Books: The Little Nugget
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P.G. Wodehouse >> The Little Nugget
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'I will read Mr Ford's telegram,' proceeded Mr Mennick unmoved.
'It is rather long. I think Mr Ford is somewhat annoyed. "The boy
has obviously been stolen by some hireling of his mother's." I am
reading Mr Ford's actual words,' he said, addressing Cynthia with
that touch of diffidence which had marked his manner since his
entrance.
'Don't apologize,' said Cynthia, with a short laugh. 'You're not
responsible for Mr Ford's rudeness.'
Mr Mennick bowed.
'He continued: "Remove him from her illegal restraint. If
necessary call in police and employ force."'
'Charming!' said Mrs Ford.
'Practical,' said Mr Mennick. 'There is more. "Before doing
anything else sack that fool of a tutor, then go to Agency and
have them recommend good private school for boy. On no account
engage another tutor. They make me tired. Fix all this today. Send
Ogden back to Eastnor with Mrs Sheridan. She will stay there with
him till further notice." That is Mr Ford's message.'
Mr Mennick folded both documents carefully and replaced them in
his pocket.
Mrs Ford looked at the clock.
'And now, would you mind going, Mr Mennick?'
'I am sorry to appear discourteous, Mrs Ford, but I cannot go
without Ogden.'
'I shall telephone to the office to send up a porter to remove
you.'
'I shall take advantage of his presence to ask him to fetch a
policeman.'
In the excitement of combat the veneer of apologetic diffidence
was beginning to wear off Mr Mennick. He spoke irritably. Cynthia
appealed to his reason with the air of a bored princess descending
to argument with a groom.
'Can't you see for yourself that he's not here?' she said. 'Do you
think we are hiding him?'
'Perhaps you would like to search my bedroom?' said Mrs Ford,
flinging the door open.
Mr Mennick remained uncrushed.
'Quite unnecessary, Mrs Ford. I take it, from the fact that he
does not appear to be in this suite, that he is downstairs making
a late luncheon in the restaurant.'
'I shall telephone--'
'And tell them to send him up. Believe me, Mrs Ford, it is the
only thing to do. You have my deepest sympathy, but I am employed
by Mr Ford and must act solely in his interests. The law is on my
side. I am here to fetch Ogden away, and I am going to have him.'
'You shan't!'
'I may add that, when I came up here, I left Mrs Sheridan--she is
a fellow-secretary of mine. You may remember Mr Ford mentioning
her in his telegram--I left her to search the restaurant and
grill-room, with instructions to bring Ogden, if found, to me in
this room.'
The door-bell rang. He went to the door and opened it.
'Come in, Mrs Sheridan. Ah!'
A girl in a plain, neat blue dress entered the room. She was a
small, graceful girl of about twenty-five, pretty and brisk, with
the air of one accustomed to look after herself in a difficult
world. Her eyes were clear and steady, her mouth sensitive but
firm, her chin the chin of one who has met trouble and faced it
bravely. A little soldier.
She was shepherding Ogden before her, a gorged but still sullen
Ogden. He sighted Mr Mennick and stopped.
'Hello!' he said. 'What have you blown in for?'
'He was just in the middle of his lunch,' said the girl. 'I
thought you wouldn't mind if I let him finish.'
'Say, what's it all about, anyway?' demanded Ogden crossly. 'Can't
a fellow have a bit of grub in peace? You give me a pain.'
Mr Mennick explained.
'Your father wishes you to return to Eastnor, Ogden.'
'Oh, all right. I guess I'd better go, then. Good-bye, ma.'
Mrs Ford choked.
'Kiss me, Ogden.'
Ogden submitted to the embrace in sulky silence. The others
comported themselves each after his or her own fashion. Mr Mennick
fingered his chin uncomfortably. Cynthia turned to the table and
picked up an illustrated paper. Mrs Sheridan's eyes filled with
tears. She took a half-step towards Mrs Ford, as if about to
speak, then drew back.
