Mr. Bickersdyke galloped unsteadily on. He condemned the Government. He said they had betrayed their trust.
And then he told an anecdote.
“The Government, gentlemen,” he said, “achieves nothing worth achieving, and every individual member of the Government takes all the credit for what is done to himself. Their methods remind me, gentlemen, of an amusing experience I had while fishing one summer in the Lake District.”
In a volume entitled Three Men in a Boat there is a story of how the author and a friend go into a riverside inn and see a very large trout in a glass case. They make inquiries about it. Five men assure them, one by one, that the trout was caught by themselves. In the end the trout turns out to be made of plaster of Paris.
Mr. Bickersdyke told that story as an experience of his own while fishing one summer in the Lake District.
It went well. The meeting was amused. Mr. Bickersdyke went on to draw a trenchant comparison between the lack of genuine merit in the trout and the lack of genuine merit in the achievements of His Majesty’s Government.
There was applause.
When it had ceased, Psmith rose to his feet again.
“Excuse me,” he said.
XI
Misunderstood
Mike had refused to accompany Psmith to the meeting that evening, saying that he got too many chances in the ordinary way of business of hearing Mr. Bickersdyke speak, without going out of his way to make more. So Psmith had gone off to Kenningford alone, and Mike, feeling too lazy to sally out to any place of entertainment, had remained at the flat with a novel.
He was deep in this, when there was the sound of a key in the latch, and shortly afterwards Psmith entered the room. On Psmith’s brow there was a look of pensive care, and also a slight discoloration. When he removed his overcoat, Mike saw that his collar was burst and hanging loose and that he had no tie. On his erstwhile speckless and gleaming shirt front were number of finger-impressions, of a boldness and clearness of outline which would have made a Bertillon expert leap with joy.
“Hullo!” said Mike dropping his book.
Psmith nodded in silence, went to his bedroom, and returned with a looking-glass. Propping this up on a table, he proceeded to examine himself with the utmost care. He shuddered slightly as his eye fell on the finger marks; and without a word he went into his bathroom again. He emerged after an interval of ten minutes in sky-blue pyjamas, slippers, and an Old Etonian blazer. He lit a cigarette; and, sitting down, stared pensively into the fire.
“What the dickens have you been playing at?” demanded Mike.
Psmith heaved a sigh.
“That,” he replied, “I could not say precisely. At one moment it seemed to be rugby football, at another a jiujitsu séance. Later, it bore a resemblance to a pantomime rally. However, whatever it was, it was all very bright and interesting. A distinct experience.”
“Have you been scrapping?” asked Mike. “What happened? Was there a row?”
“There was,” said Psmith, “in a measure what might be described as a row. At least, when you find a perfect stranger attaching himself to your collar and pulling, you begin to suspect that something of that kind is on the bill.”
“Did they do that?”
Psmith nodded.
“A merchant in a moth-eaten bowler started warbling to a certain extent with me. It was all very trying for a man of culture. He was a man who had, I should say, discovered that alcohol was a food long before the doctors found it out. A good chap, possibly, but a little boisterous in his manner. Well, well.”
Psmith shook his head sadly.
“He got you one on the forehead,” said Mike, “or somebody did. Tell us what happened. I wish the dickens I’d come with you. I’d no notion there would be a rag of any sort. What did happen?”
“Comrade Jackson,” said Psmith sorrowfully, “how sad it is in this life of ours to be consistently misunderstood. You know, of course, how wrapped up I am in Comrade Bickersdyke’s welfare. You know that all my efforts are directed towards making a decent man of him; that, in short, I am his truest friend. Does he show by so much as a word that he appreciates my labours? Not he. I believe that man is beginning to dislike me, Comrade Jackson.”
“What happened, anyhow? Never mind about Bickersdyke.”
“Perhaps it was mistaken zeal on my part. … Well, I will tell you all. Make a long arm for the shovel, Comrade Jackson, and pile on a few more coals. I thank you. Well, all went quite smoothly for a while. Comrade B. in quite good form. Got his second wind, and was going strong for the tape, when a regrettable incident occurred. He informed the meeting, that while up in the Lake country, fishing, he went to an inn and saw a remarkably large stuffed trout in a glass case. He made inquiries, and found that five separate and distinct people had caught—”
“Why, dash it all,” said Mike, “that’s a frightful chestnut.”
Psmith nodded.
“It certainly has appeared in print,” he said. “In fact I should have said it was rather a well-known story. I was so interested in Comrade Bickersdyke’s statement that the thing had happened to himself that, purely out of goodwill towards him, I got up and told him that I thought it was my duty, as a friend, to let him know that a man named Jerome had pinched his story, put it in a book, and got money by it. Money, mark you, that should by rights have been Comrade Bickersdyke’s. He didn’t appear to care much about sifting the matter thoroughly. In fact, he seemed anxious to get on with his speech, and slur the matter over. But, tactlessly perhaps, I continued rather to harp on the thing. I said that the book in which the story had appeared was published in 1889. I asked him how long
