seen Mrs. Spenser appear to greater advantage than at that moment, sir.”
“Exactly. Now follow me like a leopard. Observing my Aunt Agatha in her downfall; watching her turn bright mauve and listening to her being told off in liquid French by a whiskered hotel proprietor without coming back with so much as a single lift of the eyebrows, I felt as if the scales had fallen from my eyes. For the first time in my life, Jeeves, the awe with which this woman had inspired me from childhood’s days left me. It came back later, I’ll admit; but at the moment I saw my Aunt Agatha for what she was—not, as I had long imagined, a sort of man-eating fish at the very mention of whose name strong men quivered like aspens, but a poor goop who had just dropped a very serious brick. At that moment, Jeeves, I could have told her precisely where she got off; and only a too chivalrous regard for the sex kept me from doing so. You won’t dispute that?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, then, my firm conviction is that the scales will fall from Mr. Sipperley’s eyes when he sees this Waterbury, this old head master, stagger into his office covered from head to foot with flour.”
“Flour, sir?”
“Flour, Jeeves.”
“But why should he