Luck of the Bodkins (30 page)

Monty said he supposed so. In his present distraught state, he could not imagine ever eating again himself, but he presumed some people liked doing it.

'But what you tell me,' said Reggie, 'alters the entire lay-out.

With a couple of thousand tucked into my stocking, I can go West without a tremor. Lottie Blossom told me once that you could get a room for eight dollars a week in Hollywood and
a
second-hand car for five and, if you played your cards right, live entirely on the appetizers at other people's cocktail-parties. Why, dash it, I could make two thousand pounds last about twenty years.
’

Monty was interested not so much in his companion's living arrangements for the next two decades as in the method by which he was proposing to place himself in a position to undertake the visit to California. He returned to the main point at issue.

'But, Reggie, you can't really get that mouse, can you?
’

‘
Of course.
’

'How?'

‘
Easy. It must be in Lottie's state-room.
’

'You mean you would go and look for it?
’

'Certainly. Pie. Take me about ten minutes.
’

This was not the first time that Monty Bodkin had found himself in the role of the capitalist who hires underlings to do sinister work for him. Not so many weeks had elapsed since in the smoking-room of Blandings Castle he had engaged Percy Pilbeam, that nasty little private investigator, to purloin the manuscript of the Hon. Galahad Threepwood's celebrated Memoirs. It was not, therefore, because the idea was new and strange to him that he now bit thoughtfully at his lower lip. It was because he was fond of Reggie and was experiencing much the same emotions as would have been his had the latter informed him of his intention of entering a tiger's cage.

'Suppose she catches you?' he said, quailing at the vision which the words conjured up.

'Ah!' said Reggie. 'That thought occurred to me, too. That's the thing we've got to give a little attention to. Lottie, roused, might be quite on the violent side. Yes, yes, we must not ignore that aspect of the matter. Ill tell you what, I'll just go and take a turn up and down the deck and bend the brain to it.'

There had been moments earlier that afternoon when Monty had chafed at the slowness o
f Albert Peasemarch's movements,
but the steward, for all that he was scant of breath and handicapped by a tender corn, seemed to him to have been sheet-lightning itself in comparison with Reggie. Hours, he felt, must have elapsed before the familiar form once more appeared in the doorway of the smoking-room.

But Reggie speedily cleared himself of any suspicion of having wasted his time. It was not day-dreams or idle conversations with fellow-passengers that had delayed him.

'It's all right,
’
he said. 'I've been talking; to Lottie. Everything's fixed.'

Monty was at a loss.

'What did you want to talk to her for?
’

'Strategy, my dear chap,' said Reggie with modest pride.
‘
‘
I
said I had come from you, acting as your agent. I said that you had told me all and had empowered me to offer her
a
hundred quid for the mouse.'

Monty became more fogged than ever. His friend's complacent manner, which seemed to suggest that he imagined himself to have accomplished a brilliant diplomatic coup, bewildered him.

'But what on earth was the good of that?
I
suppose she laughed herself sick?'

'She seemed amused, certainly. She explained, what I had already told you was the case, that money was no object. What she wanted, she said, and what she was jolly well going to get, was a job for Ambrose. I affected to reason with the girl, and in the end - what I was working up to, of course, in my snaky way - I said: "Well, listen, will you meet Monty tonight and talk it over?" And she said she would, at ten o'clock on the dot.'

‘
But, dash it-
^‘

'So you are to meet her then.
’
·Yes, but, dash it-' Reggie held up a hand.

'All right. I know what's on your mind. You're thinking of the risk of Gertrude seeing you chatting with Lottie. Is that it?'

Monty said that that was precisely it.

‘
Don't worry. You don't suppose I forgot that, do you?
I
have eliminated all risk. The tr
yst is arranged for the second-
class promenade deck. Don't forget the hour, because we shall be working to schedule. Ten o'clock to the tick.'

'Second-class promenade deck,' said Monty musing. 'Yes, that ought to be all right.'

'Of course it will be all right. How can there be any chance of Gertrude seeing you? First-class passengers don't go strolling all over the second-class. There can't be a hitch. At ten o'clock you will meet Lottie on the second-class promenade deck, she having told Ambrose that she is turning in early owing to a headache, and you will detain her there for a quarter of an hour or so, talking any sort of rot you like so long as it isn't bad enough to make your audience walk out on you. By the end of that period I shall have thoroughly scoured her state-room and got the mouse. I mean to say, we know the thing must be there, and there aren't so many spots in a state-room where a fairly sizeable Mickey Mouse could be, so there you are. See any flaws in that continuity?'

'Not a flaw.'

'Nor do I. Because there aren't any. It's money for jam. Tell me once again, for I like hearing the sound of the words, you'll really slip me -?'

Two thousand quid?'

Two thousand quid,
’
murmured Reggie, rolling the syllables round his tongue. 'Yes, you shall have it.'

