Uncle Fred in the Springtime (25 page)

But
these good things do not last. A little sleep, a little slumber, a little
folding of the hands in sleep, and along comes somebody shaking us by the
shoulder.

Lord
Ickenham, sitting up, found that the person shaking his shoulder was Horace
Davenport.

16

He rose courteously. To
say that the sight of this unexpected apparition had left him feeling
completely at his ease would be to present the facts incorrectly. For an
instant, indeed, his emotions had been practically identical with those of the
heroine of a pantomime when the Demon King suddenly pops up out of a trap at
her elbow in a cascade of red fire. But his nervous system was under excellent
control, and there was nothing in his manner to indicate how deeply he had been
stirred.

‘Ah,
good evening, good evening!’ he said. ‘Mr Davenport, is it not? Delighted to
see you. But what are we doing here? I thought we had decided to go and take a
rest cure at Bournemouth. Did something happen to cause us to change our mind?’

‘Hoy!’
said Horace.

He had
raised a protesting hand. His eyes were the eyes of one who has passed through
the furnace, and he was vibrating gently, as if he had swallowed a small
auxiliary engine.

‘I beg
your pardon?’

‘That “we”
stuff. Cut it out. Not in the mood.’

Something
seemed to tell Lord Ickenham that this was not the delightfully receptive
Horace Davenport of their previous meeting, but he persevered.

‘My
dear fellow, of course. I’m sorry if it annoyed you. Just one of those
professional mannerisms one slips into. Most of my patients seem to find it
soothing.’

‘They
do, do they? You and your bally patients!’

The
undisguised bitterness with which the young man spoke these words confirmed
Lord Ickenham in his view that there had been a hitch somewhere. However, he continued
to do his best.

‘I beg
your pardon?’

‘Don’t
keep begging my pardon. Though, my gosh,’ said Horace shrilly, ‘you jolly well
ought to. Pulling my leg like that. It may interest you to learn that I know
all.’

‘Indeed?’

‘Yes.
You’re not Sir Roderick Glossop.’

Lord
Ickenham raised his eyebrows.

‘That
is a very odd statement to make. I confess I do not like the sound of it. It
suggests a feverishness. Tell me, do we —’Will you stop it! Listen. You’re
Valerie’s Uncle Fred. I’ve met someone who knows Glossop, and have had him
described to me in pitiless detail.’

Lord
Ickenham was a man who could accept the inevitable. He might not like it, but
he could accept it.

‘In
that case, as you suggest, it is perhaps hardly worth while to try to keep up
the innocent deception. Yes, my dear fellow, you are perfectly right. I am
Valerie’s Uncle Fred.’

‘And it
was Pongo Twistleton and Polly Pott that I met in the hall that time. It wasn’t
a — what’s the word? A nice thing that was you three blisters did to me, making
me think I was off my rocker. I realize now that there was absolutely nothing
wrong with me at all.’

‘No
doubt you are feeling much relieved.’

‘What I’m
feeling, if you want to know, is considerably incensed and pretty dashed
shirty.’

‘Yes, I
can appreciate your emotion, and I can only say that I am sorry. It went to my
heart to do it, but it was military necessity. You were in the way, and had to
be removed by such means as lay to hand. Let me explain what we are all doing,
visiting Blandings Castle incognito like this. Believe me, it was no idle whim
that brought us here. We are hoping that Polly may succeed in winning the Duke’s
heart, without him knowing who she is, thus paving the way for her marriage to
your cousin Ricky. You know that pumpkin-headed old man’s views on class
distinctions. If Ricky told him that he wanted to marry a girl of dubious
origin — and I defy anyone to think of an origin more dubious than dear old
Mustard — he would forbid the banns without hesitation. We are trying to put
something over the stealth, and we could not trust your open, honest nature not
to give the show away.’

Horace’s
just wrath gave way momentarily to bewilderment.

‘But I
thought Ricky and Polly had split up.’

‘Far
from it. It is true that after that affair at the Ball there was a temporary
rift, but Polly’s womanly tact smoothed the thing over. He is once more one
hundred per cent the devout lover.’

‘Then
why does he want to murder me?’

‘He
doesn’t.’

‘He
does, I tell you.’

‘You’re
thinking of someone else.’

‘I’m not
thinking of someone else. I found him on the back of my car just now, and he
distinctly stated that he was going to tear me into little shreds and strew me
over the local pasture land.’

‘On the
back of your car, did you say?’

‘Yes.
As I climbed down from the front, he climbed down from the back and made a dive
at me.’

‘I
appear not to be abreast of the Stop Press situation,’ said Lord Ickenham. ‘You
had better tell me your story — one, I can see, that promises to be fraught
with interest.’

For the
first time, Horace brightened. It was plain that some pleasing thought had
occurred to him.

‘It’s
going to interest you, all right. Yes, by Jove, you’re going to sit up and take
notice, believe me. A pretty nasty spot you’re in. The curse has come upon me,
said the Lady of Shalott. What, what?’

Lord
Ickenham found him obscure.

‘You
speak in riddles, my boy. A little less of the Delphic Oracle. Let your Yea be
Yea and your Nay be Nay.’

‘All
right. If you want the thing in a nutshell, then, Valerie is in full possession
of the facts concerning your goings-on, and is coming here tomorrow at the
latest.’

Here
was something Lord Ickenham had not anticipated. And though it was his habit to
present on all occasions an impassive front to the blows of Fate, he started
perceptibly, and for an instant his jaunty moustache seemed to droop.

‘Valerie?
Coming here?’

‘I
thought that would touch you up.’

‘Not at
all. I am always glad to see my dear niece, always. You have run into her
again, then?’