'Come, Ogden,' said Mr Mennick gruffly. Necessary, this Hired
Assassin work, but painful--devilish painful. He breathed a sigh
of relief as he passed into the corridor with his prize.
At the door Mrs Sheridan hesitated, stopped, and turned.
'I'm sorry,' she said impulsively.
Mrs Ford turned away without speaking, and went into the bedroom.
Cynthia laid down her paper.
'One moment, Mrs Sheridan.'
The girl had turned to go. She stopped.
'Can you give me a minute? Come in and shut the door. Won't you
sit down? Very well. You seemed sorry for Mrs Ford just now.'
'I am very sorry for Mrs Ford. Very sorry. I hate to see her
suffering. I wish Mr Mennick had not brought me into this.'
'Nesta's mad about that boy,' said Cynthia. 'Heaven knows why.
_I_ never saw such a repulsive child in my life. However,
there it is. I am sorry for you. I gathered from what Mr Mennick
said that you were to have a good deal of Ogden's society for some
time to come. How do you feel about it?'
Mrs Sheridan moved towards the door.
'I must be going,' she said. 'Mr Mennick will be waiting for me.'
'One moment. Tell me, don't you think, after what you saw just
now, that Mrs Ford is the proper person to have charge of Ogden?
You see how devoted she is to him?'
'May I be quite frank with you?'
'Please.'
'Well, then, I think that Mrs Ford's influence is the worst
possible for Ogden. I am sorry for her, but that does not alter my
opinion. It is entirely owing to Mrs Ford that Ogden is what he
is. She spoiled him, indulged him in every way, never checked
him--till he has become--well, what you yourself called him,
repulsive.'
Cynthia laughed.
'Oh well,' she said, 'I only talked that mother's love stuff
because you looked the sort of girl who would like it. We can drop
all that now, and come down to business.'
'I don't understand you.'
'You will. I don't know if you think that I kidnapped Ogden from
sheer affection for Mrs Ford. I like Nesta, but not as much as
that. No. I'm one of the Get-Rich-Quick-Wallingfords, and I'm
looking out for myself all the time. There's no one else to do it
for me. I've a beastly home. My father's dead. My mother's a cat.
So--'
'Please stop,' said Mrs Sheridan. I don't know why you are telling
me all this.'
'Yes, you do. I don't know what salary Mr Ford pays you, but I
don't suppose it's anything princely. Why don't you come over to
us? Mrs Ford would give you the earth if you smuggled Ogden back
to her.'
'You seem to be trying to bribe me,' said Mrs Sheridan.
'In this case,' said Cynthia, 'appearances aren't deceptive. I
am.'
'Good afternoon.'
'Don't be a little fool.'
The door slammed.
'Come back!' cried Cynthia. She took a step as if to follow, but
gave up the idea with a laugh. She sat down and began to read her
illustrated paper again. Presently the bedroom door opened. Mrs
Ford came in. She touched her eyes with a handkerchief as she
entered. Cynthia looked up.
'I'm very sorry, Nesta,' she said.
Mrs Ford went to the window and looked out.
'I'm not going to break down, if that's what you mean,' she said.
'I don't care. And, anyhow, it shows that it _can_ be done.'
Cynthia turned a page of her paper.
'I've just been trying my hand at bribery and corruption.'
'What do you mean?'
'Oh, I promised and vowed many things in your name to that
secretary person, the female one--not Mennick--if she would help
us. Nothing doing. I told her to let us have Ogden as soon as
possible, C.O.D., and she withered me with a glance and went.'
Mrs Ford shrugged her shoulders impatiently.
'Oh, let her go. I'm sick of amateurs.'
'Thank you, dear,' said Cynthia.
'Oh, I know you did your best. For an amateur you did wonderfully
well. But amateurs never really succeed. There were a dozen little
easy precautions which we neglected to take. What we want is a
professional; a man whose business is kidnapping; the sort of man
who kidnaps as a matter of course; someone like Smooth Sam
Fisher.'
