Berry And Co. (17 page)

“Is Katharine’s advertisement in?” I asked.

My sister nodded.

“She’s put her telephone number, too.”

“Has she? She will be mad when she sees we’ve had the same idea.”

“Ah,” said Berry. “I’d forgotten the telephone. That’s another vulnerable spot. I shouldn’t wonder if—”

The sentence was never finished.

The hurried stammer of the telephone bell made a dramatic irruption, and Jill, who was in the act of drinking, choked with excitement.

In silence we listened, to be quite sure. A second prolonged vibration left no room for doubt.

“They’re off,” said Berry.

“I – I feel quite nervous,” said Daphne. “Let Falcon answer it.”

But Jill was already at the door…

Breathlessly we awaited her return.

Nobby, apparently affected by the electricity with which the air was charged, started to relieve his feelings by barking stormily. The nervous outburst of reproof which greeted his eloquence was so unexpectedly menacing that he retired precipitately beneath the table, his small white tail clapped incontinently between his legs.

The next moment Jill tore into the room.

“It’s a cook!” she cried in a tempestuous whisper. “It’s a cook! She wants to speak to Daphne. It’s a trunk call. She’s rung up from Torquay.”

“Torquay!” I cried aghast. “Good Heavens!”

“What did I say?” said Berry. My sister rose in some trepidation. “Two hundred miles is nothing. Have another hunk of toast. It was only made on Sunday, so I can recommend it.”

Daphne hastened from the room, with Jill twittering at her heels, and in some dudgeon I cut myself a slice of bread.

Berry turned his attention to the Sealyham.

“Nobby, my lad, come here.”

Signifying his delight at this restoration to favour by an unusually elaborate rotatory movement of his tail, the terrier emerged from his cover and humbled himself at his patron’s feet. The latter picked him up and set him upon his knee.

“My lad,” he said, “this is going to be a momentous day. Cooks, meet to be bitten, are due to arrive in myriads. Be ruthless. Spare neither the matron nor the maid. What did Mr Henry say in 1415?—

This day is call’d the feast of Sealyham:

She that outlives this day, and comes safe home,

Will sit with caution when this day is named,

And shudder at the name of Sealyham.

She that shall live this day, and see old age,

Will yearly on the razzle feast her neighbours,

And say, ‘Tomorrow is Saint Sealyham’:

Then will she strip her hose and show her scars,

And say, ‘These wounds I had on Nobby’s day.’

Old cooks forget; yet all shall be forgot,

But she’ll remember with a flood of talk

What feats you did that day.”

Nobby licked his face enthusiastically.

Then came a swift rush across the hall, and Daphne and Jill pelted into the room.

“She’s coming up for an interview tomorrow,” panted the latter. “Six years in her last place, but the people are going abroad. If we engage her, she can come on Monday. Sixty pounds a year.”

Daphne was beaming.

“I must say I liked the sound of her. Very respectful she seemed. Her name’s rather unusual, but that isn’t her fault. Pauline Roper. I fancy she’s by way of being an expert. She’s got a certificate from some institute of cookery, and her sister’s a trained nurse in Welbeck Street. That’s why she wants to be in London. What’s the return fare from Torquay?” she added. “I said I’d pay it, if I took up her reference.”

“Oh, something under five pounds,” said Berry.

“What!”

“My dear,” said her husband, “if the expenditure of that sum were to ensure me a breakfast the very sight of which did not make my gorge rise, I should regard it as a trustee investment.”

Reference to a time-table showed that the price of Pauline Roper’s ticket would be two pounds nine shillings and fourpence halfpenny.

Somewhat to our surprise and greatly to our relief, the day passed without another application for the post of cook, personal or otherwise.

To celebrate the solitary but promising response to our SOS signal, and the prospect which it afforded of an early deliverance from our state, we dined at the
Berkeley
and went to the play.

On returning home we found a telegram in the hall. It had been handed in at Paris, and ran as follows:

Cook called Camille François leaving for Cholmondeley Street tomorrow aaa can speak no English so must be met at Dover aaa boat due 4.15 aaa Jonah.

The train roared through Ashford, and Berry looked at his watch. Then he sighed profoundly and began to commune with himself in a low tone.

