Bunbury, Quincunx and Quatrefoil

Tags

anaphoric reference, Cafe Moroc, Camelot, codicil, Deus quem punire.., Fusion food, Guenevere and Lancelot, Japanese oak, kelim, kofte, Kundry, Latin Verse Speaking Competition, meze, Morgan Le Fey, Parsifal, Pele Tower, Pit Bull, Pliny, quatrefoil, Quincunx, Ridebis et, Simon Bolivar, Vickers machine gun, Wagner

Sitting in the offices of Bunbury, Quincunx and Quatrefoil Solicitors

in Rochester, Dru was digging her metal-tipped heel into the Japanese

oak parquet, which was irritating Mr Bunbury Junior considerably, though

he tried to remain professionally impassive, only occasionally clearing his

throat, like a Pit Bull on a restraint lead.

With his monogrammed handkerchief – BQ&Q- he mopped at

excessive saliva, which her small time act of vandalism was

provoking...so the stirrup cups are endowed to the museum, but

I have some personal papers for you.  He handed over a brown

envelope to Gus.  Can you initial for receipt, please?  He then

reached down and lifted a few school magazines bound with a

perished rubber band from the floor.

Gus immediately recognised back numbers of St

Birinus Middle‘s annual publication, from the 60s.

They seem to cover 1955-62, Mr Bunbury explained.  Your father

apparently treasured your team photos.  He asterisked the year when

you captained the 1st XI.  He has annotated the Prize-giving List for

1961, when you took the Classics Cup for Latin Public Speaking.

I remember that, said Snod, flicking through the yellowed pages.

I had to memorise and deliver some Pliny.  Something along the

lines of Ridebis et licet..

..rideat, supplied Bunbury Junior, who had come second in his prep

school’s Latin Verse Speaking Competition with the very same passage

and had his defeat bitterly imprinted on his memory forever.  Pliny the

Elder.

You will notice a communication from Lady Wivern, your mother,

which outlines the financial arrangements she made with Miss

Snodbury over your welfare and protection, when she released you into

her care.

Mehercule! Snod ejaculated. Deus quem punire uit demerat.

What? said Dru, digging her heel into the floor even more deeply.

Whom God will destroy He first makes mad, supplied Mr Bunbury,

eager to show his linguistic prowess.

Pliny the Younger, Snod stated firmly with an anaphoric reference

which Bunbury was incapable of tracing.

Instead the solicitor cleared his throat, glared at Dru’s foot and

continued, The codicil clarifies her wishes and we have drawn up

instructions as to how you may gain access to the bank vault and its

contents. We will send you further details along with your-ahem!–

(here a further glare at Dru’s heel).. with a note of our charges.

And a bill for repairs to the floor, he wanted to add.

He burbled on in a factual manner for a few more minutes.

Snod and Drusilla retired to The Cafe Moroc– a ‘fusion of Regency

decadence and Moroccan chic’, according to its advertising blurb.

Gus had had enough decadence for one day, so they concentrated

on twelve different meze dishes (to share) and a lamb kofte.

I don’t understand, whispered Dru.  What’s been going on?

Snod was in deep shock, but it didn’t prevent him from demolishing

eight out of the twelve dishes, which Dru thought was somewhat

unfair, especially as he went for her favourites with a vengeance,

adding yet another stain to his, thankfully, polka-dotted tie.

Berenice was not his mother; Hugo de Sousa was not his half-brother;

Aunt Augusta was not his aunt, nor Dru’s great-aunt.  The other

Augusta who had run wild in the Bosphorous was not his grandmother,

nor Dru’s great-grandmother, though the sale of the inherited kelims

had paid for his music lessons and ‘extras’..

Dru could see the carrot of being Aunt Augusta’s sole legatee

vanishing as rapidly as the meze.

So, she slowly worked it out, Anthony Revelly, the toy boy tutor, had

an affair with the widowed Lady Wivern.  The Vickers machine gun accident

didn’t knock the balls off his potential coronet then.

Coronet?

Okay, I suppose it was Lord Wivern’s then.  Or was the title in her family?

