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

To put it crisply, he is engaged in what Comrade Cootes, to whom I alluded just now, would call ‘funny business.’ ”

“I⁠ ⁠…”

“Pardon me,” said Psmith. “If you will be patient for a few minutes more, I shall have finished and shall then be delighted to lend an attentive ear to any remarks you may wish to make. As it occurs to me⁠—indeed, you hinted as much yourself just now⁠—that my own position in this little matter has an appearance which to the uninitiated might seem tolerably rummy, I had better explain how I come to be guarding a diamond necklace which does not belong to me. I rely on your womanly discretion to let the thing go no further.”

“Will you please⁠ ⁠…”

“In one moment. The facts are as follows. Our mutual friend Mr. Keeble, Miss Halliday, has a stepdaughter who is married to one Comrade Jackson who, if he had no other claim to fame, would go ringing down through history for this reason, that he and I were at school together and that he is my best friend. We two have sported on the green⁠—ooh, a lot of times. Well, owing to one thing and another, the Jackson family is rather badly up against it at the present⁠ ⁠…”

Eve jumped up angrily.

“I don’t believe a word of it,” she cried. “What is the use of trying to fool me like this? You had never heard of Phyllis before Freddie spoke about her in the train⁠ ⁠…”

“Believe me⁠ ⁠…”

“I won’t. Freddie got you down here to help him steal that necklace and give it to Mr. Keeble so that he could help Phyllis, and now you’ve got it and are trying to keep it for yourself.”

Psmith started slightly. His monocle fell from its place.

“Is everybody in this little plot! Are you also one of Comrade Keeble’s corps of assistants?”

“Mr. Keeble asked me to try to get the necklace for him.”

Psmith replaced his monocle thoughtfully.

“This,” he said, “opens up a new line of thought. Can it be that I have been wronging Comrade Threepwood all this time? I must confess that, when I found him here just now standing like Marius among the ruins of Carthage (the allusion is a classical one, and the fruit of an expensive education), I jumped⁠—I may say, sprang⁠—to the conclusion that he was endeavouring to double-cross both myself and the boss by getting hold of the necklace with a view to retaining it for his own benefit. It never occurred to me that he might be crediting me with the same sinful guile.”

Eve ran to him and clutched his arm.

“Mr. Smith, is this really true? Are you really a friend of Phyllis?”

“She looks on me as a grandfather. Are you a friend of hers?”

“We were at school together.”

“This,” said Psmith cordially, “is one of the most gratifying moments of my life. It makes us all seem like one great big family.”

“But I never heard Phyllis speak about you.”

“Strange!” said Psmith. “Strange. Surely she was not ashamed of her humble friend?”

“Her what?”

“I must explain,” said Psmith, “that until recently I was earning a difficult livelihood by slinging fish about in Billingsgate Market. It is possible that some snobbish strain in Comrade Jackson’s bride, which I confess I had not suspected, kept her from admitting that she was accustomed to hobnob with one in the fish business.”

“Good gracious!” cried Eve.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Smith⁠ ⁠… Fish business⁠ ⁠… Why, it was you who called at Phyllis’s house while I was there. Just before I came down here. I remember Phyllis saying how sorry she was that we had not met. She said you were just my sort of⁠ ⁠… I mean, she said she wanted me to meet you.”

“This,” said Psmith, “is becoming more and more gratifying every moment. It seems to me that you and I were made for each other. I am your best friend’s best friend and we both have a taste for stealing other people’s jewellery. I cannot see how you can very well resist the conclusion that we are twin-souls.”

“Don’t be silly.”

“We shall get into that series of ‘Husbands and Wives Who Work Together.’ ”

“Where is the necklace?”

Psmith sighed.

“The business note. Always the business note. Can’t we keep all that till later?”

“No. We can’t.”

“Ah, well!”

Psmith crossed the room, and took down from the wall the case of stuffed birds.

“The one place,” said Eve, with mortification, “where we didn’t think of looking!”

Psmith opened the case and removed the centre bird, a depressed-looking fowl with glass eyes which stared with a haunting pathos. He felt in its interior and pulled out something that glittered and sparkled in the lamplight.

“Oh!”

Eve ran her fingers almost lovingly through the jewels as they lay before her on the little table.

“Aren’t they beautiful!”

“Distinctly. I think I may say that of all the jewels I have ever stolen⁠ ⁠…”

“Hey!”

Eve let the necklace fall with a cry. Psmith spun round. In the doorway stood Mr. Edward Cootes, pointing a pistol.

IV

“Hands up!” said Mr. Cootes with the uncouth curtness of one who has not had the advantages of a refined home and a nice upbringing. He advanced warily, preceded by the revolver. It was a dainty, miniature weapon, such as might have been the property of some gentle lady. Mr. Cootes had, in fact, borrowed it from Miss Peavey, who at this juncture entered the room in a black and silver dinner-dress surmounted by a Rose du Barri wrap, her spiritual face glowing softly in the subdued light.

“Attaboy, Ed,” observed Miss Peavey crisply.

She swooped on the table and gathered up the necklace. Mr. Cootes, though probably gratified by the tribute, made no acknowledgment of it, but continued to direct an austere gaze at Eve and Psmith.

“No funny business,” he advised.

“I would be the last person,” said Psmith agreeably, “to advocate anything of the sort. This,” he said to Eve, “is Comrade Cootes, of whom you have heard so much.”

Eve was staring, bewildered, at the poetess, who, satisfied with the manner in which the preliminaries had been conducted, had begun looking about her with idle curiosity.

“Miss Peavey!” cried