Right Ho, Jeeves

P. G. Wodehouse · 1934 · 264 pages

Right Ho, Jeeves

P. G. Wodehouse243

She broke off, and stood glaring at Jeeves. During the latter portion of her address, he had been standing by in a respectful manner, endeavouring to catch the speaker’s eye. “If I might make a suggestion, madam.” I am not saying that in the course of our long association I have always found myself able to view Jeeves with approval. There are aspects of his character which have frequently caused coldnesses to arise between us. He is one of those fellows who, if you give them a thingummy, take a what-d’you-call-it. His work is often raw, and he has been known to allude to me as “mentally negligible”. More than once, as I have shown, it has been my painful task to squelch in him a tendency to get uppish and treat the young master as a serf or peon. These are grave defects. But one thing I have never failed to hand the man. He is magnetic. There is about him something that seems to soothe and hypnotize. To the best of my knowledge, he has never encountered a charging rhinoceros, but should this contingency occur, I have no doubt that the animal, meeting his eye, would check itself in mid-stride, roll over and lie purring with its legs in the air. At any rate he calmed down Aunt Dahlia, the nearest thing to a charging rhinoceros, in under five seconds. He just stood there looking respectful, and though I didn’t time the thing--not having a stop-watch on me--I should say it wasn’t more than three seconds and a quarter before her whole manner underwent an astounding change for the better. She melted before one’s eyes.

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