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presents and walking tours. What is Pop Glossop doing here as the butler?’
‘Ah! I thought you might be going to ask that. I was meaning to tell you some time.’
‘Tell me now.’
‘Well, it was his idea.’
I eyed her sternly. Bertram Wooster has no objection to listening to drivel, but it must not be pure babble from the padded cell, as this appeared to be.
‘His idea?’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you asking me to believe that Sir Roderick Glossop got up one morning, gazed at himself in the mirror, thought he was looking a little pale and said to himself, “I need a change. I think I’ll try being a butler for awhile”?’
‘No, not that, but… I don’t know where to begin.’
‘Begin at the beginning. Come on now, young B. Wickham, smack into it,’ I said, and took a piece of cake in a marked manner.
The austerity of my tone seemed to touch a nerve and kindle the fire that always slept in this vermilion-headed menace to the common weal, for she frowned a displeased frown and told me for heaven’s sake to stop goggling like a dead halibut.
‘I have every right to goggle like a dead halibut,’ I said coldly, ‘and I shall continue to do so as long as I see fit. I am under a considerable nervous s. As always seems to happen when you are mixed up in the doings, life has become one damn thing after another, and I think I am justified in demanding an explanation. I await your statement.’
‘Well, let me marshal my thoughts.’
She did so, and after a brief intermission, during which I finished my piece of cake, proceeded.
‘I’d better begin by telling you about Upjohn, because it all started through him. You see, he’s egging Phyllis on to marry Wilbert Cream.’
‘When you say egging -‘
‘I mean egging. And when a man like that eggs, something has to give, especially when the girl’s a pill like Phyllis, who always does what Daddy tells her.’
‘No will of her own?’
‘Not a smidgeon. To give you an instance, a couple of days ago he took her to Birmingham to see the repertory company’s performance of Chekhov’s Seagull, because he thought it would be educational. I’d like to catch anyone trying to make me see Chekhov’s Seagull, but Phyllis just bowed her head and said, “Yes, Daddy.” Didn’t even attempt to put up a fight. That’ll show you how much of a will of her own she’s got.’
It did indeed. Her story impressed me profoundly. I knew Chekhov’s Seagull. My Aunt Agatha had once made me take her son Thos to a performance of it at the Old Vic, and what with the strain of trying to follow the cock-eyed goings-on of characters called Zarietchnaya and Medvienko and having to be constantly on the alert to prevent Thos making a sneak for the great open spaces, my suffering had been intense. I needed no further evidence to tell me that Phyllis Mills was a girl whose motto would always be ‘Daddy knows best’. Wilbert had only got to propose and she would sign on the dotted line because Upjohn wished it.
‘Your aunt’s worried sick about it.’
‘She doesn’t approve?’
‘Of course she doesn’t approve. You must have heard of Willie Cream, going over to New York so much.’
‘Why yes, news of his escapades has reached me. He’s a playboy.’
‘Your aunt thinks he’s a screwball.’
‘Many playboys are, I believe. Well, that being so, one can understand why she doesn’t want those wedding bells to ring out. But,’ I said, putting my finger on the res in my unerring way, ‘that doesn’t explain where Pop Glossop comes in.’
‘Yes, it does. She got him here to observe Wilbert.’
I found myself fogged.
‘Cock an eye at him, you mean? Drink him in, as it were? What good’s that going to do?’
She snorted impatiently.
‘Observe in the technical sense. You know how these brain specialists work. They watch the subject closely. They engage him in conversation. They apply subtle tests. And sooner or later -‘
‘I begin to see. Sooner or later he lets fall an incautious word