The Picnic and Suchlike Pandemonium

by Gerald Durrell

  ‘Even in the condition he was in, weeping hysterically, he saw the wisdom of my words. What, he implored me, were we to do? Mon Dieu, I could not tell him that I had about as much idea of what to do as he had. I had to take the initiative or else the whole situation would disintegrate.

  ‘Firstly, I said, he must dry his eyes, gain some control over himself and then go into the kitchen and send his daughter to her room, saying that she had been over-working (which was perfectly true). He must dismiss the kitchen boys, say that Monsieur Albert Henri Perigord had a headache and was retiring to bed. On no account was anyone to be allowed into the dining-room.

  ‘Having tidied him up a bit – for in his frenzy of grief he had torn off his chef’s hat and trampled it underfoot and hurled a bottle of excellent Medoc at the wall, a lot of which had splashed over him – I sent him into the kitchen. Then I dragged the body of Albert Henri out of the dining-room through the hallway and down into the cellar which, being cool, we used for keeping our wines and game and poultry. I went back upstairs to find that Morceau had done everything that I had suggested, so that we had a moment’s respite.

  ‘Morceau was beginning to show signs of considerable strain and I knew that he would break under it if I did not keep him occupied. I opened a bottle of champagne and made him drink. In his highly excited state the wine had a befuddling effect, which calmed him down considerably. We sat there like two criminals, monsieur, discussing the best way of getting rid of a corpse weighing over a hundred kilos. It was a macabre discussion I can assure you.

  ‘Morceau was all for waiting until it was dark and then taking the body out in the pony and trap and leaving it in some remote forest glade a number of kilometres from the village. I objected to this on the score that, if the body was discovered, people in the village knew of Albert. Henri’s presence in the hotel and would ask why his body should be found so far away. This would immediately throw suspicion on Morceau. Did he, I asked, want to be known throughout the length and breadth of France as the chef who had killed a Michelin man with his cooking? He burst into tears again and said he would commit suicide if this was said of him.

  ‘I said that we must be intelligent and think of a way of disposing of the corpse without implicating ourselves. I told him that my “uncle” was unmarried and had only a small circle of acquaintances, so that his disappearance would not occasion any undue alarm. This was indeed true, for Albert Henri had a very small circle of acquaintances simply because he was so untrustworthy. I knew that anyone in Paris would treat his disappearance as a cause for rejoicing rather than the reverse. I could hardly tell Morceau that, so to keep him calm, I assured him that, given the hours of darkness, I would think of a solution to our problem. But I do assure you, monsieur, I was at my wits’ end what to do.’

  At this moment the waiter approached the table and told me that my food was ready.

  ‘Good, good,’ said the old man, ‘don’t delay. Come, monsieur, let me conduct you to the dining-room.’

  He rose and led me into the hotel and thence into a small but beautifully appointed dining-room and there pulled a chair for me to sit down. The waiter came forward bearing a dish of toast and a large dish of pâté. A sudden realization came to me.

  ‘Tell me,’ I said to the Patron, ‘this pâté commemorating the Passing of Albert Henri Perigord . . . is this named after your friend?’

  ‘Of course, monsieur,’ said the Patron. ‘It was the least I could do.’

  I cut a slice of the pâté from the dish, applied it to a fragment of toast and put it in my mouth. It was delicious beyond belief.

  ‘Magnificent, Patron,’ I said, ‘a wonderful pâté. Your friend would have been proud to have had it called after him.’

  ‘Thank you, monsieur,’ he said bowing.

  ‘But, tell me,’ I went on, ‘you haven’t finished your story. You can’t leave me in mid-air like that . . . what did you do with the body?’

  The old man looked at me and hesitated for a moment, as if making up his mind whether to vouchsafe this secret or not. At last he sighed.

  ‘Monsieur,’ he said, ‘we did the only thing we could do . . . indeed the only thing that I am sure Albert Henri would have wanted us to do.’

  ‘What was that?’ I asked, perhaps obtusely.

