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Page 43
'My back's hurting like blazes,' said Mike. 'And my ear's all sore
where that chap got me. Anything the matter with you?'
'Physically,' said Psmith, 'no. Spiritually much. Do you realize,
Comrade Jackson, the thing that has happened? I am riding in a tram. I,
Psmith, have paid a penny for a ticket on a tram. If this should get
about the clubs! I tell you, Comrade Jackson, no such crisis has ever
occurred before in the course of my career.'
'You can always get off, you know,' said Mike.
'He thinks of everything,' said Psmith, admiringly. 'You have touched
the spot with an unerring finger. Let us descend. I observe in the
distance a cab. That looks to me more the sort of thing we want. Let us
go and parley with the driver.'
17. Sunday Supper
The cab took them back to the flat, at considerable expense, and Psmith
requested Mike to make tea, a performance in which he himself was
interested purely as a spectator. He had views on the subject of
tea-making which he liked to expound from an armchair or sofa, but he
never got further than this. Mike, his back throbbing dully from the
blow he had received, and feeling more than a little sore all over,
prepared the Etna, fetched the milk, and finally produced the finished
article.
Psmith sipped meditatively.
'How pleasant,' he said, 'after strife is rest. We shouldn't have
appreciated this simple cup of tea had our sensibilities remained
unstirred this afternoon. We can now sit at our ease, like warriors
after the fray, till the time comes for setting out to Comrade Waller's
once more.'
Mike looked up.
'What! You don't mean to say you're going to sweat out to Clapham
again?'
'Undoubtedly. Comrade Waller is expecting us to supper.'
'What absolute rot! We can't fag back there.'
'Noblesse oblige. The cry has gone round the Waller household, "Jackson
and Psmith are coming to supper," and we cannot disappoint them now.
Already the fatted blanc-mange has been killed, and the table creaks
beneath what's left of the midday beef. We must be there; besides,
don't you want to see how the poor man is? Probably we shall find him
in the act of emitting his last breath. I expect he was lynched by the
enthusiastic mob.'
'Not much,' grinned Mike. 'They were too busy with us. All right, I'll
come if you really want me to, but it's awful rot.'
One of the many things Mike could never understand in Psmith was his
fondness for getting into atmospheres that were not his own. He would
go out of his way to do this. Mike, like most boys of his age, was
never really happy and at his ease except in the presence of those of
his own years and class. Psmith, on the contrary, seemed to be bored by
them, and infinitely preferred talking to somebody who lived in quite
another world. Mike was not a snob. He simply had not the ability to be
at his ease with people in another class from his own. He did not know
what to talk to them about, unless they were cricket professionals.
With them he was never at a loss.
But Psmith was different. He could get on with anyone. He seemed to
have the gift of entering into their minds and seeing things from their
point of view.
As regarded Mr Waller, Mike liked him personally, and was prepared, as
we have seen, to undertake considerable risks in his defence; but he
loathed with all his heart and soul the idea of supper at his house. He
knew that he would have nothing to say. Whereas Psmith gave him the
impression of looking forward to the thing as a treat.
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