Kevin Kiernan has come across a short extract from an unpublished Jeeves and Wooster story, ‘Jeeves and the short Christmas’ set in……..
December 1938
I woke up, knowing I had been on a mighty bender the night before. It was Catsmeat Potter-Pirbright’s birthday bash at the Drones Club. I now realise why the Constabulary, to test your sobriety, ask you to walk in a straight line. After a bender, a straight line is impossible, almost cruel.
Just then, as if by magic, Jeeves shimmered into the room like a cloud of gas. In his hand was a glass of his famous hangover cure. It was ‘a little preparation of his own invention: Worcester Sauce giving it colour, two raw eggs making it nutritious, and the red pepper providing its bite.’
Needless to say, but, I will say it anyway, I gulped it down.
Suddenly I was no longer in an iron foundry, with the master blacksmith relentlessly pounding a lump of iron with a 28lb hammer, I also seemed to have stepped off the spinning carousel and its resident horse going up and down. As Jeeves drew back the curtains, the birds twittered and the sun shone in.
But somehow something was amiss. I had been at my Berkeley Mansions flat in Mayfair for some years, but, and I am no Chartered Surveyor, somehow this seemed different. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I was sure that the window was normally on the other side of the room. Then I heard the loud bong of a nearby church bell.
I am no Wolfgang Amadeus, but I sensed a different, deeper note, I croaked ‘have they installed a new bell at St George’s Hanover Square?’
‘It’s St Paul’s Cathedral, Sir, you may remember that our Mayfair flat is being renovated, we have moved, for a few months, to a flat in the heart of the City of London,
That’s what is so amazing about Jeeves, we had moved flats and I was unaware. Rather like the three times I thought I was heading for Scotland. I got off the train, kilt, sporran and golf clubs and found myself in Cannes (Jeeves’s favourite holiday spot).
‘I thought the City might be good for a change,’ said Jeeves. I knew immediately that something was up. It was a fair step to the Drones and even the Junior Ganymede, Jeeves’s club for manservants. Why the City? Suddenly an image popped up of Jeeves studiously reading the FT each morning over the last month or so. Jeeves never did anything for no reason. There was more to this than met my eye.
I confronted him with the evidence, albeit flimsy, and he said that while he was here he had decided to forsake his penchant for the horses (a wise choice in the winter months) and play the stock market instead. His normal head covering, the bowler hat, was also the chapeau of choice for brokers, so he soon merged in well in their favourite watering hole, the Bull and Bear. Apparently my circle of friends and relations soon got wind of his investment fund and they piled in with cash. Such was the power of the Jeeves Brand,
His main target, he explained, was a company called Peace and Harmony Tours which specialised in coach holidays in Middle Europe. Jeeves said that the company was heavily backed by the German Government, in an attempt to persuade people that all was well in the region. Their owner was one Roderick Spode, head of the pro-right group, the Black Shorts. Jeeves and I had had past encounters with Spode, a suspicious bruiser to say the least.
Jeeves said that he had ‘borrowed’ all Spode’s shares for a £100 fee. Spode apparently was keen on receiving the fee as he wanted to upgrade the Black Shorts of his followers from second hand Footer Bags to something more Savile Row. Today was the due date for the shares’ return.
I had no idea what ‘borrowing’ meant. But before I could ask Jeeves he had donned a beard and a Homburg hat and was gone.
Just then the Irving Berlin song came on the radio, ‘There may be trouble ahead………let’s face the music and dance.’ Ominous, what?
I headed for the Drones, but as soon as I had left the apartment, I ran into a brick wall which wasn’t there before. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a very large gorilla in a suit.
‘Ah Spode, fancy meeting you.’ I noticed that his Black-shorted associates were lined up on the opposite pavement. They must have switched sporting code because they each had a baseball bat.
‘You blasted Wooster, Where’s Jeeves? He has my shares and I need them urgently. The embassy says I must sell immediately…..’ he stopped there, realising he had said too much. He blew a whistle and he and his chums goose-stepped off.
When I got to the Drones I was looking forward to a session of throwing cards into a top hat. Trivial at first sight, but surprisingly hard. But on entering The Games Room there was a bit of a hubbub. The club members surrounded me asking if I had read the newspaper. Apparently the Peace and Harmony shares had just hit rock bottom. Throwing cards needs 100% concentration and the cacophony I was faced with was too much, so I taxied home. A closer look at the paper revealed that the charabancs and open top buses for Peace and Harmony Tours, which now looked awfully like tanks and armoured cars, were lining the Czech border. On entering my flat, things had hardly improved. It was like a noisy shareholders’ meeting of those who had poured money into the Jeeves fund. There was Aunt Dahlia, Catsmeat, Gussie Fink Nottle, Stiffy Byng and a poor soul who was looking forward to a Prague City Break with P and H tours. There was also a serious looking man of military bearing who said he was from MI5. He was wondering why Jeeves was supporting an armed incursion from a foreign power.
Suddenly the door opened and there was …… Father Christmas. It was Jeeves in disguise. He quelled the immediate hubbub with a carefully raised eyebrow. He explained that he had invented a new City tactic ‘shorting a stock’. He had borrowed 10,000 P and H shares, he knew that the price was bound to fall so he had sold them immediately at the then price of £5 each, netting £50,000. They were now 1 penny each, so Jeeves had bought back shares for just over £42 and returned them to a furious Spode. I am no Albert Einstein, but I saw that Jeeves had made a very healthy profit. All of Jeeves clients, with cash in hand, were happy. Mr MI5 congratulated Jeeves, mentioning a possible decoration. Jeeves advised me that a trip to Scotland ..really .. might be prudent until the dust had settled. There was the Flying Scotsman steaming up at King’s Cross. My kilt, golf clubs and sporran were already packed and there was a taxi waiting outside. Merry Christmas Everyone.