'My dear Nesta! Who? I don't think I know the gentleman.'
'He tried to kidnap Ogden in 1906, when we were in New York. At
least, the police put it down to him, though they could prove
nothing. Then there was a horrible man, the police said he was
called Buck MacGinnis. He tried in 1907. That was in Chicago.'
'Good gracious! Kidnapping Ogden seems to be as popular as
football. And I thought I was a pioneer!'
Something approaching pride came into Mrs Ford's voice.
'I don't suppose there's a child in America,' she said, 'who has
had to be so carefully guarded. Why, the kidnappers had a special
name for him--they called him "The Little Nugget". For years we
never allowed him out of our sight without a detective to watch
him.'
'Well, Mr Ford seems to have changed all that now. I saw no
detectives. I suppose he thinks they aren't necessary in England.
Or perhaps he relied on Mr Broster. Poor Reggie!'
'It was criminally careless of him. This will be a lesson to him.
He will be more careful in future how he leaves Ogden at the mercy
of anybody who cares to come along and snap him up.'
'Which, incidentally, does not make your chance of getting him
away any lighter.'
'Oh, I've given up hope now,' said Mrs Ford resignedly.
'_I_ haven't,' said Cynthia.
There was something in her voice which made her companion turn
sharply and look at her. Mrs Ford might affect to be resigned, but
she was a woman of determination, and if the recent reverse had
left her bruised, it had by no means crushed her.
'Cynthia! What do you mean? What are you hinting?'
'You despise amateurs, Nesta, but, for all that, it seems that
your professionals who kidnap as a matter of course and all the
rest of it have not been a bit more successful. It was not my want
of experience that made me fail. It was my sex. This is man's
work. If I had been a man, I should at least have had brute force
to fall back upon when Mr Mennick arrived.'
Mrs Ford nodded.
'Yes, but--'
'And,' continued Cynthia, 'as all these Smooth Sam Fishers of
yours have failed too, it is obvious that the only way to kidnap
Ogden is from within. We must have some man working for us in the
enemy's camp.'
'Which is impossible,' said Mrs Ford dejectedly.
'Not at all.'
'You know a man?'
'I know _the_ man.'
'Cynthia! What do you mean? Who is he?'
'His name is Peter Burns.'
Mrs Ford shook her head.
'I don't know him.'
'I'll introduce you. You'll like him.'
'But, Cynthia, how do you know he would be willing to help us?'
'He would do it for me,' Cynthia paused. 'You see,' she went on,
'we are engaged to be married.'
'My dear Cynthia! Why did you not tell me? When did it happen?'
'Last night at the Fletchers' dance.'
Mrs Ford's eyes opened.
'Last night! Were you at a dance last night? And two railway
journeys today! You must be tired to death.'
'Oh, I'm all right, thanks. I suppose I shall be a wreck and not
fit to be seen tomorrow, but just at present I feel as if nothing
could tire me. It's the effect of being engaged, perhaps.'
'Tell me about him.'
'Well, he's rich, and good-looking, and amiable'--Cynthia ticked
off these qualities on her fingers--'and I think he's brave, and
he's certainly not so stupid as Mr Broster.'
'And you're very much in love with him?'
'I like him. There's no harm in Peter.'
'You certainly aren't wildly enthusiastic!'
'Oh, we shall hit it off quite well together. I needn't pose to
_you_, Nesta, thank goodness! That's one reason why I'm fond
of you. You know how I am situated. I've got to marry some one
rich, and Peter's quite the nicest rich man I've ever met. He's
really wonderfully unselfish. I can't understand it. With his
money, you would expect him to be a perfect horror.'
A thought seemed to strike Mrs Ford.
'But, if he's so rich--' she began. 'I forget what I was going to
say,' she broke off.
