Summer Moonshine by P. G. Wodehouse Read Free Book Online

hope I haven't interrupted you when you were busy.'
    'Not at all.'
    'I ought to have made an appointment.'
    'No, no, please. Any time you're passing.'
    'That's very nice of you. Well, this is why I've come. I have just left my father—'
    'Only a temporary rift, let us trust.'
    ' – frothing at the mouth about this bill of yours.'
    She ceased to smile. The moment had come for gravity – even, if it proved necessary, for sternness. She saw that he, too, had become serious, and hoped that this did not mean obduracy.
    'Ah, yes, the bill. Let me see, what bill was that?'
    'The one you sent him for incidental expenses connected with the office. That book of his, you know, which you published for him.'
    'What was it called?'
    '"My Sporting Memories." It was about his big-game hunting experiences.'
    'I see. Far-flung stuff. Outposts of the Empire. How I saved my native bearer, 'Mbongo, from the wounded puma. The villagers seemed friendly, so we decided to stay the night.'
    'That sort of thing, yes.'
    'I like your hat,' said Joe. 'How wise you are to wear black hats with your lovely fair hair.'
    This seemed to Jane evasive.
    'It doesn't matter whether you like my hat or not, Mr Busby. The point is that my father—'
    'Who is your father?'
    'Sir Buckstone Abbott.'
    'Plain or Bart?'
    'He is a Baronet. But does that matter, either?'
    'It doesn't much, does it?' said Joe, struck by her reasoning.
    'Than shall we stick to what does. The point is that my father is—'
    'At a loss to comprehend?'
    'Yes. He quite understood that the money he paid you at the beginning would be all, and now along comes this other bill.'
    'May I see it?'
    'Here it is.'
    'H'm. Yes.'
    'What does that mean? That you think it is a bit steep?'
    'I think it's precipitous.'
    'Well, then?'
    'The thing is absurd. It shall be adjusted at once.'
    'Thank you.'
    'Not at all.'
    'And when you say "adjusted"—'
    'I mean cancelled. Expunged. Struck off the register. Razed to its foundations and sown with salt.'
    Even though her companion's face was pleasant; even though his manner, at first gentle, kind and almost tender, had now become gentle, kind and quite definitely tender, Jane had never hoped for anything as good as this. She gave a little squeak.
    'Oh, Mr Busby!'
    The young man seemed puzzled.
    'May I ask you something?' he said. 'You keep calling me "Mr Busby". I dare say you've noticed it yourself. Why is that?'
    Jane stared.
    'But you are Mr Busby, aren't you?'
    'When you say that, smile. No, I am not Mr Busby.'
    'What are you, then? His partner?'
    'Not even his friend. I am just a passer-by. Simply a chip drifting down the river of Life.'
    He studied the bill, a soft smile playing about his lips.
    'Masterly!' he murmured. 'A genuine work of Art. Do you know how Busby estimates these incidental expenses connected with the office? Broadly speaking, they represent the sum
which he thinks he can chisel out of the unfortunate sap of the second part without having the police piling in on him. What happens is this: Busby goes out to lunch. The waiter hands him the bill of fare. "Caviar," he reads, and his heart leaps up within him. And then his eye lights on the figure in the right-hand column and there comes the chilling thought: Can he afford it? And he is just about to answer with a rueful negative and put in his order for a chop and French-fried, when he suddenly remembers—'
    Jane had been bubbling inarticulately, like her Widgeon Seven when it took a steep hill.
    'You – you – you mean,' she cried, at last achieving coherence, 'that you have nothing to do with the firm; that you have just been playing the fool with me; raising my hopes—'
    'Not at all.'
    'Then what did you mean by saying that you would have the bill cancelled?'
    'I meant precisely that.'
    The quiet confidence with which he spoke impressed Jane in spite of herself. She looked at him pleadingly.
    'You aren't just being funny?'
    'Certainly not. When I said that I wasn't a friend of Mr Busby's, I