I don’t know, Snod said wearily.  They clearly did not marry.  Mmm.. I

suppose Lionel and Peregrine were my half-brothers.  I may be entitled to

pre-fix ‘The Honourable’  to my name.

But the boys are both dead, aren’t they?  And they didn’t have any family?

Not as far as I know.  There’s nothing mentioned in the paperwork.  Oh,

really, it’s all too much.

You mentioned your name, Drusilla persisted.  But you may have been

given the Christian name ‘Augustus’ to help to recreate your identity.

She refused to use the PC term ‘forename’.  In that she was her father’s

daughter.

Yes, apparently Lady Wivern called me Arthur Parsifal.  Snod looked

abashed. I’ve never really liked Wagner.  Too narcissistic.

The Honourable Arthur Parsifal Revelly?  Dru choked on a chick pea.

Ah, like Kundry, you are the first to address me by the name my mother

gave me.

Kundry?

In the opera. ‘The wound, the wound, it burns within my heart’

Right.  Dru didn’t know what he was rambling on about. What was Lady

Wivern’s name?

Aurelia Tindall, according to all this bumf.  Of Coquetbrookdale.  Her ancestors

had owned a pele tower in the Borders.

Oh, I’ve always wanted to live in a pele tower, breathed Dru.  Murgatroyd, he

whose name must not be spoken, is renovating one up there, according to

mother.

Well, we won’t be inheriting a domesticated fortification either.  It was in ruins

and so it was unsaleable and couldn’t alleviate her insolvency or save Wyvern

Mote from being left to the nation.

So, Berenice dumped you after she received payment to take you on as her son?

She tried to foist you off on her mother and then her sister took charge of the

whole sorry mess.   All that in spite of having been paid a fair whack,

no doubt.

Enough to cost Aurelia Wyvern Mote; but enough to pave Berenice’s way to

decamping to the land of her hero, Simon Bolivar.

There’s a detail that you’re missing, Dru pointed out, quickly mopping up

some sauce with a torn corner of pita bread.

Only one? Gus sighed.

You are Arthur, King of Camelot.

So, in that case I must forgive Guenevere and Lancelot if life is to go on.

Guenevere?  Lancelot?

Anthony and Aurelia, I suppose, Snod nodded.  Oh, you’ve finished all the

chick peas.

Yes, I have you greedy old.. She checked any outward expression of her

inner turmoil. And Aunt Augusta?  Shall we still take her out?  she asked

instead.

Morgan le Fey!  But at least she didn’t plot against me, so we shouldn’t

punish her, though she’s no water sprite, that’s for sure. No, let the healing

begin!

And he tossed her the envelope and its contents.  Some of this applies to

you.

 

 

Tarka Dahl

Tags

Alsatian, Cobra beer, Drusus, fakir, Food Hygiene Rating, Henry Williamson, Jamie Cullum, Jean Rhys, jellied eels, Kingfisher beer, kipper, lamphrey, mongoose, Naan, Neil Gunn, Pliny, Poppadom, Prawn Dansak, Shahjanee, Silver Darlings, smiggle, Sophie Dahl, Tarka Dahl, Tarka the Otter, Wide Sargasso Sea, Wind in the Willows

Brassica and I decided to go out for a curry at Benares Balti,

since the town was freezing cold.  Apparently they had a new

menu, so we thought we would give it a go.

We were shown to a table for two right under the speaker

which over-amplifies the CD on a loop.  No matter.  I’ve heard it

so many times that I just switch off, as I do when my husband

talks to me about budgeting.

Hmm, Suttonford Shahjanee with saffron rice and star anise sounds

interesting, I opined.

 Two Cobras- half pints, please, Brassie told the levitating waiter.

Where had he come from?  Was there a coil of rope in the corner

where he kept his mongooses?  Mongice?

Okay.  So my friend would like Number 42 and I’ll have the Tarka

Dahl, Brassie informed him politely.

No.  Wait! You can’t possibly, I interjected.  I don’t approve.

What are you on about? queried Brassie.  Why can’t I have it?

Haven’t you read that classic book by Henry Williamson? I asked.

