Laughing Gas by P. G. Wodehouse Read Free Book Online Page A

theme and switched off to an aspect of the matter which had been puzzling me from the first. You will remember that I had thought this kid to have spoken in riddles, and I still wanted an explanation of those rather mystic opening words of his.
    'You're probably right,' I said pacifically. 'But, be that as it may, what made you think I was a reporter?'
    'I'm expecting a flock of them here.'
    'You are?'
    'Sure. There'll be camera men, too, and human interest writers.'
    'What, to see you have a tooth out?'
    'Sure. When I have a tooth out, that's news.'
    'What! '
    'Sure. This is going to make the front page of every paper in the country.' 'What, your tooth?'
    'Yay, my tooth. Listen, when I had my tonsils extracted last year, it rocked civilization. I'm some shucks, I want to tell you.'
    'Somebody special, you mean?'
    'I'll say that's what I mean. I'm Joey Cooley.'
    Owing to the fact that one of my unswerving rules in life is never to go to a picture if I am informed by my spies that there is a child in it, I had never actually set eyes on this stripling. But of course I knew the name. Ann, if you remember, had spoken of him. So had April June.
    'Oh, ah,' I said. 'Joey Cooley, eh?'
    'Joey Cooley is correct.'
    'Yes, I've heard of you.'
    'So I should think.'
    'I know your nurse.'
    *My what?'
    'Well, your female attendant or whatever she is. Ann Bannister.'
    'Oh, Ann? She's an all-right guy, Ann is.' 'Quite.'
    'A corker, and don't let anyone tell you different.' 'I won't.'
    'Ann's a peach. Yessir, that's what Ann is.'
    'And April June was talking about you the other day.'
    'Oh, yeah? And what did she have to say?'
    'She told me you were in her last picture.'
    'She did, did she?' He snorted with not a little violence, and his brow darkened. It was plain that he was piqued. Meaning nothing but to pass along a casual item of information, I appeared to have touched some expose d nerve. 'The crust of that dame! In her last picture, eh? Let me tell you that she was in my last picture!'
    He snorted a bit more. He had taken up the National Geographic Magazine again, and I noted that it quivered in his hands, as if he were wrestling with some powerful emotion. Presently the spasm passed, and he was himself again.
    'So you've met that pill, have you?' he said.
    It was my turn to quiver, and 1 did so like a jelly.
    'That what?'
    'That pill.'
    'Did you say "pill"?'
    ' "Pill" was what I said. Slice her where you like, she's still boloney.' I drew myself up.
    'You are speaking,' I said, 'of the woman I love.'
    He started to say something, but I raised my hand coldly and said 'Please,' and silence supervened. He read his National Geographic Magazine. I read mine. And for some minutes matters proceeded along these lines. Then I thought to myself: 'Oh, well, dash it,' and decided to extend the olive branch. Too damn silly, I mean, a couple of fellows on the brink of having teeth out simply sitting reading the National Geographic Magazine at one another instead of trying to forget by means of pleasant chitchat the ordeal which lay before them. 'So you're Joey Cooley?' I said.
    He accepted the overture in the spirit in which it was intended.
    'You never spoke a truer word,' he replied agreeably. 'That's about who I am, if you come right down to it. Joey Cooley, the Idol of American Motherhood. Who are you?'
    'Havershot's my name.' 'English, aren't you?' 'That's right.' 'Been in Hollywood long?' 'About a week.' 'Where are you staying?'
    'I've a bungalow at the Garden of the Hesperides.'
    'Do you like Hollywood?'
    'Oh, rather. Topping spot.'
    'You ought to see Chillicothe, Ohio.'
    'Why?'
    'That's where I come from. And that's where I'd like to be now. Yessir, right back there in little old Chillicothe.' 'You're homesick, what?' 'You betcher.'
    'Still, I suppose you have a pretty good time here?' His face clouded. Once more, it appeared, I had said the wrong thing. 'Who, me? I do not.' 'Why not?'
    'I'll tell you why not. Because I'm practically a member