Jeeves & Wooster: A Shelter from the Rain
Title: A Shelter from the Rain
Fandom: PG Wodehouse's Jeeves
Characters: Bertie, Jeeves, others mentioned
Words: ~1500
Notes: Originally written for 120_minuten as answer to the Challenge Rain (with and without umbrella).
A Shelter from the Rain
If you've been reading previous parts of these recollections, you may or may not have noticed that Jeeves is the rock on which the whole Wooster household is built. Or pretty much all of this Wooster's life. One shudders to think about how it would look without this sterling fellow's interventions in re: accidental engagements.
I mention it and I imagine the seasoned reader of my adventures yawning. Come on, Bertram, they say, how could one not notice. And quite right they are. I just want to emphazise it for whoever might be new to this Bertram's babbling.
My man Jeeves, as steady and dutyful as he unquestionably is, has this thing about taking vacations every once in a while. From what he tells me mostly of a maritime nature, to the south of France or some rural English coast spot to do the local piscine life a bit of no good. He's quite fond of fishing, which is only natural for someone who has to maintain his vast quantities of fish-fed brain power.
However that may be, in the meantime, Bertram Wooster finds himself sans rock. On these occasions I feel very much like this poet fellow Jeeves and a former English teacher of young Bertram like to go on about, who lost his pet gazelle. But Bertie, you might say, you've never had a gazelle. And right again. I merely mention it because I imagine losing it as a rather grey and hopeless feeling not unlike the g. and h. f. I was having. The Woosters are of stern stuff, one recollects the family hero, who fought at Agincourt. Ask anyone at the Drones Club and they will tell you that Bertram Wilberforce Wooster is a man of chilled steel, not easily shaken by the s. and a. of outrageous fortune and with an upper-lip that is decidedly on the stiff side. But when the days stretch, one into the other, grey and cold and so very Jeevesless, it's rather hard on yours truly.
Now Jeeves wouldn't be the godlike valet he is, if he wouldn't arrange it everytime so that I'm seen to by some of his Junior Ganymede fellows, great valets and butlers each one of them, I'm sure. But it's just not the real tobasco. Not the whole Jeeves experience, if you get my meaning. They shimmer about the rooms allright, but never with quite the Jeevesian virtuosity. There's always that nagging feeling that they have actually used the door to enter the room. Quite excusable, I know, but not nearly as amazing as Jeeves's out-of-thin-air-act. They also fail at the genial kind of kidding back and forth, I like to do with Jeeves. Utterly stuffy chaps, all 'yes, sir' and 'quite so, sir' without citing poets about snails and larks and such things. Though, in their favor, they also refrain from giving assorted neckwear the soupy eye and disapproving eyebrow, which should be a relief, but comes as a shallow sort of victory.
There is, of course, also the matter of aunts, lovesick Wooster pals and matrimonial threats like the Basset menace, who, unchecked by this not so clever gentleman's vastly cleverer gentleman, turn on Bertam like plagues on egypt. Epicly, I mean to say, if that is a word. I hear that hyenas tend to show a similar inclination when faced with a weak and helpless young gazelle, though I'm at a loss as to how it comes that I'm the gazelle now. This Moore guy would probably know.
So the other side of an utterly Jeevesless fortnight found this Wooster as a ghost of himself. Gone were the lightness of disposish and the genial outlook on life. I won't say I was shivering like an asp, if aspes are the things that shiver, but there was a definite shake to the hand as I lifted my whiskey and s., very light on the s., thank you very much.
I had taken shelter at the Drones Club, hiding, if you will, from Aunt Agatha, who had found a new beazel of the frightfully smart and Bertram-moulding variety to throw at yours truly. Aunt Agatha, you might recall, is the one who frightens children and sprouts fangs at night to howl at the full moon. I'll never understand how she gets them to agree to her nuptial scheme. For an intelligent and strong-minded woman, one feels, there could be greater goals in life than mould this Wooster.
Be that as it may, I was hiding from the fate worse than d. and was doing quite well. The shaking of the Wooster hand was subsiding quite nicely during the second w. and s., when I spotted Bingo. In ordinary circumstances not the worst chap to spot, but here the plot thickens, because he happened to be in love with the smart and moulding beazel currently quite regrattably engaged to Bertram W. Wooster. A Bingo Little on whom Cupid has done his wheeze is a hard trial of the friendship even under ordinary circumstances, but when you happen to be engaged to his tender goddess of the week, a chat with him easily places in the 'Quite distressing, sir'-range of the scale.
Thinking this, I was struck with a new wave of misery. But may the night be dark as it might, a Wooster doesn't just lay down to die. We fight, we pull ourselves together, we sneak out through the smoking room.
I have often remarked on how nature doesn't care for the fate of man. In my experience it tends to be far too gay and cheerful, with sunshine and carelessly singing birds that seem to mock you when life throws the hard and heavy at you. Well, I don't mind telling you, it's not one bit better, when nature decides to humor your feelings. It was raining freely and the streets of the metrop. were grey, damp and kind of smelly. The external life mirrored this Wooster's internal one quite nicely, with the chill, the general air of tristesse and the Jeeveslessness. I was reminded of Madeline Basset, a human blister of the first water, who when meeting me tends to go on and on about how sad life is, when she isn't busy discussing wee fairies or god's daisy chains or something equally alarming. Not an association with high chances of improving the mood, I might add.
