Pelham Wodehouse - Not George Washington — an Autobiographical Novel

The next point of importance is my interview with Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell. She had known all along how matters stood in regard to Eva and myself. She had not been hostile to me on that account. She had only pointed out that as I could do nothing towards supporting Eva I had better keep away when my cousin was in London. That was many years ago. Since then we had seldom met. Latterly, not at all. Invitations still arrived from her, but her afternoon parties clashed with my after-breakfast pipe, and as for her evening receptions—well, by the time I had pieced together the various component parts of my dress clothes, I found myself ready for bed. That is to say, more ready for bed than I usually am.

I went to Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell in a very bitter mood. I was bent on trouble.

"I've come to congratulate Eva," I said.

Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell sighed.

"I was afraid of this," she said.

"The announcement was the more pleasant," I went on, "because James has been a bosom friend of mine."

"I'm afraid you are going to be extremely disagreeable about your cousin's engagement," she said.

"I am," I answered her. "Very disagreeable. I intend to shadow the young couple, to be constantly meeting them, calling attention to them. James will most likely have to try to assault me. That may mean a black eye for dear James. It will certainly mean the police court. Their engagement will be, in short, a succession of hideous contretemps , a series of laughable scenes."

"Julian," said Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell, "hitherto you have acted manfully toward Eva. You have been brave. Have you no regard for Eva?"

"None," I said.

"Nor for Mr. Cloyster?"

"Not a scrap."

"But why are you behaving in this appallingly selfish way?"

This was a facer. I couldn't quite explain to her how things really were, so I said:

"Never you mind. Selfish or not, Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell, I'm out for trouble."

That night I had a letter from her. She said that in order to avoid all unpleasantness, Eva's engagement would be of the briefest nature possible. That the marriage was fixed for the twelfth of next month; that the wedding would be a very quiet one; and that until the day of the wedding Eva would not be in London.

It amused me to find how thoroughly I had terrified Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell. How excellently I must have acted, for, of course, I had not meant a word I had said to that good lady.

In the days preceding the twelfth of June I confess I rather softened to James. The entente cordiale was established between us. He told me how irresistible Eva had been that night; mentioned how completely she had carried him away. Had she not carried me away in precisely the same manner once upon a time?

He swore he loved her as dearly as—(I can't call to mind the simile he employed, though it was masterly and impressive.) I even hinted that the threats I had used in the presence of Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell were not serious. He thanked me, but said I had frightened her to such good purpose that the date would now have to stand. "You will not he surprised to hear," he added, "that I have called in all my work. I shall want every penny I make. The expenses of an engaged man are hair-raising. I send her a lot of flowers every morning—you've no conception how much a few orchids cost. Then, whenever I go to see her I take her some little present—a gold-mounted umbrella, a bicycle lamp, or a patent scent-bottle. I'm indebted to you, Julian, positively indebted to you for cutting short our engagement."

I now go on to point two: the morning of the twelfth of June.

Hurried footsteps on my staircase. A loud tapping at my door. The church clock chiming twelve. The agitated, weeping figure of Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell approaching my hammock. A telegram thrust into my hand. Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell's hysterical exclamation, "You infamous monster—you—you are at the bottom of this."

All very disconcerting. All, fortunately, very unusual.

My eyes were leaden with slumber, but I forced myself to decipher the following message, which had been telegraphed to West Kensington Lane:

Wedding must be postponed.—CLOYSTER.

"I've had no hand in this," I cried; "but," I added enthusiastically, "it serves Eva jolly well right."

Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell seemed somehow to drift away after that.

Apparently I went to sleep again, and she didn't wait.

When I woke, it was getting on for two o'clock. I breakfasted, with that magnificent telegram propped up against the teapot; had a bath, dressed, and shortly before five was well on my way to Walpole Street.

The more I thought over the thing, the more it puzzled me. Why had James done this? Why should he wish to treat Eva in this manner? I was delighted that he had done so, but why had he? A very unexpected person, James.

James was lying back in his shabby old armchair, smoking a pipe. There was tea on the table. The room seemed more dishevelled than ever. It would have been difficult to say which presented the sorrier spectacle, the room or its owner.

He looked up as I came in, and nodded listlessly. I poured myself out a cup of tea, and took a muffin. Both were cold and clammy. I went to the bell.

"What are you doing?" asked James.

"Only going to ring for some more tea," I said.

"No, don't do that. I'll go down and ask for it. You don't mind using my cup, do you?"

He went out of the room, and reappeared with a jug of hot water.

"You see," he explained, "if Mrs. Blankley brings in another cup she'll charge for two teas instead of one."

"It didn't occur to me," I said. "Sorry."

"It sounds mean," mumbled James.

"Not at all," I said. "You're quite right not to plunge into reckless extravagance."

James blushed slightly—a feat of which I was surprised to see that he was capable.

"The fact is——" he began.

I interrupted him.

"Never mind about that," I said. "What I want to know is—what's the meaning of this?" And I shoved the bilious-hued telegraph form under his nose, just as Mrs. Gunton-Cresswell had shoved it under mine.

"It means that I'm done," he said.

"I don't understand."

"I'll explain. I have postponed my marriage for the same reason that I refused you a clean cup—because I cannot afford luxuries."

"It may be my dulness; but, still, I don't follow you. What exactly are you driving at?"

"I'm done for. I'm on the rocks. I'm a pauper."

"A what?"

"A pauper."

I laughed. The man was splendid. There was no other word for it.

"And shall I tell you something else that you are?" I said. "You are a low, sneaking liar. You are playing it low down on Eva."

He laughed this time. It irritated me unspeakably.

"Don't try to work off the hollow, mirthless laugh dodge on me," I said, "because it won't do. You're a blackguard, and you know it."

"I tell you I'm done for. I've barely a penny in the world."

"Rot!" I said. "Don't try that on me. You've let Eva down plop, and I'm jolly glad; but all the same you're a skunk. Nothing can alter that. Why don't you marry the girl?"

"I can't," he said. "It would be too dishonourable."

"Dishonourable?"

"Yes. I haven't got enough money. I couldn't ask her to share my poverty with me. I love her too dearly."

I was nearly sick. The beast spoke in a sort of hushed, soft-music voice as if he were the self-sacrificing hero in a melodrama. The stained-glass expression on his face made me feel homicidal.

"Oh, drop it," I said. "Poverty! Good Lord! Isn't two thousand a year enough to start on?"

"But I haven't got two thousand a year."

"Oh, I don't pretend to give the figures to a shilling."