  ‘We turned my friend into a pâté, monsieur. It is perhaps somewhat ironical that it was for this very pate that we were awarded our star by the Michelin, but we were most grateful for it, nevertheless. Bon appetit, monsieur.’ Chuckling, he turned and made his way out to the kitchen.

  The Entrance

  My friends Paul and Marjorie Glenham are both failed artists or, perhaps, to put it more charitably, they are both unsuccessful. But they enjoy their failure more than most successful artists enjoy their success. This is what makes them such good company and is one of the reasons that I always go and stay with them when I am in France. Their rambling farmhouse in Provence was always in a state of chaos, with sacks of potatoes, piles of dried herbs, plates of garlic and forests of dried maize jostling with piles of half-finished water colours and oil-paintings of the most hideous sort, perpetrated by Marjorie, and strange, Neanderthal sculpture which was Paul’s handiwork. Throughout this market-like mess prowled cats of every shade and marking and a river of dogs from an Irish wolfhound the size of a pony to an old English bulldog which made noises like Stephenson’s Rocket. Around the walls in ornate cages were housed Marjorie’s collection of Roller canaries, who sang with undiminished vigour regardless of the hour, thus making speech difficult. It was a warm, friendly, cacophonous atmosphere and I loved it.

  When I arrived in the early evening I had had a long drive and was tired, a condition that Paul set about remedying with a hot brandy and lemon of Herculean proportions. I was glad to have got there for, during the last half hour, a summer storm had moved ponderously over the landscape like a great black cloak and thunder reverberated among the crags, like a million rocks cascading down a wooden staircase. I had only just reached the safety of the warm, noisy kitchen, redolent with the mouth-watering smells of Marjorie’s cooking, when the rain started in torrents. The noise of it on the tile roof combined with the massive thunderclaps that made even the solid stone farmhouse shudder, aroused the competitive spirit in the canaries and they all burst into song simultaneously It was the noisiest storm I had ever encountered.

  ‘Another noggin, dear boy?’ enquired Paul, hopefully.

  ‘No, no!’ shouted Marjorie above the bubbling songs of the birds and the roar of the rain, ‘the food’s ready and it will spoil if you keep it waiting. Have some wine. Come and sit down, Gerry dear.’

  ‘Wine, wine, that’s the thing. I’ve got something special for you, dear boy,’ said Paul and he went off into the cellar to reappear a moment later with his arms full of bottles, which he placed reverently on the table near me. ‘A special Gigondas I have discovered,’ he said. ‘Brontosaurus blood I do assure you, my dear fellow, pure prehistoric monster juice. It will go well with the truffles and the guinea-fowl Marjorie’s run up.’

  He uncorked a bottle and splashed the deep red wine into a generously large goblet. He was right. The wine slid into your mouth like red velvet and then, when it reached the back of your tongue, exploded like a firework display into your brain cells.

  ‘Good, eh?’ said Paul, watching my expression. ‘I found it in a small cave near Carpentras. It was a blistering hot day and the cave was so nice and cool that I sat and drank two bottles of it before I realized what I was doing. It’s a seducing wine, all right. Of course when I got out in the sun again the damn stuff hit me like a sledge-hammer. Marjorie had to drive.’

  ‘I was so ashamed,’ said Marjorie, placing in front of me a black truffle the size of a peach encased in a fragile, feather-light overcoat of crisp brown pastry. ‘He paid for the wine and then bowed to the Patron and fell flat on his face. Th
e Patron and his sons had to lift him into the car, it was disgusting.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ said Paul, ‘the Patron was enchanted. It gave his wine the accolade it needed.’

  ‘That’s what you think,’ said Marjorie. ‘Now start, Gerry, before it gets cold.’

  I cut into the globe of golden pastry in front of me and released the scent of the truffle, like the delicious aroma of a damp autumn wood, a million leafy, earthy smells rolled up into one. With the Gigondas as an accompaniment this promised to be a meal for the Gods. We fell silent as we attacked our truffles and listened to the rain on the roof, the roar of thunder and the almost apoplectic singing of the canaries. The bulldog, who had, for no apparent reason, fallen suddenly and deeply in love with me, sat by my chair watching me fixedly with his protuberant brown eyes, panting gently and wheezing.

