Short Fiction - P. G. Wodehouse (top ten ebook reader txt) 📗

We met at lunch once. And you sent me some flowers. It was ever so kind of you,” she said, beaming.

She cracked another nut. She seemed to consider that the introductions were complete and that formality could now be dispensed with once more. She appeared at peace with all men.

The situation was slipping from Rollo’s grip. He continued to gape.

Then he remembered his grievance.

“I think you might have let me know you weren’t coming to supper.”

“Supper?”

“I sent a note to the theatre this afternoon.”

“I haven’t been to the theatre today. They let me off because I was going to be married. I’m so sorry. I hope you didn’t wait long.”

Rollo’s resentment melted before the friendliness of her smile.

“Hardly any time,” he said, untruthfully.

“If I might explain, sir,” said Wilson.

“By George! If you can, you’ll save me from a brainstorm. Cut loose, and don’t be afraid you’ll bore me. You won’t.”

“Mrs. Wilson and I are old friends, sir. We come from the same town. In fact⁠—”

Rollo’s face cleared.

“By George! Market what’s-its-name! Why, of course. Then she⁠—”

“Just so, sir. If you recollect, you asked me once if I had ever been in love, and I replied in the affirmative.”

“And it was⁠—”

“Mrs. Wilson and I were engaged to be married before either of us came to London. There was a misunderstanding, which was entirely my⁠—”

“Jim! It was mine.”

“No, it was all through my being a fool.”

“It was not. You know it wasn’t!”

Rollo intervened.

“Well?”

“And when you sent me with the flowers, sir⁠—well, we talked it over again, and⁠—that was how it came about, sir.”

The bride looked up from her walnuts.

“You aren’t angry?” she smiled up at Rollo.

“Angry?” He reflected. Of course, it was only reasonable that he should be a little⁠—well, not exactly angry, but⁠—And then for the first time it came to him that the situation was not entirely without its compensations. Until that moment he had completely forgotten Mr. Galloway.

“Angry?” he said. “Great Scott, no! Jolly glad I came back in time to get a bit of the wedding-breakfast. I want it, I can tell you. I’m hungry. Here we all are, eh? Let’s enjoy ourselves. Wilson, old scout, bustle about and give us your imitation of a bridegroom mixing a ‘B. and S.’ for the best man. Mrs. Wilson, if you’ll look in at the theatre tomorrow you’ll find one or two small wedding presents waiting for you. Three bouquets⁠—they’ll be a bit withered, I’m afraid⁠—a bracelet, and a gold Billiken with ruby eyes. I hope he’ll bring you luck. Oh, Wilson!”

“Sir?”

“Touching this little business⁠—don’t answer if it’s a delicate question, but I should like to know⁠—I suppose you didn’t try the schedule. What? More the Market Thingummy method, eh? The one you described to me?”

“Market Bumpstead, sir?” said Wilson. “On those lines.”

Rollo nodded thoughtfully.

“It seems to me,” he said, “they know a thing or two down in Market Bumpstead.”

“A very rising little place, sir,” assented Wilson.

By Advice of Counsel

The traveller champed meditatively at his steak. He paid no attention to the altercation which was in progress between the waiter and the man at the other end of the dingy room. The sounds of strife ceased. The waiter came over to the traveller’s table and stood behind his chair. He was ruffled.

“If he meant lamb,” he said, querulously, “why didn’t he say ‘lamb,’ so’s a feller could hear him? I thought he said ‘ham,’ so I brought ham. Now Lord Percy gets all peevish.”

He laughed bitterly. The traveller made no reply.

“If people spoke distinct,” said the waiter, “there wouldn’t be half the trouble there is in the world. Not half the trouble there wouldn’t be. I shouldn’t be here, for one thing. In this restawrong, I mean.” A sigh escaped him.

“I shouldn’t,” he said, “and that’s the truth. I should be getting up when I pleased, eating and drinking all I wanted, and carrying on same as in the good old days. You wouldn’t think, to look at me, would you now, that I was once like the lily of the field?”

The waiter was a tall, stringy man, who gave the impression of having no spine. In that he drooped, he might have been said to resemble a flower, but in no other respect. He had sandy hair, weak eyes set close together, and a day’s growth of red stubble on his chin. One could not see him in the lily class.

“What I mean to say is, I didn’t toil, neither did I spin. Ah, them was happy days! Lying on me back, plenty of tobacco, something cool in a jug⁠—”

He sighed once more.

“Did you ever know a man of the name of Moore? Jerry Moore?”

The traveller applied himself to his steak in silence.

“Nice feller. Simple sort of feller. Big. Quiet. Bit deaf in one ear. Straw-coloured hair. Blue eyes. ’Andsome, rather. Had a ’ouse just outside of Reigate. Has it still. Money of his own. Left him by his pa. Simple sort of feller. Not much to say for himself. I used to know him well in them days. Used to live with him. Nice feller he was. Big. Bit hard of hearing. Got a sleepy kind of grin, like this⁠—something.”

The traveller sipped his beer in thoughtful silence.

“I reckon you never met him,” said the waiter. “Maybe you never knew Gentleman Bailey, either? We always called him that. He was one of these broken-down Eton or ’Arrer fellers, folks said. We struck up a partnership kind of casual, both being on the tramp together, and after a while we ’appened to be round about Reigate. And the first house we come to was this Jerry Moore’s. He come up just as we was sliding to the back door, and grins that sleepy grin. Like this⁠—something. ‘ ’Ullo!’ he says. Gentleman kind of gives a whoop, and hollers, ‘If it ain’t my old pal, Jerry Moore! Jack,’ he says to me, ‘this is my old pal, Mr. Jerry Moore, wot I met in ’appier days down at Ramsgate one summer.’

“They shakes hands,