A Spot of Fanfic
Mar. 28th, 2011 01:07 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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indeedsir_backupTitle: Jeeves and the Baiser Florentin
Author: Wotwotleigh
Chapter: 1
Pairing: Jeeves/Bertie
Summary: Jeeves proposes an unusual solution to a young couple's romantic dilemma.
Rating: G
Words: 3,705, so far
Disclaimer: Jeeves and Bertie belong to Wodehouse. I'm just writing this for fun.
Jeeves and the Baiser Florentin
Hard experience has taught me that it is just when things are at their most oojah-cum-spiff that Fate generally decides to jump out from behind a bush and slosh you in the midsection with a sand-stuffed sock. Fat-headed though we may be, we Woosters tend to learn our lessons, once we have been biffed a few times. Looking back over the whole thing now, I really ought to have seen it coming.
I was sauntering about London one afternoon, a snatch of some popular melody on my lips, and it would have been clear to even the most casual of observers that Bertram was in fine spirits. The birds tootled merrily. The lark bunged itself along on the wing, and the snail adhered firmly to the thorn. In short, God was in his heaven and all was right with the world. I was filled to the eyeteeth with bien être and goodwill toward man and beast.
It was in this general frame of mind that I began drifting in the direction of that jeweller’s on Bond Street that I sometimes frequent. I had some vague idea of obtaining a pair of understated silver cufflinks that I had caught Jeeves gazing at in a wistful sort of manner one afternoon when he had come to meet me outside of the Bollinger. I felt like doing the sterling fellow a good turn, and I had already used up the local bookery’s supply of Spinoza. Apparently he hadn’t put out any fresh stuff recently. I procured the goods and was just leaving the establishment when Fate suddenly decided to manifest itself in the vicinity of my third waistcoat button.
Fate had, on this occasion, chosen to take the form of a small, roundish female, hidden somewhere beneath a teetering pile of parcels and shopping bags. She had been emerging from another shop – some sort of purveyor of feminine acoutrements – and her trajectory had intersected with my own. We extracted ourselves from the resulting debris of hat boxes and colored tissue paper, and as I was helping her reassemble the fragments, she paused to get a good dekko at my map.
“Oh my gosh!” she squeaked. “Is that Bertie Wooster?”
“In person, not a picture,” I replied. I tried to doff the lid, but it had apparently come unstuck in the collision. She found it amongst the scree and jammed it jauntily onto the Wooster bean.
“Well, well, well! Golly! It’s been ages, hasn’t it?” She paused, and gave me an accusing once-over. “You do remember me, don’t you?”
“I certainly do, Margie, old blister,” I replied. “How could I forget?”
You may or may not have read my account of that whole sticky business with Madeline Bassett, Gussie Fink-Nottle, Tuppy Glossop and my cousin Angela that took place shortly after my vacation in Cannes. If you have, you will remember me mentioning that, during said Cannes sojourn, I had been ticked off in no uncertain manner by a girl for delivering a particularly fruity soliloquy on the subject of her fiancé’s legs. Mind you, I didn’t commit the act in cold blood. She had solicited my opinion, and had set the tone of the proceedings by asking if I didn’t consider them Nature’s last word in ridiculous underpinnings. A leading question, if ever I’ve heard one. In any case, the upshot was that, by the time she got finished giving me what for, I felt more like a piñata at the end of a party for juvenile delinquents than anything human. Well, what I’m trying to get at is, this was that girl.
To look at her, one wouldn’t have thought her capable of that affronted mother tigress stuff. Margie Gascoigne was one of these Helen Kane-ish little popsies, all raven curls, saucer eyes and dimples. Attractive enough, if you go in for that sort of thing.
“Say, listen, Bertie,” she said, as I helped her reload her cargo, “maybe you can help me. I’m looking for a place called the Drones.”
“Say no more, young Margie. The Drones happens to be my home away from home.”
“Wonderful! You’re a doll, Bertie!” I think she would have clapped her hands in girlish enthusiasm if it wouldn't have upset the ballast all over again. “I’m supposed to meet my fiancé outside of it in about fifteen minutes, and I haven’t a clue where it is.”
