P. G. Wodehouse: The Man Upstairs and Other Stories

9. ARCHIBALD'S BENEFIT (continued)

'I don't!' yelled Archibald. 'It doesn't! It doesn't do anything of the sort! You've made me another man!'

She stared, wild-eyed, astonished.

'What! Do you mean that you, too--'

'I should just say I do. I tell you I hate the beastly stuff. I only pretended to like it because I thought you did. The hours I've spent learning it up! I wonder I've not got brain fever.'

'Archie! Used you to read it up, too? Oh, if I'd only known!'

'And you forgive me--this morning, I mean?'

'Of course. You couldn't leave a golf tournament. By the way, how did you get on?'

Archibald coughed.

'Rather well,' he said modestly. 'Pretty decently. In fact, not badly. As a matter of fact, I won the championship.'

'The championship!' whispered Margaret. 'Of America?'

'Well, not absolutely of America,' said Archibald. 'But all the same, a championship.'

'My hero.'

'You won't be wanting me for a while, I guess?' said Stuyvesant nonchalantly. 'Think I'll smoke a cigarette on the porch.'

And sobs from the stairs told that Mrs Milsom was already on her way to her room.