Books: Love Among the Chickens
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P. G. Wodehouse >> Love Among the Chickens
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CHAPTER XII
SOME EMOTIONS AND YELLOW LUPIN
The fame which came to me through that gallant rescue was a little
embarrassing. I was a marked man. Did I walk through the village,
heads emerged from windows, and eyes followed me out of sight. Did I
sit on the beach, groups formed behind me and watched in silent
admiration. I was the man of the moment.
"If we'd wanted an advertisement for the farm," said Ukridge on one of
these occasions, "we couldn't have had a better one than you, Garny,
my boy. You have brought us three distinct orders for eggs during the
last week. And I'll tell you what it is, we need all the orders we can
get that'll bring us in ready money. The farm is in a critical
condition. The coffers are low, deuced low. And I'll tell you another
thing. I'm getting precious tired of living on nothing but chicken and
eggs. So's Millie, though she doesn't say so."
"So am I," I said, "and I don't feel like imitating your wife's proud
reserve. I never want to see a chicken again. As for eggs, they are
far too much for us."
For the last week monotony had been the keynote of our commissariat.
We had had cold chicken and eggs for breakfast, boiled chicken and
eggs for lunch, and roast chicken and eggs for dinner. Meals became a
nuisance, and Mrs. Beale complained bitterly that we did not give her
a chance. She was a cook who would have graced an alderman's house and
served up noble dinners for gourmets, and here she was in this remote
corner of the world ringing the changes on boiled chicken and roast
chicken and boiled eggs and poached eggs. Mr. Whistler, set to paint
sign-boards for public-houses, might have felt the same restless
discontent. As for her husband, the Hired Retainer, he took life as
tranquilly as ever, and seemed to regard the whole thing as the most
exhilarating farce he had ever been in. I think he looked on Ukridge
as an amiable lunatic, and was content to rough it a little in order
to enjoy the privilege of observing his movements. He made no
complaints of the food. When a man has supported life for a number of
years on incessant Army beef, the monotony of daily chicken and eggs
scarcely strikes him.
"The fact is," said Ukridge, "these tradesmen round here seem to be a
sordid, suspicious lot. They clamour for money."
He mentioned a few examples. Vickers, the butcher, had been the first
to strike, with the remark that he would like to see the colour of Mr.
Ukridge's money before supplying further joints. Dawlish, the grocer,
had expressed almost exactly similar sentiments two days later; and
the ranks of these passive resisters had been receiving fresh recruits
ever since. To a man the tradesmen of Combe Regis seemed as deficient
in Simple Faith as they were in Norman Blood.
"Can't you pay some of them a little on account?" I suggested. "It
would set them going again."
"My dear old man," said Ukridge impressively, "we need every penny of
ready money we can raise for the farm. The place simply eats money.
That infernal roop let us in for I don't know what."
That insidious epidemic had indeed proved costly. We had painted the
throats of the chickens with the best turpentine--at least Ukridge and
Beale had,--but in spite of their efforts, dozens had died, and we had
been obliged to sink much more money than was pleasant in restocking
the run. The battle which took place on the first day after the
election of the new members was a sight to remember. The results of it
were still noticeable in the depressed aspect of certain of the
recently enrolled.
"No," said Ukridge, summing up, "these men must wait. We can't help
their troubles. Why, good gracious, it isn't as if they'd been waiting
for the money long. We've not been down here much over a month. I
never heard of such a scandalous thing. 'Pon my word, I've a good mind
to go round, and have a straight talk with one or two of them. I come
and settle down here, and stimulate trade, and give them large orders,
and they worry me with bills when they know I'm up to my eyes in work,
looking after the fowls. One can't attend to everything. The business
is just now at its most crucial point. It would be fatal to pay any
attention to anything else with things as they are. These scoundrels
will get paid all in good time."
It is a peculiarity of situations of this kind that the ideas of
debtor and creditor as to what constitutes a good time never coincide.
* * * * *
I am afraid that, despite the urgent need for strict attention to
business, I was inclined to neglect my duties about this time. I had
got into the habit of wandering off, either to the links, where I
generally found the professor, sometimes Phyllis, or on long walks by
myself. There was one particular walk along the cliffs, through some
of the most beautiful scenery I have ever set eyes on, which more than
any other suited my mood. I would work my way through the woods till I
came to a small clearing on the very edge of the cliff. There I would
sit and smoke by the hour. If ever I am stricken with smoker's heart,
or staggers, or tobacco amblyopia, or any other of the cheery things
which doctors predict for the devotee of the weed, I shall feel that I
sowed the seeds of it that summer in that little clearing overlooking
the sea. A man in love needs much tobacco. A man thinking out a novel
needs much tobacco. I was in the grip of both maladies. Somehow I
found that my ideas flowed more readily in that spot than in any
other.
