Этот неподражаемый Дживс! / The Inimitable Jeeves

So I didn’t worry about Bingo. Or about anything else, as a matter of fact. Life was wonderful. Everything seemed to be going right. Even three horses on which I’d invested a sizeable amount won instead of sitting down to rest in the middle of the race, as horses usually do when I’ve got money on them.

Added to this, the weather was excellent; Jeeves liked my new socks; and my Aunt Agatha had gone to France for at least six weeks. And, if you knew my Aunt Agatha, you’d agree that that alone was happiness enough for anyone.

One morning while I was having my bath, I began to sing like a bally nightingale. It seemed to me that everything was absolutely for the best in the best of all possible worlds.

But have you ever noticed a strange thing about life? When I dried myself and came into the sittingroom, I saw a letter from Aunt Agatha on the mantelpiece.

“Oh God!” I said when I’d read it.

“Sir?” said Jeeves.

“It’s from my Aunt Agatha, Jeeves. Mrs Gregson[45 - Gregson – Грегсон], you know.

”

“Yes, sir?”

“Ah, you wouldn’t speak in that careless tone if you knew what was in it,” I said with a hollow laugh. “The curse has come upon us, Jeeves. She wants me to go and join her at—what’s the name of the dashed place?—at Roville-sur-mer[46 - Roville-sur-mer – Ровиль-сюр-Мер]. Oh, damn it!”

“Packing, sir?”

“I suppose so.”

To people who don’t know my Aunt Agatha I find it extraordinarily difficult to explain why it I am afraid of her.

I mean, I’m not dependent on her financially or anything like that. It’s simply personality. You see, all through my childhood and when I was a kid at school she was always able to turn me inside out[47 - to turn me inside out – вывернуть меня наизнанку] with a single glance. If she said I had go to Roville, it was all decided. I must buy the tickets.

“What’s the idea, Jeeves? I wonder why she wants me.”

“I could not say, sir.

”

Well, it was no good talking about it. I must go to Roville. At last I will able to wear my cummerbund I had bought six months ago. One of those silk contrivances, you know, which you tie round your waist instead of a waistcoat. To be honest, I did not wear it because I knew that there would be trouble with Jeeves. Still, at a place like Roville—with the gaiety and joie de vivre[48 - joie de vivre – радость жизни (франц.