Plum Pie Read Online Free PDF Page B

the Drones Club millionaire, but it is well known that it's practically impossible to extract as much as five bob from him without using chloroform and a forceps. Dozens have tried it and failed.
    "That's what Freddie Widgeon told me. Freddie says that once Jas Waterbury enters your life, you can kiss at least a portion of your holdings goodbye. Has he taken anything off you?"
    "Fifteen quid."
    "You're lucky it wasn't fifteen hundred."
     
    If you're saying to yourself that these words of Catsmeat's must have left me uneasy and apprehensive, you are correct to the last drop. A quarter to four found me pacing the Wooster carpet with furrowed brow. If it had been merely a matter of this grease-coated theatrical agent tapping Freddie Widgeon for a couple of bob, it would have been different. A child can tap Freddie. But when it came to him parting Oofy Prosser, a man in whose wallet moths nest and raise large families, from a colossal sum like two thousand pounds, the brain reeled and one sought in vain for an explanation. Yet so it was. Catsmeat said it was impossible to get the full story, because every time Jas's name was mentioned Oofy just turned purple and spluttered, but the stark fact remained that Jas's bank balance was that amount up and Oofy's that amount down, and it made me feel like a fellow in a novel of suspense who suddenly realizes that he's up against an Octopus of Crime and hasn't the foggiest how he's going to avoid the menacing tentacles.
    But it wasn't long before Reason returned to its throne and I saw that I'd been alarming myself unnecessarily. Nothing like that was going to happen to me. It might be that Jas Water-bury would have a shot at luring me into some business venture with the ultimate aim of leaving me holding the baby, but if he did he would find himself stymied by a firm nolle prosequi, so, to cut a long story s, by the time the front door bell rang Bertram was himself again.
    I answered the bell, for it was Jeeves's afternoon off. Once a week he downs tools and goes off to play Bridge at the Junior Ganymede. I opened the door and Jas and his niece came in, and I stood gaping dumbly. For an instant, you might say I was spellbound.
    Not having attended the performance of a pantomime since fairly early childhood, I had forgotten how substantial Fairy Queens were, and the sight of Trixie Waterbury was like a blow from a blunt instrument. A glance was enough to tell me why the dramatic critic of the Leeds Evening Chronicle had called her buxom. She stood about five feet nine in her short French vamps and bulged in every direction. Also the flashing eyes and the gleaming teeth. It was some moments before I was able to say Good Afternoon.
    "Afternoon," said Jas Waterbury. He looked about him approvingly. "Nice little place you've got here. Costs a packet to keep up, I'll bet. This is Mr. Wooster, Trixie. You call him Bertie."
    The Fairy Queen said wouldn't 'sweetie-pie' be better, and Jas Waterbury told her with a good deal of enthusiasm that she was quite right.
    "Much more box office," he agreed. "Didn't I say she would be right for the part, cocky? You can rely on her to give a smooth West End performance. When do you expect your lady friend?"
    "Any moment now."
    "Then we'd better be dressing the stage. Discovered, you sitting in that chair there with Trixie on your lap."
    "What!"
    He seemed to sense the consternation in my voice, for h< frowned a little under the grease.
    "We're all working for the good of the show," he reminded me austerely. "You want the scene to carry conviction, and there's nothing like a sight gag."
    I could see there was much in what he said. This was not time for half measures, I sat down. I don't say I sat blithely, but I sat, and Wigan's favourite Fairy Queen descended on my lap with a bump that made the stout chair tremble like an aspen And scarcely had she started to nestle when the door bell rang.
    "Curtain going up," said Jas Waterbury. "Let's have the passionate