 CHAPTER VI THE RAIN HAD STOPPED WHEN SMITH STEPPED OUT INTO THE STREET, AND THE SUN WAS SHINING AGAIN IN THAT HALF-BLASTING, HALF-APOLOGETIC MANNER WHICH IT AFFECTS ON ITS REAPPEARANCE AFTER A SUMMER SHOWER. The pavements glistened cheerfully, and the air had a welcome freshness. Posing at the corner, he pondered for a moment as to the best method of passing the hour in twenty minutes, which must elapse before he could reasonably think of lunching. The fact that the offices of the Morning Globe were within easy strolling distance decided him to go thither and see if the first post had brought anything in the shape of answers to his advertisements. And his energy was rewarded a few minutes later, when Box 365, when being opened, yielded up quite a little budget of literary matter. No fewer than seven letters in all. A nice bag. What, however, had appeared at first sight evidence of a pleasing abolition of enterprise on the part of the newspaper-reading public turned out on closer inspection when he had retired to a corner where he could concentrate in peace a hollow delusion. Enterprising in a sense, though the communications were, and they certainly showed the writers as men of considerable ginger and business push, to Smith they came as a disappointment. He had expected better things. These letters were not at all what he had paid good money to receive. They missed the point altogether. The right spirit, it seemed to him, was entirely absent. The first envelope, attractive though it looked from the outside, being of an expensive brand of stationery and gaily adorned with a somewhat startling crest merely contained a pleasantly worded offer from a Mr. Alastair McDougall to advance him any sum from ten to fifty thousand pounds on his note of hand only. The second revealed a similar proposal from another Scott named Cullen MacDonald. While in the third Mr. Ian Campbell was prepared to go as high as one hundred thousand. All three philanthropists had but one stipulation to make. They would have no dealings with minors. Youth, with all its glorious traditions, did not seem to appeal to them. But they cordially urged Smith, in the event of his having celebrated his twenty-first birthday, to come round to the office and take the stuff away in a sack. Keeping his head well in the midst of a shower of riches, Smith dropped the three letters with a sigh into the waste-paper basket, and opened the next in order. This was a bulky envelope, and its contents consisted of a printed brochure entitled, This Night Shall Thy Soul Be Required of Thee, while, by a curious and appropriate coincidence, number five proved to be a circular from an energetic firm of coffin-makers offering to bury him for eight pounds ten. Number six, also printed, was a manifesto from one Howard Hill of Newmarket, recommending him to apply without delay for Hill's three-horse special, without which, who demanded Mr. Hill in large type, gave you Wibliwab for the Jubilee Cup. No sportsman could hope to accomplish the undoing of the book-makers. Although by doing so he convinced himself of that very lack of enterprise which he had been deploring in the great public, Smith placed this communication with the others in the waste-paper baskets. There now remained only number seven, a slight flicker of hope returned to him when he perceived that this envelope was addressed by hand and not in TypeScript. He opened it. Beyond a doubt, he had kept the pick of the bunch to the last. Here was something that made up for all those other disappointments. Written in a scrawly and apparently agitated hand, the letter ran as follows. If R. Smith will meet the writer in the lobby of the Piccadilly Palace Hotel at twelve-sharp Friday, July 1st, business may result if business meant and terms reasonable. R. Smith will wear a pink chrysanthemum in his buttonhole and will say to the writer, There will be rain in Northumberland to-day, to which the writer will reply, Good for the crops! Kindly, be punctual. A pleased smile played upon Smith's solemn face as he read this communication for the second time. It was much more of the sort of thing for which he had been hoping. Although his closest friend, Mike Jackson, was a young man of complete ordinariness, Smith's taste when he sought companionship lay as a rule in the direction of the bizarre. He preferred his humanity eccentric. And the writer, to judge him by this specimen of his correspondence, appeared to be eccentric enough for the most exacting taste. After this promising person turned out to be a rebel jester or an earnest crank, Smith felt no doubt whatever as to the advisability of following the matter up. Whichever he might be, his society ought to afford entertainment during the interval before lunch. Smith glanced at his watch. The hour was a quarter to twelve. He would be able to secure the necessary chrysanthemum and reach the Piccadilly Palace Hotel by twelve-sharp, thus achieving the business-like punctuality on which the unknown writer seemed to set such store. It was not until he had entered a florist's shop on the way to the Trist that it was borne in upon him that the adventure was going to have its drawbacks. The first of these was the chrysanthemum. Preoccupied with the rest of the communication, Smith, when he had read the letter, had not given much thought to the decoration which it would be necessary for him to wear. And it was only when, in reply to his demand for a chrysanthemum, the florist came forward, almost hidden, like the army at Dunzenane, behind what looked like a small shrubbery that he realized what he, a correct and fastidious dresser, was up against. Is that a chrysanthemum? Yes, sir, pink chrysanthemum. One? Yes, sir, one pink chrysanthemum. Smith regarded the repellent object with disfavor through his eyeglass. Then, having placed it in his buttonhole, he proceeded on his way, feeling like some wild thing peering through the undergrowth. The distressing shrub completely spoiled his walk. Arriving at the hotel and standing in the lobby, he perceived the existence of further complications. The lobby was in its usual state of congestion, it being a recognized meeting place for those who did not find it convenient to go as far east as that traditional rendezvous of Londoners, the spot under the clock at Charing Cross Station, and the writer, while giving instructions as to how Smith should ornament his exterior, had carelessly omitted to mention how he himself was to be recognized. A rollicking, slap-dash conspirator was Smith's opinion. It seemed best to take up a position as nearly as possible in the center of the lobby, and stand there until the writer, lured by the chrysanthemum, should come forward and start something. As soon as he accordingly did, but when at the end of ten minutes nothing had happened beyond a series of collisions with perhaps a dozen hurrying visitors to the hotel, he decided on a more active course. A young man of sporting appearance had been standing beside him for the last five minutes, and ever and anon this young man had glanced with some impatience at his watch. He was plainly waiting for someone, so Smith tried the formula on him. "'There will be rain,' said Smith, in Northumberland to-morrow.' The young man looked at him, not without interest, certainly, but without that gleam of intelligence in his eye which Smith had hoped to see. "'What?' he replied. "'There will be rain in Northumberland to-morrow.' "'Thanks, Zadkiel,' said the young man, do so gratifying, I'm sure. I suppose you couldn't predict the winner of the Goodwood Cup as well.' He then withdrew rapidly to intercept a young woman in a large hat who had just come through the swing doors. Smith was forced to the conclusion that this was not his man. He was sorry on the whole, for he had seemed a pleasant fellow. As Smith had taken up a stationary position and the population of the lobby was for the most part in a state of flux, he was finding himself next to someone new all the time, and now he decided to accost the individual whom the reshovel had just brought elbow to elbow with him. This was a jovial-looking soul with a floured waistcoat, a white hat, and a modelled face, just a man who might have written that letter. The effect upon this person of Smith's meteorological remark was instantaneous, a light of the utmost friendliness shown in his beautifully shaven face as he turned. He seized Smith's hand and gripped it with a delightful hardiness. He had the air of a man who has found a friend, and what is more an old friend. He had a sort of journey's end-and-lover's meeting look. "'My dear old chap,' he cried, "'I've been waiting for you to speak for the last five minutes. New we'd met before somewhere, but couldn't place you. Face familiar as the Dickens, of course. Well, well, well, and how are they all?' "'Who?' said Smith courteously. "'Why, the boys, my dear chap!' "'Oh, the boys?' "'The dear old boys,' said the other, specifying more exactly. He slapped Smith on the shoulder. What times those were, eh?' "'Which?' said Smith. "'The times we all used to have together.' "'Oh, those?' said Smith. Something of discouragement seemed to creep over the other's exuberance as a cloud creeps over the summer sky. But he persevered. "'Fancy meeting you again like this.' "'It's a small world,' agreed Smith. "'I'd ask you to come and have a drink,' said the jovial one, with the slight increase of intensity which comes to a man who approaches the core of a business deal. But the fact is, my ass of a man sent me out this morning without a penny. Forgot to give me my note-case. Damn careless! I'll have to sack the fellow.' "'Anoing, certainly,' said Smith. "'I wish I could have stood you a drink,' said the other wistfully. Of all the sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these, it might have been,' sighed Smith. "'I'll tell you what,' said the jovial one, inspired. "'Lend me a fiver, my dear old boy. That's the best way out of the difficulty. I can send it round to your hotel or wherever you are this evening when I get home.' A sweet, sad smile played over Smith's face. "'Leave me, comrade,' he murmured. "'Eh?' "'Pass along, old friend, pass along.' Resignation displaced joviality in the other's countenance. Nothing doing?' he inquired. "'Nothing.' "'Well, there was no harm in trying,' argued the other. "'None whatever.' "'You see,' said the now far less jovial man confidentially, you look such a perfect mug in that eyeglass that it tempts a chap. I can quite understand how it must. No offence, assuredly not. The white hat disappeared through the swing doors and Smith returned to his