Charles's Cooking.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume L, Issue 12765, 17 June 1911, Page 9 (Supplement)

Charles's Cooking.

I WANT you to understand quite clearly that it wasn't Charles's fault. Charles is a dear. If he hadn't been I shouldn't have married him. The trouble lay with the silly manner in which his mother had brought him up. She was one of those marvellous, olilt'ushioned wives who keep house on nothing a week, save their worn-oat clothes for the deserving poor, say " You are quite right, darling," every time the husband opens his mouth, train the girls to grovel- before tho boys, and teach the boys to trample on their sisters and think themselves noble for doing it. I might have been warned by the awful clothes and oppressive goodness o£ Charles's sisters. But, us I say, lie is a dear, and I only thought that he was the one nice inemler in an t unfortunate family. But, when we were married, I began to find out that he had little ways. He icad more theories aboub housekeeping thfui are wholesome for Miy man; he was proud of them, too, and he used to trot them out for my improvement on all occasions.

I didn't,take much notice at first. When he grumbled at the dinner, I used just to sit still and watch whether ho took second helpings. or not. Ha generally did take second helpings, so 1 knew, by that, that he was only talking to amuse himself. Charles has a beautiful appetite, a:id I knew that he enjoyed his food all the more if 1 lef him tell me, while he was eating it what was wrong with the cooking. So o! course, I let him. I never did believe in putting a stop to other people s harmless little pleasures. But, when he began to talk in tho same way before strangers, I felt that the pleasure wasn't harmless any longer. It was rudo, and I really cannot see why I should allow my husband to ba rude when I expect other women's husbands to be polite to me. Well, one evening, St. John Dier came to dinner. St. John is Charles's cjiumi and I took, special pains with that dinnc-r in order that it should be Kn A°\ th? m bo% We had soup, a gnUed[steak, a sou flea, a savoury, and desert. It wasn't ambitious, of course, theh?n!, e n w*'* W anything about the soup but, while he was helping' the steak, he asked St. John if he ever dined at Blank's in Fleet Street

~" A}\\ They know how to urill there." Charles said. " Wonder** if heir d, e f -would give our cook I les«J?a fw ca^?* be b">ught to under. hSk^h-^^H ? high art- Why, look at thjs-I could have done it bet- i «?+W?, SellV -An<3 ¥ duS-'*he steak: wren the carving fork. | St. John looked at me rather nor- j vously, and I smiled at him and be^n-n | to talk about the wondorfulness of Sir '■■ Herbert Tree in Henry VIII. Charles 1 ad two helps of the grill, and remark- ; ed, in a general sort of way that a j man needed food of any kind after a ' long day's work. . I

When the souflee was handed, Charles looked at the piece he had taken, and then he laid down his fork and said to St. John.

" Talking of soiiflees

" We were speaking of colour effects oil the stage," Sb. John said rather distinctly.

" Exactly. Just the same thing. What a stage effect needs is care in the planning. What a soufleo needs w care in the making. The eggs, now— they should ba whipped enough but not too much; the flavouring should bo measured accurately—not flung in anyhow." He made a violent hack at the piece ou his plate—a hack which would have been unnecessarily hard if he had been cutting leather. " Touch ! " he said. " Tough ! my dear fellow, you must be patient with us. We* shall improve in time, no doubt."

St. John didn't know which way to look, and; as for me, 1 was so angry that I had no pity left for him or anyone else. / How we got through the rest of that dinner, I hardly know. But when I found myself alone in the drawing-room, I raged. Oh, I was furious 1 For two pins— cr even less —I would have told Charles exactly what I thought of him. I sat and made up a lot of tilings to say, but, when I had thought out a speech whi h it Avo.u.ld really do Charles good to hear, n sudden idea came to mo. And then I had to wasto the speech, because the idea was so mufh better, St. John went away, presently. i don't know what he had been saying to Charles, but diaries was in quite n noblo and forgiving frame of mind. He called^ me a little woman, and hoped ho hadn't been too sharp with me.

"But it almost makes me lose my temper to see srood food ruined," he said. " I sometimes thing that I ouvdit to have boon a chef—l have the talent for it. Don't you thing that, to-mor-row, you could give the cook a little ifWure? Try to make her understand that, as her master does not consider fcu<h matters beneath his attention, sho oueht. at lea,st. to take a certain amount of interest in them."

" Yes, dear," I said sweetly. " And don't rou think that yon might ask St. John to dinner again then, for I'm going to make a now arrangement in the Jyi-hen,"

r- ATiere are times, darling," said Charles, with his arm around me. when you remind me of my mother/ .T said I was very glad to hear it. Vtell, he asked St. John to dinner °n the following Wednesday, and. on that day. I pave both the cook and the parlotirmafd evenings out. T v m t out nfr-,elf, and trot a rather late, very rood tea, at a shop, because I though* that it might be some time l^fnro T had any more food. Then T wroto n note to Charles, left it on tno h" 1'! ta' 10, and ]o kod myself into my bedroom with a novel.

