. When I
was in the employment of Lord Frederick Ranelagh, shortly before I entered your
service, his lordship was very neatly swindled by a criminal known, I believe,
by the sobriquet of Soapy Sid, who scraped acquaintance with us in Monte Carlo
with the assistance of a female accomplice. I have never forgotten the
circumstances."
"I don't
want to butt in on your reminiscences, Jeeves," I said, coldly, "but
you're talking through your hat. How can there have been anything fishy about
this business? They've left me the pearls, haven't they? Very well, then, think
before you speak. You had better be tooling down to the desk now and having
these things shoved in the hotel safe." I picked up the case and opened
it. "Oh, Great Scott!"
The bally thing
was empty!
"Oh, my
Lord!" I said, staring. "Don't tell me there's been dirty work at the
crossroads after all!"
"Precisely,
sir. It was in exactly the same manner that Lord Frederick was swindled on the
occasion to which I have alluded. While his female accomplice was gratefully
embracing his lordship, Soapy Sid substituted a duplicate case for the one
containing the pearls and went off with the jewels, the money and the receipt.
On the strength of the receipt he subsequently demanded from his lordship the
return of the pearls, and his lordship, not being able to produce them, was
obliged to pay a heavy sum in compensation. It is a simple but effective
ruse."
I felt as if
the bottom had dropped out of things with a jerk.
"Soapy
Sid? Sid! Sidney! Brother Sidney! Why, by Jove, Jeeves, do you think
that parson was Soapy Sid?"
"Yes,
sir."
"But it
seems so extraordinary. Why, his collar buttoned at the back—I mean, he would
have deceived a bishop. Do you really think he was Soapy Sid?"
"Yes, sir.
I recognised him directly he came into the room."
I stared at the
blighter.
"You
recognised him?"
"Yes,
sir."
"Then,
dash it all," I said, deeply moved, "I think you might have told
me."
"I thought
it would save disturbance and unpleasantness if I merely abstracted the case
from the man's pocket as I assisted him with his coat, sir. Here it is."
He laid another
case on the table beside the dud one, and, by Jove, you couldn't tell them
apart. I opened it and there were the good old pearls, as merry and bright as
dammit, smiling up at me. I gazed feebly at the man. I was feeling a bit
overwrought.
"Jeeves,"
I said. "You're an absolute genius!"
"Yes,
sir."
Relief was
surging over me in great chunks by now. Thanks to Jeeves I was not going to be
called on to cough up several thousand quid.
"It looks
to me as though you had saved the old home. I mean, even a chappie endowed with
the immortal rind of dear old Sid is hardly likely to have the nerve to come
back and retrieve these little chaps."
"I should
imagine not, sir."
"Well,
then—— Oh, I say, you don't think they are just paste or anything like
that?"
"No, sir.
These are genuine pearls and extremely valuable."
"Well,
then, dash it, I'm on velvet. Absolutely reclining on the good old plush! I may
be down a hundred quid but I'm up a jolly good string of pearls. Am I right or
wrong?"
"Hardly
that, sir. I think that you will have to restore the pearls."
"What! To
Sid? Not while I have my physique!"
"No, sir.
To their rightful owner."
"But who
is their rightful owner?"
"Mrs.
Gregson, sir."
"What! How
do you know?"
"It was
all over the hotel an hour ago that Mrs. Gregson's pearls had been abstracted.
I was speaking to Mrs. Gregson's maid shortly before you came in and
she informed me that the manager of the hotel is now in Mrs. Gregson's
suite."
"And
having a devil of a time, what?"
"So I
should be disposed to imagine, sir."
The situation
was beginning to unfold before me.
"I'll go
and give them back to her, eh? It'll put me one up, what?"
"Precisely,
sir. And, if I may make the suggestion, I think it might be judicious to stress
the fact that they were stolen by——"
"Great
Scott! By the dashed girl she was hounding me on to marry, by Jove!"
"Exactly,
sir."
"Jeeves,"
I said, "this is going to be the biggest score off my jolly old relative
that has ever occurred in the world's history."
"It is not
unlikely, sir."
"Keep her
quiet for a bit, what? Make her stop snootering me for a while?"
"It should
have that effect, sir."
"Golly!"
I said, bounding for the door.
*
* *
* *
Long before I
reached Aunt Agatha's lair I could tell that the hunt was up. Divers chappies
in hotel uniform and not a few chambermaids of sorts were hanging about in the
corridor, and through the panels I could hear a mixed assortment of voices,
with Aunt Agatha's topping the lot. I knocked but no one took any notice, so I
trickled in. Among those present I noticed a chambermaid in hysterics, Aunt
Agatha with her hair bristling, and the whiskered cove who looked like a
bandit, the hotel manager fellow.
"Oh,
hallo!" I said. "Hallo-allo-allo!"
Aunt Agatha
shooshed me away. No welcoming smile for Bertram.
"Don't
bother me now, Bertie," she snapped, looking at me as if I were more or
less the last straw.
"Something
up?"
"Yes, yes,
yes! I've lost my pearls."
"Pearls?
Pearls? Pearls?" I said. "No, really? Dashed annoying. Where did you
see them last?"
"What does
it matter where I saw them last? They have been stolen."
Here Wilfred
the Whisker King, who seemed to have been taking a rest between rounds, stepped
into the ring again and began to talk rapidly in French. Cut to the quick he
seemed. The chambermaid whooped in the corner.