quest. He engaged the attention of a middle-aged man in a snuff-colored suit which has come within hail. "'There will be rain in Northumberland tomorrow,' he said. The man peered at him inquiringly. "'Hey,' he said. Smith repeated his observation. "'Ha!' said the man. Smith was beginning to lose the unruffled calm which made him such an impressive figure to the public eye. He had not taken into consideration the possibility that the object of his search might be deaf. He had undoubtedly added to the embarrassment of the pursuit. He was moving away when a hand fell on his sleeve. Smith turned. The hand which still grasped his sleeve belonged to an elegantly dressed young man of somewhat nervous and feverish appearance. During his recent vigil Smith had noticed this young man standing not far away, and had had half a mind to include him in the platoon of new friends he was making that morning. "'I say,' said this young man in a tense whisper, "'did I hear you say that there would be rain in Northumberland tomorrow?' "'If,' said Smith, "'you were anywhere within the radius of a dozen yards while I was chatting with the recent deaf adder, I think it is possible that you did.' "'Good for the crops,' said the young man. "'Come over here where we can talk quietly.' "'Too.' "'So your arp, Smith,' said the young man, when they had made their way to a remote corner of the lobby, apart from the throng. "'The same.' "'I say, Dashett, you're frightfully late, you know. I told you to be here at twelve sharp. It's nearly twelve past.' "'You're wrong me,' said Smith. "'I arrived here precisely at twelve. Since when I have been standing like patients on a monument?' "'Like what?' "'Let it go,' said Smith. "'It is not important. "'I asked you to wear a pink chrysanthemum, so I could recognize you, you know.' "'I am wearing a pink chrysanthemum. I should have imagined that that was a fact that the most casual could have hardly overlooked.' "'That thing?' The other gazed disparagingly at the floral decoration. I thought it was some kind of cabbage. I knit one of those little, what-you-may-call-its-that-people-do wearing their button-holes.' "'Carnation, possibly?' "'Carnation, that's right.' Smith removed the chrysanthemum and dropped it behind his chair. He looked at his companion reproachfully. "'If you had studied botany at school, comrade,' he said, "'much misery might have been averted. I cannot begin to tell you the spiritual agony I suffered, trailing through the metropolis behind that shrub.' Whatever decent sympathy and remorse the other might have shown at these words were swept away in the shock resultant on a glance at his watch. Not for an instant during this brief return of his to London had Freddie Threepwood been unmindful of his father's stern injunction to him to catch the twelve-fifty train back to market-blandings. If he missed it, there would be the deuce of a lot of unpleasantness. And unpleasantness in the home was the one thing Freddie wanted to avoid nowadays. For like a prudent convict in a prison, he hoped by exemplary behavior to get his sentence of imprisonment at Blanding's castle reduced for good conduct. "'Good Lord, I've only got about five minutes. Not to talk quick about this thing, this business, that advertisement of yours. Ah, yes, my advertisement. It interested you?' Was it on the level?' "'O, surely, we Smiths do not deceive.' Freddie looked at him doubtfully. "'You know, you aren't a bit like I expected you'd be.' "'In what respect,' inquired Smith, "'do I fall short of the ideal?' "'It isn't so much falling short. It's—' "'Oh, I don't know. Well, yes, if you want to know, I thought you'd be a tougher specimen altogether. I got the impression from your advertisement that you were down and out and ready for anything, and you look as if you were on your way to a garden-party at Buckingham Palace.' "'Ah,' said Smith, enlightened, it is my costume that is causing these doubts in your mind. This is the second time this morning that such a misunderstanding has occurred. I have no misgivings. These trousers may sit well, but if they do, it is because the pockets are empty.' "'Are you really broke?' "'As broke as the Ten Commandments.' "'I'm hanged if I can believe it.' "'Suppose I brush my hat the wrong way for a moment,' said Smith obligingly. Would that help?' "'His companion remains silent for a few moments. In spite of the fact that he was in so great a hurry and thought that every minute that passed brought nearer the moment when he would be compelled to tear himself away and make a dash for Paddington Station, Freddie was finding it difficult to open the subject which he had come there to discuss. "'Look here,' he said at length, I shall have to trust you, dash it. "'You could pursue no better course.' "'It's like this. I'm trying to raise a thousand quid.' "'I regret that I cannot offer to advance it to you myself. I have indeed already been compelled to decline to lend a gentleman who claimed to be an old friend of mine so small as some as a fiver. But there is a dear, obliging soul of the name of Alastair MacDougal, who, good Lord, he don't think I'm trying to touch you.' That impression did flip through my mind. "'Oh, dash it, no. No, but—' "'Well, as I was saying, I'm frightfully keen to get hold of a thousand quid.' "'So am I,' said Smith, two minds with but a single thought. "'How do you propose to start about it? For my part I must freely confess that I haven't a notion. I am stumped. The cry goes round the chancellories. Smith is baffled.' "'I say, old thing,' said Freddie, plaintively, "'you couldn't talk a bit less, could you? I've only got about two minutes.' "'I beg your pardon. Proceed.' "'It's so dash it difficult to know how to begin the thing. I mean, it's all a bit complicated till you get the hang of it. Look here. You said in your advertisement that you had no objection to crime.' Smith considered the point. "'Within reason, and if undetected, I see no objection to ten pennerth of crime.' "'Well, look here. Look here.' "'Well, look here,' said Freddie. "'Will you steal my aunt's diamond necklace?' Smith placed his monocle in his eye and bent gravely toward his companion. "'Steal your aunt's necklace?' he said indulgently. "'Yes.' "'You do not think she might consider it a liberty from one to whom she has never been introduced? What Freddie might have replied to this pertinent question will never be known, for at this moment, looking nervously at his watch for the twentieth time, he observed that the hands had passed a half hour and were well on their way to twenty-five minutes to one. He bounded up with a cry. "'I must go. I shall miss that damn train!' And meanwhile,' said Smith. The familiar phrase, the words and meanwhile, had occurred at least once in every film Freddie had ever seen, had the effect of wrenching the latter's mind back to the subject in hand for a moment. Freddie was not a clear-thinking young man, but even he could see that he had left the negotiation suspended at a very satisfactory point. Nevertheless, he had to catch that twelve-fifty. "'Right and tell me what you think about it,' panted Freddie, skimming through the lobby like a swallow. "'You have, unfortunately, omitted to leave a name and address,' Smith pointed out, following him at an easy jog trot. In spite of his hurry, a prudence born of much movie seeing restrained Freddie from supplying the information asked for. Give away your name and address, and you never knew what might happen. "'I'll write to you,' he cried, racing for a cab. "'I shall count the minutes,' said Smith courteously. "'Drive like blazes,' said Freddie to the chauffeur. "'Where?' inquired the man, not unreasonably. "'Eh! Oh! Paddington!' The cab whirled off, and Smith, pleasantly conscious of a morning nodial spent, gazed after it pensively for a moment. Then, with the feeling that the authorities of Colney Hatch or some kindred establishment had been extraordinarily negligent, he permitted his mind to turn with genial anticipation in the direction of lunch. For though he had celebrated his first day of emancipation from Billingsgate Fish Market by rising late and breakfasting later, he had become aware by now of that not unpleasant emptiness which is the silent luncheon gong of the soul. III The minor problem now presented itself of where to lunch, and with scarcely a moment's consideration he dismissed those large, noisy and bustling restaurants which lie near Piccadilly Circus. After a morning spent with Eve Halliday and the young man who was going about the place asking people to steal his aunt's breakfast, it was imperative that he select some place where he could sit and think quietly. Any food of which he partook must be consumed in calm, even cloisteral surroundings, unpolluted by the presence of a first violin who tied himself into knots, and an orchestra in whose lexicon there was no such word as piano. One of his clubs seemed indicated. In the days of his prosperity, Smith's father, an enthusiastic clubman, had enrolled his son's name on the list of several institutions. And now, although the lean years had arrived, he was still a member of six, and would continue to be a member till the beginning of the new year and the consequent call for fresh subscriptions. These clubs ranged from the drones, frankly frivolous, to the senior conservative, solidly worthy. Almost immediately Smith decided that for such a mood as was upon him at the moment, the latter might have been specially constructed. Anybody familiar with the interior of the senior conservative club would have applauded his choice. In the whole of London no better haven could have been found by one desirous of staying his interior with excellently cooked food while passing his soul under a leisurely examination. They fed you well at the drones, too, no doubt, but there youth held carnival, and the thoughtful man, examining his soul, was apt at any moment to have his meditations broken in upon by a chunk of bread, dexterously thrown by some bright spirit at an adjoining table. No horror of that description could possibly occur at the senior conservative. The senior conservative has 6,111 members. Some of the 6,111 are more respectable than the others, but they are all respectable, whether they be numbered among the oldest inhabitants like the Earl of Emsworth, who joined as a country member in 1888, or are among the recent creations of the last election of candidates. They are bald, revered men, who look as if they are on their way to the city to preside at director's meetings, or have dropped in after conferring with the prime minister at Downing Street