Leave It to Psmith, P. G. Wodehouse [novels to read .txt] 📗

Money? What money? If I have said once,” declared Lord Emsworth, “that Angus McAllister is all wrong on the subject of hollyhocks, I’ve said it a hundred times.”

“Let me explain. This three thousand pounds⁠ ⁠…”

“My dear fellow, no. No, no. It was like you,” said his lordship with a vague heartiness, “it was like you⁠—good and generous⁠—to make this offer, but I have ample, thank you, ample. I don’t need three thousand pounds.”

“You don’t understand. I⁠ ⁠…”

“No, no. No, no. But I am very much obliged, all the same. It was kind of you, my dear fellow, to give me the opportunity. Very kind. Very, very, very kind,” proceeded his lordship, trailing to the door and reading as he went. “Oh, very, very, very⁠ ⁠…”

The door closed behind him.

“Oh, damn!” said Mr. Keeble.

He sank into a chair in a state of profound dejection. He thought of the letter he would have to write to Phyllis. Poor little Phyllis⁠ ⁠… he would have to tell her that what she asked could not be managed. And why, thought Mr. Keeble sourly, as he rose from his seat and went to the writing-table, could it not be managed? Simply because he was a weak-kneed, spineless creature who was afraid of a pair of grey eyes that had a tendency to freeze.

“My dear Phyllis,” he wrote.

Here he stopped. How on earth was he to put it? What a letter to have to write! Mr. Keeble placed his head between his hands and groaned aloud.

“Hallo, Uncle Joe!”

The letter-writer, turning sharply, was aware⁠—without pleasure⁠—of his nephew Frederick, standing beside his chair. He eyed him resentfully, for he was not only exasperated but startled. He had not heard the door open. It was as if the smooth-haired youth had popped up out of a trap.

“Came in through the window,” explained the Hon. Freddie. “I say, Uncle Joe.”

“Well, what is it?”

“I say, Uncle Joe,” said Freddie, “can you lend me a thousand quid?”

Mr. Keeble uttered a yelp like a pinched Pomeranian.

III

As Mr. Keeble, red-eyed and overwrought, rose slowly from his chair and began to swell in ominous silence, his nephew raised his hand appealingly. It began to occur to the Hon. Freddie that he had perhaps not led up to his request with the maximum of smooth tact.

“Half a jiffy!” he entreated. “I say, don’t go in off the deep end for just a second. I can explain.”

Mr. Keeble’s feelings expressed themselves in a loud snort.

“Explain!”

“Well, I can. Whole trouble was, I started at the wrong end. Shouldn’t have sprung it on you like that. The fact is, Uncle Joe, I’ve got a scheme. I give you my word that, if you’ll only put off having apoplexy for about three minutes,” said Freddie, scanning his fermenting relative with some anxiety, “I can shove you on to a good thing. Honestly I can. And all I say is, if this scheme I’m talking about is worth a thousand quid to you, will you slip it across? I’m game to spill it and leave it to your honesty to cash up if the thing looks good to you.”

“A thousand pounds!”

“Nice round sum,” urged Freddie ingratiatingly.

“Why,” demanded Mr. Keeble, now somewhat recovered, “do you want a thousand pounds?”

“Well, who doesn’t, if it comes to that?” said Freddie. “But I don’t mind telling you my special reason for wanting it at just this moment, if you’ll swear to keep it under your hat as far as the guv’nor is concerned.”

“If you mean that you wish me not to repeat to your father anything you may tell me in confidence, naturally I should not dream of doing such a thing.”

Freddie looked puzzled. His was no lightning brain.

“Can’t quite work that out,” he confessed. “Do you mean you will tell him or you won’t?”

“I will not tell him.”

“Good old Uncle Joe!” said Freddie, relieved. “A topper! I’ve always said so. Well, look here, you know all the trouble there’s been about my dropping a bit on the races lately?”

“I do.”

“Between ourselves, I dropped about five hundred of the best. And I just want to ask you one simple question. Why did I drop it?”

“Because you were an infernal young ass.”

“Well, yes,” agreed Freddie, having considered the point, “you might put it that way, of course. But why was I an ass?”

“Good God!” exclaimed the exasperated Mr. Keeble. “Am I a psychoanalyst?”

“I mean to say, if you come right down to it, I lost all that stuff simply because I was on the wrong side of the fence. It’s a mug’s game betting on horses. The only way to make money is to be a bookie, and that’s what I’m going to do if you’ll part with that thousand. Pal of mine, who was up at Oxford with me, is in a bookie’s office, and they’re game to take me in too if I can put up a thousand quid. Only I must let them know quick, because the offer’s not going to be open for ever. You’ve no notion what a deuce of a lot of competition there is for that sort of job.”

Mr. Keeble, who had been endeavouring with some energy to get a word in during this harangue, now contrived to speak.

“And do you seriously suppose that I would⁠ ⁠… But what’s the use of wasting time talking? I have no means of laying my hands on the sum you mention. If I had,” said Mr. Keeble wistfully. “If I had⁠ ⁠…” And his eye strayed to the letter on the desk, the letter which had got as far as My dear Phyllis and stuck there.

Freddie gazed upon him with cordial sympathy.

“Oh, I know how you’re situated, Uncle Joe, and I’m dashed sorry for you. I mean, Aunt Constance and all that.”

“What!” Irksome as Mr. Keeble sometimes found the peculiar condition of his financial arrangements, he had always had the consolation of supposing that they were a secret between his wife and himself. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I know that Aunt Constance keeps an eye on the doubloons and checks the outgoings pretty narrowly. And I think