He put the good old cup of tea softly on the table by my bed, and I took a refreshing sip. Just right, as usual. Not too hot, not too sweet, not to weak, not too strong, not too much milk, and not a drop spilled in the saucer. A most amazing cove, Jeeves. So dashed competent in every respect.
It was some time before this happened, for he had got a very fine hand indeed. I suppose it wasn’t often that the boys of Market Snodsbury Grammar School came across a man public-spirited enough to call their head master a silly ass, and they showed their appreciation in no uncertain manner. Gussie may have been one over the eight, but as far as the majority of those present were concerned he was sitting on top of the world.
Aunt Agatha is my tough aunt, the one who eats broken bottles and conducts human sacrifices by the light of the full moon.
I wish people wouldn’t tell me I can’t do things.
Ah, well,’ I said resignedly, ‘if that’s that, that’s that, what?’ ‘So it would appear, sir.’ ‘Nothing to do but keep the chin up and the upper lip as stiff as can be managed. I think I’ll go to bed with an improving book. Have you read The Mystery of the Pink Crayfish by Rex West?
Watching you at work, I was reminded of the young lady of Natchez, whose clothes were all tatters and patches. In alluding to which, she would say, “Well, Ah itch, and wherever ah itches, Ah scratches.
He was the sort of man who would have tried to cheer Napoleon up by talking about the Winter Sports at Moscow.
There is nothing an author today has to guard himself more carefully against than the Saga Habit. The least slackening of vigilance and the thing has gripped him.
I mean, if you fool about too long at the start, trying to establish atmosphere, as they call it, and all that sort of rot, you fail to grip and the customers walk out on you.
A pictorial record of his hopes and despairs would have looked like a fever chart.
I will be your wife, Bertie.’ There didn’t seem much to say to this except ‘Oh, thanks.
You don’t get any five shillings out of me.’ ‘Oh, all right.’ He sat silent for a space. ‘Things happen to guys that don’t kick in their protection money,’ he said dreamily.
Once in every few publishing seasons there is an Event. For no apparent reason, the great heart of the Public gives a startled jump, and the public’s great purse is emptied to secure copies of some novel which has stolen into the world without advance advertising and whose only claim to recognition is that The Licensed Victuallers’ Gazette has stated in a two-line review that it is ‘readable’.
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.
Experience, dearly bought in the days of his residence at the University, had taught him that when the Law gripped you with its talons the only thing to do was to give a false name, say nothing and hope for the best.
You know, with the most charitable feelings towards him, there are moments when you can’t help thinking that young Bingo ought to be in some sort of a home.
It suddenly struck me so forcibly, one morning while I was having my bath, that I hadn’t a worry on earth that I began to sing like a bally nightingale as I sploshed the sponge about. It seemed to me that everything was absolutely for the best in the best of all possible worlds.
His spirit was willing, but his will was not spirited.
Bertie,’ he said, ‘I want your advice.’ ‘Carry on.’ ‘At least, not your advice, because that wouldn’t be much good to anybody. I mean, you’re a pretty consummate old ass, aren’t you? Not that I want to hurt your feelings, of course.
It’s a mystery to me how kidnappers ever get caught.