I had not been inside the professor's grounds since the occasion when
I had gone in through the box-wood hedge. But on the afternoon
following my financial conversation with Ukridge I made my way
thither, after a toilet which, from its length, should have produced
better results than it did. Not for four whole days had I caught so
much as a glimpse of Phyllis. I had been to the links three times, and
had met the professor twice, but on both occasions she had been
absent. I had not had the courage to ask after her. I had an absurd
idea that my voice or my manner would betray me in some way. I felt
that I should have put the question with such an exaggerated show of
indifference that all would have been discovered.
The professor was not at home. Nor was Mr. Chase. Nor was Miss Norah
Derrick, the lady I had met on the beach with the professor. Miss
Phyllis, said the maid, was in the garden.
I went into the garden. She was sitting under the cedar by the tennis-
lawn, reading. She looked up as I approached.
I said it was a lovely afternoon. After which there was a lull in the
conversation. I was filled with a horrid fear that I was boring her. I
had probably arrived at the very moment when she was most interested
in her book. She must, I thought, even now be regarding me as a
nuisance, and was probably rehearsing bitter things to say to the maid
for not having had the sense to explain that she was out.
"I--er--called in the hope of seeing Professor Derrick," I said.
"You would find him on the links," she replied. It seemed to me that
she spoke wistfully.
"Oh, it--it doesn't matter," I said. "It wasn't anything important."
This was true. If the professor had appeared then and there, I should
have found it difficult to think of anything to say to him which would
have accounted to any extent for my anxiety to see him.
"How are the chickens, Mr. Garnet?" said she.
The situation was saved. Conversationally, I am like a clockwork toy.
I have to be set going. On the affairs of the farm I could speak
fluently. I sketched for her the progress we had made since her visit.
I was humorous concerning roop, epigrammatic on the subject of the
Hired Retainer and Edwin.
"Then the cat did come down from the chimney?" said Phyllis.
We both laughed, and--I can answer for myself--I felt the better for
it.
"He came down next day," I said, "and made an excellent lunch of one
of our best fowls. He also killed another, and only just escaped death
himself at the hands of Ukridge."
"Mr. Ukridge doesn't like him, does he?"
"If he does, he dissembles his love. Edwin is Mrs. Ukridge's pet. He
is the only subject on which they disagree. Edwin is certainly in the
way on a chicken farm. He has got over his fear of Bob, and is now
perfectly lawless. We have to keep a steady eye on him."
"And have you had any success with the incubator? I love incubators. I
have always wanted to have one of my own, but we have never kept
fowls."
"The incubator has not done all that it should have done," I said.
"Ukridge looks after it, and I fancy his methods are not the right
methods. I don't know if I have got the figures absolutely correct,
but Ukridge reasons on these lines. He says you are supposed to keep
the temperature up to a hundred and five degrees. I think he said a
hundred and five. Then the eggs are supposed to hatch out in a week or
so. He argues that you may just as well keep the temperature at
seventy-two, and wait a fortnight for your chickens. I am certain
there's a fallacy in the system somewhere, because we never seem to
get as far as the chickens. But Ukridge says his theory is
mathematically sound, and he sticks to it."
"Are you quite sure that the way you are doing it is the best way to
manage a chicken farm?"
"I should very much doubt it. I am a child in these matters. I had
only seen a chicken in its wild state once or twice before we came
down here. I had never dreamed of being an active assistant on a real
farm. The whole thing began like Mr. George Ade's fable of the Author.
An Author--myself--was sitting at his desk trying to turn out any old
thing that could be converted into breakfast-food when a friend came
in and sat down on the table, and told him to go right on and not mind
him."
"Did Mr. Ukridge do that?"
"Very nearly that. He called at my rooms one beautiful morning when I
was feeling desperately tired of London and overworked and dying for a
holiday, and suggested that I should come to Combe Regis with him and
help him farm chickens. I have not regretted it."
"It is a lovely place, isn't it?"
"The loveliest I have ever seen. How charming your garden is."
"Shall we go and look at it? You have not seen the whole of it."
As she rose, I saw her book, which she had laid face downwards on the
grass beside her. It was the same much-enduring copy of the
"Manoeuvres of Arthur." I was thrilled. This patient perseverance must
surely mean something. She saw me looking at it.
