Right Ho, Jeeves

nothing—merely snorted. There was something about the thought of these people carelessly revelling at a time when, for all they knew, I was probably being dragged about the countryside by goats or chewed by elephants, that struck home at me like a poisoned dart. It was the sort of thing you read about as having happened just before the French Revolution—the haughty nobles in their castles callously digging in and quaffing while the unfortunate blighters outside were suffering frightful privations.
    The voice of the Bassett cut in on these mordant reflections:
    “Bertie.”
    “Hullo!”
    Silence.
    “Hullo!” I said again.
    No response. Whole thing rather like one of those telephone conversations where you sit at your end of the wire saying: “Hullo! Hullo!” unaware that the party of the second part has gone off to tea.
    Eventually, however, she came to the surface again:
    “Bertie, I have something to say to you.”
    “What?”
    “I have something to say to you.”
    “I know. I said ‘What?’”
    “Oh, I thought you didn’t hear what I said.”
    “Yes, I heard what you said, all right, but not what you were going to say.”
    “Oh, I see.”
    “Right-ho.”
    So that was straightened out. Nevertheless, instead of proceeding she took time off once more. She stood twisting the fingers and scratching the gravel with her foot. When finally she spoke, it was to deliver an impressive boost:
    “Bertie, do you read Tennyson?”
    “Not if I can help.”
    “You remind me so much of those Knights of the Round Table in the ‘Idylls of the King’.”
    Of course I had heard of them—Lancelot, Galahad and all that lot, but I didn’t see where the resemblance came in. It seemed to me that she must be thinking of a couple of other fellows.
    “How do you mean?”
    “You have such a great heart, such a fine soul. You are so generous, so unselfish, so chivalrous. I have always felt that about you—that you are one of the few really chivalrous men I have ever met.”
    Well, dashed difficult, of course, to know what to say when someone is giving you the old oil on a scale like that. I muttered an “Oh, yes?” or something on those lines, and rubbed the billowy portions in some embarrassment. And there was another silence, broken only by a sharp howl as I rubbed a bit too hard.
    “Bertie.”
    “Hullo?”
    I heard her give a sort of gulp.
    “Bertie, will you be chivalrous now?”
    “Rather. Only too pleased. How do you mean?”
    “I am going to try you to the utmost. I am going to test you as few men have ever been tested. I am going–-”
    I didn’t like the sound of this.
    “Well,” I said doubtfully, “always glad to oblige, you know, but I’ve just had the dickens of a bicycle ride, and I’m a bit stiff and sore, especially in the—as I say, a bit stiff and sore. If it’s anything to be fetched from upstairs–-”
    “No, no, you don’t understand.”
    “I don’t, quite, no.”
    “Oh, it’s so difficult…. How can I say it?… Can’t you guess?”
    “No. I’m dashed if I can.”
    “Bertie—let me go!”
    “But I haven’t got hold of you.”
    “Release me!”
    “Re–-”
    And then I suddenly got it. I suppose it was fatigue that had made me so slow to apprehend the nub.
    “What?”
    I staggered, and the left pedal came up and caught me on the shin. But such was the ecstasy in the soul that I didn’t utter a cry.
    “Release you?”
    “Yes.”
    I didn’t want any confusion on the point.
    “You mean you want to call it all off? You’re going to hitch up with Gussie, after all?”
    “Only if you are fine and big enough to consent.”
    “Oh, I am.”
    “I gave you my promise.”
    “Dash promises.”
    “Then you really–-”
    “Absolutely.”
    “Oh, Bertie!”
    She seemed to sway like a sapling. It is saplings that sway, I believe.
    “A very parfait knight!” I heard her murmur, and there not being much to say after that, I excused myself on the ground that I had got about two pecks of dust down my back and would like to go and get my maid to put me into something loose.
    “You go back to Gussie,” I said, “and tell him that all is well.”
    She gave a sort of hiccup and, darting forward, kissed me on the forehead. Unpleasant, of course, but, as Anatole would say, I can take a few smooths with a rough. The next moment she was legging it for the dining-room, while I, having bunged the bicycle into a bush, made for the stairs.
    I need not dwell upon my buckedness.