The Corfu Trilogy Part 25

'Him,' said Lucretia, 'you don't want to trust him. He's a drunkard and a liar and it is well known in the village that he has got two wives.'

'So you are telling me,' said the judge, endeavouring to sort out this confusion, 'that the kyrios kyrios didn't swear at him in Greek and refuse payment for the turkeys.' didn't swear at him in Greek and refuse payment for the turkeys.'

'Of course he didn't,' said Lucretia. 'A kinder, finer, more upstanding kyrios kyrios...'

'Yes, yes, all right,' said the judge.

He sat pondering for some time while we all waited in suspense, then he glanced up and looked at Crippenopoulos.

'I can see no evidence,' he said, 'that the Englishman behaved in the way you have suggested. Firstly he does not speak Greek.'

'He does speak Greek,' shouted Crippenopoulos wrathfully. 'He called me a...'

'Will you be quiet,' said the judge coldly. 'Firstly, as I was saying, he does not speak Greek. Secondly, your own witness denies all knowledge of the incident. It seems to me clear, however, that you endeavoured to extract payment for turkeys which had not, in fact, been killed and eaten by the defendant's dog. However, you are not on trial here for that, so I will merely find the defendant not guilty, and you will have to pay the costs.'

Immediately pandemonium reigned. Crippenopoulos was on his feet, purple with rage, shouting at the top of his voice and calling on St Spiridion's aid. Spiro, bellowing like a bull, embraced Leslie, kissed him on both cheeks, and was followed by the weeping Lugaretzia who did likewise. It was some time before we managed to extricate ourselves from the court, and jubilantly we went down to the Esplanade and sat at a table under the trees to celebrate.

Presently the judge came past and we rose in a body to thank him and invite him to sit and have a drink with us. He refused the drink shyly and then fixed Leslie with a penetrating eye.

'I wouldn't like you to think,' he said, 'that justice in Corfu is always dispensed like that, but I had a long conversation with Spiro about the case and after some deliberation I decided that your crime was not as bad as the man's. I hoped it might teach him not to swindle foreigners in future.'

'Well, I really am most grateful to you,' said Leslie.

The judge gave a little bow. He glanced at his watch.

'Well, I must be going,' he said. 'By the way, thank you so much for those stamps you sent me yesterday. Among them were two quite rare ones which were new to my collection.'

Raising his hat he trotted off across the Esplanade.

Interlude for Spirits What seest thou else in the dark backward and abysm of time?

SHAKESPEARE, The Tempest The Tempest

Interlude for Spirits Not very long after Leslie's court case, Margo was beset by another affliction to keep company with her acne. She suddenly started to put on weight and before long, to her horror, she was almost circular. Androuch.e.l.li, our doctor, was called in to view this mystery. He uttered a long series of distressed 'Po, po, po's' as he viewed Margo's obesity. He tried her on several pills and potions and a number of diets, to no effect.

'He says,' Margo confided to us tearfully at lunch one day, 'that he thinks it's glandular.'

'Glandular?' said Mother, alarmed. 'What does he mean, glandular?'

'I don't know,' wailed Margo.

'Must we always discuss your ailments at mealtimes?' inquired Larry.

'Larry dear, Androuch.e.l.li says it's glandular,' said Mother.

'Rubbish,' said Larry airily. 'It's puppy fat.'

'Puppy fat!' squeaked Margo. 'Do you know how much I weigh?'

'What you want is more exercise,' said Leslie. 'Why don't you take up sailing?'

'Don't think the boat's big enough,' said Larry.

'Beast,' said Margo, bursting into tears. 'You wouldn't say things like that if you knew how I felt.'

'Larry dear,' said Mother placatingly, 'that wasn't a very kind thing to say.'

'Well, I can't help it if she's wandering around looking like a water-melon covered with spots,' said Larry irritably. 'One would think it was my my fault the way you all go on.' fault the way you all go on.'

'Something will have to be done,' said Mother. 'I shall see Androuch.e.l.li tomorrow.'

But Androuch.e.l.li repeated that he thought her condition might be glandular and that in his opinion Margo ought to go to London for treatment. So, after a flurry of telegrams and letters, Margo was dispatched to London and into the tender care of two of the only worth-while relatives with whom we were still on speaking terms, my mother's cousin Prudence and her mother, Great-Aunt Fan.