“Follow me," I said suavely, "and your troubles shall soon be at an end. Fiancé, eh? I thought surely you two must have hitched up by now.”
“What? Oh.” She gave a snort like a disgruntled steam engine. “When you saw me last, I was still with that blighter with the legs. Well, that’s all off. Goodness, I don’t know what I was thinking. That would have been the bloomer of a lifetime, don’t you think, Bertie?”
I weighed in with a carefully neutral “Oh, ah.” “Forgive and Forget” may be the Wooster motto, but our other one is “Safety First.”
“Anyway, I’ve found someone else.”
“Oh, ah,” I said again, taking up the refrain. “Is this one a little more up to specs?”
“It wouldn’t even be a fair comparison,” she sniffed, shunting a couple of parcels into my arms as we walked. “Will you carry those for me? Thanks, Bertie, you’re a darling. He’s terribly handsome.”
“Well, that’s a start.”
“Oh, yes. Here, take a couple more. He’s like a cross between Rudolph Valentino, Ramon Navarro, and Clark Gable,” she said, warming to her theme, “with maybe just a hint of William Powell about the eyes.”
I was about to comment that this sounded like some kind of bally monstrosity out of Greek mythology, but I thought better of it. I opted instead for a safer “Well, well!”
“And he’s ever so bright,” she said, hanging a couple of shopping bags off my nearest arm. “He studied the Classics at Oxford.”
“Ah, an Oxford man, is he?” I said, unsuccessfully dodging an incoming hat box, which hit home firmly on top of the pile.
“Sure,” she said. “He was at school with you. He talks about you all the time.”
I wracked my brain for an old school chum that looked like a terrifying hydra with the heads of four or five different popular stars of the silver screen, but none came to mind. Before I could enquire further, she continued.
“Anyway, he can tell you all you ever wanted to know about the relative merits of Thucydides and Herodotus. If you want to know the difference between a Mede and a Persian, he’s your man.”
I was struck by one of those sudden inspirations that one is struck by on occasion. “Is there a difference?” I said. “I’d always heard that one man’s Mede is another man’s Persian.”
She stopped abruptly, and although I couldn’t see her past the surging sea of boxes that was now blocking almost my entire field of vision, I could tell that she was giving me one of those irked tigress looks. “Are you quite done?” she asked.
“Oh yes, that was all I had to say on the subject.”
“Good,” she said coldly. “I wouldn’t want to interrupt.”
“No, no. Do go on.”
“As I was saying, he’s practically perfect in every way. He’s got the whole works: handsome, intelligent, charming, sweet. But . . .”
“Ah. There is a snag?”
“It’s just that . . . he’s so frightfully boring!”
After the build-up the chap had been getting up to this point, I must confess that this came as a bit of a surprise. I would have scratched the head, had I access to any of my fingers. “Boring, eh? What do you mean by boring, exactly?”
I sensed a bit of uncomfortable squirming in my peripherals. “Well, you know,” she said. “Boring. All he ever wants to do is talk. I’m lucky if I can get a friendly pat on the hand out of him. Sometimes, if he’s feeling really daring, he’ll give me a brotherly peck on the cheek. It’s as if he still thinks it’s nineteen-aught-one, and a chaperone is going to pop out at any minute and rap him on the knuckles if we so much as let our elbows touch.”
I saw all. “Ah. One of these old-fashioned fellows of delicate sensibilities?”
“Is that what it is? I just figured him for a fathead.”
“Well, there’s always that. What is the name of this paragon?”
“Peveril,” she sighed, with a sort of soupiness I would not have expected from a girl who had just let it be known that she was affianced to someone who went by the name "Peveril."
"I don't know any Peverils," I said.
"Of course you do, you ass! Peveril Fitzralph. You were at Eton and Oxford together."
I started, nearly causing an avalanche of hat boxes. “Old Fungus Fitzralph?” I cried. “Good gosh, I do know him!”
“Fungus?” she said, sounding as if her own delicate sensibilities were a bit ruffled.
