Service with a Smile (7 page)

‘What
she needs is young society. How extremely fortunate that I was able to bring my
friend Meriwether with me.’

Lady
Constance started. She had momentarily forgotten his friend Meriwether.

‘Emsworth
took him off to look at the Empress, feeling that it would have a tonic effect
after the long railway journey. You’ll like Meriwether.’

‘Indeed?’
said Lady Constance, who considered this point a very moot one. She was
strongly of the opinion that any associate of Frederick, fifth Earl of
Ickenham, would be as unfit for human consumption as that blot on the peerage
himself. The slight flicker of friendliness resulting from the discovery that
he had at one time been on cordial terms with the man who meant so much to her
had died away, and only the memory of his last visit to the castle remained.
She wished she did not remember that visit so clearly. Like quite a number of those
whose paths Lord Ickenham had crossed, she wanted to forget the past. Pongo Twistleton
would have understood how she felt.

‘You
have known Mr Meriwether a long time?’ she said.

‘From
boyhood. His boyhood, of course, not mine.’

‘He
comes from Brazil, I hear.’

‘Yes,
like Charley’s Aunt. But —’ Here Lord Ickenham’s voice took on a grave note, ‘—
on no account mention Brazil to him if you don’t mind. It was the scene of the
great tragedy of his life. His young wife fell into the Amazon and was eaten by
an alligator.’

‘How
dreadful!’

‘For
her, yes, though not of course for the alligator. I thought I had better give
you this word of warning. Pass it along, will you? Oh, hullo, Dunstable.’

The
Duke had lumbered on to the terrace and was peering at him in his popeyed way.

‘Hullo,
Ickenham. You here again?’

‘That’s
right.’

‘You’ve
aged.’

‘Not
spiritually. My heart is still the heart of a little child.’

‘Pass
what along?’

‘Ah,
you overheard what I was saying? I was speaking of my friend Meriwether, whom
Lady Constance very kindly invited here with me.’

It
would be too much, perhaps, to say that Lady Constance snorted at this
explanation of Bill’s presence in the home, but she unquestionably sniffed. She
said nothing, and ate a cucumber sandwich in rather a marked manner. She was
thinking that she would have more to say to her brother Clarence on this subject
when she got him alone.

‘What
about him?’

‘I was
urging Lady Constance not to speak to him of Brazil. Will you remember this?’

‘What
would I want to speak to him of Brazil for?’

‘You
might on learning that that was where he had spent much of his life. And if you
did, a far-away look would come into his eyes and he would grunt with pain. His
young wife fell into the Amazon.’

‘Potty
thing to do.’

‘And
was eaten by an alligator.’

‘Well,
what else did the silly ass expect would happen? Connie,’ said the Duke,
dismissing a topic that had failed from the start to grip him. ‘Stop stuffing
yourself with food and come along. Young George wants to take some pictures of
us with his camera. He’s out on the lawn with Archibald. You met my nephew,
Archibald?’

‘Not
yet,’ said Lord Ickenham. ‘I am looking forward eagerly to making his
acquaintance.’

‘You’re
what?’
said the Duke incredulously.

‘Any
nephew of yours.’

‘Oh I
see what you mean. But you can’t go by that. He’s not like me. He’s potty.’

‘Indeed?’

‘Got
less brain than Connie here, and hasn’t the excuse for pottiness that she has,
because he’s not a woman. Connie’s hoping he’ll marry the Stick-in-the-Mud
girl, though why any girl would want to tie herself up with a poop like that,
is more than I can imagine. He’s an artist. Draws pictures. And you know what
artists are. Where is the Tiddlypush girl, Connie? George wants her in the
picture.’

‘She
went down to the lake.’

‘Well,
if she thinks I’m going there to fetch her, she’s mistaken,’ said the Duke
gallantly. ‘George’ll have to do without her.’

3

On a knoll overlooking the
lake there stood a little sort of imitation Greek temple, erected by Lord Emsworth’s
grandfather in the days when landowners went in for little sort of imitation
Greek temples in their grounds. In front of it there was a marble bench, and on
this bench Myra Schoonmaker was sitting, gazing with what are called unseeing
eyes at the Church Lads bobbing about in the water below. She was not in the
gayest of spirits. Her brow, indeed, was as furrowed and her lips as drawn as
they had been three days earlier when she had accompanied Lord Emsworth to the
Empress’s sty.

A
footstep on the marble floor brought her out of her reverie with a jerk. She
turned and saw a tall, distinguished-looking man with grey hair and a jaunty
moustache, who smiled at her affectionately.

‘Hullo
there, young Myra,’ he said.

He
spoke as if they were old friends, but she had no recollection of ever having
seen him before.

‘Who
are you?’ she said. The question seemed abrupt and she wished she had thought
of something more polished.

A
reproachful look came into his eyes.

‘You usedn’t
to say that when I soaped your back. “Nobody soaps like you, Uncle Fred,” you
used to say, and you were right. I had the knack.’

The
years fell away from Myra, and she was a child in her bath again.

‘Well!’
she said, squeaking in her emotion.

‘I see
you remember.’

‘Uncle
Fred! Fancy meeting you again like this after all these years. Though I suppose
I ought to call you Mr. Twistleton.’

‘You would
be making a serious social gaffe, if you did. I’ve come a long way since we
last saw each other. By pluck and industry I’ve worked my way up the ladder,
step by step, to dizzy heights. You may have heard that a Lord Ickenham was
expected at the Castle today. I am the Lord Ickenham about whom there has been
so much talk. And not one of your humble Barons or Viscounts, mind you, but a
belted Earl, with papers to prove it.’

‘Like
Lord Emsworth?’

‘Yes,
only brighter.’

‘I
remember now Father saying something about your haying become a big wheel.’