"Did you draw Pamela from anybody?" she asked suddenly.
I was glad now that I had not done so. The wretched Pamela, once my
pride, was for some reason unpopular with the only critic about whose
opinion I cared, and had fallen accordingly from her pedestal.
As we wandered down from the garden paths, she gave me her opinion of
the book. In the main it was appreciative. I shall always associate
the scent of yellow lupin with the higher criticism.
"Of course, I don't know anything about writing books," she said.
"Yes?" my tone implied, or I hope it did, that she was an expert on
books, and that if she was not it didn't matter.
"But I don't think you do your heroines well. I have just got 'The
Outsider--' " (My other novel. Bastable & Kirby, 6s. Satirical. All
about Society--of which I know less than I know about chicken-farming.
Slated by /Times/ and /Spectator/. Well received by /London Mail/ and
/Winning Post/)--"and," continued Phyllis, "Lady Maud is exactly the
same as Pamela in the 'Manoeuvres of Arthur.' I thought you must have
drawn both characters from some one you knew."
"No," I said. "No. Purely imaginary."
"I am so glad," said Phyllis.
And then neither of us seemed to have anything to say. My knees began
to tremble. I realised that the moment had arrived when my fate must
be put to the touch; and I feared that the moment was premature. We
cannot arrange these things to suit ourselves. I knew that the time
was not yet ripe; but the magic scent of the yellow lupin was too much
for me.
"Miss Derrick," I said hoarsely.
Phyllis was looking with more intentness than the attractions of the
flower justified at a rose she held in her hand. The bee hummed in the
lupin.
"Miss Derrick," I said, and stopped again.
"I say, you people," said a cheerful voice, "tea is ready. Hullo,
Garnet, how are you? That medal arrived yet from the Humane Society?"
I spun round. Mr. Tom Chase was standing at the end of the path. The
only word that could deal adequately with the situation slapped
against my front teeth. I grinned a sickly grin.
"Well, Tom," said Phyllis.
And there was, I thought, just the faintest tinkle of annoyance in her
voice.
* * * * *
"I've been bathing," said Mr. Chase, /a propos des bottes/.
"Oh," I replied. "And I wish," I added, "that you'd drowned yourself."
But I added it silently to myself.
CHAPTER XIII
TEA AND TENNIS
"Met the professor's late boatman on the Cob," said Mr. Chase,
dissecting a chocolate cake.
"Clumsy man," said Phyllis. "I hope he was ashamed of himself. I shall
never forgive him for trying to drown papa."
My heart bled for Mr. Henry Hawk, that modern martyr.
"When I met him," said Tom Chase, "he looked as if he had been trying
to drown his sorrow as well."
"I knew he drank," said Phyllis severely, "the very first time I saw
him."
"You might have warned the professor," murmured Mr. Chase.
"He couldn't have upset the boat if he had been sober."
"You never know. He may have done it on purpose."
"Tom, how absurd."
"Rather rough on the man, aren't you?" I said.
"Merely a suggestion," continued Mr. Chase airily. "I've been reading
sensational novels lately, and it seems to me that Mr. Hawk's cut out
to be a minion. Probably some secret foe of the professor's bribed
him."
My heart stood still. Did he know, I wondered, and was this all a
roundabout way of telling me he knew?
"The professor may be a member of an Anarchist League, or something,
and this is his punishment for refusing to assassinate some
sportsman."
"Have another cup of tea, Tom, and stop talking nonsense."
Mr. Chase handed in his cup.
"What gave me the idea that the upset was done on purpose was this. I
saw the whole thing from the Ware Cliff. The spill looked to me just
like dozens I had seen at Malta."
"Why do they upset themselves on purpose at Malta particularly?"
inquired Phyllis.
"Listen carefully, my dear, and you'll know more about the ways of the
Navy that guards your coasts than you did before. When men are allowed
on shore at Malta, the owner has a fancy to see them snugly on board
again at a certain reasonable hour. After that hour any Maltese
policeman who brings them aboard gets one sovereign, cash. But he has
to do all the bringing part of it on his own. Consequence is, you see
boats rowing out to the ship, carrying men who have overstayed their
leave; and when they get near enough, the able-bodied gentleman in
custody jumps to his feet, upsets the boat, and swims for the gangway.
The policemen, if they aren't drowned--they sometimes are--race him,
and whichever gets there first wins. If it's the policeman, he gets
his sovereign. If it's the sailor, he is considered to have arrived
not in a state of custody and gets off easier. What a judicious remark
that was of the governor of North Carolina to the governor of South
Carolina, respecting the length of time between drinks. Just one more
cup, please, Phyllis."
