Luck of the Bodkins (13 page)

'Not at all, sir.
’

'I'm a little upset, steward.'

‘
You do seem a little upset, sir.
’

‘
Yes. You see, I'm engaged to be married..

‘
I hope you'll be very happy, sir.'

'So do I. But will I? That's the point. That's the question.
’
"What's the question?' asked Reggie Tennyson, entering as he spoke.

Chapter 10

The emotions which flooded Monty Bodkin's bosom as he beheld his old friend sauntering into the state-room were similar to, though more intense than, those which must have come to the beleaguered troops in Lucknow as they heard the swirl of the Highland pipes. He was just the man Monty wanted to see. You could have offered Montague Bodkin at that moment the cream of the world's wit and beauty and intellect, and he would have c
hosen Reggie Tennyson. 'Reggie!
'he cried.

An awed expression came into the other's face.

'It's astounding,' he said. 'Positively miraculous. I come in here, into this small, enclosed space, and when I'm about six inches away from you
,
you innate your lungs and bellow "Reggie I" in my ear-hole at the top of your voice, and I don't so much as wince. And an hour ago, if a bird on a distant tree had tweet-tweeted in the most confidential of undertones, I'd have leaped straight out of my skin and cried like a child. And this change, old boy, was brought about purely and simply by a smallish girl attaching herself to my neck and twisting it into the shape of a corkscrew. Yes, it's a fact. With those slim hands she cured my headache in the space of -
’

Monty was dancing much as Mr Llewellyn had danced before Mabel Spence.

'Never mind your headache!
‘

'I don't now. It's gone. As I tell you -
’

'Reggie, we
've got to change state-rooms !
‘

'What are you talking about?'

‘
About our changing state-rooms.
’

'But we've changed state-rooms.
’

'Change them again, I mean.'

'What, you shift up and me shift down?
’

‘
Yes.'

Thus placing me next door to Lottie Blossom?'

Reggie smiled a faint, sad smile, and shook his head.

'No, laddie,' he said. 'I'm sorry, but no. Not unless you give me definite assurance that my brother Ambrose has fallen overboard. You have no conception, Monty,' proceeded the younger of the Tennysons earnestly, 'you have literally no conception how Ambrose has warmed up since our last meeting. I take it he has seen the passenger list. At any rate, ever since I left you and went on deck for that breath of fresh air he has been following me about all over the ship, exuding hostility and menace. I lose him from time to time, but he always finds me again, and when he finds me he glares, breathing noisily through the nose. It would be courting a hideous doom for me to be such a mug as to change state-rooms. Why do you want to change, anyway? This is a nicer state-room altogether than the one I've got. No comparison. Softer bed, better furniture, two old English prints on the wall instead of one, prettier carpet, handsomer steward -'

'Thank you, sir,' said Albert Peasemarch.

'Don't dream of changing. You'll be as cosy in here as
a
worm in a chestnut. And this room has got a private bath -'

'Ha!'

'Eh?'

Monty's face twisted.

'You mentioned the word "bath". Go and take a look at it.' 'I've seen it.' 'See it again.
’

Reggie raised his eyebrows.

'You're pretty mystic this p.m., Monty, and I fail to grasp the gist. Still, if it will please you - Golly!' he said opening the bathroom door and falling back a step.

'You see!'

'Who did that?'

'Your friend Lotus Blossom, with a lipstick.'

Reggie was unquestionably impressed. He looked at Monty as if he were seeing him with new eyes.

‘I
say,' he said reverently, 'you must have been making the pace in the most amazing way
for her to let herself go like
that! Lottie isn't a girl it's easy to get chummy with in a hurry. Full of reserve. It was weeks before she put that piece of ice down my back. I had no notion you were such a swift worker, old man. Why, you can't have known her more than about half an hour.'

'I don't know her 1 I've never met her.' 'Never met her?
’

'No. I came in and found the wall as you see it I suppose she meant that writing for you.' Reggie considered this theory.

‘I
see what you mean. Yes, that might be so. Gosh, I'm glad I've moved!'

'You
haven't moved.' ·Yes, I have.' ‘
Reggie!'

‘
I'm sorry, old boy, but that's final.
’

'But, dash it, Reggie, listen. Think
of my position, I'm engaged!' ‘
I'm sorry.'

'Engaged! Engaged to be married. And my fiancee liable at any moment to walk into that bathroom -
’

'Well, really, sir!' said Albert Peasemarch.

The steward was looking his austerest. Twenty years of ocean travel had not weakened those high principles which he had imbibed in boyhood from a Victorian mother.

'Well, really, sir! A pure, sweet English girl... Is the young lady English?'

'Of course she's English.
’

'Very good, sir. Then, as I
was saying,' said Albert Pease
march with quiet rebuke, 'a pure, sweet English girl is hardly likely to come wandering in and out of a bachelor young gentleman's bathroom. She wouldn't dream of doing such a thing, not a pure, sweet English girl wouldn't. She would blush at the thought.'

'Exactly,' said Reggie. 'Well spoken, steward.'

Thank you, sir.'

‘
A bull's eye, absolutely. He's right, Monty. I can't understand a decent-minded chap like you so much as entertaining such an idea. If you want to know, I'm a little shocked. How can you suppose that a girl of Gertrude's rigid propriety would ever contemplate the notion of coming in here for her morning tub? Really,Monty!'

