My Man Jeeves Page 4

  ABSENT TREATMENT

  I want to tell you all about dear old Bobbie Cardew. It's a mostinteresting story. I can't put in any literary style and all that; butI don't have to, don't you know, because it goes on its Moral Lesson.If you're a man you mustn't miss it, because it'll be a warning to you;and if you're a woman you won't want to, because it's all about how agirl made a man feel pretty well fed up with things.

  If you're a recent acquaintance of Bobbie's, you'll probably besurprised to hear that there was a time when he was more remarkable forthe weakness of his memory than anything else. Dozens of fellows, whohave only met Bobbie since the change took place, have been surprisedwhen I told them that. Yet it's true. Believe _me_.

  In the days when I first knew him Bobbie Cardew was about the mostpronounced young rotter inside the four-mile radius. People have calledme a silly ass, but I was never in the same class with Bobbie. When itcame to being a silly ass, he was a plus-four man, while my handicapwas about six. Why, if I wanted him to dine with me, I used to post hima letter at the beginning of the week, and then the day before send hima telegram and a phone-call on the day itself, and--half an hour beforethe time we'd fixed--a messenger in a taxi, whose business it was tosee that he got in and that the chauffeur had the address all correct.By doing this I generally managed to get him, unless he had left townbefore my messenger arrived.

  The funny thing was that he wasn't altogether a fool in other ways.Deep down in him there was a kind of stratum of sense. I had known him,once or twice, show an almost human intelligence. But to reach thatstratum, mind you, you needed dynamite.

  At least, that's what I thought. But there was another way which hadn'toccurred to me. Marriage, I mean. Marriage, the dynamite of the soul;that was what hit Bobbie. He married. Have you ever seen a bull-pupchasing a bee? The pup sees the bee. It looks good to him. But he stilldoesn't know what's at the end of it till he gets there. It was likethat with Bobbie. He fell in love, got married--with a sort of whoop,as if it were the greatest fun in the world--and then began to find outthings.

  She wasn't the sort of girl you would have expected Bobbie to raveabout. And yet, I don't know. What I mean is, she worked for herliving; and to a fellow who has never done a hand's turn in his lifethere's undoubtedly a sort of fascination, a kind of romance, about agirl who works for her living.

  Her name was Anthony. Mary Anthony. She was about five feet six; shehad a ton and a half of red-gold hair, grey eyes, and one of thosedetermined chins. She was a hospital nurse. When Bobbie smashed himselfup at polo, she was told off by the authorities to smooth his brow andrally round with cooling unguents and all that; and the old boy hadn'tbeen up and about again for more than a week before they popped off tothe registrar's and fixed it up. Quite the romance.

  Bobbie broke the news to me at the club one evening, and next day heintroduced me to her. I admired her. I've never worked myself--myname's Pepper, by the way. Almost forgot to mention it. Reggie Pepper.My uncle Edward was Pepper, Wells, and Co., the Colliery people. Heleft me a sizable chunk of bullion--I say I've never worked myself, butI admire any one who earns a living under difficulties, especially agirl. And this girl had had a rather unusually tough time of it, beingan orphan and all that, and having had to do everything off her own batfor years.

  Mary and I got along together splendidly. We don't now, but we'll cometo that later. I'm speaking of the past. She seemed to think Bobbie thegreatest thing on earth, judging by the way she looked at him when shethought I wasn't noticing. And Bobbie seemed to think the same abouther. So that I came to the conclusion that, if only dear old Bobbiedidn't forget to go to the wedding, they had a sporting chance of beingquite happy.

  Well, let's brisk up a bit here, and jump a year. The story doesn'treally start till then.

  They took a flat and settled down. I was in and out of the place quitea good deal. I kept my eyes open, and everything seemed to me to berunning along as smoothly as you could want. If this was marriage, Ithought, I couldn't see why fellows were so frightened of it. Therewere a lot of worse things that could happen to a man.

