P. G. Wodehouse: Uneasy Money

Chapter 16 (continued)

'She wants the advertisement, of course. I know it doesn't sound sensational--a lost monkey; but when it's a celebrity's lost monkey it makes a difference. Suppose King George had lost a monkey; wouldn't your London newspapers give it a good deal of space? Especially if it had thrown eggs at one of the ladies and bitten the Duke of Norfolk in the leg? That's what our visitor has been doing apparently. At least, he threw eggs at the scullery-maid and bit a millionaire. It's practically the same thing. At any rate, there it is. The newspaper men are here, and they seem to regard this farm as their centre of operations. I had the greatest difficulty in inducing them to go home to their well-earned dinners. They wanted to camp out on the place. As it is, there may still be some of them round, hiding in the grass with notebooks, and telling one another in whispers that they were the men who really solved the murder mystery. What shall we do?'

Bill had no suggestions.

'You realize our position? I wonder if we could be arrested for kidnapping. The monkey is far more human than most of the millionaire children who get kidnapped. It's an awful fix. Did you know that Lady Wetherby is going to offer a reward for the animal?'

'No, really?'

'Five hundred dollars!'

'Surely not!'

'She is. I suppose she feels she can charge it up to necessary expenses for publicity and still be ahead of the game, taking into account the advertising she's going to get.'

'She said nothing about that when I saw her.'

'No, because it won't be offered until to-morrow or the day after. One of the newspaper men told me that. The idea is, of course, to make the thing exciting just when it would otherwise be dying as a news item. Cumulative interest. It's a good scheme, too, but it makes it very awkward for me. I don't want to be in the position of keeping a monkey locked up with the idea of waiting until somebody starts a bull market in monkeys. I consider that that sort of thing would stain the spotless escutcheon of the Boyds. It would be a low trick for that old-established family to play. Not but what poor, dear Nutty would do it like a shot,' she concluded meditatively.