Read Online The Convivial Codfish by Charlotte MacLeod - Free Book Online

elegant parlor car, he’d say each passenger had troubles enough of his own to contend with.
    Those who weren’t still looking dazed and nursing their own or some friend’s injuries were making futile efforts to straighten out the general mess. Though the train’s usual furnishings were bolted to the floor, a number of extra chairs and occasional tables had been brought in for the passengers’ convenience. These of necessity were small, flimsy affairs and most of them had gone flying when the train stopped, carrying with them crystal, napkins, ashtrays, beaded handbags, gloves, fans, smelling bottles, lorgnettes, pince-nez, and monocles guests had been laying aside after they’d made their initial effects.
    Among the debris was a shocking amount of broken glass. It was dangerous to have around, but apparently nothing could be done about it right now except to pick up the shards one by one. Such implements as brooms and dustpans, Hester Tolbathy had to keep explaining, were brought down from the house when the train had to be cleaned and taken back there afterward. She was begging everyone not to bother, but that only spurred them to greater efforts, as always happens when a hostess is most desperate for people to quit milling around and give her a chance to cope.
    One dowager, though, took a dim view of risking her petticoats among the slivers. “Why aren’t the servants taking care of this?” she demanded.
    “The servants? Oh, you mean the caterers,” said the much-tried Hester Tolbathy. “I suppose they feel it’s not their job, which it really isn’t. Besides, they must be having problems of their own. Heaven knows what’s happened to all that food they were getting ready to set out for the buffet. Could somebody please go and see? I don’t dare leave my patient.”
    She was sitting on the floor with Mr. Twipp’s head in her lap, doling brandy into him from the end of a teaspoon. He looked worse than Wouter Tolbathy.
    “I’ll go,” said Max. He’d have gone anyway. Being so much the youngest and nimblest, he was in the caboose before anybody else could get started. There, he found three women in the trim black and white uniforms he’d seen earlier. As he’d expected, they were trying to reassemble the makings for what must have been planned as a truly sumptuous Edwardian supper. When they saw him open the door, one of the women giggled, somewhat hysterically.
    “You’d better not come in here. We’re picking your dinner off the floor. For Pete’s sake, don’t tell anybody I said that. Would you know if we’re supposed to go ahead and serve, or what?”
    “I’d say or what,” Max told her. “It’s an awful mess out there. We’re headed back to our starting point, and should arrive any minute now. There are two serious injuries that I know of, I don’t know how many minor ones, and the dining car’s full of broken glass. What I expect Mrs. Tolbathy will want you to do is take whatever of the food is salvageable to the house and set up your buffet there, so the passengers can eat quickly and get along home. Nobody’s in a party mood any more.”
    “What a shame,” said the woman who appeared to be in charge of the catering crew. “It started out as such an elegant affair. Pam and Angie and I were looking forward to serving the buffet. Mostly we get run-of-the-mill jobs like corporation luncheons and wedding receptions. What happened to the train, do you know?”
    “Mr. Tolbathy thinks it may have been a deer on the track,” said Max. That was as good a prevarication as any. “By the way, where’s your boss? The man with the fancy corkscrew?”
    The woman called Angie shrugged. “Marge was asking me that just before the train stopped. We thought he’d be back to see about the wines for dinner. He’s got nothing to do with us, though. He just breezed in here and started giving orders. Then he went off somewhere and we haven’t seen him since.”
    “When did you first see