"It's all Bertie Wooster's fault!"
I returned to Berkeley Mansions at something like quarter to eight – it still felt abhorrently early, but something about the steel-helmeted blighters on every street corner counting down the minutes to curfew does have the effect of making one a bit uneasy. The building was still pretty miserable-looking, with a smacking great crater right over where 117A used to be that had just been sort of left to simmer for a few months too long. Thankfully, my chambers were still in something that resembled working order – all thanks to Jeeves. In these dark days, I had come to appreciate him more than ever, and on this in particular I was grateful to have him by my side.
I burst into my sitting room ready to sink into my armchair and forget everything for a few hours, but unfortunately found it was already occupied by a stout, broad, bespectacled blob in uniform who appeared to be in the middle of a long lecture to nobody in particular about the “degeneracies of Anglo civilisation”. For a moment it didn’t seem to notice my arrival, before its mole-like face churned in my direction.
“Ah!” it declared, in an accent so soupy one could drink it with a spoon, “Mr. Vooster!”
“Yes,” I said, taking no care to hide my distaste at the creature’s presence, “What are you doing here, Schultz?”
The conglomeration of flesh that had occupied by sitting room turned back away from me, its visage that of a nasty satisfaction, and embarked on a long tirade somewhat hindered by the aforementioned accent, “Mr. Vooster, I am bre-zen (present?) to inform you that the prillages hehr-to (privileges hitherto?) granted to you by Jahr-man Command in Bree-tan (German Command in Britain) have been revoked, pernalleny (permanently), in the face of your flagrant defiance of our or-tor-ty (authority)!”
“Sorry, can you repeat that?” I asked, feigning an innocence I had long-lost.
“You heard me vell.” Schultz grunted, “Do not...try me, Vooster.”
Yes, I had, and I supposed things would come to this eventually. The Hun had chosen to turn the blind eye to much of my life after all that happened before the invasion and after – I suppose they thought I had some hidden function not clear upon purchase. They’d let me take extra rations, they’d let me drive, they’d even let me keep going to the Drones after it became officers-only – but one escapade too far on my part had showed them the err of their ways. I had a feeling I knew which one it was, too.
“I presume this is about what happened by the Albert Memorial?”
“Ja. You were ket-chered (captured) in the company of ruh-sus-tince (resistance) elements!” Schultz was visibly starting to glow red, like a balloon filled with a year-and-a-half of pent up anger with me.For a moment I didn’t know what to say.
“Well, it happens, you know.”
“UGH!”
My callous remark had triggered a conflagration that was moderated only by Schultz’s unwieldy girth, as he rose up to his full height of five foot six and began to wade through the air towards me, huffing and puffing. I backed away, cautiously – though where I’d go I hadn’t the foggiest, since curfew was about to kick off. In a moment of morbid curiosity, I noted the gun on Schultz’s waist.
“MISTER VOOSTER,” Schultz boomed, his eyes wobbling in their sockets like miniature jellies, “IT WORST THUNK (was thought) THAT YOU COULD BE OF ASSET TO THE REICH! IT SEEMS WE WERE MIST-AH-KEN!”
“And so I’m…” I almost caught myself on the hatstand, and realised I was being backed against the closed door, with no way out, “I’m revoked, of my privileges, yes, I understand…”
“NO! VOOSTER!” With a trembling fatty hand, Schlutz reached for his waist, “YOU HAFF INTERVENED (have interfered, I think) WITH OUR AFFAIRS FOR THE LAST TIME!”
I was trying to think of some witty retort to be my last words, when suddenly there was a loud THUNK; Schultz's eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he fell to the ground. Behind him, of course was
“
Jeeves!” I exclaimed in delight, “I say! I - I don’t know how to thank you enough, I…”
“No need to strain yourself, sir.” Jeeves casually discarded his saucepan to one side as I shifted around the mass of Schlutz toward him, “I took the liberty of waiting until you arrived to strike Herr Schultz, so there was no chance of him coming to on your return. Now, I feel,” he composed himself, “it is time to leave.”
“I...I suppose...London, you mean?” I asked, “As in leave London, now, when curfew is about to begin? When my privileges have just been revoked? Running a hearty risk, what?”
“If you will pardon me for saying, sir, the graver risk by far is remaining here with an incapacitated Waffen-SS officer.”
“Well, certainly.”
“And since your privilages have now been revoked and a warrant put out for your arrest over the Albert Memorial Incident, to stay in your established residence would be, if you would permit me to say, sir, a poor strategy.”
“Indeed. But how do we leave, Jeeves?”
“Well, sir, I have been contacted by the Vanguards of the Red Dawn, and they have agreed to stage an attack on the far side of Berkeley Square that will provide sufficient distraction to the units on patrol here that we can escape without detection should we secure a German armoured car, of which there are 4 in the immediate vicinity. I should say that on the intersection between Charles Street and Fitzmaurice Place is the one most likely to be discarded by its occupants should a firefight break out on the intersection with Bruton Street.”
I was taken aback by the thoroughness of Jeeves’ planning, and then again by the tenacity of the Vanguards. I remembered when they were nothing but an occasional nuisance to the urban scene, but now they had really come into their own to fight for their country and save...me.
“The attack is set to begin at any moment sir, I suggest we leave at once via the fire exit.”
“I...why are they doing this?”
“Sir?”
“The Vanguards, why do they want to help me? I mean, surely they see me as the problem! It was my tomfoolery that got us into this mess in the first place! I mean if it weren’t for me and the Brinkley Set, Churchill would’ve stayed put, the invasion wouldn’t have happened and they wouldn’t have to fight for their lives just to go for the freedom to stroll down Whitehall without being mowed down by maxim-gun fire!”
“
Machine-gun fire, sir, the Maxim gun has not been used for many years…”
“Well?” I asked.
Jeeves’ expression softened with an emotion I had never seen before, and have only seen once since, “They...they see you as their...
our only hope, sir.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You are one of the only men in Britain with political experience that is not under German heel, nor imprisoned for that fact.”
“I mean, if you’re talking about when I was Prime Minister for all of 6 minutes…”
“It all counts, sir.”
“Jeeves, I’ve never won an election! I never stood as an MP I was just...ennobled...for a few moments and then it was gone, Jeeves! Gone! The invasion came and went, my chums either signed up, got locked up or ran away, and I was just...left here. What do they expect me to do, lead an army?”
“We will never find out, sir, if we don’t move, immediately.”
There was a low
kroom from the street outside, then an assortment of yells in German, and then the clack-clack of machine-gun fire.
“Yes…” I gave the old flat a final once-over, “Well, there’s nothing else for it, is there? Let’s go, Jeeves. We’re going to the country for a bit. And then...then we're going to
save it.”
***
