“No, no, tomatoes,” said Mother. “Surely you know tomatoes?”
The gloom on the young Greek’s face lightened. She wanted tomatoes.
“Yes, Madam,” he answered, smiling.
“There,” said Mother, triumphantly, “well then, tomatoes grilled on toast.”
“Yes, Madam,” he said dutifully, and went away into the corner and communed with the Purser.
Greek gesticulations are remarkable for their force and expressiveness. Behind Mother’s back we watched the shadow-play between the waiter and the Purser. The Purser obviously told him in no uncertain manner that if he didn’t know what grilled tomatoes were he must go and ask. Disconsolately, the waiter approached to encounter Mother once again.
“Madam,” he said mournfully, “how you make gill-ed?”
Mother, until then, bad been under the impression that she had made a major breakthrough in the barriers that the Greeks kept putting up against her. She suddenly felt deflated.
“What is ‘gill-ed’?” she asked the waiter. “I don’t speak Greek.”
He looked flabbergasted. It had, after all, been Madam’s idea in the first place. He felt that she was being unfair in now trying to lay the blame at his door. She had asked for “gill-ed”; if she didn’t know what “gill-ed” was, who the hell did?
“Tomatoes Madam wants,” he said, starting all over again.
“On toast,” repeated Mother.
He wandered away moodily and had another altercation with the Purser, which ended in the Purser ordering him sternly to the kitchen.
“Really,” said Mother, “one knows one’s back in Greece because one can’t get anything done properly.”
We waited for the next round. Basically, the rule in Greece is to expect everything to go wrong and to try to enjoy it whether it does or doesn’t.
After a long interval, the waiter came bath with the things we had ordered and plonked a pot of tea in front of Mother and a plate upon which there was a piece of bread and two raw tomatoes cut in half.
“But this is not what I ordered,” she complained. “They’re raw, and it’s bread.”
“Tomatoes, Madam,” said the boy stubbornly. “Madam say tomatoes.”
“But grilled,” protested Mother. “You know, cooked.”
The boy just stared at her.
“Look,” said Mother, as one explaining to an idiot child, “you make toast first, you understand? You make the toast.”
“Yes,” replied the boy dismally.
“All right, then,” said Mother. “Then you put the tomatoes on the toast and you grill them. Understand?”
“Yes, Madam. You no want this?” he asked, gesturing at the plate of bread and tomatoes.
“No, not like that. Grilled,” said Mother.
The boy wandered off carrying the plate, and had another sharp altercation with the Purser, who was now harassed by the arrival of a lot of Greek passengers, including our fat ladies, all of whom were demanding attention.
We watched the waiter, fascinated, as he put the plate of tomatoes and bread on a table and then spread out a paper napkin with the air of a conjuror about to perform a very complicated trick. Our hypnotized gaze attracted the attention of Mother and Margo and they looked round in time to see the waiter place the bread and the tomatoes carefully in the middle of the napkin.
“What on earth is he doing?” asked Mother.
“Performing some ancient Greek rite,” explained Larry.
The waiter now folded up the napkin with the bread and tomatoes inside, and started across the saloon.
“He’s not bringing them to me like that, is he?” asked Mother in amazement.
We watched entranced as he solemnly made his way across the saloon and laid his burden upon the big oil stove in the centre of it. Although it was spring, the weather was chilly, and so the stove had been lit and was, indeed, almost red hot and giving out a comforting heat. I think we all divined what he was going to do but could not quite conceive such an action being possible. Before our fascinated eyes he placed napkin, bread and tomatoes carefully on the glowing lid of the stove and then stepped back to watch. There was a moment’s pause and the napkin burst into flames to be followed, almost immediately, by the bread. The waiter, alarmed that his novel form of cookery was not being effective, seized another napkin from a nearby table and tried to extinguish the blaze by throwing it over the top of the stove. The napkin, not unnaturally, caught fire too.
“I don’t know what Greek delicacy that is,” said Larry, “but it looks delicious, and cooked almost by the table, too.”
“The boy must be mad,” exclaimed Mother.
“I hope you’re not going to eat them after all that,” said Margo. “It doesn’t look very hygienic.”
“It’s the only really piquant way of doing tomatoes,” insisted Larry. “And think what fun you’ll have picking the bits of charred napkin out of your teeth afterwards.”
“Don’t be so disgusting, Larry,” protested Mother. “I’m certainly not eating that.”
Two other waiters had joined the first and all three were trying to beat out the flames with napkins. Bits of tomato and flaming toast flew in all directions, landing indiscriminately on tables and customers alike. One of our fat ladies of the night before was blotched with a succulent section of tomato, and an old gentleman, who had just sat down, had his tie pinned to him with a piece of flaming toast like a red hot Indian arrow. The Purser, emerging from the kitchen, took in the situation at a glance. He seized a large jug of water and running forward, threw it over the stove. It certainly had the effect of extinguishing the flames, but all the closer tables were immediately enveloped in steam, and clouds spread over the dining saloon containing the blended scents of tomato, burnt bread and charred napkin.
“It smells just like minestrone,” said Larry. “I do think after all the boy’s efforts you ought to try just a little, Mother.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Larry,” cried Mother. “They’ve all gone mad.”
“No,” said Leslie, “they’ve all gone Greek.”
“The terms are synonymous,” observed Larry.
One waiter had now hit another for some inexplicable reason, the Purser was shaking the original waiter by his lapels and shouting in his face. The scene was further enlivened by vociferous cries of complaint and annoyance from the surrounding tables. The threatening gestures, the pushing, the rich invective, were fascinating to watch but, like all good things, they eventually ended with the Purser slapping the original waiter over the back of his head and the waiter ripping off his badge of office, his dingy white coat, and hurling it at the Purser, who threw it back at him and ordered him out of the saloon. He curtly told the other waiters to clean up the mess and made placating noises to all and sundry as he made his way over to our table. He stopped, drew himself up to his full height beside us, plucked a fresh carnation from his buttonhole and put it in Mother’s left hand, while seizing her right hand and kissing it gracefully.
“Madam,” he said, “I am apologetic. We cannot give you grillid tomatoes. Anything else you want, we do, but grillid tomatoes, no.”
“Why not?” asked Larry, in a spirit of curiosity.
“Because the grill in the kitchen it is broken. You see,” he added by way of explanation, “it is the maiden voyage.”
“It seems the most unmaidenly voyage to me,” commented Leslie.
“Tell me,” enquired Larry, “why was the waiter trying to grill on that stove?”
“The boy very stupid,” said the Purser. “We have only experienced personnel on this ship. He will be dismantled in Piraeus .”
“How do you dismantle a waiter?” asked Larry, fascinated.
“Larry, dear, the Purser is a very busy man, so don’t let’s keep him,” said Mother hastily. “I’ll just have a boiled egg.”
“Thank you,” replied the Purser with dignity and he bowed and disappeared into the kitchen.
“I would have settled for raw tomatoes if I’d been you,” said Larry. “You saw what they did with the grilled tomatoes. I dread to think what they are going to do with the boiled eggs.”