“A little joke amongst us old school chums. He insisted on cultivating a full set of whiskers the whole time he was at Oxford,” I explained. “He thought it gave him a distinguished whatsis.”
She clicked the tongue. “That sounds like something he would do. Well! Speak of the Devil!" She unshipped a "Yoo-hoo!" and a clatter of high heels told me that she had left my side.
Peering over the crest of the mountain of parcels, I perceived that we had fetched up against the Drones, and that my old chum Fungus was among those present.
---
It was a pensive Bertram who trickled into the old homestead a short while later. My native hue was sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. I hadn't had time to chat with Fungus beyond a couple of desultory what-hos and a bit of well welling before he decanted Margie and packages into the two-seater and tooled off, but I had seen enough to confirm Margie's testimony. I bunged my hat onto the hat rack and was about to call for Jeeves when the man himself floated in and good afternoon sirred.
"Jeeves," I said, as he helped me out of the outermost crust, "I've just seen my old school friend Fungus Fitzralph over at the Drones."
"Yes, sir."
I raised a curious eyebrow. I had been expecting something less in the nature of an affirmative. "You seem unsurprised, Jeeves."
"The young gentleman called at the flat earlier, sir. He was desirous of soliciting your advice."
"My advice?"
"Yes, sir. He is facing a predicament that is romantic in nature, and he thought that you, being more experienced than himself in such matters, might be able to offer a solution."
Well, I must say I was dashed flattered. While those in my circle come from far and wide to seek Jeeves' counsel, I am generally regarded as a goof of the first water. My advice is received with an indulgent pat on the head, at best.
"Good lord, Jeeves," I said, scratching the bean. "Well, you know I am always the first to leap into action when the time comes for all good men to come to the aid of the party."
"Quite so, sir."
"But I'm dashed if I know what to suggest. He seems a hopeless case to me."
"You are familiar with the young gentleman's difficulty, sir?"
"I am," I said. "I heard the whole story from the female half of the sketch, and then I got to see him in action. The poor blighter is just like the chap in that song, you know the one."
"Sir?"
"I can't remember the name of it, but it's been all the rage at the Drones lately. There's a line in it that goes, 'He's up in his Latin and Greek, but in his shiekin', he's weak.'"
"I am not familiar with that particular composition, sir."
"Well, you should try it over on your pianola sometime, Jeeves. It's a corker. But as I was saying, up until I saw him just now, I was at a loss to understand why any self-respecting girl would work herself into such a lather over the chump."
"The gentleman's appearance has changed since you last met, sir?"
"I'll say it has, Jeeves. When I laid eyes on him earlier, I felt a bit like stout Cortez staring at the Pacific, silent upon that peak in whatsit."
"Darien, sir."
"Right. Anyway, he's no longer the algae-encrusted gargoyle that I knew in my younger days. He's divested himself of all trace of whiskerage, for one thing."
"A sound decision, sir," said Jeeves gravely. He takes a strong view in matters of facial foliage. "He also looks as if he's been taking in a few Swedish exercises along with his morning toast and kippers, and now bears more than a passing resemblance to Michelangelo's David."
"There is a distinctly Byronic aspect to the young gentleman's appearance, sir."
"In short, just the sort of chap that any red-blooded beazel would give her eyeteeth to hitch herself to."
"Precisely, sir."
"And this poor girl has fallen for him like a ton of bricks, only to find that he's got all the pash of something on a slab of ice. When they met just now, to fling her arms around his neck and gaze up at him in the manner of a girl who expected her face to be covered with burning kisses was, with her, the work of an instant. But Fungus, the dumb brick, just said 'Hullo, darling,' and stood there patting her on the shoulder."
"No doubt frustrating for the young lady, sir."
"Precisely, Jeeves. Rem acu tetigisti. But," I said, cutting straight to the heart of the thing, "why?"
"Sir?"
"I mean to say, what's wrong with the blighter? Why the reticence? Doesn't he care for the little blister?"
