Free A Pelican at Blandings by Sir P G Wodehouse Page A

meeting.
    'Willie,' she said, 'you look like the Wreck of the Hesperus.'
    He took no offence at an old friend's candour. He had
indeed arrived at the same conclusion himself when peering
into the mirror that morning. He merely heaved a sombre
sigh.
    'I've had a lot of trouble.'
    'What's gone wrong this time?'
    'It's a long story.'
    'Then before you start on it tell me how in the name of
everything mysterious you come to be headed for Blandings
Castle.'
    'That's part of the story.'
    'All right, then, carry on. You have the floor.'
    Wilbur drank deeply of his gin and tonic to assist the
marshalling of his thoughts. After a moment's brooding he
appeared to have got them in order.
    'It started with my divorce.'
    'Which one? Luella?'
    'No, not Luella.'
    'Marlene?'
    'No, not Marlene. Genevieve.'
    'Oh, Genevieve? Yes, I read about that.'
    'It was a terrible shock when she walked out on me.'
    The thought crossed Vanessa's mind that after his ample
experience of that sort of thing the exodus of another wife
should have seemed pure routine, but she did not say so. She
was a tactful girl, and it was plain to her that for some
inscrutable reason the loss of the third Mrs. Trout, who
had chewed gum and talked baby-talk, had affected him
deeply.
    'I loved her, Pauline I mean Vanessa. I worshipped her. And
she ditched me for a guy who plays the trumpet in a band. And
not a name band, either.'
    'Tough,' said Vanessa, but purely out of politeness. The
character in the drama calling for sympathy was, she considered,
the guy who played the trumpet. Unsuccessful in his
profession, chained to a band that was not a name band, and
now linked to Mrs. Genevieve Trout. One would have had to
be hard-hearted indeed not to feel a pang of pity for a man
with a record like that.
    Wilbur attracted the attention of a waiter and ordered two
more gin and tonics. Even if his heart is broken, the prudent
man does not neglect the practical side of life.
    'Where was I?' he said, passing a weary hand over his
forehead.
    'You had got as far as the trumpeter, and you were saying
how much you loved Genevieve.'
    'That's right.'
    'Still?'
    'Do you mean Do I love her still? I certainly do. I think of
her all the time. I lie awake nights. I seem to hear her voice.
She used to say the cutest things.'
    'I can imagine.'
    'She used to call roses woses.'
    'So she did.'
    'And rabbits wabbits.'
    'Yes, I remember.'
    'So you can understand how I felt when I saw that picture.'
    'What picture would that be?'
    'It was in the window of one of those art galleries on Bond
Street, and it was the image of Genevieve.'
    'You mean a portrait?'
    'No, not a portrait, a picture of a girl by some French guy.
And I said to myself I'd got to have it to remind me of her.'
    'So you bought it, and they threw in an invitation to
Blandings Castle? Sort of like trading stamps?'
    'Don't joke about it.'
    'I'm not joking. Something must have happened, to bring
you here, and I'm waiting to be told what.'
    'That was the Duke.'
    'What Duke?'
    'Dunstable he calls himself. He invited me.'
    Vanessa flung her arms out in a despairing gesture. Wilbur
had always been a story-teller who got his stories muddled up,
but with his present conte he was excelling himself.
    'I don't get it,' she said. 'I just don't get it. Maybe you'll
make it clearer as you proceed, so go on from when you bought
the picture. In words of one syllable, if you can manage it.'
    Wilbur fortified himself with gin and tonic. From now on
every word he uttered was going to be a knife in his bosom.
    'I didn't buy it. That's the whole point. It was past one
o'clock, and like a sap I thought I might as well have lunch
first, so I went to a club where I've a guest card and was having
a drink at the bar before going into the dining-room, when
this duke came along and sat down next to me and started
telling me what was wrong with the Government. We hit it off
pretty well and I had some more drinks, and before I knew
what was happening I was telling him