Apart from a brief letter saying she had arrived safely and that she, Cousin Prue, and Aunt Fan had taken up residence at a hotel near Notting Hill Gate and that she had been put in touch with a good doctor, we heard nothing further from Margo for a considerable length of time.

'I do wish she would write,' Mother said.

'Don't fuss, Mother,' said Larry. 'What's she got to write about, anyway, except to give you her new dimensions?'

'Well, I like to know what's going on,' said Mother. 'After all, she's in London London.'

'What's London got to do with it?' asked Larry.

'In a big city like that anything can happen,' said Mother darkly. 'You hear all sorts of things about girls in big cities.'

'Really, Mother, you do worry unnecessarily,' said Larry in exasperation. 'What do you think's happened to her, for Heaven's sake? Do you think she's being lured into some den of vice? They'd never get her through the door.'

'It's no joking matter, Larry,' said Mother severely.

'But you get yourself into a panic about nothing,' said Larry. 'I ask you, what self-respecting white slaver is going to look at Margo twice? I shouldn't think there's one strong enough to carry her off, anyway.'

'Well, I'm worried,' said Mother, 'and I'm going to send a cable.'

So she sent a cable to Cousin Prudence, who replied at length saying that Margo was a.s.sociating with people she didn't approve of, that she thought it would be a good thing if Mother came to talk some sense into her. Immediately pandemonium reigned. Mother, distraught, dispatched Spiro to buy tickets and started packing frantically, until she suddenly remembered me. Feeling it would do more harm than good to leave me in the tender care of my two elder brothers, she decided that I should accompany her. So Spiro was dispatched to get more tickets and yet more packing was done. I regarded the whole situation as heaven-sent, for I had just acquired a new tutor, Mr Richard Kralefsky, who was endeavouring with grim determination in the face of my opposition to instruct me in irregular French verbs, and this trip to England, I thought, would give me a much-needed respite from this torture.

The journey by train was uneventful, except that Mother was in constant fear of being arrested by the Fascist carabinieri. This fear increased a thousand fold when, at Milan, I drew a caricature of Mussolini on the steamy window of the carriage. Mother scrubbed at it for quite ten minutes with her handkerchief, with all the dedication of a washerwoman in a contest, before she was satisfied that it was obliterated.

Coming from the calm, slow, sunlit days of Corfu, our arrival in London, late in the evening, was a shattering experience. So many people were at the station that we did not know know, all hurrying to and fro, grey-faced and worried. The almost incomprehensible language that the porters spoke, and London aglitter with lights and churning with people. The taxi nosing its way through Piccadilly like a beetle through a firework display. The cold air that made your breath float like a web of smoke in front of your mouth as you talked, so that you felt like a character in a cartoon strip.

Eventually the taxi drew up outside the fake, soot-encrusted Corinthian columns of Balaklava Mansions. We got our luggage into the hotel with the aid of an elderly, bowlegged, Irish porter, but there was no one to greet us, so apparently the telegram signaling our arrival had gone astray. The young lady, we were informed by the porter, had gone to her meeting, and Miss Hughes and the old lady had gone to feed the dogs.

'What did he say, dear?' asked Mother when he had left the room, for his accent was so thick that it sounded almost as though he were talking a foreign language. I said that Margo had gone to a meeting and that Cousin Prue and Aunt Fan were feeding the dogs.

'What can can he mean?' said Mother, bewildered. 'What meeting has Margo gone to? What dogs is he talking about?' he mean?' said Mother, bewildered. 'What meeting has Margo gone to? What dogs is he talking about?'

I said I did not know but, from what I had seen of London, what it needed was a few more dogs around.

'Well,' said Mother, inexpertly putting a shilling in the meter and lighting the gas fire, 'I suppose we'll just have to make ourselves comfortable and wait until they come back.'

We had waited an hour when suddenly the door burst open and Cousin Prue rushed in, arms outstretched, crying 'Louise, Louise, Louise,' like some strange marsh bird. She embraced us both, her sloe dark eyes glowing with love and excitement. Her beautiful face, delicately scented, was soft as a pansy as I kissed her dutifully.

'I began to think that you were never coming,' she said. 'Mummy is on her way up. She finds the stairs trying, poor dear. Well, now, don't don't you both look well. You must tell me everything. Do you like this hotel, Louise? It's so cheap and convenient, but full of the most peculiar people.' you both look well. You must tell me everything. Do you like this hotel, Louise? It's so cheap and convenient, but full of the most peculiar people.'

A gentle wheezing sound made itself heard through the open door.

