The Jeeves Omnibus (44 page)

‘Yes, sir. Quite correct.’

‘I thought so. Well, Spode,
qua
menace, is a spent egg. He has dropped out and ceased to function.’

‘That is very gratifying, sir.’

‘Most. But we are still faced by this Becher’s Brook, that young Stiffy continues in possession of the notebook. That notebook, Jeeves, must be located and re-snitched before we are free to move in any other direction. Aunt Dahlia has just left in despondent mood, because, while she concedes that the damned thing is almost certainly concealed in the little pimple’s sleeping quarters, she sees no hope of fingers being able to be laid upon it. She says it may be anywhere and is undoubtedly carefully hidden.’

‘That is the difficulty, sir.’

‘Quite. But that is where this significant passage comes in. It points the way and sets the feet upon the right path. I’ll read it to you. The detective is speaking to his pals, and the “they” refers to some bounders at the present unidentified, who have been ransacking a girl’s room, hoping to find the missing jewels. Listen attentively, Jeeves. “They seem to have looked everywhere, my dear Postlethwaite, except in the one place where they might have expected to find something. Amateurs, Postlethwaite, rank amateurs. They never thought of the top of the cupboard, the thing any experienced crook thinks of at once, because” – note carefully what follows – “because he knows it is every woman’s favourite hiding-place.”’

I eyed him keenly.

‘You see the profound significance of that, Jeeves?’

‘If I interpret your meaning aright, sir, you are suggesting that Mr Fink-Nottle’s notebook may be concealed at the top of the cupboard in Miss Byng’s apartment?’

‘Not “may”, Jeeves, “must”. I don’t see how it can be concealed anywhere else but. That detective is no fool. If he says a thing is so, it is so. I have the utmost confidence in the fellow, and am prepared to follow his lead without question.’

‘But surely, sir, you are not proposing –’

‘Yes, I am. I’m going to do it immediately. Stiffy has gone to the Working Men’s Institute, and won’t be back for ages. It’s absurd to suppose that a gaggle of Village Mothers are going to be sated with
coloured
slides of the Holy Land, plus piano accompaniment, in anything under two hours. So now is the time to operate while the coast is clear. Gird up your loins, Jeeves, and accompany me.’

‘Well, really, sir –’

‘And don’t say “Well, really, sir”. I have had occasion to rebuke you before for this habit of yours of saying “Well, really, sir” in a soupy sort of voice, when I indicate some strategic line of action. What I want from you is less of the “Well, really, sir” and more of the buckling-to spirit. Think feudally, Jeeves. Do you know Stiffy’s room?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Then Ho for it!’

I cannot say, despite the courageous dash which I had exhibited in the above slab of dialogue, that it was in any too bobbish a frame of mind that I made my way to our destination. In fact, the nearer I got, the less bobbish I felt. It had been just the same the time I allowed myself to be argued by Roberta Wickham into going and puncturing that hot-water bottle. I hate these surreptitious prowlings. Bertram Wooster is a man who likes to go through the world with his chin up and both feet on the ground, not to sneak about on tiptoe with his spine tying itself into reefer knots.

It was precisely because I had anticipated some such reactions that I had been so anxious that Jeeves should accompany me and lend moral support, and I found myself wishing that he would buck up and lend a bit more than he was doing. Willing service and selfless co-operation were what I had hoped for, and he was not giving me them. His manner from the very start betrayed an aloof disapproval. He seemed to be dissociating himself entirely from the proceedings, and I resented it.

Owing to this aloofness on his part and this resentment on mine, we made the journey in silence, and it was in silence that we entered the room and switched on the light.

The first impression I received on giving the apartment the once-over was that for a young shrimp of her shaky moral outlook Stiffy had been done pretty well in the matter of sleeping accommodation. Totleigh Towers was one of those country houses which had been built at a time when people planning a little nest had the idea that a bedroom was not a bedroom unless you could give an informal dance for about fifty couples in it, and this sanctum could have accommodated a dozen Stiffys. In the rays of the small electric light up in the ceiling, the bally thing seemed to stretch for miles in every
direction
, and the thought that if that detective had not called his shots correctly, Gussie’s notebook might be concealed anywhere in these great spaces, was a chilling one.

