Jeeves in the Offing

only two days away, she must have been getting pretty uneasy about the continued absence of the big shot slated to address the young scholars on ideals and life in the world outside. If you are on the board of governors of a school and have contracted to supply an orator for the great day of the year, you can be forgiven for feeling a trifle jumpy when you learn that the silver-tongued one has gadded off to the metropolis, leaving no word as to when he will be returning, if ever. For all she knew, Upjohn might have got the holiday spirit and be planning to remain burning up the boulevards indefinitely, and of course nothing gives a big beano a black eye more surely than the failure to show up of the principal speaker. So now she quite naturally blossomed like a rose in June and asked if the old son of a bachelor had mentioned anything about when he was coming back.
‘He’s coming back tonight. He says he hopes you haven’t been worrying.’
A snort of about the calibre of an explosion in an ammunition dump escaped my late father’s sister.
‘Oh, does he? Well, I’ve a piece of news for him. I have been worrying. What’s kept him in London so long?’
‘He’s been seeing his lawyer about this libel action he’s bringing against the Thursday Review.’
I have often asked myself how many inches it was that Kipper leaped from his chair at these words. Sometimes I think it was ten, sometimes only six, but whichever it was he unquestionably came up from the padded seat like an athlete competing in the Sitting High Jump event. Scarface McColl couldn’t have risen more nippily.
‘Against the Thursday Review?’ said Aunt Dahlia. ‘That’s your rag, isn’t it, young Herring? What have they done to stir him up?’
‘It’s this book Daddy wrote about preparatory schools. He wrote a book about preparatory schools. Did you know he had written a book about preparatory schools?’
‘Hadn’t an inkling. Nobody tells me anything.’
‘Well, he wrote this book about preparatory schools. It was about preparatory schools.’
‘About preparatory schools, was it?’
‘Yes, about preparatory schools.’
‘Thank God we’ve got that straightened out at last. I had a feeling we should get somewhere if we dug long enough. And - ?’
‘And the Thursday Review said something libellous about it, and Daddy’s lawyer says the jury ought to give Daddy at least five thousand pounds. Because they libelled him. So he’s been in London all this time seeing his lawyer. But he’s coming back tonight. He’ll be here for the prize-giving, and I’ve got his speech all typed out and ready for him. Oh, there’s my precious Poppet,’ said Phyllis, as a distant barking reached the ears. ‘He’s asking for his dinner, the sweet little angel. All right, darling, Mother’s coming,’ she fluted, and buzzed off on the errand of mercy.
A brief silence followed her departure.
‘I don’t care what you say,’ said Aunt Dahlia at length in a defiant sort of way. ‘Brains aren’t everything. She’s a dear, sweet girl. I love her like a daughter, and to hell with anyone who calls her a half- wit. Why, hullo,’ she proceeded, seeing that Kipper was slumped back in his chair trying without much success to hitch up a drooping lower jaw. ‘What’s eating you, young Herring?’
I could see that Kipper was in no shape for conversation, so took it upon myself to explain.
‘A certain stickiness has arisen, aged relative. You heard what P. Mills said before going to minister to Poppet. Those words tell the story.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The facts are readily stated. Upjohn wrote this slim volume, which, if you recall, was about preparatory schools, and in it, so Kipper tells me, said that the time spent in these establishments was the happiest of our lives. Ye Ed passed it on to Kipper for comment, and he, remembering the dark days at Malvern House, Bramley-on-Sea, when he and I were plucking the gowans fine there, slated it with no uncertain hand. Correct, Kipper?’
He found speech, if you could call making a noise like a buffalo taking its foot out of a swamp finding speech.
‘But, dash it,’ he said, finding a bit more, ‘it was perfectly legitimate criticism. I didn’t mince my words, of course -‘
‘It would be interesting to find out what these unminced words were,’ said Aunt Dahlia, ‘for among them there appear to have been one or two which seem likely to set your proprietor back five thousand of the best and