The Jeeves Omnibus (369 page)

‘Oh, hullo, cocky,’ said this oleaginous character, speaking thickly, for he was making an early lunch on what looked like a ham sandwich. ‘Something I can do for you?’

‘Jas Waterbury?’

‘That’s me. You want a shop?’

‘I want a girl.’

‘Don’t we all? What’s your line? Are you running a touring company?’

‘No, it’s more like amateur theatricals.’

‘Oh, those? Well, let’s have the inside story.’

I had told myself that it would be embarrassing confiding one’s intimate private affairs to a theatrical agent, and it was embarrassing, but I stiffened the upper lip and had at it, and as my narrative proceeded it was borne in upon me that I had sized up Jas Waterbury all wrong. Misled by his appearance, I had assumed him to be one of those greasy birds who would be slow on the uptake and unable to get hep to the finer points.
He
proved to be both quick and intelligent. He punctuated my remarks with understanding nods, and when I had finished said I had come to the right man, for he had a niece called Trixie who would fill the bill to my complete satisfaction. The whole project, he said, was right up Trixie’s street. If I placed myself in her hands, he added, the act must infallibly be a smash hit.

It sounded good, but I pursed my lips a bit dubiously. I was asking myself if an uncle’s love might not have made him give the above Trixie too enthusiastic a build-up.

‘You’re sure,’ I said, ‘that this niece of yours would be equal to this rather testing job? It calls for considerable histrionic skill. Can she make her role convincing?’

‘She’ll smother you with burning kisses, if that’s what you’re worrying about.’

‘What I had in mind was more the dialogue. We don’t want her blowing up in her lines. Don’t you think we ought to get a seasoned professional?’

‘That’s just what Trixie is. Been playing Fairy Queens in panto for years. Never got a shop in London owing to jealousy in high places, but ask them in Leeds and Wigan what they think of her. Ask them in Hull. Ask them in Huddersfield.’

I said I would, always provided I happened to come across them, and he carried on in a sort of ecstasy.

‘“This buxom belle” –
Leeds Evening Chronicle
. “A talented bit of all right” –
Hull Daily News
. “Beauty and dignity combined” –
Wigan Intelligencer
. Don’t you fret yourself, cocky, Trix’ll give you your money’s worth. And talking of that, how much does the part pay?’

‘I was thinking of a fiver.’

‘Make it ten.’

‘Right ho.’

‘Or, rather, fifteen. That way you’ll get every ounce of zest and cooperation.’

I was in no mood to haggle. Aunt Dahlia had rung up while I was breakfasting to tell me that Honoria Glossop had told her that she would be looking in on me at four o’clock, and it was imperative that the reception committee be on hand to greet her. I dished out the fifteen quid and asked how soon he could get hold of his niece, as time was of the essence. He said her services would be at my disposal well ahead of zero hour, and I said Fine.

‘Give me a ring when it’s all set,’ I said. ‘I’ll be lunching at the Drones Club.’

This seemed to interest him quite a bit.

‘Drones Club, eh? You a member there? I’ve got some good friends at the Drones Club. You know a Mr Widgeon?’

‘Freddie Widgeon? Yes, very well.’

‘And Mr Prosser?’

‘Yes, I know Oofy Prosser.’

‘Give them my best, if you see them. Nice lads, both. And now you can trot along and feed your face without a care in the world. I’ll have contacted Trixie before you’re half-way through your fish and chips.’

And I was called to the phone while having the after-luncheon coffee in the smoking-room. It was, as I had anticipated, Jas Waterbury.

‘That you, cocky?’

I said it was, and he said everything was under control. Trixie had been contacted and would be up and doing with a heart for any fate in good time for the rise of the curtain. What, he asked, was the address they were to come to, and I told him and he said they would be there at a quarter to four without fail. So that was all fixed, and I was full of kindly feelings towards Jas Waterbury as I made my way back to the smoking-room. He was a man whom I would have hesitated to invite to come with me on a long walking tour and I still felt that he would have been well advised to go easier on the grease as regarded both his hair and his person, but there was no getting away from it that if circumstances rendered it necessary for you to plot plots, he was the ideal fellow to plot them with.

During my absence from the smoking-room Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright had taken the chair next to mine, and I lost no time in sounding him out on the subject of Jas Waterbury.

‘You remember you were telling me about theatrical agents, Catsmeat. Did you ever happen to come across one called Waterbury?’

He pondered awhile.

‘The name seems vaguely familiar. What does he look like?’