  But we now come to the incident of the quiet Dinner, and it's just herethat love's young dream hits a snag, and things begin to occur.

  I happened to meet Bobbie in Piccadilly, and he asked me to come backto dinner at the flat. And, like a fool, instead of bolting and puttingmyself under police protection, I went.

  When we got to the flat, there was Mrs. Bobbie looking--well, I tellyou, it staggered me. Her gold hair was all piled up in waves andcrinkles and things, with a what-d'-you-call-it of diamonds in it. Andshe was wearing the most perfectly ripping dress. I couldn't begin todescribe it. I can only say it was the limit. It struck me that if thiswas how she was in the habit of looking every night when they weredining quietly at home together, it was no wonder that Bobbie likeddomesticity.

  "Here's old Reggie, dear," said Bobbie. "I've brought him home to havea bit of dinner. I'll phone down to the kitchen and ask them to send itup now--what?"

  She stared at him as if she had never seen him before. Then she turnedscarlet. Then she turned as white as a sheet. Then she gave a littlelaugh. It was most interesting to watch. Made me wish I was up a treeabout eight hundred miles away. Then she recovered herself.

  "I am so glad you were able to come, Mr. Pepper," she said, smiling atme.

  And after that she was all right. At least, you would have said so. Shetalked a lot at dinner, and chaffed Bobbie, and played us ragtime onthe piano afterwards, as if she hadn't a care in the world. Quite a jollylittle party it was--not. I'm no lynx-eyed sleuth, and all that sort ofthing, but I had seen her face at the beginning, and I knew that she wasworking the whole time and working hard, to keep herself in hand, andthat she would have given that diamond what's-its-name in her hair andeverything else she possessed to have one good scream--just one. I'vesat through some pretty thick evenings in my time, but that one had therest beaten in a canter. At the very earliest moment I grabbed my hat andgot away.

  Having seen what I did, I wasn't particularly surprised to meet Bobbieat the club next day looking about as merry and bright as a lonelygum-drop at an Eskimo tea-party.

  He started in straightway. He seemed glad to have someone to talk toabout it.

  "Do you know how long I've been married?" he said.

  I didn't exactly.

  "About a year, isn't it?"

  "Not _about_ a year," he said sadly. "Exactly a year--yesterday!"

  Then I understood. I saw light--a regular flash of light.

  "Yesterday was----?"

  "The anniversary of the wedding. I'd arranged to take Mary to theSavoy, and on to Covent Garden. She particularly wanted to hear Caruso.I had the ticket for the box in my pocket. Do you know, all throughdinner I had a kind of rummy idea that there was something I'dforgotten, but I couldn't think what?"

  "Till your wife mentioned it?"

  He nodded----

  "She--mentioned it," he said thoughtfully.

  I didn't ask for details. Women with hair and chins like Mary's may beangels most of the time, but, when they take off their wings for a bit,they aren't half-hearted about it.

  "To be absolutely frank, old top," said poor old Bobbie, in a brokensort of way, "my stock's pretty low at home."

  There didn't seem much to be done. I just lit a cigarette and satthere. He didn't want to talk. Presently he went out. I stood at thewindow of our upper smoking-room, which looks out on to Piccadilly, andwatched him. He walked slowly along for a few yards, stopped, thenwalked on again, and finally turned into a jeweller's. Which was aninstance of what I meant when I said that deep down in him there was acertain stratum of sense.

  * * * * *

  It was from now on that I began to be really interested in this problemof Bobbie's married life. Of course, one's always mildly interested inone's friends' marriages, hoping they'll turn out well and all that;but this was different. The average man isn't like Bobbie, and theavera
ge girl isn't like Mary. It was that old business of the immovablemass and the irresistible force. There was Bobbie, ambling gentlythrough life, a dear old chap in a hundred ways, but undoubtedly achump of the first water.

