Sunset at Blandings Read online

  A knock on the door interrupted his sombre meditations, the diffident knock of one not sure of his welcome, and Lord Emsworth entered looking like a refugee from a three-alarm fire. He had removed the dress clothes which his sister Florence compelled him to don for dinner and put on the familiar baggy trousers and tattered shooting coat which few tramps would not have been too fastidious to appear in in public.

  ‘Ah, Mr. Smith,’ he said, ‘I hope I am not disturbing you.’

  Jeff, though solitude was above all what he desired at the moment, assured him that he was not, and Lord Emsworth wandered to and fro, picking things up and dropping them, his habit when in a room new to him.

  ‘I thought you might like to come and see the Empress by moonlight,’ he said in the manner of someone inviting a friend to take a look at the Taj Mahal.

  Six simultaneous things he would have preferred to do flashed through Jeff’s mind, but consideration for a host of whom he had become very fond kept him from mentioning them and he replied that that would just make his day.

  ‘But will she be up?’ he asked, and Lord Emsworth asked up where.

  ‘Won’t she have gone to bed?’

  ‘Oh, no, she always has a snack at about this hour.’

  ‘Bran mash?’

  ‘That and the other things prescribed by Wolfe-Lehmann. According to Wolfe-Lehmann, whose advice I follow to the letter, a pig to be in health must consume daily nourishment amounting to fifty-seven hundred calories, these to consist of proteins four pounds seven ounces, carbohydrates twenty-five pounds.’

  ‘It doesn’t leave her much time for anything else.’

  ‘No, she has few other interests.’

  ‘Nothing like sticking to what you do best.’

  ‘Exactly. We will go out by the back door and through the kitchen garden. It is the shortest way.’

  The route indicated took them past Beach’s pantry, and they could hear the butler’s fruity laugh, indicating that Gally was telling him some humorous story from his deplorable youth. It surprised Jeff that anyone could laugh in the world as at present constituted. He himself was sunk in a gloom on which not even the prospect of seeing Empress of Blandings by moonlight could make an impression.

  Lord Emsworth, on the other hand, was bright and chatty. He had returned to the subject of Sir Gregory Parsloe, on which he knew that his young friend would wish to be fully informed. It was not far to the Empress’s sty, and the Parsloe saga provided absorbing, if one-sided conversation all the way. If Jeff had had any doubts as to the depths of infamy to which baronets could sink,[39] they were resolved by the time he reached his destination. He did not suppose he would ever meet Sir Gregory Parsloe, but if he did he told himself he would be careful not to buy a used car from him.

  At the sty Lord Emsworth paused.

  ‘Have you a flask with you?’ he asked.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘A flask of whisky.’

  This surprised Jeff. He had not suspected his host of being a drinking man, and in any case it seemed to him that the other might have quenched his thirst before leaving the house. He said he was sorry but he had not, and Lord Emsworth looked relieved.

  ‘I asked because on one occasion somebody drank from a flask while at the rails of the sty and dropped it into the Empress’s trough,[40] and I am sorry to say that she became completely intoxicated. My brother Galahad, I remember, suggested that she ought to join Alcoholics Anonymous, and I was very doubtful whether the committee would accept a pig. Fortunately we discovered the truth. But it was an anxious time.’

  ‘It just shows you,’ said Jeff.

  ‘It does indeed,’ said Lord Emsworth.

  The Empress, as predicted, was having a late snack, and for what seemed to Jeff several hours they stood gazing at her. Eventually she appeared to feel that she had had sufficient to see her through till breakfast and retired to the covered portion of the sty, there to curl up and get the wholesome slumber which Wolfe-Lehmann no doubt considered essential to her health. Reluctantly Lord Emsworth led the way back to the house, and Jeff was privileged to hear how Sir Gregory Parsloe, stopping at nothing, had decoyed George Cyril Wellbeloved, Lord Emsworth’s superbly gifted pig man, from service at the castle to his own employment.

