Jeeves and the Wedding Bells(41)
‘Bertie, if Amelia sees me making up to Woody she’ll tear me limb from limb. It won’t just be the straight-sets spanking on the tennis court, she’ll grind my bones to powder.’
‘But you can explain later. Anyway, you’re marrying Venables, so that’ll put an end to any lingering doubts.’
Georgiana stood up. ‘Yes, that’ll put an end to all doubts.’
‘So will you do it?’
There had been more silences now than at a Trappist convention – if they have such things – so another one at this juncture didn’t much surprise me.
‘Bertie,’ Georgiana said eventually, ‘I have to go back to work next week in London. We’ve been moving offices, which is why I’ve been able to have a few days down here. I’ve been working in my room.’
‘Have you by Jove? What on? Another potboiler from the intended?’
‘No, it’s a novel. It’s rather good, as a matter of fact. I’ll ask them to send you a copy. It’s a love story, but written by a man.’
‘Golly, that sounds unusual.’
‘Very.’
Georgiana was poised to go, with basket and secateurs aligned and ready for the off, but for some reason she hesitated.
She looked at me in a puzzled way. ‘You’re very kind, aren’t you?’
‘Am I?’
‘Yes. All this malarkey just to help an old friend. And I’ve seen the way you talk to the servants. Mrs Tilman told me they think the world of you. “A proper gentleman is Mr Wilberforce,” she said.’
‘She seems a thoroughly good egg herself.’
Still she hesitated. The length of limb, the wooden basket over the arm, the melancholy look … I wondered where the old Georgiana with the sparkle and appetite for crustacea had gone; the Mark Two version had a hint of the Lady of the Shalott, if that’s the girl I mean.
Then an odd thing happened. The big eyes filled and, all in a moment, overflowed.
She put a hand to her face and turned quickly, saying, ‘I’d better go back to work’, then vanished across the lawn.
I stilled an impulse to run after and console. It took some stilling, I admit; the Wooster code does not allow us to see a girl in tears without at least offering a shoulder and a pat on the back.
I hadn’t the faintest idea what had caused her to spring a leak, but some instinct told me to mind my own business as, with a plod like that of a ploughman on his homeward way, I took up the picnic basket and headed for the servants’ entrance.
My mood improved considerably when an hour or so later I had a cup of tea with Mrs Tilman in the kitchen.
‘You’re not needed at dinner tonight, Mr Wilberforce. Mr Hoad’s recovered from his funny turn.’
‘That’s exceptionally good news, Mrs T. I don’t think I was really cut out for waiting at table. It takes it out of a chap.’
‘Mr Bicknell had to drive Dame Judith’s dress to the cleaners in Dorchester. Lord Etringham told me he volunteered to pay the bill, seeing as it was his man who—’
‘Quite right too.’ I made a mental note to reimburse his lordship. ‘What’s Mrs Padgett cooking tonight?’
‘It’s a rack of lamb, come up from the butcher’s this morning. And then a tart with some strawberries.’
‘Sounds safe enough. Not too much fluid.’
‘And Lord Etringham says you’re to go up with him and Mr Beeching for a cricket practice at six o’clock.’
‘Right ho. You seem to bump into Lord Etringham rather a lot in the space of a single day.’
Mrs Tilman flushed a little. ‘It’s the housekeeper’s job to make sure everyone’s happy. Another cup, Mr W?’
The cricket pitch at Melbury Hall was a goodish walk from the house, at the far end of the estate. A five-bar gate beyond the boundary gave on to a lane leading down to the village; through this entrance the local yeomen had come and gone on a hundred years of Sundays, to play out their historic rivalries with Melbury Tetchett, Magnum in Parvo, Kingston St Jude and all points west.
It was a balmy evening as I sauntered up with Woody and Jeeves – or Lord Etringham as he remained until we were well down the crazy paving, through the Pineapple Gates and out of earshot of the house. To keep the charade intact, I was carrying Woody’s leather cricket bag, while he and Jeeves walked a few paces ahead.
A stout net stood beside the pitch, with three stumps at the batting end and a single one for the bowlers. To say that I was out of practice at our national game would be a … What’s the word? Li-something. Jeeves would know. Undershooting by a fair whack, anyway. I had once opened the bowling at private school when some plague had laid low the brightest and best; at Eton I had been a wet bob, though an ineffectual one, we Woosters tending to the willowy and the prejudice in the boat running to avoirdupois, and plenty of it. All in all, it had been more than a decade since the cream flannel had graced the limbs and it was with no small trepidation that I donned the protective gear beside the net while Jeeves and Woody windmilled their arms in somewhat menacing fashion.