Mum's the Word (11 page)

She was no taller than a leprechaun. I could have picked her up and put her in my pocket. But I was afraid she would bite.

“What you wanting?” She rounded on her fellow servitor, who had nerved to touch her arm.

“The young woman was very difficult.” Voice turning tremulous as his candle, he aged before my eyes. A victim of geriatric abuse. “I'm all done in; have to go sit down with the newspaper and chew on some melon seeds.”

Eyes tender, our tiny hostess reached up a mile to pat his boney shoulder. “You do that and I'll see you fired.”

Taking my bag, Ben whispered, “I think they're beginning to take to us.”

“Can't say I am,” the woman gave her crisp white apron a twitch, “but I am taking you to the meeting room. Was only joshing about booting you out. Ain't my place or old Baldy's to do the honours.”

Ben's sigh of relief could surely be heard all over the midwest. I was afraid he would kneel down and kiss her feet.

“The name's Jeffries,” she informed us, “and this here's Peeps.”

“Spelled P-E-P-Y-S,” boasted the sour-faced owner.

“A descendent of the great diarist?” Ben enthused. “How I enjoyed being forced to read his stuff as a schoolboy!”

Jeffries smacked her flabby lips. “We don't hold with them spill-yer-guts books here. We like nice stories about people sitting down to breakfast eating their eggs benedict and making plans for lunch and dinner.”

Ben and I opened our mouths; but Jeffries turned on Pepys and blew out his candle. “You and that damn thing!
Carrying it around like a hot water bottle. Give here and stack their cases with the others by the stairs.”

At funeral speed we processed through the depressingly cavernous hall, under the varnished beams of a ceiling laid out as if for multiple games of naughts and crosses. Ben, every minute going against him, must have been dying to break into a run. A three-ball chandelier, reminiscent of a pawnbroker's sign, hung unlit from a second story rotunda, but Pepys' candle must indeed have been for show because gas lamps mounted on the mahogany walls bathed the staircase in mystery and cast gloomy shadows on dark oil paintings and the maroon and cream diamond tile.

I pictured a butler descending the stairs, candle held aloft. “
Ladies and Gentlemen, the master is dead of unnatural causes and … the will is as full of holes as cheese
.”

“Seen som'at worth stealing?” Pausing beside a door, Jeffries' face split into a troll grimace.

“I … I was just admiring that painting.” My finger wavered toward an oil portrait. Background was the greenish black of motor oil. Subject: a starch-and-vinegar woman wearing voluminous black, relieved only by her white cap, which was tied under her chin with a venomous bow. But could be there was life in the old girl? A finger of her right hand was raised.

Pepys' cracked voice leaped up behind me. “The lady is pointing heavenward, as was the fashion in them times when a picture was painted in memorium.”

“And if you're keen on that sort of thing,” added Jeffries, “you'll love the portrait of the Cat Cadaver over the fireplace.” And on that ghastly note, the door yawned open.

Ben would see a roomful of Mangés and experience the urge to prostrate himself, crying, “Mercy, mighty masters!” I saw only the room with its carved oak paneling and red flock wallpaper, the table covers with bobbled fringe, the ruby lamps with their dingle-dangle shades. Blood-red velvet curtains swirled back from windows, aping the entrance to a fortune-teller's crystal ball domain. The air was stale with dust. What vibes would the gypsy Chantal pick up in this horrible room? Were evil forces at work here? Other than those of bad taste?

Upon the mantelpiece reposed a bronze urn. Did it hold paper clips and string or the ashes of Josiah Mendenhall? I fought to keep from looking, but there it was—the famed portrait of the Cat Cadaver. Oh, my darling Tobias, how you would hate to be remembered in such a state of rigor mortis!

I heard Jeffries loudly announce us. Time for me to wish I were twenty pounds thinner, not pregnant and five thousand miles away. Critical eyes studied us.

“Good evening, I'm Bentley Haskell and this my lovely wife Giselle—”

“
Enchantée, mon ami
!” I am Solange and next to me
mon mari
Vincent.” The voice was creamy rich as French chocolate, its owner a tall woman with gleaming upswept hair, and the aristocratic air of having just stepped off the tumbril. Her greeting had broken the spell. The mass of formless humanity began to shift and separate into living, breathing entities, some male, some female.

