MONEY FOR NOTHING

Taranaki Daily News, 13 November 1934, Page 11

MONEY FOR NOTHING

By j

P. Q. Wodehouse

CHAPTER .18 (continued). “I am going to offer a little reward,” said Mr. Carmody, gently urging the punt out into the open, “just to make everything seem more natural. One thousand pounds is the sum l am propos-. ing to give for the recovery of this stolen property. You had better try for that. Well, I must not keep you here all the morning, chattering away like this. No doubt you have much to do.” The punt floated out into the sunshine, and the roof of the boathouse hid this fat conscienceless man from Soapy's eyes. From somewhere out in the great open spaces beyond came the sound of a paddle, wielded with a care-free joyousness. Whatever might be his guest’s state of mind, Mr. Carmody was plainly in the pink. * Soapy climbed the Steps listlessly. The interview had left him weak and shaken. He brooded dully on this revelation of the inky depths of Lester Carmody’s Soul. It seemed to him that if this was what England’s upper classes (who ought to be setting an example) were like, Great Britain could not- hope to continue mucrr longer as a first-class power; and it gave him in his anguish a little satisfaction to remember that in years gone by his ancestors had thrown off Britain’s yoke. Beyond burning his eyebrows one Fourth of July, when a boy, with a maroon that exploded prematurely, he had never thought much about this affair before, but now he was conscious of a glow of patriotic fevour. If General Washington had been present at that moment Soapy would have shaken hands with him. Soapy wandered aimlessly through the sunlit garden. The little spurt of consolation caused by the reflection that some hundred and fifty years ago the United States of America had severed relations with a country which was to produce, a man like Lester Carmody had long since ebbed away, leaving emptiness behind’.it. He was feeling very low and in urgent need of one of those largely advertised toriies which claim to relieve anaemia, - brain-fag, lassitude, anxiety, palpitations,- faintness, melancholia, exhaustion, neurasthenia, muscular limpness and -depression of spirits. For he had got them all, especially brain-fag and melancholia; and the sudden appearance of Sturgis, fluttering towards him down the gravel path, provided nothing in. the nature of a cure. He felt that he had had-All he wanted of the butler’s conversation. Even of the most stimulating society enough is enough, and to Soapy about half a minute of Sturgis seemed a good medium dose for an adult. He would have fled, but there was nowhere to go. He remained where he was, making his expression as forbidding as possible. A motion-picture director could have read that expression like a book. Soapy was registering deep disinclination to talk about rabbits. But for the moment, it appeared, Sturgis had put rabbits on one side. Other matters occupied his mind. "I beg your pardon, sir,” he said, "but have you seen Mr. John?” . “Mr. Who?" “Mr. John, sir.” So deep was Soapy’s preoccupation that for a moment the name conveyed nothing to him. "Mr. Carmody’s nephew, sir. Mr. CarrolL” "Oh? Yes, he went off. in his car with my daughter.” “Will he ba gone long, do you think, sir?" Soapy could answer that one. “Yes,” he said “He. won’t be back for some time.” “You see, when I took Mr. Carmody , his drink, sir, he told me to tell Bolt, the chauffeur, to give me the ticket.” "What.ticket?” asked Soapy wearily. The buiSr’was only too glad to reply, He had feared that this talk of theirs might be about to end all too quickly, and these explanations helped to prolong it. And, now that he knew that there was no need to go on searching for John, his time was his own again. "It was a ticket for a bag which Mr. Carmody, sent Bolt to leave at the cloakroom at Shrub Hill Station in Worcester this morning, sir. I now ascertain from Bolt that he gave it to Mr. John to give to Mr. Carmody.” “What!” cried Soapy. "And Mr. John has apparently gone off without giving it to him. However, no doubt it is quite safe. Did you make satisfactory progress with the hutch, sir?” "Eh?” "The robert-hutch, sir." “What?” ■ . .. A look of concern came into Sturgis’ face. His companion’s manner was strange. .... "Is anything the matter, sir?” "Eh?” "Shall I bring you something to drink, sir?” Few men ever become so distrait that this particular question fails to penetrate. Soapy nodded feverishly.