At seven o'olook I hoard Charles* key in the door. Our flat is built «" the plan of the dome of <3f. Po n i»o_;r you whisper at one end. ail that -o^ ear can be b^ni-d ?»+. +1-'----other. fso T hp«rd OharTow n^o J.^

.COPMLETE STORY BY DENZIL O'MALIM.

"Sheffield Weekly Telegraph."

and put his umbrella in the rack; then he saw the note, and I heard the paper rustling as he opened it.

"' Dearest, " 1 have had a dreadful day. Both the servants went away quite suddenly this afternoon. I did my best to prepare dinner, but, as you know, I am not very good at these things, and before 1 had done more than lay the table, one of my bad sick-headaches came on. I am going to lio down. Please don't disturb me, for if I am quite quiet for a while, I hope the pavn will pass off. All the things for dinner are in the larder, and I am sure you won't mind cooking them. You know so much about cooking. Nancy.

" P.S.--I have written St. John Dier, telling him that you are getting dinner, and asking him not to dress, as it will be only a bachelor affair." Charles stood still for a long time. Then he came to my door and knocked.

" Nancy! " he shouted. I gave a .smothered groan. " Nancy! What the dickens J " I groaned louder. " Are you very.bad, little woman? ' asked Charles anxiously. " You ought to have the .doctor. Lot mo in."

"If I move, I shall bs sick," I moaned. " I don't want the doctor, dear. I shall be all right if I am let alone. Go and get dinner, and don't worry about me." • ; Charles knocked again, but 1 didn't answer. Then ho went away, and I heard him stamping round the kitchen. Presently the gas-stove lit with a.pop It always back-fires if you don't know how to manage it. Charles tramped, about a bit more, and then I heard the most awful smash.

It was all that I could do to keep from flying out to see how much of my wedding crockery he had broken. But 1 set my teeth and kept still, though the smash was followed by a series of thinks which told me that he was picking up the bits. In a few minutes, there came the very-gentlest tap at my door that I had ever known Charles to give. •

" I say, Nancy," lie asked, do you cook chops ? "

" Put them on the stove I said

"What? Right on the gas?" " No, in a pan, of course. Darling, ray head is so bad. If you could help asking questions and breaking things-1-" Just then- St. John arrived. Charles made a long explanation, and the way St. John laughed did my heart good to hear. Then Charles got angry, and f-aid it was all very well for people to laiK-h when they didn't have to do the work.

" Keep calm, old man," St. John said cheerily. " I'll lend a hand, and we'll worry through together." \ So there were two of them ramping round my kitchen. I'd' have given a Croat deal to see them, but, of coursp. I couldn't, so I had to be content with sounds and smells.

They shouted at one another; they Lanced tins; they left the water tap running; they smashed more china than I ever knew I possessed. And the smells—" .

There was a-burnt soup smell—l sup* pose they had let it boil over. There was a burnt fat smell of the very worst and greasiest order. There wa3 a cabbage smell, and a smell that told me they had whisked one of the kitchen cloths into the gas by mistake. And, all the time, the stove kept on smelling, for they had never managed to li.'ht it properly. It got so bad at last that I had to put my head under the quilt—partly to protect my nose, and partly to stifle my laughter I kept it there till v loud yell brought me out with a start. [ l'ecogriispcl /Charles's voieo, and 1 knew that this yell was the kind that a man gives when ho is really hurt. I tuorcod open mv door and raced into the kitchen. I shouldn't have known the place—it looked as if all the scrap iron, china, and food barrows from Islington Market had been wheeled into it and tilted out on -the floor. Everything breakable was broken, and everything burnable- was burnt, and, in tho middle of it. stood St. John looking anxious, and Charles, with a very white face, nursing one hand in tho oihur.

Oh, poor clear, lint ho had scalded Mmsnlf badly! And there was that stupid St. John gaping at him instead of t'inq him up with oil and bandages. r didn't spestlr a word till I had got his poor hand nicely dressed. Then I said. " Well ? ". " Well'? " muttered Charles. " Well ? " chuckled St. John. Wo stared at one another for a moment, and thon Jin went off into fits of Ififghtor. Rt. John sat do'.vn on the floor, Charles collapsed against the table on top of what I think he had for a pudding, and we all laughed ourselves limp. When St. John could bjieak he proposed that we should let him take us to dinner at a Testaurant. " That is, if your headache will rllow you to so." he said to me, " and if Charles isn't yearning to pive us anc^her cookery demonstration." It was rather nasty of him to put it i-h.it way, hnt. still, wo w"»it. T wm hungry, and I thought that T. might ar. well get something out of him »s n, sot-off against all the crockery he had broken. * It hapriened some time n.go. But T :rw nroud to-be.aMo to fell toy: Mi.itCharles h^s never sin^o said that Ire Trnnded hjm of his mother.