“He tells me you’ve given him a part in your show.”

“Oh, yes. Just a few lines.”

“But I’ve just had fifty-seven cables from home telling me on no account to let him go on the stage.”

“I’m sorry. But Cyril is just the type I need for that part. He’s simply got to be himself.”

“It’s pretty tough on me, George, old man. My Aunt Agatha sent this blighter over with a letter of introduction to me, and she will hold me responsible.”

“She’ll cut you out of her will?”

“It isn’t a question of money. But—of course, you’ve never met my Aunt Agatha, so it’s rather hard to explain. But she’s a sort of human vampire-bat, and she’ll make things most fearfully unpleasant for me when I go back to England. She’s the kind of woman who comes and rags you before breakfast, don’t you know.”

“Well, don’t go back to England, then. Stick here and become President.”

“But, George, old top——!”

“Good night!”

“But, I say, George, old man!”

“You didn’t get my last remark. It was ‘Good night!’ You Idle Rich may not need any sleep, but I’ve got to be bright and fresh in the morning. God bless you!”

I felt as if I hadn’t a friend in the world. I was so jolly well worked up that I went and banged on Jeeves’s door. It wasn’t a thing I’d have cared to do as a rule, but it seemed to me that now was the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party, so to speak, and that it was up to Jeeves to rally round the young master, even if it broke up his beauty-sleep.

Jeeves emerged in a brown dressing-gown.

“Sir?”

“Deuced sorry to wake you up, Jeeves, and what not, but all sorts of dashed disturbing things have been happening.”

“I was not asleep. It is my practice, on retiring, to read a few pages of some instructive book.”

“That’s good! What I mean to say is, if you’ve just finished exercising the old bean, it’s probably in mid-season form for tackling problems. Jeeves, Mr. Bassington-Bassington is going on the stage!”

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