as to the prospects of the coming by-election and the little Wopsley division. With the quiet dignity which atoned for his lack in years in this stronghold of mellow worth, Smith mounted the steps, passed through the doors which were obligingly flung open for him by two uniform dignitaries, and made his way to the coffee-room. Here, having selected a table in the middle of the room and ordered a simple and appetizing lunch, he gave himself up to thoughts of Eve Halliday. As he had confessed to his young friend Mr. Walterwick, she had made a powerful impression upon him. He was tearing himself from his daydreams in order to wrestle with a mutton-chop when a foreign body shot into his orbit and blundered heavily against the table. Looking up, he perceived a long, thin, elderly gentleman of pleasantly vague aspect, who immediately began to apologize. "'My dear sir, I am extremely sorry. I trust I have caused no damage.' "'None whatever,' replied Smith courteously. "'The fact is, I have mislaid my glasses. It is a bat without them. Can't see where I'm going!' A gloomy-looking young man with long and disordered hair, who stood at the elderly gentleman's elbow, coughed suggestively. He was shuffling restlessly, and appeared to be anxious to close the episode and move on. A young man evidently of highly strong temperament. He had a sullen air. The elderly gentleman started vaguely at the sound of the cough. "'Yeah,' he said, as if in answer to some spoken remark. "'Oh, yes, quite so, quite so, my dear fellow. Mustn't stop here chatting, hey! Had to apologize, though. Nearly upset this gentleman's table. Can't see where I'm going without my glasses. Blind is a bat, eh, what? Quite so, quite so!' He ambled off, doddering cheerfully, while his companion still preserved his look of sulky aloofness. Smith gazed after them with interest. "'Can you tell me,' he asked of the waiter, who was rallying round with potatoes, who that was?' The waiter followed his glance. "'Don't know who the young gentleman is, sir. Guest here, I fancy. The old gentleman is the Earl of Emsworth. Lives in the country and doesn't often come to the club. Very absent-minded gentleman, they tell me. "'Potato, sir?' "'Thank you,' said Smith. The waiter drifted away and returned. "'I have been looking at the guest-book, sir. The name of the gentleman lunching with Lord Emsworth is Mr. Ralston McTodd.' "'Thank you very much. I am sorry you had the trouble. No trouble, sir.' Smith resumed his meal. Four.' The sullen demeanor of the young man, who had accompanied Lord Emsworth through the coffee-room, accurately reflected the emotions which were vexing his troubled soul. Ralston McTodd, the powerful young singer of Saskatoon, plums the depths of human emotion and strikes a new note, Montreal star. Very readable, Ipsilanti Harold, had not enjoyed his lunch. The pleasing sense of importance induced by the fact that for the first time in his life he was hobnobbing with a genuine Earl had given way after ten minutes of his host's society to a mingle despair and irritation which had grown steadily deeper as the meal proceeded. It is not too much to say that by the time the fish-course arrived it would have been a relief to Mr. McTodd's feelings if he could have taken up the butter-dish and banged it down, butter and all, on his lordship's bald head. A temperamental young man was Ralston McTodd. He liked to be the center of the picture, to do the talking, to air his views, to be listened to respectfully and with interest by a submissive audience. At the meal which had just concluded none of these reasonable demands had been permitted to him. From the very beginning Lord Emsworth had collared the conversation and held it with a gentle bleeding persistency against all assaults. Five times had Mr. McTodd almost succeeded in launching one of his best epigrams only to see it swept away on the tossing flood of a lecture on Hollyhawks. At the sixth attempt he had managed to get it all out, complete and sparkling, and the old-ass opposite him had taken it in his stride like a hurdle and gone galloping off about the mental and moral defects of a creature named Angus McAllister, who appeared to be his head gardener or something of the kind. The luncheon, though he was a hearty feeder and as a rule appreciative of good cooking, had turned to ashes in Mr. McTodd's mouth, and it was a soured and chafing singer of Saskatoon who dropped scowlingly into an armchair by the window of the lower smoking-room a few moments later. We introduce Ralston McTodd to the reader in short at a moment when he is very near the breaking point. A little more provocation and goodness knows what he may not do. For the time being he is merely leaning back in his chair and scowling. He has a faint hope, however, that a cigar may bring some sort of relief, and he is waiting for one to be ordered for him. The Earl of Emsworth did not see the scowl. He had not really seen Mr. McTodd at all from the moment of his arrival at the club, when somebody, who sounded like the head porter, had informed him that a gentleman was waiting to see him, and had led him up to a shapeless blur which had introduced himself as his expected guest. The loss of his glasses had had its usual effect on Lord Emsworth, making the world a misty place in which indefinite objects swam dimly, like fish in muddy water. Not that this mattered much, seeing that he was in London, for in London there was never anything worth looking at. Beyond a vague feeling that it would be more comfortable on the whole if he had his glasses, a feeling just strong enough to have made him send off a messenger boy to his hotel to hunt for them, Lord Emsworth had not allowed lack of vision to interfere with his enjoyment of the proceedings. And unlike Mr. McTodd, he had been enjoying himself very much. A good listener this young man he felt. Very soothing the way he had constituted himself a willing audience, never interrupting or thrusting himself forward, as is so often the deplorable tendency of the modern young man. Lord Emsworth was bound to admit that, much as he had disliked the idea of going to London to pick up this poet or whatever he was, the thing had turned out better than he had expected. He liked Mr. McTodd's silent but obvious interest in flowers, his tacit but warm-hearted sympathy in the matter of Angus McAllister. He was glad he was coming to Blandings. It would be agreeable to conduct him personally through the gardens, to introduce him to Angus McAllister and allow him to plumb for himself the black abysses of that outcast's mental processes. Meanwhile, he had forgotten all about ordering that cigar. In large gardens were ample space permits, said Lord Emsworth, dropping cosily into his chair and taking up the conversation at the point where it had been broken off. Nothing is more desirable than that there should be some places, for one at least, of quiet greenery alone, without any flowers whatever. I see that you agree with me. Mr. McTodd had not agreed with him. The grunt which Lord Emsworth had taken for an exclamation of rapturous adhesion to his sentiments had been merely a sort of bubble of sound rising from the tortured depths of Mr. Todd's suffering soul, the cry, as the poet beautifully puts it, of some strong smoker in his agony. The desire to smoke had now gripped Mr. McTodd's very vitals. But as some lingering remains of the social sense kept him from asking point blank for the cigar for which he yearned, he sawed in his mind for a way of approaching the subject obliquely. "'In no other way,' proceeded Lord Emsworth, "'can the brilliancy of flowers be so keenly enjoyed, as by— "'Talking of flowers,' said Mr. McTodd, "'it is a fact, I believe, that tobacco smoke is good for roses.' "'As by pacing for a time,' said Lord Emsworth, "'in some cool green alley, and then passing on to the flowery places.' "'It is partly, no doubt, the unconscious working out of some optical law, the explanation of which in everyday language is that the eye— "'Some people say that smoking is bad for the eyes. I don't agree with them,' said Mr. McTodd warmly. "'Bing, as it were, saturated with the green color, is the more attuned to receive the others, especially the reds. "'It was probably some such consideration that influenced the designers of the many old gardens of England in devoting so much attention to the cult of the yew tree. When you come to Blandings, my dear fellow, I will show you are celebrated yew alley. And when you see it, you will agree that I was right in taking the stand I did against Angus McAllister's pernicious views.' "'I was lunging in the club yesterday,' said Mr. McTodd, with the splendid McTodd dogginess, where they had no matches on the tables in the smoking-room. Only spills. It made it very inconvenient.' "'Angus McAllister,' said Lord Emsworth, is a professional gardener. I need say no more. You know as well as I do, my dear fellow, what professional gardeners are like when it is a question of moss.' What it meant was that, when you wanted to light your afterlunch and cigar, you had to get up and go to a gas burner on a bracket at the other end of the room. This, for some obscure reason, appears to infuriate them. It rouses their basest passions. Nature intended a yew alley to be carpeted with a mossy growth. The mossy path in the yew alley at Blandings is in true relation for colour to the trees and grassy edges. Yet will you credit it that that soulless disgrace to Scotland actually wish to grub it all up and have a rolled gravel path staring up from beneath those immemorial trees? I have already told you how I was compelled to give into him in the matter of the Hollyhawks, head gardeners of any ability at all or rare in these days, and one has to make concessions, but this was too much. I was perfectly friendly and civil about it. Certainly McAllister, I said, you may have your gravel path if you wish it, I make but one proviso, that you construct it over my dead body. Only when I am weltering in my blood on the threshold of that yew alley shall you disturb one inch of my beautiful moss. Try to remember, McAllister, I said, still quite cordially, that you are not laying out a recreation ground in a Glasgow suburb. You are proposing to make an eyesore of what is possibly the most beautiful nook in one of the finest and oldest gardens in the United Kingdom. He made such repulsive scotch noise at the back of his throat, and there the matter rests. Let me, my dear fellow, said Lord Emsworth, writhing down into the depths of his chair like an aristocratic snake until his spine rested snugly against the leather. Let