Short Fiction, P. G. Wodehouse [books for 20 year olds .txt] 📗

heard you⁠—unknowingly, of course⁠—doing a good man a grave injustice.”

“Mr. Callender could have defended himself if he had wished.”

“I was not referring to George. The injustice was to myself.”

“To you?”

“I was the sole author of this afternoon’s little drama. I like George, but I cannot permit him to pose in any way as my collaborator. George has old-fashioned ideas. He does not keep abreast of the times. He can write plays, but he needs a man with a big brain to boom them for him. So, far from being entitled to any credit for this afternoon’s work, he was actually opposed to it.”

“Then why did he pretend you had saved him?” she demanded.

“George’s,” said Mr. Mifflin, “is essentially a chivalrous nature. At any crisis demanding a display of the finer feelings he is there with the goods before you can turn round. His friends frequently wrangle warmly as to whether he is most like Bayard, Lancelot, or Happy Hooligan. Some say one, some the other. It seems that yesterday you saved him from a watery grave without giving him time to explain that he could save himself. What could he do? He said to himself, ‘She must never know!’ and acted accordingly. But let us leave George, and return⁠—”

“Thank you, Mr. Mifflin.” There was a break in her laugh. “I don’t think there is any necessity. I think I understand now. It was very clever of you.”

“It was more than cleverness,” said Mr. Mifflin, rising. “It was genius.”

A white form came to meet George as he re-entered the veranda.

“Mr. Callender!”

He stopped.

“I’m very sorry I said such horrid things to you just now. I have been talking to Mr. Mifflin, and I want to say I think it was ever so nice and thoughtful of you. I understand everything.”

George did not, by a good deal; but he understood sufficient for his needs. He shot forward as if some strong hand were behind him with a needle.

“Miss Vaughan⁠—Mary⁠—I⁠—”

“I think I hear aunt calling,” said she.

But a benevolent Providence has ordained that aunts cannot call forever; and it is on record that when George entered his box on the two hundredth night of that great London success, Fate’s Footballs, he did not enter it alone.

Misunderstood

The profession of Mr. James (“Spider”) Buffin was pocket-picking. His hobby was revenge. James had no objection to letting the sun go down on his wrath. Indeed, it was after dark that he corrected his numerous enemies most satisfactorily. It was on a dark night, while he was settling a small score against one Kelly, a mere acquaintance, that he first fell foul of Constable Keating, whose beat took him through the regions which James most frequented.

James, having “laid for” Mr. Kelly, met him in a murky side-street down Clerkenwell way, and attended to his needs with a sandbag.

It was here that Constable Keating first came prominently into his life. Just as James, with the satisfying feeling that his duty had been done, was preparing to depart, Officer Keating, who had been a distant spectator of the affair, charged up and seized him.

It was intolerable that he should interfere in a purely private falling-out between one gentleman and another, but there was nothing to be done. The policeman weighed close upon fourteen stone, and could have eaten Mr. Buffin. The latter, inwardly seething, went quietly, and in due season was stowed away at the Government’s expense for the space of sixty days.

Physically, there is no doubt that his detention did him good. The regular hours and the substitution of bread and water for his wonted diet improved his health thirty percent. It was mentally that he suffered. His was one of those just-as-good cheap-substitute minds, incapable of harbouring more than one idea at a time, and during those sixty days of quiet seclusion it was filled with an ever-growing resentment against Officer Keating. Every day, as he moved about his appointed tasks, he brooded on his wrongs. Every night was to him but the end of another day that kept him from settling down to the serious business of Revenge. To be haled to prison for correcting a private enemy with a sandbag⁠—that was what stung. In the privacy of his cell he dwelt unceasingly on the necessity for revenge. The thing began to take on to him the aspect almost of a Holy Mission, a sort of Crusade.

The days slipped by, bringing winter to Clerkenwell, and with it Mr. Buffin. He returned to his old haunts one Friday night, thin but in excellent condition. One of the first acquaintances he met was Officer Keating. The policeman, who had a good memory for faces, recognised him, and stopped.

“So you’re out, young feller?” he said genially. When not in the active discharge of his professional duties the policeman was a kindly man. He bore Mr. Buffin no grudge.

“Um,” said Mr. Buffin.

“Feeling fine, eh?”

“Um.”

“Goin’ round to see some of the chaps and pass them the time of day, I shouldn’t wonder?”

“Um.”

“Well, you keep clear of that lot down in Frith Street, young feller. They’re no good. And if you get mixed up with them, first thing you know, you’ll be in trouble again. And you want to keep out of that now.”

“Um.”

“If you never get into trouble,” said the policeman sententiously, “you’ll never have to get out of it.”

“Um,” said Mr. Buffin. If he had a fault as a conversationalist, it was a certain tendency to monotony, a certain lack of sparkle and variety in his small-talk.

Constable Keating, with a dignified but friendly wave of the hand, as one should say, “You have our leave to depart,” went on his way; while Mr. Buffin, raging, shuffled off in the opposite direction, thinking as hard as his limited mental equipment would allow him.

His thoughts, which were many and confused, finally composed themselves into some order. He arrived at a definite conclusion, which was that if the great settlement was to be carried through successfully it must be done when the policeman was off duty. Till then he had pictured himself