  And there was Mary, determined that he shouldn't be a chump. AndNature, mind you, on Bobbie's side. When Nature makes a chump likedear old Bobbie, she's proud of him, and doesn't want her handiworkdisturbed. She gives him a sort of natural armour to protect himagainst outside interference. And that armour is shortness of memory.Shortness of memory keeps a man a chump, when, but for it, he mightcease to be one. Take my case, for instance. I'm a chump. Well, if Ihad remembered half the things people have tried to teach me during mylife, my size in hats would be about number nine. But I didn't. Iforgot them. And it was just the same with Bobbie.

  For about a week, perhaps a bit more, the recollection of that quietlittle domestic evening bucked him up like a tonic. Elephants, I readsomewhere, are champions at the memory business, but they were fools toBobbie during that week. But, bless you, the shock wasn't nearly bigenough. It had dinted the armour, but it hadn't made a hole in it.Pretty soon he was back at the old game.

  It was pathetic, don't you know. The poor girl loved him, and she wasfrightened. It was the thin edge of the wedge, you see, and she knewit. A man who forgets what day he was married, when he's been marriedone year, will forget, at about the end of the fourth, that he'smarried at all. If she meant to get him in hand at all, she had got todo it now, before he began to drift away.

  I saw that clearly enough, and I tried to make Bobbie see it, when hewas by way of pouring out his troubles to me one afternoon. I can'tremember what it was that he had forgotten the day before, but it wassomething she had asked him to bring home for her--it may have been abook.

  "It's such a little thing to make a fuss about," said Bobbie. "And sheknows that it's simply because I've got such an infernal memory abouteverything. I can't remember anything. Never could."

  He talked on for a while, and, just as he was going, he pulled out acouple of sovereigns.

  "Oh, by the way," he said.

  "What's this for?" I asked, though I knew.

  "I owe it you."

  "How's that?" I said.

  "Why, that bet on Tuesday. In the billiard-room. Murray and Brown wereplaying a hundred up, and I gave you two to one that Brown would win,and Murray beat him by twenty odd."

  "So you do remember some things?" I said.

  He got quite excited. Said that if I thought he was the sort of rotterwho forgot to pay when he lost a bet, it was pretty rotten of me afterknowing him all these years, and a lot more like that.

  "Subside, laddie," I said.

  Then I spoke to him like a father.

  "What you've got to do, my old college chum," I said, "is to pullyourself together, and jolly quick, too. As things are shaping, you'redue for a nasty knock before you know what's hit you. You've got tomake an effort. Don't say you can't. This two quid business shows that,even if your memory is rocky, you can remember some things. What you'vegot to do is to see that wedding anniversaries and so on are includedin the list. It may be a brainstrain, but you can't get out of it."

  "I suppose you're right," said Bobbie. "But it beats me why she thinkssuch a lot of these rotten little dates. What's it matter if I forgotwhat day we were married on or what day she was born on or what day thecat had the measles? She knows I love her just as much as if I were amemorizing freak at the halls."

  "That's not enough for a woman," I said. "They want to be shown. Bearthat in mind, and you're all right. Forget it, and there'll betrouble."

  He chewed the knob of his stick.

  "Women are frightfully rummy," he said gloomily.

  "You should have thought of that before you married one," I said.

  * * * * *

  I don't see that I could have done any more. I had put the whole thingin a nutshell for him. You would have thought he'd have seen the point,and that it would have made him brace up and get a hold on himself. Butno. Off he went again in the same old way. I gave up arguing with him.I had a good deal of time on my hands, but not enough to amount toanything when it was a question of reforming dear old Bobbie by argument.If you see a man asking for trouble, and insisting on getting it, theonly thing to do is to stand by and wait till it comes to him. Afterthat you may get a chance. But till then there's nothing to be done.But I thought a lot about him.

  Bobbie didn't get into the soup all at once. Weeks went by, and months,and still nothing happened. Now and then he'd come into the club with akind of cloud on his shining morning face, and I'd know that there hadbeen doings in the home; but it wasn't till well on in the spring thathe got the thunderbolt just where he had been asking for it--in thethorax.

