The Girl on the Boat

Girl on the Boat, by Pelham
Grenville Wodehouse

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Title: The Girl on the Boat
Author: Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
Release Date: March 1, 2007 [EBook #20717]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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THE GIRL ON THE BOAT
BY

P. G. WODEHOUSE
HERBERT JENKINS LIMITED 3 YORK STREET LONDON S.W.1
[Illustration: A HERBERT JENKINS BOOK]
Tenth printing, completing 95,781 copies
Printed in Great Britain by Butler & Tanner Ltd., Frome and London

WHAT THIS STORY IS ABOUT
It was Sam Marlowe's fate to fall in love with a girl on the R.M.S.
"Atlantic" (New York to Southampton) who had ideals. She was
looking for a man just like Sir Galahad, and refused to be put off with
any inferior substitute. A lucky accident on the first day of the voyage
placed Sam for the moment in the Galahad class, but he could not stay
the pace.
He follows Billie Bennett "around," scheming, blundering and hoping,
so does the parrot faced young man Bream Mortimer, Sam's rival.
There is a somewhat hectic series of events at Windles, a country house
in Hampshire, where Billie's ideals still block the way and Sam comes
on in spite of everything.
Then comes the moment when Billie.... It is a Wodehouse novel in
every sense of the term.

ONE MOMENT!
Before my friend Mr. Jenkins--wait a minute, Herbert--before my
friend Mr. Jenkins formally throws this book open to the public, I
should like to say a few words. You, sir, and you, and you at the back,
if you will kindly restrain your impatience.... There is no need to jostle.
There will be copies for all. Thank you. I shall not detain you long.

I wish to clear myself of a possible charge of plagiarism. You smile.
Ah! but you don't know. You don't realise how careful even a splendid
fellow like myself has to be. You wouldn't have me go down to
posterity as Pelham the Pincher, would you? No! Very well, then. By
the time this volume is in the hands of the customers, everybody will,
of course, have read Mr. J. Storer Clouston's "The Lunatic at Large
Again." (Those who are chumps enough to miss it deserve no
consideration.) Well, both the hero of "The Lunatic" and my "Sam
Marlowe" try to get out of a tight corner by hiding in a suit of armour in
the hall of a country-house. Looks fishy, yes? And yet I call on Heaven
to witness that I am innocent, innocent. And, if the word of
Northumberland Avenue Wodehouse is not sufficient, let me point out
that this story and Mr. Clouston's appeared simultaneously in serial
form in their respective magazines. This proves, I think, that at these
cross-roads, at any rate, there has been no dirty work. All right, Herb.,
you can let 'em in now.
P. G. WODEHOUSE. Constitutional Club, Northumberland Avenue.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. A DISTURBING MORNING 11
II. GALLANT RESCUE BY WELL-DRESSED YOUNG MAN 27
III. SAM PAVES THE WAY 56
IV. SAM CLICKS 69
V. PERSECUTION OF EUSTACE 95
VI. SCENE AT A SHIP'S CONCERT 104
VII. SUNDERED HEARTS 111

VIII. SIR MALLABY OFFERS A SUGGESTION 126
IX. ROUGH WORK AT A DINNER TABLE 144
X. TROUBLE AT WINDLES 159
XI. MR. BENNETT HAS A BAD NIGHT 180
XII. THE LURID PAST OF JOHN PETERS 193
XIII. SHOCKS ALL ROUND 207
XIV. STRONG REMARKS BY A FATHER 217
XV. DRAMA AT A COUNTRY HOUSE 227
XVI. WEBSTER, FRIEND IN NEED 242
XVII. A CROWDED NIGHT 257

THE GIRL ON THE BOAT
CHAPTER I
A DISTURBING MORNING
Through the curtained windows of the furnished flat which Mrs.
Horace Hignett had rented for her stay in New York, rays of golden
sunlight peeped in like the foremost spies of some advancing army. It
was a fine summer morning. The hands of the Dutch clock in the hall
pointed to thirteen minutes past nine; those of the ormolu clock in the
sitting-room to eleven minutes past ten; those of the carriage clock on
the bookshelf to fourteen minutes to six. In other words, it was exactly
eight; and Mrs. Hignett acknowledged the fact by moving her head on
the pillow, opening her eyes, and sitting up in bed. She always woke at
eight precisely.

Was this Mrs. Hignett the Mrs. Hignett, the