"Sure
you've looked everywhere?" I said.
"Of course
I've looked everywhere."
"Well, you
know, I've often lost a collar stud and——"
"Do try
not to be so maddening, Bertie! I have enough to bear without your
imbecilities. Oh, be quiet! Be quiet!" she shouted in the sort of voice
used by sergeant-majors and those who call the cattle home across the Sands of
Dee. And such was the magnetism of her forceful personality that Wilfred
subsided as if he had run into a wall. The chambermaid continued to go strong.
"I
say," I said, "I think there's something the matter with this girl.
Isn't she crying or something? You may not have spotted it, but I'm rather
quick at noticing things."
"She stole
my pearls! I am convinced of it."
This started
the whisker specialist off again, and in about a couple of minutes Aunt Agatha
had reached the frozen grande-dame stage and was putting the last of the
bandits through it in the voice she usually reserves for snubbing waiters in
restaurants.
"I tell
you, my good man, for the hundredth time——"
"I
say," I said, "don't want to interrupt you and all that sort of
thing, but these aren't the little chaps by any chance, are they?"
I pulled the
pearls out of my pocket and held them up.
"These look
like pearls, what?"
I don't know
when I've had a more juicy moment. It was one of those occasions about which I
shall prattle to my grandchildren—if I ever have any, which at the moment of
going to press seems more or less of a hundred-to-one shot. Aunt Agatha simply
deflated before my eyes. It reminded me of when I once saw some chappies
letting the gas out of a balloon.
"Where—where—where——"
she gurgled.
"I got
them from your friend, Miss Hemmingway."
Even now she
didn't get it.
"From Miss
Hemmingway. Miss Hemmingway! But—but how did they come into her
possession?"
"How?"
I said. "Because she jolly well stole them. Pinched them! Swiped them!
Because that's how she makes her living, dash it—palling up to unsuspicious
people in hotels and sneaking their jewellery. I don't know what her alias is,
but her bally brother, the chap whose collar buttons at the back, is known in
criminal circles as Soapy Sid."
She blinked.
"Miss
Hemmingway a thief! I—I——" She stopped and looked feebly at me. "But
how did you manage to recover the pearls, Bertie dear?"
"Never
mind," I said crisply. "I have my methods." I dug out my entire
stock of manly courage, breathed a short prayer and let her have it right in
the thorax.
"I must
say, Aunt Agatha, dash it all," I said severely, "I think you have
been infernally careless. There's a printed notice in every bedroom in
this place saying that there's a safe in the manager's office where jewellery
and valuables ought to be placed, and you absolutely disregarded it. And what's
the result? The first thief who came along simply walked into your room and
pinched your pearls. And instead of admitting that it was all your fault, you
started biting this poor man here in the gizzard. You have been very, very
unjust to this poor man."
"Yes,
yes," moaned the poor man.
"And this
unfortunate girl, what about her? Where does she get off? You've accused her of
stealing the things on absolutely no evidence. I think she would be jolly well
advised to bring an action for—for whatever it is and soak you for substantial
damages."
"Mais
oui, mais oui, c'est trop fort!" shouted the Bandit Chief, backing me
up like a good 'un. And the chambermaid looked up inquiringly, as if the sun
was breaking through the clouds.
"I shall
recompense her," said Aunt Agatha feebly.
"If you
take my tip you jolly well will, and that eftsoons or right speedily. She's got
a cast-iron case, and if I were her I wouldn't take a penny under twenty quid.
But what gives me the pip most is the way you've unjustly abused this poor man
here and tried to give his hotel a bad name——"
"Yes, by
damn! It's too bad!" cried the whiskered marvel. "You careless old
woman! You give my hotel bad names, would you or wasn't it? To-morrow you leave
my hotel, by great Scotland!"
And more to the
same effect, all good, ripe stuff. And presently having said his say he withdrew,
taking the chambermaid with him, the latter with a crisp tenner clutched in a
vice-like grip. I suppose she and the bandit split it outside. A French hotel manager wouldn't be likely to let real money
wander away from him without counting himself in on the division.
I turned to
Aunt Agatha, whose demeanour was now rather like that of one who, picking
daisies on the railway, has just caught the down express in the small of the
back.
"I don't
want to rub it in, Aunt Agatha," I said coldly, "but I should just
like to point out before I go that the girl who stole your pearls is the girl
you've been hounding me on to marry ever since I got here. Good heavens! Do you
realise that if you had brought the thing off I should probably have had
children who would have sneaked my watch while I was dandling them on my knee?
I'm not a complaining sort of chap as a rule, but I must say that another time
I do think you might be more careful how you go about egging me on to marry
females."
I gave her one
look, turned on my heel and left the room.
*
* *
* *
"Ten
o'clock, a clear night, and all's well, Jeeves," I said, breezing back
into the good old suite.
"I am
gratified to hear it, sir."
"If twenty
quid would be any use to you, Jeeves——"
"I am much
obliged, sir."
There was a
pause. And then—well, it was a wrench, but I did it. I unstripped the
cummerbund and handed it over.
"Do you
wish me to press this, sir?"
I gave the
thing one last, longing look. It had been very dear to me.
"No,"
I said, "take it away; give it to the deserving poor—I shall never wear it
again."
"Thank you
very much, sir," said Jeeves.
