‘Not too good,’ I agreed. ‘Unquestionably open to criticism, the animal’s behaviour.’
‘He must be off his head. He knows me perfectly well. He sees me every day.’
‘Ah,’ I said, putting my finger on the weak spot in his argument, ‘but I don’t suppose he’s ever seen you in that dressing-gown.’
I had been too outspoken. He let me see at once that he had taken umbrage.
‘What’s wrong with my dressing-gown?’ he demanded hotly.
‘A bit on the bright side, don’t you think?’
‘No, I do not.’
‘Well, that’s how it would strike a highly-strung dog.’
I paused here to chuckle softly, and he asked what the devil I was giggling about. I put him abreast.
‘I was merely thinking that I wish we could strike the highly-strung dog. The trouble on these occasions is that one is always weaponless. It was the same some years ago when an angry swan chased self and friend on to the roof of a sort of boathouse building at my Aunt Agatha’s place in Hertfordshire. Nothing would have pleased us better than to bung a brick at the bird, or slosh him with a boathook, but we had no brick and were short of boathooks. We had to wait till Jeeves came along, which he eventually did in answer to our cries. It would have thrilled you to have seen Jeeves on that occasion. He advanced dauntlessly and -‘
‘Mr. Wooster!’
‘Speaking.’
‘Kindly spare me your reminiscences.’
‘I was merely saying -‘
‘Well, don’t.’
Silence fell. On my part, a wounded silence, for all I’d tried to do was take his mind off things with entertaining chit-chat. I moved an inch or two away from him in a marked manner. The Woosters do not force their conversation on the unwilling.
All this time Bartholomew had been trying to join us, making a series of energetic springs. Fortunately Providence in its infinite wisdom had given Scotties short legs, and though full of the will to win he could accomplish nothing constructive. However much an Aberdeen terrier may bear ‘mid snow and ice a banner with the strange device Excelsior, he nearly always has to be content with dirty looks and the sharp, passionate bark.
Some minutes later my fellow-rooster came out of the silence. No doubt the haughtiness of my manner had intimidated him, for there was a mildness in his voice which had not been there before.
‘Mr. Wooster.’
I turned coldly.
‘Were you addressing me, Bassett?’
‘There must be something we can do.’
‘You might fine the animal five pounds.’
‘We cannot stay here all night.’
‘Why not? What’s to stop us?’
This held him. He relapsed into silence once more. And we were sitting there like a couple of Trappist monks, when a voice said ‘Well, for heaven’s sake!’ and I perceived that Stiffy was with us.
Not surprising, of course, that she should have turned up sooner or later. If Scotties come, I ought to have said to myself, can Stiffy be far behind?
9
Considering that so substantial a part of her waking hours is devoted to thrusting innocent bystanders into the soup, Stiffy is far prettier than she has any right to be. She’s on the small side – petite, I believe, is the technical term – and I have always felt that when she and Stinker walk up the aisle together, if they ever do, their disparity in height should be good for a laugh or two from the ringside pews. The thought has occurred to me more than once that the correct response for Stinker to make, when asked by the M.C. if he is prepared to take this Stephanie to be his wedded wife, would be, ‘Why, certainly, what there is of her.’
‘What on earth do you two think you’re doing?’ she inquired, not unnaturally surprised to see her uncle and an old friend in our current position. ‘And why have you been upsetting the furniture?’
‘That was me,’ I said. ‘I bumped into the grandfather clock. I’m as bad as Stinker, aren’t I, bumping into things, ha-ha.’
‘Less of the ha-ha,’ she riposted warmly. ‘And don’t mention yourself in the same breath as my Harold. Well, that doesn’t explain why you’re sitting up there like a couple of buzzards on a tree top.’