  I was smoking a quiet cigarette one morning in the window looking outover Piccadilly, and watching the buses and motors going up one way anddown the other--most interesting it is; I often do it--when in rushedBobbie, with his eyes bulging and his face the colour of an oyster,waving a piece of paper in his hand.

  "Reggie," he said. "Reggie, old top, she's gone!"

  "Gone!" I said. "Who?"

  "Mary, of course! Gone! Left me! Gone!"

  "Where?" I said.

  Silly question? Perhaps you're right. Anyhow, dear old Bobbie nearlyfoamed at the mouth.

  "Where? How should I know where? Here, read this."

  He pushed the paper into my hand. It was a letter.

  "Go on," said Bobbie. "Read it."

  So I did. It certainly was quite a letter. There was not much of it,but it was all to the point. This is what it said:

  "MY DEAR BOBBIE,--I am going away. When you care enough about me to remember to wish me many happy returns on my birthday, I will come back. My address will be Box 341, _London Morning News_."

  I read it twice, then I said, "Well, why don't you?"

  "Why don't I what?"

  "Why don't you wish her many happy returns? It doesn't seem much toask."

  "But she says on her birthday."

  "Well, when is her birthday?"

  "Can't you understand?" said Bobbie. "I've forgotten."

  "Forgotten!" I said.

  "Yes," said Bobbie. "Forgotten."

  "How do you mean, forgotten?" I said. "Forgotten whether it's thetwentieth or the twenty-first, or what? How near do you get to it?"

  "I know it came somewhere between the first of January and thethirty-first of December. That's how near I get to it."

  "Think."

  "Think? What's the use of saying 'Think'? Think I haven't thought? I'vebeen knocking sparks out of my brain ever since I opened that letter."

  "And you can't remember?"

  "No."

  I rang the bell and ordered restoratives.

  "Well, Bobbie," I said, "it's a pretty hard case to spring on anuntrained amateur like me. Suppose someone had come to Sherlock Holmesand said, 'Mr. Holmes, here's a case for you. When is my wife'sbirthday?' Wouldn't that have given Sherlock a jolt? However, I knowenough about the game to understand that a fellow can't shoot off hisdeductive theories unless you start him with a clue, so rouse yourselfout of that pop-eyed trance and come across with two or three. Forinstance, can't you remember the last time she had a birthday? Whatsort of weather was it? That might fix the month."

  Bobbie shook his head.

  "It was just ordinary weather, as near as I can recollect."

  "Warm?"

  "Warmish."

  "Or cold?"

  "Well, fairly cold, perhaps. I can't remember."

  I ordered two more of the same. They seemed indicated in the YoungDetective's Manual. "You're a great help, Bobbie," I said. "Aninvaluable assistant. One of those indispensable adjuncts withoutwhich no home is complete."

  Bobbie seemed to be thinking.

  "I've got it," he said suddenly. "Look here. I gave her a present onher last birthday. All we have to do is to go to the shop, hunt up thedate when it was boug
ht, and the thing's done."

  "Absolutely. What did you give her?"

  He sagged.

  "I can't remember," he said.

  Getting ideas is like golf. Some days you're right off, others it'sas easy as falling off a log. I don't suppose dear old Bobbie had everhad two ideas in the same morning before in his life; but now he didit without an effort. He just loosed another dry Martini into theundergrowth, and before you could turn round it had flushed quite abrain-wave.

  Do you know those little books called _When were you Born_?There's one for each month. They tell you your character, your talents,your strong points, and your weak points at fourpence halfpenny a go.Bobbie's idea was to buy the whole twelve, and go through them till wefound out which month hit off Mary's character. That would give us themonth, and narrow it down a whole lot.

