The Manor Wodehouse Col ection

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  The Little Warrior

  The Swoop

  William Tell Told Again

  Mike: A Public School Story

  Jill the Reckless

  The Politeness of Princes & Other School Stories

  The Man Upstairs & Other Stories

  The Coming of Bill

  A Man of Means: A Series of Six Stories

  The Gem Collector

  The Adventures of Sally

  The Clicking of Cuthbert

  A Damsel in Distress

  Jeeves in the Springtime & Other Stories

  The Pothunters

  My Man Jeeves

  The Girl on the Boat

  Mike & Psmith

  The White Feather

  The Man With Two Left Feet & Other Stories

  Piccadilly Jim

  Psmith in the City

  Right Ho, Jeeves

  Uneasy Money

  A Prefect’s Uncle

  Psmith Journalist

  The Prince and Betty

  Something New

  The Gold Bat & Other Stories

  Head of Kay’s

  The Intrusion of Jimmy

  The Little Nugget

  Love Among the Chickens

  Tales of St. Austin’s

  Indiscretions of Archie

  Jeeves, Emsworth and Others

  My Man Jeeves

  P. G. Wodehouse

  The Manor Wodehouse Collection

  Tark Classic Fiction

  an imprint of

  MANOR

  Rockville, Maryland

  2008

  My Man Jeeves by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, in its current format, copyright © Arc Manor 2008. Th

  is book, in whole or in part, may not be copied or reproduced in its current format by any means, electronic, mechanical or otherwise without the permission of the publisher.

  Th

  e original text has been reformatted for clarity and to fi t this edition.

  Arc Manor, Arc Manor Classic Reprints, Manor Classics, TARK Classic Fiction, Th e and the Arc

  Manor logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Arc Manor Publishers, Rockville, Maryland.

  All other trademarks are properties of their respective owners. Chandi.

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  is book is presented as is, without any warranties (implied or otherwise) as to the accuracy of the production, text or translation. Th

  e publisher does not take responsibility for any typesetting, format-

  ting, translation or other errors which may have occurred during the production of this book.

  ISBN: 978-1-60450-065-3

  Published by TARK Classic Fiction

  An Imprint of Arc Manor

  P. O. Box 10339

  Rockville, MD 20849-0339

  www.ArcManor.com

  Printed in the United States of America/United Kingdom

  Contents

  Leave it to Jeeves

  

  Jeeves and the Unbidden Guest

  

  Jeeves and the Hard-Boiled Egg

  

  Absent Treatment

  

  Helping Freddie

  

  Rallying Round Old George

  

  Doing Clarence a Bit of Good

  

  The Aunt and the Sluggard

  

  Please Visit

  www.ManorWodehouse.com

  for a complete list of titles available in our

  Manor Wodehouse Collection

  Leave it to Jeeves

  Jeeves – my man, you know – is really a most extraordinary chap.

  So capable. Honestly, I shouldn’t know what to do without him. On

  broader lines he’s like those chappies who sit peering sadly over the

  marble battlements at the Pennsylvania Station in the place marked

  “Inquiries.” You know the Johnnies I mean. You go up to them and

  say: “When’s the next train for Melonsquashville, Tennessee?” and

  they reply, without stopping to think, “Two-forty-three, track ten,

  change at San Francisco.” And they’re right every time. Well, Jeeves

  gives you just the same impression of omniscience.

  As an instance of what I mean, I remember meeting Monty

  Byng in Bond Street one morning, looking the last word in a grey

  check suit, and I felt I should never be happy till I had one like it. I

  dug the address of the tailors out of him, and had them working on

  the thing inside the hour.

  “Jeeves,” I said that evening. “I’m getting a check suit like that

  one of Mr. Byng’s.”

  “Injudicious, sir,” he said fi rmly. “It will not become you.”

  “What absolute rot! It’s the soundest thing I’ve struck for years.”

  “Unsuitable for you, sir.”

  Well, the long and the short of it was that the confounded thing

  came home, and I put it on, and when I caught sight of myself in the

  glass I nearly swooned. Jeeves was perfectly right. I looked a cross

  between a music-hall comedian and a cheap bookie. Yet Monty had

  looked fi ne in absolutely the same stuff . Th

  ese things are just Life’s

  mysteries, and that’s all there is to it.

  But it isn’t only that Jeeves’s judgment about clothes is infal-

  lible, though, of course, that’s really the main thing. Th

  e man knows

  everything. Th

  ere was the matter of that tip on the “Lincolnshire.”

  5

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  I forget now how I got it, but it had the aspect of being the real, red-

  hot tabasco.

  “Jeeves,” I said, for I’m fond of the man, and like to do him a

  good turn when I can, “if you want to make a bit of money have

  something on Wonderchild for the ‘Lincolnshire.’”