It was a beaten and miserable Betram, not to metion quite wet, who entered his flat, which I feared might still be besieged by the auntly menace. The brow was knitted and the outlook was dark, I don't mind telling you.
Though I had feared the worst, the auntly plague was not to be seen and I collapsed into one of the armchairs. I was pondering the bleekness and remembering darkly some fellow or other going on about abandoning all hope ye who enter, when there was a soft cough not unlike the cordial sound of a well-mannered sheep on the other side of a hill. My head snapped up, and there he was, door-defyingly shimmered into the room. He looked bronzed and fit like the south of France had provided decidedly more sun than the English vicinity.
'Good evening, sir,' he said. 'I couldn't advise leaving the wet jacket on when sitting there, the upholstery might sustain damage.'
'Jeeves!' I cryed, sounding a bit reminiscent of a lost lamb on the opposite hill side. 'I thought you wouldn't come back before Tuesday!'
He eyed my with his very own blend of stuffed-frogness and fond je ne sais quoi, while he gently helped wrestling the Wooster self out of the soggy jacket. 'It is Tuesday, sir.'
With one thing or another, that fact had quite slipped the old onion, I could have sworn that it was Saturday or some such, but of course, I wouldn't doubt him. When Jeeves said it was Tuesday, it unquestionably was. 'How did the fishing go, old thing?' I asked genially for one doesn't like to come on too strong so shortly after the return. One wants to ease into the subject of the Wooster sorrows without completely destroying the relaxed glow of a freshly vacated Jeeves.
'It was quite satisfactory, sir.' He gave my new tie a look of the soupiest sort and I don't mind saying, it considerably warmed the Wooster chest.
'I'm glad to hear it, I need you brain fueled up on fish like nobody's business.'
'Mr Jarvis told me that Lady Worplesdon and a young woman of remarkably high built were frequent guests,' he inquired.
I let the Wooster corpus fall back into the cushions with a deep sight. 'And that's just the very tip of this particular chunk of boat-sinking glacier.'
A snifter of the right stuff materialized in my hand and Jeeves 'Indeed, sir'ed with just the right amount of well-concealed Jeevesian concern. I took a sip and while giving him the picture of his young master's most recent troubles, I began to feel that all things considered this was a world I could face.
.
Fandom: PG Wodehouse's Jeeves
Characters: Bertie, Jeeves, others mentioned
Words: ~1500
Notes: Originally written for 120_minuten as answer to the Challenge Rain (with and without umbrella).
A Shelter from the Rain
If you've been reading previous parts of these recollections, you may or may not have noticed that Jeeves is the rock on which the whole Wooster household is built. Or pretty much all of this Wooster's life. One shudders to think about how it would look without this sterling fellow's interventions in re: accidental engagements.
I mention it and I imagine the seasoned reader of my adventures yawning. Come on, Bertram, they say, how could one not notice. And quite right they are. I just want to emphazise it for whoever might be new to this Bertram's babbling.
My man Jeeves, as steady and dutyful as he unquestionably is, has this thing about taking vacations every once in a while. From what he tells me mostly of a maritime nature, to the south of France or some rural English coast spot to do the local piscine life a bit of no good. He's quite fond of fishing, which is only natural for someone who has to maintain his vast quantities of fish-fed brain power.
However that may be, in the meantime, Bertram Wooster finds himself sans rock. On these occasions I feel very much like this poet fellow Jeeves and a former English teacher of young Bertram like to go on about, who lost his pet gazelle. But Bertie, you might say, you've never had a gazelle. And right again. I merely mention it because I imagine losing it as a rather grey and hopeless feeling not unlike the g. and h. f. I was having. The Woosters are of stern stuff, one recollects the family hero, who fought at Agincourt. Ask anyone at the Drones Club and they will tell you that Bertram Wilberforce Wooster is a man of chilled steel, not easily shaken by the s. and a. of outrageous fortune and with an upper-lip that is decidedly on the stiff side. But when the days stretch, one into the other, grey and cold and so very Jeevesless, it's rather hard on yours truly.
Now Jeeves wouldn't be the godlike valet he is, if he wouldn't arrange it everytime so that I'm seen to by some of his Junior Ganymede fellows, great valets and butlers each one of them, I'm sure. But it's just not the real tobasco. Not the whole Jeeves experience, if you get my meaning. They shimmer about the rooms allright, but never with quite the Jeevesian virtuosity. There's always that nagging feeling that they have actually used the door to enter the room. Quite excusable, I know, but not nearly as amazing as Jeeves's out-of-thin-air-act. They also fail at the genial kind of kidding back and forth, I like to do with Jeeves. Utterly stuffy chaps, all 'yes, sir' and 'quite so, sir' without citing poets about snails and larks and such things. Though, in their favor, they also refrain from giving assorted neckwear the soupy eye and disapproving eyebrow, which should be a relief, but comes as a shallow sort of victory.