‘He in
no way overstated it. How is he?’

‘He’s
all right.’

‘Full
of beans?’

‘Oh,
yes.’

‘More
than you are, my child. I was watching you sitting there, and you reminded me
of Rodin’s Penseur. Were you thinking of Bill Bailey?’

Myra
started.

‘You
don’t —?’

‘Know
Bill Bailey? Certainly I do. He’s a friend of my nephew Pongo’s and to my mind
as fine a curate as ever preached a sermon.’

The
animation which had come into the girl’s face at this reunion with one of whom
she had such pleasant memories died away to be replaced by a cold haughtiness
like that of a princess reluctantly compelled to give her attention to the
dregs of the underworld.

‘You’re
entitled to your opinion, I suppose,’ she said stiffly. ‘I think he’s a rat.’

It
seemed to Lord Ickenham that he could not have heard correctly. Young lovers,
he knew were accustomed to bestow on each other a variety of pet names, but he
had never understood ‘rat’ to be one of them.

‘A
rat?’

‘
Yes.’

‘Why do
you call him that?’

‘Because
of what he did.’

‘What
was that?’

‘Or
didn’t do, rather.’

‘You
speak in riddles. Couldn’t you make it clearer?’

‘I’ll
make it clearer, all right. He stood me up.’

‘I
still don’t get the gist.’

‘Very
well, then, if you want the whole story. I phoned him that I was coming to
London to marry him, and he didn’t show up at the registry office.’

‘What!’

‘Had
cold feet, I suppose. I ought to have guessed from the way he said “Oh, rather”,
when I asked him if he wasn’t pleased. I waited at the place for hours, but he
never appeared. And he told me he loved me!’

It was
not often that Lord Ickenham was bewildered, but he found himself now unequal
to the intellectual pressure of the conversation.

‘He
never appeared? Are we talking of the same man? The one I mean is an
up-and-coming young cleric named Bill Bailey, in whose company I passed fully
three-quarters of an hour yesterday at the registry office. I was to have been
one of his witnesses, lending a tone to the thing.’

Myra
stared.

‘Are
you crazy?’

‘The
charge has sometimes been brought against me, but there’s nothing in it. Just
exuberant. Why do you ask?’

‘He can’t
have been at the registry office. I’d have seen him.’

‘He’s
hard to miss, I agree. Catches the eye, as you might say. But I assure you —’At
the registry office in Wilton Street?’

‘Say
that again.

‘Say
what again?’

‘Wilton
Street.’

‘Why?’

‘I
wanted to test a theory that has just occurred to me. I think I have the
solution of this mystery that has been perplexing us. Someone, especially if a
good deal agitated hearing somebody say “Wilton” over the telephone, could
easily mistake it for “Milton”. Some trick of the acoustics. It was at the
Milton Street registry office that Bill, my nephew Pongo and I kept our vigil.
We all missed you.’

The
colour drained from Myra Schoonmaker’s face. Her eyes, as they stared into Lord
Ickenham’s, had become almost as prominent as the Duke’s.

‘You
don’t mean that?’

‘I do,
indeed. There were we, waiting at the church—’

‘Oh,
golly, what an escape I’ve had!’

Lord
Ickenham could not subscribe to this view.

‘Now
there I disagree with you. My acquaintance with Bill Bailey has been brief, but
as I told you, it has left me with a distinctly favourable impression of him. A
sterling soul he seemed to me. I feel the spiritual needs of Bottleton East are
safe in the hands of a curate like that. Don’t tell me you’ve weakened on him?’

‘Of
course I’ve not weakened on him.’

‘Then
why do you feel that you have had an escape?’

‘Because
I came back here so mad with him for standing me up, as I thought, that when
Archie Gilpin proposed to me I very nearly accepted him.’

Lord
Ickenham looked grave. These artists, he was thinking, work fast.

‘But
you didn’t?’

‘No.’

‘Well,
don’t. It would spoil Bill’s visit. And I want him to enjoy himself at Blandings
Castle. But I didn’t tell you about that, did I? It must have slipped my mind.
I’ve brought Bill here with me. Incognito, of course. I thought you might like
to see him. I always strive, when I can, to spread sweetness and light. There
have been several complaints about it.’

Chapter
Four

1

It was the practice of
Lord Ickenham, when visiting a country house to look about him, before doing
anything else, for a hammock to which he could withdraw after breakfast and lie
thinking deep thoughts. Though, like Abou ben Adhem a man who loved his fellow
men, he made it an invariable rule to avoid them after the morning meal with an
iron firmness, for at that delectable hour he wished to be alone to meditate.
Whoever wanted to enjoy the sparkle of his conversation had to wait till
lunch, when it would be available to all.

Such a
hammock he had found on the lawn of Blandings Castle, and on the morning after
his arrival he was reclining in it at peace with all the world. The day was
warm and sunny. A breeze blew gently from the west. Birds chirped, bees buzzed,
insects droned as they went about the various businesses that engage the
attention of insects in the rural districts. In the stable yard, out of view
behind a shrubbery, somebody — possibly Voules the chauffeur — was playing the
harmonica. And from a window in the house, softened by distance, there sounded
faintly the tap-tap-tap of a typewriter, showing that Lavender Briggs, that
slave of duty, was at work on some secretarial task and earning the weekly
envelope. Soothed and relaxed, Lord Ickenham fell into a reverie.

He had
plenty to occupy his mind. As a man who specialized in spreading sweetness and
light, he was often confronted with problems difficult of solution, but he had
seldom found them so numerous. As he mused on Lady Constance, on Lavender
Briggs, on the Duke of Dunstable and on the Church Lads, he could see, as he
had told Pongo, that his hands would be full and his ingenuity strained to the
uttermost.