  He shook his head.

  “I’d rather not, sir.”

  “But it’s the straight goods. I’m going to put my shirt on him.”

  “I do not recommend it, sir. Th

  e animal is not intended to win.

  Second place is what the stable is after.”

  Perfect piffl

  e, I thought, of course. How the deuce could Jeeves

  know anything about it? Still, you know what happened. Wonder-

  child led till he was breathing on the wire, and then Banana Fritter

  came along and nosed him out. I went straight home and rang for

  Jeeves.

  “After this,” I said, “not another step for me without your advice.

  From now on consider yourself the brains of the establishment.”

  “Very good, sir. I shall endeavour to give satisfaction.”

  And he has, by Jove! I’m a bit short on brain myself; the old bean

  would appear to have been constructed more for ornament than for

  use, don’t you know; but give me fi ve minutes to talk the thing over

  with Jeeves, and I’m game to advise any one about anything. And

  that’s why, when Bruce Corcoran came to me with his troubles, my

  fi rst act was to ring the bell and put it up to the lad with the bulging

  forehead.

  “Leave it to Jeeves,” I said.

  I fi rst got to know Corky when I came to New York. He was a

  pal of my cousin Gussie, who was in with a lot of people down Wash-

  ington Square way. I don’t know if I ever told you about it, but the

  reason why I left England was because I was sent over by my Aunt

  Agatha to try to stop young Gussie marrying a girl on the vaudeville

  stage, and I got the whole thing so mixed up that I decided that it

  would be a sound scheme for me to stop on in America for a bit in-

  stead of going back and having long cosy chats about the thing with

  aunt. So I sent Jeeves out to fi nd a decent apartment, and settled

  down for a bit of exile. I’m bound to say that New York’s a topping

  place to be exiled in. Everybody was awfully good to me, and there

  seemed to be plenty of things going on, and I’m a wealthy bird, so

  everything was fi ne. Chappies introduced me to other chappies, and

  6

  MY MAN JEEVES

  so on and so forth, and it wasn’t long before I knew squads of the

  right sort, some who rolled in dollars in houses up by the Park, and

  others who lived with the gas turned down mostly around Washing-

  ton Square – artists and writers and so forth. Brainy coves.

  Corky was one of the artists. A portrait-painter, he called him-

  self, but he hadn’t painted any portraits. He was sitting on the side-

  lines with a blanket over his shoulders, waiting for a chance to get

  into the game. You see, the catch about portrait-painting – I’ve

  looked into the thing a bit – is that you can’t start painting portraits

  till people come along and ask you to, and the

y won’t come and ask

  you to until you’ve painted a lot fi rst. Th

  is makes it kind of diffi

  cult

  for a chappie. Corky managed to get along by drawing an occa-

  sional picture for the comic papers – he had rather a gift for funny

  stuff when he got a good idea – and doing bedsteads and chairs and

  things for the advertisements. His principal source of income, how-

  ever, was derived from biting the ear of a rich uncle – one Alexander

  Worple, who was in the jute business. I’m a bit foggy as to what jute

  is, but it’s apparently something the populace is pretty keen on, for

  Mr. Worple had made quite an indecently large stack out of it.

  Now, a great many fellows think that having a rich uncle is

  a pretty soft snap: but, according to Corky, such is not the case.

  Corky’s uncle was a robust sort of cove, who looked like living for

  ever. He was fi fty-one, and it seemed as if he might go to par. It was

  not this, however, that distressed poor old Corky, for he was not big-

  oted and had no objection to the man going on living. What Corky

  kicked at was the way the above Worple used to harry him.

  Corky’s uncle, you see, didn’t want him to be an artist. He didn’t

  think he had any talent in that direction. He was always urging him

  to chuck Art and go into the jute business and start at the bottom

  and work his way up. Jute had apparently become a sort of obsession

  with him. He seemed to attach almost a spiritual importance to it.

  And what Corky said was that, while he didn’t know what they did

  at the bottom of the jute business, instinct told him that it was some-

  thing too beastly for words. Corky, moreover, believed in his future

  as an artist. Some day, he said, he was going to make a hit. Mean-

  while, by using the utmost tact and persuasiveness, he was inducing

  his uncle to cough up very grudgingly a small quarterly allowance.

  He wouldn’t have got this if his uncle hadn’t had a hobby. Mr.

  Worple was peculiar in this respect. As a rule, from what I’ve ob-

  7

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  served, the American captain of industry doesn’t do anything out

  of business hours. When he has put the cat out and locked up the

  offi

  ce for the night, he just relapses into a state of coma from which

  he emerges only to start being a captain of industry again. But Mr.