  Entering through the back door, they separated, Lord Emsworth to proceed to his room and read Whiffle’s On the Care of the Pig[41] for an hour or so before going to bed, Jeff to fulfil his original intention of sitting on the terrace in the moonlight.

  It was soon after this that Gally bade Beach good night and Beach, having heard Lord Emsworth come in and remembering how often after these night expeditions he forgot to lock up, went to inspect the back door.

  It was as he had thought. The door was not locked.

  He locked it.

  Jeff, meanwhile, thankful to be alone, though naturally sorry that he was to hear no more about Sir Gregory Parsloe, continued to sit in the moonlight, smoking his pipe and looking on the dark side of things.

  Jeff was one of those rare young men whose hearts, once bestowed, are bestowed for ever. In a world filled to overflowing with male butterflies flitting and sipping and then moving on to flit and sip somewhere else he remained as steadfast as Jacob or any of the others who became famous for their constancy. He had fallen in love with Vicky at their first meeting and he had been in love with her ever since, and the fact that he was now so low in her estimation made no difference to him. He had friends who in the same position, deprived of the girl they loved, would have consoled themselves with the thought that there would be another one along in a minute, but this easy philosophy was not for J. G. Bennison. The current situation made J. G. Bennison feel that hope was dead.

  How long he would have sat there had nothing occurred to divert his thoughts, he could not have said, but one of the charms of the English climate is its ability to change from high summer to midwinter in a matter of minutes, and a bitter wind springing up from the east persuaded him that he would be more comfortable in bed.

  It is rather saddening to think that his first emotion on reaching the back door and finding it locked was a surge of anti-Lord Emsworth feeling, for there was nothing to indicate that that absentminded peer was not responsible for the devastating act. Nothing could be truer to form than that his host should have locked up, completely forgetting that he had left a companion out on the terrace. Showing once again that in human affairs it is always the wrong man who gets the blame. Beach, who should have played the stellar role in Jeff’s commination service, escaped without a curse.

  Two courses were open to Jeff. He could ring bells and hammer on doors till he roused the house or he could stay outside for the night. Neither appealed to him. It was improbable that the first alternative would bring Lady Florence down in a dressing gown, but it was a possibility, and the thought of being pierced by those icy eyes was one that intimidated even a Smith who knew what fear was only by hearsay. On the other hand, with the wind freshening, remaining in the great outdoors offered few attractions.

  It was as he stood there, this way and that dividing the swift mind, as somebody once put it, that he had a vague recollection, when on the terrace, of having seen an open window not very far above him, a window well within the reach of one who in his undergraduate days at Oxford had mastered the knack of climbing up walls and sliding through windows after lock-up. He had wondered whose it was.

  Externally Blandings Castle might have been specially designed for the climber’s convenience. Stout strands of ivy had been allowed to flourish on its walls till the merest novice would have experienced no difficulty in finding his way up.

  A minute later he was window bound, glad to find that the old skill had not deserted him. Five minutes later he was across the sill. And twenty-five seconds after that the quiet night was disturbed by a noise like the shattering of a hundred dishes falling from the hands of a hundred waiters, and he was staggering across the floor with a bruised shin and drenched trouser l
egs. The occupant of the room, as he was to discover later, had placed beneath the window a jug full of water, several assorted fire irons, a chair, a picture of sheep in a meadow and another picture of a small girl nursing a kitten.

  Lights flashed on, and a voice spoke, the voice of Claude Duff.

  ‘Stick ‘em up, or I shoot,’ it said. ‘It’s all right shooting a burglar,’ it added. ‘I asked my solicitor.’[42]

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  THAT JEFF, climbing through the window in the dark, should have become entangled in fire irons, jugs of water and pictures of sheep and kittens was not surprising, for these had been stacked in close ranks, impossible to avoid. It was also less than extraordinary that he should have felt irritated with Claude Duff. A drier and less bruised man might have applauded Claude’s prudence in consulting his solicitor before starting to take human life. Jeff felt only annoyance, and he expressed this in his opening words, which were:

  ‘Oh, don’t be a damned fool.’