me describe for you the yew alley at Blandings. Entering from the west. Mr. McTodd gave up the struggle and sank back, filled with black and deleterious thoughts, into a tobacco-less hell. The smoking-room was full now, and on all sides fragrant blue clouds arose from little groups of serious thinkers who were discussing what Gladstone had said in seventy-eight. Mr. McTodd, as he watched them, had something of the emotions of the parry excluded from Paradise. So reduced was he by this time that he would have accepted gratefully the meanest straight-cut cigarette in place of the corona of his dreams. But even this poor substitute for smoking was denied him. Lord Emsworth droned on. Having approached from the west, he was now well inside the yew alley. Many of the yews, no doubt, have taken forms other than those that were originally designed. Some are like turned chessmen. Some might be taken for adaptations of human figures, for one can trace here and there a hat-covered head or a spreading petticoat. Some rise in solid blocks with rounded roof and stemless mushroom finial. These have for the most part arched recesses, forming arbors. One of the tallest... eh, what? Lord Emsworth blinked vaguely at the waiter who had sidled up. A moment before he had been a hundred odd miles away, and it was not easy to adjust his mind immediately to the fact that he was in the smoking-room of the senior conservative club. Eh, what? A messenger boy has just arrived with these, your lordship. Lord Emsworth peered in a dazed and wooly manner at the proffered spectacle case. Intelligence returned to him. Oh, thank you! Thank you very much! My glasses! Capital! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! He removed the glasses from their case and placed them on his nose, and instantly the world sprang into being before his eyes, sharp and well-defined. It was like coming out of a fog. Dear me! he said in a self-congratulatory voice. Then abruptly he sat up, transfixed. The lower smoking-room at the senior conservative club is on the street level, and Lord Emsworth's chair faced the large window. Through this, as he raised his now-spectacle face, he perceived for the first time that among the row of shops on the opposite side of the road was a jaunty new florist. It had not been there at his last visit to the metropolis, and he stared at it rapidly, as a small boy would stare at a saucer of ice cream if such a thing had suddenly descended from heaven immediately in front of him. And like a small boy in such a situation, he had eyes for nothing else. He did not look at his guest. And in the ecstasy of his discovery he had completely forgotten that he had a guest. Any flower shop, however small, was a magnet to the earl of Emsworth, and this was a particularly spacious and arresting flower shop. Its window was gay with summer blooms, and Lord Emsworth, slowly rising from his chair, pointed like a dog that sees a pheasant. Bless my soul!" he murmured. If the reader has followed with the closeness which it deserves the extremely entertaining conversation of his lordship recorded in the last few paragraphs, he will have noted a reference to Hollyhawks. Lord Emsworth had ventilated the Hollyhawk question at some little length while seated at the luncheon table. But as we had not the good fortune to be present at that enjoyable meal, a brief resume of the situation must now be given and the intelligent public allowed to judge between his lordship and the uncompromising Macalester. Briefly the position was this. Many head gardeners are apt to favor in the Hollyhawk forms that one cannot but think half for their aim an ideal that is a false and unworthy one. Angus Macalester, clinging to the head gardener-esque standard of beauty and correct form, would not sanction the wide outer petal. The flower, so Angus held, must be very tight and very round, like the uniform of a major general. Lord Emsworth, on the other hand, considered this view narrow and claimed the liberty to try for the very highest and truest beauty in Hollyhawks. The loosely folded inner petals of the Hollyhawk he considered invited a wonderful play and brilliancy of color, while the wide outer petal, with its slightly waved surface and gently frilled edge. Well, anyway, Lord Emsworth liked his Hollyhawks floppy and Angus Macalester liked them tight, and bitter warfare had resulted, in which, as we have seen, his lordship had been compelled to give way. He had been brooding on this defeat ever since, and in the forest opposite he saw a possible sympathizer, a potential ally, an intelligent chum with whom he could get together and thoroughly damn Angus Macalester's glass Ouija in obstinacy. You would not have suspected Lord Emsworth from a casual glance of having within him the ability to move rapidly. But it is a fact that he was out of the smoking room and skimming down the front steps of the club before Mr. Mac Todd's jaw, which had fallen at the spectacle of his host, bowding out of his horizon of vision like a jack-wrappet, had time to hitch itself up again. A moment later, Mr. Mac Todd, happening to direct his gaze out of the window, saw him whiz across the road and vanish into the florist's shop. It was at this juncture that Smith, having finished his lunch, came downstairs to enjoy a quiet cup of coffee. The room was rather crowded, and the chair which Lord Emsworth had vacated offered a wide invitation. He made his way to it. Is this chair occupied?" he inquired politely, so politely that Mr. Mac Todd's reply sounded by contrast even more violent than it might otherwise have done. No, it isn't, snapped Mr. Mac Todd. Smith seated himself. He was feeling agreeably disposed of conversation. Lord Emsworth has left you then, he said. Is he a friend of yours?" inquired Mr. Mac Todd in a voice that suggested that he was perfectly willing to accept a proxy as a target for his wrath. I know him by sight, nothing more. Blast him! muttered Mr. Mac Todd with indescribable virulence. Smith eyed him inquiringly. Correct me if I'm wrong, he said, but I seem to detect in your manner a certain half-veiled annoyance. Is anything the matter?" Mr. Mac Todd barked bitterly. Oh no, nothing's the matter, nothing whatever, except that old beaver. Here he wronged Lord Emsworth, who, whatever his faults, was not a bearded man. That old beaver invited me to lunch, talked all the time about his infernal flowers, never let me get a word in edgeways, had in the common civility to offer me a cigar, and now has gone off without a word of apology and buried himself in that shop over the way. I've never been so insulted in my life," raved Mr. Mac Todd. Scarcely the perfect host, admitted Smith. And if he thinks, said Mr. Mac Todd, rising, that I'm going to go and stay with him at his beastly castle after this, he's mistaken. I'm supposed to go down there with him this evening, and perhaps the old fossil thinks I will, after this. A horrid laugh rolled up for Mr. Mac Todd's interior. Likely, I see myself, after being insulted like this. Would you?" he demanded. Smith gave the matter thought. I am inclined to think no. And so am I damned well inclined to think no, cried Mr. Mac Todd. I'm going away now, this very minute, and if that old total loss ever comes back, you can tell him he's seen the last of me. And Ralston Mac Todd, his blood boiling with justifiable indignation and peak to a degree dangerous on such a warm day, stalked off towards the door with a hard, set face. Through the door he stalked to the cloakroom for his hat and cane. Then, his lips moving silently, he stalked through the hall, stalked down the steps, and passed from the scene, stalking furiously round the corner in quest of a tobacconist. At the moment of his disappearance, the Earl of Emsworth had just begun to give the sympathetic florist a limpid character sketch of Angus McAllister. Smith shook his head sadly. These clashings of human temperament were very lamentable. They disturbed the afterlunch and repose of the man of sensibility. He ordered coffee and endeavored to forget the painful scene by thinking of Eve Halliday. Five. The florist who had settled down to ply his trade opposite the senior conservative club was a delightful fellow, thoroughly sound on the Hullyhog question, and so informative in the matter of Delphiniums, Achilles, Choreopsis, Eurigiums, Geums, Lupens, Bergamot, and Early Flaxes, that Lord Emsworth gave himself up wholeheartedly to the feast of reason and the flow of soul. And it was only some fifteen minutes later that he remembered that he had left a guest languishing in the lower smoking-room, and that his guest might be thinking him a trifle remiss in the observance of the sacred duties of hospitality. Bless my soul, yes, said his lordship, coming out from under the influence with a start. Even then he could not bring himself to dash abruptly from the shop. Twice he reached the door, and twice pottered back to his sniffed flowers and say something he had forgotten to mention about the stronger-growing Clematis. Finally however, with one last longing lingering look behind, he tore himself away and trotted back across the road. Arrived in the lower smoking-room, he stood in the doorway for a moment, peering. The place had been a blur to him when he had left it, but he remembered that he had been sitting in the middle window, and as there were only two seats by the window, that tall, dark young man in one of them must be the guest he had deserted. But he could be a changeling never occurred to Lord Emsworth. So pleasantly had the time passed in the shop across the way that he had the impression that he had only been gone a couple of minutes or so. He made his way to where the young man sat. A vague idea came into his head that the other had grown a bit in his absence, but it passed. "'My dear fellow,' he said genially as he slid into the other chair, "'I really must apologize.' It was plain to Smith that the other was under a misapprehension, and a really nice-minded young man would no doubt have put the matter right at once. The fact that it never for a single instant occurred to Smith to do so was due, no doubt, to some innate defect in his character. He was essentially a young man who took life as it came, and the more inconsequently it came the better he liked it. Suddenly he reflected it would become necessary for him to make some excuse and steal quietly out of the other's life, but meanwhile the situation seemed to him to present entertaining possibilities. "'Not at all,' he replied graciously. Not at all. "'I was afraid for a moment,' said Lord Emsworth, "'that you might, quite