'Ah, there's Mummy,' cried Prue. 'Mummy! Mummy! Louise's here.'

Through the door appeared my Great-Aunt Fan. At first glance she looked, I thought rather uncharitably, like a walking tent. She was enveloped in a rusty-red tweed suit of incredible style and dimensions. It made her look like a russet-red pyramid of tweed. On her head she wore a somewhat battered velveteen hat of the style that pixies are reputedly wont to use. Her spectacles, through which her eyes stared owlishly, glittered.

'Louise!' she cried throwing her arms wide and casting her eyes up as though Mother were some divine apparition. 'Louise and Gerald! You have come!'

Mother and I were kissed and embraced heartily. This was not the feathery, petal-soft embrace of Cousin Prue. This was a hearty, rib-cracking embrace and a firm kiss that left your lips feeling bruised.

'I am so sorry we weren't here to greet you, Louise dear,' said Prue, 'but we weren't sure when you were arriving and we had the dogs to feed.'

'What dogs?' asked Mother.

'Why, my Bedlington puppies, of course,' said Prue. 'Didn't you know? Mummy and I have become dog-breeders.' She gave a coy, tinkling laugh.

'But you had something else last time,' said Mother. 'Goats or something, wasn't it?'

'Oh, we've still got those,' said Aunt Fan. 'And my bees and the chickens. But Prudence here thought it would be a good thing to start dog-breeding. She's got such a head for business.'

'I really think it's a paying concern, Louise dear,' said Prue earnestly. 'I bought Tinkerbell and then Lucybell...'

'And then Tinybell,' interrupted Aunt Fan.

'And Tinybell,' said Prue.

'And Lucybell,' said Aunt Fan.

'Oh, Mummy, do be quiet. I've already said Lucybell.'

'And there's Tinkerbell too,' said Aunt Fan.

'Mummy is a little hard of hearing,' said Prue unnecessarily, 'and they have all had puppies. I brought them up to London to sell and at the same time we have been keeping an eye on Margo.'

'Yes, where is Margo?' asked Mother.

Prue tiptoed over to the door and closed it softly.

'She's at a meeting meeting, dear,' she said.

'I know, but what sort of meeting?' asked Mother.

Prue glanced round nervously.

'A spiritualist spiritualist meeting,' she hissed. meeting,' she hissed.

'And then there's Lucybell,' said Aunt Fan.

'Oh, Mummy, do be quiet.'

'Spiritualist meeting?' said Mother. 'What on earth's she gone to a spiritualist meeting for?'

'To cure her fatness and her acne,' said Prue. 'But mark my words, no good will come of it. It's an evil power.'

I could see Mother beginning to get alarmed.

'But I don't understand,' she said. 'I sent Margo home to see that doctor, what's his name?'

'I know know you did, dear,' said Prue. 'Then, after she came to this hotel, she fell into the grasp of that evil woman.' you did, dear,' said Prue. 'Then, after she came to this hotel, she fell into the grasp of that evil woman.'

'What evil woman?' said Mother, now considerably alarmed.

'The goats are well too,' said Aunt Fan, 'but their milk yield is down a little this year.'

'Oh, Mummy, do shut up,' hissed Prue. 'I mean that evil woman, Mrs Haddock.'

'Haddock, haddock,' said Mother, bewildered. Her train of thought was always liable to be interrupted if anything culinary was mentioned.

'She's a medium, my dear,' said Prue, 'and she's got her hooks on Margo. She's told Margo that she's got a guide.'

'A guide?' said Mother feebly. 'What sort of guide?'

I could see, in her distraught condition, that she was now beginning to think Margo had taken up mountaineering or some similar occupation.

'A spirit guide,' said Prue. 'It's called Mawake. He's supposed to be a Red Indian.'

'I have ten hives now,' said Aunt Fan proudly. 'We get twice as much honey.'

'Mother, be quiet,' said Prue.

'I don't understand,' said Mother plaintively. 'Why isn't she still going to the doctor for her injections?'

'Because Mawake told her not to,' said Prue triumphantly. 'Three seances ago, he said according to Margo, and of course the whole thing comes through Mrs Haddock so you can't trust it for a moment according to Margo, Mawake said she was to have no more punctures.'

'Punctures?' said Mother.

'Well, I suppose it's Red Indian for injections,' said Prue.

'It is nice to see you again, Louise,' said Aunt Fan. 'I think we ought to have a cup of tea.'

'That's a very good idea,' said Mother faintly.