Something New, P. G. Wodehouse [best desktop ebook reader .TXT] 📗

I didn’t get it. Bad men were abroad. That fellow with the spectacles, who was in the museum when I met you there this evening, swooped down from nowhere, and I had to tell him that you had rung for me to read to you. Fortunately I had this novel on me. I think he followed me upstairs to see whether I really did come to your room.”

Mr. Peters groaned miserably.

“Baxter,” he said; “He’s a man named Baxter⁠—Lord Emsworth’s private secretary; and he suspects us. He’s the man we⁠—I mean you⁠—have got to look out for.”

“Well, never mind. Let’s be happy while we can. Make yourself comfortable and I’ll start reading. After all, what could be pleasanter than a little literature in the small hours? Shall I begin?”

Ashe Marson found Joan Valentine in the stable yard after breakfast the next morning, playing with a retriever puppy. “Will you spare me a moment of your valuable time?”

“Certainly, Mr. Marson.”

“Shall we walk out into the open somewhere⁠—where we can’t be overheard?”

“Perhaps it would be better.”

They moved off.

“Request your canine friend to withdraw,” said Ashe. “He prevents me from marshaling my thoughts.”

“I’m afraid he won’t withdraw.”

“Never mind. I’ll do my best in spite of him. Tell me, was I dreaming or did I really meet you in the hall this morning at about twenty minutes after two?”

“You did.”

“And did you really tell me that you had come to the castle to steal⁠—”

“Recover.”

“⁠—Recover Mr. Peters’ scarab?”

“I did.”

“Then it’s true?”

“It is.”

Ashe scraped the ground with a meditative toe.

“This,” he said, “seems to me to complicate matters somewhat.”

“It complicates them abominably!”

“I suppose you were surprised when you found that I was on the same game as yourself.”

“Not in the least.”

“You weren’t!”

“I knew it directly I saw the advertisement in the Morning Post. And I hunted up the Morning Post directly you had told me that you had become Mr. Peters’ valet.”

“You have known all along!”

“I have.”

Ashe regarded her admiringly.

“You’re wonderful!”

“Because I saw through you?”

“Partly that; but chiefly because you had the pluck to undertake a thing like this.”

“You undertook it.”

“But I’m a man.”

“And I’m a woman. And my theory, Mr. Marson, is that a woman can do nearly everything better than a man. What a splendid test case this would make to settle the votes-for-women question once and for all! Here we are⁠—you and I⁠—a man and a woman, each trying for the same thing and each starting with equal chances. Suppose I beat you? How about the inferiority of women then?”

“I never said women were inferior.”

“You did with your eyes.”

“Besides, you’re an exceptional woman.”

“You can’t get out of it with a compliment. I’m an ordinary woman and I’m going to beat a real man.”

Ashe frowned.

“I don’t like to think of ourselves as working against each other.”

“Why not?”

“Because I like you.”

“I like you, Mr. Marson; but we must not let sentiment interfere with business. You want Mr. Peters’ five thousand dollars. So do I.”

“I hate the thought of being the instrument to prevent you from getting the money.”

“You won’t be. I shall be the instrument to prevent you from getting it. I don’t like that thought, either; but one has got to face it.”

“It makes me feel mean.”

“That’s simply your old-fashioned masculine attitude toward the female, Mr. Marson. You look on woman as a weak creature, to be shielded and petted. We aren’t anything of the sort. We’re terrors! We’re as hard as nails. We’re awful creatures. You mustn’t let my sex interfere with your trying to get this reward. Think of me as though I were another man. We’re up against each other in a fair fight, and I don’t want any special privileges. If you don’t do your best from now onward I shall never forgive you. Do you understand?”

“I suppose so.”

“And we shall need to do our best. That little man with the glasses is on his guard. I was listening to you last night from behind the door. By the way, you shouldn’t have told me to run away and then have stayed yourself to be caught. That is an example of the sort of thing I mean. It was chivalry⁠—not business.”

“I had a story ready to account for my being there. You had not.”

“And what a capital story it was! I shall borrow it for my own use. If I am caught I shall say I had to read Aline to sleep because she suffers from insomnia. And I shouldn’t wonder if she did⁠—poor girl! She doesn’t get enough to eat. She is being starved⁠—poor child! I heard one of the footmen say that she refused everything at dinner last night. And, though she vows it isn’t, my belief is that it’s all because she is afraid to make a stand against her old father. It’s a shame!”

“She is a weak creature, to be shielded and petted,” said Ashe solemnly.

Joan laughed.

“Well, yes; you caught me there. I admit that poor Aline is not a shining example of the formidable modern woman; but⁠—” She stopped. “Oh, bother! I’ve just thought of what I ought to have said⁠—the good repartee that would have crushed you. I suppose it’s too late now?”

“Not at all. I’m like that myself⁠—only it is generally the next day when I hit the right answer. Shall we go back?⁠ ⁠… She is a weak creature, to be shielded and petted.”

“Thank you so much,” said Joan gratefully. “And why is she a weak creature? Because she has allowed herself to be shielded and petted; because she has permitted man to give her special privileges, and generally⁠—No; it isn’t so good as I thought it was going to be.”

“It should be crisper,” said Ashe critically. “It lacks the punch.”

“But it brings me back to my point, which is that I am not going to imitate her and forfeit my independence of action in return for chivalry. Try to look at it from my point of view, Mr. Marson. I know you need the money just as much as I do. Well, don’t you think I should feel a little