  ‘Magnificent, Marjorie,’ I said as the last fragment of pastry dissolved like a snowflake on my tongue. ‘I don’t know why you and Paul don’t set up a restaurant: with your cooking and Paul’s choice of wines you’d be one of the three-star Michelin jobs in next to no time.’

  ‘Thank you, dear,’ said Marjorie, sipping her wine, ‘but I prefer to cook for a small audience of gourmets rather than a large audience of gourmands.’

  ‘She’s right, there’s no gainsaying it,’ agreed Paul, splashing wine into our glasses with gay abandon. A sudden prolonged roar of thunder directly overhead precluded speech for a long minute and was so fierce and sustained that even the canaries fell silent, intimidated by the sound. When it had finished Marjorie waved her fork at her spouse.

  ‘You mustn’t forget to give Gerry your thingummy,’ she said.

  ‘Thingummy?’ asked Paul, blankly. ‘What thingummy?’

  ‘You know,’ said Marjorie, impatiently, ‘your thingummy . . . your manuscript . . . it’s just the right sort of night for him to read it.’

  ‘Oh, the manuscript . . . yes,’ said Paul, enthusiastically. ‘The very night for him to read it.’

  ‘I refuse,’ I protested. ‘Your paintings and sculptures are bad enough. I’m damned if I’ll read your literary efforts as well.’

  ‘Heathen,’ said Marjorie, good-naturedly. ‘Anyway, it’s not Paul’s, it’s someone else’s.’

  ‘I don’t think he deserves to read it after those disparaging re-marks about my art,’ said Paul. ‘It’s too good for him.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s a very curious manuscript I picked up . . .’ Paul began, when Marjorie interrupted.

  ‘Don’t tell him about it, let him read it,’ she said. ‘I might say it gave me nightmares.’

  While Marjorie was serving helpings of guinea-fowl wrapped in an almost tangible aroma of herbs and garlic, Paul went over to the comer of the kitchen where a tottering mound of books, like some ruined castle, lay between two sacks of potatoes and a large barrel of wine. He rummaged around for a bit and then emerged triumphantly with a fat red notebook, very much the worse for wear, and came and put it on the table.

  ‘There!’ he said with satisfaction. ‘The moment I’d read it I thought of you. I got it among a load of books I bought from the library of old Doctor Lepitre, who used to be prison doctor down in Marseilles. I don’t know whether it’s a hoax or what.’

  I opened the book and on the inside of the cover found a book-plate in black, three cypress trees and a sundial under which was written, in Gothic script, ‘Ex Libras Lepitre’. I flipped over the pages and saw that the manuscript was in longhand, some of the most beautiful and elegant copperplate handwriting I had ever seen, the ink now faded to a rusty brown.

  ‘I wish I had waited until daylight to read it,’ said Marjorie with a shudder.

  ‘What is it? A ghost story?’ I asked curiously.

  ‘No,’ said Paul uncertainly, ‘at least, not exactly. Old Lepitre is dead, unfortunately, so I couldn’t find out about it. It’s a very curious story. But the moment I read it I thought of you, knowing your interest in the occult and things that go bump in the night. Read it and tell me what you think. You can have the manuscript if you want it. It might amuse you, anyway.’

  ‘I would hardly call it amusing,’ said Marjorie, ‘anything but amusing. I think it’s horrid.’

  Some hours later, full of good food and wine, I took the giant golden oil lamp, carefully trimmed, and in its gentle daffodil-yellow light I made my way upstairs to the guest room and a feather bed the size of a barn door. The bulldog had followed me upstairs and sat wheezing, watching me undress and climb into bed. He now lay by the bed looking at me soulfully. The storm continued unabated and the rumble of thunder was almost continuous, while the dazzling flashes of lightning lit up the whole room at intervals. I adjusted the wick of the lamp, moved it closer to me, picked up the red notebook and settled myself back against the pillows to read. The manuscript began without preamble.

  March 16th 1901. Marseilles.

  I have all night lying ahead of me and, as I know I cannot sleep – in spite of my resolve – I thought I would try to write down in detail the thing that has just happened to me. I am afraid that setting it down like this will not make it any the more believable, but it will pass the time until dawn comes and with it my release.

  Firstly I must explain a little about myself and my relationship with Gideon de Teildras Villeray so that the reader (if there ever is one) will understand how I came to be in the depths of France in mid-winter. I am an antiquarian bookseller and can say, in all modesty, that I am at the top of my profession. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I was at the top of my profession. I was even once described by one of my fellow booksellers – I hope more in a spirit of levity than of jealousy – as a ‘literary truffle hound’, a description which I suppose, in its amusing way, does describe me.

  A hundred or more libraries have passed through my hands, and I have been responsible for a number of important finds; the original Gottenstein manuscript, for example; the rare ‘Conrad’ illustrated Bible, said by some to be as beautiful as the Book of Kells; the five new poems by Blake that I unearthed at an unpromising countryhouse sale in the Midlands; and many lesser but none-the-less satisfying discoveries, such as the signed first edition of Alice in Wonderland that I found in a trunk full of rag books and toys in the nursery of a vicarage in Shropshire and a presentation copy of Sonnets from the Portuguese, signed and with a six-line verse written on the flyleaf by both Robert and Elizabeth Browning.

  To be able to unearth such things in unlikely places is rather like water divining, either you are born with the gift or not; it is not something you can acquire, though most certainly, with practice, you are able to sharpen your perceptions and make your eye keener. In my spare time I also catalogue some of the smaller and more important libraries, as I get enormous pleasure out of simply being with books. To me the quietness of a library, the smell and the feel of the books, is like the taste and texture of food to a gourmet. It may sound fanciful, but I can stand in a library and hear the myriad voices around me as though I was standing in the middle of a vast choir, a choir of knowledge and beauty.

  Naturally, because of my work, it was at Sotheby’s that I first met Gideon. I had unearthed in a house in Sussex a small but quite interesting collection of first editions and, being curious to know what they would fetch, had attended the sale myself. As the bidding was in progress I got the uncomfortable feeling that I was being watched. I glanced around but could see no one whose attention was not upon the auctioneer. Yet, as the sale proceeded I got more and more uncomfortable. Perhaps this is too strong a word, but I became convinced that I was the object of an intense scrutiny.

  At last the crowd in the saleroom moved slightly and I saw who it was. He was a man of medium height with a handsome but somewhat plump face, piercing and very large dark eyes and smoky-black, curly hair, worn rather long. He was dressed in a well-cu
t dark overcoat with an astrakhan collar, and in his elegantly gloved hands he carried the sales catalogue and a wide-brimmed dark velour hat. His glittering, gypsy-like eyes were fixed on me intently, but when he saw me looking at him the fierceness of his gaze faded, and he gave me a faint smile and a tiny nod of his head, as if to acknowledge that he had been caught out staring at me in such a vulgar fashion. He turned then, shouldered his way through the people that surrounded him and was soon lost to my sight.

  I don’t know why but the intense scrutiny of this stranger disconcerted me, to such an extent that I did not follow the rest of the sale with any degree of attention, except to note that the items I had put up fetched more than I had anticipated. The bidding over, I made my way through the crush and out into the street.

  It was a dank, raw day in February, with that unpleasant smoky smell in the air that augurs fog and makes the back of your throat raw. As it looked unpleasantly as though it might drizzle I hailed a cab. I have one of those tall, narrow houses in Smith Street, just off the King’s Road. It was bequeathed to me by my mother and does me very well. It is not in a fashionable part of Town, but the house is quite big enough for a bachelor like myself and his books, for I have, over the years, collected a small but extremely fine library on the various subjects that interest me: Indian art, particularly miniatures; some of the early Natural Histories; a small but rather rare collection of books on the occult; a number of volumes on plants and great gardens, and a good collection of first editions of contemporary novelists. My home is simply furnished but comfortable; although I am not rich, I have sufficient for my needs and I keep a good table and very reasonable wine cellar.