Free Money for Nothing by P. G. Wodehouse Page B

badly needed a drop of oil, and it emitted, as it went, a low wailing sound that seemed to John like a commentary on the whole situation.
VI
    Some half a mile from Curzon Street, on the fringe of the Soho district, there stands a smaller and humbler hotel named the Belvidere. In a bedroom on the second floor of this, at about the moment when Pat and Hugo had entered the lobby of the Lincoln, Dolly Molloy sat before a mirror, cold-creaming her attractive face. She was interrupted in this task by the arrival of the senatorial Thomas G.
    'Hello, sweetie-pie,' said Miss Molloy. 'There you are.'
    'Yes,' replied Mr Molloy. 'Here I am.'
    Although his demeanour lacked the high tragedy which had made strong men quail in the presence of Pat Wyvern, this man was plainly ruffled. His fine features were overcast and his frank grey eyes looked sombre.
    'Gee! If there's one thing in this world I hate,' he said, 'it's having to talk to policemen.'
    'What happened?'
    'Oh, I gave my name and address. A name and address, that is to say. But I haven't got over yet the jar it gave me seeing so many cops all gathered together in a small room. And that's not all,' went on Mr Molloy, ventilating another grievance. 'Why did you make me tell those folks you were my daughter?'
    'Well, sweetie, it sort of cramps my style, having people know we're married.'
    'What do you mean, cramps your style?'
    'Oh, just cramps my style.'
    'But, darn it,' complained Mr Molloy, going to the heart of the matter, 'it makes me out so old, folks thinking I'm your father.' The rather pronounced gap in years between himself and his young bride was a subject on which Soapy Molloy was always inclined to be sensitive. 'I'm only forty-two.'
    'And you don't seem that, not till you look at you close,' said Dolly with womanly tact. 'The whole thing is, sweetie, being so dignified, you can call yourself anybody's father and get away with it.'
    Mr Molloy, somewhat soothed, examined himself not without approval, in the mirror.
    'I do look dignified,' he admitted.
    'Like a Professor or something.'
    'That isn't a bald spot coming there, is it?'
    'Sure it's not. It's just the way the light falls.'
    Mr Molloy resumed his examination with growing content.
    'Yes,' he said complacently, 'that's a face which for business purposes is a face. Just a Real Good Face. I may not be the World's Sweetheart, but nobody can say I haven't got a map that inspires confidence. I suppose I've sold more dud oil-stock to suckers with it than anyone in the profession. And that reminds me, honey, what do you think?'
    'What?' asked Mrs Molloy, removing cream with a towel.
    'We're sitting in the biggest kind of luck. You know how I've been wanting all this time to get hold of a really good prospect – some guy with money to spend who might be interested in a little oil deal? Well, that Carmody fellow we met tonight has invited us to go and visit at his country home.'
    'You don't say!'
    'Yes, ma'am!'
    'Well, isn't that great. Is he rich?'
    'He's got an uncle that must be, or he couldn't be living in a place like he was telling me. It's one of those stately homes of England you read about.'
    Mrs Molloy mused. The soft smile on her face showed that her day dreams were pleasant ones.
    'I'll have to get me some new frocks . . . and hats . . . and shoes...and stockings...and...'
    'Now, now, now!' said her husband, with that anxious alarm which husbands exhibit on these occasions. 'Be yourself, baby! You aren't going to stay at Buckingham Palace.'
    'But a country-house party with a lot of swell people . . .'
    'It isn't a country-house party. There's only the uncle besides those two boys we met tonight. But I'll tell you what. If I can plant a good block of those Silver River shares on the old man, you can go shopping all you want.'
    'Oh, Soapy! Do you think you can?'
    'Do I think I can?' echoed Mr Molloy scornfully. 'I don't say I've ever sold Central Park or Brooklyn Bridge to anybody, but if I can't get rid of a