Yes, sir." " And old Glossop wouldn't kick in ? " " No, sir. Instead, he read the young gentleman something of a lecture. What the young gentleman described as ' pi-jaw.' And I happen to know that hard feelings existed as a consequence on the latter's side. So much so, indeed, that I received the impression that he had been planning something in the nature of a reprisal." " He wouldn't have the nerve to do the dirty on a future stepfather, would he ? " " Young gentlemen are headstrong, sir." " True. One recalls the case of my Aunt Agatha's son, young Thos., and the Cabinet Minister." " Yes, sir." " In a spirit of ill-will he marooned him on an island in the lake with a swan."
" Yes, sir." " How is the swarming in these parts ? I confessthat I would like to see old Glossop shinning up something with a bilious bird after him." " I fancy that Master Seabury's thoughts turned more towards something on the order of a booby trap, sir." " They would. No imagination, that kid. No vision. I've often noticed it. His fancy is -what's the word ? " " Pedestrian, sir ? " " Exactly. With all the limitless opportunitiesof a large country house at his disposal, he is content to put soot and water on top of the door, a thing you could do in a suburban villa. I have never thought highly of Seabury, and this confirms my low opinion." < " Not soot and water, sir. I think what the young gentleman had in mind was the old-fashioned butter-slide, sir. He was asking me yesterday where the butter was kept, and referred guardedly to a humorous film he had seen not long ago in Bristol, in which something of that nature occurred." I was disgusted. Goodness knows that any outrage perpetrated on the person of a bloke like Sir Roderick Glossop touches a ready chord in Bertram Wooster's bosom, but a butter-slide . . . the lowest depths, as you might say. The merest A B C of the booby-trapping art. There isn't a fellow at the Drones who would sink to such a thing.
I started to utter a scornful laugh, then stopped. The word had reminded me that life . was stem and earnest and that time was passing. " Butter, Jeeves! Here we are, standing idly here, talking of butter, and all the time you ought to have been racing to the larder, getting me some." " I will go immediately, sir." " You know where to lay your hand on it all right ? " " Yes, sir." " And you're sure it will do the trick ? " "
Quite sure, sir." " Then shift-ho, Jeeves. And don't loiter." I sat down on an upturned flower-pot, and resumed my vigil. My feelings were very different now from what they had been when first I had begun to roost on this desirable property. Then, I had been a penniless outcast, so to speak, with nothing much of a future before me. Now, I could see daylight. Presently Jeeves would return with the fixings. Shortly after that, I should be the old pink-cheeked clubman once more. And, in due season, I should be safely inside the 11.50 train, on my way to London and safety. It was a good deal uplifted. I drank in the night air with a light heart. And it was while I was drinking it in that a sudden uproar proceeded from the house. 3eabury appeared to be contributing most of it. He was yelling his bally head off. From time to time, one caught the fainter, yet penetrating note of the Dowager Lady Chuffnell. She seemed to be reproaching or upbraiding someone. Blending with this, there could be discerned a deeper voice, the unmistakable baritone woofle of Sir Roderick Glossop. The whole appeared to be proceeding from the drawing-room, and, except for one time when I was sauntering in Hyde Park and suddenly found myself mixed up in a Community Singing, I've never heard anything like it. It couldn't have been very long after this when the front door was suddenly flung open. Somebody emerged. The door slammed. And then the emerger started to stump rapidly down the drive in the direction of the gates.
There had been just a moment when the light from the hall had shone upon this bloke. It had been long enough for me to identify him. This sudden exiter, who was now padding away into the darkness with every outward sign of being fed to the eye teeth, was none other than Sir Roderick Glossop. And his face, I noted, was as black as the ace of spades. A few moments later, while I was still wondering what it was all about and generally turning the thing over in my mind, I observed Jeeves looming up on the right flank. I was glad to see him. I desired enlightment. "
What was all that, Jeeves ? " " The disturbance, sir ? "
