Chapter 8

Gun. Gun, gun-gun gun. He had been in some rum sitches heretofore, but being married and murdered in the space of a night seemed a little rummier than the usual fare. Isby looked… loony. She looked absolutely bonkers, barmy, and barking. The gun might have cast her expresh in a worse light than it would have been in some other con… not contest, that other word, context, but even without the context there was this sort of wild twitchiness. True, there was the possibility that was the just the way of things when you position your new spouse between the crosshairs. It was bound to be a bit thick for the person with the digit on the trigger too, with that kind of decision imminent. Jeeves had read some book with that sort of plot once, by some Russian fellow. At least that was what Jeeves had said it was about—Bertie was fond of novels with murders in them so he had picked it up, but he had to put it back down pretty soon because he couldn’t keep the names straight (1).

But all of that was neither here nor that other place, as Isby was still waving a gun at them.

“Bollocks,” said Eddie.

“Yes, Edmund?”

“This is your cunning plan?”

“Well, yes. What do you think?”

“Bollocks, Isby.”

“Eddie. Who’s got the gun?” She waggled it at him.

“In that case… it’s as subtle and nuanced as a ballet.” He paused. “A ballet danced by a mad elephant that got kicked out of the pachyderm ballet corps for stepping on people’s toes and who’s spent the ten years since then sitting around eating ice cream.”

“Oh, Edmund… you know I don’t want to riddle you with bullet holes, don’t you?”

“As I would prefer not to be riddled. What say you, shall we run off together and spend Wooster’s money like wastrel kings?”

“Mm… no. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll let you go now so I can take you out for dinner and a good shag some time.”

He blinked. “… Yes, alright.” And then he biffed off.

That was a bit rummy. More than a bit, really. Usually Bertie was pleased when one of the girls with her sights on him sighted another sight for sighting, but he was married to this one, so the circs were rather altered. There was something a bit off, also, about her killing her new husband and letting Eddie go. Perhaps Jeeves was right about him after all, then. Yes, in retrospect it did seem rather obvious.

Well, save that for later. If there was going to be a later. Ah, but that was the rub, wasn’t it, that sort of question of laterness. Later was suddenly in an unusual amount of doubt. That was a rum thought. As an experiment, he thought about tomorrow. Tomorrow, tomorrow… nice thing. Time when the sun came around again, woke the people up to their daily toil or daily loafing, depending on who they were, held up all sorts of possibilities up in front of them, or sort of up in front of them behind a bit of a curtain, because it never really was clear what those possibilities were, except to Jeeves, probably. But the point was, the fact of those possibilities existing for him at all was coming into serious question, and he wasn’t sure what to make of it. He’d never really thought about not having tomorrow. About no more freedom, sure. Every time the dark knell of the wedding bells got too close, as a matter of fact. About no more youth, well, once or twice. But not seeing the sun rise tomorrow… well, he hadn’t really seen the sun rise… ever, as a matter of fact, except a few times when he had stayed out that late. But that wasn’t the point. There was this real possibility that the trusty Wooster heart might be counting down on it’s beats, and the Wooster brain might be thinking the last thoughts it was going to think. And it might not be a much-valued brain by the standards of some people, but he was rather attached to it and didn’t much like the thought of small bits of lead penetrating it at a substantial velocity, and the Wooster thoughts never being thought again. He did not like it at all.

He heard a small sigh on his left, and he turned and saw Baldrick staring at the ground and he remembered that he wasn’t alone in this goggling up at the great unknown teetering on the brink. “Are you alright?” he whispered. Baldrick looked up and made a thing that was sort of like a smile, which was quite an accomplishment under the c.

“So here we are at the much-fabled It, I suppose,” said Bertie, by way of conversation. “It seems like there’s something that’s supposed to be done at a time like this, but dashed if I can think of it. Figures the one chance to do it…” His voice caught and he gulped it down.

“He’ll come back for us, Mr. Wooster.”

“Eddie? You really think so? I mean, I suppose you’ve known him longer…” They didn’t either of them seem all that chuffed by the thought. Mostly because, after all, it wasn’t bally likely.

Well, so this was It, then.

And then it sort of happened rather rapidly. Eddie was back, saying something, Baldrick’s start of surprise was palpable from a foot away while not looking at him (Perhaps it shook the air around him in some manner? It seemed possible, at any rate. Or maybe the world has these blips where exclamation points become corpor… corpor… that word, sometimes. Either way, the space to Bertie’s left had pulsed with sudden shock.)

