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Authors: Mark Evans
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nearly turned inside out, and my entire body to recoil in stenchy horror, bumping hard into Harry beside me.
‘Oh, great, you’ve knocked over my fantasy fondue! Can someone pass me a simulated serviette?’ As he knelt beneath the table to clean up a spill that existed only in his imagination, I decided that Harry might be taking the mimed meals a little too seriously.
‘Mumble, grunge, mumble,’ the servant repeated. But then: ‘’Ere, ’ave this, young ’un . . .’
Words? Actual words? This grim-perfumed, lower-class hag could speak actual words? 5 I was so stunned that I barely realized she was handing me something.
‘Wh-what is it?’
‘It’s a dumpling.’ It was indeed a dumpling. But she was not done with her handing. ‘And here’s a carrot.’ She did not lie, it was a carrot. And still she was not done. ‘And a sliver of game terrine. And a nice bit of Cheddar, couple of omelettes, slice of gammon, a mackerel salad, some stuffed mushrooms and a Wiener Schnitzel.’
Truly this servant spoke truly, for from beneath her grimy robes she withdrew all these comestibles and placed them on the table before me. I could barely believe it: food! Real food! With all its smells and tastes and stomach-filling potential. Though I don’t like mushrooms.
‘You’d better eat it quick, afore the headmaster sees you.’
‘But . . . why are you doing this? Who are you?’
‘I’m just a friend.’ I had never had a grotesque crone for a friend, yet if food she had provided me with then friend she definitely was and, that food having been provided, friend indeed she had become. 6 ‘A friend who’s here to help ye escape. Meet me here at midnight and I shall tell ye more. Mumble, grunge, mumble.’
She grunged mumblily away, a haze of filth and rank reek trailing after her. Who was this strange creature? Why had she fed me? Would she really help me escape? And why did she not wash more or dress better? All these questions crossed my mind like an ugly man crossing a dance-floor in search of a partner, that is to say quickly and without answer.
‘What a mess!’ Harry had finally finished mime-mopping his imaginary spill and now sat back up at the table. Seeing the food the servant had left, his eyes went wider than Queen Victoria after an all-you-can-eat sausage buffet. 7 ‘Oh, great! Now it is as if I can actually see real food! Curse my gastronomic imagination!’
In frustration he banged his head on the table, thereby squashing the stuffed mushrooms and affixing them to his forehead, which was fine because, as I mentioned before, I don’t like mushrooms.
‘No, Harry. It is real food. Given to me. Help yourself.’
‘No, it’s yours. I couldn’t.’
But he could, and he did, for though his words said one thing his actions said another, and as our fellow pupils simply stared, the sight of actual, edible fare stunning them into inaction, Harry descended on the food like a swarm of peckish locusts or a hungry hurricane. At length, he sat back and emitted a loud, satisfied burp.
‘Oh, tremendous. That is the best and only meal I’ve had in ages,’ he said, as a mushroom slid from his forehead and into his mouth, punctuating the meal with a savoury full-stop.
Harry and I were the only non-hungry boys in the school that day, apart from Bissington, who had eaten his own arm, and Frobisher, who had in turn eaten Bissington. But the meal had provided more than mere physical food, for the appearance of the mysterious servant meant I had also dined on the psychic food of hope.
1 Now defunct phrase derived from Latin meaning ‘grapes that can be made into wine’.
2 The Great Coffee and Cake Shortage of 1867 stopped every writer in Britain being able to work for several months, just after the author had completed the first part of the book. On starting the second part some months later, he found he had somewhat lost his thread, hence the meandering nature of this section.
3 A reference to
‘Oh, great, you’ve knocked over my fantasy fondue! Can someone pass me a simulated serviette?’ As he knelt beneath the table to clean up a spill that existed only in his imagination, I decided that Harry might be taking the mimed meals a little too seriously.
‘Mumble, grunge, mumble,’ the servant repeated. But then: ‘’Ere, ’ave this, young ’un . . .’
Words? Actual words? This grim-perfumed, lower-class hag could speak actual words? 5 I was so stunned that I barely realized she was handing me something.
‘Wh-what is it?’
‘It’s a dumpling.’ It was indeed a dumpling. But she was not done with her handing. ‘And here’s a carrot.’ She did not lie, it was a carrot. And still she was not done. ‘And a sliver of game terrine. And a nice bit of Cheddar, couple of omelettes, slice of gammon, a mackerel salad, some stuffed mushrooms and a Wiener Schnitzel.’
Truly this servant spoke truly, for from beneath her grimy robes she withdrew all these comestibles and placed them on the table before me. I could barely believe it: food! Real food! With all its smells and tastes and stomach-filling potential. Though I don’t like mushrooms.
‘You’d better eat it quick, afore the headmaster sees you.’
‘But . . . why are you doing this? Who are you?’
‘I’m just a friend.’ I had never had a grotesque crone for a friend, yet if food she had provided me with then friend she definitely was and, that food having been provided, friend indeed she had become. 6 ‘A friend who’s here to help ye escape. Meet me here at midnight and I shall tell ye more. Mumble, grunge, mumble.’
She grunged mumblily away, a haze of filth and rank reek trailing after her. Who was this strange creature? Why had she fed me? Would she really help me escape? And why did she not wash more or dress better? All these questions crossed my mind like an ugly man crossing a dance-floor in search of a partner, that is to say quickly and without answer.
‘What a mess!’ Harry had finally finished mime-mopping his imaginary spill and now sat back up at the table. Seeing the food the servant had left, his eyes went wider than Queen Victoria after an all-you-can-eat sausage buffet. 7 ‘Oh, great! Now it is as if I can actually see real food! Curse my gastronomic imagination!’
In frustration he banged his head on the table, thereby squashing the stuffed mushrooms and affixing them to his forehead, which was fine because, as I mentioned before, I don’t like mushrooms.
‘No, Harry. It is real food. Given to me. Help yourself.’
‘No, it’s yours. I couldn’t.’
But he could, and he did, for though his words said one thing his actions said another, and as our fellow pupils simply stared, the sight of actual, edible fare stunning them into inaction, Harry descended on the food like a swarm of peckish locusts or a hungry hurricane. At length, he sat back and emitted a loud, satisfied burp.
‘Oh, tremendous. That is the best and only meal I’ve had in ages,’ he said, as a mushroom slid from his forehead and into his mouth, punctuating the meal with a savoury full-stop.
Harry and I were the only non-hungry boys in the school that day, apart from Bissington, who had eaten his own arm, and Frobisher, who had in turn eaten Bissington. But the meal had provided more than mere physical food, for the appearance of the mysterious servant meant I had also dined on the psychic food of hope.
1 Now defunct phrase derived from Latin meaning ‘grapes that can be made into wine’.
2 The Great Coffee and Cake Shortage of 1867 stopped every writer in Britain being able to work for several months, just after the author had completed the first part of the book. On starting the second part some months later, he found he had somewhat lost his thread, hence the meandering nature of this section.
3 A reference to
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