"Mr. Fitzralph was kind enough to confide in me, sir. The problem does not stem from a lack of affection for the young lady, but rather a lack of confidence. He feels that his lack of experience would impair his ability to cosset the object of his adoration in a manner that would meet her exacting standards."
I sucked in the breath and clicked the tongue sympathetically. "Poor old Fungus!" I said. "But still, he rather brought it on himself, what? While the rest of us were honing our technique on the local fauna, he was busy cultivating his whiskers and poring over Corinthian capitals."
"So he gave me to understand, sir."
"And she, meanwhile, is expecting him to play the part of one of these silver screen lovers with the flaring nostrils and the Arabian headgear."
"Yes, sir. The young lady is so disgruntled by the situation that she has spoken forebodingly of ending the engagement unless he becomes more demonstrative."
"And you say he wants my advice?"
"Yes, sir."
I chewed the lip a bit, and lit a thoughtful gasper. I had to confess I was at a loss. "I'm at a loss, Jeeves," I said, coming to the res.
Jeeves coughed gently, and gave me that look that I have come to recognize as signifying that he has got the goods and is about to come across with a corker. "If I might make a suggestion, sir?" he said.
"I was hoping you would," I replied.
"Given the young lady's apparent flair for the cinematic, sir, I feel that perhaps all that Mr. Fitzralph requires is a bit of theatrical coaching."
"Ah. Give him a little stage business, you mean."
"Precisely, sir. I recently attended a cinematic entertainment in which the protagonist experienced a disagreement with object of his affections. This situation culminated in a heated argument between the two lovers. At the climax of this exchange, the young lady expressed her intention to sever her relations with the gentleman, in response to which he grasped her firmly by upper arms, informed her that he would brook no such nonsense, and enfolded her in a passionate embrace. She was so moved by this display of passion and manly resolve that she melted in his arms and tearfully declared her love for him. They then put their differences aside and were happily reunited."
I shook the lemon. I had spotted a flaw in his scheme. "It's good stuff, Jeeves, and it's just the sort of thing females of the Margie Gascoigne type tend to eat up with a spoon. But I don't see how it will work."
"Sir?"
"Well, even if Fungus is able to learn his lines and blocking, what about the dénouement? I thought the nub of the issue was that he is one of those bashful birds who goes to pieces at the thought of attempting anything more than the auntliest of pecks."
"Yes, sir. He will no doubt require specific instruction in the nuances of osculation as a supplement to the course of action I have already outlined."
"Are you saying that he will need kissing lessons, Jeeves?"
"Precisely, sir. The kiss itself, as you have already perceived, is essential to the approach that I am proposing. The burden of his expression of passion must be borne by the kiss, which is, after all, the fiery accompaniment on the keyboard of the teeth of the lovely songs which love sings in a burning heart."
"Good lord, that's a ripe gag. One of yours?"
"No, sir. I was paraphrasing the poet Verlaine. In the original French—"
"Now is not the time, Jeeves."
"Yes, sir."
"We must stay focused on the matter at hand."
"Very good, sir."
"Where were we? Ah, yes," I said, finding my train of thought again. "You were saying that someone needs to take the poor benighted sap in hand and explain to him the basics of smooching."
Jeeves coughed gently. "Or, rather, to demonstrate them to him, sir."
I struggled to catch his drift. "Demonstrate? As in, actually kiss the blighter?"
"Demonstration is the most efficacious method of instruction in physical technique, sir."
"Yes, I see what you mean, Jeeves. A chap can't learn to Charleston by listening to another chap give him a blow-by-blow of the procedure."
"Precisely, sir."
"But," I said, coming to the crux, or nub, of the thing, "who is going to do the dirty deed?"
He unshipped a second gentle cough. "You, sir, were the person who sprang immediately to mind."
I goggled. You could have knocked me down with an f. "Jeeves," I said, when I had sufficiently recovered my powers of speech, "are you saying you want me to kiss Fungus?"
"Yes, sir."
"He'd never go for it," I pointed out.
"You think not, sir?"
