P G Wodehouse, page 5
ing page, pointing with a stubby forefi nger.
“Well, what does all this mean? I’ve kept out of watching cricket
since I landed in England, but yesterday they got the poison needle
to work and took me off to see Surrey play Kent at that place Lord’s
where you say you go sometimes.”
“I was there yesterday, sir. A very exciting game.”
“Exciting? How do you make that out? I sat in the bleachers all
afternoon, waiting for something to break loose. Doesn’t anything
ever happen at cricket?”
Th
e butler winced a little, but managed to smile a tolerant smile.
Th
is man, he refl ected, was but an American and as such more to be
pitied than censured. He endeavoured to explain.
“It was a sticky wicket yesterday, sir, owing to the rain.”
“Eh?”
“Th
e wicket was sticky, sir.”
“Come again.”
“I mean that the reason why the game yesterday struck you as
slow was that the wicket – I should say the turf – was sticky – that
is to say wet. Sticky is the technical term, sir. When the wicket is
sticky, the batsmen are obliged to exercise a great deal of caution,
31
P. G. WODEHOUSE
as the stickiness of the wicket enables the bowlers to make the ball
turn more sharply in either direction as it strikes the turf than when
the wicket is not sticky.”
“Th
at’s it, is it?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Th
anks for telling me.”
“Not at all, sir.”
Mr. Crocker pointed to the paper.
“Well, now, this seems to be the box-score of the game we saw
yesterday. If you can make sense out of that, go to it.”
Th
e passage on which his fi nger rested was headed “Final Score,”
and ran as follows:
Surrey
First Innings
Hayward, c Wooley, b Carr
67
Hobbs, run out
0
Hayes, st Huish, b Fielder
12
Ducat, b Fielder
33
Harrison, not out
11
Sandham, not out
6
Extras 10
Total (for four wickets)
139
Bayliss inspected the cipher gravely.
“What is it you wish me to explain, sir?”
“Why, the whole thing. What’s it all about?”
“It’s perfectly simple, sir. Surrey won the toss, and took fi rst
knock. Hayward and Hobbs were the opening pair. Hayward called
Hobbs for a short run, but the latter was unable to get across and
was thrown out by mid-on. Hayes was the next man in. He went out
of his ground and was stumped. Ducat and Hayward made a capi-
tal stand considering the stickiness of the wicket, until Ducat was
bowled by a good length off -break and Hayward caught at second
slip off a googly. Th
en Harrison and Sandham played out time.”
Mr. Crocker breathed heavily through his nose.
“Yes!” he said. “Yes! I had an idea that was it. But I think I’d like
to have it once again, slowly. Start with these fi gures. What does
that sixty-seven mean, opposite Hayward’s name?”
32
PICADILLY JIM
“He made sixty-seven runs, sir.”
“Sixty-seven! In one game?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why, Home-Run Baker couldn’t do it!”
“I am not familiar with Mr. Baker, sir.”
“I suppose you’ve never seen a ball-game?”
“Ball-game, sir?”
“A baseball game?”
“Never, sir.”
“Th
en, Bill,” said Mr. Crocker, reverting in his emotion to the
bad habit of his early London days, “you haven’t lived. See here!”
Whatever vestige of respect for class distinctions Mr. Crocker
had managed to preserve during the opening stages of the interview
now defi nitely disappeared. His eyes shone wildly and he snorted
like a war-horse. He clutched the butler by the sleeve and drew him
closer to the table, then began to move forks, spoons, cups, and even
the contents of his plate about the cloth with an energy little short
of feverish.
“Bayliss!”
“Sir?”
“Watch!” said Mr. Crocker, with the air of an excitable high
priest about to initiate a novice into the Mysteries.
He removed a roll from the basket.
“You see this roll? Th
at’s the home plate. Th
is spoon is fi rst base.
Where I’m putting this cup is second. Th
is piece of bacon is third.
Th
ere’s your diamond for you. Very well, then. Th
ese lumps of sugar
are the infi elders and the outfi elders. Now we’re ready. Batter up?
He stands here. Catcher behind him. Umps behind catcher.”
“Umps, I take it, sir, is what we would call the umpire?”
“Call him anything you like. It’s part of the game. Now here’s
the box, where I’ve put this dab of marmalade, and here’s the pitcher,
winding up.”
“Th
e pitcher would be equivalent to our bowler?”
“I guess so, though why you should call him a bowler gets
past me.”
“Th
e box, then, is the bowler’s wicket?”
“Have it your own way. Now pay attention. Play ball! Pitcher’s
winding up. Put it over, Mike, put it over! Some speed, kid! Here
it comes, right in the groove. Bing! Batter slams it and streaks for
33
P. G. WODEHOUSE
fi rst. Outfi elder – this lump of sugar – boots it. Bonehead! Batter
touches second. Th
ird? No! Get back! Can’t be done. Play it safe.
