Jeeves and the Wedding Bells(36)

BY THE TIME the commotion had finally died down, the dining room at Melbury Hall contained men only; and I hope it’s not ungallant to say that it seemed a better place for it.

Lady Hackwood had dispatched Amelia to inquire after Georgiana and had then taken Mrs Venables and Dame Judith up to her boudoir – there, one assumed, to coo over children’s photographs, swap horror stories about their husbands and, in Dame Judith’s case, to purge the outer garments of gooseberry.

In the dining room, Bicknell placed the port on the table and retired to his position in front of the double doors. I was told to clear the remains of the table while the men pushed up their chairs towards the host.

‘I think we’re all right for bowling,’ said Sir Henry, as though the events of dinner had been no more than a brief interruption. ‘I’ve got a local farmer called Harold Niblett. Runs like a Jehu, bowls like the wind. Useful bat as well. Beeching can open from the other end.’

‘Thank you, Sir Henry, but to be honest, I was only ever a net bowler,’ said Woody.

‘Good enough in this company,’ said Sir Henry. ‘And that footman Liddle, the one I sacked last week. He can show us his wobblers.’

‘Are you happy to have him back so soon?’ said Jeeves.

‘Not happy, Etringham, no. But needs must. I’ve paid him a guinea to bowl eight overs and keep his hands off the silver. You can turn your arm over, too, I expect.’

‘It has been many a year since I had the opportunity,’ said Jeeves. ‘I fear time’s wingèd chariot may have—’

‘Well, go up and have a net tomorrow. Get some practice. What about you, Venables? Do you bowl?’

‘No, I’m an opening batsman. The Nizam of Hyderabad was kind enough to say I reminded him of Victor Trumper. I field at first slip. Hands like flypaper, they tell me.’

‘All right.’ Sir Henry ran his eye up and down the ex-Collector like a buyer inspecting the goods at an Irish horse fair, but bit his tongue.

‘What about you, young Venables? Fancy a few overs?’

‘I barely know the rules, I’m afraid,’ said Rupert Venables. ‘My tastes always ran more to the aesthetic. At school I was allowed to miss games because I was needed in the art room, and then of course there was Cambridge.’

‘What happened there?’ said Woody.

‘A little punting,’ said Rupert. ‘And study, of course. As an undergraduate I was already developing my passion for travel.’

Sir Henry let out a noise like a mastiff sneezing and made a long arm for the port decanter. ‘Well, you can go in number eleven, then. Anyway, Etringham, we’re all right for bowling. What your man has to do is find me a pair of top-order batsmen.’

‘I feel confident that he will be able to do so by tomorrow evening. Might I venture to suggest a wager on the outcome of the match?’

Sir Henry’s face assumed a look of foxy interest. ‘What? A straight bet with their captain?’

‘I wonder if there could be a way of interesting the bookmaker in Dorchester,’ said Jeeves. ‘It is my experience of turf accountants that if they see a likely profit in it for themselves they are prepared to make a book on any event, however parochial. I might be able to link it to events at Ascot.’

‘Shall I leave that in your capable hands, Etringham?’

‘I should be happy to oblige. I assume that the abilities of the Dorset Gentlemen are well known in the district?’

‘They’ve been around for donkey’s years. The bookies should know their form all right.’

‘I remember,’ ‘Vishnu’ Venables began, ‘the final of the Uttar Pradesh Divisional Cup. One year it was held in Chanamasala, and as luck would have it I received a call from the Deputy High Commissioner saying, “Sidney, you’re the only man we can rely on …”’

I can’t say for what Venables was being relied on, however, as by this time I had finished my clearing and was dismissed by a nod from Bicknell, who was still on duty by the doors to the hall.

It was with considerable relief that I sat down at the kitchen table and passed a hand across the brow. My schoolboy role as Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream had involved me in memorising and speaking many more lines than had been required of me in the part of Wilberforce, stand-in footman; but the stakes had not been as high. A momentary lapse or fluff from me, and Boggis-Rolfe minor sat ready, text in hand, to provide the missing line. A slip-up from Wilberforce, on the other hand … I had no doubt that the mayhem that had been narrowly avoided would have made the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse look like the warm-up act at the Melbury Tetchett Gymkhana.