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indeedsir_backupRating: PG-13
Original Prompt: A Christmas Carol. “Bah” I said, and I meant it to sting. “Humbug.” I added, least I be taken for a sap.
Warnings: Aunt Dahlia's less sympathetic side.
Disclaimer: Not mine, and not for profit
A/N: To the original prompter: I would have loved to do more with this prompt, but unfortunately, my time has been limited. I hope you enjoy this nonetheless. Thanks to
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erynn999 for the beta job. “Bah” I said, and I meant it to sting. “Humbug.” I added, least I be taken for a sap.
Jeeves looked up from the greenery he was arranging artfully on the mantle as I growled my way into the room and slumped into an armchair from whence I could glare mournfully at the flickering fire. A lush tree stood in the corner, covered in bright glass baubles and delicate beaded garlands. The whole effect was so tasteful and Jeevesian and homelike that my foul mood only increased. I slouched down further in the chair, and I daresay my lower lip protruded just a tad.
"Pardon me for saying so, but you seem distressed, sir," said Jeeves, who had materialised by the sideboard. "Perhaps a cocktail would soothe your nerves."
Well! I liked that. I attempted to puff my chest out and fix the bally traitor with a gimlet eye, but found myself deflating under his respectful gaze. That is to say, I toppled like the walls of Jericho. I sunk lower in my seat. "Alright, Jeeves," I conceded. "Mix us up a b. and s., then." He frowned a little at that, which is to say, there was the faintest drawing together of his brow, and I could feel him watching me out of the corner of his eye as he set about mixing up the requested libation.
I avoided his eyes as he pressed the drink into my hand, and took a melancholy sip. After several long moments of self sipping drearily, while Jeeves stood patiently by my side, I sighed. Addressing my glass, I asked him, "Tell me, Jeeves, I'm not an ungenerous man, am I?"
"Certainly not, sir." His tone was firm, but I continued to direct my conversation to my ice cubes.
"I mean to say, I'm not stingy with the folding stuff. I wouldn't turn away a starving man. Bertram Wooster's door is always open to a friend in need, is it not?"
"It is, sir."
"And would you say I am derelict in my duties as a devoted nephew? Not to Aunt Agatha, mind, for she is more the sort to inspire fear than devotion. But my Aunt Dahlia - have I not risked my neck and my very sanity for her? Stealing cow creamers and paintings and entertaining Gorringes, to name a few? I should say I have! And what does she ask of me now, that - that - that traitoress? A man must have his limit, Jeeves, and this is mine."
At this point I happened to glance at him out of the corner of my eye, and was struck with a pang in my chest. My eyes burned. "It's all moot anyway, Jeeves," I said with a manful sniffle. "You've made up your mind, and while I must say I am surprised at the lack of loyalty of the Jeeveses, I will not keep you here against your will.
"Sir?" My usually imperturbable manservant's voice was infused, if that's the word I want, with bemusement, concern, and what, if I had not known better, I would have believed to be hurt. I fixed him a disgruntled look from beneath my brows.
"There's no need to be going around saying "sir" to me in those tones, Jeeves, as if you aren't perfectly aware of what's going on," I scolded. "Aunt Dahlia has told me all."
******
The conversation had gone thus:
It being early December, that is to say, the season for decking the halls and bestowing tokens of affection on one's nearest and dearest, I tootled up my own n. and d., vis, my aunt Dahlia.
"What ho, aged ancestor," I greeted her stentorian tones cheerfully. "May all the joys of the season be yours, and cetera."
"Is that you, Bertie, you ass?" was her delightful rejoinder. I assured her it was, and explained my mission.
"I've called to see what trinkets you might want for Christmas, Auntie D." I had already purchased some silver monstrosity for Uncle Tom, a necklace for Cousin Angela, and for Bonzo, I figured I'd slip him some gaspers to smuggle into his school, but I was a t a loss for something to gift Aunt Dahlia.
There was a calculating pause. When she spoke again, it was in her sweetest, though still booming, tones.
"Actually, Bertie, dear," she cooed, "There is something I would like from you."
"Ask away, dearest auntie," I urged, for the holidays make me magnanimous, or so I thought, until I heard her request.
