Gerald Durrell - The Picnic and Suchlike Pandemonium

We piled into the Rolls, and Jack started her up. At first, in order to try to get us to shelter as quickly as possible, he drove fast, but soon, the cries and roars from the back, made him slow down, for to travel at any speed turned the rain into a stinging whip across one’s face. We had progressed perhaps half a mile, when a familiar shuddering sensation made it clear to us all that we had a puncture. Cursing, Jack eased the Rolls to a standstill, and he and Leslie changed the wheel, while the rest of us sat in sodden silence, and the rain beat down. Margo’s hair, so carefully prepared for the occasion, now hung in rat’s tails about her face. Mother looked as though she’d just finished swimming the Atlantic single-handed, while Larry was probably in the worst condition of all. He’d put the ear-flaps down on his deer-stalker, but a steady stream of water, like; miniature Niagara, flowed off the peak of his hat and into his lap. The thick tweed of his coat absorbed water with the eagerness and completeness of a Saharan sand-dune. The coat was heavy in itself, but now it had absorbed some ten gallons of rain water, it hung round Larry like a suit of damp armour.

“What I want to know, Mother, is what you’ve got against me?” he remarked, as Jack and Leslie got into the car and we started off again.

“Whatever do you mean, dear?” asked Mother. “I’ve got nothing against you. Don’t be silly.”

“I can’t believe that this is all fortuitous,” said Larry. “It seems too well planned, as if you had some deep, psychological urge to destroy me. Why didn’t you simply put a pillow over my face when I was in my pram? Why wait until I’m in my prime?”

“You do talk nonsense, Larry,” said Mother. “If a stranger heard you talking like that, he’d think you meant it.”

“I do mean it,” exclaimed Larry. “Never mind; my publishers are going to love the publicity “Famous Novelist killed by Mother. ‘I did it because I thought he was suffering,’ she said.”

“Oh, do be quiet, Larry!” said Mother. “You make me cross when you talk like that.”

“Well, the picnic was your idea,” Larry pointed out.

“But the Air Ministry roof . . .” Mother began.

“Spare me,” pleaded Larry. “If you mention the Air Ministry roof once again, I shall scream. One can only hope they have all been struck by lightning.”

We had now reached the top of the cliffs. It was almost as dark as twilight, and the driving curtains of rain were pushed and trembled by gusts of wind so that one could not see more than a short distance with any clarity. A flash of golden lightning, accompanied by au enormous clap of thunder right overhead, made both Mother and Margo squeak with apprehension. It was at that moment that we got our second puncture.

“Well,” said Jack, philosophically, as he pulled the car into the side of the road. “That’s it.”

There was a short silence.

“What do you mean: “that’s it”?” asked Larry. “Why don’t you change the wheel? It may have escaped your notice, but it’s still raining in the back here.”

“Can’t,” replied Jack, succinctly. “We’ve only got one spare.”

“Only one spare?” cried Larry, incredulously. “Dear God! What organization! What planning! Do you realize that if Stanley had carried on like this he’d still be looking for Livingstone?”

“Well, I can’t help it,” said Jack. “We’ve used up our spare. You don’t expect to get two punctures — one on top of the other.”

“The art of life is to be prepared for the unexpected,” said Larry.

“Well this is unexpected,” replied Margo. “If you’re so clever, you deal with it.”

“I will,” said Larry, to our surprise. “When surrounded by morons the only thing to do is to take charge.”

So saying, he climbed laboriously out of the car. “Where are you going, dear?” asked Mother. “Over there,” said Larry, pointing. “There is a man in a field. Don’t ask me what he is doing in the field in the pouring rain; he’s probably the village idiot. But from him I might ascertain where the nearest cottage or hostelry is with a telephone, and we can walk there and phone for a breakdown van.”

“That is clever of you,” said Mother, admiringly.

“Not really,” replied Larry. “It’s just that when you are surrounded on all sides by stupidity, any logical decision seems like a stroke of genius.”

He marched off down the road, and I followed him, determined not to miss anything.

We reached the field, on the far side of which was the man, pacing about among the rows of some newly-emerging crop, whistling cheerily to himself. His shoulders were protected from the rain by a sack, and another one was draped over his head. Now and then he’d pause, bend down, examine a plant carefully, and then pull it up. I began to wonder whether he was the village idiot. We made our way towards him, between the furrows. The dark earth was as sticky as molasses and long before we reached him, both Larry and I were carrying some five pounds of soil on each shoe.

“What with my coat weighing about eight-hundred pounds, and the mud on my shoes, I might well suffer a cardiac arrest,” panted Larry.

“Hello, there!” I called to the man as soon as we were within ear-shot. He straightened up and looked at us, mud-covered, dripping.

“Goo’ arternoon,” he called.

“You’d think, with its meteorological history, that the English language could have thought up another greeting, wouldn’t you?” said Larry. “It’s perfectly preposterous to say ‘good afternoon’ on a day whose climatic conditions could make even Noah worry.”

As we reached the man, Larry became as charming as his ridiculous costume and dripping condition would allow.

“So sorry to worry you,” he said, “but our car’s broken down. I was wondering if you’d be kind enough to tell us where the nearest telephone is, so that we can telephone for a breakdown van to come?”

The man studied us carefully. He had tiny, twinkling blue eyes and a hawk-like nose set in a great slab of a face as russet as an autumn apple.

“Telephone?” he queried. “There’s no telephone ’ere-abouts. No call for ’un really, sur — no, not out ’ere.”

“Yes, I understand,” went on Larry patiently, “but where’s the nearest one?”

“Nearest one?” said the man. “Nearest one . . . Now, let me think . . . It’s a good long time since I used the telephone, but it’ll come to me presently . . . Now, Geoff Rogers, he’s jist down the valley this way, but ’e ’asn’t got one . . . nor hasn’t Mrs Charlton, she’s up that way . . . no, I think your best solution, sur, is to go to the cross roads and turn right. That’ll bring you to ‘The Bull’ — the pub, sur, they’ve got a telephone . . . Least-ways, they ’ad one when I was there last spring.”

“I see,” said Larry. “How do we get to the cross roads from here?”

“It’s a tidy walk, sur,” said the man. “A good three miles it be.”

“If you could just give us directions,” Larry suggested.

“It’s a tidy walk an’ up ’ill most o’ the way,” went on the man.

“Well,” answered Larry, “that’s not important. If you could just tell us which . . .”

“I could lend you Molly,” said the man. “That ’ud be quicker.”

“I wouldn’t dream of inconveniencing your wife . . .” Larry began, when the man interrupted with a bellow of laughter.

“My wife!” he crowed. “My wife! Bless your soul, sur, but that’s a laugh, and no mistake. Molly ain’t my wife , bless you, sur. She’s my ’orse.”

“Oh,” said Larry. “Well, it’s very kind of you but I haven’t ridden for years, and we’ve already had one unfortunate experience with a horse today.”