His mind was in a whirl. He could almost feel the brains inside his head heaving and tossing like an angry ocean. So that was what that smooth old . crook had done with the stuff—stored it away in a Left Luggage office at a railway station! What to do?

All, he perceived, was not yet lost. It would be absurd to pretend that things were shaping themselves ideally, but disaster might still be retrieved. It would be embarrassing, no doubt, to meet Chimp Twist after what had occurred, but a man who would win to wealth must learn to put up with embarrassments. The only possible next move was to go over to Healthward Ho, reveal to Chimp what had occurred, and with his co-operation recover the ticket from John.

Soapy brightened. Another possibility had occurred to ’ him.. If he were to reach Healthward Ho with the minimum of delay, it might be that he would find both Chimp and John still under the influence of those admirable drops: in which case a man of his resource would Purely be able to insinuate himself into John’s presence long enough to be able to remove a Left Luggage ticket from his person. But it ’twere done, then ’twere well ’twere done quickly. What he needed was the Dex-Mayo. And the Dex-Mayo was standing ouside the stable yard, waiting for him. He became a thing of dash .and activity. For many years he had almost given up the exercise of running, but he- ran now like the lissom athlete he had been in his early twenties. And as he came panting round the back of the house the first thing he saw was the tail-end of the car disappearing into the stable-yard. “Hi!” shouted Soapy, using for the purpose the last remains of his breath. The Dex-Mayo vanished. And Soapy, very nearly a spent force now, arrived at the opening of the stable yard just in time to see Bolt, the chauffeur, putting the key of the garage in his pocket after locking the door. Bolt was a thing of beauty. He gleamed in the sunshine. He was wearing a new hat, his Sunday clothes, and a pair of yellow shoes that might have been bits chipped off the sun itself. There was a carnation in his buttonhole. He would have lent tone to a garden-party at Buckingham Palace. He regarded Soapy with interest. “Been having a little run, sir?” 'The car!” croaked Soapy.

“I’ve just put it away, sir, Mr. Carmody has given me the day off to attend the wedding of the wife’s niece over at Upton Snodsbury.” “I want the car.” <

“I’ve just put it away, sir,” said Bolt, speaking more slowly and with the manner of one explaining something to an untutored foreigner. “Mr. Carmody has given me the day off. Mrs. Bolt’s niece is being married over at- Upton Snodsbury. And she’s got a lovely day for it,” said the chauffeur, glancing at the sky with something as near approval as a chauffeur ever p/ermits himself. "Happy the birde that the sun shines on, they say. Not that I agree altogether with those old sayings. I know that When I and Mrs. Bolt was married it rained the whole time like cats and dogs, and we’ve been very happy. Very happy indeed we’ve been, taking it by and.large. I don’t . . . .” It began to seem to Soapy .that the staff of English country-houses must be selected primarily for their powers of conversation. Every domestic with whom he had come in contact in Rudge Hall so far had had at his disposal an apparently endless flow of lively Smalltalk. The butler, if you let him, would gossip all day about rabbits, and here was the chauffeur apparently settling down to dictate his autobiography. And every moment precious! With a violent effort he contrived to take in a stock of breath. “I want the car, to go to Healthward Ho. I can drive it.” The chauffeur’s manner changed. Up til.', now he had been the cheery clubman meeting an old friend in the smok-ing-room and drawing him aside for a long, intimate chat.; but at this shocking suggestion he froze. He gazed at Soapy with horrified incredulity. “Drive the Dex-Mayo, sir?” he gasped. “Over to Healthward Ho.” The crisis passed. Bolt swallowed convulsively and was himself once. more. One must be patient, he realised, with laymen. They do not understand. When they come to a chauffeur and calmly propose that their vile hands shall touch his sacred steering-wheel, they are not trying to be deliberately offensive. It is simply that they do not know. “I’m afraid that wouldn’t quite do, sir,” he said, with a faint, reproving smile. “Do you think I can’t drive?” “Not the Dex-Mayo you can’t, sir.” Bolt spoke a little curtly, for he had been much moved and was still shaken. "Mr. Carmody don’t like nobody handling his car but me.” “But I must go over to Healthward Ho. ' It’s important. Business.” (To be continued).