Plum Pie (19 page)

"Yes, sir."

"How stout?"

"There is a photograph of the gentleman in Madam's boudoir, if you care to see it."

"Let's go," said Bingo. He was conscious a strange thrill, but at the same time he was telling himself that he must not raise his hopes too high. Probably, judged by Drones standards, this new uncle of his would prove to be nothing special.

A minute later, he had reeled and a sharp cry had escaped his lips. He was looking, spellbound, at the photograph of a man so vast, so like a captive balloon, that Kirk Rockaway seemed merely pleasantly plump in comparison. A woman, he felt, even one as globular as his Aunt Myrtle, would have been well advised before linking her lot with his to consult her legal adviser to make sure that she was not committing bigamy.

A long sigh of ecstasy proceeded from him.

"Up from the depths!" he murmured. "Up from the depths! " "Sir?"

"Nothing, nothing. Just a random thought. I'm going to borrow this photograph, Willoughby."

"Madam may be annoyed on discovering its absence."

"Tell her she'll have it back this afternoon. I only want to show it to a man at the Drones," said Bingo.

He was thinking of his coming interview with Oofy Prosser. If Oofy was prepared to meet his terms, he would let him have —say—twenty per cent of this certain winner, but he meant to drive a hard bargain.

Our Man in America

This has not been a good theatrical season. Except for two or three musicals no Broadway production, as far as can be ascertained, has made a profit, and, as always, no contribution has been made to the takings by the Second Act Club. The Second Act Club consists of young fellows who are fond of the theatre but dislike paying for tickets, and the way you I get round this formality is as follows. What you do is go to a bar across from the theatre and check your hat and coat. Then when the people come out at the first act intermission you stroll across the street and mingle with them till the buzzer sounds for Act Two, when you accompany them back into the theatre and select your seat. Unless the thing is a sell-out, there are sure to be some empties.

Closely linked with the Second Act Club is the Opening Night Party Association, though this, owing to its more testing demands on the nervous system, has fewer practising members. A comparative weakling can sneak into second acts, but in order to attend an opening night party to which you have not been invited you need presence and aplomb, not to mention a dinner jacket and a clean shirt, both well beyond the scope of the average Second Acter. The theory is that nobody knows who anybody else is at an opening night party, so you hang around Sardi's or wherever it may be till the guests begin to arrive and then join them at their table. It is seldom that anyone likes to question anybody bona fides, as the questionee may turn out to be the producer wife's favourite brother, so there is really very little risk except that you may be kissed by the female star when you tell her how wonderful she was. We would strongly advise any young man starting out in life to become an opening night banqueter rather than a Second Acter, for even the second act of the sort of play they are putting on nowadays is best avoided, an though you may sometimes strike a bad patch and get throw out of an opening night party, it will probably not be till you are well ahead of the game in the matter of lobster Newburg and champagne.

*

No news from Philadelphia at the moment of going to pres except a rather unpleasant episode in the life of Robert Gilpin a gatekeeper at the local Zoo. Seems he was standing at his post when a young man approached him carrying a red-bellied turtle.

"Ah," said Mr. Gilpin. "A red-bellied turtle, eh? Just what we happen to be short of. Come in and let me have it."

The young man came in and let him have it on the base of the skull. Then, stepping over his prostrate body, he took hundred dollars from the gatehouse cash register and with drew. Asked by reporters how it felt to be beaned with a red bellied turtle, Mr. Gilpin replied that it was about the same as being beaned with any other kind of turtle. Nothing much in ii either way, he said.

*

The wise guys who understand national finance have been telling us that we are in for a bad time unless something is done to curb the Administration's 'reckless spending programme', giving the impression that they think our money is being unwisely handled by the men up top. I am sure very few of us will agree with this. One of the reasons why our faces light up when the time comes to hand over four-fifths of our last year's income to the government is that we know that the lolly will be employed to some good end.

Only the other day the government started a project for studying the diving reflex and volume receptors of seals, which is a thing I can hardly wait to find out about, and now they are touching me for a bit more because they want to take a census of fish. Four hundred skin-divers are diving daily into the Atlantic and Pacific oceans in order to 'determine the distribution of the fish that inhabit American waters', and that sort of thing comes high. You know what skin-divers are like. They want theirs. By the time I have paid this bunch their salaries, it is very doubtful if I shall be able to afford the one meat meal a week to which I had been looking forward.

But I can quite see how it would jeopardise America's safety not to count these fish, so I shall make do quite happily on biscuits and cheese, and of course there is always the chance that a kindly skin-diver, grateful for my patronage, will slip me a halibut or something on the side.

*

Talking of dogs—not that we were, but suppose we had been—there is a Television writer in these parts who never wants to hear the word mentioned again. They told him the other day to do a story featuring a cocker spaniel which was on the pay roll, and he wrote one of those charming little domestic comedies which, after the usual complications and misunderstandings, ended with the family going out to dinner at a restaurant accompanied by the dog.

So far, so good. But he had not reckoned with the thoroughness with which TV organisations go into these things. The assistant director said to the director "Do you think it's all right to have a cocker spaniel dining at a restaurant?". The director did not feel equal to deciding an important point like that, and put it up to the producer. The producer, not liking to commit himself, passed the buck to the executive producer, who handed it on to the advertising agency, who after a good deal of thought felt that the only safe course was to apply directly to the sponsor. The sponsor was on a yacht cruise, but after three days they managed to locate him.

"Is it okay," they asked, "for a cocker spaniel to go out to dinner with the family?"

"Sure," said the sponsor. "Why not?"

So everybody was happy except the writer, who got properly ticked off for costing the management four day's shooting. "In future," they told him, "lay off the controversial stuff."

