Gerald Durrell - Fillets of Plaice

“It was extremely clever of you to stand still, sir,” I said.

“Why?” asked the D.C. suspiciously.

“Well, most people in those circumstances would have panicked, sir, but you kept your head admirably. If it hadn’t been for you I doubt whether I’d have ever caught the mamba.”

The D.C. looked at me suspiciously again, but I was wearing my most innocent expression.

“Hah!” he said. “Well, let’s go and have a drink.”

“Well, I think there are one or two more creatures here for me to catch and I’d better get Martin to organise things a bit. I’ll join you in a minute, sir, if I may.”

“Certainly,” he said, “I’ll send Martin to you.”

Martin staggered into the dining-room looking like the sole survivor of the Titanic.

“Jesus Christ,” he said, “I never thought...”

“Look,” I said firmly, “just don’t think. Do what I say.”

“It’s worse than the lavatory!”

“Nothing could be worse than the lavatory. Now, just take things calmly.”

While we were talking Pious and I were busy collecting further denizens of the fan, which consisted of numerous geckos, eight tree frogs, a hysterical dormouse with its nest and young, three bats, a couple of irascible scorpions and an incredible number of beetles.

“What are we going to do?” said Martin in despair, almost wringing his hands.

I turned to Pious and I could tell from his expression that he was as worried by this awful catastrophe as Martin was. I, unfortunately, was suffering from an almost uncontrollable desire to laugh loud and long but I didn’t dare to do so.

“Now,” I said to Pious, “you go go for Masa McGrade’s house and you find chop. Then you go to Masa Girton’s house and you find chop. Then you go to A.D.O.’s house and find chop, then you go for our place and find chop. I want chop in one hour, you hear.”

“I hear, sah,” said Pious and disappeared.

“God, I shall be sent back to Umchichi,” said Martin.

“That might well happen,” I said, “but judging by the D.C.’s reaction it will not.”

“But he couldn’t have been pleased,” said Martin.

“I don’t think anybody was, with the possible exception of me. I’ve got some nice specimens out of it.”

“But what are we going to do now?” said Martin, gazing at the wreckage of the table.

I sat him down in a chair.

“I sent the D.C. to call you because I said you could control the situation,” I explained. “Pious has gone to fetch the chop. What it’ll be, God only knows, but at least it will be something to eat. In the meantime, you must try and fill the D.C. up with as much gin as possible.”

“I’ve got plenty of gin,” said Martin earnestly.

“Well, there you are,” I said soothingly. “The problem’s almost solved.”

“But I don’t see how...” Martin said.

“Look, just don’t think about it. Leave it to me. The point is, you have to appear as though you are in control of the situation.”

“Oh. Yes, I see what you mean,” said Martin.

I called Amos and John from the kitchen.

“Clean up this table, polish it and put things for chop,” I said.

“Yes, sah,” they said in a chorus.

“Pious done go for chop. You tell Jesus and my cook they can make new chop.”

“Yes, sah.”

“But you go make the table look fine like before, you hear?”

“Please, sah,” said Amos.

“Whatee?” I asked.

“Masa done catch all de snakes from inside dere?” inquired Amos, pointing at the wreckage of the punka.

“Yes,” I said. “You no go fear. I done catch all the beef.”

“I don’t know how you organise things so well,” said Martin.

“Listen,” I said, “as far as the D.C. is concerned, you’ve organised all this. Now, when we join them you assume an almost military pose. You’ve got to give the D.C. the impression that while I was more concerned with my animals you had everything else under perfect control. And don’t apologise every five minutes! We’ll get him well ginned up and Pious will have the food under control so don’t worry about that. All you have to do is give the impression that although this is a disaster, it is a very minor one and you are quite sure that on thinking it over the D.C. will see the funny side of it.”

“The funny side of it?” said Martin faintly.

“Yes,” I said. “How long have you been in the Colonial Service?”

“Since I was twenty-one,” he said.

“Don’t you realise that people like that pompous ass dine out on stories like this? You’ve probably done yourself more good than harm.”

“Are you sure?” said Martin doubtfully.

“You think about it,” I said. “Now let’s go out onto the veranda.”

So we joined the D.C on the veranda and found that the others had been doing stalwart service. Mary had given the D.C. a long lecture on orchids and flower arrangements. McGrade had given him such a complicated discourse on bridge building and road maintenance that I don’t think even he could have understood. And Robin had come in at just the right moment to discuss literature and art, two subjects about which the D.C. knew nothing.

I dug Martin in the ribs and he straightened up.

“I’m terribly sorry about that, sir,” he said. “Most unfortunate. I’m afraid my boy didn’t check on the hooks in the ceiling. However, I have... er... organised everything and we should have chop in about an hour. Terribly sorry to keep you waiting.”

He subsided into a chair and mopped his face with his handkerchief.

The D.C. looked at him speculatively and drained his tenth gin.

“I don’t usually,” he said acidly, “in the course of my duties have fans dropped on my head.”

There was a short but ominous silence. It was obvious that Martin could think of nothing to say, so I stepped into the breach.

“I must say, sir, that I was damned glad to have you there,” I said.

I turned to the others.

“Of course, you all didn’t see it but there was a mamba in that fan. If it hadn’t been for the D.C., I doubt whether I would have got it.”

“A mamba!” squeaked Mary.

“Yes,” I said, “and he was in a very nasty mood, I can assure you. But fortunately the D.C. kept his head and so we managed to catch it.”

“Well,” said the D.C., “I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I helped very much.”

“Oh that’s modesty, sir,” I said. “Most people, as I told you, would have panicked. After all, a mamba is supposed to be the most deadly snake in Africa.”

“A mamba!” said Mary. “Fancy that! Think of it, coiled there over our heads waiting to attack! I do think you were both awfully brave.”

“By Jove, yes,” said Robin smoothly. “I’m afraid I would have run like a hare.”

“So would I,” said McGrade, who was built like an all-in wrestler and not afraid of anything.

“Well,” said the D.C. deprecatingly, having found himself forced into the position of hero, “you get used to this sort of situation, you know, especially when you’re trekking around in the bush.”

He embarked on a long and slightly incoherent story about a leopard he had nearly shot once and we all sighed with relief when Pious emerged out of the gloom and informed us that our second dinner was ready.

Cold baked beans and tinned salmon were not what one would call a gastronomic delight, but they served their purpose and by the end of dinner, full of gin, the D.C. was telling us some most improbable snake stories.

Fortunately, the flute salad had not been within range of the catastrophe and so this had been salvaged and after we had eaten it we all agreed that Mary, who had put her heart and soul into it, had done us proud and that it was the flute salad to end all flute salads.