Indiscretions of Archie - P. G. Wodehouse (essential books to read txt) 📗

The jeweller eyed him approvingly, a man after his own heart; but Archie looked doubtful. It was all very well for Reggie to tell him to grab it in that careless way. Reggie was a dashed millionaire, and no doubt bought bracelets by the pound or the gross or whatnot; but he himself was in an entirely different position.

“Eight hundred and fifty dollars!” he said, hesitating.

“Worth it,” mumbled Reggie van Tuyl.

“More than worth it,” amended the jeweller. “I can assure you that it is better value than you could get anywhere on Fifth Avenue.”

“Yes?” said Archie. He took the bracelet and twiddled it thoughtfully. “Well, my dear old jeweller, one can’t say fairer than that, can one⁠—or two, as the case may be!” He frowned. “Oh, well, all right! But it’s rummy that women are so fearfully keen on these little thingummies, isn’t it? I mean to say, can’t see what they see in them. Stones, and all that. Still, there it is, of course!”

“There,” said the jeweller, “as you say, it is, sir.”

“Yes, there it is!”

“Yes, there it is,” said the jeweller, “fortunately for people in my line of business. Will you take it with you, sir?”

Archie reflected.

“No. No, not take it with me. The fact is, you know, my wife’s coming back from the country tonight, and it’s her birthday tomorrow, and the thing’s for her, and, if it was popping about the place tonight, she might see it, and it would sort of spoil the surprise. I mean to say, she doesn’t know I’m giving it her, and all that!”

“Besides,” said Reggie, achieving a certain animation now that the tedious business interview was concluded, “going to the ballgame this afternoon⁠—might get pocket picked⁠—yes, better have it sent.”

“Where shall I send it, sir?”

“Eh? Oh, shoot it along to Mrs. Archibald Moffam, at the Cosmopolis. Not today, you know. Buzz it in first thing tomorrow.”

Having completed the satisfactory deal, the jeweller threw off the business manner and became chatty.

“So you are going to the ballgame? It should be an interesting contest.”

Reggie van Tuyl, now⁠—by his own standards⁠—completely awake, took exception to this remark.

“Not a bit of it!” he said, decidedly. “No contest! Can’t call it a contest! Walkover for the Pirates!”

Archie was stung to the quick. There is that about baseball which arouses enthusiasm and the partisan spirit in the unlikeliest bosoms. It is almost impossible for a man to live in America and not become gripped by the game; and Archie had long been one of its warmest adherents. He was a wholehearted supporter of the Giants, and his only grievance against Reggie, in other respects an estimable young man, was that the latter, whose money had been inherited from steel-mills in that city, had an absurd regard for the Pirates of Pittsburg.

“What absolute bally rot!” he exclaimed. “Look what the Giants did to them yesterday!”

“Yesterday isn’t today,” said Reggie.

“No, it’ll be a jolly sight worse,” said Archie. “Looney Biddle’ll be pitching for the Giants today.”

“That’s just what I mean. The Pirates have got him rattled. Look what happened last time.”

Archie understood, and his generous nature chafed at the innuendo. Looney Biddle⁠—so-called by an affectionately admiring public as the result of certain marked eccentricities⁠—was beyond dispute the greatest left-handed pitcher New York had possessed in the last decade. But there was one blot on Mr. Biddle’s otherwise stainless scutcheon. Five weeks before, on the occasion of the Giants’ invasion of Pittsburg, he had gone mysteriously to pieces. Few native-born partisans, brought up to baseball from the cradle, had been plunged into a profounder gloom on that occasion than Archie; but his soul revolted at the thought that that sort of thing could ever happen again.

“I’m not saying,” continued Reggie, “that Biddle isn’t a very fair pitcher, but it’s cruel to send him against the Pirates, and somebody ought to stop it. His best friends should interfere. Once a team gets a pitcher rattled, he’s never any good against them again. He loses his nerve.”

The jeweller nodded approval of this sentiment.

“They never come back,” he said, sententiously.

The fighting blood of the Moffams was now thoroughly stirred. Archie eyed his friend sternly. Reggie was a good chap⁠—in many respects an extremely sound egg⁠—but he must not be allowed to talk rot of this description about the greatest left-handed pitcher of the age.

“It seems to me, old companion,” he said, “that a small bet is indicated at this juncture. How about it?”

“Don’t want to take your money.”

“You won’t have to! In the cool twilight of the merry old summer evening I, friend of my youth and companion of my riper years, shall be trousering yours.”

Reggie yawned. The day was very hot, and this argument was making him feel sleepy again.

“Well, just as you like, of course. Double or quits on yesterday’s bet, if that suits you.”

For a moment Archie hesitated. Firm as his faith was in Mr. Biddle’s stout left arm, he had not intended to do the thing on quite this scale. That thousand dollars of his was earmarked for Lucille’s birthday present, and he doubted whether he ought to risk it. Then the thought that the honour of New York was in his hands decided him. Besides, the risk was negligible. Betting on Looney Biddle was like betting on the probable rise of the sun in the east. The thing began to seem to Archie a rather unusually sound and conservative investment. He remembered that the jeweller, until he drew him firmly but kindly to earth and urged him to curb his exuberance and talk business on a reasonable plane, had started brandishing bracelets that cost about two thousand. There would be time to pop in at the shop this evening after the game and change the one he had selected for one of those. Nothing was too good for Lucille on her birthday.

“Right-o!” he said. “Make it so, old friend!”

Archie walked back to the Cosmopolis. No misgivings came to mar his perfect contentment. He felt no qualms about