“Eyenose cuzzedin lyebins,” Nick added.
Everyone looked at me for a translation. “He’s saying he noticed what I’d done when he discovered he was eating beans for the second time,” I explained.
“Dinlye furstye,” Nick agreed.
Before I could translate this, I was swept aside by Janine and Uncle Ted. I mean literally swept aside. Janine cried out. “Oh, my poor Nick!” and pushed me off on to the chair opposite the Prat’s, while Uncle Ted said, “Morning, morning,” as he sat down by Nick, and both waitresses and one waiter fled. The first waiter fetched out his order pad, rather sadly.
“Order for me, Ted,” Janine said. “Poor Nick’s helpless in the morning.” She began tenderly buttering toast for Nick. She had a new sweater today. The shoulder of it that was turned to me had a golden splash on it, as if someone had broken an egg over her. I wish someone had.
The Prat looked as disappointed as the waiter. But he politely pushed the marmalade nearer Janine and said to me, “Can’t he butter his own toast by now?”
“I usually let him try,” I said. “Some mornings he butters the plate and tries to eat it.”
“He looks rather to have reached that stage,” the Prat said. Shrewd of him. Nick always makes his worst mistakes when he’s almost awake.
But this conversation caused Janine to notice the Prat. She leant forward and read his badge. So did I. It said RUPERT THE MAGE. “Rupert the Mage,” Janine said. “You must be one of Gram White’s esoteric circle in Universe Three.”
“Strictly freelance,” he said. “I believe we met in Bristol the other day, Mrs Mallory.”
I never heard how this not very promising conversation developed – or even if it developed at all – because Uncle Ted shouted at me. “Maree!” he shouted imploringly from the other side of Nick. “Maree! I’ve been put on a panel at twelve today. What do I say?”
“That depends what it’s on,” I said soothingly. “What’s it about?”
“God knows,” he said, despair all over him. “Promise me you’ll come along and nod intelligently at me from the front.”
“Senzyou murrain fanzy,” Nick said.
“Eh?” said Uncle Ted. He never could understand Nick’s morning talk.
“He’s telling you about the panel,” I explained. “He says it’s on—”
Then we got interrupted again. This time it was a long thin fellow dressed like a soldier who came up and loomed over Uncle Ted. His tall cheekbones loomed too, over his hollow cheeks, as he said, “Mr Mallory. Sir.”
His teeth showed under a fierce black moustache after that. I think it was a smile. I hoped it was, for Uncle Ted’s sake. Uncle Ted sort of sank down in his chair and looked as if he hoped so too. “What can I do for you?” he asked the man.
“I come to embrace you,” the man said. Uncle Ted flinched. “I am—” The man said some foreign name none of us could catch. He was too tall for any of us to read his badge. Then he said, “I come from fighting for my country. From Croatia. I come to say that you have saved my life and my sanity, sir. The guns would have killed my mind. But by reading your great book daily, I kept my courage and fought for my country.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” said my uncle. “Er – which book?”
“Your so great history of King Arthur, his riders and the saintly Grail,” said the man.
“Er,” said Uncle Ted, “I think you’ve got the wrong Mallory. The one you want has only one L. And he’s been dead quite a while, I’m afraid.”
He might as well not have spoken. Staring into the distance – like Nick was also, except that this man’s eyes were wide and mad – the Croatian went on, “It is a book that inspires the heart to greatness. To serve. To fight against odds. To crush the enemy. To smite so that blood bursts from the nose and the ears. I have two English books of great inspiration with me as I fight. Both folded in my breast. Both stop several bullets. I have your book and the great Tolkien’s. But they tell me Tolkien is not here. So I come to you to thank you. Thank you, sir.” He ducked his long cadaverous face at Uncle Ted and marched away.
“I think he may be what they used to call shell-shocked,” Uncle Ted said ruefully. “What name did he say? All I heard was Balkan gabble.”
“Million Gabblevitch,” Nick said, almost normally. “Tower of Babel. Dutch joke.”
“Eh?” said Uncle Ted. He never gets Nick’s jokes, either.
Something made me look at the Prat. He was staring after the tall Croatian striding away from us, and he was looking utterly fed up and disappointed, as if the Croatian had somehow let him down badly.
[1]
From Maree Mallory’s
Thornlady Directory, file