Blandings Castle and Elsewhere (9 page)

'What do you mean, sixty?' demanded his lordship, with
the warmth of a man who would be that next birthday. 'My
poor father was seventy-seven when he was killed in the
hunting-field. My uncle Robert lived till nearly ninety. My
cousin Claude was eighty-four when he broke his neck trying
to jump a five-barred gate. My mother's brother, Alistair ...'

'Don't!' said the girl with a little shudder. 'Don't! It makes it
all seem so awful and hopeless.'

Yes, that was Gertrude: and in Lord Emsworth's opinion she
needed company.

The reactions of Lord Emsworth to the young man Popjoy,
when he encountered him for the first time in the drawing-room
shortly before dinner, were in the beginning wholly favourable.
His son's friend was an extraordinarily large and powerful person
with a frank, open, ingenuous face about the colour of the inside
of a salmon, and he seemed a little nervous. That, however, was
in his favour. It was, his lordship felt, a pleasant surprise to find
in one of the younger generation so novel an emotion as
diffidence.

He condoned, therefore, the other's trick of laughing
hysterically even when the subject under discussion was the
not irresistibly ludicrous one of green-fly in the rose-garden.
He excused him for appearing to find something outstandingly
comic in the statement that the glass was going up. And when,
springing to his feet at the entrance of Gertrude, the young man
performed some complicated steps in conjunction with a table
covered with china and photograph-frames, he joined in the
mirth which the feat provoked not only from the visitor but
actually from Gertrude herself.

Yes, amazing though it might seem, his niece Gertrude, on
seeing this young Popjoy, had suddenly burst into a peal of happy
laughter. The gloom of the last two weeks appeared to be gone.
She laughed. The young man laughed. They proceeded down to
dinner in a perfect gale of merriment, rather like a chorus of
revellers exiting after a concerted number in an old-fashioned
comic opera.

And at dinner the young man had spilt his soup, broken a
wine-glass, and almost taken another spectacular toss when
leaping up at the end of the meal to open the door. At which
Gertrude had laughed, and the young man had laughed, and his
lordship had laughed – though not, perhaps, quite so heartily as
the young folks, for that wine-glass had been one of a set which
he valued.

However, weighing profit and loss as he sipped his port, Lord
Emsworth considered that the ledger worked out on the right
side. True, he had taken into his home what appeared to be a
half-witted acrobat: but then any friend of his son Frederick was
bound to be weak in the head, and, after all, the great thing
was that Gertrude seemed to appreciate the newcomer's society.
He looked forward contentedly to a succession of sunshine days
of peace, perfect peace with loved ones far away; days when he
would be able to work in his garden without the fear, which had
been haunting him for the last two weeks, of finding his niece
drooping wanly at his side and asking him if he was wise to stand
about in the hot sun. She had company now that would occupy
her elsewhere.

His lordship's opinion of his guest's mental deficiencies was
strengthened late that night when, hearing footsteps on the
terrace, he poked his head out and found him standing beneath
his window, blowing kisses at it.

At the sight of his host he appeared somewhat confused.

'Lovely evening,' he said, with his usual hyenaesque laugh. 'I –
er – thought ... or, rather ... that is to say... Ha, ha, ha!'

'Is anything the matter?'

'No, no! No! No, thanks, no! No! No, no! I – er – ho, ho, ho! –
just came out for a stroll, ha, ha!'

Lord Emsworth returned to his bed a little thoughtfully.
Perhaps some premonition of what was to come afflicted his
subconscious mind, for, as he slipped between the sheets, he
shivered. But gradually, as he dozed off, his equanimity became
restored.

Looking at the thing in the right spirit, it might have been
worse. After all, he felt, the mists of sleep beginning to exert their usual
beneficent influence, he might have been entertaining at Blandings Castle
one of his nephews, or one of his sisters, or even – though this was
morbid – his younger son Frederick.

