“There’s Menelous Stafili,” said David.
Amanda gave a little crow of laughter in which Yani joined, for it was a well-known fact that the local policeman was far too kind-hearted to arrest anybody, and in any case over the years he had worked with methodical intensity on the art of being lazy, so that it was with great difficulty one could get him out of bed should there be any dire emergency that required the enforcement of law and order.
“Well, if he’s the only law we’ve got to worry about,” Amanda giggled, “I should think we could kidnap the whole village and get away with it.”
“Yes, but I don’t think the Mayor’s wife is a suitable sort of thing,” David said gravely.
“I know,” said Amanda. “We’ll ask Father.”
“We won’t do anything of the sort. You know he would immediately put a stop to anything like that.”
“I don’t mean tell him, you chump,” said Amanda impatiently. “Just find out his views generally.”
“I don’t see how you are going to do that,” said David, “without telling him.”
“You leave it to me,” said Amanda. “I am more subtle than you are. Anyway, we’d better be getting home to supper now, Yani. Can you come out to Hesperides with us to-morrow morning and we’ll discuss the matter further? In the meantime I’ll try and find out what my father thinks.”
“All right,” said Yani, “I’ll meet you down on the beach in the morning.”
The children walked back to the villa arguing vehemently, in undertones, about the pros and cons of kidnapping. When they got back they found the big brass oil lamps had been lighted and were casting a pool of golden light through the windows and on to the terrace where the supper table had been laid.
“Ah, there you are, dears,” said Mrs Finchberry-White. “I was just coming to look for you Agathi says supper’s ready. At least, that’s what I think she says, because your father refused to come into the kitchen and discuss it with her.”
“With two women in the house,” rumbled the General, puffing meditatively at his pipe. “I really don’t see why it is incumbent upon me to go into the kitchen and discuss the sordid details of what we are going to eat.”
“Quite right, Father,” said Amanda, smiling at him sweetly. “you just sit there. I’ll go and attend to everything.”
“You are an idiot,” whispered David, following her into the kitchen where she was supervising Agathi.
“Why?” asked Amanda.
“Well, you are overdoing the sweet-little-woman stuff,” said David. “If you’re not careful Father will smell a rat.”
“Nonsense,” said Amanda. “You just wait and see.”
They sat down to their meal on the terrace and ate for some moments in contented silence.
“Did you paint well to-day, dear?” inquired Mrs Finchberry-White of her husband; she had long ago given up all ideas of her husband becoming a true painter and so now discussed his painting rather as though it was an ailment.
“Another masterpiece,” admitted the General, “This, by the way, is a remarkably good stew.”
“Thank you, dear,”said Mrs Finchberry-White, delighted, though she had played absolutely no part in the organisation of the food.
“Tell me, Father,” asked Amanda, “if you could paint as well as Rembrandt, what would you do?”
“I should be exceptionally pleased,” said the General.
“No. What I mean is, if you suddenly found you could paint as well as Rembrandt, would you sell your pictures?”
“Of course,” said the General in astonishment.
“Yes, but would you pretend that they were Rembrandts that you had discovered in the attic?” asked Amanda,
David was getting increasingly alarmed and mystified by his sister’s somewhat bizarre approach to the problem in hand.
“If I pretended they were real Rembrandts,” said the General thoughtfully, “it would be illegal, so I should have to sell them under my own name. I might, of course, do it under a pseudonym such as Rembranta, for example. But otherwise the whole thing would seem like fraudulent conspiracy.”
“Why are some things considered crimes and other things not?” asked Amanda.
“That, my dear,” said the General, “is a problem that has been confusing both religious sects and philosophers throughout the ages, so I find myself at this juncture, full of stew, unable to give you a quick answer.”
“I know,” said Amanda, “the crimes which hurt people, you can understand why they are bad, but there are other things which don’t necessarily hurt people, but yet are still considered to be crimes.”
“There are times,” said the General resignedly, “when you sound almost as incomprehensible as your mother.”
“Well,” said Amanda, waving her fork about, “take. Um . . . take kidnapping, for example. Providing you don’t hurt the victim, would you consider kidnapping a crime?”
The General took a large mouthful of food and chewed it thoughtfully while turning the question over in his mind. “In my considered opinion,” he said eventually, “next to murder, rape, torture and voting for the Labour Party, there is no worse crime.”
David looked at his sister with a self-satisfied air. “Anyway,” said the General, pushing his chair back from the table and pulling his pipe out of his pocket, “why this sudden interest in the more unseemly activities of the human race? You don’t, I trust, intend to take up cat burglary or some similar occupation in the near future?”
“No,” said Amanda, “I was just interested. You always told us that when in doubt we were to ask you.”
“The trouble is,” explained the General, “that whenever you ask me I find myself in some doubt too.”
With his empty pipe, he beat out a rapid and complicated rhythm on his aluminium leg.
“Henry, dear, must you do that?” inquired Mrs Finchberry-White.
“Wattusi drum rhythm,” explained the General. “They always play it before they attack.”
“It’s very interesting,” said Mrs Finchberry-White doubtfully, “but I don’t think you ought to do it at table. It sets a bad example to the children.”
“I see absolutely no connection whatsoever,” said the General, “since neither of them smokes and neither of them possesses an aluminium leg.”
“Yes, but when I was a gal,” said Mrs Finchberry-White, “gentlemen did not do those sort of things at table.”
“I,” said the General firmly, “am no gentleman. You knew that when you married me and you have spent twenty unsuccessful years endeavouring to convert me into one. I beg that you will desist from this Sisyphus-like struggle.”
The children left their parents wrangling amicably at the table and made their way up to bed.
“I told you kidnapping would be no good,” said David as they climbed the creaking wooden stairs, bent and warped with the arthritis of many winters.