Title: Only you -or- Jeeves and the Unwitting Declaration
Author: godsdaisiechain
Fandom: Jeeves and Wooster
Type: Fic
Characters/Pairing: Jeeves, Bertie, Aunt Dahlia, Madeleine Bassett, Roderick Spode, Seppings, Cedric the dead chipmunk
Challenges: Sleepless, One Night Only
Word Count: ~3000
Rating: PG
Summary: Aunt Dahlia advises Bertie to get a crush out of his system.  Little does she realize what rannygazoo will be unleashed.  Alternating Bertie/Jeeves POVs


Bertie

“You’ve been moping about the place like a basset hound with a toothache, Bertie,” the aged r. bellowed as if the last of the Woosters were haring across the downs in hot pursuit of a fox rather than lounging on a doleful chaise. “I can’t have it, you foul excrescence.  If Anatole even catches a whiff of this, he’ll think it’s because of his food and, he’ll be off again.”

“Please don’t say that name,” Bertram moaned like a man who was engaged, yet again, to La Bassett, after thinking that he had managed to fob off the seer of God’s daisy chain in twinkling heavens onto an unsuspecting Fink-Nottle.  Not even Anatole’s timbales de ris du veau Touslousianne was enough to buoy the spirits, which slumped about the environs like a limp biscuit in the spilled milk.

“What name, you foul, moping blot?  Anatole?” Tea things came into violent contact with one another, rather like the chaps on boat race night jockeying to pinch the helmets of unsuspecting policemen.  “Since when do you do anything except dote on Anatole’s cuisine?”

“Bassett,” quoth self, shifting slightly to alleviate the pressure exerted on the willowy frame by a mercilessly firm bolster whose consistency bore an uncomfortable resemblance to the unhappy sausages of youth.   “Give me Anatole or give me death, but do not give me Bassett.”

“Bassett, Bassett, Bassett, Bassett, Bassett!!” cried Aunt Dahlia, the tea things dancing a can-can on the tray in front of her.  “You seem to be unaware of your great good fortune in attaching a one-girl beauty chorus.  Sweet-tempered and rather fond of you.” She handed the nephew a steaming cup of Darjeeling with the air of a woman who has just realized that the cat had got in amongst the whatsits. “Good point, Bertie.  If she’s fond of you, perhaps her brains are a bit addled.”

“The heart wants what the thimgummy what-have-you,” I riposted, just as the blight Bassett wafted into the room, lisping in her dreamy just-seen-a-fairy-that-was-in-fact-a-mouse voice.

“I’m terribly sorry to be late, Mrs. Travers.  I’ll pour if you like.”

“Thank you, dear,” said the aged r.

“I was so terribly distracted by the most darling little fairy creature out in the garden. All brown and furry and so terribly still. I’ve named him Cedric.”

The Wooster bean reeled. After fifteen minutes of rough going, it appeared that La Bassett had befriended a dead chipmunk recently decapitated by one of Aunt D’s hunters.  Of course, no one save Bertram seemed to find anything amiss with this tomfoolery.

“Bertie, dear, “ said Aunt Dahlia and the intestines froze.  That tone bode no good.  “Why don’t you and Madeleine go find poor Cedric and restore him to his fairy house?”

“I’d be delighted, of course,” self stammered, while the old onion, already harrowed from the earlier fray, cast about for aid and succotash.

The Jeeves-ex-machina intervened.  “Roderick Spode, Earl of Sidcup,” he intoned, and none other than Roderick Spode came charging into the room behind a veritable Everest of flowers and a colossal box of chocolates, evidently eager to move in now that the last suitor left a void.

“Little Madeline,” he began.

Wooster missed the rest of the fluffy exchange as Jeeves took the slender elbow.  “You have received a phone call, sir.  Mr. Fungy-Phipps has been faced with an urgent business matter relating to your committee work.  Shall I collect a message or would you prefer to take the call in the lower hallway?”

“I’ll follow you, Jeeves,” I said.

“No you won’t,” said the aged r.  “Even you can find a telephone on your own.  I have to speak with Jeeves.”

“Certainly, madam,” said Jeeves.


Jeeves

Mrs. Travers had summoned my master and myself to Brinkley Court because of one of those little contretemps that so often clouded the atmosphere in her crowded household and social circle.   I had passed an agreeable few days making book on my young master’s engagement prospects and the number of dead animals Miss Bassett would mistake for fairies. The introduction of a headless chipmunk, now bestowed with the cognomen “Cedric,” had afforded over an hour of innocent amusement to myself, the underbutler and the several assistant gardeners while Miss Bassett engaged in social intercourse with it, well recompensing us for the many hours of preparation and betting beforehand and the discussion afterwards.  Seppings paid handsomely, as my interventions kept the household staff occupied and out of trouble, and the distraction was welcome to me as well, for I had been experiencing a series of emotions that sorely tried my resource and tact.