There is, of course, also the matter of aunts, lovesick Wooster pals and matrimonial threats like the Basset menace, who, unchecked by this not so clever gentleman's vastly cleverer gentleman, turn on Bertam like plagues on egypt. Epicly, I mean to say, if that is a word. I hear that hyenas tend to show a similar inclination when faced with a weak and helpless young gazelle, though I'm at a loss as to how it comes that I'm the gazelle now. This Moore guy would probably know.
So the other side of an utterly Jeevesless fortnight found this Wooster as a ghost of himself. Gone were the lightness of disposish and the genial outlook on life. I won't say I was shivering like an asp, if aspes are the things that shiver, but there was a definite shake to the hand as I lifted my whiskey and s., very light on the s., thank you very much.
I had taken shelter at the Drones Club, hiding, if you will, from Aunt Agatha, who had found a new beazel of the frightfully smart and Bertram-moulding variety to throw at yours truly. Aunt Agatha, you might recall, is the one who frightens children and sprouts fangs at night to howl at the full moon. I'll never understand how she gets them to agree to her nuptial scheme. For an intelligent and strong-minded woman, one feels, there could be greater goals in life than mould this Wooster.
Be that as it may, I was hiding from the fate worse than d. and was doing quite well. The shaking of the Wooster hand was subsiding quite nicely during the second w. and s., when I spotted Bingo. In ordinary circumstances not the worst chap to spot, but here the plot thickens, because he happened to be in love with the smart and moulding beazel currently quite regrattably engaged to Bertram W. Wooster. A Bingo Little on whom Cupid has done his wheeze is a hard trial of the friendship even under ordinary circumstances, but when you happen to be engaged to his tender goddess of the week, a chat with him easily places in the 'Quite distressing, sir'-range of the scale.
Thinking this, I was struck with a new wave of misery. But may the night be dark as it might, a Wooster doesn't just lay down to die. We fight, we pull ourselves together, we sneak out through the smoking room.
I have often remarked on how nature doesn't care for the fate of man. In my experience it tends to be far too gay and cheerful, with sunshine and carelessly singing birds that seem to mock you when life throws the hard and heavy at you. Well, I don't mind telling you, it's not one bit better, when nature decides to humor your feelings. It was raining freely and the streets of the metrop. were grey, damp and kind of smelly. The external life mirrored this Wooster's internal one quite nicely, with the chill, the general air of tristesse and the Jeeveslessness. I was reminded of Madeline Basset, a human blister of the first water, who when meeting me tends to go on and on about how sad life is, when she isn't busy discussing wee fairies or god's daisy chains or something equally alarming. Not an association with high chances of improving the mood, I might add.
It was a beaten and miserable Betram, not to metion quite wet, who entered his flat, which I feared might still be besieged by the auntly menace. The brow was knitted and the outlook was dark, I don't mind telling you.
Though I had feared the worst, the auntly plague was not to be seen and I collapsed into one of the armchairs. I was pondering the bleekness and remembering darkly some fellow or other going on about abandoning all hope ye who enter, when there was a soft cough not unlike the cordial sound of a well-mannered sheep on the other side of a hill. My head snapped up, and there he was, door-defyingly shimmered into the room. He looked bronzed and fit like the south of France had provided decidedly more sun than the English vicinity.
'Good evening, sir,' he said. 'I couldn't advise leaving the wet jacket on when sitting there, the upholstery might sustain damage.'
'Jeeves!' I cryed, sounding a bit reminiscent of a lost lamb on the opposite hill side. 'I thought you wouldn't come back before Tuesday!'
He eyed my with his very own blend of stuffed-frogness and fond je ne sais quoi, while he gently helped wrestling the Wooster self out of the soggy jacket. 'It is Tuesday, sir.'
With one thing or another, that fact had quite slipped the old onion, I could have sworn that it was Saturday or some such, but of course, I wouldn't doubt him. When Jeeves said it was Tuesday, it unquestionably was. 'How did the fishing go, old thing?' I asked genially for one doesn't like to come on too strong so shortly after the return. One wants to ease into the subject of the Wooster sorrows without completely destroying the relaxed glow of a freshly vacated Jeeves.
'It was quite satisfactory, sir.' He gave my new tie a look of the soupiest sort and I don't mind saying, it considerably warmed the Wooster chest.
'I'm glad to hear it, I need you brain fueled up on fish like nobody's business.'
'Mr Jarvis told me that Lady Worplesdon and a young woman of remarkably high built were frequent guests,' he inquired.
I let the Wooster corpus fall back into the cushions with a deep sight. 'And that's just the very tip of this particular chunk of boat-sinking glacier.'
A snifter of the right stuff materialized in my hand and Jeeves 'Indeed, sir'ed with just the right amount of well-concealed Jeevesian concern. I took a sip and while giving him the picture of his young master's most recent troubles, I began to feel that all things considered this was a world I could face.
.