“Jeeves,” I said, “may I speak frankly?”
“Certainly, sir.”
“What I have to say may wound you.”
“Not at all, sir.”
“Well, then——”
No—wait. Hold the line a minute. I’ve gone off the rails.
I don’t know if you have had the same experience, but the snag I alwayscome up against when I’m telling a story is this dashed difficult problemof where to begin it. It’s a thing you don’t want to go wrong over,because one false step and you’re sunk. I mean, if you fool about toolong at the start, trying to establish atmosphere, as they call it, andall that sort of rot, you fail to grip and the customers walk out on you.
Get off the mark, on the other hand, like a scalded cat, and your publicis at a loss. It simply raises its eyebrows, and can’t make out whatyou’re talking about.
And in opening my report of the complex case of Gussie Fink-Nottle,Madeline Bassett, my Cousin Angela, my Aunt Dahlia, my Uncle Thomas,young Tuppy Glossop and the cook, Anatole, with the above spot ofdialogue, I see that I have made the second of these two floaters.
I shall have to hark back a bit. And taking it for all in all andweighing this against that, I suppose the affair may be said to have hadits inception, if inception is the word I want, with that visit of mineto Cannes. If I hadn’t gone to Cannes, I shouldn’t have met the Bassettor bought that white mess jacket, and Angela wouldn’t have met her shark,and Aunt Dahlia wouldn’t have played baccarat.
Yes, most decidedly, Cannes was the point d’appui.
Right ho, then. Let me marshal my facts.
I went to Cannes—leaving Jeeves behind, he having intimated that he didnot wish to miss Ascot—round about the beginning of June. With metravelled my Aunt Dahlia and her daughter Angela. Tuppy Glossop, Angela’sbetrothed, was to have been of the party, but at the last moment couldn’tget away. Uncle Tom, Aunt Dahlia’s husband, remained at home, because hecan’t stick the South of France at any price.
So there you have the layout—Aunt Dahlia, Cousin Angela and self off toCannes round about the beginning of June.
All pretty clear so far, what?
We stayed at Cannes about two months, and except for the fact that AuntDahlia lost her shirt at baccarat and Angela nearly got inhaled by ashark while aquaplaning, a pleasant time was had by all.
On July the twenty-fifth, looking bronzed and fit, I accompanied aunt andchild back to London. At seven p.m. on July the twenty-sixth we alightedat Victoria. And at seven-twenty or thereabouts we parted with mutualexpressions of esteem—they to shove off in Aunt Dahlia’s car to BrinkleyCourt, her place in Worcestershire, where they were expecting toentertain Tuppy in a day or two; I to go to the flat, drop my luggage,clean up a bit, and put on the soup and fish preparatory to pushing roundto the Drones for a bite of dinner.
And it was while I was at the flat, towelling the torso after amuch-needed rinse, that Jeeves, as we chatted of this and that—pickingup the threads, as it were—suddenly brought the name of GussieFink-Nottle into the conversation.
As I recall it, the dialogue ran something as follows:
SELF: Well, Jeeves, here we are, what?
JEEVES: Yes, sir.
SELF: I mean to say, home again.
JEEVES: Precisely, sir.
SELF: Seems ages since I went away.
JEEVES: Yes, sir.
SELF: Have a good time at Ascot?
JEEVES: Most agreeable, sir.
SELF: Win anything?
JEEVES: Quite a satisfactory sum, thank you, s