'Don't say "it", old boy. Keep saying "two thousand quid
’’
. It's like wonderful music. Do you realize that if I arrive in Hollywood with two thousand
quid in my pocket there is noth
ing that I will not be able to accomplish?
’

'No?
’

'Literally nothing. I shall expect to own the place within the year. Two thousand quid I You couldn't sing it, could you? I should like to hear it sung.
’

Chapter
18

With the possible exception of a certain brand of cigarette -one puff of which, one gathers from the advertisements, will make a week-old corpse spring from its bier and dance the Carioca - there is nothing that so braces a girl up as a reconciliation with the man she loves. As Gertrude Butterwick tripped to her state-room after dinner that night to fetch
a
forgotten handkerchief, she came as near to floating on air as was within the scope of one who, owing to years of developing her physique with hockey and other outdoor sports, weighed
a
hundred and thirty-three pounds in her step-ins. An afternoon of roseate dreams, topped off by a warm salt-water bath and
a
substantial meal, had put her i
n the pink. Her step was jaunty,
Her eyes sparkled. She seemed full of yeast.

Markedly different was the demeanour of Albert Pease
’
march, whom she found in the state-room tidying up for the night. The steward was breathing heavily, and there was on his face an anxious, careworn look, as if he had just glanced out of a port-hole and seen his mother searching for her spectacles on an iceberg.

His gloom was so pronounced that Gertrude felt compelled to inquire into it. His appearance quite shocked her. Hitherto, she had always known the steward, if not actually as a ray of sunshine, certainly as cheerful and respectfully vivacious. It was as if a new and strange Albert Peasemarch now stood before her, a Peasemarch into whose soul the iron had entered.

'Is anything the matter?' she asked.

Albert Peasemarch heaved a heavy sigh.

'Nothing that you can cure, miss,' he replied, picking up
a
shoe from the floor, breathing on it, and placing it in a cupboard.

'You seem to be in trouble.
’

‘I
am in trouble, miss.'

‘
You're sure I can't do anything?
’

'Nothing, miss. It's just Fate,' said Albert Peasemarch, and walked sombrely into the bathroom to fold towels.

Gertrude lingered uncertainly in the doorway. She had secured the handkerchief for which she had come, but she was feeling that to go away and leave this sufferer alone with his grief would be inhuman. It was obvious that pain and anguish were racking Albert Peasemarch's brow, and nobody who had studied the works of the poet Scott at school could fail to be aware that in such circumstances a woman's duty was clear. Always kind-hearted, Gertrude Butterwick was tonight more than ever in the mood to play the role of ministering angel.

As she stood hesitating the steward uttered a sudden loud moan. There was no mistaking the note of agony. Gertrude decided to remain and, though he had said that there was nothing that she could do, at least to offer first aid.

'What did you say?' she asked as he emerged.

‘
When, miss?'

'I thought I heard you say something.
’
'In there in the bathroom?' 'Yes.
’

'Merely that I was the Bandollero, miss,
’
said Albert Peasemarch, still with that same inspissated gloom.

Gertrude was perplexed. The word seemed somehow vaguely familiar, but she could not identify it.

The Bandollero?
’
^;

‘
Yes, miss.
’

‘
What's a Bandollero?
’

There, miss, you have me. I've an idea it's a sort of Spanish brigand or bandit.'

Enlightenment flooded upon Gertrude.

'Oh, you mean the Bandolero? You were singing that song, "The Bandolero". I didn't recognize it. It's a favourite song of Mr Bodkin's. I know it well.
’

Albert Peasemarch's face twisted with uncontrollable emotion.

'I wish I did,' he said mournfully. 'I keep forgetting the second verse.'

Gertrude's perplexity returned. 'But does that worry you?' 'Yes, miss.'

'I mean, why not just hum it?
’

'Humming is no good, miss. It would not satisfy the public's demands. I've got to s
ing it' 'In public, do you mean?
'

'Yes, miss. Tonight, at the second-class concert. This very night as near ten o'clock as may be, I shall be standing up on that platform in the second-class saloon, going through with it And where am I going to get off if I can't even pronounce the word, let alone remember verse two? You say it's not Ban-dollero...'

'No, I know it's not Bandollero.
’

'But how are we to know whether it's Bandol-tfro or Ban-dol-a
’
ro?' 'Try it both ways.'

Albert Peasemarch heaved another of his heavy sighs.

'Have you ever considered the extraordinary workings of Fate, miss? Makes you think a bit, that does. Why am I in this position, faced with singing "The Bandoll" - or rather - "lero" or "lairo" at the second-class concert tonight? Purely and simply because a gentleman named J. G. Garges took it into his head to travel on this boat'

‘I
don't understand.'

'It's intricket,' agreed Albert Peasemarch with a sort of moody satisfaction. 'And yet at the same time, if you follow me, it's not intricket at all, but quite simple. If Mr J. G. Garges wasn't on board, I wouldn't be in the position what I am. And when you consider all the various things - the chain of circumstances, as you might call it - that had to happen to get him on board at this particular time ... well, it just makes you realize what helpless prawns we all are in the clutches of a remorseless -'

'Who is Mr Garges?'

'One of the second-class passengers, miss. Beyond that
I
know nothing, him being merely a name to me. But here he is, travelling in the second cabin of this boat, and I want you to look at how Fate has brought that about, miss. Take a simple aspect of the matter. J. G. Garges must have had croup or measles or such-like during his infancy as a child. ... You concede that, miss?' 'Yes, I suppose so.
’