naturally, be offended. Absurd!' "'Shouldn't have left you like that. You're doing bad manners, but, my dear fellow, I simply had to pop across the street.' "'Most decidedly,' said Smith, "'always pop across streets. It is the secret of a happy and successful life.' Lord Emsworth looked at him a little perplexedly and wondered if he had caught the last remark correctly. But his mind had never been designed for the purpose of dwelling closely on problems for any length of time any let it go. "'Beautiful roses that man has,' he observed, really an extraordinarily fine display. "'Indeed,' said Smith. "'Nothing to touch mine, though. I wish, my dear fellow, you could have been down at blandings at the beginning of the month. My roses were at their best, then. It's too bad you weren't there to see them.' "'The fault, no doubt, was mine,' said Smith. "'Of course you weren't in England, then.' "'Ah, that explains it. "'Still, I shall have plenty of flowers to show you when you're at blandings.' "'I expect,' said Lord Emsworth, at last showing a host-like disposition to give his guest a belated innings. "'I expect you'll write one of your poems about my gardens, eh?' Smith was conscious of a feeling of distinct gratification. Weeks of toil among the herrings of Billingsgate had left him with a sort of haunting fear that even in private life there clung to him the miasma of the fish market. Yet here was a perfectly unprejudiced observer looking squarely at him and mistaking him for a poet, showing that in spite of all that he had gone through there must still be something notably spiritual and un-fishy about his outward appearance. "'Very possibly,' he said. "'Very possibly.' "'I suppose you get your ideas for your poetry from all sorts of things,' said Lord Emsworth, nobly resisting the temptation to collar the conversation again. He was feeling extremely friendly towards this poet fellow. It was deuce at civil of him not to be put out and huffy at being left alone in the smoking-room. "'From practically everything,' said Smith, except fish. "'Fish?' "'I have never written a poem about fish.' "'No,' said Lord Emsworth, again feeling that a pin had worked loose in the machinery of the conversation. I was once offered a princely sum, went on Smith, now floating happily along on the tide of his native exuberance, to write a ballad for the Fishmonger's Gazette, entitled, Herbert the Turbot. But I was firm. I declined.' "'Indeed,' said Lord Emsworth. One has one's self-respect,' said Smith. "'Oh, decidedly,' said Lord Emsworth. It was painful, of course. The editor broke down completely when he realized that my refusal was final. However, I sent him on with a letter of introduction to John Drinkwater, who I believe turned him out quite a good little effort on the theme. At this moment, when Lord Emsworth was feeling a trifle dizzy, and Smith, on whom conversation always acted as a mental stimulus, was on the point of plunging even deeper into the agreeable depths of light perciflage, a waiter approached. "'A lady to see you, your lordship.' "'Eh? Ah, yes, of course, of course. I was expecting her. It is a miss—what is the name? Holliday? Halliday? It is a miss Halliday,' he said, in explanation to Smith, who was coming down to Blandings to catalog the library. My secretary Baxter told her to call here and see me. If he will excuse me for a moment, my dear fellow—certainly." As Lord Emsworth disappeared, it occurred to Smith that the moment had arrived for him to get his hat and steal softly out of the other's life forever. Only so could confusion and embarrassing explanations be avoided. And it was Smith's guiding rule in life always to avoid explanations. It might, he felt, caused Lord Emsworth a momentary pang when he returned to the smoking-room and found that he was a poet short. But what is that in these modern days when poets are so plentiful that it is almost impossible to fling a brick in any public place without damaging some stern young singer? Smith's view of the matter was that if Lord Emsworth was bent on associating with poets, there was bound to be another one along in a minute. He was on the point, therefore, of rising, when the laziness induced by a good lunch decided him to remain in his comfortable chair for a few minutes longer. He was in one of those moods of rare tranquility which it is rash to break. He lit another cigarette, and his thoughts, as they had done after the departure of Mr. Todd, turned dreamly in the direction of the girl he had met at Miss Clarkson's employment bureau. He amused upon her with a gentle melancholy. Sad he felt that two obviously kindred spirits like himself and her should meet in the world of London life only to separate again, presumably forever, simply because the etiquette governing those who are created male and female forbids a man to cement a chance acquaintancehip by ascertaining the lady's name and address, asking her to lunch and swearing eternal friendship. He sighed as he gazed thoughtfully out of the lower smoking-room window. As he had indicated in his conversation with Mr. Walterwick, those blue eyes and that cheerful, friendly face had made a deep impression on him. Who was she? Where did she live? And was he ever to see her again? He was. Even as he asked himself the question, two figures came down the steps of the club and paused. One was Lord Emsworth, without his hat. The other, as Smith's usually orderly heart give a spasmodic bound at the side of her, was the very girl who was occupying his thoughts. There she stood, as blue-eyed, as fair-haired, as indescribably jolly and charming as ever. Smith rose from his chair with a vehemence almost equal to that recently displayed by Mr. McTodd. It was his intention to add himself immediately to the group. He raced across the room in a manner that drew sensorious glances from the local gray-beards, many of whom had half a mind to write to the committee about it. But when he reached the open air, the pavement at the foot of the club-steps was empty. The girl was just vanishing round the corner into the strand, and of Lord Emsworth there was no sign whatever. By this time, however, Smith had acquired a useful working knowledge of his lordship's habits, and he knew where to look. He crossed the street and headed for the florist's shop. "'Hah, my dear fellow!' said his lordship amably, suspending his conversation with the proprietor on the subject of Delphiniums. Must you be off? Don't forget that our train leaves Paddington at five sharp. You take your ticket for market-blendings!' Smith had come into the shop merely with the intention of asking his lordship if he happened to know Miss Halliday's address. But these words opened out such a vista of attractive possibilities that he had abandoned this team program immediately. He remembered now that among Mr. Todd's remarks on things in general had been one to the effect that he had received an invitation to visit Blanding's castle, of which invitation he did not propose to avail himself. And he argued that if he had acted as substitute for Mr. Todd at the club, he might well continue the kindly work by officiating for him at Blanding's. Looking at the matter altruistically, he would prevent his kind host much disappointment by taking this course, and, looking at it from a more personal viewpoint, only by going to Blanding's could he renew his acquaintance with this girl. Smith had never been one of those who hang back differently when adventure calls, and he did not hang back now. At five sharp, he said, I will be there. Capital, my dear fellow, said his lordship. Does Miss Halliday travel with us? Eh! No, she is coming down in a day or two. I shall look forward to meeting her, said Smith. He turned to the door, and Lord Emsworth, with a farewell beam, resumed his conversation with the florist. End of chapter 6 Chapter 7 of Leave It to Smith This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Leave It to Smith by P. G. Woodhouse. Chapter 7 Part 1 Baxter Suspects The five o'clock train, having given itself a spasmodic jerk, began to move slowly out of Paddington Station. The platform past which it was gliding was crowded with a number of the fauna always to be seen at railway stations at such moments. But in their ranks there was no sign of Mr. Ralston MacTodd, and Smith, as he sat opposite Lord Emsworth in a corner seat of a first class compartment, felt that genial glow of satisfaction which comes to the man who has successfully taken a chance. Until now he had been half-afraid that MacTodd, having changed his mind, might suddenly appear with a bag and baggage, an event which must necessarily have caused confusion and discomfort. His mind was now tranquil, concerning the future he declined to worry. It would no doubt contain its little difficulties, but he was prepared to meet them in the right spirit, and his only trouble in the world now was the difficulty he was experiencing in avoiding his lordship's legs, which showed a disposition to pervade the compartment like the tentacles of an octopus. Lord Emsworth rather ran to leg, and his practice of reclining when at ease on the base of his spine was causing him to straddle, like a polygon in Pilgrim's Progress, right across the way. It became manifest that in a journey lasting several hours his society was likely to prove irksome. For the time being, however, he endured it, and listened with polite attention to his host's remarks on the subject of the Blanding's Gardens. Lord Emsworth, in a train moving in the direction of home, was behaving like a horse heading for his stable. He snorted and spoke at length and with emotion, of roses in herbaceous borders. It will be dark, I suppose, by the time we arrive, he said regretfully, but the first thing tomorrow, my dear fellow, I must take you round and show you my gardens. I shall look forward to it keenly, said Smith. There are, I can readily imagine, distinctly, o' jock come spiff. I beg your pardon, said Lord Emsworth, with a start. Let it all, said Smith graciously. Er, what did you say, after his lordship, after a slight pause? I was saying that, from all reports, you must have a very nifty display of garden produce at your rural seat. Oh, yes, oh, most, said his lordship, looking puzzled. He examined Smith across the compartment with something of the peering curiosity which he would have bestowed upon a new and unclassified shrub. Most extraordinary, he murmured. I trust, my dear fellow, you will not think me personal, but do you know, nobody would imagine that you are a poet. You don't look like a poet, and dash it, you don't talk like a poet. How should a