“Jeeves,” Mrs. Travers said in her usual stentorian tones, “I need your help.  I lost another housemaid to that dratted Bassett at cards and only you can get her back.”

Resource and tact are my stock in trade and it took all my considerable stores of the latter not to sigh.  Mrs. Travers was all too apt to gamble with the lives of her servants.  “Might I be so bold as to ask which housemaid, madam?”

“Alice,” she said.  My heart sank as I had, only recently, extricated myself from a romantic understanding with the young person in question.  “She’s in love with you and will do whatever you like.”

“I fear, madam, that our relations have not remained as uniformly cordial as one might desire in the current circumstances.”

Mrs. Travers nostrils flared and her visage pinkened deeply.  A less scrupulous narrator would have described her as scarlet and mentioned the spittle that flew from her lips, liberally bedewing her ledger. “Don’t tell me.  You threw her over for that maid of Madeleine Bassett’s. Agnes. The one the looks like a sylph, constantly wafting about the place in those filmy dresses. The staff have been mooning over her for weeks.”

It took some effort to tamp down my alarm at the mere notion that such a person could become attached to me.  Agnes, while an attractive girl in her way, was far too whimsical for my tastes.  “Oh no, madam!  Agnes is engaged to the underbutler at Totleigh Towers.  Alice has formed an attachment to Roger, the younger son of one of the local publicans near her new situation.”

“Surely you can break it up, Jeeves.  Her replacement is a nuisance and a pest.”

I sighed inwardly yet again.  Mrs. Travers was neither kind nor particularly generous to those of my class in general, and it was imperative to remain in her good graces. “If you will allow me, Mrs. Travers.  I believe that the young person in question was Roger’s former fiancée and worked with him in the public house.  You may be able to secure her a position in the village here by employing Mr. Green’s daughter Bessie, a most responsible and quiet young person.”

Mrs. Travers, unlike her nephew, had been blessed with a great deal of mental acuity and instantly understood my suggestion. “That doughy girl at the pub?  Will she fit the uniform?”

“Madam, some things are worth the expenditure of a few pounds. However, you could effect a trade, perhaps, for one of the slimmer kitchen maids. Bessie is an excellent home cook and could relieve Anatole by cooking the staff meals.”

Mrs. Travers let loose a string of expletives. “You are the feline’s nightwear, Jeeves. If only that damned butler of mine could give such good advice.”  I forbore to point out that Mr. Seppings had, in fact, been the source of my intelligence, as we had been splitting Mrs. Travers’s generous tips for some years.


Bertie

The aged r. gripped the slender elbow in a clawlike, er, grip or hold or similar in the half hour just before we tied on the old feedbag to mangle of Anatole’s choice viands.  We stood at the window to her study, watching Spode attempt to coax or cajole a lifeless chipmunk to join La Bassett’s fairy kingdom.

“Bertie, I have determined the root cause of your troubles with Madeline.”

“Yes, aged r.  The girl is dotty, but she appears well pleased with her conquest.”

“Yes.  You.  She told Roderick this morning that, while she understood your limitations as an intellectual,” here the nephew sputtered indignantly, “she could not abandon to you a loveless life.”

“What blithering rot,” I said.

The aged r. tightened her grip.  “As I said, foul blot, I have determined the root cause of your troubles.”

“You have been speaking with Jeeves.”

“But even he did not suspect, Bertie.”  The very humerus indented.  “Bertie, you are in love with another.”

“Applesauce.”

“Truth.”

“Unmitigated pommes whatchmacallit, aged r.  I had not thought your mental powers would wane for some decades, but once again Wooster W. is proven incorrect, and not a moment too soon.”

“Bertie, you love another.  And it must be someone unsuitable or you would have brought her around rather than getting engaged to Madeleine again.  There’s only one solution.  You must spend one night of passion with her.  One night only.”

“I am not sure Madeleine would consent to any type of passion.  It might frighten the fairies, what?”

“Not Madeleine, fool, the girl you really love.  I’ve told Jeeves everything.  He’s on the case.”

The intestines fossilized in the willowy corpus.   Jeeves, stellar as were his gifts and many the times he had valiantly scooped the young master from the weltering bisque, was precisely the wrong person to help in the current sitch.

Jeeves

Mrs. Travers’ intelligence regarding my master was most unwelcome.  It seemed that she suspected him of an attachment that interfered with his ability to marry Miss Madeleine Bassett, a most unsuitably silly young woman for a man of Mr. Wooster’s description.  Not only did I have no wish to leave the service of such a kind, generous man, one with a heart of gold, but my own heart misgave me at the thought that he loved and I knew nothing of it.  My own emotional situation, for I had made the most unwelcome discovery that I was, in fact, enamored of Mr. Wooster myself, required every shred of my resources to appear unaffected by this communication.