"Use your intelligence, Jeeves. You could while away an entire afternoon heaving bricks in the middle of the busiest street in London without beaning a single chap whose idea of a large afternoon is to spend it being kissed by Bertram Wooster."
A muscle at the left side of his mouth twitched in an inscrutable manner, if inscrutable is the word I want. "One might be surprised, sir."
I hadn't the foggiest notion what he was on about, but I decided to let it pass for the moment. "Anyway, even if I could convince him to let me inflict my lips on his person, I'm not exactly up on this smouldering Hollywood stuff myself. I've always been more old-fashioned in my approach. I doubt I could dish out the kind of goods that these hard-case modern girls tend to go in for."
Jeeves stood for a moment in silence, putting on one of his better stuffed frog impersonations. I waited respectfully for him to come to the surface. I find it's better to let him percolate in peace in these moments. At length, my patience was rewarded.
"I may be able to offer a solution to that particular difficulty, sir," he said. "However . . ." And with that, he sort of fizzled out. I had the distinct impression that he was letting "I dare not" wait upon "I would".
"Why this cat-in-the-adaging, Jeeves?" I asked.
"I simply feel that what I am about to suggest might easily be taken in the wrong spirit, sir."
"You don't think I'll like it?"
"The possibility does occur to me, sir."
"That doesn't usually stop you," I pointed out.
He ramped up the stuffed frog routine a notch or two. "It is a matter of propriety, sir."
"Well, at least tell me what you have in mind," I said. "It can't be much rummier than what you've already suggested."
"Very good, sir. I merely thought, sir, that I might be able to impart a technique to you, which you could then, in turn, impart to Mr. Fitzralph."
It didn't take long for his meaning to penetrate. We Woosters are quick to catch on. I started visibly, and looked at him with a wild surmise. I tottered and clutched at a passing armchair. "Jeeves," I said, when the tongue at last became untangled from the tonsils, "are you proposing to kiss me?"
"I hope you will not feel that I am taking a liberty, sir."
I chewed the lip a bit. I remember that Stiffy Byng once asked me if one might kiss Jeeves, and I had replied without hesitation that one most certainly might not. But then, the chap never ceased to astonish me with his hidden depths. If you had told me only a few years ago that he was the sort of bird who would go about the place coshing policemen and being named Reginald with impunity, I would have had a good laugh at your expense. But, there you are. It just goes to show that you never can tell.
"Good lord, Jeeves," I said. "I mean to say, gosh!"
"It is only a suggestion, sir."
Incredible, of course, but what could I do? Experience has taught me that Jeeves' loonier-sounding schemes are often his ripest. I shrugged the shoulders. "Well, Jeeves," I said, "you know best, of course." I tilted up the bean, closed the eyes, puckered the lips, and waited for him to deliver the goods.
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Date: 2011-03-28 06:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 04:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 10:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 08:56 am (UTC)The witing -style and situations are topping and Jeeves, my dear fellow, I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE.
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Date: 2011-03-28 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 10:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 04:52 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 12:07 pm (UTC)Love this: "Use your intelligence, Jeeves. You could while away an entire afternoon heaving bricks in the middle of the busiest street in London without beaning a single chap whose idea of a large afternoon is to spend it being kissed by Bertram Wooster."
A muscle at the left side of his mouth twitched in an inscrutable manner, if inscrutable is the word I want. "One might be surprised, sir." So telling.
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Date: 2011-03-28 04:53 pm (UTC)I'm rather fond of that bit myself. :)
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Date: 2011-03-28 05:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 05:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-30 12:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 05:21 pm (UTC)can't wait for the next part!
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Date: 2011-03-30 12:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 05:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-30 12:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-28 10:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-30 12:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-29 12:47 am (UTC)"being named Reginald with impunity." *snort!*
I loved every little bit. Please make more happen, if not directly following this, then somewhere close by?
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Date: 2011-03-30 12:51 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-04-25 02:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-10-26 05:09 am (UTC)“Forgive and Forget” may be the Wooster motto, but our other one is “Safety First.”
So terribly pleased that there is more of this to gnaw on!
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Date: 2011-10-29 02:06 am (UTC)