Joy in the Morning by P. G. Wodehouse Page A

never have brought us together. And, if she had to bring us together, she ought not to have told me to be bright and genial. You know about her wanting me to be bright and genial?’
    Yes. She said you were inclined to be a bit stiff in your manner with Uncle Percy.’
    ‘I am always stiff in my manner with elderly gentlemen who snort like foghorns when I appear and glare at me as if I were somebody from Moscow distributing Red propaganda. It’s the sensitive, highly strung artist in me. Old Hardened Arteries does not like me.’
    ‘So Nobby said. She thinks it’s because he regards you as a butterfly. My personal view is that it’s those grey flannel bags of yours.’
    ‘What’s wrong with them?’
    ‘The patch on the knee, principally. It creates a bad impression. Haven’t you another pair?’
    ‘Who do you think I am? Beau Brummel?’
    I forbore to pursue the subject.
    ‘Well, go on.’
    ‘Where was I?’
    ‘You were saying you made a bloomer in trying to be bright and genial.’
    ‘Ah, yes. That’s right. I did. And this is how it came about. You see, the first thing a man has to ask himself, when he is told to be bright and genial, is “How bright? How genial?” Shall he, that is to say, be just a medium ray of sunshine, or shall he go all out and shoot the works? I thought it over, and decided to bar nothing and be absolutely rollicking. And that, I see now, is where I went wrong.’
    He paused, and remained for a space in thought. I could see that some painful memory was engaging his attention.
    ‘I wonder, Bertie,’ he said, coming to the surface at length, ‘if you were present one day at the Drones when Freddie Widgeon sprang those Joke Goods on the lunchers there?’
    ‘Joke Goods?’
    ‘The things you see advertised in toy-shop catalogues as handy for breaking the ice and setting the table in a roar. You know. The Plate Lifter. The Dribble Glass. The Surprise Salt Shaker.’
    ‘Oh, those?’
    I laughed heartily. I remembered the occasion well. Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright was suffering from a hangover at the moment, and I shall not readily forget his emotion when he picked up his roll and it squeaked and a rubber mouse ran out of it. Strong men had to rally round with brandy.
    And then I stopped laughing heartily. The frightful significance of his words hit me, and I started as if somebody had jabbed a red-hot skewer through the epidermis.
    ‘You aren’t telling me you worked those off on Uncle Percy?’
    Yes, Bertie. That is what I did.’
    ‘Golly!’
    ‘That about covers it.’
    I groaned a hollow one. The heart had sunk. One has, of course, to make allowances for writers, all of them being more or less loony. Look at Shakespeare, for instance. Very unbalanced. Used to go about stealing ducks. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help feeling that in springing Joke Goods on the guardian of the girl he loved Boko had carried an author’s natural goofiness too far. Even Shakespeare might have hesitated to go to such lengths.
    ‘But why?’
    ‘I suppose the idea at the back of my mind was that I ought to show him my human side.’
    ‘Did he take it big?’
    ‘Pretty big.’
    ‘He didn’t like it?’
    ‘No. I can answer that question without reservation. He did not like it.’
    ‘Has he forbidden you the house?’
    You don’t have to forbid people houses after looking at them as he looked at me over the Surprise Salt Shaker. The language of the eyes is enough. Do you know the Surprise Salt Shaker? You joggle it, and out comes a spider. The impression I received was that he was allergic to spiders.’
    I rose. I had heard enough.
    ‘I’ll be pushing along,’ I said, rather faintly.
    ‘What’s your hurry?’
    ‘I ought to be going to Wee Nooke. Jeeves will be arriving at any moment with the luggage, and I shall have to get settled in.’
    ‘I see. I would come with you, only I am in the act of composing a well-expressed letter of apology to my Lord Worplesdon. I had better finish it,