"I want you to give me Jeeves."
I reeled. I staggered. I clutched the breast.
"I must have misheard you, Auntie," I wheezed. "I thought I heard you say you wanted me to give you Jeeves."
"Well, I did."
"But Auntie -"
"You know Seppings is retiring."
"Yes, but Auntie-"
"Well, I want Jeeves to come buttle for me."
"Not Jeeves, Auntie."
"Yes, Jeeves. Do clean out your ears, you young blister. Surely you could do this one favour for your favourite auntie?"
I could not. I couldn't get on without Jeeves. I mean to say, the man is a marvel and a paragon. Though I had once sworn that I would not be a slave to my valet, over the years, I have come to depend on his serene, shining presence. I mean to say, when I thought about home, it was Jeeves I pictured. To give him up would be to condemn B. Wooster to a bleak and meaningless existence. Though my aunt has no qualms about pinching other people's servants, I had never dreamt that she possessed such depths of perfidy as to try to pinch a gem like Jeeves from the bosom of her own family. It was not to be borne. I would put my foot down.
"No." I had not known I could sound so firm.
"No?" Aunt Dahlia sounded scandalized. "Is this how you show your loyalty as a nephew? Is this how you repay your loving family, who once saved you from choking on a rubber sheet? How many times have you slept beneath the roof of Brinkley Court and supped on Anatole's masterpieces?" She paused, I presume to savour the memory of that master's latest culinary feat, but I felt too sick to my stomach to engage in gastronomic reminiscences. "An aunt's curse on you if you won't, you young blot."
I was feeling decidedly browbeaten, but then a thought occurred to me.
"Eureka!" I exclaimed.
"What's that?" the relative demanded.
"You may cajole and threaten me all you like, Aunt Dahlia," I announced, confidant now, "but Jeeves will never agree to it." Aha! I thought. I had her now. There was another pause, then -
"Don't be an ass, Bertie. Jeeves has already agreed."
The world went grey. "He wouldn't!"
"He has," the telephone informed me smugly. "We spoke last time you came to visit. You wouldn't stand in the man's way, would you?"
My ears buzzed and my head swam. "No." I swallowed hard. If Jeeves's inclination tugged him to Brinkley, I could not stand in his way.
"You see, dear, it's all arranged. I just wanted you to go into this with good grace."
"Of course." My voice sounded distant to my own ears.
"Good lad. Was that all? I have to go wheedle some funds out of Tom."
"Toodle pip, Auntie D." I said numbly, replacing the receiver on the hook. I stood staring blankly at it for long minutes, contemplating the horror of a Jeevesless existence. Jeeves was leaving me. That was the thought that left a burning throbbing pain in my chest. My future stretched out in front of me in an endless series of long Jeevesless days and cold Jeevesless nights - though to be fair, my nights were already Jeevesless, as inviting one's manservant into one's bed is not the act of a preux chevalier, no matter how marvellous and handsome said manservant - but there was still something comforting in knowing my paragon slumbered just down the hall.
And now he would abandon me, without so much as a by your leave! The more I contemplated this betrayal, this conspiracy between my aunt and my man, the more embittered I grew. Well! There would be no donning the gay apparel and fa-la-la-ing with the masses for this Wooster! My lovely Christmas had been thoroughly dashed.
“Bah” I had said, growling my way into the sitting room where Jeeves was at work on the decorating. “Humbug.” Which brings us back to the current posish.
*****
"I'm sorry, sir," Jeeves said, with the faintest tightening of the brows, which signalled genuine confusion, a rarity on his intelligent map, "But I am unaware of what you are referring to."
I boggled at him. "Unaware, Jeeves? Have you forgotten your decision to leave me for my Aunt Dahlia? And at Christmas, too," I added with an unintended plaintive note.
"Sir?" his tone was gentle. "I assure you, I have no intention of leaving your service."
A tiny bubble of hope rose in my chest. "Really, Jeeves? But Aunt Dahlia said -" I filled him in on the details on my conversation with the scheming relative. "Do you mean to say my aunt lied to me Jeeves? You never spoke to her about replacing Seppings?"
