A Damsel in Distress

A Damsel in Distress

Project Gutenberg's A Damsel in Distress, by Pelham Grenville
Wodehouse #3 in our series by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
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Title: A Damsel in Distress
Author: Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
Release Date: June, 2000 [EBook #2233] [This file was last updated on
March 28, 2002]

Edition: 11
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A DAMSEL
IN DISTRESS ***

Etext scanned by Jim Tinsley

[Transcriber's Note for edition 11: in para. 4 of Chapter 19, the word
"leafy" has been changed to "leaky". "leafy" was the word used in the
printed edition, but was an obvious misprint. Some readers have noted
that other editions have slightly different punctuation, notably some
extra commas, and semi-colons where there are colons in this edition;
but the punctuation herein does follow at least one printed text.--jt]

A DAMSEL IN DISTRESS
by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
CHAPTER 1.
Inasmuch as the scene of this story is that historic pile, Belpher Castle,
in the county of Hampshire, it would be an agreeable task to open it
with a leisurely description of the place, followed by some notes on the
history of the Earls of Marshmoreton, who have owned it since the
fifteenth century. Unfortunately, in these days of rush and hurry, a
novelist works at a disadvantage. He must leap into the middle of his
tale with as little delay as he would employ in boarding a moving
tramcar. He must get off the mark with the smooth swiftness of a
jack-rabbit surprised while lunching. Otherwise, people throw him
aside and go out to picture palaces.

I may briefly remark that the present Lord Marshmoreton is a widower
of some forty-eight years: that he has two children--a son, Percy
Wilbraham Marsh, Lord Belpher, who is on the brink of his
twenty-first birthday, and a daughter, Lady Patricia Maud Marsh, who
is just twenty: that the chatelaine of the castle is Lady Caroline Byng,
Lord Marshmoreton's sister, who married the very wealthy colliery
owner, Clifford Byng, a few years before his death (which unkind
people say she hastened): and that she has a step-son, Reginald. Give
me time to mention these few facts and I am done. On the glorious past
of the Marshmoretons I will not even touch.
Luckily, the loss to literature is not irreparable. Lord Marshmoreton
himself is engaged upon a history of the family, which will doubtless
be on every bookshelf as soon as his lordship gets it finished. And, as
for the castle and its surroundings, including the model dairy and the
amber drawing-room, you may see them for yourself any Thursday,
when Belpher is thrown open to the public on payment of a fee of one
shilling a head. The money is collected by Keggs the butler, and goes
to a worthy local charity. At least, that is the idea. But the voice of
calumny is never silent, and there exists a school of thought, headed by
Albert, the page-boy, which holds that Keggs sticks to these shillings
like glue, and adds them to his already considerable savings in the
Farmers' and Merchants' Bank, on the left side of the High Street in
Belpher village, next door to the Oddfellows' Hall.
With regard to this, one can only say that Keggs looks far too much
like a particularly saintly bishop to indulge in any such practices. On
the other hand, Albert knows Keggs. We must leave the matter open.
Of course, appearances are deceptive. Anyone, for instance, who had
been standing outside the front entrance of the castle at eleven o'clock
on a certain June morning might easily have made a mistake. Such a
person would probably have jumped to the conclusion that the
middle-aged lady of a determined cast of countenance who was
standing near the rose-garden, talking to the gardener and watching the
young couple strolling on the terrace below, was the mother of the
pretty girl,