Gerald Durrell - Fillets of Plaice

While this rather tricky conversation had been going on, the enormous platter of groundnut chop had been placed in front of Mary, and down the long shining table had appeared some twenty little plates containing the small small tings. It really looked most impressive.

“I’m sorry, sir, we couldn’t think of anything except groundnut chop,” said Martin, who had an awful tendency to apologise in advance, thus giving his adversary a chance to complain. “But normally my cook does it frightfully well.”

“I know one tends to eat too much of it,” said the D.C., “but, really, I think it’s a very good, sustaining food.”

Mary had served the groundnut chop with rice onto the plates, which were solemnly carried by Amos and Pious and distributed among us. Then came the sort of chess game that one had to play with the small small tings.

The D.C.’s plate was piled high. He added three or four chunks of pink paw-paw and looked at it with satisfaction.

“Splendid,” he said, “it looks absolutely splendid.”

Martin began to look a little less strained, for he knew that my cook was helping Jesus and that the groundnut chop would probably be excellent.

Mary, on her best behaviour, looked at the D.C., who gravely bowed his head, and she dipped her spoon and fork into the groundnut chop. The D.C. followed suit and then we all picked up our implements and attacked our plates. The punka, creaking slightly, waved to and fro and sent wafts of warm air upon us.

“Best groundnut chop I’ve ever had,” said the D.C., having just swallowed an enormous mouthful.

Martin beamed at me across the table.

“Martin’s a great one for organising,” said McGrade.

“Indeed he is. I agree with you entirely,” said Robin. “I fear that on this occasion it is I who have failed.”

“Failed?” said the D.C., “how d’ye mean, failed?”

“Well, we could have put on a much more splendiferous meal for you,” said Robin, “but unfortunately the river ran rather dry and the boat with the supplies couldn’t get up. So I’m afraid poor Martin’s doing the best he can in the circumstances.”

“Yes,” said Mary, “we’d hoped to put on a really good meal for you.”

“Nonsense, nonsense,” said the D.C., waving his hands deprecatingly. “This is superb.”

Martin positively glowed and relaxed.

“Tell me,” said the D.C., “I understand you’re an animal collector, Durrell.”

“Yes, sir,” I answered.

“But surely you don’t find much around here?” he enquired.

During the course of our drinks on the veranda I had seen Pious swiftly and silently remove a praying mantis and a gecko from the D.C.’s chair.

“When I was an A.D.O.,” he said, “wandering about in the bush, never saw a damn’ thing.”

“Oh, there’s an amazing amount of stuff around here if you know where to look for it, sir,” I said. “Why, only the other day I caught quite a rare creature at the bottom of Martin’s garden. There’s plenty of life here if you look for it.”

“Extraordinary,” said the D.C., shovelling a great spoonful of groundnut chop into his mouth, “I wouldn’t have thought there was anything living so near to civilisation, as it were.”

At that moment came a noise like somebody breaking the backbone of a whale, and with a rustle like a million autumn leaves being caught by a hurricane, the palm leaf punka crashed straight onto the table, one end of it completely obliterating the D.C.

Fortunately, it put out the candles so that nothing caught fire, but it did, however contain in its many ballet-skirt-like sets of fronds an extremely interesting cross-section of the local fauna that lives in close proximity to civilisation.

The effect upon the party was considerable.

“Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” screamed Mary, leaping to her feet, upsetting her gin and tonic and losing her normal pose of placidity.

“Why didn’t you let me check it, you stupid bastard!” roared McGrade.

“There are times when I really despair of you, Martin,” said Robin with some asperity.

“I’m terribly, terribly sorry, sir,” said Martin to the invisible D.C. “I really don’t know how to apologise.”

He was trembling from head to foot at the catastrophe. The palm fronds rustled and the D.C.s’ head appeared. He emerged from the punka looking not unlike an albino African emerging from his hut. He opened his mouth to say something and then caught sight of a chocolate-coloured, very hairy spider the circumference of a saucer making its way along the punka towards him. Already the rich and happy little community that had been living in the fan undisturbed for years was starting to emerge. The D.C. pushed back his chair and leapt to his feet.

I knew this was a disaster of the worst sort from Martin’s point of view, but I have always found in life that one should seize every opportunity. It seemed as though the punka was going to provide me with some interesting specimens.

“I suggest you all go into the other room,” I said, noticing a new species of gecko emerging from the palm fronds. “I’ll fix things in here.”

The parts of the table that were still visible were rapidly becoming covered with indignant beetles and other specimens of lesser life who looked, even if they were not, extremely malevolent.

Mary pulled herself together and with great grace led the way out of the dining-room and onto the veranda and the others trooped after her.

The staff had been frozen solid because, as we had been sitting in our chairs, it would have been extremely difficult to remove the palm leaf fan and pretend that dinner was going on as normal. It was a situation they had not met with before and even Pious was incapable of coping with it.

“Pious,” I roared, startling him out of his horrified trance, “go bring bottles, boxes, anything for catch this beef.”

Beef is the all-important West African term meaning any animal that walks, flies or crawls. Pious, grabbing Amos and the two small boys by the scruff of the neck, disappeared.

By this time a number of other interesting inhabitants were appearing out of the punka to see why their community life had been disturbed. The first to emerge was a young and highly indignant green mamba, reputedly the most deadly snake in Africa. He was about two feet long, like a green and yellow plaited lariat, and you could tell from his attitude that the whole thing was very upsetting to his psyche. I tried to pin him down with a fork but he wriggled free and fell off the table onto the floor. It was only then that I realised that although all the others had fled to the veranda and left the disaster to me, the D.C. had stayed on. The green mamba, in that irritating way that snakes have, with the whole of the room to choose from, wriggled straight towards the D.C., who remained rooted to the spot, his face going a rather interesting shade of blue. I made another quick assault on the mamba and this time succeeded in pinning him down and picking him up by the back of the neck. By this time Pious had returned, having unearthed from the kitchen jars, boxes, bottles and other containers. I slipped the green mamba into a bottle and corked it up securely.

The D.C. was still regarding me with bulging eyes. I had to say something in an attempt to cover up the disaster and protect Martin. I smiled at the D.C. beguilingly.

“You see what I mean, sir?” I said airily, removing a large beetle from the groundnut chop where he was lying on his back waving his legs and uttering shrill mechanical whirrings. “The animals are all around you. It’s merely a question of finding out where they live.”

He stared at me for a moment.

“Yes. Yes, I can see that,” he said, adding, “I think I need a drink.”