“
Mille pardons, madame. Mais vous êtes Camille François? Non? Quel dommage! Dix mille pardons. Adieu
… Deuce of a lot of ‘milles,’ aren’t there? I wonder if there’ll be many passengers. And will she come first-class, or before the mast? You know, this is a wild mare’s chest, and that’s all there is to it. We shall insult several hundred women, miss the cook, and probably lose Pauline into the bargain. What did I come for?”

“Nonsense,” said Jill stoutly. “Jonah’s told her to look out for us.”

“I’ll bet he never thought I should be fool enough to roll up, so she won’t expect me. As a matter of fact, if he’s described anyone, he’s probably drawn a lifelike word-picture of Daphne.”

“It’s no good worrying,” said I. “The only thing to do is to address every woman who looks in the least like a cook as she steps off the gangway. When we do strike her, Jill can carry on.”

“It’s all very well,” said Berry, “but what does a cook look like, or look least like, or least look like? I suppose you know what you mean.” Jill began to shake with laughter. “She’ll probably be all dressed up to give us a treat, and, for all we know, she may have a child with her, and, if she’s pretty, it’s a hundred to one some fellow will be seeing her off the boat. You can’t rule out any one. And to accost strange women indiscriminately is simply asking for trouble. Understand this: when I’ve been knocked down twice, you can count me out.”

This was too much for Jill, who made no further efforts to restrain her merriment. Fixing her with a sorrowful look, my brother-in-law sank back in his corner with a resigned air.

Jonah’s telegram had certainly complicated matters.

We had received it too late to prevent the dispatch of the cook whose services he had apparently enlisted. After a prolonged discussion we had decided that, while Daphne must stay and interview Pauline Roper, the rest of us had better proceed to Dover with the object of meeting the boat. It was obvious that Jill must go to deal with the immigrant when the latter had been identified, but she could not be expected to effect the identification. I was unanimously chosen for this responsible task, but I refused point-blank to make the attempt single-handed. I argued with reason that it was more than one man could do, and that the performance of what was, after all, a highly delicate operation must be shared by Berry. After a titanic struggle the latter gave in, with the result that Jill and he and I had left London by the eleven o’clock train. This was due to arrive at Dover at two minutes to one, so that we should have time for lunch and to spare before the boat came in.

But that was not all.

The coming of Jonah’s
protégée
made it impossible for my sister to engage Pauline Roper out of hand. Of course the latter might prove impossible, which, in a way, would simplify the position. If, as was more probable, she seemed desirable, the only thing to do was to pay her fare and promise to let her know within twenty-four hours whether we would engage her or not. That would give us time to discover whether Camille François was the more promising of the two.

Whatever happened, it was painfully clear that our engagement of a cook was going to prove one of the most costly adventures of its kind upon which we had ever embarked.

The train steamed into Dover one minute before its scheduled time, and we immediately repaired to the Lord Warden Hotel.

Lunch was followed by a comfortable half-hour in the lounge, after which we decided to take the air until the arrival of the packet.

Perhaps the most famous of the gates of England, Dover has always worn a warlike mien. Less formidable than renowned Gibraltar, there is a look of grim efficiency about her heights, an air of masked authority about the windy galleries hung in her cold grey chalk, something of Roman competence about the proud old gatehouse on the Castle Hill. Never in mufti, never in gaudy uniform, Dover is always clad in “service” dress. A thousand threats have made her porterage a downright office, bluntly performed. And so those four lean years, that whipped the smile from many an English hundred, seem to have passed over the grizzled Gate like the east wind, leaving it scatheless. About herself no change was visible. As we leaned easily upon the giant parapet of the Admiralty Pier, watching the tireless waves dance to the
cappriccio
of wind and sun, there was but little evidence to show that the portcullis, recently hoist, had for four years been down. Under the shadow of the Shakespeare Cliff the busy traffic of impatient Peace fretted as heretofore. The bristling sentinels were gone: no craft sang through the empty air: no desperate call for labour wearied tired eyes, clawed at strained nerves, hastened the scurrying feet: no longer from across the Straits came flickering the ceaseless grunt and grumble of the guns. The wondrous tales of nets, of passages of arms, of sallies made at dawn – mortal immortal exploits – seemed to be chronicles of another age. The ways and means of War, so lately paramount, were out of sight. As in the days before, the march of Trade and caravan of Pleasure jostled each other in the Gate’s mouth. Only the soldierly aspect of the place remained – Might in a faded surcoat, her shabby scabbard hiding a loose bright blade…

The steamer was up to time.