  A pretty hot idea for a non-thinker like dear old Bobbie. We salliedout at once. He took half and I took half, and we settled down to work.As I say, it sounded good. But when we came to go into the thing, wesaw that there was a flaw. There was plenty of information all right,but there wasn't a single month that didn't have something that exactlyhit off Mary. For instance, in the December book it said, "Decemberpeople are apt to keep their own secrets. They are extensive travellers."Well, Mary had certainly kept her secret, and she had travelled quiteextensively enough for Bobbie's needs. Then, October people were "bornwith original ideas" and "loved moving." You couldn't have summedup Mary's little jaunt more neatly. February people had "wonderfulmemories"--Mary's speciality.

  We took a bit of a rest, then had another go at the thing.

  Bobbie was all for May, because the book said that women born in thatmonth were "inclined to be capricious, which is always a barrier to ahappy married life"; but I plumped for February, because February women"are unusually determined to have their own way, are very earnest, andexpect a full return in their companion or mates." Which he owned wasabout as like Mary as anything could be.

  In the end he tore the books up, stamped on them, burnt them, and wenthome.

  It was wonderful what a change the next few days made in dear oldBobbie. Have you ever seen that picture, "The Soul's Awakening"? Itrepresents a flapper of sorts gazing in a startled sort of way into themiddle distance with a look in her eyes that seems to say, "Surely thatis George's step I hear on the mat! Can this be love?" Well, Bobbie hada soul's awakening too. I don't suppose he had ever troubled to thinkin his life before--not really _think_. But now he was wearing hisbrain to the bone. It was painful in a way, of course, to see a fellowhuman being so thoroughly in the soup, but I felt strongly that it wasall for the best. I could see as plainly as possible that all thesebrainstorms were improving Bobbie out of knowledge. When it was allover he might possibly become a rotter again of a sort, but it wouldonly be a pale reflection of the rotter he had been. It bore out theidea I had always had that what he needed was a real good jolt.

  I saw a great deal of him these days. I was his best friend, and hecame to me for sympathy. I gave it him, too, with both hands, but Inever failed to hand him the Moral Lesson when I had him weak.

  One day he came to me as I was sitting in the club, and I could seethat he had had an idea. He looked happier than he had done in weeks.

  "Reggie," he said, "I'm on the trail. This time I'm convinced that Ishall pull it off. I've remembered something of vital importance."

  "Yes?" I said.

  "I remember distinctly," he said, "that on Mary's last birthday we wenttogether to the Coliseum. How does that hit you?"

  "It's a fine bit of memorizing," I said; "but how does it help?"

  "Why, they change the programme every week there."

  "Ah!" I said. "Now you are talking."

  "And the week we went one of the turns was Professor Some One'sTerpsichorean Cats. I recollect them distinctly. Now, are we narrowingit down, or aren't we? Reggie, I'm going round to the Coliseum thisminute, and I'm going to dig the date of those Terpsichorean Cats outof them, if I have to use a crowbar."

  So that got him within six days; for the management treated us likebrothers; brought out the archives, and ran agile fingers over thepages till they treed the cats in the middle of May.

  "I told you it was May," said Bobbie. "Maybe you'll listen to meanother time."

  "If you've any sense," I said, "there won't be another time."

  And Bobbie said that there wouldn't.

  Once you get your memory on the run, it parts as if it enjoyed doing it.I had just got off to sleep that night when my telephone-bell rang. Itwas Bobbie, of course. He didn't apologize.

  "Reggie," he said, "I've got it now for certain. It's just come to me.We saw those Terpsichorean Cats at a matinee, old man."

  "Yes?" I said.

  "Well, don't you see that that brings it down to two days? It must havebeen either Wednesday the seventh or Saturday the tenth."

  "Yes," I said, "if they didn't have daily matinees at the Coliseum."

  I heard him give a sort of howl.

  "Bobbie," I said. My feet were freezing, but I was fond of him.

  "Well?"