'Dear Nesta, I know what you were going to say. If he's so rich,
why should he be marrying me, when he could take his pick of half
London? Well, I'll tell you. He's marrying me for one reason,
because he's sorry for me: for another, because I had the sense to
make him. He didn't think he was going to marry anyone. A few
years ago he had a disappointment. A girl jilted him. She must
have been a fool. He thought he was going to live the rest of his
life alone with his broken heart. I didn't mean to allow that.
It's taken a long time--over two years, from start to finish--but
I've done it. He's a sentimentalist. I worked on his sympathy, and
last night I made him propose to me at the Fletchers' dance.'
Mrs Ford had not listened to these confidences unmoved. Several
times she had tried to interrupt, but had been brushed aside. Now
she spoke sharply.
'You know I was not going to say anything of the kind. And I don't
think you should speak in this horrible, cynical way of--of--'
She stopped, flushing. There were moments when she hated Cynthia.
These occurred for the most part when the latter, as now, stirred
her to an exhibition of honest feeling which she looked on as
rather unbecoming. Mrs Ford had spent twenty years trying to
forget that her husband had married her from behind the counter of
a general store in an Illinois village, and these lapses into the
uncultivated genuineness of her girlhood made her uncomfortable.
'I wasn't going to say anything of the kind,' she repeated.
Cynthia was all smiling good-humour.
'I know. I was only teasing you. "Stringing", they call it in your
country, don't they?'
Mrs Ford was mollified.
'I'm sorry, Cynthia. I didn't mean to snap at you. All the
same ...' She hesitated. What she wanted to ask smacked so
dreadfully of Mechanicsville, Illinois. Yet she put the question
bravely, for she was somehow feeling quite troubled about this
unknown Mr Burns. 'Aren't you really fond of him at all, Cynthia?'
Cynthia beamed.
'Of course I am! He's a dear. Nothing would make me give him up.
I'm devoted to old Peter. I only told you all that about him
because it shows you how kind-hearted he is. He'll do anything for
me. Well, shall I sound him about Ogden?'
The magic word took Mrs Ford's mind off the matrimonial future of
Mr Burns, and brought him into prominence in his capacity of
knight-errant. She laughed happily. The contemplation of Mr Burns
as knight-errant healed the sting of defeat. The affair of Mr
Mennick began to appear in the light of a mere skirmish.
'You take my breath away!' she said. 'How do you propose that Mr
Burns shall help us?'
'It's perfectly simple. You heard Mr Mennick read that telegram.
Ogden is to be sent to a private school. Peter shall go there
too.'
'But how? I don't understand. We don't know which school Mr
Mennick will choose.'
'We can very soon find out.'
'But how can Mr Burns go there?'
'Nothing easier. He will be a young man who has been left a little
money and wants to start a school of his own. He goes to Ogden's
man and suggests that he pay a small premium to come to him for a
term as an extra-assistant-master, to learn the business. Mr Man
will jump at him. He will be getting the bargain of his life.
Peter didn't get much of a degree at Oxford, but I believe he was
wonderful at games. From a private-school point of view he's a
treasure.'
'But--would he do it?'
'I think I can persuade him.'
Mrs Ford kissed her with an enthusiasm which hitherto she had
reserved for Ogden.
'My darling girl,' she cried, 'if you knew how happy you have made
me!'
'I do,' said Cynthia definitely. 'And now you can do the same for
me.'
'Anything, anything! You must have some more hats.'
'I don't want any more hats. I want to go with you on Lord
Mountry's yacht to the Riviera.'
'Of course,' said Mrs Ford after a slight pause, 'it isn't my
party, you know, dear.'
'No. But you can work me in, darling.'
'It's quite a small party. Very quiet.'
'Crowds bore me. I enjoy quiet.'
Mrs Ford capitulated.
'I fancy you are doing me a very good turn,' she said. 'You must
certainly come on the yacht.'
'I'll tell Peter to come straight round here now,' said Cynthia
simply. She went to the telephone.
