Gerald Durrell - The Corfu Trilogy

As I explained to Mother, while trying to argue her into agreeing to this, if I had a donkey to carry me and my equipment, I could go so much farther a field. Why couldn’t I have it for Christmas, I asked? Because, Mother replied, firstly, they were too expensive, and secondly, there were not any babies available at that precise time. But if they were too expensive, I argued, why couldn’t I have one as a Christmas and birthday present? I would willingly forgo all other presents in lieu of a donkey. Mother said she would see, which I knew from bitter experience generally meant that she would forget about the matter as rapidly and as comprehensively as possible. As it got near to my birthday, I once again reiterated all the arguments in favour of having a donkey. Mother just repeated that we would see.

Then one day, Costas, the brother of our maid, made his appearance in the olive grove just outside our little garden carrying on his shoulders a great bundle of tall bamboos. Whistling happily to himself he proceeded to dig holes in the ground and to set the bamboos upright so that they formed a small square. Peering at him through the fuchsia hedge, I wondered what on earth he was doing, so, whistling Roger, I went round to see.

‘I am building,’ said Costas, ‘a house for your mother.’

I was astonished. What on earth could Mother want a bamboo house for? Had she, perhaps, decided to sleep out of doors? I felt this was unlikely. What, I inquired of Costas, did Mother want with a bamboo house?

He gazed at me wall-eyed.

‘Who knows?’ he said shrugging. ‘Perhaps she wants to keep plants in it or store sweet potatoes for the winter.’

I thought this was extremely unlikely as well, but having watched Costas for half an hour I grew bored and went off for a walk with Roger.

By the next day the framework of the bamboo hut had been finished and Costas was now busy twining bundles of reeds between the bamboos to form solid walls and the roof. By the next day it was completed and looked exactly like one of Robinson Crusoe’s earlier attempts at house-building. When I inquired of Mother what she intended to use the house for, she said that she was not quite sure, but she felt it would come in useful. With that vague information I had to be content.

The day before my birthday, everybody started acting in a slightly more eccentric manner than usual. Larry, for some reason best known to himself, went about the house shouting ‘Tantivy!’ and ‘Tally-ho’ and similar hunting slogans. As he was fairly frequently afflicted in this way, I did not take much notice.

Margo kept dodging about the house carrying mysterious bundles under her arms, and at one point I came face to face with her in the hall and noted, with astonishment, that her arms were full of multi-coloured decorations left over from Christmas. On seeing me she uttered a squeak of dismay and rushed into her bedroom in such a guilty and furtive manner that I was left staring after her with open mouth.

Even Leslie and Spiro were afflicted, it seemed, and they kept going into mysterious huddles in the garden. From the snippets of their conversation that I heard, I could not make head or tail of what they were planning.

‘In the backs seats,’ Spiro said, scowling. ‘Honest to Gods, Masters Leslies, I have dones it befores.’

‘Well, if you’re sure, Spiro,’ Leslie replied doubtfully, ‘but we don’t want any broken legs or anything.’

Then Leslie saw me undisguisedly eavesdropping and asked me truculently what the hell I thought I was doing, eavesdropping on people’s private conversations? Why didn’t I go down to the nearest cliff and jump off ? Feeling that the family were in no mood to be amicable, I took Roger off into the olive groves and for the rest of the day we ineffectually chased green lizards.

That night I had just turned down the lamp and snuggled down in bed when I heard sounds of raucous singing, accompanied by gales of laughter, coming through the olive groves. As the uproar got closer, I could recognize Leslie’s and Larry’s voices, combined with Spiro’s, each of them appearing to be singing a different song. It seemed as though they had been somewhere and celebrated too well. From the indignant whispering and shuffling going on in the corridor, I could tell that Margo and Mother had reached the same conclusion.

They burst into the villa, laughing hysterically at some witticism that Larry had produced, and were shushed fiercely by Margo and Mother.

‘Do be quiet,’ said Mother. ‘You’ll wake Gerry. What have you been drinking?’

‘Wine,’ said Larry in a dignified voice. He hiccuped.

‘Wine,’ said Leslie. ‘And then we danced, and Spiro danced, and I danced, and Larry danced. And Spiro danced and then Larry danced and then I danced.’

‘I think you had better go to bed,’ said Mother.

‘And then Spiro danced again,’ said Leslie, ‘and then Larry danced.’

‘All right, dear, all right,’ said Mother. ‘Go to bed , for heaven’s sake. Really, Spiro, I do feel that you shouldn’t have let them drink so much.’

‘Spiro danced,’ said Leslie, driving the point home.

‘I’ll take him to bed,’ said Larry. ‘I’m the only sober member of the party.’

There was the sound of lurching feet on the tiles as Leslie and Larry, clasped in each other’s arms, staggered down the corridor.

‘I’m now dancing with you ,’ came Leslie’s voice as Larry dragged him into his bedroom and put him to bed.

‘I’m sorrys, Mrs Durrells,’ said Spiro, his deep voice thickened with wine, ‘but I couldn’t stops thems.’

‘Did you get it?’ said Margo.

‘Yes, Missy Margos. Don’ts you worrys,’ said Spiro. ‘It’s down with Costas.’

Eventually Spiro left and I heard Mother and Margo going to bed. It made a fittingly mysterious end to what had been a highly confusing day as far as I was concerned. But I soon forgot about the family’s behaviour, as, lying in the dark wondering what my presents were going to be the following day, I drifted off to sleep.

The following morning I woke and lay for a moment wondering what was so special about that day, and then I remembered. It was my birthday. I lay there savouring the feeling of having a whole day to myself when people would give me presents and the family would be forced to accede to any reasonable requests. I was just about to get out of bed and go and see what my presents were, when a curious uproar broke out in the hall.

‘Hold its head. Hold its head ,’ came Leslie’s voice.

‘Look out, you’re spoiling the decorations,’ wailed Margo.

‘Damn the bloody decorations,’ said Leslie. ‘Hold its head .’

‘Now, now, dears,’ said Mother, ‘don’t quarrel.’

‘Dear God,’ said Larry in disgust, ‘dung all over the floor.’

The whole of this mysterious conversation was accompanied by a strange pitter-pattering noise, as though someone were bouncing ping-pong balls on the tile floor of the hall. What on earth, I wondered, was the family up to now? Normally at this time they were still lying, semi-conscious, groping bleary-eyed for their early morning cups of tea. I sat up in bed, preparatory to going into the hall to join in whatever fun was afoot, when my bedroom door burst open and a donkey, clad in festoons of coloured crepe paper, Christmas decorations, and with three enormous feathers attached skilfully between its large ears, came galloping into the bedroom, Leslie hanging grimly on to its tail, shouting, ‘Woa, you bastard!’

‘Language, dear,’ said Mother, looking flustered in the doorway.

‘You’re spoiling the decorations,’ screamed Margo.

‘The sooner that animal gets out of here,’ said Larry, ‘the better. There’s dung all over the hall now.’