The inimitable Jeeves

in his firm at Johannesburg, and we are hoping that they will settle down there and do well.’
    I didn’t get the thing at all.
    ‘Friday? The day after tomorrow, do you mean?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘For South Africa?’
    ‘Yes. They leave on the Edinburgh Castle’
    ‘But what’s the idea? I mean, aren’t they in the middle of their term at Oxford?’
    Aunt Agatha looked at me coldly.
    ‘Do you positively mean to tell me, Bertie, that you take so little interest in the affairs of your nearest relatives that you are not aware that Claude and Eustace were expelled from Oxford over a fortnight ago?’
    ‘No, really?’
    ‘You are hopeless, Bertie. I should have thought that even you -‘
    ‘Why were they sent down?’
    ‘They poured lemonade on the Junior Dean of their college … I see nothing amusing in the outrage, Bertie.’
    ‘No, no, rather not,’ I said hurriedly. ‘I wasn’t laughing. Choking. Got something stuck in my throat, you know.’
    ‘Poor Emily,’ went on Aunt Agatha, ‘being one of those doting mothers who are the ruin of their children, wished to keep the boys in London. She suggested that they might cram for the Army. But I was firm. The Colonies are the only place for wild youths like Eustace and Claude. So they sail on Friday. They have been staying for the last two weeks with your Uncle Clive in Worcestershire. They will spend tomorrow night in London and catch the boat-train on Friday morning.’
    ‘Bit risky, isn’t it? I mean, aren’t they apt to cut loose a bit tomorrow night if they’re left all alone in London?’
    ‘They will not be left alone. They will be in your charge.’
    ‘Mine!’
    ‘Yes. I wish you to put them up in your flat for the night, and see that they do not miss the train in the morning.’
    ‘Oh, I say, no!’
    ‘Bertie!’
    ‘Well, I mean, quite jolly coves both of them, but I don’t know. They’re rather nuts, you know… Always glad to see them, of course, but when it comes to putting them up for the night -‘
    ‘Bertie, if you are so sunk in callous self-indulgence that you cannot even put yourself to this trifling inconvenience for the sake of-‘
    ‘Oh, all right,’ I said. ‘All right.’
    It was no good arguing, of course. Aunt Agatha always makes me feel as if I had gelatine where my spine ought to be. She’s one of those forceful females. I should think Queen Elizabeth I must have been something like her. When she holds me with her glittering eye and says, ‘Jump to it, my lad’, or words to that effect, I make it so without further discussion.
    When she had gone, I rang for Jeeves to break the news to him.
    ‘Oh, Jeeves,’ I said, ‘Mr Claude and Mr Eustace will be staying here tomorrow night.’
    ‘Very good, sir.’
    ‘I’m glad you think so. To me the outlook seems black and scaly. You know what those two lads are!’
    ‘Very high-spirited young gentlemen, sir.’
    ‘Blisters, Jeeves. Undeniable blisters. It’s a bit thick!’
    ‘Would there by anything further, sir?’
    At that, I’m bound to say, I drew myself up a trifle haughtily. We Woosters freeze like the dickens when we seek sympathy and meet with cold reserve. I knew what was up, of course. For the last day or so there had been a certain amount of coolness in the home over a pair of jazzy spats which I had dug up while exploring in the Burlington Arcade. Some dashed brainy cove, probably the chap who invented those coloured cigarette-cases, had recently had the rather topping idea of putting out a line of spats on the same system. I mean to say, instead of the ordinary grey and white, you can now get them in your regimental or school colours. And, believe me, it would have taken a chappie of stronger fibre than I am to resist the pair of Old Etonian spats which had smiled up at me from inside the window. I was inside the shop, opening negotiations, before it had even occurred to me that Jeeves might not approve. And I must say he had taken the thing a bit hardly. The fact of the matter is, Jeeves, though in many ways the best valet in London, is too conservative. Hide-bound, if you know what I mean, and an enemy to Progress.
    ‘Nothing further, Jeeves,’ I said, with quiet dignity.
    ‘Very good, sir.’
    He gave one frosty look at the spats and biffed off. Dash him!

    Anything merrier and brighter than the Twins, when they curvetted into the old flat while I was dressing for dinner the next night, I have never struck in my whole puff. I’m only about