Horace’s
manner became more friendly. He was still resentful of the trick that had been
played upon him and by no means inclined to accept as an adequate excuse for it
the plea of military necessity, but he found it impossible not to admire this
iron man.

‘I met
her at a restaurant last night. I had gone there in pursuance of that idea we
discussed of having the binge of a lifetime before tooling off to Bournemouth.
You remember agreeing with me that it would be a good thing to go on a binge?’

‘Ah,
yes. So I did.’

‘You
also recommended me to steep myself in a beverage called May Queen.’

‘That’s
right. The binge-goer’s best friend. Did you like it?’

‘Well,
yes and no. Peculiar stuff. For a while it makes you feel as if you were
sitting on top of the world. But, as you progress, a great sorrow starts to
fill you. Quart One — fine. Joy reigning supreme and blue birds singing their
little hearts out. The moment you’re well into Quart Two, however, the whole
situation alters. You find yourself brooding on what a rotten world this is and
what a foul time you’re having in it. The outlook darkens. Tears spring to the
eyes. Everything seems sad and hopeless.’

‘This
is most interesting. In my day, I never went into the thing as thoroughly as
you appear to have done. One-Pint Ickenham, they used to call me.’

‘And I
had just reached this second stage, when who should come in but Valerie,
accompanied by an elderly female who looked as if she might have something to
do with breeding Pekinese. They sat down, and the next thing I knew, I had
squashed in between them and was telling Valerie how miserable I was.’

‘This
must have interested her companion.

‘Oh, it
did. She seemed absorbed. A decent old bird, at that. I owe everything to her.
As soon as she got the hang of the situation, she started advocating my cause
in the most sporting fashion. Valerie, I should mention, wasn’t frightfully
sympathetic at the outset. Her manner was cold and proud, and she kept telling
me to take my elbow out of her lap. But this fine old geezer soon altered all
that. It seemed that there had been a similar tragedy in her own life, and she
told us all about it.’

‘You
revealed the facts about your broken engagement to this Pekinese-breeder, then?’

‘Oh,
rather. Right away. There’s something about this May Queen of yours that seems
to break down one’s reserve, if you know what I mean. And when I had given her
a full synopsis, she related her story. Something to do with once long ago
loving a bloke dearly and quarrelling with him about something and him turning
on his heel and going to the Federated Malay States and marrying the widow of a
rubber planter, all because she had been too proud to speak the little word
that would have fixed everything. And years afterwards there arrived a simple
posy of white violets, together with a slip of paper bearing the words: “It
might have been.”‘

‘Moving.’

‘Very.
I cried buckets. She then leaned across me and told Valerie that the quality of
mercy was not strained but dropped like something or other on something I didn’t
catch. I couldn’t quite follow it all, but the effects were excellent. I saw
Valerie’s eye soften, and a tear stole into it. The next moment, we were locked
in a close embrace.’

‘And
then?’

‘Well,
the long evening wore on, so to speak. The female Pekinese told us more about
her Federated Malay Stater, and I went on crying, and Valerie started crying,
too, and presently the Peke was also weeping freely, and it was at about this
time that the head waiter came up and suggested that we should take our custom
elsewhere. So we all went back to my flat and had eggs and bacon. And it was
while I was doling out the dishfuls that I suddenly remembered that I was a
loony and so had no right to marry a sweet girl. I mentioned this to Valerie,
and then the whole story came out.’

‘I see.’

‘The
Peke, it appeared, knew Sir Roderick Glossop well, her cousin Lionel having
been treated by him for some form of loopiness, and her description of the man
made it clear that you couldn’t be him. So it seemed pretty obvious that you
must be you.’

‘Remorseless
reasoning.’

‘And
when I speculated as to your motives for leading me up the garden path, Valerie
snorted a bit and said it was plain that you were up to some kind of hell in
this ancient pile and had wanted to get me out of the way. Which you admit to
have been the case. She’s a most intelligent girl.’

‘Most.
I have sometimes thought that it would be an admirable thing if she were to
choke.’

‘And
the outcome of the whole affair was that she went down to Ickenham this
morning, just to make sure you weren’t on the premises — her intention, having
ascertained this, being to breeze along here and expose you to one and all. And
I saw that what I had got to do was make an early start and get here before she
did. Because you see, though all is forgiven and forgotten between us, so to
speak, and love has, as it were, come into its own again, there is just one
small catch, that she seems a bit curious about Polly.’

‘You
mean about your relations with her?’

‘Yes.
She said in rather a sinister way that she supposed Polly was a very pretty
girl, and my statement to the effect that she was a plain little thing whom I
had taken to the Ball purely out of pity was none too cordially received. Her
manner struck me as that of a girl who intended to investigate further.’

‘So
your desire to have her arrive here and meet Polly and see what she really
looks like is slight?’

‘Almost
nil,’ confessed Horace frankly. ‘As soon as I could manage it, therefore, I
drove here in the car to tell Polly to clear out while there was yet time.’

‘Very
shrewd.’

‘I
phoned her from the Emsworth Arms, arranging a meeting at the castle gate. I
then hopped into the car and went there. And conceive my astonishment when,
alighting from the prow, I observed Ricky alighting from the stern.’

‘It
must have given you a start.’

‘It
did. A flying start. I was off like a jack rabbit. And after I had gone about
three quarters of a mile, touching the ground perhaps twice in the process, I
found myself outside the castle and stopped and reviewed the situation. And I
saw that having missed Polly, the best thing I could do was to get hold of you.
I knew which your room was, of course, and I sneaked up with the idea of
waiting till you came to dress for dinner. That I should have found you first
crack out of the box like this is the one bit of goose I have experienced in
the course of a sticky evening.’