I was standing there, hoping for the best, when my meditations were broken in upon by an odd, gargling sort of noise, something like static and something like distant thunder, and to cut a long story short this proved to proceed from the larynx of the dog Bartholomew.

He was standing on the bed, stropping his front paws on the coverlet, and so easy was it to read the message in his eyes that we acted like two minds with but a single thought. At the exact moment when I soared like an eagle on to the chest of drawers, Jeeves was skimming like a swallow on to the top of the cupboard. The animal hopped from the bed and, advancing into the middle of the room, took a seat, breathing through the nose with a curious whistling sound, and looking at us from under his eyebrows like a Scottish elder rebuking sin from the pulpit.

And there for a while the matter rested.

JEEVES WAS THE
first to break a rather strained silence.

‘The book does not appear to be here, sir.’

‘Eh?’

‘I have searched the top of the cupboard, sir, but I have not found the book.’

It may be that my reply erred a trifle on the side of acerbity. My narrow escape from those slavering jaws had left me a bit edgy.

‘Blast the book, Jeeves! What about this dog?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘What do you mean – “Yes, sir”?’

‘I was endeavouring to convey that I appreciate the point which you have raised, sir. The animal’s unexpected appearance unquestionably presents a problem. While he continues to maintain his existing attitude, it will not be easy for us to prosecute the search for Mr Fink-Nottle’s notebook. Our freedom of action will necessarily be circumscribed.’

‘Then what’s to be done?’

‘It is difficult to say, sir.’

‘You have no ideas?’

‘No, sir.’

I could have said something pretty bitter and stinging at this – I don’t know what, but something – but I refrained. I realized that it was rather tough on the man, outstanding though his gifts were, to expect him to ring the bell every time, without fail. No doubt that brilliant inspiration of his which had led to my signal victory over the forces of darkness as represented by R. Spode had taken it out of him a good deal, rendering the brain for the nonce a bit flaccid. One could wait and hope that the machinery would soon get going again, enabling him to seek new high levels of achievement.

And, I felt as I continued to turn the position of affairs over in my mind, the sooner, the better, for it was plain that nothing was going to budge this canine excrescence except an offensive on a
major
scale, dashingly conceived and skilfully carried out. I don’t think I have ever seen a dog who conveyed more vididly the impression of being rooted to the spot and prepared to stay there till the cows – or, in this case, his proprietress – came home. And what I was going to say to Stiffy if she returned and found me roosting on her chest of drawers was something I had not yet thought out in any exactness of detail.

Watching the animal sitting there like a bump on a log, I soon found myself chafing a good deal. I remember Freddie Widgeon, who was once chased on to the top of a wardrobe by an Alsatian during a country house visit, telling me that what he had disliked most about the thing was the indignity of it all – the blow to the proud spirit, if you know what I mean – the feeling, in fine, that he, the Heir of the Ages, as you might say, was camping out on a wardrobe at the whim of a bally dog.

It was the same with me. One doesn’t want to make a song and dance about one’s ancient lineage, of course, but after all the Woosters did come over with the Conqueror and were extremely pally with him: and a fat lot of good it is coming over with Conquerors, if you’re simply going to wind up being given the elbow by Aberdeen terriers.

These reflections had the effect of making me rather peevish, and I looked down somewhat sourly at the animal.

‘I call it monstrous, Jeeves,’ I said, voicing my train of thought, ‘that this dog should be lounging about in a bedroom. Most unhygienic.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Scotties are smelly, even the best of them. You will recall how my Aunt Agatha’s McIntosh niffed to heaven while enjoying my hospitality. I frequently mentioned it to you.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘And this one is even riper. He should obviously have been bedded out in the stables. Upon my Sam, what with Scotties in Stiffy’s room and newts in Gussie’s, Totleigh Towers is not far short of being a lazar house.’

‘No, sir.’

