The Empire Trilogy - J. G. Farrell [201]
This was fortunate, because standards had yet again (and for the last time) begun to decline at the Majestic. By now most of the servants had vanished. From the day of the explosion they had gradually melted away, as native bearers on safaris are reputed to melt, one by one, into the jungle, taking with them anything of value that did not happen to be nailed down (not, however, that there was a great deal of value at the Majestic, nailed down or otherwise). Among the many objects whose disappearance for the most part went unnoticed the following items were seen to be missing: two of Edward’s sporting rifles, his hunting pink, his velvet smoking-jacket, most of his fishing rods, a carved ivory chess-set from the residents’ lounge, approximately half of the pile of stone hot-water jars on the first floor, a hundred weight of embossed cutlery and china (very popular), a portrait in oils of a former manager of the hotel clad in Napoleonic uniform, sheets, pillow-cases and blankets (also very popular), the unfortunate dog Foch (who had always been a great favourite with the kitchen staff) and the stuffed pike from the gun room.
One morning, returning up the drive from an early walk through the grounds, the Major was astonished to meet the cook, clad in a fur coat several sizes too big for her, with unlaced men’s shoes on her feet, and pulling a hand-cart piled high with gilt chairs from the writing-room. At the sight of the Major she gave a shriek of fear and cried what sounded like: “Jesus, Mary and Joseph!” But the Major averted his eyes and walked past her without even noticing, thereby proving to the cook the efficacy of prayer.
The cook was the last of the servants to go. Presently only Murphy remained, muttering to himself and haunting the staircases as he had always done. These days, of course, he was never asked to do anything, for his reason was quite clearly unhinged. He was merely there, a cadaverous relic of a happier time. Occasionally someone might glance at him curiously and wonder why he did not leave too. But he didn’t. He remained to lurk in the company of the silent, prowling cats in the shadowy upper storeys. People were too busy to bother about him.
There was the cooking to be done, for instance. Miss Johnston had taken charge of the kitchens and established a hierarchy of helpers whose jobs diminished gradually in importance from her own to that of poor Mrs Rice who was considered only capable of washing the dishes. Strangely enough, the food was better in these last few days of the Majestic’s existence than it had been for many years—indeed, since the hotel had reached its zenith in the 1880s.
The ladies tied aprons round their waists and put their diamond rings in a saucer on the sideboard while they kneaded the dough for apple pies or disembowelled chickens with trembling fingers. How exciting it was! If only the future had seemed less uncertain how they would have enjoyed this challenge to abilities which since girlhood, throughout all their long, dull and genteel lives, had lain dormant! Moved, the Major watched them at work, Miss Bagley’s rheumy eyes blurred by incipient cataracts, Miss Devere’s head permanently bent to one side, Miss Johnston unable to stand up for long because her ankles would swell, Mrs Rice stooped over the sink with the steam clouding her pince-nez, and all of them, without exception, forgetting things (“Now what was it I was going to do?”) and losing things (“Now where on earth did I put...?”) which very often turned out to be in front of their noses.
But then with a start, the Major would remember that he had letters to write, that he must telephone Dublin, that he must put an advertisement in the Irish Times...and many other things. In short, that he must continue to row furiously for the nearest land, for the boat continued to settle lower and lower in the water.
Unsavoury characters were noticed lurking