  ‘Jeff!’ cried Claude in ringing tones, and Jeff snarled a reminder that danger lurked in addressing him thus. Who knew that Lady Florence was not even now with her hand on the door handle, all ready to join their little circle? The fire irons alone had made enough noise to wake a dozen Florences.

  ‘I thought you were a burglar,’ said Claude.

  ‘Well, I’m not.’

  ‘What are you exactly?’ Claude asked. ‘I mean, climbing up walls and sliding through windows. Conduct surely a bit on the eccentric side. No son of mine would do that sort of thing unless he were rehearsing for pantomime.’

  ‘I was locked out by old Emsworth,’ Jeff replied, though he should have said ‘old Beach’ . ‘He took me out to see his pig by moonlight, and he forgot that I had gone on to the terrace. Tell me,’ he went on more amiably, for the agony of his shin was now abating, ‘What were those things doing on the floor?’

  There was modest pride in Claude’s voice as he answered the question.

  ‘That was my own unaided idea. I can’t sleep without a window open, so I always open one and set a booby-trap in case of burglars. I’m glad you turned out not to be one, for between you and me I was stretching the facts a bit when I said I was going to shoot. I haven’t a gun.’

  ‘But all right otherwise?’

  ‘No complaints at all. I like it here. The slight crumpled rose leaf is that Piper’s sister will be arriving at any moment. She’s a terror.’

  ‘She can’t be worse than Florrie.’

  ‘My dear chap, she begins where the latter leaves off. Not that Lady Florence is a woman you would care to meet late at night down a dark alley. I was amazed when I thought she was Vicky’s mother. Great relief when I found she was only step.’

  ‘Vicky!’

  The word had shot from Jeff’s lips like a projectile.

  ‘She asked me to call her Vicky.’

  Jeff could not speak. He had not seen Claude Duff for some time, but he knew all about his uncanny gift for ensnaring the female heart. Women fell before him like ninepins and he was always falling before women. Not once but on several occasions Jeff had had to listen to outpourings from him reminiscent of the Song of Solomon. And Vicky, her eyes opened to the defects of J. G. Bennison, would be quite likely to fall under his spell, if she had not fallen already. Jeff had lost her, no argument about that, but that did not debar him from being shocked, horrified, appalled and rendered speechless by the prospect of her becoming another’s.

  Claude took advantage of his dumbness to proceed.

  ‘I wouldn’t say this to anyone except you, Jeff, but I’m in love. I’ve thought I was several times, I know, but this is the real thing. She was with Mr. Threepwood when I arrived yesterday, and he introduced us. “This is my niece Miss Underwood,” he said, and in a flash something told me I had met my ideal. It was the way she looked. You’ve probably not noticed, but she has a sort of sad expression, as if she had had some great sorrow in her life. One longs to pick her up and kiss her and comfort her. Do you believe in love at first sight, Jeff?’

  Long association with Claude had given Jeff plenty of opportunity of making up his mind about this phenomenon, even if he had not had his own experience to guide him, but still unable to speak, he answered neither in the affirmative or the negative, and Claude continued.

  ‘It’s an odd thing that this should have happened, because up till now I’ve always been attracted by tallish girls, and Vicky’s so small and dainty. What are those statuette things you hear people talking about? Tan something.’

  Jeff was apparently unable to help him, for he remained silent.

  ‘Tan?’ said Claude, snapping his fingers. ‘Tan? Tan? Tanagra,’ he said, inspired. ‘She’s a Tanagra statuette. I’ve never seen one, but I know what they must be like. Jeff, old man, do you think I have a chance. She’s not engaged to anybody, is she?’

  ‘No,’ said Jeff, speaking for the first time. It was a point on which he was well informed.

