We had made goodish going on the road, and it wasn’t more than about four-forty when I rang the front-door bell. Jeeves took the car to the stables, and the butler – Butterfield was his name, I remembered – led me to the drawing-room.
‘Mr. Wooster,’ he said, loosing me in.
I was not surprised to find tea in progress, for I had heard the clinking of cups. Madeline Bassett was at the controls, and she extended a drooping hand to me. ‘Bertie! How nice to see you.’
I can well imagine that a casual observer, if I had confided to him my qualms at the idea of being married to this girl, would have raised his eyebrows and been at a loss to understand, for she was undeniably an eyeful, being slim, svelte and bountifully equipped with golden hair and all the fixings. But where the casual observer would have been making his bloomer was in overlooking that squashy soupiness of hers, that subtle air she had of being on the point of talking babytalk. She was the sort of girl who puts her hands over a husband’s eyes, as he is crawling in to breakfast with a morning head, and says ‘Guess who?’ I once stayed at the residence of a newly-married pal of mine, and his bride had had carved in large letters over the fireplace in the drawing-room, where it was impossible to miss it, the legend ‘Two Lovers Built This Nest’, and I can still recall the look of dumb anguish in the other half of the sketch’s eyes every time he came in and saw it. Whether Madeline Bassett, on entering the marital state, would go to such an awful extreme, one could not say, but it seemed most probable, and I resolved that when I started trying to reconcile her and Gussie, I would not scamp my work but would give it everything I had.
‘You know Mr. Pinker,’ she said, and I perceived that Stinker was present. He was safely wedged in a chair and hadn’t, as far as I could see, upset anything yet, but he gave me the impression of a man who was crouching for the spring and would begin to operate shortly. There was a gate-leg table laden with muffins and cucumber sandwiches which I foresaw would attract him like a magnet.
On seeing me, he had started visibly, dropping a plate with half a muffin on it, and his eyes had widened. I knew what he was thinking, of course. He supposed that my presence must be due to a change of heart. Rejoice with me, for I have found the sheep which was lost, he was no doubt murmuring to himself. I mourned in spirit a bit for the poor fish, knowing what a nasty knock he had coming to him when he got on to it that nothing was going to induce me to undertake whatever the foul commission might be that Stiffy had earmarked for me. On that point I was resolved to be firm, no matter what spiritual agonies he and she suffered in the process. I had long since learned that the secret of a happy and successful life was to steer clear of any project masterminded by that young scourge of the species.
The conversation that followed was what you might call . . . I’ve forgotten the word, but it begins with a d. I mean, with Stinker within earshot Madeline and I couldn’t get down to brass tacks, so we just chewed the fat… desultory, that’s the word I wanted. We just chewed the fat in a desultory way. Stinker said he was there to talk over the forthcoming school treat with Sir Watkyn, and I said ‘Oh, is there a school treat coming up?’ and Madeline said it was taking place the day after tomorrow and owing to the illness of the vicar Mr. Pinker would be in sole charge, and Stinker winced a bit, as if he didn’t like the prospect much.
Madeline asked if I had had a nice drive down, and I said ‘Oh, splendid.’ Stinker said Stiffy would be so pleased I had come, and I smiled one of my subtle smiles. And then Butterfield came in and said Sir Watkyn could see Mr. Pinker now, and Stinker oozed off. And the moment the door had closed behind curate and butler, Madeline clasped her hands, gave me one of those squashy looks, and said: