by Tom Holt
Sunday was a tense, anxious time, and the usual assembly at the church-door brief and unusually tactful. The Padre’s sermon had praised the anti-tank projector, but the second lesson had been the miracle of the loaves and fishes, which must remind everyone of the forthcoming miracle of the parsnips and corned beef. Scriptural references to the healing of the sick had endorsed Elizabeth, but the Lord’s Prayer itself, with its reference to daily bread, had favoured Lucia. The heavenly powers, then, were undecided. Lucia spent the evening at the piano; Elizabeth bandaged Withers until that worthy soul protested that she must go and make the dinner.
Monday morning passed slowly, and in the High Street the queues in the shops hissed with whispered speculation. Corned beef was in unusually great demand, and parsnips, which were as a rule easily obtainable, suddenly became as scarce as truffles. Lucia noticeably bought both, while Elizabeth examined everyone minutely for the slightest signs of ill health. Lunch was hurriedly consumed, and Patience cards laid out to beguile the impatience of expectation. A light shower began at half-past two. Would someone slip on the wet cobbles in West Street and twist their ankle, so that Elizabeth could render medical assistance?
The wireless had been installed in the garden-room ever since the outbreak of war, and the chairs were arranged around it as for a concert or recital. Elizabeth sat in the front row, wearing more grey serge than ever and smiling sweetly, beside Lucia, who was also smiling, and who gripped a notebook with which to take down Georgie’s every word in case anyone missed anything. The room filled up, and the apparatus was switched on. There was the usual humming, as of countless bees busy about a honeypot, a few sharp crackles, and a faint sound, growing more distinct. There were a few minutes to go before the appointed time for the broadcast and the previous programme, a collection of popular songs sung by some female or other, was not yet finished. Lucia assumed the pained expression usually reserved for the gramophone, and waited. The voice, albeit cacophonous, was somehow familiar ....
‘That was Miss Olga Bracely,’ crackled the wireless, ‘singing for us some of the numbers that she will be performing before an invited audience Somewhere in London tomorrow night.’
The gramophone face was replaced by a look of shock and horror. If Olga was going to sing in London tomorrow, if she was in the studio this afternoon broadcasting, then she must be in London, and staying at her house in Brompton Square with Georgie. And no mention of it in his letter! What on earth was she supposed to think about that? Or, for that matter, what could she do about it? She must go to London first thing tomorrow morning.
‘The time is now four-o’clock,’ enunciated the wireless, oblivious of Lucia’s suffering. ‘Mr. George Pillson will now address us on “Making the Most of Your Ration-Book”. ’
A pause, interrupted by a crackle from the apparatus, and then Georgie’s voice, sounding sheepish but marvellously clear.
‘Hello everybody,’ said Georgie. ‘I’m going to talk to you today about “Making the Most of Your Ration-Book”. Oh, he’s just said that, how tar’some. As you may know, corned beef is a highly nutritious form of preserved meat, and can, with a little care, be transformed into a tasty and appetising dish. Here, then, is my recipe for corned beef à la Riseholme, to feed a family of two adults and two children. This is very economical and simple to make, and requires two ounces of corned beef. First, we weigh out the corned beef—hand me the scales, Miss Foljambe ....’
Mouths watered and imaginations ran riot as Georgie went through the recipe for corned beef à la Riseholme. Elizabeth alone remained stonily smiling, except when Georgie appeared to have knocked something over, probably a cup of milk, and said ‘Drat the thing!’ quite audibly, whereupon she permitted one of her eyebrows to rise slightly. The other guests, meanwhile, were as if transfixed, and the Padre licked his lips loudly several times. Corned beef à la Riseholme was followed by parsnip-and-potato pie, the mere assonance of which was enough to conjure up visions of replete and satisfied gourmets pushing back their chairs and voicing their praise of the cook.
‘Next week,’ concluded Georgie, ‘we shall be making the best of rabbit and seeking substitutes for the artichoke. Goodbye, everyone. Are we off the air now? Oh!’
Victory was Lucia’s, and such a victory! Yet she paid as much attention to the chatter of her guests as she would to idle talk of the weather. She could see only unpleasant conspiracy and distasteful intrigue. Georgie and Olga. Of course, they would dine together and congratulate each other on their cleverness, and perhaps Georgie might be persuaded to produce his celebrated parsnip-and-potato pie, or even corned beef à la Riseholme. The fact that all over the country, from Truro to Thurso, her Georgie’s recipe would undoubtedly be followed to the letter was no consolation to her; rather the reverse. The ovation he had received in Tilling Institute had been enough to make him abandon his wife and home for the glamour of London. What effect would the praise and respect of the entire nation, the eloquent praise of the epicure who could once again enjoy artichoke where no artichokes were, the grunted thanks of the coal-miner whose evening was illuminated by a glorious carrot pie, have upon his weak and vacillating mind? He would probably never come back now; he would tour the country with Olga, she singing vulgar songs, he giving cookery demonstrations, the length and breadth of Britain and the Empire, unless she went to London tomorrow by the first train and stopped him. As she made the tea and brought in the toast and apricot-jam she resolved to do it, and having made the resolution, dismissed the unpleasant matter from her mind, for there was work to be done here. Oh dear, she thought, I hope I’ve made the tea strong enough.
There was comfort at least in the obvious discomfiture of Elizabeth, who was now so cast down that she drank her tea and ate her toast without the slightest grimace.
‘’Twud be a bonny thing if a’ the menfolk o’ Tilling would do so much tae help their country,’ she heard the Padre remark to Diva. ‘Sich a canny way wi’ t’ corned beef, and the disguising o’ t’malice in t’wee parsnips.’
‘Dear Padre,’ cooed Lucia, ‘I am so glad you thought so. And such reflected glory on our dear Tilling.’
‘You must put up a plaque, dear,’ said Elizabeth ironically, ‘to record the fact. “It was in this house that Mr. George Pillson first discovered parsnip pie”, or words to that effect.’
‘I don’t think so, dear,’ replied Lucia in her very best drawl. ‘It would look so much out of place, and besides, one doesn’t like to appear conspicuous or self-advertising. Service is its own reward, after all.’
‘Never would have thought so much could be done with parsnips,’ wondered Diva. ‘Such imagination. I’ve always been a bit wary of the beastly things, but now I shall have them at least once a week. I wonder what he’ll do with turnips?’
‘Just fancy, Kenneth,’ squeaked Evie, ‘and you always said that parsnips weren’t fit for human beings to eat, not if they were starving in the desert, and it was a waste of valuable land growing them.’
‘That was before yon master chef created sich a fine recipe. Why, I’ll warrant he could conjure toothsome viands out o’ firewood.’
‘I too must confess that parsnips have never been greatly to my taste in the past,’ added Mr. Wyse solemnly, ‘but thanks to your talented husband, Mrs. Pillson, I feel that I am now much more aware of the potential of the vegetable. Susan, my dear, we must persuade our cook to make us parsnip pie this evening, and corned beef à la Riseholme tomorrow. And as soon as the recipe has been mastered—and so lucidly expressed was it by Mr. Pillson that I feel confident that the process will take no great time—it would be a signal honour, Mrs. Pillson, if you would dine with us and give, so to speak, your endorsement to our cook’s interpretation of the recipe.’
‘Delighted, Mr. Wyse,’ said Lucia. ‘Now then, a little rubber of Bridge? Excellent.’
But before the tables could be ordered and partners chosen, there was a furious knocking and ringing at the front-door. Lucia rose swiftly and answered i
t. On the step stood Major Benjy in his uniform, looking pale and haggard.
‘Is my wife here, Mrs. Pillson? I’m afraid I have some rather bad news for her. In the garden-room? Thank you.’
The Major fairly raced through and leapt up the steps in a manner that belied his years. Elizabeth was in the process of trying to understand Diva’s bid, and the unexpected intrusion of her husband caused her to drop her band, which was heavy with aces.
‘I’ve got something to tell you, Liz,’ said the Major. ‘Only just heard it myself. I had a message from the officer commanding the new garrison. They’re carrying out manoeuvres near the river and the fact of the matter is, we’re going to have to get out of Grebe for a while. Well, to cut a long story short, they want us out by tomorrow lunchtime, so we’d better start packing now.’
Chapter 8.
Lucia departed to London to keep an eye on Georgie. Unable to get a taxi at Waterloo, she was compelled to travel by omnibus to Brompton Square and, carrying her own suitcase, she struggled wearily up to the doorstep of Olga’s house, just across the street from the rather more attractive dwelling where she herself had briefly held court as pretender to the social throne of the capital. But that interlude seemed to her now no more than a dream, an improbable fantasy. She put down her heavy load and rang the bell. The door was opened by Foljambe, imperturbable as ever. Georgie, it transpired, was having his bath and would be down shortly, so Lucia had an opportunity to inspect Miss Bracely’s property. A small house, as she remembered, very expensively furnished yet managing at every turn to strike exactly the wrong note.
‘Lucia!’ exclaimed Georgie. ‘How unexpected! What are you doing here?’
That, like everything else in the house, seemed to strike exactly the wrong note, but she put it down to the confusion of joyous reunion.
‘Oh Georgie,’ she gushed, ‘the broadcast! When I heard it I simply had to drop everything and rush to your side.’
‘Was it as bad as all that?’
‘Georgie, it was a triumph! Magnificent! Tremendous! Not a parsnip to be had in the whole of Tilling. The only topic of conversation. How proud I felt. And yet, hearing your voice, distorted by that dwefful wireless but unmistakably you, how lonely and how sad I felt, Georgie. As sweet Ovid so felicitously phrases it, surgit amar’ aliquid, and I felt that I must congratulate you in person. So I caught the duellists’ train and hurried up to London at once. I had to take an omnibus at Waterloo—what an adventure—and you’ll never guess what all the cockney wives were talking about. Your broadcast, of course. I heard one of them say “parsnips” distinctly three times, another discoursed of corned beef, a third told her companions how she would look forward to Monday afternoons in future. And now, do you think I might have a cup of tea?’
Georgie, had he been able, like Lucia, to make classical references at this awful hour of the morning, would have reflected on the power of Orpheus to cause trees and rocks to follow him by the power of his poetry; as it was, he could only think of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, and that did not seem polite somehow.
‘Fancy!’ he said. ‘You came all this way just because of my broadcast. How flattering. Will you be staying long?’
‘Staying?’ replied his wife, slipping her coat over her suitcases. ‘The thought had not crossed my mind. Let me see; I’ve got so much to do in Tilling. And would dear Olga be able to put me up? Such a charming house, but so small.’
‘Olga isn’t staying here,’ said Georgie firmly. ‘Just me and Foljambe.’
‘But she’s singing in London tonight,’ said Lucia, rather too much in the style of counsel for the prosecution for Georgie’s liking.
‘Yes, but she’s singing in Lincoln this morning, and as soon as the concert is over tonight she’s catching the night train to Edinburgh for a concert tomorrow. So she won’t be coming here at all.’
A flood of relief came over Lucia’s heart, and such was its force that she found herself able to praise Olga without apparent effort.
‘What a marvellous woman she is, Georgie, so unsparing of herself. Lincoln! Edinburgh! She is an example to all of us. Such constant movement. Are you going to the concert tonight?’
‘No, I’m not,’ moped Georgie. ‘I’ve got to rehearse my next broadcast. Too tar’some. The Ministry has sent me a whole sackful of carrots, and I’m to make up a recipe for carrot casserole. Nothing but carrots wherever I turn these days. Why, I’m beginning to look like a carrot.’
In Lucia’s opinion he already did, especially in moments of stress, but she thought it inadvisable to tell him this. He had paused, as if preparing to face some momentous decision, and then burst out, ‘I’m getting terribly bored with all this cooking. It was great fun to do in Tilling, preparing ingenious things for the officers and our friends, but doing it all day with no music or sketching or Bridge, and no company, and Olga hurtling around the country like the Flying Scotsman—it’s so very tedious, and I don’t want to do it any more. I’m not used to doing the same thing all day. I like doing different things, and when I’m bored with doing one thing, I want to stop doing that and start doing something else. Imagine how tar’some it would be to play croquet all day from seven in the morning to seven at night, even if you particularly enjoyed croquet or were terribly good at it. It’s as bad as working in a factory. And then there’s these broadcasts—why, I’m terrified in case something goes wrong, and there’s nobody about to reassure me and say they liked it except Foljambe, and she’s doing it too, so she can’t really tell and besides, she’s far too polite to tell me if l sounded really awful.’
‘You poor dear,’ said Lucia.
‘Teddy Broome says they’re bound to be very popular,’ he went on, ‘but I’m getting to the stage now where I can’t think of another thing to do with parsnips and carrots and tripe and so forth. I’ve already written them a booklet, which they say they’re going to distribute right across the country. I do think that that’s enough to be going on with, without being stuck here in London like a slave. I’ve decided that after I’ve finished this series of broadcasts—two more—I shall go back to Tilling and invent recipes there. They can get someone else to broadcast them, or else I can come up to London for the day. Then they can send all those sacks of onions and potatoes and things to Mallards, and we can eat them rather than letting them all go to waste. I’ve had to eat my way through mountains of cold parsnips before I got the recipe exactly right, and Foljambe says that if she has to eat any more corned beef she’ll give up her position and go and live with her married sister in Worcester until the war is over. I couldn’t face that. So there it is.’ And, although as a rule he never smoked in the morning, he lit a cigarette and got bits of tobacco all over his tongue.
‘Georgie, what a wonderful idea!’ exclaimed Lucia. ‘No, not Foljambe going to Worcester, you coming back to Tilling. Then we can have proper dinner parties, with lots of food, and you can try out your recipes on all our friends, which will be much more rewarding. And even Elizabeth couldn’t pretend that the food was black market if she saw it being delivered at Mallards in big sacks with Government arrows printed on them. I’ll tell you what, Georgie; if you don’t think Olga will be coming back here for a while, I’ll stay here for the next fortnight—Tilling can look after itself for a change—and we can have games of piquet and duets, and visits to the theatre and the galleries, unless they’ve sent all the pictures away by now, I can’t remember, and you’ll do far more work that way than if you’re stuck in a gloomy kitchen from sunrise to sunset, and I can read to you when you’re cooking, and eat up all the corned beef so that Foljambe won’t run away to Worcester. Much more agreeable than being stuck here on your own with nothing but carrots to keep you company, and much nicer for me than being all alone at Mallards.’
So depressed had Georgie become, practically buried alive in peeled vegetables and constantly badgered by Teddy Broome and the B.B.C., that the prospect seemed quite appealing.
‘That’s settled then,’ he
cried joyously, ‘and now tell me all about Tilling. What has Elizabeth been getting up to, and what did they all think of my broadcast? Was she furious?’
No need to ask who ‘she’ was. ‘Absolutely livid, Georgie, and she and Major Benjy have been turned out of Grebe by the Army, because they’re doing manoeuvres up by the river. And Elizabeth has been made head of the Red Cross, would you believe it, although the only thing she knows about medicine is that it comes from the chemist. She’s only doing it to interfere with my hospital.’
‘And swank around in her uniform, I’ll bet.’
‘Grey serge with a grey velour hat, although we don’t know yet whether she’ll get a watch that pins on the front.’
‘Goodness!’ said Georgie, somewhat taken aback by the thought. ‘But this is perfectly dreadful. What are you going to do?’
‘I shall co-operate fully, of course, while letting it be known, gently but firmly, that the hospital is fully capable of dealing with all emergencies. But this is why you’re needed so badly, Georgie. You must help me put Elizabeth firmly in her place again.’
As Ulysses longed for Ithaca, even on Calypso’s enchanted island, so Georgie’s soul longed for Tilling. He had had enough of Brompton Square and vegetables; he wanted to see once more the clash of personalities in the High Street, and hear again the clamour of voices as equal battle was joined.
‘And where are they both living,’ he asked, ‘if they’ve been thrown out of Grebe? In a tent on the beach? Or have they gone into one of the alms-houses?’