*

A funny thing happened to Garry Moore, the television comedian, on his way to the studio the other night. His face being so familiar to the viewing public, he is always being stopped in the street and asked for his autograph, and as he is a kindly man who believes in keeping in with the fans, he never fails to oblige. On this occasion he was coming along Sixth Avenue to attend a late night rehearsal, when, as he passed the mouth of a dark alley, a man emerged and said something in a low voice.

"Why, certainly, certainly," said Mr. Moore heartily. "Only too pleased,"  and he took an old envelope from his pocket, scribbled his name on it and went his way. It was a few minutes later that he suddenly realized that what the member of his public had whispered in his ear was "This is a stick-up."

7. George and Alfred

The little group of serious thinkers in the bar parlour of the Angler's Rest were talking about twins. A Gin and Tonic had brought the subject up, a cousin of his having recently  acquired a couple, and the discussion had not proceeded far when it was seen that Mr. Mulliner, the Sage of the bar parlour, was smiling as if amused by some memory, "I was thinking of my brother's sons George and Alfred," he explained. "They were twins."

"Identical?" asked a Scotch on the Rocks.

"In every respect.

"Always getting mistaken for each other, I suppose?"

"They would have been, no doubt, if they had moved in the same circles, but their walks in life kept them widely separated. Alfred was a professional conjuror and spent most of his time in London, while George some years previously had gone to seek his fortune in Hollywood, where after various vicissitudes he had become a writer of additional dialogue on the staff of Jacob Schnellenhamer of the Colossal-Exquisite corporation.

The lot of a writer of additional dialogue in a Hollywood [studio is not an exalted one—he ranks, I believe, just above a script girl and just below the man who works the wind machine—but any pity I might have felt for George for being one of the  dregs was mitigated by the fact that I knew his position was only temporary, for on his thirtieth birthday, which would be occurring very shortly, he would be coming into possession of a large fortune left to him in trust by his godmother.

It was on Mr. Schnellenhamer's yacht that I met George again after an interval of several years. I had become friendly with Mr. Schnellenhamer on one of his previous visits to England, and when I ran into him one day in Piccadilly he told me he was just off to Monte Carlo to discuss some business matters with Sam Glutz of the Perfecto-Wonderful, who was wintering there, and asked me if I would care to come along. I accepted the invitation gratefully, and the first person I saw when I came on board was George.

I found him in excellent spirits, and I was not surprised, for he said he had reached the age of thirty a few days ago and would be collecting his legacy directly we arrived in Monaco.

"Your trustee is meeting you there?"

"He lives there. An old boy of the name of Bassinger."

"Well, I certainly congratulate you, George. Have you made any plans?"

"Plenty. And the first is to stop being a Yes man."

"I thought you were a writer of additional dialogue."

"It's the same thing. I've been saying Yes to Schnellenhamer for three years, but no longer. A radical change of policy there's going to be. In the privacy of my chamber I've been practising saying No for days. No, Mr. Schnellenhamer!" said George. "No, no, no! You're wrong, Mr. Schnellenhamer. You're quite mistaken, Mr. Schnellenhamer. You're talking through your hat, Mr. Schnellenhamer. Would it be going too far if I told him he ought to have his head examined?"

"A little, I think."

"Perhaps you're right."

"You don't want to hurt his feelings."

"I don't think he has any. Still, I see what you mean."

We arrived in Monte Carlo after a pleasant voyage, and as soon as we had anchored in Monaco harbour I went ashore to see the sights and buy the papers, and I was thinking of returning to the yacht, when I saw George coming along, seeming to be in a hurry. I hailed him, and to my astonishment he turned out to be not George but Alfred, the last person I would have expected-to find in Monte Carlo. I had always supposed that conjurors never left London except to appear at children's parties in the provinces.

He was delighted to see me. We had always been very close to one another. Many a time as a boy he had borrowed my top hat in order to take rabbits out of it, for even then he was acquiring the rudiments of his art and the skill which had enabled him to bill himself as The Great Alfredo. There was genuine affection in his manner as he now produced a hardboiled egg from my breast pocket.

"But how in the world do you come to be here, Alfred?" I asked.

His explanation was simple.

"I'm appearing at the Casino. I have a couple of spots in the revue there, and I don't mind telling you that I'm rolling the customers in the aisles nightly," he said, and I recalled that he had always interspersed his feats with humorous dialogue. "How do you happen to be in Monte Carlo? Not on a gambling caper, I trust?"

"I am a guest on Mr. Schnellenhamer's yacht."

He started at the mention of the name.

"Schnellenhamer? The movie man? The one who's doing the great Bible epic Solomon And The Queen Of Sheba?"

"Yes. We are anchored in the harbour."

"Well, well," said Alfred. His air was pensive. My words had apparently started a train of thought. Then he looked at his watch and uttered an exclamation. "Good Lord," he said, "I must rush, or I'll be late for rehearsal."

And before I could tell him that his brother George was also on Mr. Schnellenhamer's yacht he had bounded off.

Mr. Schnellenhamer was on the deck when I reached the yacht, concluding a conversation with a young man whom I presumed to be a reporter, come to interview him. The young man left, and Mr. Schnellenhamer jerked a thumb at his retreating back.

"Listen," he said. "Do you know what that fellow's been telling me? You remember I was coming here to meet Sam Glutz? Well, it seems that somebody mugged Sam last night."

"You don't say! "

"Yessir, laid him out cold. Are those the papers you've got there? Lemme look. It's probably on the front page."

Lie was perfectly correct, Even George would have had to say 'Yes, Mr. Schnellenhamer.' The story was there under big headlines. On the previous night, it appeared, Mr. Glutz had been returning from the Casino to his hotel, when some person unknown had waylaid him and left him lying in the street in a considerably battered condition. He had been found by a passerby and taken to the hospital to be stitched together.