"A nuisance," said Psmith, "this incessant demand for you. That's the
worst of being popular. If he wants you to stop to tea, edge away. A
meal on rather a sumptuous scale will be prepared in the study against
your return."
Mike changed quickly, and went off, leaving Psmith, who was fond of
simple pleasures in his spare time, earnestly occupied with a puzzle
which had been scattered through the land by a weekly paper. The prize
for a solution was one thousand pounds, and Psmith had already informed
Mike with some minuteness of his plans for the disposition of this sum.
Meanwhile, he worked at it both in and out of school, generally with
abusive comments on its inventor.
He was still fiddling away at it when Mike returned.
Mike, though Psmith was at first too absorbed to notice it, was
agitated.
"I don't wish to be in any way harsh," said Psmith, without looking up,
"but the man who invented this thing was a blighter of the worst type.
You come and have a shot. For the moment I am baffled. The whisper flies
round the clubs, 'Psmith is baffled.'"
"The man's an absolute driveling ass," said Mike warmly.
"Me, do you mean?"
"What on earth would be the point of my doing it?"
"You'd gather in a thousand of the best.
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