Gerald Durrell - Fillets of Plaice

“Oh dear,” said Mother, “I do wish we hadn’t come.”

“Do not worry, Muzzer,” said Max, “help is on de way. I feel it in my bones.”

“I think Larry’s right,” said Donald. “Lots of fishing boats along this stretch of coast. One’s bound to come along sooner or later.”

“Well, it had better be sooner than later,” said Mother, “otherwise we’re all going to starve to death.”

“It’s all Larry’s fault,” said Leslie belligerently, for he was feeling hungry. “He suggested the trip.”

“Now, don’t turn on me,” said Larry angrily. “You were just as much in favour of it as I was. If the damned thing had been organised properly we wouldn’t be in this predicament.”

“I agree with Leslie,” said Margo. “It was Larry’s suggestion.”

“I didn’t suggest we ran out of petrol in a remote bay surrounded by unclimbable cliffs ten kilometres away from the nearest source of supplies,” said Larry.

“Now, now, dears,” said Mother, “don’t quarrel. I’m sure Donald’s right. There’ll be a fishing boat along soon.”

“In the meantime,” said Sven, “I will play to you, my dear Mrs Durrell, to soothe you.”

It was unfortunate that he chose Bach since, as it apparently soothed him, he was under the impression it soothed everybody else.

But the day passed and no fishing boat appeared. The ice was melting away with great rapidity as, indeed, were our food supplies. Our meal that night would have prompted any Oliver Twist to ask for more.

“Bloody silly,” said Larry. “All these damned fishing boats dashing up and down the coast. Why the hell don’t they fish in this area?”

“Maybe there’ll be a night fisherman tonight,” said Mactavish.

Though Spiro and Taki kept watch, nothing passed the mouth of the bay. For breakfast we had a rather soggy peach each. Lunch consisted entirely of watermelons and bread.

“What do our supplies consist of now?” asked Larry when we had consumed this repast.

“It’s rather fortunate that I am a small eater,” said Theodore, adding hastily, “I mean, fortunate for me, that is.”

“If this goes on I don’t know what we’re going to do,” said Mother, who by now had worked herself into a sort of near panic in spite of everything everybody was trying to do to reassure her.

“Resort to cannibalism,” said Larry.

“Larry dear, don’t joke like that,” said Mother. “It’s not funny.”

“In any case, ha ha,” said Mactavish, “you’d find me rather tough.”

“Oh, we’d start on you,” said Larry, fixing him with a baleful stare. “We’d have you as a rather indigestible hors d’oeuvre. But Leonora, cooked slowly in the sand as they do it in Polynesia would, I feel, be absolutely delicious. Toes, buttocks and breast.”

“Larry, don’t be disgusting,” said Margo. “I couldn’t possibly eat a human being.”

“Damned bad form,” said Donald, “Only wogs eat each other.”

“It’s surprising, though, what you can do when you have to,” said Theodore. “I think it was in Bosnia where several villages were snowed up for an unprecedented number of months and, er..., quite a few of the villagers took to cannibalism.”

“Now, will you all stop talking about cannibalism,” said Mother. “You’ll only make matters worse.”

“Well, you still haven’t answered my question,” said Larry. “What are our supplies at the moment?”

“Watermelons,” said Mother, “three green peppers and two loaves of bread. Taki is trying to catch some fish but he says it isn’t a very good bay for fish.”

“But surely there were a couple of legs of lamb left,” said Larry.

“Yes, dear,” said Mother, “but the ice has melted now to such an extent that they’ve gone off and so I had to bury them.”

“Dear God,” said Larry, “it’ll have to be cannibalism.”

The day passed and still no boat appeared. That evening we had very dried-up bread, slightly shrivelled green peppers and watermelon.

Taki and Spiro took up their watch in the bows of the benzina and we all went to bed feeling extremely hungry.

The following morning no boat had been sighted during the night. Our situation, from being slightly comic, was now becoming quite serious. We were all aboard the benzina holding a council of war. My suggestion that we could exist for another couple of days by eating limpets was immediately crushed underfoot.

“My specimens, you know, are deteriorating quite fast,” said Theodore in a worried tone of voice.

“Oh, damn your bloody specimens,” said Larry. “If only you’d collect something more substantial than microscopic life it would help keep us alive now.”

“I really don’t know what we’re going to do,” said Mother.

We had one minute portion of bread each for breakfast and that was the end of our supplies.

“I suppose we’ll all just die here,” she went on, “and it’s not the sort of place that I would choose to be buried in.”

“Muzzer vill not die,” said Max affectionately. “If necessary, I vill commit suicide and you can eat me.”

Mother was rather taken aback by this lavish offer.

“It’s awfully kind of you, Max,” she said, “but I do hope that won’t be necessary.”

Just at that precise moment Spiro, who had been standing in the bows of the boat, uttered one of his bull roars that made the cliffs echo and bounce.

“Here! Here!”

He was shouting and waving his arms and we saw a small boat with a tiny, rather decrepit engine attached to it passing across the mouth of the bay.

“Here! Here!” shouted Spiro again in Greek. “Come here!” So rich and deep was Spiro’s voice and such tremendous lung power lay in his stocky frame that, aided by the echo chamber of the cliffs that surrounded us, the man in the boat actually heard him and turned and looked in our direction. We all rushed to the bows of the boat and made wild gestures beckoning him to come to us. He switched off his engine and Spiro bellowed once more,

“Come here! Come here!”

“Who, me?” said the man in the fishing boat.

“But of course YOU,” said Spiro, “who else?”

“You want me to come to you ?” asked the man in the boat, getting things quite clear in his mind.

Spiro called upon Saint Spiridion and several other local saints.

“But of course you!” he roared. “Who else is there?”

The man looked around him carefully. “Nobody,” he called back.

“Well, it’s YOU that I want then,” shouted Spiro.

“What do you want?” inquired the man interestedly.

“If you come closer I can tell you,” yelled Spiro, muttering to himself, “idiot!”

“Alright,” said the man.

He switched on his engine and came zig-zagging towards us.

“Thank God,” said Mother in a trembling voice, “oh, thank God.”

I must say that at that juncture we all shared her feelings.

The little boat, some twelve feet long, came nosing up to us and the man switched his engine off and bumped gently against our side. He was as brown as a hazel nut, with enormous bluey-black eyes and a curly mop of hair, and it was quite obvious from the very beginning that if he wasn’t an idiot he was very close to being one.

He grinned up at the assembled company ingratiatingly.

“ Kalimera ,” he said.

With infinite relief in our voices we all said kalimera back.

“Now, listen,” said Spiro, taking charge of the situation, “we have...”

“You are Greek?” asked the fisherman, looking at Spiro with interest.

“Of course I’m Greek,” shouted Spiro, “but the thing is that...”

“Are all of you Greek?” inquired the fisherman.