In matters where shades of feeling are involved, it is not
always easy for the historian to be as definite as he could wish.
He wants to keep the record straight, and yet he cannot take any
one particular moment of time, pin it down for the scrutiny of
Posterity and say 'This was the moment when Lord Emsworth
for the first time found himself wishing that his guest would
tumble out of an upper window and break his neck.' To his
lordship it seemed that this had been from the beginning his
constant day-dream, but such was not the case. When, on the
second morning of the other's visit, the luncheon-gong had
found them chatting in the library and the young man, bounding
up, had extended a hand like a ham and, placing it beneath
his host's arm, gently helped him to rise, Lord Emsworth had
been quite pleased by the courteous attention.

But when the fellow did the same thing day after day, night
after night, every time he caught him sitting; when he offered
him an arm to help him across floors; when he assisted him up
stairs, along corridors, down paths, out of rooms and into raincoats;
when he snatched objects from his hands to carry them
himself; when he came galloping out of the house on dewy
evenings laden down with rugs, mufflers, hats and, on one
occasion, positively a blasted respirator ... why, then Lord Emsworth's
proud spirit rebelled. He was a tough old gentleman and,
like most tough old gentlemen, did not enjoy having his juniors
look on him as something pathetically helpless that crawled the
earth waiting for the end.

It had been bad enough when Gertrude was being the Little
Mother. This was infinitely worse. Apparently having conceived
for him one of those unreasoning, overwhelming devotions, this
young Popjoy stuck closer than a brother; and for the first time
Lord Emsworth began to appreciate what must have been the
feelings of that Mary who aroused a similar attachment in
the bosom of her lamb. It was as if he had been an Oldest
Inhabitant fallen into the midst of a troop of Boy Scouts, all
doing Good Deeds simultaneously, and he resented it with an
indescribable bitterness. One can best illustrate his frame of
mind by saying that, during the last phase, if he had been called
upon to choose between his guest and Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe
as a companion for a summer ramble through the
woods, he would have chosen Sir Gregory.

And then, on top of all this, there occurred the episode of
the step-ladder.

The Hon. Freddie Threepwood, who had decided to run
down and see how matters were developing, learned the details
of this rather unfortunate occurrence from his cousin Gertrude.
She met him at Market Blandings Station, and he could
see there was something on her mind. She had not become
positively Maeterlinckian again, but there was sorrow in her
beautiful eyes: and Freddie, rightly holding that with a brainy
egg like himself directing her destinies they should have contained
only joy and sunshine, was disturbed by this.

'Don't tell me the binge has sprung a leak,' he said anxiously.

Gertrude sighed.

'Well, yes and no.'

'What do you mean, yes and no? Properly worked, the thing
can't fail. This points to negligence somewhere. Has old Beefers
been ingratiating himself?'

'Yes.'

'Hanging on the guv'nor's every word? Interesting himself in
his pursuits? Doing him little services? And been at it two
weeks? Good heavens! By now the guv'nor should be looking
on him as a prize pig. Why isn't he?'

'I didn't say he wasn't. Till this afternoon I rather think he
was. At any rate, Rupert says he often found Uncle Clarence
staring at him in a sort of lingering, rather yearning way. But
when that thing happened this afternoon, I'm afraid he wasn't
very pleased.'

'What thing?'

'That step-ladder business. It was like this. Rupert and I sort
of went for a walk after lunch, and by the time I had persuaded
him that he ought to go and find Uncle Clarence and ingratiate
himself with him, Uncle Clarence had disappeared. So Rupert
hunted about for a long time and at last heard a snipping noise
and found him miles away standing on a step-ladder, sort of
pruning some kind of tree with a pair of shears. So Rupert said,
"Oh, there you are!" And Uncle Clarence said, Yes, there he was,
and Rupert said, "Ought you to tire yourself? Won't you let me
do that for you?"'

'The right note,' said Freddie approvingly. 'Assiduity. Zeal.
Well?'

'Well, Uncle Clarence said, "No, thank you! – Rupert thinks
it was "Thank you" – and Rupert stood there for a bit, sort of
talking, and then he suddenly remembered and told Uncle
Clarence that you had just 'phoned that you were coming
down this evening, and I think Uncle Clarence must have got
a touch of cramp or something, because he gave a kind of sudden
sharp groan, Rupert says, and sort of quivered all over. This
made the steps wobble, of course, so Rupert dashed forward to
steady them, and he doesn't know how it happened, but they
suddenly seemed to sort of shut up like a pair of scissors, and the
next thing he knew Uncle Clarence was sitting on the grass, not
seeming to like it much, Rupert says. He had ricked his ankle a
bit and shaken himself up a bit, and altogether, Rupert says, he
wasn't fearfully sunny. Rupert says he thinks he may have lost
ground a little.'

