In which we learn that sound resonates deeply and profoundly off a domed ceiling
‘Don’t forget,’ whispered Olive, dashing back and forth between the naughty boys, talking animals and circus performers as they walked to the Brighton Hotel. ‘Best behaviour . . . Manners, grace and charm . . . Don’t upset Thistlebloom. We don’t want to lose anyone else before the Queen’s visit.’
‘Manners,’ repeated Elizabeth-Jane, arching her long neck.
‘Grace and Charm,’ cooed Num-Num, drooling on the footpath.
‘Woof!’ said the stray dog of prodigious filth who had suddenly joined their party.
‘Best behaviour!’ cried Helga the hippo.
‘Best behaviour!’ agreed Alfonzo, crossing his heart and spitting on the palm of his hand.
Hmmm. While this might seem very reassuring, dear reader, we are each and every one of us unique, and one person’s best can be quite different from another’s. For example, my best attempt at baking a sponge cake might be as light and fluffy as a cloud, a veritable melt-in-your-mouth delicacy, while your best attempt might be more akin to the kind of sponge one would use to wipe the mould off one’s dirty laundry tub. No judgement intended! I am simply saying that best is highly variable.
‘Best behaviour!’ yelled Carlos, shoving a stick of dynamite up his jumper.
‘Good grief,’ muttered Olive beneath her breath, but turning to Thistlebloom, she smiled and sang, ‘High tea! How simply splendid!’
‘Welcome to the Brighton!’ The concierge bowed and stretched his white-gloved hand towards the door.
‘Wait!’ cried Ivan, charging up the steps. ‘I’ll hold the door!’
‘No, it was my idea!’ shouted Splash Gordon. He dived at Ivan’s legs.
‘But I want to have the best manners!’ yelled Ivan.
‘No! No! No!’ screamed Splash. ‘I’m nicer than you! I’m full of manners! Let me hold the stinking door!’
I am afraid to say that a tussle ensued. Right there on the steps of the city’s most prestigious hotel. Fists, elbows, teeth and white gloves were used rather freely.
‘Enough!’ snapped Thistlebloom, and she expelled them on the spot.
Even the concierge.
Smoothing her wrinkle-free pinafore, Thistlebloom sniffed, commanded Fumble to play doorman to his fellow students and marched on ahead into the tea rooms.
Dear, sweet Fumble! Our beloved moose did a marvellous job, bowing, smiling, saying a kind word here, offering a compliment there, giving the occasional kiss to a special friend. He even welcomed the marble statue of Julius Caesar and the lamp post, but they continued to loiter outside on the footpath and refused to enter.
‘Never mind,’ soothed Olive. ‘We have enough friends for a party.’ And she and Eduardo led him inside by the antlers.
The tea rooms were, in fact, a hall – a magnificent octagonal space with a pale blue marble floor, soaring windows and a gold-domed ceiling dripping with crystal chandeliers. A string quartet sat by one of the windows, nodding, swaying and playing lilting tunes by Bach and Mozart. Pretty waitresses in black dresses and white lace aprons dashed hither and thither between the tables, bearing silver trays and teapots. And at the centre of all this beauty and opulence stood an enormous fountain with a life-sized sculpture of a hippopotamus. The hippopotamus balanced on one hind leg, its face pointed to the ceiling, a continuous stream of water spurting from its lips.
‘Huh.’ Olive squinted. ‘Why, that fountain looks remarkably like –’
‘Oh no!’ Eduardo groaned. ‘That pig is Up to No Good.’
They watched as Pig McKenzie led Thistlebloom away from the round tables at the centre of the hall to a secluded nook with a table for two. Once seated, they were largely concealed behind a potted hedge and a Japanese screen.
Olive started to move a little closer, but froze. ‘No,’ she said, blushing. ‘I cannot spy or eavesdrop. It is bad enough that I have already snooped by reading Mrs Groves’ letter from the Inspector of Schools. I will not stoop to the pig’s Lowly Standards.’