"But how does all that apply?" I asked, dry-mouthed.
"Mr. Hawk upset the professor just as those Maltese were upset.
There's a patent way of doing it. Furthermore, by judicious
questioning, I found that Hawk was once in the Navy, and stationed at
Malta. /Now/, who's going to drag in Sherlock Holmes?"
"You don't really think--?" I said, feeling like a criminal in the
dock when the case is going against him.
"I think friend Hawk has been re-enacting the joys of his vanished
youth, so to speak."
"He ought to be prosecuted," said Phyllis, blazing with indignation.
Alas, poor Hawk!
"Nobody's safe with a man of that sort, hiring out a boat." Oh,
miserable Hawk!
"But why on earth should he play a trick like that on Professor
Derrick, Chase?"
"Pure animal spirits, probably. Or he may, as I say, be a minion."
I was hot all over.
"I shall tell father that," said Phyllis in her most decided voice,
"and see what he says. I don't wonder at the man taking to drink after
doing such a thing."
"I--I think you're making a mistake," I said.
"I never make mistakes," Mr. Chase replied. "I am called Archibald the
All-Right, for I am infallible. I propose to keep a reflective eye
upon the jovial Hawk."
He helped himself to another section of the chocolate cake.
"Haven't you finished /yet/, Tom?" inquired Phyllis. "I'm sure Mr.
Garnet's getting tired of sitting talking here," she said.
I shot out a polite negative. Mr. Chase explained with his mouth full
that he had by no means finished. Chocolate cake, it appeared, was the
dream of his life. When at sea he was accustomed to lie awake o'
nights thinking of it.
"You don't seem to realise," he said, "that I have just come from a
cruise on a torpedo-boat. There was such a sea on as a rule that
cooking operations were entirely suspended, and we lived on ham and
sardines--without bread."
"How horrible!"
"On the other hand," added Mr. Chase philosophically, "it didn't
matter much, because we were all ill most of the time."
"Don't be nasty, Tom."
"I was merely defending myself. I hope Mr. Hawk will be able to do as
well when his turn comes. My aim, my dear Phyllis, is to show you in a
series of impressionist pictures the sort of thing I have to go
through when I'm not here. Then perhaps you won't rend me so savagely
over a matter of five minutes' lateness for breakfast."
"Five minutes! It was three-quarters of an hour, and everything was
simply frozen."
"Quite right too in weather like this. You're a slave to convention,
Phyllis. You think breakfast ought to be hot, so you always have it
hot. On occasion I prefer mine cold. Mine is the truer wisdom. You can
give the cook my compliments, Phyllis, and tell her--gently, for I
don't wish the glad news to overwhelm her--that I enjoyed that cake.
Say that I shall be glad to hear from her again. Care for a game of
tennis, Garnet?"
"What a pity Norah isn't here," said Phyllis. "We could have had a
four."
"But she is a present wasting her sweetness on the desert air of
Yeovil. You had better sit down and watch us, Phyllis. Tennis in this
sort of weather is no job for the delicately-nurtured feminine. I will
explain the finer points of my play as we go on. Look out particularly
for the Tilden Back-Handed Slosh. A winner every time."
We proceeded to the tennis court. I played with the sun in my eyes. I
might, if I chose, emphasise that fact, and attribute my subsequent
rout to it, adding, by way of solidifying the excuse, that I was
playing in a strange court with a borrowed racquet, and that my mind
was preoccupied--firstly, with /l'affaire/ Hawk, secondly, and
chiefly, with the gloomy thought that Phyllis and my opponent seemed
to be on friendly terms with each other. Their manner at tea had been
almost that of an engaged couple. There was a thorough understanding
between them. I will not, however, take refuge behind excuses. I
admit, without qualifying the statement, that Mr. Chase was too good
for me. I had always been under the impression that lieutenants in the
Royal Navy were not brilliant at tennis. I had met them at various
houses, but they had never shone conspicuously. They had played an
earnest, unobtrusive game, and generally seemed glad when it was over.
Mr. Chase was not of this sort. His service was bottled lightning. His
returns behaved like jumping crackers. He won the first game in
precisely six strokes. He served. Only once did I take the service
with the full face of the racquet, and then I seemed to be stopping a
bullet. I returned it into the net. The last of the series struck the
wooden edge of my racquet, and soared over the back net into the
shrubbery, after the manner of a snick to long slip off a fast bowler.
"Game," said Mr. Chase, "we'll look for that afterwards."