Ben gripped my hand. Face flushed, eyes lowered (as befitted a believer in the divine right of Chef Kings) he approached the closest chair. A chair occupied by a woman in a pumpkin trouser suit. “To be permitted into the presence of the great Mangés is so immense a privilege, I am rendered speechless, except to say thank you for counting me worthy of your time.”

I braced myself for the grand piano in the library corner to break into “This is my moment! My moment sublime!”

“You are sadly erroneous,
monfrère
,” announced Vincent, husband of Solange. “We are all candidates, same as you. Only deeference is we answer the call a leetle more prompt.”

“My Lord!” Dropping my hand, Ben would have sunk onto a maroon brocade chair, had it been vacant. “This can't be! I thought I was the only candidate—”

“Jeez! Reminds me of a joke.” The speaker was a stout boy of about eleven. He wore an Hawaiian shirt, wire-rimmed glasses and a smirk.

“Eez eet suitable for adult company?” Vincent had dyed black hair and a complexion
vin rouge
.

“Bingo, honey, is it rude?” This from the stocky woman who could have passed for Friar Tuck but for her pumpkin-coloured trouser suit.

“Mom, please!” The kid pressed his hands down on his plump knees. “This man dies and thinks he's the only one who made it to heaven. There are no other guys around, see. Then St. Peter comes knocking on the door and says ‘You're in hell, and worse—you got solitary!' Get it?”

A forced sputter of laughter; followed by silence emanating most strongly from the four people seated on the scroll-backed sofa, A grey-haired matron wearing a corsage, a grey-haired man with a worry-worn face, a spindly man with a Charlie Chaplin moustache, and beside him, a youngish female with flowing hair, a bloodless complexion and so thin that if you held her up to the light you'd see right through her.

“Don't you think it's funny?” the kid demanded.

Ben was rigid as the Cat Cadaver. What a time he must be having dealing with the presence of a child here in the sacred womb of the Mangés!

“I theenk,
mon petit choux
”
—
the Frenchwoman addressed the boy—“we are none of us much for laughter while we wait for the Mangés to arrive. How say you we all introduce ourselves
encore
for the benefit of Mr. and Mrs. Haskell?”

Bingo's mater produced a grim smile. “I'm Ernestine Hoffman, homemaker …” Pause for applause, which did not come. “My hobbies are gardening, mug collecting and decorating with doilies. I've been married twenty-one years to my lovely husband Frank, who can't be with us due to the pressure of business.” She picked at her pumpkin collar, “And last but also first—proud mother of the wonderful young man to my right.”

Understandably, Ben was dazed. The woman had failed to mention the field of expertise that had brought her the Mangés' attention. To say nothing of why she had toted her rotund son along.

“Meet the great one!” Lolling back in his chair, the pudgy kid pushed back his hair from his middle-aged executive brow and placed his hands over the dome of his blinding Hawaiian shirt. “Don't everyone get intimidated at once. And feel free to blame Mom. She dragged me to this fun fest. It's not easy, you know, being Bingo Hoffman, Child Prodigy. Here's the bio: I began reciting recipes at age seven
months. I was flipping crêpes at age two; at age five I had accumulated the scientific data to finally answer the question, Should an omelet be beaten clockwise? At six I had my own newspaper column …”

A yawn blew across the room. A guilty look crossed the Frenchman's face. Bingo's mom glared.

“… have lectured and performed all over the States.” Bingo blew out his already balloon cheeks, then deflated them with a weary sigh. “And when I get back to Cleveland I start my own TV show.”

“Wonderful, hon!” came the pleasant voice of the grey-haired woman wearing the corsage. “But don't you go overdoing. You're still a boy. Find time for a little fun.”

“No one pushes Bingo but himself,” bristled Bingo's Mom.

Jerking forward on his seat as though responding to an electrical shock, Ben said, “I thought Mangé members had to be chefs in the orthodox sense of the word.”

I could feel myself turning as red as the room. This use of burgundy and crimson was suffocating, especially with that mahogany ceiling bearing down on us like a coffin lid.

