Summer Moonshine by P. G. Wodehouse

conversation with Jane at the Savoy Grill, Adrian Peake was not a man for whom Joe cared. To Adrian, Joe was a fellow he knew slightly in London and had had no desire to meet again in the country.
    'Oh, hullo!' he said.
    'Good morning,' said Joe. 'I'm afraid I'm trespassing.'
    'Oh, not at all.'
    'I didn't know there was anybody here. Do you own this craft? I thought it was a derelict.'
    'I'm not surprised,' said Adrian, with a morose look at his little home. 'No, I don't own it. I've taken it for a few weeks.'
    'I'm at a pesthouse called the Goose and Gander.'
    'I have my meals there,' said Adrian dejectedly.
    He was no more dejected than Joe. In his darkest thoughts about the Goose and Gander, he had never supposed that life there involved Adrian Peake as a table companion.
    'I'm just going off to breakfast there now,' said Adrian. 'Did you have breakfast there?'
    'Yes. Ham and eggs.'
    'That seems to be the only food they've ever heard of. They gave me ham and eggs yesterday. How do you suppose they get the ham that extraordinary blackish-purple colour?'
    'Will power?' hazarded Joe.
    And have you ever tasted such filthy coffee?'
    'Never,' said Joe, though he had lived in French hotels.
    Something almost of cordiality came into Adrian Peake's eyes. As has been said, he had always disliked Joe, but he found him now sympathetic and a kindred spirit.
    'The bread's not any too good, either,' he said.
    'No,' said Joe. 'But what are you doing down here, living on a houseboat? Writing a novel?'
    'No, just camping out.'
    'Well, sooner you than me.'
    There was a pause.
    'Well,' said Adrian, 'may as well be getting along, I suppose. You coming my way?'
    'I thought, if you don't mind, I'd stay on here for a while.'
    'Do.'
    'I might have a swim, if you've really no objection to me making myself at home.'
    'You'll find a towel in the saloon,' said Adrian. He checked the impulse to warn his companion against bumping his head. That brief feeling of camaraderie had already waned. Soberer thought told him that he wanted Joe to bump his head.
    Joe, alone once more, started to give himself up again to tender contemplation of Walsingford Hall. But he had scarcely settled down to it, when he saw that his meditations were about to be interrupted. A tall slender figure was coming across the water meadows.
    Sir Buckstone Abbott was a man of his word. He had promised that he would send Miss Whittaker down to the houseboat with a note inviting its tenant to come up and see him some time, and here was Miss Whittaker bearing that note. She halted at the foot of the plank and looked up. Joe came to the broken rail and looked down. He did not know who this vision might be, but in the absence of the Mignonette's proprietor, it was plainly for him to do the honours.
    'Good morning,' he said.
    'Good morning,' said Miss Whittaker.
    'Nice day.'
    'Very nace. Mr Peake?'
    Joe remained tranquil. Only yesterday he had been accused of being J. Mortimer Busby, and a man to whom this happens learns to take it. Without heat, he replied that he was not Mr Peake.
    'He has gone off to the inn to have breakfast, and at this moment is probably standing with reluctant feet where the eggs and bacon meet. My name is Vanringham.'
    This statement seemed to surprise and, oddly, to displease his visitor. Her tiptilted nose quivered, and she repeated the word with a rising inflexion which betrayed unmistakable distaste.
    'Vanringham?'
    'You seem startled and revolted.'
    'I know a Mr Vanringham,' said Miss Whittaker, as if that explained it. Then, dismissing the nauseous subject: 'Sir Buck-stone Abbott desired me to call and leave a note for Mr Peake. I will put it in the saloon, so that he will find it when he returns.'
    She spoke, however, with a diffident note in her voice, and Joe saw that she was standing with reluctant feet where the gangplank and river-bank met, eyeing the former dubiously. It was plain that it did not enjoy her full confidence. He came to the rescue of beauty