When four o’clock came she was well in sight, and at fourteen minutes past the hour the rattle of the donkey-engine came to a sudden stop, and a moment later the gangways were thrust and hauled into their respective positions.

Berry and I stood as close to the actual points of disembarkation as convenience and discretion allowed, while Jill hovered excitedly in the background.

As the passengers began to descend—

“Now for it,” said my brother-in-law, settling his hat upon his head. “I feel extremely nervous and more ill at ease than I can ever remember. My mind is a seething blank, and I think my left sock-suspender is coming down. However… Of course, it is beginning to be forcibly what they call ‘borne in upon’ me that we ought to have brought some barbed wire and a turnstile. As it is, we shall miss about two-thirds of them. Here’s your chance,” he added, nodding at a stout lady with a green suit-case and a defiant glare. “I’ll take the jug and bottle department.”

I had just time to see that the object of his irreverence was an angular female with a brown paper parcel and a tumbler, when my quarry gained
terra firma
and started in the direction of the train.

I raised my hat.

“
Pardon, madame
.
Mais vous êtes Camille
—”

“Reeang,” was the discomfiting reply. “Par de baggarge.”

I realized that an offer which I had not made had been rejected, and that the speaker was not of French descent.

The sting of the rebuff was greatly tempered by the reception with which Berry’s advances were met.

I was too late to hear what he had said, but the resentment which his attempt had provoked was disconcertingly obvious.

After fixing my brother-in-law with a freezing stare, his addressee turned as from an offensive odour and invested the one word she thought fit to employ with an essence of loathing which was terrible to hear.

“Disgusting!”

Berry shook his head.

“The right word,” he said, “was ‘monstrous.’”

He turned to accost a quiet-looking girl wearing an oil-silk gaberdine and very clearly born upon the opposite side of the Channel.

With a sigh, I addressed myself to a widow with a small boy clad in a
pélérine
. To my embarrassment she proved to be deaf, but when I had stumblingly repeated my absurd interrogation, she denied the impeachment with a charming smile. During our exchange of courtesies the child stood staring at me with a finger deep in his mouth. At their conclusion he withdrew this and pointed it directly at my chin.

“
Pourquoi s’est-il coupé, maman
?” he demanded in a piercing treble.

The question was appropriate, but unanswerable.

His mother lugged him incontinently away.

Berry was confronting one of the largest ladies I have ever seen. As he began to speak, she interrupted him.

“Vous êtes Meestair Baxtair, n’est-ce pas? Ah, c’est bien ça. J’avais si peur de ne pas vous trouver. Mais maintenant je suis tranquille. Mon mari me suit. Ah, le voilà!”
She turned about, the better to beckon to a huge man with two bags and a hold-all.
“Pierre! Pierre!”

Beneath the avalanche of good-will Berry stood paralysed.

Recognizing that something must be done, I sought to interfere.

“Leave me alone,” said Berry weakly. “I’ve – I’ve got off.”

It took all my energy and most of my French to convince his
vis-à-vis
that she was mistaken.

During the interlude about fifteen “possibles” escaped us.

I threw a despairing glance in Jill’s direction, wiped the sweat from my brow, and returned to the attack.

After four more failures my nerve began to go. Miserably I turned to my brother-in-law.

He was in the act of addressing a smart-looking girl in black, bearing a brand-new valise and some wilting roses.

Before she had had time to appreciate his inquiry there was a choking yell from the gangway, and a very dark gentleman, with an Italian cast of countenance, thrust his explosive way on to the pier.

My knowledge of his native tongue was limited to
carissimo, spaghetti
, and one or two musical directions, but from the vehemence of his tone and the violence of his dramatic gestures it was plain that the torrent which foamed from his lips was both menacing and abusive. From the shape of the case which he was clutching beneath his left arm, I judged him to be an exponent of the guitar.