‘Your glass is empty, Mr. Wooster,’ he cried buoyantly, ‘may I refill it?’
I said he might. I had had two, which is generally my limit, but with my aplomb shattered as it was I felt that a third wouldn’t hurt. Indeed, I would have been willing to go even more deeply into the thing. I once read about a man who used to drink twenty-six martinis before dinner, and the conviction was beginning to steal over me that he had had the right idea.
‘Roderick tells me,’ he proceeded, as sunny as if a crack of his had been greeted with laughter in court, ‘that the reason you were unable to be with us at the school treat this afternoon was that urgent family business called you to Brinkley Court. I trust everything turned out satisfactorily?’
‘Oh yes, thanks.’
‘We all missed you, but business before pleasure, of course. How was your uncle? You found him well, I hope?’
‘Yes, he was fine.’
‘And your aunt?’
‘She had gone to London.’
‘Indeed? You must have been sorry not to have seen her. I know few women I admire more. So hospitable. So breezy. I have seldom enjoyed anything more than my recent visit to her house.’
I think his exuberance would have led him to continue in the same strain indefinitely, but at this point Stiffy came out of the thoughtful silence into which she had fallen. She had been standing there regarding him with a speculative eye, as if debating within herself whether or not to start something, and now she gave the impression that her mind was made up.
‘I’m glad to see you so cheerful, Uncle Watkyn. I was afraid my news might have upset you.’
‘Upset me!’ said Pop Bassett incredulously. ‘Whatever put that idea in your head?’
‘Well, you’re short one son-in-law.’
‘It is precisely that that has made this the happiest day of my life.’
‘Then you can make it the happiest of mine,’ said Stiffy, striking while the iron was h. ‘By giving Harold that vicarage.’
Most of my attention, as you may well imagine, being concentrated on contemplating the soup in which I was immersed, I cannot say whether or not Pop Bassett hesitated, but if he did, it was only for an instant. No doubt for a second or two the vision of that hard-boiled egg rose before him and he was conscious again of the resentment he had been feeling at Stinker’s failure to keep a firm hand on the junior members of his flock, but the thought that Augustus Fink-Nottle was not to be his son-in-law drove the young cleric’s shortcomings from his mind. Filled with the milk of human kindness so nearly to the brim that you could almost hear it sloshing about inside him, he was in no shape to deny anyone anything. I really believe that if at this point in the proceedings I had tried to touch him for a fiver, he would have parted without a cry.
‘Of course, of course, of course, of course,’ he said, carolling like one of Jeeves’s larks on the wing. ‘I am sure that Pinker will make an excellent vicar.’
‘The best,’ said Stiffy. ‘He’s wasted as a curate. No scope. Running under wraps. Unleash him as a vicar, and he’ll be the talk of the Established Church. He’s as hot as a pistol.’
‘I have always had the highest opinion of Harold Pinker.’
‘I’m not surprised. All the nibs feel the same. They know he’s got what it takes. Very sound on doctrine, and can preach like a streak.’
‘Yes, I enjoy his sermons. Manly and straightforward.’
‘That’s because he’s one of these healthy outdoor open air men. Muscular Christianity, that’s his dish. He used to play football for England.’
‘Indeed?’
‘He was what’s called a prop forward.’
‘Really?’
At the words ‘prop forward’ I had, of course, started visibly. I hadn’t known that that’s what Stinker was, and I was thinking how ironical life could be. I mean to say, there was Plank searching high and low for a forward of this nature, saying to himself that he would pretty soon have to give up the hopeless quest, and here was I in a position to fill the bill for him, but owing to the strained condition of our relations unable to put him on to this good thing. Very sad, I felt, and the thought occurred to me, as it had often done before, that one ought to be kind even to the very humblest, because you never know when they may not come in useful.