Part Two
In which other interested parties, notably one Buck MacGinnis and
a trade rival, Smooth Sam Fisher, make other plans for the Nugget's
future. Of stirring times at a private school for young gentlemen.
Of stratagems, spoils, and alarms by night. Of journeys ending in
lovers' meetings. The whole related by Mr Peter Burns, gentleman
of leisure, who forfeits that leisure in a good cause.
Peter Burns's Narrative
Chapter 1
I
I am strongly of the opinion that, after the age of twenty-one, a
man ought not to be out of bed and awake at four in the morning.
The hour breeds thought. At twenty-one, life being all future, it
may be examined with impunity. But, at thirty, having become an
uncomfortable mixture of future and past, it is a thing to be
looked at only when the sun is high and the world full of warmth
and optimism.
This thought came to me as I returned to my rooms after the
Fletchers' ball. The dawn was breaking as I let myself in. The air
was heavy with the peculiar desolation of a London winter morning.
The houses looked dead and untenanted. A cart rumbled past, and
across the grey street a dingy black cat, moving furtively along
the pavement, gave an additional touch of forlornness to the
scene.
I shivered. I was tired and hungry, and the reaction after the
emotions of the night had left me dispirited.
I was engaged to be married. An hour back I had proposed to
Cynthia Drassilis. And I can honestly say that it had come as a
great surprise to me.
Why had I done it? Did I love her? It was so difficult to analyse
love: and perhaps the mere fact that I was attempting the task was
an answer to the question. Certainly I had never tried to do so
five years ago when I had loved Audrey Blake. I had let myself be
carried on from day to day in a sort of trance, content to be
utterly happy, without dissecting my happiness. But I was five
years younger then, and Audrey was--Audrey.
I must explain Audrey, for she in her turn explains Cynthia.
I have no illusions regarding my character when I first met Audrey
Blake. Nature had given me the soul of a pig, and circumstances
had conspired to carry on Nature's work. I loved comfort, and I
could afford to have it. From the moment I came of age and
relieved my trustees of the care of my money, I wrapped myself in
comfort as in a garment. I wallowed in egoism. In fact, if,
between my twenty-first and my twenty-fifth birthdays, I had one
unselfish thought, or did one genuinely unselfish action, my
memory is a blank on the point.
It was at the height of this period that I became engaged to
Audrey. Now that I can understand her better and see myself,
impartially, as I was in those days, I can realize how indescribably
offensive I must have been. My love was real, but that did not
prevent its patronizing complacency being an insult. I was King
Cophetua. If I did not actually say in so many words, 'This
beggar-maid shall be my queen', I said it plainly and often in my
manner. She was the daughter of a dissolute, evil-tempered artist
whom I had met at a Bohemian club. He made a living by painting
an occasional picture, illustrating an occasional magazine-story,
but mainly by doing advertisement work. A proprietor of a patent
Infants' Food, not satisfied with the bare statement that Baby
Cried For It, would feel it necessary to push the fact home to the
public through the medium of Art, and Mr Blake would be commissioned
to draw the picture. A good many specimens of his work in this vein
were to be found in the back pages of the magazines.
A man may make a living by these means, but it is one that
inclines him to jump at a wealthy son-in-law. Mr Blake jumped at
me. It was one of his last acts on this earth. A week after he
had--as I now suspect--bullied Audrey into accepting me, he died
of pneumonia.
His death had several results. It postponed the wedding: it
stirred me to a very crescendo of patronage, for with the removal
of the bread-winner the only flaw in my Cophetua pose had
vanished: and it gave Audrey a great deal more scope than she had
hitherto been granted for the exercise of free will in the choice
of a husband.
This last aspect of the matter was speedily brought to my notice,
which till then it had escaped, by a letter from her, handed to me
one night at the club, where I was sipping coffee and musing on
the excellence of life in this best of all possible worlds.
It was brief and to the point. She had been married that morning.