Tarka The Otter.  You can’t eat a curry named after one of those

gloriously sinuous creatures. And what about Portly and his daddy in

Wind in the Willows?  They were practically human.  They complained

about the noisy, materialistic behaviour of other wild creatures in their

environment.  You can’t eat such superior moral beings.  They have much

to instruct their human neighbours.

Especially in a town such as Suttonford, I suppose, Brassie agreed,

grudgingly. But, don’t be ridiculous, Candia!  What’s in a name? as the

Bard said.  Do you think Jamie Cullum and his band avoid post-

performance Indian take-aways, just because he’s married to

Sophie, whose surname is reminiscent of a lentil curry? Indians are

probably the only places open at that time of the morning.  They can’t

afford to be picky.

I turned round, but the waiter had seemingly ascended his rope,

or gone to seek out the Cobras with his mongoose.

Shhh!  It’s just that otters have been spotted in The River Sutton,

I whispered.  It’s all too close to home.

How long have they been there? Brassie silently mouthed.

About five million years, give or take a few periods when they

went on holiday, I informed her.

You don’t think..? Her eyes grew wide.  Rumours of tethered

Alsatians were coming back to haunt her. But she could see the

Food Hygiene Rating certificate showed a 4, so that was

reassuring, surely.

The waiter returned with the drinks.  He lit a candle under the hot

plate.

Have a Prawn Dansak instead, I suggested.

Well, I suppose no one has immortalised their pet prawn, have

they?  Brassie can become very silly.  

I wonder if people have ever curried eels?  I mean, they jellied them,

didn’t they? I mused.  They still do.

Next you’ll be saying that they shouldn’t smiggle them from their

coverts- I think I have used the correct term-as you have just read

Jean Rhys’ The Wide Sargasso Sea!  Or one shouldn’t eat a kipper if

one is a fan of Neil Gunn.

Neil Gunn?

The Silver Darlings, darling!

I broke a Poppadum and dipped it in some chutney.  You know

a Roman Emperor once had a tame lamphrey and Pliny said that

certain notables called their fish by name.  Antonia, the wife of

Drusus, used to hang jewels in their gills.

This lady is ready?  The waiter had crept up on us again.  Very sorry

to say, but no Tarka Dahl tonight.

Well, that’s a relief, I replied.  She’ll have the Prawn Dansak.

Naan?

One plain; one spicy. He noted this down.

Sometimes it’s better not to know, I said to Brassie.  Wait!  Can I

have a Kingfisher, please?

But our attendant fakir had disappeared again.

There’s nothing like a curry on a cold night.

The Cramond Lioness

Tags

Alex Salmond, Cramond Lioness, Lion Rampant, Pliny, Scottish Independance

Here’s one for Alex Salmond!

THE CRAMOND LIONESS

(a Roman artefact discovered in Jan., 1997 in the River Almond,

near Cramond)

 

 

Celtic prey, you’re about to be ravaged

in the savage amphitheatre method.

Bored tyrants only have to drop their thumbs.

Your arms are back-stretched, yet it does not bite.

II

Native populations felt such talons-

and teeth.  Yet Pliny once remarked that lions,

alone of wild beasts, show mercy to those

who will prostrate themselves as conquered foes.

III

A Roman carved it, shaped sandstone to beast.

Why do the snakes on its plinth crawl away?

Are they deserting Caledonia?

Will our ancestral spirits leave us too?

IV

Ferryman, your sighting of this statue

caused its salvage, as the Lion Rampant

tosses its wild mane, unsheaths its claws,

unscathed by its submersion in Time’s silt.

V

Will Scotland’s lion be merciful to those

who kept it as a leisure ornament;

stained it with iron salts of industry;

chucked it down the river when the time came?

VI

Both inefficient walls have crumbled now;

tides and tables eventually been turned.

Iron has entered the lion’s soul.

Puissant once more, pray it licks those who bow.

English: Cramond Lion – an exhibit in the Royal Museum, Chambers Street. The statue, actually a lioness, was found in the mud of the River Almond by ferryman Robert Graham in 1997, close to the site of a Roman fort, established around 140 AD. Graham received a £50,000 reward for recovering one of the most important Roman finds in Scotland. It took two years under controlled conditions before it was dried out and could be displayed. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)