‘And consider the matter from another angle,’ I said, warming to my theme. ‘I refer to the danger of keeping a dog of this nature and disposition in a bedroom, where it can spring out ravening on anyone who enters. You and I happen to be able to take care of ourselves
in
an emergency such as has arisen, but suppose we had been some highly strung house-maid.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I can see her coming into the room to turn down the bed. I picture her as a rather fragile girl with big eyes and a timid expression. She crosses the threshold. She approaches the bed. And out leaps this man-eating dog. One does not like to dwell upon the sequel.’

‘No, sir.’

I frowned.

‘I wish,’ I said, ‘that instead of sitting there saying “Yes, sir” and “No, sir”, Jeeves, you would do something.’

‘But what can I do, sir?’

‘You can get action, Jeeves. That is what is required here – sharp, decisive action. I wonder if you recall a visit we once paid to the residence of my Aunt Agatha at Woollam Chersey in the county of Herts. To refresh your memory, it was the occasion on which, in company with the Right Honourable A. B. Filmer, the Cabinet Minister, I was chivvied on to the roof of a shack on the island in the lake by an angry swan.’

‘I recall the incident vividly, sir.’

‘So do I. And the picture most deeply imprinted on my mental retina – is that the correct expression?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘– is of you facing that swan in the most intrepid “You-can’t-do-that-there-here” manner and bunging a raincoat over its head, thereby completely dishing its aims and plans and compelling it to revise its whole strategy from the bottom up. It was a beautiful bit of work. I don’t know when I have seen a finer.’

‘Thank you, sir. I am glad if I gave satisfaction.’

‘You certainly did, Jeeves, in heaping measure. And what crossed my mind was that a similar operation would make this dog feel pretty silly.’

‘No doubt, sir. But I have no raincoat.’

‘Then I would advise seeing what you can do with a sheet. And in case you are wondering if a sheet would work as well, I may tell you that just before you came into my room I had had admirable results with one in the case of Mr Spode. He just couldn’t seem to get out of the thing.’

‘Indeed, sir?’

‘I assure you, Jeeves. You could wish no better weapon than a sheet. There are some on the bed.’

‘Yes, sir. On the bed.’

There was a pause. I was loath to wrong the man, but if this wasn’t a
nolle prosequi
, I didn’t know one when I saw one. The distant and unenthusiastic look on his face told me that I was right, and I endeavoured to sting his pride, rather as Gussie in our
pourparlers
in the matter of Spode had endeavoured to sting mine.

‘Are you afraid of a tiny little dog, Jeeves?’

He corrected me respectfully, giving it as his opinion that the undersigned was not a tiny little dog, but well above the average in muscular development. In particular, he drew my attention to the animal’s teeth.

I reassured him.

‘I think you would find that if you were to make a sudden spring, his teeth would not enter into the matter. You could leap on to the bed, snatch up a sheet, roll him up in it before he knew what was happening, and there we would be.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Well, are you going to make a sudden spring?’

‘No, sir.’

A rather stiff silence ensued, during which the dog Bartholomew continued to gaze at me unwinkingly, and once more I found myself noticing – and resenting – the superior, sanctimonious expression on his face. Nothing can ever render the experience of being treed on top of a chest of drawers by an Aberdeen terrier pleasant, but it seemed to me that the least you can expect on such an occasion is that the animal will meet you half-way and not drop salt into the wound by looking at you as if he were asking if you were saved.

It was in the hope of wiping this look off his face that I now made a gesture. There was a stump of candle standing in the parent candlestick beside me, and I threw this at the little blighter. He ate it with every appearance of relish, took time out briefly in order to be sick, and resumed his silent stare. And at this moment the door opened and in came Stiffy – hours before I had expected her.

The first thing that impressed itself upon one on seeing her was that she was not in her customary buoyant spirits. Stiffy, as a rule, is a girl who moves jauntily from spot to spot – youthful elasticity is, I believe, the expression – but she entered now with a slow and dragging step like a Volga boatman. She cast a dull eye at us, and after a brief ‘Hallo, Bertie. Hallo, Jeeves,’ seemed to dismiss us from her thoughts. She made for the dressing table and having removed her hat, sat looking at herself in the mirror with sombre eyes. It was
plain
that for some reason the soul had got a flat tyre, and seeing that unless I opened the conversation there was going to be one of those awkward pauses, I did so.