To say that that moment was a turning point in my life would be to
use a ridiculously inadequate phrase. It dynamited my life. In a
sense it killed me. The man I had been died that night, regretted,
I imagine, by few. Whatever I am today, I am certainly not the
complacent spectator of life that I had been before that night.
I crushed the letter in my hand, and sat staring at it, my pigsty
in ruins about my ears, face to face with the fact that, even in a
best of all possible worlds, money will not buy everything.
I remember, as I sat there, a man, a club acquaintance, a bore
from whom I had fled many a time, came and settled down beside me
and began to talk. He was a small man, but he possessed a voice to
which one had to listen. He talked and talked and talked. How I
loathed him, as I sat trying to think through his stream of words.
I see now that he saved me. He forced me out of myself. But at the
time he oppressed me. I was raw and bleeding. I was struggling to
grasp the incredible. I had taken Audrey's unalterable affection
for granted. She was the natural complement to my scheme of
comfort. I wanted her; I had chosen and was satisfied with her,
therefore all was well. And now I had to adjust my mind to the
impossible fact that I had lost her.
Her letter was a mirror in which I saw myself. She said little,
but I understood, and my self-satisfaction was in ribbons--and
something deeper than self-satisfaction. I saw now that I loved
her as I had not dreamed myself capable of loving.
And all the while this man talked and talked.
I have a theory that speech, persevered in, is more efficacious in
times of trouble than silent sympathy. Up to a certain point it
maddens almost beyond endurance; but, that point past, it soothes.
At least, it was so in my case. Gradually I found myself hating
him less. Soon I began to listen, then to answer. Before I left
the club that night, the first mad frenzy, in which I could have
been capable of anything, had gone from me, and I walked home,
feeling curiously weak and helpless, but calm, to begin the new
life.
Three years passed before I met Cynthia. I spent those years
wandering in many countries. At last, as one is apt to do, I
drifted back to London, and settled down again to a life which,
superficially, was much the same as the one I had led in the days
before I knew Audrey. My old circle in London had been wide, and I
found it easy to pick up dropped threads. I made new friends,
among them Cynthia Drassilis.
I liked Cynthia, and I was sorry for her. I think that, about that
time I met her, I was sorry for most people. The shock of Audrey's
departure had had that effect upon me. It is always the bad nigger
who gets religion most strongly at the camp-meeting, and in my
case 'getting religion' had taken the form of suppression of self.
I never have been able to do things by halves, or even with a
decent moderation. As an egoist I had been thorough in my egoism;
and now, fate having bludgeoned that vice out of me, I found
myself possessed of an almost morbid sympathy with the troubles of
other people.
I was extremely sorry for Cynthia Drassilis. Meeting her mother
frequently, I could hardly fail to be. Mrs Drassilis was a
representative of a type I disliked. She was a widow, who had been
left with what she considered insufficient means, and her outlook
on life was a compound of greed and querulousness. Sloane Square
and South Kensington are full of women in her situation. Their
position resembles that of the Ancient Mariner. 'Water, water
everywhere, and not a drop to drink.' For 'water' in their case
substitute 'money'. Mrs Drassilis was connected with money on all
sides, but could only obtain it in rare and minute quantities. Any
one of a dozen relations-in-law could, if they had wished, have
trebled her annual income without feeling it. But they did not so
wish. They disapproved of Mrs Drassilis. In their opinion the Hon.
Hugo Drassilis had married beneath him--not so far beneath him as
to make the thing a horror to be avoided in conversation and
thought, but far enough to render them coldly polite to his wife
during his lifetime and almost icy to his widow after his death.
Hugo's eldest brother, the Earl of Westbourne, had never liked the
obviously beautiful, but equally obviously second-rate, daughter
of a provincial solicitor whom Hugo had suddenly presented to the
family one memorable summer as his bride. He considered that, by
doubling the income derived from Hugo's life-insurance and
inviting Cynthia to the family seat once a year during her
childhood, he had done all that could be expected of him in the
matter.
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