Freddie pondered with knit brows. He was feeling something
of the chagrin of a general who, after sweating himself to a
shadow planning a great campaign, finds his troops unequal to
carrying it out.

'It's such a pity it should have happened. One of the
vicars near here has just been told by the doctor that he's got to
go off to the south of France, and the living is in Uncle Clarence's
gift. If only Rupert could have had that, we could have
got married. However, he's bought Uncle Clarence some
lotion.'

Freddie started. A more cheerful expression came into his
sternly careworn face.

'Lotion?'

'For his ankle.'

'He couldn't have done better,' said Freddie warmly. 'Apart
from showing the contrite heart, he has given the guv'nor medicine, and medicine
to the guv'nor is what catnip is to the cat. Above all things he dearly loves
a little bit of amateur doctoring. As a rule he tries it on somebody else
– two years ago he gave one of the housemaids some patent ointment for
chilblains and she went screaming about the house – but, no doubt, now
that the emergency has occurred, he will be equally agreeable to treating
himself. Old Beefers has made the right move.'

In predicting that Lord Emsworth would appreciate the gift
of lotion, Freddie had spoken with an unerring knowledge of his
father's character. The master of Blandings was one of those
fluffy-minded old gentlemen who are happiest when experimenting
with strange drugs. In a less censorious age he would
have been a Borgia. It was not until he had retired to bed that he
discovered the paper-wrapped bottle on the table by his side.
Then he remembered that the pest Popjoy had mumbled something
at dinner about buying him something or other for his
injured ankle. He tore off the paper and examined the contents
of the bottle with a lively satisfaction. The liquid was a dingy
grey and sloshed pleasantly when you shook it. The name on the
label – Blake's Balsam – was new to him, and that in itself was a
recommendation.

His ankle had long since ceased to pain him, and to some men
this might have seemed an argument against smearing it with
balsam; but not to Lord Emsworth. He decanted a liberal dose
into the palm of his hand. He sniffed it. It had a strong, robust,
bracing sort of smell. He spent the next five minutes thoughtfully
rubbing it in. Then he put the light out and went to sleep.

It is a truism to say that in the world as it is at present
constituted few things have more far-reaching consequences
than the accident of birth. Lord Emsworth had probably suspected
this. He was now to receive direct proof. If he had been
born a horse instead of the heir to an earldom, that lotion would
have been just right for him. It was for horses, though the Rev.
Rupert Bingham had omitted to note the fact, that Blake had
planned his balsam; and anyone enjoying even a superficial
acquaintance with horses and earls knows that an important
difference between them is that the latter have the more sensitive
skins. Waking at a quarter to two from dreams of being
burned at the stake by Red Indians, Lord Emsworth found
himself suffering acute pain in the right leg.

He was a little surprised. He had not supposed that that fall
from the ladder had injured him so badly. However, being a
good amateur doctor, he bore up bravely and took immediate
steps to cope with the trouble. Having shaken the bottle till it
foamed at the mouth, he rubbed in some more lotion. It
occurred to him that the previous application might have been
too sketchy, so this time he did it thoroughly. He rubbed and
kneaded for some twenty minutes. Then he tried to go to sleep.

Nature has made some men quicker thinkers than others.
Lord Emsworth's was one of those leisurely brains. It was not till
nearly four o'clock that the truth came home to him. When it
did, he was just on the point of applying a fifth coating of the
balsam to his leg. He stopped abruptly, replaced the cork, and,
jumping out of bed, hobbled to the cold-water tap and put as
much of himself under it as he could manage.

The relief was perceptible, but transitory. At five he was out
again, and once more at half-past. At a quarter to six, succeeding
in falling asleep, he enjoyed a slumber, somewhat disturbed by
the intermittent biting of sharks, which lasted till a few minutes
past eight. Then he woke as if an alarm clock had rung, and
realized that further sleep was out of the question.