  ‘Then I may have a chance. Do you think I have a chance, Jeff? We got along like a couple of sailors on shore leave, and fortunately money is no problem. A secretary doesn’t make a fortune, though I hope you’ll stick old Emsworth for a packet when and if, but I can lay my hands on something better any time I want to. One of my uncles is Duff of Duff and Trotter, and he’s always after me to go into the business. I’ve held off so far because of the prestige of being with Piper, but now that I plan to get married …’

  Jeff could bear no more.

  ‘Good night,’ he said.

  ‘But, Jeff, don’t go yet, old man.’

  ‘Good night,’ said Jeff.

  It was with heart bowed down that he sought the seclusion of his bedroom. He had supposed it already bowed down about as far as it could go, but he realized now that he had underestimated its capabilities for sinking. There is a difference, subtle but well-marked, between the emotions of a lover who has been told by the girl he loves that all is over between them and those of a lover who, tottering from this blow, sees a Claude Duff beginning to exercise his fascinations on her. In the former case he has a hope, if only a weak one; in the latter, merely despair.

  Jeff was a modest man and could think clearly, and he was miserably conscious that between himself and a charmer like Claude Duff there could be no contest. Take looks, for instance. They ought not to count, but they do. And he was what dramatic critics call adequate. Claude was spectacular.

  Claude could play the piano, always a gift of maximum assistance to a wooer. And in addition to this he had only to fall in with his uncle’s wishes to have plenty of money at his disposal. It was ridiculous to hope to compete with a man so armed at every point.

  With Jeff so sunk in the slough of despond it might have seemed that nothing could bring him even momentarily to the surface; but that this feat could be accomplished was proved before he had gone the length of the corridor. All that was needed was for someone to steal up behind him, tap him on the shoulder and say ‘Ho’. Sergeant Murchison, appearing from nowhere, did this, and Jeff came out of his thoughts with a start which could not have been more violent, if, like Lord Emsworth’s pig man, he had seen the White Lady of Blandings.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THE TROUBLE about being the chronicler of a place like Blandings Castle, where someone is always up to something and those who are not up to something are up to something else, is that you have so many people to write about that you tend to push quite deserving characters into the background. Sergeant Murchison is a case in point. Mention, it is true, has been made of him from time to time, but only casual mention. Not a word has been said of the way he felt about things, not a syllable concerning his love for Marilyn Poole, Lady Diana’s maid, and the public is left without a clue as to whether he liked his daily duties or disliked them.

  Now it can be told. His daily duties gave him the heeby-jeebies. In jaundiced mood he regarded himself as a bird in a gilded cage. It was as distasteful to him to have to follow Sir Jam
es Piper wherever he went as it was to Sir James to be followed. Often he thought wistfully of the brave old days when he had been a simple constable walking a beat in Whitechapel or Bottleton East with platoons of drunks and disorderlies on every side, inviting him to make a pinch. Where, he asked himself bitterly, were those pinches now? Gone with the wind, one with Nineveh and Tyre.

  It can be readily appreciated, therefore, that when, smoking at his window and thinking of Marilyn and her distressing habit of flirting with Sir James’s chauffeur, he saw a sinister figure climbing up the castle wall, he had felt as the poet Wordsworth used to do when he beheld a rainbow in the sky. (Wordsworth’s heart, it will be remembered, always leaped up when this happened.) To race downstairs would have been with him the work of an instant if he had not slowed himself up by tripping over a loose mat.

  However, the marauder was still there when he reached the corridor, so he crept up behind him, tapped him on the shoulder and said ‘Ho’.

  The effect of this on Jeff was electrical. To have hands tapping him on the shoulder and voices saying ‘Ho’ where no hands or voices should have been would have startled the most phlegmatic man. He rose perhaps six inches into the air and came to earth too short of breath to speak. Sergeant Murchison took it on himself to keep the conversation going.

  ‘You’re pinched,’ he said.

  ‘Pinched!’ said Jeff, recovering enough breath for the simple monosyllable.