Stick around the sack, old pal. Second batter up. Pitcher getting
something on the ball now besides the cover. Whiff s him. Back to
the bench, Cyril! Th
ird batter up. See him rub his hands in the dirt.
Watch this kid. He’s good! He lets two alone, then slams the next
right on the nose. Whizzes around to second. First guy, the one we
left on second, comes home for one run. Th
at’s a game! Take it from
me, Bill, that’s a game! ”
Somewhat overcome with the energy with which he had fl ung
himself into his lecture, Mr. Crocker sat down and refreshed him-
self with cold coff ee.
“Quite an interesting game,” said Bayliss. “But I fi nd, now that
you have explained it, sir, that it is familiar to me, though I have
always known it under another name. It is played a great deal in this
country.”
Mr. Crocker started to his feet.
“It is? And I’ve been fi ve years here without fi nding it out!
When’s the next game scheduled?”
“It is known in England as Rounders, sir. Children play it with
a soft ball and a racquet, and derive considerable enjoyment from it.
I had never heard of it before as a pastime for adults.”
Two shocked eyes stared into the butler’s face.
“Children?” Th
e word came in a whisper.
“A racquet?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You – you didn’t say a soft ball?”
“Yes, sir.”
A sort of spasm seemed to convulse Mr. Crocker. He had lived
fi ve years in England, but not till this moment had he realised to the
full how utterly alone he was in an alien land. Fate had placed him,
bound and helpless, in a country where they called baseball Round-
ers and played it with a soft ball.
He sank back into his chair, staring before him. And as he sat
the wall seemed to melt and he was gazing upon a green fi eld, in
the centre of which a man in a grey uniform was beginning a Sa-
lome dance. Watching this person with a cold and suspicious eye,
stood another uniformed man, holding poised above his shoulder a
sturdy club. Two Masked Marvels crouched behind him in attitudes
34
PICADILLY JIM
of watchful waiting. On wooden seats all around sat a vast multitude
of shirt-sleeved spectators, and the air was full of voices.
One voice detached itself from the din.
“Pea-nuts! Get y’r pea-nuts!”
Something that was almost a sob shook Bingley Crocker’s ample
frame. Bayliss the butler gazed down upon him with concern. He
was sure the master was unwell.
Th
e case of Mr. Bingley Crocker was one that would have pro-
vided an admirable “instance” for a preacher seeking to instil into
an impecunious and sceptical fl ock the lesson that money does not
of necessity bring with it happiness. And poetry has crystallised his
position in the following stanza.
An exile from home splendour dazzles in vain,
Oh, give me my lowly thatched cottage again;
Th
e birds singing gaily, that came at my call,
Give me them, and that peace of mind dearer than all.
Mr. Crocker had never lived in a thatched cottage, nor had his
relations with the birds of his native land ever reached the stage
of intimacy indicated by the poet; but substitute “Lambs Club” for
the former and “members” for the latter, and the parallel becomes
complete.
Until the time of his second marriage Bingley Crocker had been
an actor, a snapper-up of whatever small character-parts the gods
provided. He had an excellent disposition, no money, and one son, a
young man of twenty-one. For forty-fi ve years he had lived a hand-
to-mouth existence in which his next meal had generally come as a
pleasant surprise: and then, on an Atlantic liner, he met the wid-
ow of G. G. van Brunt, the sole heiress to that magnate’s immense
fortune.
What Mrs. van Brunt could have seen in Bingley Crocker to
cause her to single him out from all the world passes comprehen-
sion: but the eccentricities of Cupid are commonplace. It were best
to shun examination into fi rst causes and stick to results. Th
e swift
romance began and reached its climax in the ten days which it took
one of the smaller Atlantic liners to sail from Liverpool to New
York. Mr. Crocker was on board because he was returning with a
theatrical company from a failure in London, Mrs. van Brunt be-
cause she had been told that the slow boats were the steadiest. Th
ey
35
P. G. WODEHOUSE
began the voyage as strangers and ended it as an engaged couple –
the aff air being expedited, no doubt, by the fact that, even if it ever
occurred to Bingley to resist the onslaught on his bachelor peace, he
soon realised the futility of doing so, for the cramped conditions of
ship-board intensifi ed the always overwhelming eff ects of his future
bride’s determined nature.
Th
e engagement was received in a widely diff ering spirit by the
only surviving blood-relations of the two principals. Jimmy, Mr.