After a sleepless night, we left Brinkley Court the afternoon. I sent the baggage by train and rode with Mr. Wooster in the two-seater.

We left the village behind us without uttering a word, and following some minutes further silence, I began, “Sir, Mrs. Travers has informed me…”

I had never seen my master so angry or upset. “None of that blithering rot, Jeeves.”  His voice shook in a manner I had never before had the displeasure to experience.

“Yes, sir,” I hoped my own voice was not similarly unsteady.

“I mean it.  It must cease and desist in sickness and health from this moment forward and etcetera.”  The two-seater swerved sickeningly.

“Yes, sir.” We rode a few minutes in uneasy quiet, preoccupied with our various thoughts.  I was too distressed even to consider the possibility that Mr. Wooster’s thoughts were less sophisticated than my own. After some minutes more, my cogitations produced a desired result.

“If I may take the liberty, sir, I do have an idea that may suit your preferences in this matter.”

“Does it involve one night of passion, Jeeves?”

“No sir.”  In this I was somewhat disingenuous because I intended many more nights than one.  However, Mr. Wooster had always been very forgiving of my slight misrepresentations in the past and I had no reason to suspect this case would be any different.

“Then proceed.”

Bertie

Wooster B. had hoved into one of those roadside pubs scattered about the roads between the metrop. and the country seats of one’s aged relations that usually just seemed to be there to liven up the scenery.  Jeeves and self had scurried inside and formed a quorum at one of the tables in order to partake of fortifying libations after the bombshell had burst upon the two-seater.

“You mean  to say, Jeeves, that I should merely pretend that the night of passion occurred?”

“Yes, sir,” said Jeeves, sipping his lager like one who has nearly surfeited on fish and needs to refresh an overfed brain.  “Mrs. Travers is unlikely to require details on so delicate a matter.”

This took some time to penetrate the bean.

“You mean a delicate matter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Being a matter that is delicate?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And the aged r. would not inquire because of the delicate matter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Poppycock, Jeeves.  The woman has no compunction, if that is the word I want.”

“It is, sir. The very word.  Sir, if I may take a liberty.  In most matters, you are no doubt correct; however, Mrs. Travers is unlikely to take an interest in anything except the effects of this particular intervention.”

“The intervention being the delicate matter?”

“As you say, sir.”

“And how, Jeeves, is this supposed to be whatsitted?”

“Please forgive me, sir, but Mrs. Travers is quite convinced that you are indeed infatuated with someone.” A pint glass slipped from the slender paw and into the firmer Jeevesian palm before being placed on a beer mat.

“Utter tosh Jeeves,”  the pipes quavered alarmingly.  I rose and biffed toward the safety of the two-seater before Jeeves could utter another word.”  He bounded into his seat just as the thing began to move.  Nothing more was said until we passed the boundaries of the metropolis and Jeeves took the wheel to negotiate the trickier bits.

“Sir, I do apologize,” he said, the voice fluttering the slightest bit at the edges.  “It was not my intention to discomfit you.”  He looked positively green.

Wooster B wrestled the largyngeal region into working trim in the manner of D’Arcy Cheesewright vanquishing a Cambridge opponent.  “Piffle.  She is driveling.  Just driveling.” Jeeves sprang back as though an ocean liner had been levered up off his broad, strapping shoulders, as evidenced by his sitting up slightly straighter. “As if Wooster B is not aware of the working of his own manly breast.”

“I apologize again, sir.”

“No need, Jeeves, you are marvelous and handsome as usual. Quite the usual toothsome and lovable self, master of the young master’s heart and all that, what?”

Had he not been seated, the whatever-number of the Jeeveses would have collapsed on the spot, he was that poleaxed.  “Sir?” he inquired, in a small, humble voice quite unlike his usual professional tone.

Blast.  There’s the pixies out among the burned cats.


Jeeves

Mr. Wooster appeared extremely distressed by his most welcome declaration that I was the keeper of his precious heart, but he alighted from the car and ran inside before I could say anything further.  I asked Mr. Jarvis to park the car, a request he agreed to quite cheerfully, and ran up the back stairs before Mr. Wooster had managed to extricate his whangee from the cage outside the elevator.  I opened the door while he fumbled for his latchkey.

“Would you care for some tea, sir?”

“A whiskey and soda, Jeeves,” he said.  “With no soda.”

“Very good, sir.”

I gave him the desired beverage.  “Will you dine in or out, sir?” Mr. Wooster dropped the empty glass onto the carpet.

