Pelham Wodehouse - Love Me, Love My Dog

John looked at her, and gulped.

He cleared his throat.

What he wanted to say was: "Miss Ellison, your lightest wish is law. I love you--not with the weak two-by-four imitation of affection such as may be offered to you by certain knock-kneed members of the Peerage, but with a great, broad, deep, throbbing love such as the world has never known. Take Reuben. You have my heart, my soul; shall I deny you a dog? Take Reuben. And when you look upon him, think, if but for a moment, of one who, though far away, is thinking, thinking always of you. Miss Ellison, good-bye!"

What he said was: "Er, I----"

And that, mind you, was pretty good going for John.

Oh, thank you!" cried Aline. "Thank you so much, Mr. Barton. It's perfectly sweet of you, and I'll take such care of him. I won't let him out of my sight for a minute."

". . ." said John, brightly.

Mathematicians among my readers do not need to be informed that ". . ." is the algebraical sign representing a blend of wheeze, croak, and hiccough.

And the motor rolled off.

It was about an hour later that Lord Bertie Fendall, finding Aline seated under the shade of the trees, came to a halt beside her.

"Barton went off in the car just now, didn't he?" he inquired, casually.

"Yes," said Aline.

Lord Bertie drew a deep breath of relief. At last he could walk abroad without the feeling that at any moment that infernal dog might charge out at him from round the next corner. With a light heart he dropped into a chair beside Aline, and began to buzz.

"Do you know, Miss Ellison--"

A short cough immediately behind him made him look round. His voice trailed off. His eyeglass fell with a jerk and bounded on the end of its cord. He sprang to his feet.

"Oh, there you are, Reuben," said Aline. "Here, come here. What have you been doing to your nose? It's all muddy. Aren't you fond of dogs, Lord Herbert? I love them."

"Eh? I beg your pardon?" said his lordship, revolving warily on his own axis, as the animal lumbered past him. "Oh, yes. Yes. That is to say--oh, yes. Very."

Aline was removing the mud from Reuben's nose with the corner of her pocket-handkerchief.

"Don't you think you can generally tell a man's character by whether dogs take to him or not? They have such wonderful instinct."

"Wonderful," agreed his lordship, meeting Reuben's rolling eye and looking hastily away.

"Mr. Barton was going to take Reuben with him, but that would have been silly for such a short while, wouldn't it?"

"Yes. Oh, yes," said Lord Bertie. "I suppose," he went on, "he will spend most of his time in the stables and so on, don't you know? Not in the house, I mean, don't you know, what?"

"The idea!" cried Aline, indignantly. "Reuben's not a stable dog. I'm never going to let him out of my sight."

"No?" said Lord Bertie a little feverishly. "No? Oh, no. Quite so."

"There!" said Aline, giving Reuben a push. "Now you're tidy. What were you saying, Lord Herbert?"

Reuben moved a step forward, and wheezed slightly.

"Excuse me, Miss Ellison," said his lordship. "I've just recollected an important--there's a good old boy!--an important letter I meant to have written. Excuse me!"

The announcement of his proposed departure may have been somewhat abrupt, but at any rate no fault could be found with his manner of leaving. It was ceremonious in the extreme. He moved out of her presence backwards, as if she had been royalty.

Aline saw him depart with a slightly aggrieved feeling. She had been in the mood for company. For some reason which she could not define she was conscious of quite a sensation of loneliness. It was absurd to think that John's departure could have caused this. And yet somehow it did leave a blank. Perhaps it was because he was so big and silent. You grew used to his being there just as you grew used to the scenery, and you missed him when he was gone. That was all. If Nelson's column were removed, one would feel lonely in Trafalgar Square.

Lord Bertie, meanwhile, having reached the smoking-room, where he proposed to brood over the situation with the assistance of a series of cigarettes, found Keggs there, arranging the morning papers on a side-table. He flung himself into an arm-chair, and, with a scowl at the butler's back, struck a match.

"I 'ope your lordship is suffering no ill effects from the adventure?" said Keggs, finishing the disposal of the papers.

"What?" said Lord Bertie, coldly. He disliked Keggs.

"I was alluding to your lordship's encounter with the dog Reuben this morning."

Lord Bertie started.

"What do you mean?"

"I observed that your lordship 'ad climbed a tree to elude the animal."

"You saw it?"

Keggs bowed.

"Then why the devil, you silly old idiot," demanded his lordship explosively, "didn't you come and take the brute away?"

It had been the practice in the old days, both of Lord Bertie and of his father, to address the butler in moments of agitation with a certain aristocratic vigour.

"I 'ardly liked to interfere, your lordship, beyond informing Mr. Barton. The animal being 'is."

Lord Bertie flung his cigarette out of the window, and kicked a foot- stool. Keggs regarded these evidences of an overwrought soul sympathetically.

"I can appreciate your lordship's hemotion," he said, "knowin' 'ow haverse to dogs your lordship 'as always been. It seems only yesterday," he continued, reminiscently, "that your lordship, then a boy at Heton, 'ome for the 'olidays, handed me a package of Rough on Rats, and instructed me to poison 'er ladyship your mother's toy Pomeranian with it."

Lord Bertie started for the second time since he had entered the room. He screwed his eyeglass firmly into his eye, and looked keenly at the butler. Keggs's face was expressionless. Lord Bertie coughed. He looked round at the door. It was closed.

"You didn't do it," he said.

"The 'onorarium which your lordship offered," said the butler, deprecatingly, "was only six postage-stamps and a 'arf share in a white rat. I did not consider it hadequate in view of the undoubted riskiness of the proposed act."

"You'd have done it if I had offered more?"

"That, your lordship, it is impossible to say after this lapse of time."

The Earl of Stockleigh had at one time had the idea of attaching his son and heir to the Diplomatic Service. Lord Bertie's next speech may supply some clue to his lordship's reasons for abandoning that scheme.

"Keggs," he said, leaning forward, "what will you take to poison that dashed dog, Reuben?"

The butler raised a hand in pained protest.

"Your lordship, really!"

"Ten pounds."

"Your lordship!"

"Twenty."

Keggs seemed to waver.

"I'll give you twenty-five," said his lordship.

Before the butler could reply, the door opened and Mr. Keith entered.

"The morning papers, sir," said Keggs deferentially, and passed out of the room.

It was a few days later that he presented himself again before Lord Bertie. His lordship was in low spirits. He was not in love with Aline--he would have considered it rather bad form to be in love with anyone--but he found her possessed of attractions and wealth sufficient to qualify her for an alliance with a Stockleigh; and he had concentrated his mind, so far as it was capable of being concentrated on anything, upon bringing the alliance about. And up to a point everything had seemed to progress admirably. Then Reuben had come to the fore and wrecked the campaign. How could a fellow keep up an easy flow of conversation with one eye on a bally savage bulldog all the time? And the brute never left her. Wherever she went he went, lumbering along like a cart-horse with a nasty look out of the corner of his eye whenever a fellow came up and tried to say a word. The whole bally situation, decided his lordship, was getting dashed impossible, and if something didn't happen to change it he would get out of the place and go off to Paris.