And then Bertie wasn’t married any more, according to Eddie anyway, and his sureness that he didn’t want to die multiplied from its previously hefty presence to near-immeasurable proportions. And then there was a gunshot that didn’t happen, and a stabbing that did, and Eddie looked surprised and then fell onto the ground, and Bertie ran up and dragged Isby away, and tried to control the hand waving the knife.

“Now, Isby, (oof!) I’m very sorry, but (agh!) I really have to tie you up. If you were a (oof!) man we could just knock you out, but we have to be chivalrous in this sort of thing, so (oof!) you’ve got to (ack!) be tied up. It’s no use biting me, you know. No, nor stabbing me! Ouch. Dash it, Isby…”

And then the knife was plucked out of her hand, and a voice at Bertie’s elbow said, “I think we may dispense with this, do you not agree, sir?”

“Jeeves!” Bertie stumbled slightly, fell, and ended up sitting on Isby, which, under the c. was for the best.

“Excuse my tardiness, sir, there was some perplexity on the subject of your destination. I did manage to unload the gun while her coat was in the cloakroom, but I am afraid she must have obtained the knife at a later time.”

“Say it not, Jeeves! It was the absolute bud-nipping nick on the nose of time in tip-top form. Like one of those Deuced Ex (2) thingies from the old plays. Really Jeeves, absolutely remarkable.”

Jeeves began to tie Isby’s wrists together. Bertie got up and stretched a bit, and contemplated the fact of not dying. Corking feeling, that. He heard a sort of thunking sound, and turned back to Jeeves. Isby was lying unconscious and Jeeves was putting a stone back in its place before resuming his tying.

“Jeeves! Did you biff a woman over the head with a rock?”

“She endeavored to bite me, sir.”

“Jeeves!”

“I think sir, you will find it was self-defense.”

“Hah! So you think she’s got uncommonly sharp nippers too. I thought as much! Bally mongoose…” He rubbed his ear.

“Sir?”

“Nothing, Jeeves, nothing. Alright, I accept your extenuating c’s. Just be sure not to make a habit of it, you know. Biffing people over the head with rocks is a slippery slope. Over time, and all that—bigger and bigger stones, until you commence chucking bally boulders on passersby. There was this former member of the drones, Puffy, I think his name was…” (3)

“Thank you, sir. I will keep it in mind. Are you very much hurt, sir?”

“Let me see… no, barely drew blood. Fortuitous, that. We had better check on Eddie though.” Baldrick shifted to the side to make room beside his master and looked anxious. Jeeves knelt down next to the prone figure.

“Unfortunately, sir… I think he will recover fully.”

“Now Jeeves, don’t be like that. Eddie was almost a chum of mine. Once. Maybe.”

“I was not, sir, and he was not. Have you any brandy on you?”

“Yes, here. Oh, all right, I suppose I can see a bit of your point, but you must admit, he did come back. Just like Baldrick said he would, in fact.” Baldrick looked down as if ashamed for some reason. Jeeves mopped at the unconscious man’s shoulder and the part of the handkerchief that had touched him came up shiny and black in the gloom. Bertie gulped.

“Might I trouble you for your handkerchief, sir? Mine is proving insufficient.”

“Yes, yes, of course.” Bertie knelt down by the other two and pulled out his handkerchief. “I do… what? Hold it here and press down, right?”

“Yes, sir.”

Jeeves began the process of wetting the man’s lips with brandy. It was all a bit grim, so Bertie made conversation. “How did you find us, anyway?”

“I’m afraid there was more luck involved than I would have desired, sir. The particulars with which Mr. Baldrick supplied me were ill-informed, but after retracing my steps back to the party, a waiter directed me in a more satisfactory direction.” Baldrick looked up quickly. “I suspect, however, that the discrepancy owes more to Mr. Blackadder than to Mr. Baldrick.”

“It’s bally queer, that—the diabolical plotting I mean. I don’t know how you could have seen it coming. Perhaps if we started out friends on a different foot, as it were…”

“I think not, sir.”

“Well, yes, I suppose not. He did try, though. Is he alright?” Eddie—Blackadder—sputtered a little and blinked up at them. There were three bending over him, but he focused on only one.