poet talk? Well, Lord Emsworth considered the point. Well, Miss Peavey, but of course you don't know Miss Peavey. Miss Peavey is a poetess, and she way-laid me the other morning while I was having a most important conference with McAllister on the subject of bulbs, and asked me if I didn't think that it was fairies teardrops that made the do. Did you ever hear such dashed nonsense? Evidently an aggravated case. Is Miss Peavey staying at the castle? My dear fellow, you couldn't shift her with blasting powder. Really, this craze of my sister Constance fulfilling the house with these infernal literary people is getting on my nerves. I can't stand these poets and what not, never could. We must always remember, however, said Smith gravely, that poets are also God's creatures. Good heavens, explained his lordship aghast. I have forgotten that you were one. What will you think of me, my dear fellow? But of course, as I said a moment ago, you are different. I admit that, when Constance told me that she had invited you to the house, I was not cheered. But now that I have had the pleasure of meeting you, the conversation had worked round to the very point to which Smith had been wishing to direct it. He was keenly desirous of finding out why Mr. McTodd had been invited to blandings, and to still more vital matter, of ascertaining whether on his arrival there, as Mr. McTodd's understudy, he was going to meet people who knew the poet by sight. On this latter point it seemed to him, hung the question of whether he was about to enjoy a delightful visit to a historic country house in the society of Eve Halliday, or leave the train at the next stop and omit to return to it. It was extremely kind of Lady Constance, he hazarded, to invite a perfect stranger to blandings. Oh, she's always doing that sort of thing, said his lordship. It didn't matter to her that she'd never seen you in her life. She had read your books, you know, and liked them, and when she heard that you were coming to England, she wrote to you. I see, said Smith, relieved. Of course, it is all right as it has turned out, said Lord Emsworth handsomely. As I say, you're different. And how you came to write that, that bilge, suggested Smith. The very word I was about to employ, my dear fellow. No, no, I don't mean that. Capital stuff, no doubt. Capital stuff, but I understand. Constance tried to make me read the things, but I couldn't. I fell asleep over them. I hope you rested well. The fact is, I suppose they were beyond me. I couldn't see any sense in the things. If you would care to have another pop at them, said Smith, agreeably, I have a complete set in my bag. No, no, my dear fellow, thank you very much. Thank you a thousand times. I find that reading in the train tires my eyes. Ah, you would prefer that I read them aloud? No, no. A look of hunted alarm came into his lordship's speaking countenance at the suggestion. As a matter of fact, I generally take a short nap at the beginning of a railway journey. I find it refreshing, and in short, refreshing. You will excuse me? If you think you can get to sleep all right without the aid of my poems, certainly. You won't think me rude? Not at all. Not at all. By the way, am I likely to meet any old friends at Blandings? Oh no, there will be nobody but ourselves, except my sister and Miss Peavey, of course. You said you had not met Miss Peavey, I think. I have not had that pleasure. I am, of course, looking forward to it with the utmost keenness. Lord Emsworth eyed him for a moment, astonished, then concluded the conversation by closing his eyes defensively. Smith was left to his reflections, which a few minutes later were interrupted by a smart kick on the shin, as Lord Emsworth, a jumpy sleeper, began to throw his long legs about. Smith moved to the other end of the seat, and taking his bag down from the rack extracted a slim volume bound in squashy mauve. After gazing at this in an unfriendly manner for a moment, he opened it at random and began to read. His first move on leaving Lord Emsworth at the florists had been to spend a portion of his slender capital on the works of Ralston MacTod, in order not to be taken at a disadvantage in the event of questions about them at Blandings. But he speedily realized, as he dipped into the poems, that anything in the nature of a prolonged study of them was likely to spoil his little holiday. They were not light summer reading. Across the pale parabola of joy, a gargling snored from the other end of the compartment abruptly detached his mind from its struggle with this mystic line. He perceived that his host had slipped even further down onto his spine and was now lying with open mouth in an attitude suggestive of dislocation. And as he looked, there was a whistling sound, and another snore proceeded from the back of his lordship's throat. Smith rose and took his book of poems out into the corridor with a purpose of roaming along the train until he should find an empty compartment in which to read in peace. With the two adjoining compartments, he had no luck. One was occupied by an elderly man with a retriever, while the presence of a baby and the other ruled it out of consideration. The third, however, looked more promising. It was not actually empty, but there was only one occupant, and he was asleep. He was lying back in the far corner with a large silk handkerchief draped over his face and his feet propped up on the seat opposite. His society did not seem likely to act as a bar to the study of Mr. McTodd's masterpieces. Smith sat down and resumed his reading. Across the pale parabola of joy, Smith knitted his brow. It was just the sort of line which was likely to have puzzled his patroness, Lady Constance, and he anticipated that she would come to him directly. He arrived and asked for an explanation. It would obviously be a poor start for his visit to confess that he had no theory as to its meaning himself. He tried it again. Across the pale parabola of joy, a sound like two or three pigs feeding rather noisily in the middle of a thunderstorm interrupted his meditations. Smith laid his book down and gazed in a pained way across the compartment. There came to him a sense of being unfairly put upon, as towards the end of his troubles it might have come upon Job. This he felt was too much. He was being harried. The man in the corner went on snoring. There is always a way. Almost immediately Smith saw what Napoleon would have done in this crisis. On the seat beside the sleeper was lying a compact little suitcase with hard, sharp edges. Rising softly, Smith edged along the compartment and secured this. Then having balanced it carefully on the rack above the sleeper's stomach, he returned to his seat to await developments. These were not long and coming. The train, now flying at its best speed through open country, was shaking itself at intervals in a vigorous way as it raced along. A few seconds later it apparently passed over some points and shivered briskly down its whole length. The suitcase wobbled insecurely, hesitated, and fell chunkily in the exact middle of its owner's waistcoat. There was a smothered gulp beneath the handkerchief. The sleeper sat up with a jerk. The handkerchief fell off. And there was revealed to Smith's interested gaze the face of the honorable Freddy three-wood. Part 2 GOO! observed Freddy. He removed the bag from his midriff and began to massage the stricken spot. Then suddenly perceiving that he was not alone he looked up and saw Smith. GOO! said Freddy, and sat staring wildly. Nobody is more alive than we are to the fact that the dialogue of Freddy three-wood recorded above is not bright. Nevertheless those were his opening remarks, and the excuse must be that he had passed through a trying time and had just received two shocks, one after the other. From the first of these the physical impact of the suitcase he was recovering, but the second had simply paralyzed him. When the mists of sleep having cleared away he saw sitting but a few feet away from him on the train that was carrying him home, the very man with whom he had plotted in the lobby of the Piccadilly Palace Hotel, a cold fear gripped Freddy's very vitals. Freddy's troubles had begun when he had just missed the 12.50 train. This disaster had perturbed him greatly, for he could not forget his father's stern injunctions on the subject. But what had really upset him was the fact that he had come within an ace of missing the five o'clock train as well. He had spent the afternoon in a motion picture palace, and the fascination of the film had caused him to lose all sense of time, so that only the slow fade out on the embrace and the words the end reminded him to look at his watch. A mad rush had got him to Paddington just as the five o'clock express was leaving the station. Exhausted he had fallen into a troubled sleep from which he had been aroused by a violent blow in the waistcoat at the nightmare vision of Smith in the seat across the compartment. One cannot wonder, in these circumstances, that Freddy did not immediately soar to the heights of eloquence. The picture which the honorable Freddy Threepwood had selected for his patronage that afternoon was the well-known super-super-film Fangs of the Past, featuring Bertha Blevich and Maurice Heddlestone, which, as everybody knows, is all about blackmail. Greenwald, by primitive hills, bathed in the golden sunshine of peace and happiness, the village of Honeydeen slumbered in the clear morning air, but off the train from the city stepped a stranger, the stranger Maxwell Bannister. He inquired of a passing rustic, the passing rustic Claude Hepworth, the way to the great house where Immortal Dale, the lady bountiful of the village. Well, anyway, it is all about blackmail, and it had affected Freddy profoundly. It still colored his imagination, and the conclusion to which he came the moment he saw Smith was that the latter had shadowed him and was following him home with the purpose of extracting hush money. While he was still gurgling wordlessly, Smith opened the conversation. I'd be a lightful and unexpected pleasure, comrade. I thought you had left the metropolis some hours since. As Freddy sat looking like a cornered doormouse, a voice from the corridor spoke. Ah, there you are, my dear fellow. Lord Emsworth was beaming in the doorway. His slumbers, like those of Freddy, had not lasted long. He had been aroused only a few minutes after Smith's departure by the arrival of the retriever from the next compartment, which, bored by the society of its owner, had strolled off on a tour of investigation, and, finding next door an old acquaintance