Don't come near the flat!'
'But it's my own flat.'
'I can't help that. Aunt Isabel doesn't like you. She asked me what you did for a living. And when I told her you didn't do anything she said she thought as much, and that you were a typical specimen of a useless and decaying aristocracy. So if you think you have made a hit, forget it.
What on earth are you doing in Paris?" I asked.
"Bertie, old man," said Biffy solemnly, "I came here to try and forget."
"Well, you've certainly succeeded.
I ordered another. If this was going to be a fish-story, I needed stimulants.
"On the liner going to New York I met a girl." Biffy made a sort of curious gulping noise not unlike a bulldog trying to swallow half a cutlet in a hurry so as to be ready for the other half. "Bertie, old man, I can't describe her. I simply can't describe her."
This was all to the good.
I'd always thought of Jeeves as a kind of natural phenomenon; but, by Jove! of course, when you come to think of it, there must be quite a lot of fellows who have to press their own clothes themselves, and haven't got anybody to bring them tea in the morning, and so on. It was rather a solemn thought, don't you know. I mean to say, ever since then I've been able to appreciate the frightful privations the poor have to stick.
P.G. WodehouseDon't leave me, Bertie. I'm lost."
"What do you mean, lost?"
"I came out for a walk and suddenly discovered after a mile or two that I didn't know where on earth I was. I've been wandering round in circles for hours."
"Why didn't you ask the way?"
"I can't speak a word of French."
"Well, why didn't you call a taxi?"
"I suddenly discovered I'd left all my money at my hotel."
"You could have taken a cab and paid it when you got to the hotel."
"Yes, but I suddenly discovered, dash it, that I'd forgotten its name."
And there in a nutshell you have Charles Edward Biffen. As vague and woollen-headed a blighter as ever bit a sandwich.
Well, if he comes when I'm out, tell him to wait. And now, Jeeves, mes gants, mon chapeau, et le whangee de monsieur. I must be popping.
P.G. WodehouseI say, Bertie, is it really true that you were once engaged to Honoria?"
"It is."
Biffy coughed.
"How did you get out - I mean, what was the nature of the tragedy that prevented the marriage?"
"Jeeves worked it. He thought out the entire scheme."
"I think, before I go," said Biffy thoughtfully, "I'll just step into the kitchen and have a word with Jeeves."
I felt that the situation called for complete candour.
"Biffy, old egg," I said, "as man to man, do you want to oil out of this thing?"
"Bertie, old cork," said Biffy earnestly, "as one friend to another, I do.
I have brought the heather-mixture suit, as the climatic conditions are congenial. To-morrow, if not prevented, I will endeavour to add the brown lounge with the faint green twill.'
'It can't go on - this sort of thing - Jeeves.'
'We must hope for the best, sir.'
'Can't you think of anything to do?'
'I have been giving the matter considerable thought, sir, but so far without success. I am placing three silk shirts - the dove-coloured, the light blue, and the mauve - in the first long drawer, sir.'
'You don't mean to say you can't think of anything, Jeeves?'
'For the moment, sir, no. You will find a dozen handkerchiefs and the tan socks in the upper drawer on the left.' He strapped the suit-case and put it on a chair. 'A curious lady, Miss Rockmetteller, sir.'
'You understate it, Jeeves.'
He gazed meditatively out of the window.
'In many ways, sir, Miss Rockmetteller reminds me of an aunt of mine who resides in the south-east portion of London. Their temperaments are much alike. My aunt has the same taste for the pleasures of the great city. It is a passion with her to ride in taxi-cabs, sir. Whenever the family take their eyes off her she escapes from the house and spends the day riding about in cabs. On several occasions she has broken into the children's savings bank to secure the means to enable her to gratify this desire.'
'I love to have these little chats with you about your female relatives, Jeeves,' I said coldly, for I felt that the man had let me down, and I was fed up with him. 'But I don't see what all this has got to do with my trouble.'
'I beg your pardon, sir. I am leaving a small assortment of our neckties on the mantelpiece, sir for you to select according to your preference. I should recommend the blue with the red domino pattern, sir.
Yes; Jimmy Mundy!' she said. 'I am surprised at a man of your stamp having heard of him. There is no music, there are no drunken, dancing men, no shameless, flaunting women at his meetings; so for you they would have no attraction. But for others, less dead in sin, he has his message. He has come to save New York from itself; to force it - in his picturesque phrase - to hit the trail.
P.G. WodehouseHonoria, you see, is one of those robust, dynamic girls with the muscles of a welter-weight and a laugh like a squadron of cavalry charging over a tin bridge. A beastly thing to have to face over the breakfast table. Brainy, moreover. The sort of girl who reduces you to pulp with sixteen sets of tennis and a few rounds of golf and then comes down to dinner as fresh as a daisy, expecting you to take an intelligent interest in Freud.
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