  "I've remembered something too. It's this. The day you went to theColiseum I lunched with you both at the Ritz. You had forgotten tobring any money with you, so you wrote a cheque."

  "But I'm always writing cheques."

  "You are. But this was for a tenner, and made out to the hotel. Hunt upyour cheque-book and see how many cheques for ten pounds payable to theRitz Hotel you wrote out between May the fifth and May the tenth."

  He gave a kind of gulp.

  "Reggie," he said, "you're a genius. I've always said so. I believeyou've got it. Hold the line."

  Presently he came back again.

  "Halloa!" he said.

  "I'm here," I said.

  "It was the eighth. Reggie, old man, I----"

  "Topping," I said. "Good night."

  It was working along into the small hours now, but I thought I might aswell make a night of it and finish the thing up, so I rang up an hotelnear the Strand.

  "Put me through to Mrs. Cardew," I said.

  "It's late," said the man at the other end.

  "And getting later every minute," I said. "Buck along, laddie."

  I waited patiently. I had missed my beauty-sleep, and my feet hadfrozen hard, but I was past regrets.

  "What is the matter?" said Mary's voice.

  "My feet are cold," I said. "But I didn't call you up to tell you thatparticularly. I've just been chatting with Bobbie, Mrs. Cardew."

  "Oh! is that Mr. Pepper?"

  "Yes. He's remembered it, Mrs. Cardew."

  She gave a sort of scream. I've often thought how interesting it mustbe to be one of those Exchange girls. The things they must hear, don'tyou know. Bobbie's howl and gulp and Mrs. Bobbie's scream and all aboutmy feet and all that. Most interesting it must be.

  "He's remembered it!" she gasped. "Did you tell him?"

  "No."

  Well, I hadn't.

  "Mr. Pepper."

  "Yes?"

  "Was he--has he been--was he very worried?"

  I chuckled. This was where I was billed to be the life and soul of theparty.

  "Worried! He was about the most worried man between here and Edinburgh.He has been worrying as if he was paid to do it by the nation. He hasstarted out to worry after breakfast, and----"

  Oh, well, you can never tell with women. My idea was that we shouldpass the rest of the night slapping each other on the back across thewire, and telling each other what bally brainy conspirators we were,don't you know, and all that. But I'd got just as far as this, when shebit at me. Absolutely! I heard the snap. And then she said "Oh!" inthat choked kind of way. And when a woman says "Oh!" like that, itmeans all the bad words she'd love to say if she only knew them.

  And then she began.

  "What brutes men are! What horrid brutes! How you could stand by andsee poor dear Bobbie worrying himself into a fever, when a word fromyou would have put everythin
g right, I can't----"

  "But----"

  "And you call yourself his friend! His friend!" (Metallic laugh, mostunpleasant.) "It shows how one can be deceived. I used to think you akind-hearted man."

  "But, I say, when I suggested the thing, you thought it perfectly----"

  "I thought it hateful, abominable."

  "But you said it was absolutely top----"

  "I said nothing of the kind. And if I did, I didn't mean it. I don'twish to be unjust, Mr. Pepper, but I must say that to me there seems tobe something positively fiendish in a man who can go out of his way toseparate a husband from his wife, simply in order to amuse himself bygloating over his agony----"

  "But----!"

  "When one single word would have----"

  "But you made me promise not to----" I bleated.

  "And if I did, do you suppose I didn't expect you to have the sense tobreak your promise?"

  I had finished. I had no further observations to make. I hung up thereceiver, and crawled into bed.

  * * * * *

  I still see Bobbie when he comes to the club, but I do not visitthe old homestead. He is friendly, but he stops short of issuinginvitations. I ran across Mary at the Academy last week, and her eyeswent through me like a couple of bullets through a pat of butter. Andas they came out the other side, and I limped off to piece myselftogether again, there occurred to me the simple epitaph which, when Iam no more, I intend to have inscribed on my tombstone. It was this:"He was a man who acted from the best motives. There is one born everyminute."