“Baldrick. You odiferous bastard.” Bertie jumped a little at the level of—what was it? invective, but neither of the others seemed surprised. Had he been missing that… venomous snakiness all this time? Was that what Jeeves had meant?

“If I might be permitted to interject, Mr. Blackadder, I believe that with some reflection you would find that Mr. Baldrick has behaved more generously to you than you deserve and that it is only through his intervention that I will not now send you to prison along with your murderous accomplice.”

“So rather than prison with my dignity intact, I am to roam free out of the benevolence of three nitwits. Oh, good.”

“We are not nitwits, Blackadder,” said Bertie, nettled. “At least, Jeeves isn’t.”

“Nor precisely will you roam free, Mr. Blackadder. I have taken the liberty of purchasing a one-way ticket to Rhodesia. If you will confine your compass to the lands of colonial opportunity, you may remain a free man as far as I am concerned. Mr. Wooster’s redirected funds have been directed back, and so, for Mr. Baldrick’s sake I am willing to take the view that no harm has been done. Set foot in England again, however, Mr. Blackadder, and you will be hunted down. I will see to it.”

“Mr—Mr. Jeeves?”

“Yes, Mr. Baldrick?”

“You said a ticket, I thought… I mean… I am going with him.”

Blackadder snarled. Baldrick winced.

“I say, Baldrick, you don’t have to, you know.”

If Jeeves had been the sighing sort, he would have heaved an s. “There is a ticket for you as well, Mr. Baldrick, if you wish it.”

Baldrick looked down at Blackadder, who had struggled into a slumped sitting posish and continued to glare up at him. “Thank you, Mr. Jeeves.” Bertie found himself rather wishing that kicking Blackadder might have been a little less unsporting at that particular moment.

“In that case, sirs, we will bring you to the dock and take our leaves of you tonight.”

Blackadder straightened himself up as best he could and raised his eyebrows with a sneering twist to his mouth. Except for the sneer part, it was a right decent impression of Jeeves. “‘You cannot, sir, take from me anything that I would more willingly part withal.’” He paused and considered a moment, and the aloof look sloughed off into that chilly, snaky snarl again. “Except Baldrick” (4).

Bertie goggled a moment, then found his voice, a few decibels higher than where he usually left it. “Dash it all, Blackadder, Baldrick’s the only person with the bally wherewithal to be decent to you, and the only bally friend you’ve got, so just… biff off.”

Blackadder rolled his eyes. “Good God, you can’t even curse properly.”

Jeeves turned away towards the path. “I think, sir, that we might bring our other prisoner to the police and leave Messrs. Blackadder and Baldrick for a short time while we send another person to collect them and bear them to the docks. I think the wait will not do Mr. Blackadder any lasting harm, and neither will it allow him to get far in his condition, and I think I have had a sufficient measure of his company to suffice for me for some time.”

“Yes, if you think it would be alright, Jeeves… it seems rotten luck to you, though, Balders.”

“I will miss you, sir.”

“Yes, absolutely.” Bertie stiffened his upper lip, as it were. “But if you ever happen to be in the neighborhood Balders… without old Blackie, that is…”

“Of course, Mr. Wooster.”

There were some heartfelt handshakes and a few swallowed sniffles, and then Jeeves slung Isby’s limp form over his shoulder and Bertie followed him back up the path. He looked back once at the turn of the track, and could just make out through the gloom that Baldrick had knelt down again beside his master and Blackadder had slumped back against his servant’s shoulder. Odd, that, Bertie thought. Then he hurried after Jeeves.

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“Jeeves,” Bertie said, watching the night whiz by, “you wouldn’t ever be caught in that rum sitch Balders was in, would you? Being wedged with a… person like Blackie, and feeling obliged to cart off after him whenever he got deported?”

“I would have chosen my employer better, sir. But having done, so, I certainly would have followed him as Mr. Baldrick has chosen to do.”

They watched the night whiz by in silence.

The End

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(1) That would be Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment.

(2) The origin of the phrase “Deus ex Machina”, literally “God from the Machine,” is the tradition of ancient Greek plays of getting everything into inextricably screwy circumstances and then have a god plumped down into the middle of it by a sort of crane thing (the “machine”), to clear everything up. Nowadays, of course, it refers to plots where someone or something shows up out of the blue and makes everything right instead of letting the ending come of its own accord. It’s a bit of an insult, plot-wise.

(3) No, I have no idea what he’s talking about, I completely made that up.

(4) (Hamlet, )