‘Nothing on earth.’

‘That doesn’t place him. All theatrical agents look like nothing on earth. But it’s odd that I seem to know the name. Waterbury? Waterbury? Ha! Is he a greasy bird?’

‘Very greasy.’

‘And is his first name Jas?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Then I know the chap you mean. I never met him myself – I doubt if he was going at the time when I was hoofing it from agent to agent – but I’ve heard of him from Freddie Widgeon and Oofy Prosser.’

‘Yes, he said they were friends of his.’

‘He’d revise that view if he could listen to them talking about him. Oofy in particular. Jas Waterbury once chiselled him out of two thousand pounds.’

I was amazed.

‘He chiselled
Oofy
out of two thousand pounds?’ I gasped, wondering if I could believe my e. Oofy is the Drones Club millionaire, but it is well known that it’s practically impossible to extract as much as five bob from him without using chloroform and a forceps. Dozens have tried it and failed.

‘That’s what Freddie Widgeon told me. Freddie says that once Jas Waterbury enters your life, you can kiss at least a portion of your holdings goodbye. Has he taken anything off you?’

‘Fifteen quid.’

‘You’re lucky it wasn’t fifteen hundred.’

If you’re saying to yourself that these words of Catsmeat’s must have left me uneasy and apprehensive, you are correct to the last drop. A quarter to four found me pacing the Wooster carpet with furrowed brow. If it had been merely a matter of this grease-coated theatrical agent tapping Freddie Widgeon for a couple of bob, it would have been different. A child can tap Freddie. But when it came to him parting Oofy Prosser, a man in whose wallet moths nest and raise large families, from a colossal sum like two thousand pounds, the brain reeled and one sought in vain for an explanation. Yet so it was. Catsmeat said it was impossible to get the full story, because every time Jas’s name was mentioned Oofy just turned purple and spluttered, but the stark fact remained that Jas’s bank balance was that amount up and Oofy’s that amount down, and it made me feel like a fellow in a novel of suspense who suddenly realizes that he’s up against an Octopus of Crime and hasn’t the foggiest how he’s going to avoid the menacing tentacles.

But it wasn’t long before Reason returned to its throne and I saw that I’d been alarming myself unnecessarily. Nothing like that was going to happen to me. It might be that Jas Waterbury would have a shot at luring me into some business venture with
the
ultimate aim of leaving me holding the baby, but if he did he would find himself stymied by a firm
nolle prosequi
, so, to cut a long story s, by the time the front door bell rang Bertram was himself again.

I answered the bell, for it was Jeeves’s afternoon off. Once a week he downs tools and goes off to play Bridge at the Junior Ganymede. I opened the door and Jas and his niece came in, and I stood gaping dumbly. For an instant, you might say I was spellbound.

Not having attended the performance of a pantomime since fairly early childhood, I had forgotten how substantial Fairy Queens were, and the sight of Trixie Waterbury was like a blow from a blunt instrument. A glance was enough to tell me why the dramatic critic of the
Leeds Evening Chronicle
had called her buxom. She stood about five feet nine in her short French vamps and bulged in every direction. Also the flashing eyes and the gleaming teeth. It was some moments before I was able to say Good Afternoon.

‘Afternoon,’ said Jas Waterbury. He looked about him approvingly. ‘Nice little place you’ve got here. Costs a packet to keep up, I’ll bet. This is Mr Wooster, Trixie. You call him Bertie.’

The Fairy Queen said wouldn’t ‘sweetie-pie’ be better, and Jas Waterbury told her with a good deal of enthusiasm that she was quite right.

‘Much more box office,’ he agreed. ‘Didn’t I say she would be right for the part, cocky? You can rely on her to give a smooth West End performance. When do you expect your lady friend?’

‘Any moment now.’

‘Then we’d better be dressing the stage. Discovered, you sitting in that chair there with Trixie on your lap.’

‘What!’

He seemed to sense the consternation in my voice, for he frowned a little under the grease.

‘We’re all working for the good of the show,’ he reminded me austerely. ‘You want the scene to carry conviction, and there’s nothing like a sight gag.’

I could see there was much in what he said. This was not a time for half measures. I sat down. I don’t say I sat blithely, but I sat, and Wigan’s favourite Fairy Queen descended on my lap with a bump that made the stout chair tremble like an aspen. And scarcely had she started to nestle when the door bell rang.

‘Curtain going up,’ said Jas Waterbury. ‘Let’s have that passionate embrace, Trixie, and make it good.’