“Times change,
mon garçon
.” The Frenchman rose to his feet. He was dressed in a conventional dark suit. Nevertheless, I could picture him in top hat, swirling cape, and white gloves. “The Mangés must be out for zee fresh blood. I myself come from one of the noblest families in all of France. But that does not put lobster on the table.” Lifting a silver snuff box from a whatnot table, he enclosed it with the long white fingers of his left hand. “I am zee magician Comte Vincent!” He opened his right hand and there was the snuff box. “In my night club act I toss zee eggs, flour, chocolate in a skeelet, I move my hands—
une, deux, trois
! A burst of flame, a loud bang! I lift my hat, so! to take my bow and voila,
Un Gâteau Magnifique
!”

Applause from the pleasant woman with the corsage, echoed faintly by the rest.

I could see the imaginary billow of Comte Vincent's cloak as he replaced the snuff box and picked up a long-handled shoe horn which he proceeded to twirl à la baton. “
Ma chère
Comtesse Solange is always my assistant.” The lady inclined her head. Her flawless bluish hair and discreet
black taffeta gown seemed belied by her heavy rouge and the impish beauty mark above her lip.

“Makes me into one hell of an ordinary chap,” grumbled the skinny man with the Charlie Chaplin moustache. “Name's Jim Grogg, caterer for a major airline, and I make no bones about enjoying the challenge—make that the thrill—of being a Prepackaged Gourmet. The cherries on our puddings are never off center.”

The memory of our transatlantic flight was too recent for Ben. His face turned bloodless as the skinny woman with flowing hair, whom Mr. Grogg was introducing pridefully as Divonne, his live-in lover. Tension mounted.

Ben wasn't entirely to blame. The words
When will the Mangés put in an appearance
? seemed strung in a blazing banner across the infernal room. Bingo kept aiming bits of paper at his mother's pumpkin trouser legs and her smile stretched thin. The pleasant faced woman repinned her corsage. Mr. Grogg put his arm around the wafer-thin Divonne. The comte was juggling pencils, faster and faster …

“My name's Ellie Haskell.” I addressed myself particularly to the woman with the corsage, seated beside the gentleman with misery lines carved deep in his handsome face.

“Pleased to meet you. I'm Lois Brown and this here's my husband Henderson.” She smoothed the draped frontage of her floral silk frock. Her laugh was pleasant. “Feel done up for a prom. The kids picked this out for me and bought me the corsage. We've got seven of them. All good decent kids. Sometimes I wish they weren't so happy at home. Henderson and me keep rattling the nest; but bless their hearts, they refuse to fly out or fall out.” She turned an affectionate glance on said husband, whose gloom increased. “Like Ernestine, I'm a housewife. Don't mind the work but hate the hours! When it came to cooking I never thought whether I enjoyed it or not. Feeding those ever open beaks sure was a challenge. Took a few ribbons at the county fair for my pies, but never thought I was any different from any other Josephine Blow. Then a couple of months ago I sent in my recipe for Applesauce Ice Cream to the Fruit Growers of America Bakers Benefit and won the grand prize: a ferry trip, two nights on Nantucket, and fifty dollars. And I see you're expecting a little one, my dear.”

“God help you,” snapped Ernestine Hoffman, Bingo's mom. “I sure hope your delivery is easier than mine was.” She cast a mildly reproving eye at the Child Prodigy, who was stuffing his pockets with the dusty-looking contents of a candy dish. “The doctor, of course, had never seen anything like it—not even in medical school, not even in the six years he aided Third World Natives—”

The hollow-eyed Divonne studied my burgeoning middle with a nasty expression on her pallid face.

Lois Brown laughed cheerfully. “Perhaps you'll be as fortunate as I was, honey.” My spirits rose. Perhaps motherhood would not be all pain and anguish. “Why, each and every one of my seven darlings popped out in less than five minutes. Easy as cherry beehive pie. I even invited the neighbors in for my last two deliveries. And they all stayed afterward for the nice little buffet I served them—”

Someone groaned. I think it was me.

Hand over his eyes, Ben didn't see the door open. Everyone else slid to the edge of their seats except for the comte who was still juggling. Misjudging a pencil, he got hit on the ear. Would the Mangés all wear white hats and black handlebar moustaches? Even the women?

The answer was not immediately forthcoming. Entering the room, by themselves, were Jeffries and Pepys. She carried a tray of edibles. He carried another loaded with bottles, glasses, and china that made his boney knees buckle and his bald head gleam with sweat.