‘You really should,’ said Wordsworth, scuttling over with his Little Blue Book of Wise and Witty Sayings. ‘Know your enemy! Knowledge is power! Desperate times call for desperate measures.’
‘He’s right,’ said Eduardo, and he gave her a little nudge.
Olive shrugged. She tiptoed towards the nook, crouched down and lined her eye up with a crack between the panels of the Japanese screen. Pig McKenzie was leaning back in his chair, his front trotters behind his head, eyes half-closed. ‘And then,’ he drawled, ‘the Emperor of Peru said, “Pig McKenzie, these shelters you have built for the homeless are so exceptionally beautiful, I’ll be begging you to build me a new palace by the end of the summer!”’
Thistlebloom stared at Pig McKenzie, her mouth line growing a little wider.
The pig leaned forward. ‘And if an emperor is impressed,’ he grunted, ‘well, I hardly need tell you what the Queen will say . . .’ He simpered, then looked abruptly up to the ceiling. ‘I say! Look at the detail in that magnificent chandelier!’
While Thistlebloom’s gaze was cast upwards, away from the table, the pig stuffed eight little sandwiches and five strawberry tartlets into his mouth, then slipped the silver sugar spoon into the pocket of his vest.
What a swine!
‘What a swine!’ muttered Olive as she crept away.
‘Why?’ asked Wordsworth. ‘What’s happening?’
‘He’s bragging,’ said Olive. ‘Lying. Building up his fictitious case for the Royal Award for Best Student in the Whole Wide World. Stealing the silverware. Eating all the best sandwiches and tarts before anyone else can get a taste. Just the usual.’
Suddenly, the hippopotamus in the fountain grew tired of balancing on one leg. She coughed and spluttered, gave a loud and lusty yawn and belly-flopped into the pool. A wave of water swept over the edge of the fountain and washed across the marble floor. Unfortunately, the Mayor’s wife just happened to be walking by at the time. She skidded, slipped and skated several metres on her ample bottom before colliding with a marble pillar.
‘Great botty-skating,’ murmured Helga, and she ducked beneath the surface of the water.
‘Oh dear!’ Olive cast a nervous glance towards Thistlebloom’s table, but thankfully, the potted hedge blocked any view of the fountain. The pig might just have done them a favour!
Thus cheered, Olive led Fumble, Eduardo and Wordsworth to a table where they sat down to tea with Blimp, Chester, Glenda, Num-Num, Mrs Groves and the stray dog. The snowy white tablecloth was covered in sparkling silver cutlery, crisp linen serviettes, pale blue china to match the marble floor and trays laden with dainty treats – sandwiches cut into teeny triangles, mini quiches, micro scones, strawberry tartlets, baby cream horns, dinky doughnuts and incy-wincy cupcakes with pastel pink icing.
Olive congratulated herself. ‘This truly is a wonderful way to prepare ourselves for a royal visit.’
She reached for her serviette and gasped. For there, drawn on the linen in black pen, was a picture of a grand piano falling from the sky towards Olive’s head. On top of the piano, a tap dance was being performed by a pig.
Olive scrunched the serviette into a ball, tossed it to the floor and kicked it under the table.
‘Hmmm,’ she mused. ‘A Pig of Evil Intent should never prevent one from enjoying afternoon tea.’
Wordsworth squeaked in delight. ‘How very true, Olive. Why, I think I shall add that to my Little Blue Book of Wise and Witty Sayings when I get home.’
Olive smiled and popped a scone with jam and cream into her mouth.
‘Cup of tea, madam?’
Num-Num blinked up at the waitress. ‘Num-Num want fresh meat.’
‘I think,’ said Olive, ‘that she means yes please.’
‘Olive! Excuse me, Olive!’ called Frank the liar from the next table. ‘Are your sandwiches cut into equilateral triangles or isosceles triangles?’
Olive examined the tray and replied, ‘Equilateral.’
‘Yes, ours too. What a shame. Equilateral sandwiches are far more nutritious, but the isosceles sandwiches are yummier.’