"I fear Mrs. Travers may be labouring under a misapprehension, sir. She did indeed speak to me regarding the position of butler at Brinkley Court, but I believed I had made it quite clear that I had no intention of leaving my place with you."
"Gave her the old nolle prosequi, did you?"
"Yes, sir. No other position could suit me half so well, nor any other employer." He gave me the tiniest glimmer of a soft smile at that, and such a wave of soppy emotion washed over me that I quite forgot myself and leapt from my chair to embrace him. There was a slight hesitation, before his arms came around me and his warm hands settled gently on my back, tucking me close against him.
"I really couldn't have got on without you," I mumbled into the side of his neck, and I heard him inhale deeply.
There was a longish pause, as if he were steeling himself, and just as I began to worry, he whispered, "Nor I without you, sir."
He led me to the sofa, and sat with me, his arm still around the Wooster corpus. Taking my hand in his free one, he explained his suspicions.
"It would seem that, after I had made clear that I would not leave your service, Mrs. Travers thought to use your generous nature in the pursuit of her goal."
"My generous nature, Jeeves?"
"Indeed sir. Knowing that you would feel honour-bound not to thwart my ambitions, she hoped that you would insist I go, leaving me little choice but to accept her offer of employment."
I didn't like that one bit. "Downright diabolic, Jeeves."
"A very clever ploy, sir, though one that failed to take into account the depth of, I dare hope, our mutual regard." His eyes, filled with such intense thingness, searched mine, and his grip tightened ever so slightly on my fingers.
I let my free hand drift up to caress his finely chiselled jaw. "You may say regard, old thing; I say love." I tilted my head to meet his kiss, but he stopped me with a finger on my lower lip.
"Then I will say love as well, Bertram." He smiled at me, a genuine warm smile, before his mouth met mine and I quite lost any coherent thought.
There was no donning of the gay apparel that evening, thought there was quite a lot of shucking of it, and I found myself, sometime later, a thoroughly sated and happy Bertram, ensconced in my man's arms and smoking a cheerful cigarette.
"I will say this for Auntie D.," I said, smiling up at Jeeves in what was no doubt a soppy manner, "She is a Grade A schemer. Thankfully, she'll never be a match for your grey matter, or Christmas dinner at Brinkley could prove treacherous."
"I should not allow that to happen, sir," my paragon informed me.
"No," I agreed, "There is the tie that binds, after all."
"Indefinitely, sir." And he kissed me.
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Date: 2011-12-29 05:58 am (UTC)Poor Bertie! But a happy ending. :) Great story!
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Date: 2011-12-29 06:58 am (UTC)Oh, Aunt D getting all evil mastermind was delicious, and it would have worked to, if her nephew's valet was just like everybody else's valet.
I do love it, and if you want to do a major retool of a proper Christmas Carol, there is always next year;)
Thank you so much for participating, and making this wonderful fic!
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Date: 2011-12-29 07:08 am (UTC)and it would have worked to, if . . .
. . . it hadn't been for those PESKY KIDS.
Oh. OH. Bertie and Jeeves and a selection Bertie's friends, travelling around in an old fashioned motor car, solving crimes! Someone write this!
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Date: 2011-12-29 08:02 am (UTC)That's what I was thinking, but decided to stick to the Jeeves' love=)
I'm now picturing Scooby in a morning coat and bowler. It'll take a while to process...
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Date: 2011-12-29 09:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-12-30 02:55 am (UTC)Scoobysnak for your thoughts, LadyMoonDancer?
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Date: 2011-12-30 04:04 am (UTC)You should so do this.no subject
Date: 2011-12-30 04:10 am (UTC)"Yoicks! I think you're right, Jeeves!"
(If you write this, I will totally write that Cinderella-Bertie fic.)
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Date: 2011-12-30 04:16 am (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2012-01-17 03:57 am (UTC)Claude and Eustace as the ghost of past.
Bingo as present, since he's totally instant gratification.
Bertie tripping and popping out of the death's hood, 'Drat it, now I've gone and ruined the surprise.'
What is with these J&W plot bunnies? The things breed like mutant rabbits on speed!
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