“Oh, out, certainly,” he said, twisting a handkerchief in his fingers.  “Yes, certainly.  Most handsome, indeed, and all that.”  Mr. Wooster flushed scarlet and dropped his handkerchief.

“I’ll run a bath, sir,” I said retrieving the glass and affecting not to hear.  I hoped my voice was steady enough to mask the thudding of my heart.  I set down the tray so that the class would not rattle.

“No, Jeeves, in.   These clothes are fine.”

I have said before that one must break one’s employer like a horse.  And in training horses, one must sometimes give them their head.  This was not one of those instances.  Although I was most gratified by Mr. Wooster’s appreciation, still as his valet, I was required to uphold certain standards.

“Sir?” I allowed the tiniest tone of displeasure to tinge my question, but Mr. Wooster was far too upset to hear it.

“Yes, Jeeves, just fine,” he stammered, absently, in nothing like the tone of defiant self-righteousness that marked his usual sartorial rebellions, still flushing pinkly. He accepted a second glass of whisky.  “Quite the handsome, loveable, whatsit.”

“Sir, you may be somewhat fatigued after the rigors of your trip.  A bath and a change of clothing will refresh you.” He was muttering, “just fine” to himself at intervals, which I took for consent.

By the time Mr. Wooster had bathed and dressed, I had prepared a suitable meal from the small hamper of goods Mr. Seppings had given me on leaving Brinkley Court and determined a course of action.

Bertie

Wooster ankled into a grim dining chamber, dreading the inevitable bowl of dust and plate of ashes that would form his evening meal.  If only the old cranium had somehow prevented the ruby lips from divulging, if that is the proper word, the contents of the Wooster heart.  Or at least the W. lust, as even the mentally negligible y.m. well knew that he knew not what was a Jeeves that knew what he knew not whether he knew well, or not, or what-have-you.

An absence of place setting drew the cerulean eye.  “Jeeves,” demanded the master of the abode, passing through to the kitchen where was spread a rather topping-looking repast.  Choice cheeses and breads, some type of ambrosial pate produced by the godlike hand of Anatole himself, consommé, and fine vintages.  The wrath of the W’s was about to erupt at this whatsit of the first water—serving himself and a guest rather than the thingummy.  Before any rannygazoo could spew about the place like a Vesuvius in up-to-the-minute tailoring, Jeeves shimmered into view looking rather rakishly handsome and chiseled even for him.

I had half a mind to tick him off soundly for his lapse, but the traitorous tongue went its own way as it so often is wont to do in times of stress. “The Jeevesian coiffure is somewhat less something or other.”

“Yes, sir,” he said sheepishly, pinkening most charmingly about the ears.  “I took the liberty of dressing for a casual repast.”  And so he had, again most charmingly, it seemed to Wooster.  The broad manly shoulders seemed broader and more shoulderesque, and the rest of the corpus seemed somehow more toothsome, in a way that should not have been possible, as Jeeves is a looker of the first water under ordinary circs.

A sort of gargle escaped Bertram at this juncture, followed by the following piece of drivel, to wit: “Very handsome.”

A species of smile flashed momentarily on his lemon and his ears went a shade pinker. “Thank you, sir.”

We stood a moment, gaping like bowl-less goldfish.  “What is all this manner of whatsit or thingummy, or whatchamacallit?”

“I took the liberty of…” Jeeves began and his voice cracked.  “I apologize, “ he croaked. “You see, sir, I have long been experiencing a feeling rather warmer than that of ordinary friendship….” He turned the color of a ripe tomato and trailed off before mustering his mental, er, thing.  “Sir, I hoped we could, if it is not displeasing to you, after your declaration….”

“Oh, ah,” said the y. m., collapsing into a chair like a scalded chicken in a handbasket.  “The one night?”

“No sir!” Jeeves somehow grappled with himself and started again.  “It is a feeling more enduring than… I fear….”  He paused again.

“You may as well sit and mangle of viands.”  Jeeves sat.

“I haven’t any appetite, sir,”  he said finally, with the air of a chastened schoolboy.

“No,” I agreed, and watched while he stowed everything into place, which took approximately 72 seconds by the clock.    It was long enough for Wooster to rise and go to him.  He turned and the e.’s flew wide in surprise.

“Sir?”  I reached out with trembling fingers and stroked his hair away from his face.

“You are not toying with the master of the abode?”

Tears welled up in his e.s.  “No, sir,” he whispered.

“You have done this sort of thing before?”

“No, sir,” he said.  “It is not usual for me.  I do not like men in that way, you see.  Only you.”

I leaned in and brushed the lips against his, setting off a series of fireworks about the center of the home. We came up for breath.

“Only you,” he whispered again.