I felt a worm and no man. Phyllis, I thought, would probably judge my
entire character from this exhibition. A man, she would reflect, who
could be so feeble and miserable a failure at tennis, could not be
good for much in any department of life. She would compare me
instinctively with my opponent, and contrast his dash and brilliance
with my own inefficiency. Somehow the massacre was beginning to have a
bad effect on my character. All my self-respect was ebbing. A little
more of this, and I should become crushed,--a mere human jelly. It was
my turn to serve. Service is my strong point at tennis. I am
inaccurate, but vigorous, and occasionally send in a quite unplayable
shot. One or two of these, even at the expense of a fault or so, and I
might be permitted to retain at least a portion of my self-respect.
I opened with a couple of faults. The sight of Phyllis, sitting calm
and cool in her chair under the cedar, unnerved me. I served another
fault. And yet another.
"Here, I say, Garnet," observed Mr. Chase plaintively, "do put me out
of this hideous suspense. I'm becoming a mere bundle of quivering
ganglions."
I loathe facetiousness in moments of stress.
I frowned austerely, made no reply, and served another fault, my
fifth.
Matters had reached a crisis. Even if I had to lob it underhand, I
must send the ball over the net with the next stroke.
I restrained myself this time, eschewing the careless vigour which had
marked my previous efforts. The ball flew in a slow semicircle, and
pitched inside the correct court. At least, I told myself, I had not
served a fault.
What happened then I cannot exactly say. I saw my opponent spring
forward like a panther and whirl his racquet. The next moment the back
net was shaking violently, and the ball was rolling swiftly along the
ground on a return journey to the other court.
"Love-forty," said Mr. Chase. "Phyllis!"
"Yes?"
"That was the Tilden Slosh."
"I thought it must be," said Phyllis.
In the third game I managed to score fifteen. By the merest chance I
returned one of his red-hot serves, and--probably through surprise--he
failed to send it back again.
In the fourth and fifth games I omitted to score. Phyllis had left the
cedar now, and was picking flowers from the beds behind the court.
We began the sixth game. And now for some reason I played really well.
I struck a little vein of brilliance. I was serving, and this time a
proportion of my serves went over the net instead of trying to get
through. The score went from fifteen all to forty-fifteen. Hope began
to surge through my veins. If I could keep this up, I might win yet.
The Tilden Slosh diminished my lead by fifteen. Then I got in a really
fine serve, which beat him. 'Vantage In. Another Slosh. Deuce. Another
Slam. 'Vantage out. It was an awesome moment. There is a tide in the
affairs of men, which, taken by the flood--I served. Fault. I served
again,--a beauty. He returned it like a flash into the corner of the
court. With a supreme effort I got to it. We rallied. I was playing
like a professor. Then whizz--!
The Slosh had beaten me on the post.
"Game /and/--," said Mr. Chase, tossing his racquet into the air and
catching it by the handle. "Good game that last one."
I turned to see what Phyllis thought of it.
At the eleventh hour I had shown her of what stuff I was made.
She had disappeared.
"Looking for Miss Derrick?" said Chase, jumping the net, and joining
me in my court, "she's gone into the house."
"When did she go?"
"At the end of the fifth game," said Chase.
"Gone to dress for dinner, I suppose," he continued. "It must be
getting late. I think I ought to be going, too, if you don't mind. The
professor gets a little restive if I keep him waiting for his daily
bread. Great Scott, that watch can't be right! What do you make of it?
Yes, so do I. I really think I must run. You won't mind. Good-night,
then. See you to-morrow, I hope."
I walked slowly out across the fields. That same star, in which I had
confided on a former occasion, was at its post. It looked placid and
cheerful. /It/ never got beaten by six games to love under the very
eyes of a lady-star. /It/ was never cut out ignominiously by
infernally capable lieutenants in His Majesty's Navy. No wonder it was
cheerful.
CHAPTER XIV
A COUNCIL OF WAR
"The fact is," said Ukridge, "if things go on as they are now, my lad,
we shall be in the cart. This business wants bucking up. We don't seem
to be making headway. Why it is, I don't know, but we are /not/ making
headway. Of course, what we want is time. If only these scoundrels of
tradesmen would leave us alone for a spell we could get things going
properly. But we're hampered and rattled and worried all the time.
Aren't we, Millie?"
"Yes, dear."
"You don't let me see the financial side of the thing enough," I
complained. "Why don't you keep me thoroughly posted? I didn't know we
were in such a bad way. The fowls look fit enough, and Edwin hasn't
had one for a week."
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