Crocker’s son, on being informed that his father had plighted his
troth to the widow of a prominent millionaire, displayed the utmost
gratifi cation and enthusiasm, and at a little supper which he gave by
way of farewell to a few of his newspaper comrades and which lasted
till six in the morning, when it was broken up by the fl ying wedge
of waiters for which the selected restaurant is justly famous, joyfully
announced that work and he would from then on be total strangers.
He alluded in feeling terms to the Providence which watches over
good young men and saves them from the blighting necessity of of-
fering themselves in the fl ower of their golden youth as human sac-
rifi ces to the Moloch of capitalistic greed: and, having commiserated
with his guests in that a similar stroke of luck had not happened to
each of them, advised them to drown their sorrows in drink. Which
they did.
Far diff erent was the attitude of Mrs. Crocker’s sister, Nesta
Pett. She entirely disapproved of the proposed match. At least,
the fact that in her fi nal interview with her sister she described the
bridegroom-to-be as a wretched mummer, a despicable fortune-
hunter, a broken-down tramp, and a sneaking, grafting confi dence-
trickster lends colour to the supposition that she was not a warm
supporter of it. She agreed wholeheartedly with Mrs. Crocker’s sug-
gestion that they should never speak to each other again as long as
they lived: and it was immediately after this that the latter removed
husband Bingley, step-son Jimmy, and all her other goods and chat-
tels to London, where they had remained ever since. Whenever Mrs.
Crocker spoke of America now, it was in tones of the deepest dis-
like and contempt. Her friends were English, and every year more
exclusively of England’s aristocracy. She intended to become a lead-
ing fi gure in London Society, and already her progress had been
astonishing. She knew the right people, lived in the right square,
said the right things, and thought the right thoughts: and in the
36
PICADILLY JIM
Spring of her third year had succeeded in curing Bingley of his habit
of beginning his remarks with the words “Say, lemme tell ya some-
thing.” Her progress, in short, was beginning to assume the aspect
of a walk-over.
Against her complete contentment and satisfaction only one
thing militated. Th
at was the behaviour of her step-son, Jimmy.
It was of Jimmy that she spoke when, having hung the receiver
on its hook, she returned to the breakfast-room. Bayliss had silently
withdrawn, and Mr. Crocker was sitting in sombre silence at the
table.
“A most fortunate thing has happened, Bingley,” she said. “It
was most kind of dear Lady Corstorphine to ring me up. It seems
that her nephew, Lord Percy Whipple, is back in England. He has
been in Ireland for the past three years, on the staff of the Lord
Lieutenant, and only arrived in London yesterday afternoon. Lady
Corstorphine has promised to arrange a meeting between him and
James. I particularly want them to be friends.”
“Eugenia,” said Mr. Crocker in a hollow voice, “do you know
they call baseball Rounders over here, and children play it with a
soft ball?”
“James is becoming a serious problem. It is absolutely necessary
that he should make friends with the right kind of young men.”
“And a racquet,” said Mr. Crocker.
“Please listen to what I am saying, Bingley. I am talking about
James. Th
ere is a crude American strain in him which seems to grow
worse instead of better. I was lunching with the Delafi elds at the
Carlton yesterday, and there, only a few tables away, was James with
an impossible young man in appalling clothes. It was outrageous
that James should have been seen in public at all with such a person.
Th
e man had a broken nose and talked through it. He was saying
in a loud voice that made everybody turn round something about
his left-scissors hook – whatever that may have been. I discovered
later that he was a low professional pugilist from New York – a man
named Spike Dillon, I think Captain Wroxton said. And Jimmy
was giving him lunch – at the Carlton! ”
Mr. Crocker said nothing. Constant practice had made him an
adept at saying nothing when his wife was talking.
“James must be made to realise his responsibilities. I shall have
to speak to him. I was hearing only the other day of a most deserving
37
P. G. WODEHOUSE
man, extremely rich and lavishly generous in his contributions to the
party funds, who was only given a knighthood, simply because he
had a son who had behaved in a manner that could not possibly be
overlooked. Th
e present Court is extraordinarily strict in its views.
James cannot be too careful. A certain amount of wildness in a
young man is quite proper in the best set, provided that he is wild in
the right company. Every one knows that young Lord Datchet was
ejected from the Empire Music-Hall on Boat-Race night every year
during his residence at Oxford University, but nobody minds. Th
e
family treats it as a joke. But James has such low tastes. Professional
pugilists! I believe that many years ago it was not unfashionable for
young men in Society to be seen about with such persons, but those
days are over. I shall certainly speak to James. He cannot aff ord to
call attention to himself in any way. Th
at breach-of-promise case of
his three years ago, is, I hope and trust, forgotten, but the slightest
slip on his part might start the papers talking about it again, and