in the person of his lordship, had jumped on the seat and licked his face with such hearty goodwill that further sleep was out of the question. Being awake, Lord Emsworth, as always when he was awake, had begun to putter. When he saw Freddy, his amiability suffered a shock. Frederick, I thought I told you to be sure to return on the 1250 train. Mr. Governor, mumbled Freddy thickly, not my fault. His father seemed about to pursue the subject, but the fact that a stranger, and one who was his guest, was present, apparently decided him to avoid anything in the shape of family wrangles. He peered from Freddy to Smith and back again. Do you two know each other? He said. Not yet, said Smith. We only met a moment ago. My son, Frederick, said Lord Emsworth, rather in the voice with which he would have called attention to the presence of a slug among his flowers. Frederick, this is Mr. Mc Todd, the poet who is coming to stay at landings. Freddy started, and his mouth opened. But meeting Smith's friendly gaze, he closed the orifice again without speaking. He licked his lips in an overwrought way. You'll find me next door if you want me, said Lord Emsworth to Smith. Just discovered that George Gwillard, a very old friend, is in there. Never saw him get on the train. His dog came into my compartment and licked my face. One of my neighbors, one of my neighbors, a remarkable rose grower. As you are so interested in flowers, I will take you over to his place sometime. Why don't you join us now? I would prefer, if you do not mind, said Smith, to remain here for the moment and foster what I feel sure is about to develop into a great and lasting friendship. I am convinced that your son and I will have much to talk about together. Very well, my dear fellow, we will meet at dinner in the restaurant car. Lord Emsworth potted off, and Smith rose and closed the door. He returned to his seat to find Freddy regarding him with a tortured expression in his rather prominent eyes. Freddy's brain had had more exercise in the last few minutes than in years of his normal life, and he was feeling the strain. I say, what? he observed feebly. If there is anything, said Smith kindly, that I can do to clear up any little difficulty that is perplexing you, call on me. What is biting you? Freddy swallowed convulsively. I say, he said your name was Mac Todd. Precisely. But you said it was Smith. It is. Then why did my father call you Mac Todd? He thinks I am. It is a harmless error, and I see no reason why it should be discouraged. But why does he think you're Mac Todd? It is a long story which you may find tedious, but if you really wish to hear it, nothing could have exceeded the ratness of Freddy's attention as he listened to the tale of the encounter with Lord Emsworth at the Senior Conservative Club. Do you mean to say, he demanded at his conclusion, that you're coming to Blandings pretending to be this poet blighter? That is the scheme. But why? I have my reasons, Comrade. What is the name? Threepwood? I thank you. You will pardon me, Comrade Threepwood, if I do not go into them. And now, said Smith, to resume our very interesting chat, which was unfortunately cut short this morning, why do you want me to steal your aunt's necklace? Freddy jumped. For the moment, so tensely had the fact of his companion's audacity chained his interest, he had actually forgotten about the necklace. Great Scott! he exclaimed. Why, of course. You still have not made it quite clear. It fit splendidly. The necklace? I mean to say the great difficulty would have been to find a way of getting you into the house, and here you are, coming there as this poet bird, topping. If, said Smith, regarding him patiently through his eyeglass, I do not seem to be immediately infected by your joyous enthusiasm, put it down to the fact that I haven't the remotest idea of what you're talking about. Could you give me a pointer or two? What, for instance, assuming that I agreed to steal your aunt's necklace, would you expect me to do with it, when and if stolen? Why hand it over to me? I see. And what would you do with it? Hand it over to my uncle. And whom would he hand it over to? Look here, said Freddie. I might as well start at the beginning. An excellent idea. The speed at which the train was now proceeding had begun to render conversation in anything but stentorian tones somewhat difficult. Freddie accordingly bent forward till his mouth almost touched Smith's ear. You see, it's like this, my uncle, old Joe Keeble. Keeble, said Smith. Why, he murmured meditatively, is that name familiar? Don't interrupt old lad, pleaded Freddie. I stand corrected. Uncle Joe has a stepdaughter, Phyllis, her name is, and some time ago she popped off and married a cove called Jackson. Smith did not interrupt the narrative again, but as it proceeded his look of interest deepened, and at the conclusion he padded his companion encouragingly on the shoulder. The proceeds then of this jewel robbery, if it comes off, he said, will go to establish the Jackson home on firm footing. Am I right in thinking that? Absolutely. There is no danger, you'll pardon the suggestion, of you clinging like glue to the swag and using it to maintain yourself in the position to which you are accustomed. Absolutely not. Uncle Joe is giving me, or giving me a bit for myself, just a small bit you understand. This is the scheme. You sneak the necklace and hand it over to me. I push the necklace over to Uncle Joe, who hides it somewhere for the moment. There is the dickens of a fuss, and Uncle Joe comes out strong by telling Aunt Constance that he'll buy her another necklace just as good. Then he takes the stones out of the necklace, has them reset, and gives them to Aunt Constance. Looks like a new necklace if you see what I mean. Then he draws a check for twenty thousand quid, which Aunt Constance naturally thinks is for the new necklace, and he shoves the money somewhere as a little private account. He gives Phyllis her money and everybody's happy. Aunt Constance has got her necklace, Phyllis has got her money, and all this happened is that Aunt Constance's and Uncle Joe's combined bank balance has had a bit of a hole knocked in it. See? I see. It is a little bit difficult to follow all the necklaces. I seem to count about seventeen of them while you were talking, but I suppose I was wrong. Yes, I see, comrade three-quid. And I may say at once that you can rely on my cooperation. You'll do it? I will. Of course, said Freddy awkwardly, I'll see that you get a bit all right. I mean, Smith waved his hand deprecatingly. My dear comrade three-quid, let us not become sordid on this glad occasion. As far as I am concerned, there will be no charge. What? Oh, look here. Any assistance I can give will be offered in a purely amateur spirit. I would have mentioned before, only I was reluctant to interrupt you, that comrade Jackson is my boyhood chum. And that Phyllis, his wife, injects into my life a few beams of sunshine that illuminates dreary round. I have long desired to do something to ameliorate their lot. And now that the chance has come, I am delighted. It is true that I am not a man of affluence. My bank manager, I am told, winces in a rather painful manner whenever my name is mentioned. But I am not so reduced that I must charge a fee for performing, on behalf of a pal, a simple act of courtesy, like pinching a twenty thousand pound necklace. Good Lord, fancy that. Fancy what, comrade three-quid? Fancy your knowing Phyllis and her husband. It is odd, no doubt, but true. Many a whack at the cold beef have I had on Sunday evenings under their roof, and I am much obliged to you for putting in my way this opportunity of repaying their hospitality. Thank you. Oh, that's all right, said Freddie, some would be wielded by this eloquence. Even if the little enterprise meets with disaster, the reflection that I did my best for the young couple will be a great consolation to me when I am serving my bit of thyme in wormwood scrubs. It will cheer me up. The jailers will cluster outside the door to listen to me singing in my cell. My pet rat, as he creeps out to share the crumbs of my breakfast, will wonder why I whistle as I pick the morning's okam. I shall join in the hymns on Sundays in a way that will electrify the chaplain. That is to say, if anything goes wrong and I am what I believe is technically called copped. I say if, said Smith, gazing solemnly at his companion, but I do not intend to be copped. I have never gone in largely for crime hitherto, but something tells me I shall be rather good at it. I look forward confidently to making a nice clean job of the thing. And now, comrade three-foot, I must ask you to excuse me while I get the half-nelson on this rather poisonous poetry of good old MacTods. From the cursory glance I have taken at it, this stuff doesn't seem to mean anything. I think the boy's non-composed. You don't happen to understand the expression, across the pale parabola of joy, do you? I fear it as much. Well, pip pip for the present, comrade three-foot. I shall now ask you to retire into your corner and amuse yourself for a while as best you can. I must concentrate. Concentrate. And Smith, having put his feet up on the opposite seat and reopened the mauve volume, began to read. Freddie, his mind still in a whirl, looked out of the window at the passing scenery in a mood which was a nice blend of elation and apprehension. Part three. Although the hands of the station clock pointed to several minutes past nine, it was still apparently early evening when the train drew up at the platform of market blandings and discharged its distinguished passengers. The sun, taken in as usual by the never-failing practical joke of the Daylight Savings Act, it only just set. And a golden afterglow lingered on the fields as the car which had met the train purred over the two miles of country road that separated the little town from the castle. As they passed in between the great stone gateposts and shot up the winding drive, the soft murmur of the engines seemed to deepen rather than break the soothing stillness. The air was fragrant with indescribable English scents. Somewhere in the distance, sheep bells tinkled, rabbits waggling white tails bolted across the path, and once a herd of agitated deer made a brief appearance among the trees. The only thing that disturbed the magic hush was the fluting voice of Lord Emsworth, on whom the spectacle of his beloved property had acted as an immediate stimulant. Unlike his son, Freddie, who sat silent in his corner wrestling with his hopes and fears, Lord Emsworth had plunged into a perfect