es is a great believer in the moral effect of clothes. He
thinks I might be emboldened in a striking costume like this. He said a
Pirate Chief would be just as good. In fact, a Pirate Chief was his first
suggestion, but I objected to the boots."

I saw his point. There is enough sadness in life without having fellows
like Gussie Fink-Nottle going about in sea boots.

"And are you emboldened?"

"Well, to be absolutely accurate, Bertie, old man, no."

A gust of compassion shook me. After all, though we had lost touch a bit
of recent years, this man and I had once thrown inked darts at each
other.

"Gussie," I said, "take an old friend's advice, and don't go within a
mile of this binge."

"But it's my last chance of seeing her. She's off tomorrow to stay with
some people in the country. Besides, you don't know."

"Don't know what?"

"That this idea of Jeeves's won't work. I feel a most frightful chump
now, yes, but who can say whether that will not pass off when I get into
a mob of other people in fancy dress. I had the same experience as a
child, one year during the Christmas festivities. They dressed me up as a
rabbit, and the shame was indescribable. Yet when I got to the party and
found myself surrounded by scores of other children, many in costumes
even ghastlier than my own, I perked up amazingly, joined freely in the
revels, and was able to eat so hearty a supper that I was sick twice in
the cab coming home. What I mean is, you can't tell in cold blood."

I weighed this. It was specious, of course.

"And you can't get away from it that, fundamentally, Jeeves's idea is
sound. In a striking costume like Mephistopheles, I might quite easily
pull off something pretty impressive. Colour does make a difference. Look
at newts. During the courting season the male newt is brilliantly
coloured. It helps him a lot."

"But you aren't a male newt."

"I wish I were. Do you know how a male newt proposes, Bertie? He just
stands in front of the female newt vibrating his tail and bending his
body in a semi-circle. I could do that on my head. No, you wouldn't find
me grousing if I were a male newt."

"But if you were a male newt, Madeline Bassett wouldn't look at you. Not
with the eye of love, I mean."

"She would, if she were a female newt."

"But she isn't a female newt."

"No, but suppose she was."

"Well, if she was, you wouldn't be in love with her."

"Yes, I would, if I were a male newt."

A slight throb