The Code of the Woosters / Фамильная честь Вустеров. Пелам Гренвилл Вудхаус

o’clock, but naturally when three o’clock came and he didn’t turn up and there was another customer looking at the thing, and he let it go. So there you are. Bassett has the cow-creamer, and took it down to Totleigh last night.”

      It was a sad story, of course. A magistrate who could nick a fellow for five pounds, when a mere reprimand would more than have met the case, was capable of anything, but I couldn’t see what she thought there was to be done about it. It’s better to start a new life and try to forget. That’s what I said to my aunt. She gazed at me in silence for a moment.

      “Oh? So that’s how you feel, is it?”

      “I do, yes.”

      “You admit, I hope, that by every moral law that cow-creamer belongs to Tom?”

      “Oh, certainly”.

      “But would you allow this ugly man to get away with the swag? You would just sit tight and say ‘Well, well!’ and do nothing?”

      I weighed this.

      “Possibly not ‘Well, well!’, but I wouldn’t do anything.”

      “Well, I’m going to do something. I’m going to steal the damn thing.”

      I started at her, astounded. I uttered no verbal rebuke, but there was a distinct “Tut, tut!” in my gaze. Even though the provocation was, I admitted, I could not approve of these strong methods. And I was about to awaken her dormant conscience, when she added:

      “Or, rather, you are!”

      “Who, me?”

      “That’s right. You’re going to stay at Totleigh. You will have a hundred excellent opportunities—”

      “But, dash it![48]”

      “—and I must have it, because otherwise I shall never be able to dig a cheque out of Tom for that Pomona Grindle serial. He simply won’t be in the mood. And I signed the old girl up yesterday at a fabulous price, half the sum agreed upon to be paid in advance a week from current date. So, my lad. I can’t understand why you are so surprised. It doesn’t seem to me much to do for a loved aunt.”

      “It seems to me a dashed thing. I’m not going to—”

      “Oh, yes you are, because you know what will happen, if you don’t.”

      She paused significantly.

      “You follow me, Watson[49]?”

      I was silent. She had no need to tell me what she meant. This was not the first time she had displayed a sword. This ruthless relative has one all powerful weapon which she holds constantly over my head like the sword. The threat that if I don’t obey she will bar me from her board and wipe Anatole’s cooking from my lips. I shall not forget the time when she placed sanctions on me for a whole month—right in the middle of the pheasant season. I made one last attempt to reason with her.

      “But why does Uncle Tom want his frightful cow-creamer? It’s a ghastly object. He would be far better without it.”

      “He doesn’t think so. Well, there it is. Perform this simple, easy task for me, or guests at my dinner table will soon be saying: ‘Why is it that we never seem to see Bertie Wooster here anymore?’ Bless my soul, what an amazing lunch that was that Anatole gave us yesterday! ‘Superb’ is the only word. I don’t wonder you’re fond of his cooking. As you sometimes say, it melts in the mouth.”

      I eyed her sternly. “Aunt Dahlia, this is blackmail!”

      “Yes, isn’t it?” she said, and beetled off[50]. I resumed my seat, and ate a moody slice of cold bacon.

      Jeeves entered. “The bags are packed, sir.”

      “Very good, Jeeves,” I said. “Then let us be starting.”

* * *

      “Jeeves,” I said, breaking a thoughtful silence which had lasted for about eighty seven miles, “I am in a big trouble.”

      “Sir?”

      I frowned. The man was discreet, and this was no time for discretion.

      “Don’t pretend you don’t know all about it, Jeeves,” I said coldly. “You were in the next room throughout my interview with Aunt Dahlia, and her remarks must have been audible in Piccadilly[51].”

      He dropped the mask.

      “Well, yes, sir, I must confess that I gathered the substance of the conversation.”

      “Very well, then. You agree with me that the situation is dreadful?”

      “Certainly a somewhat sharp crisis in your affairs would appear to have been precipitated, sir.”

      “If I had my life to live again, Jeeves, I would start it as an orphan without any aunts. Don’t they put aunts in Turkey in sacks and drop them in the Bosphorus[52]?”

      “Odalisques[53], sir, I understand. Not aunts.”

      “Well, why not aunts? Look at the trouble they cause in the world. I tell you, Jeeves, and you may quote me as saying this—behind every poor, innocent, harmless blighter who is going down, you will find, if you look carefully enough, the aunt.”

      “There is much in what you say, sir.”

      “It is no use telling me that there are bad aunts and good aunts. They are all alike. Consider this Dahlia, Jeeves. I have always respected her. But what did she offer? We are familiar with Wooster, the supposed bag-snatcher. But this aunt is going to present to the world a Wooster who goes to the houses of retired magistrates and, while eating their bread and salt, steals their cow-creamers. Oh!”

      “Most disturbing, sir.”

      “I wonder how old Bassett will receive me, Jeeves.”

      “It will be interesting to observe his reactions, sir.”

      “He can’t throw me out, I suppose, Miss Bassett having invited me?”

      “No sir”.

      “On the other hand, he can—and I think he will—look at me over the top of his pince-nez and make terrible noises. The prospect is not an agreeable one.”

      “No, sir.”

      “I mean to say, even if this cow-creamer thing had not come up, conditions would be terrible.”

      “Yes, sir. Might I enquire how are you going to carry out Mrs Travers’s wishes?”

      “That is the problem which is torturing me, Jeeves. I can’t make up my mind. When I think of being barred from those menus of Anatole’s, I say to myself that I will fulfill the task. Old Bassett is firmly convinced that I am a combination of a swindler and a thief and steal everything I see.”

      “Sir?”

      “Didn’t I tell you about that? I had another encounter with him yesterday. He now looks upon me as the king of the criminal world—if not Public Enemy[54] Number One, certainly Number Two or Three.”

      I informed him briefly of what had occurred. Jeeves does not often smile, but now a distinct simper had begun to wreathe his lips.

      “A laughable misunderstanding, sir.”

      “Laughable, Jeeves?”

      “I beg your pardon, sir. I should have said ‘disturbing’.”

      “Quite. But even if I want to steal cow-creamers, how am I going to find the time? You have to plan and plot and lay schemes. And I shall think about this business of Gussie’s.”

      “Exactly, sir.”

      “And,

48

Dash it! – Чёрт побери!

49

Watson – Уотсон

50

beetled off – упорхнула

51

Piccadilly – Пикадилли

52

Bosphorus – Босфор

53

odalisques – одалиски (служанки в гареме султана)

54

Public Enemy – враг рода человеческого