Niagara of speech the moment the car entered the park. In a high tenor voice and with wide excited gestures he pointed out to Smith, oaks with a history, and rode a dendrons with a past. His conversation as they drew near the castle and came inside of the flower beds, taking on an almost lyrical note and becoming a sort of anthem of gladness, through which, like some theme in the minor, ran a series of approprious observations on the subject of Angus MacDallister. Beach, the butler solicitously scooping them out of the car at the front door, announced that her ladyship and Miss Peavey were taking their after-dinner coffee in the arbor by the bowling green. And presently Smith, conducted by his lordship, found himself shaking hands with a strikingly handsome woman in whom, though her manner was friendliness itself, he could detect a marked suggestion of the formidable. Aesthetically, he admired Lady Constance's appearance, but he could not conceal from himself that in the peculiar circumstances he would have preferred something rather more fragile and drooping. Lady Constance conveyed the impression that anybody who had the choice between stealing anything from her and stirring up a nest of hornets with a short walking stick would do well to choose the hornets. How do you do, Mr. Mac Todd? said Lady Constance with great amiability. I am so glad you are able to come after all. Smith wondered what she meant by after all, but there were so many things about his present situation calculated to tax the mine that he had no desire to probe slight verbal ambiguities. He shook her hand and replied that it was very kind of her to say so. We are quite a small party at present, continued Lady Constance, but we are expecting a number of people quite soon. For the moment, Eileen and you are our only guests. Oh, I am sorry, I should have. Miss Peavey, Mr. Mac Todd. The slim and willowy female who, during this brief conversation had been waiting in an attitude of suspended animation, gazing at Smith with large, wistful eyes, stepped forward. She clasped Smith's hand in hers, held it, and in a soft, low voice, like thick cream, made audible one reverent word. I beg your pardon, said Smith. A young man capable of bearing himself with calm and dignity in most circumstances, however trying, he found his poise wobbling under the impact of Miss Eileen Peavey. Miss Peavey often had this effect on the less soulful type of man, especially in the mornings when such men are not at their strongest and best. When she came into the breakfast room of a country house, brave men who had been up a bit late the night before quailed and tried to hide behind newspapers. She was the sort of woman who tells a man who is propping his eyes open with his fingers and endeavoring to correct a headache with strong tea, that she was up at six watching the dew fade off the grass, and didn't he think that those wisps of morning mist were the elves' bridal veils? She had lourish, fine melancholy eyes, and was apt to droop dreamily. Master, said Miss Peavey, obligingly translating. There did not seem to be any immediate comeback to a remark like this, so Smith contented himself with beaming genially at her through his monocle, and Miss Peavey came to bat again. How wonderful you were able to come, after all. Again this after all motive creeping into the theme. You know Miss Peavey's work, of course, said Lady Constance, smiling pleasantly on her two celebrities. Who does not? said Smith courteously. Oh, do you? said Miss Peavey, gratification causing her slender body to perform a sort of lady-like shimmy down its whole length. I scarcely hoped you would know my name. My Canadian sales have not been large. Quite large enough, said Smith. I mean, of course, he added with a paternal smile, that while your delicate art may not have a universal appeal in a young country, it is intensely appreciated by a small and select body of the intelligentsia. And if that was not the stuff to give them, he reflected, with not a little complacency, he was dashed. Your own wonderful poems, replied Miss Peavey, are, of course, known the whole world over. Oh, Mr. McTodd, you can hardly appreciate how I feel meeting you. It is like the realization of some golden dream of childhood. It is like, here the Honorable Freddy Threak would remark suddenly that he was going to pop into the house for a whiskey and soda. As he had not previously spoken, his observation had something of the effect of a voice from the tomb. The daylight was ebbing fast now, and in the shadows he had contrived to pass out of sight as well as out of mind. Miss Peavey started, like an abruptly wakened sonambulist, and Smith was at last able to release his hand, which he had begun to look on as gone beyond his control forever. Until this fortunate interruption there had seemed no reason why Miss Peavey should not have continued to hold it till bedtime. Freddy's departure had the effect of breaking a spell. Lord Emsworth, who had been standing perfectly still with vacant eyes like a dog listening to a noise a long way off, came to life with a jerk. I am going to have a look at my flowers, he announced. Don't be silly, Clarence, said his sister. It's much too dark to see flowers. I could smell them, retorted his lordship argumentatively. It seemed as if the party must break up, for already his lordship had begun to potter off when a newcomer arrived to solidify it again. Ah, Baxter, my dear fellow, said Lord Emsworth, here we are, you see. Mr. Baxter, said Lady Constance, I want you to meet Mr. McTodd. Mr. McTodd, said the new arrival, on a note of surprise. Yes, he found himself able to come after all. Ah, said the efficient Baxter. It occurred to Smith as a passing thought to which he gave no more than a momentary attention, that this spectacled and capable looking man was gazing at him as they shook hands with a curious intensity. But possibly, he reflected, this was merely a species of optical illusion due to the other spectacles. Baxter, staring through his spectacles, often gave people the impression of possessing an eye that could pierce six inches of Harveyized steel and stick out on the other side. Having registered in his consciousness the fact that he had been stared at keenly by this stranger, Smith thought no more of the matter, and thus lightly dismissing the Baxterian stare, Smith had acted injudiciously. He should have examined it more closely and made an effort to analyze it, for it was by no means without its message. It was a stare of suspicion, vague suspicion as yet, but nevertheless suspicion. Rupert Baxter was one of those men whose chief characteristic is a disposition to suspect their fellows. He did not suspect them of this or that definite crime, he simply suspected them. He had not yet definitely accused Smith in his mind of any specific tort or malfeasance. He merely had a nebulous feeling that he would bear watching. Ms. Peavey now flattered again into the center of things. On the arrival of Baxter, she had withdrawn for a moment into the background, but she was not the woman to stay there long. She came forward holding out a small oblong book, which, with a languishing firmness, she pressed into Smith's hands. Could I persuade you, Mr. Mc Todd, said Ms. Peavey pleadingly, to write some little thought in my autographed book and sign it? I have a fountain pen. Light flooded the arbor. The efficient Baxter, who knew where everything was, had found and pressed the switch. He did this not so much to oblige Ms. Peavey as to enable him to obtain a clearer view of the visitor. With each minute that passed, the efficient Baxter was finding himself more and more doubtful in his mind about this visitor. There, said Ms. Peavey, welcoming the illumination. Smith tapped his chin thoughtfully with a fountain pen. He felt that he should have foreseen this emergency earlier. If ever there was a woman who was bound to have an autographed book, that woman was Ms. Peavey. Just some little thought. Smith hesitated no longer. In a firm hand he wrote the words, Across the pale parabola of joy, adding an unfaltering, Ralston Mc Todd, and handed the book back. How strange, sighed Ms. Peavey. May I look, said Baxter, moving quickly to her side. How strange, repeated Ms. Peavey, to think that you should have chosen that line. There are several of your more mystic passages that I meant to ask you to explain, but particularly across the pale parabola of joy. You find it difficult to understand? A little, I confess. Well, well, said Smith indulgently. Perhaps I did put a bit of topspin on that one. I beg your pardon. I say perhaps it is a little obscure. We must have a long chat about it. Later on. Why not now? demanded the efficient Baxter, flashing his spectacles. I am rather tired, said Smith, with gentle reproach after my journey. Fatigued, we artists. Of course, said Ms. Peavey with an indignant glance at the secretary. Mr. Baxter does not understand the sensitive poetic temperament. A bit unspiritual, eh? said Smith tolerantly. A trifle unearthly. So I thought. So I thought. One of these strong, hard men of affairs, I shouldn't wonder. Shall we go and find Lord Emsworth, Mr. McTodd? said Ms. Peavey, dismissing the fermenting Baxter with a scornful look. He wandered off just now. I suppose he is among his flowers. Flowers are very beautiful by night. Indeed, yes, said Smith, and also by day. When I am surrounded by flowers, a sort of divine peace floods over me, and the rough harsh world seems far away. I feel soothed, tranquil. I sometimes thank Ms. Peavey that flowers must be the souls of little children who have died in their innocence. What a beautiful thought, Mr. McTodd, exclaimed Ms. Peavey, rapturously. Yes, agreed Smith. Don't pinch it, it's copyright. The darkness swallowed them up. Lady Constance turned to the efficient Baxter, who was brooding with furrowed brow. Charming, is he not? I beg your pardon. I said I thought Mr. McTodd was charming. Oh, quite. Completely unspoiled. Oh, decidedly. I am so glad he was able to come after all. That telegram he sent this afternoon cancelling his visit seemed so curt and final. So I thought it. Almost as if he had taken a fence at something, and decided to have nothing to do with this. Quite. Lady Constance shivered delicately. A cool breeze had sprung up. She drew her wrap more closely about her shapely shoulders, and began to walk to the house. Baxter did not accompany her. The moment she had gone, he switched off the light and sat down, chin in hand. That massive brain was working hard. End of Chapter 7, Recording by Arnold Banner, Clemens, North Carolina