Summer Moonshine by P. G. Wodehouse Page A

in distress.
    'No, please. I'll come down and get it,' he said, and made a courtly spring.
    We have seen Adrian Peake performing this feat with lissom grace and complete success. Joe was not so adroit. Arriving ashore, he tripped and staggered and, clutching the air, was embarrassed to find his arms full of unexpected Whittaker. He released her immediately, but it had been disconcerting.
    'I beg your pardon!' he said.
    'Not at all.'
    'I lost my balance.'
    'Quale,' said Miss Whittaker.
    Joe took the note from her, and stood looking meditatively at it. The sight of that A. Peake, Esq.' on the envelope saddened him. He was thinking how much better 'J. J. Vanringham, Esq.' would have looked.
    For it was, he had no difficulty in divining, a note of invitation. Some revelry was afoot up at the soap works, and Adrian Peake, purely because he was the tenant of the Mignonette, had been asked to come along and sit in. Obviously, by taking the houseboat, he had fallen within the scope of Sir Buckstone Abbott's feudal benevolence.
    No such hospitality would be extended to the lessee of a back bedroom at the Goose and Gander. When it came to mixing with the merrymakers of Walsingford Hall, poor devils who mouldered at the Goose and Gander hadn't a hope. They weren't even considered. In short, for all practical purposes, by coming to Walsingford Parva and establishing himself at the Goose and Gander, he had not advanced his ends in the slightest degree. He was as far removed from the girl he loved as if he had remained in his flat in London.
    Adrian Peake, skipper of the Mignonette, was plainly going to be given the run of the Hall. He would be popping in and out there all the time, like a rabbit. He would be in a position to see Jane daily. The best Joseph Vanringham could expect to see was J. B. Attwater, licensed to sell ales and spirits, and that extraordinary girl with the adenoids who had brought him his breakfast.
    It was bitter, and he recognized it as such. But he did not allow himself to remain brooding long over life's little ironies. A man alone with a woman has his social obligations.
    'So you know somebody of my name?' he said, making light conversation. 'Not a very common name. In fact, the only other Vanringham I know is my brother Tubby. Is he the one you've met?'
    'The name of the Mr Vanringham with whom I am acquainted,' said Miss Whittaker, speaking as if the admission soiled and degraded her, 'is Theodore.'
    'That's Tubby, all right. Where did you happen to run into him?'
    'Mr Theodore Vanringham is one of the guests of my employer, Sir Buckstone Abbott.'
    'What? Good heavens! Do you mean to say Tubby's up there at the pickle factory?'
    'I beg your pardon?'
    'Is my brother staying at Walsingford Hall?'
    'Quate. Then if you will be so kind as to see that Mr Peake receives the note—Thank you. Good morning.'
    She glided away, leaving him staring after her, stunned. But it was only for a moment that he stood thus inactive. Recovering swiftly, he darted off along the towpath toward the Goose and Gander. J. B. Attwater, he knew, possessed a telephone, and it was his aim to get to it as quickly as possible.
    It had shaken Joe to his foundations – this discovery that Tubby was a guest at the Hall. The news changed the whole aspect of affairs. He ceased to look on himself as an outcast. He had a friend at court, possibly a powerful friend at court. 'Young Vanringham's brother?' they would say. 'My dear! We must ask him up immediately!' Or would they? It was this point that he wished to have made clear to him without delay, and his fingers trembled so much that he could hardly lift the receiver. But eventually he managed it and found himself in communication
with somebody who appeared to be Sir Buckstone's butler. A brief intermission, and Tubby's voice came over the wire.
    It was a hollow, toneless voice, for the butler's summons had reached Theodore Vanringham at a moment when he was deeper than usual in gloomy thoughts on