It was the first faint glimmering of a silver lining that had come to brighten the cloud wrack of Monty's horizon. He definitely perked up.

'Why, of course!' he said.

'Why, of course!' said Reggie.

'Why, of course, sir!' said Albert Peasemarch.

'Why, of course!' said Monty. 'She wouldn't, would she?'

'Certainly not.'

'What a relief! You have thrown,' said Monty, regarding his vassal gratefully, 'a new light on the - what's your name, steward?'

'Peasemarch, sir. Albert Peasemarch.'

'You have thrown a new light on the situation, Albert Peasemarch. Thanks. For throwing a new light on the situation. All may not yet be lost.'

'No, sir.'

'Still, to be on she safe side, I wish you'd get a mop and have
a
pop at that writing.'

'It wouldn't be any use, sir. It's undeliable.
’

'All the same, get a mop and pop.'

'Very good, sir. If you wish it.'

Thanks, Peasemarch. Thank you, Albert.'

The steward withdrew. Monty threw himself down on the bed and sought to complete the calming of his agitated nerves with a cigarette. Reggie took a chair, tested it and sat down.

‘
Intelligent fellow, that,' said Monty.

'Oh, quite.'

Taken a load off my mind.'

‘
I suppose so. Not,' said Reggie, 'that it would be such
a
bad thing if Gertrude did go into that bathroom.' 'Don't gibber, old man,' begged Monty. 'Not now.
’
'I'm not gibbering. I've been thinking pretty closely about this business of you and Gertrude, Monty - pretty closely.
I
don't think you know much about feminine psychology, do you?
’

'I don't even know what it is.'

'I thought as much. If you did, you would have seen for yourself what it was that made Gertrude break off your engagement. No,' said Reggie, holding up a hand, 'let me speak. I want to explain it all to you. I've got the whole thing taped out. Now, let us just run through the main facts of your association with Gertrude. You say you started off by squashing
a
wasp for her at a picnic. Excellent. You couldn't have begun better. It lent you glamour, and girls love glamour. You can gather that from the fact that about two days later she consented to marry you.'

Two weeks.'

Two days or two weeks - the actual period of time doesn't matter. The point is that you clicked with amazing rapidity. That shows that you must have had glamour. I shouldn't wonder if during those two weeks she didn't look on you as a king among men. Well, all right, then. Up to that point you were going like a breeze. You don't dispute that?'

'No.'

'You then, however, proceed to muck up the whole thing. You make a fatal move. You go and crawl to her father.'
‘I
didn't crawl.'

‘I
don't know what you call crawling, if what you did wasn't. Ask me, you simply grovelled. He started shooting off his head and laying down absurd conditions and you, instead of telling him to put a sock in it, agreed to them.'

'What else could I have done?'

'You could have been masterful and dominant. You could have gone to Gertrude and insisted on her marrying you at the nearest registrar's and, had she refused, biffed her in the eye. Instead of which, you took it all lying down, and what was the result? Phut went your glamour. Gertrude found herself saying: "This Bodkin bird, what about him, if you come right down to it? Good with the wasps, yes, but are wasps everything?" She felt that she had been deceived in you, that that wasp was just a flash in the pan. She said to herself: "If you want my candid opinion, I believe the chap's a wash-out." From that to giving you the raspberry was a short step. There you have the whole thing in a nutshell.'

Monty puffed at his cigarette with a quiet smile. He was enjoying this. If he had had a complaint against his friend in the past, it was that Reggie Tennyson was one of those fellows who always think they know everything. Sound egg though he was in other respects, you could not get away from the fact that it could be extremely irritating, that habit of his of telling you what to do or, if you had already done it, telling you you had done it wrong.

Reggie Tennyson was the sort of chap who, discovering that you went to Butters & Butters for your socks, would wonder that you didn't know that Mutters & Mutters were the only firm in London who supplied the sock perfect: and when, having rushed off to Mutters & Mutters and stocked up with socks, you then bought a shirt or two in addition, would say: 'Not shirts, old boy. Not Mutters & Mutters for shirts. Stutters & Stutters. The only place.'

A bit rasping it had been at times, and Monty welcomed this opportunity of putting him in his place for once. He finished his cigarette, and lit another with an air.

'So that's how it was, eh?'

‘
Just like that.'

'How do you know?'

'My dear chap!
'

'Ever been wrong, Reggie?
’

'Once, in the summer of 1930.
’

'Well, you're wrong this time.'

'You think so?'

‘I
do think so.'

'What makes you think so?'

The fact,' said Monty, triumphantly unmasking his batteries, 'that Gertrude and I have just had a complete reconciliation and that I found out that the trouble had been that, for reasons into which I need not go, she had got the idea into her head that I was a chap who went about making love to every girl I met.'

It was pleasant to him to note that he had in no way overestimated the magnitude of the wallop he had been waiting to deliver. There was nothing complacent about Reggie now. The shattering of his carefully reasoned theory had hit him hard. He was plainly taken aback. Indeed, he seemed to Monty to be overdoing the thing a bit. Just because a fellow had scored off you, there was no reason to look as rattled as all that. 'She -
what was that you said?'