Olive giggled and bit into an equilateral triangle. As she chewed and dabbed at the corners of her mouth with a spare linen serviette, she surveyed her fellow students. She was ever so proud of them all. They really were trying to make this afternoon a success. Frank had just wrapped his latest lie in impeccable manners. Reginald was sitting on his hands so that he could not butter the tablecloth or the waitresses – although, to be honest, he might have been surreptitiously buttering his bottom. Sparky Burns had not touched the candelabrum on his table, even though it must have been a great temptation with its twelve flickering candles.
Here, too, at her own table, things were going swimmingly. Blimp had resisted the urge to roll amongst the cupcakes, contenting himself with wearing one of the dinky doughnuts as a necklace. Chester had not stolen a single button, even though the bellboy, the manager and the butlers all bore exceptionally beautiful specimens on their coats – shiny and silver, embossed with a regal B for Brighton. Even Olive had noticed them, and she was not a collector or connoisseur like Chester.
Glenda was casting nervous glances at the mini quiches, but so far had managed not to faint. ‘Be bold! Be brave!’ she honked to herself. From time to time, she draped a serviette over her head and took three deep breaths.
Dear, short-sighted Fumble was running every item past Mrs Groves before he ate it. The cream horn, the strawberry tartlet, the cupcake and the chocolate doughnut all got a ‘Yes, dear.’ The teapot, the sugar bowl and the three serviette rings were all removed from his hoof with a gentle ‘Perhaps another time.’
Even the stray dog was showing some restraint, seeming quite content to sit in his chair and nibble the titbits that Bozo and Boffo tossed from the next table. The fact that he had gobbled a triple-decker birthday cake from the buffet on his way in might also have taken the edge off his appetite.
Yes, they were all behaving with grace and charm and decorum. Except, perhaps, for Num-Num. Although, to be fair, the scaly great dinosaur was doing her best . . .
Num-Num picked up a sandwich, sniffed it, licked it, held her little claw out to the side and popped it into her mouth. ‘Num-num-num-num-num-num-num.’ She chewed, coughed, chewed some more, then stopped. ‘Num-Num bery, bery pardon,’ she growled and spat the sandwich onto the floor. ‘Pfft! Pfft! Sammich taste like poo!’
Olive kicked the chewed-up bread and cucumber under the table.
Num-Num bent down to look. She sat up, grinned and licked her chops. Grabbing Chester, she plopped him onto her plate, spread jam all over his back and spooned a large dollop of cream onto his head. ‘Why thank you!’ she sang and stuffed Chester into her mouth. She rolled the poor rat around and around on her tongue. ‘Mmmm . . . ratty . . . fresh . . . brown . . . sweet . . . tasty . . . ratty . . .’ Once she had sucked off all the jam and cream, she pulled Chester out by the tail, dropped him on the floor and kicked him under the table. Just as she had seen Olive do with the serviette and the soggy sandwich. Smiling stupidly, she growled, ‘Amen!’
‘Num-Num!’ gasped Olive, but instead of frowning, our heroine burst out laughing. And because she had eaten quite a lot of cake by this time, as she laughed, she burped.
Loudly.
Obtrusively.
Resonantly.
The burp was not intentional, but amidst the quiet strains of Mozart, the genteel chitter-chatter and the tinkling of silver teaspoons on fine china saucers, it sounded like a foghorn, a reckless blast of defiance.
The potted hedge at the side of the table for two parted. Thistlebloom’s bony nose poked through, followed rapidly by the rest of her. ‘I beg your pardon!’
Olive almost repeated the burp. At the last moment, however, she realised that this was not a request for clarification, but a demand for justice. She swallowed the second burp, then, adopting what she thought was her most innocent face, popped an incy-wincy cupcake into her mouth.
Thistlebloom marched across the tea rooms.
‘Uh-oh,’ Olive mumbled through a mouthful of crumbs and pink icing. ‘I think we might be in for a spot of bother.’
A spot of bother?
Oh, dear reader!
If only she had known.