  Worple in his spare time was what is known as an ornithologist. He

  had written a book called American Birds, and was writing another, to be called More American Birds. When he had fi nished that, the

  presumption was that he would begin a third, and keep on till the

  supply of American birds gave out. Corky used to go to him about

  once every three months and let him talk about American birds.

  Apparently you could do what you liked with old Worple if you

  gave him his head fi rst on his pet subject, so these little chats used

  to make Corky’s allowance all right for the time being. But it was

  pretty rotten for the poor chap. Th

  ere was the frightful suspense,

  you see, and, apart from that, birds, except when broiled and in the

  society of a cold bottle, bored him stiff .

  To complete the character-study of Mr. Worple, he was a man of

  extremely uncertain temper, and his general tendency was to think

  that Corky was a poor chump and that whatever step he took in any

  direction on his own account, was just another proof of his innate

  idiocy. I should imagine Jeeves feels very much the same about me.

  So when Corky trickled into my apartment one afternoon, shoo-

  ing a girl in front of him, and said, “Bertie, I want you to meet my

  fi ancee, Miss Singer,” the aspect of the matter which hit me fi rst was

  precisely the one which he had come to consult me about. Th

  e very

  fi rst words I spoke were, “Corky, how about your uncle?”

  Th

  e poor chap gave one of those mirthless laughs. He was look-

  ing anxious and worried, like a man who has done the murder all

  right but can’t think what the deuce to do with the body.

  “We’re so scared, Mr. Wooster,” said the girl. “We were hoping

  that you might suggest a way of breaking it to him.”

  Muriel Singer was one of those very quiet, appealing girls who

  have a way of looking at you with their big eyes as if they thought you

  were the greatest thing on earth and wondered that you hadn’t got

  on to it yet yourself. She sat there in a sort of shrinking way, look-

  ing at me as if she were saying to herself, “Oh, I do hope this great

  strong man isn’t going to hurt me.” She gave a fellow a protective

  kind of feeling, made him want to stroke her hand and say, “Th

  ere,

  there, little one!” or words to that eff ect. She made me feel that there

  8

  MY MAN JEEVES

  was nothing I wouldn’t do for her. She was rather like one of those

  innocent-tasting American drinks which creep imperceptibly into

  your system so that, before you know what you’re doing, you’re start-

  ing out to reform the world by force if necessary and pausing on your

  way to tell the large man in the corner that, if he looks at you like

  that, you will knock his head off . What I mean is, she made me feel

  alert and dashing, like a jolly old knight-errant or something of that

  kind. I felt that I was with her in this thing to the limit.

  “I don’t see why your uncle shouldn’t be most awfully bucked,” I

  said to Corky. “He will think Miss Singer the ideal wife for you.”

  Corky declined to cheer up.

  “You don’t know him. Even if he did like Muriel he wouldn’t

  admit it. Th

  at’s the sort of pig-headed guy he is. It would be a matter

  of principle with him to kick. All he would consider would be that

  I had gone and taken an important step without asking his advice,

  and he would raise Cain automatically. He’s always done it.”

  I strained the old bean to meet this emergency.

  “You want to work it so that he makes Miss Singer’s acquaintance

  without knowing that you know her. Th

  en you come along—”

  “But how can I work it that way?”

  I saw his point. Th

  at was the catch.

  “Th

  ere’s only one thing to do,” I said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Leave it to Jeeves.”

  And I rang the bell.

  “Sir?” said Jeeves, kind of manifesting himself. One of the rum-

  my things about Jeeves is that, unless you watch like a hawk, you

  very seldom see him come into a room. He’s like one of those weird

  chappies in India who dissolve themselves into thin air and nip

  through space in a sort of disembodied way and assemble the parts

  again just where they want them. I’ve got a cousin who’s what they

  call a Th

  eosophist, and he says he’s often nearly worked the thing

  himself, but couldn’t quite bring it off , probably owing to having fed

  in his boyhood on the fl esh of animals slain in anger and pie.

  Th

  e moment I saw the man standing there, registering respect-

  ful attention, a weight seemed to roll off my mind. I felt like a lost

  child who spots his father in the offi

  ng. Th

  ere was something about

  him that gave me confi dence.

  9

  P. G. WODEHOUSE

  Jeeves is a tallish man, with one of those dark, shrewd faces. His

  eye gleams with the light of pure intelligence.

  “Jeeves, we want your advice.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  I boiled down Corky’s painful case into a few well-chosen

  words.

  “So you see what it amount to, Jeeves. We want you to sug-

  gest some way by which Mr. Worple can make Miss Singer’s ac-

  quaintance without getting on to the fact that Mr. Corcoran already

  knows her. Understand?”

  “Perfectly, sir.”

  “Well, try to think of something.”

  “I have thought of something already, sir.”

  “You have!”

  “Th

 

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