She made it good, and I felt like a Swiss mountaineer engulfed by an avalanche smelling of patchouli. Jas Waterbury flung wide the gates, and who should come in but Blair Eggleston, the last caller I was expecting.

He stood goggling. I sat goggling. Jas Waterbury goggled, too. One could understand how he was feeling. Anticipating the entrance of the female star and observing coming on left centre a character who wasn’t a member of the cast at all, he was pardonably disconcerted. No impresario likes that sort of thing.

I was the first to speak. After all, I was the host and it was for me to get the conversation going.

‘Oh, hullo, Eggleston,’ I said. ‘Come along in. I don’t think you’ve met Mr Waterbury, have you. Mr Eggleston, Mr Jas Waterbury. And his niece Miss Trixie Waterbury, my fiancée.’

‘Your
what
?’

‘Fiancée. Betrothed. Affianced.’

‘Good Lord!’

Jas Waterbury appeared to be feeling that as the act had been shot to pieces like this, there was no sense in hanging around.

‘Well, Trix,’ he said, ‘your Bertie’ll be wanting to talk to his gentleman friend, so give him a kiss and we’ll be getting along. Pleased to have met you, Mr What-is-it,’ and with a greasy smile he led the Fairy Queen from the room.

Blair Eggleston seemed still at a loss. He looked at the door through which they had passed as if asking himself if he had really seen what he thought he had seen, then turned to me with the air of one who intends to demand an explanation.

‘What’s all this, Wooster?’

‘What’s all what, Eggleston? Be more explicit.’

‘Who on earth is that female?’

‘Weren’t you listening? My fiancée.’

‘You’re really engaged to her?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Who is she?’

‘She plays Fairy Queens in pantomime. Not in London owing to jealousy in high places, but they think a lot of her in Leeds, Wigan, Hull and Huddersfield. The critic of the
Hull Daily News
describes her as a talented bit of all right.’

He was silent for a space, appearing to be turning this over
in
his mind. Then he spoke in the frank, forthright and fearless way these modern novelists have.

‘She looks like a hippopotamus.’

I conceded this.

‘There is a resemblance, perhaps. I suppose Fairy Queens have to be stoutish if they are to keep faith with their public in towns like Leeds and Huddersfield. Those audiences up North want lots for their money.’

‘And she exudes a horrible scent which I am unable at the moment to identify.’

‘Patchouli. Yes, I noticed that.’

He mused again.

‘I can’t get over you being engaged to her.’

‘Well, I am.’

‘It’s official?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Well, this will be great news for Honoria.’

I didn’t get his drift.

‘For Honoria?’

‘Yes. It will relieve her mind. She was very worried about you, poor child. That’s why I’m here. I came to break it to you that she can never be yours. She’s going to marry me.’

I stared at him. My first impression was that even though the hour was only about four-thirty he was under the influence of alcoholic stimulants.

‘But I learned from a usually reliable source that that was all off.’

‘It was, but now it’s on again. We have had a complete reconciliation.’

‘Well, fancy that!’

‘And she shrank from coming and telling you herself. She said she couldn’t bear to see the awful dumb agony in your eyes. When I tell her you’re engaged, she’ll go singing about the West End of London, not only because of the relief of knowing that she hasn’t wrecked your life but because she’ll be feeling what a merciful escape she’s had. Just imagine being married to you! It doesn’t bear thinking of. Well, I’ll be going along and telling her the good news,’ he said, and took his departure.

A moment later the bell rang. I opened the door and found him on the mat.

‘What,’ he asked, ‘was that name again?’

‘Name?’

‘Your fiancée’s.’

‘Trixie Waterbury.’

‘Good God!’ he said, and pushed off. And I returned to the reverie he had interrupted.

There was a time when if somebody had come to me and said ‘Mr Wooster, I have been commissioned by a prominent firm of publishers to write your biography and I need some intimate stuff which only you can supply. Looking back, what would you consider the high spot in your career?’, I would have had no difficulty in slipping him the info. It occurred, I would have replied, in my fourteenth year when I was a resident pupil at Malvern House, Bramley-on-Sea, the private school conducted by that prince of stinkers, Aubrey Upjohn, M.A. He had told me to present myself in his study on the following morning, which always meant six of the juiciest with a cane that bit like a serpent and stung like an adder, and blowed if when morning came I wasn’t all over pink spots. I had contracted measles and the painful interview was of course postponed
sine die
, as the expression is.