Cooking the Books (37 page)

Kendall and Gordon knew when they were licked and surrendered gracefully. After all, they had lost out on the skydiving wedding, but they had retained the tiger. They were ahead, at least on points.

Breakfast was concluded. Lunch was well in hand. I had got myself another cup of coffee and was leaning on my bench, listening for my oven timer and sipping the ambrosial brew. I heard a stir in the studio and went to the door to observe.

A large cage, lined with canvas to preserve the modesty of the occupant, was being wheeled into the studio through the big doors. A whisper went through the set. The tiger had arrived. Escorting her was Leonidas Cohen. He saw me and grinned.

‘She’s in a bit of a mood today,’ he confided. ‘Nothing a few treats won’t amend, though. Everything set up for us?’

‘I think so,’ I replied. ‘Tash is over there, she’ll know. Your partner is here. With his gun,’ I added, with distaste.

‘He does so love his firearms,’ said Leonidas, waving at the Great White Hunter, who had won his argument with Ethan and had a good bead on the set. His rifle was raised. I disliked the sight of him. The idea of someone shooting any creature was horrible. Even if it was with a tranquillising dart, rather than a bullet. I was so glad that soon this would be over and I could stop associating with the TV world. Leonidas Cohen, it seemed, felt the same. ‘Right, let’s get this done,’ he said.

I went back to the kitchen to take out my last pies and turn off my oven. When I came back into the studio I joined the rest of the kitchen staff lined up along the kitchen wall.

I had not realised how very big tigers were. Tabitha eased herself disdainfully out of her cage and gave a rousing sniff. Then she sneezed. Apparently she didn’t like actors either. Leonidas came to her, attaching a leash to her collar. She lifted her lip in a half-growl. Great. A pre-menstrual tiger. He allowed her to lick some sort of treat from a thing like a table tennis bat and led her through the silent throng to the other side of the set. There he left her as he walked across to his prepared position and Tash said ‘Action!’

Leonidas had been right. A tiger does have a calming effect, even in a TV studio. She was so large and so heavily fanged and so beautiful. Her stripes were perfectly aligned. Her ears were delicately fringed. Harrison made his entrance and the tiger slouched after him, belly to the ground, as though she was hunting. Harrison turned, registered her presence, and froze. Kylie and Goss, as required, screamed. Abby the geek girl fainted across her keyboard. Then Molly Atkins emerged from her room, made an imperious gesture, and the tiger lay down at her feet.

‘Perfect,’ said Ethan.

Which meant, in film parlance, ‘Do it again!’ So they did.

Harrison entered, the girls screamed, Abby fainted, Ms Atkins reproved the tiger. Each time, Tabitha walked off the set to Leonidas, received her reward, and was led back to her entrance again. She was behaving beautifully. I was delighted. We might get away without any incident at all. That must be the end of it. They had done seven takes.

‘One more,’ said Ethan.

Leonidas protested. ‘That’s enough, surely,’ he said. ‘She’s getting bored.’

‘Just one more,’ insisted Ethan. Nothing is more implac- able than a camera person who thinks that the next take will be unimaginably perfect. Leonidas shrugged.

‘This will be the last one,’ he said. ‘Come along, Tabby, soon be out of here.’

The tiger gave him another half-growl, but allowed him to lead her back to the same tedious place she had been minutes before. Her tail was switching. This really ought to be the last take. If Tabitha had been my cat, I would have been putting down the comb before she scratched me.

‘All right, this is the last,’ agreed Ethan.

The kitchen staff gathered up personal belongings and we prepared to return to our labours. I was just thinking about maybe another cup of coffee when it all went wrong.

Tabitha followed Harrison onto the set, paused, lay down as required. Then Molly Atkins, perhaps remembering old photos of tiger hunts, planted a spike-heeled red shoe on the recumbent tiger’s neck.

Tabitha had been tried. She had been required to under- take the same boring routine all morning. She had complied, for the sake of the rewards and because she liked Leonidas. But no one had ever explained to her that she had to bear a sharp heel in her neck and she did not mean to endure it pa- tiently. She stood up abruptly, tipping Molly Atkins off balance into the desk behind her. Molly lay still. Harrison and Emily flung themselves on her, screaming. I thought I heard a voice shriek, ‘Mother!’

Tabitha was annoyed. She did not like loud voices. I saw the Great White Hunter’s finger tighten on the trigger. So did Kylie and Goss, who with one accord leapt to the tiger’s defence, screaming, ‘Nooo!’ They hung about her, arms around her neck, competely spoiling the GWH’s aim, and at that moment Tabitha banged into the set and caused the protective screen to fall on Leonidas Cohen.

The tiger was puzzled. Where was her treat? But she could smell something very agreeable. She raised her head and sniffed.

Then she shrugged off the girls, quite politely, and nosed into the audience.

No one has ever measured the degree of panic produced by an unexpected tiger on the staff of your average kitchen. Tabitha was surrounded by people and chairs and suddenly I knew what she was after. Lance the Lettuce Guy was standing on a chair, screaming, and Tabitha was pushing at his apron with her nose. At any moment she would raise one of those dreadful clawed paws and . . . Disaster loomed like an iceberg in the path of a very big ship.

I fled into the kitchen, grabbed the jar of anchovies, spilt it into a mixing bowl and called, ‘Tabby! Come along, Tabby!’ into the screaming mob. I had no chance of being heard but I saw the tiger’s head come up. At last, she seemed to be saying. Someone who gives out the rewards for being a good tiger. Because I’m worth it.

People fell over her as she slid through the throng. There were crashes. Lance the Lettuce Guy had been making anchovy dressing, that’s why she had selected him. Tabitha doted on anchovies. But my mixing bowl contained a whole jar of anchovies and Tabitha meant to have them.

I led her into the kitchen and shut the door, closing out the chaos without. Tabitha pursued her anchovies and I set down the metal bowl so that she could eat them in comfort.

I had never been so close to a tiger. She could have killed me with one casual slap of those massive soup-dish-sized paws. She slurped up the anchovies and then looked hopefully for more.

‘I don’t know if we have any more,’ I told her, just as I would to my cat Horatio. ‘Let me look.’

I crossed to the store cupboard. Tabitha drifted along behind me, making not a sound except the click of her claws on the lino. Outside, I hoped that someone was extracting Leonidas Cohen from under that pile of masonry and speeding him to my assist- ance. But for the moment there was just me and the tiger.

I found another jar of anchovies and replenished the bowl. Tabitha licked at them delicately this time, then sat back on her haunches to give her whiskers a polish. I had now run out of anchovies. Bugger. But she had just eaten a lot of salty fish, how about a drink of water?

I filled the mixing bowl. Tabitha watched me with golden-eyed benevolence. Someone who understands a tiger’s requirements, she seemed to be saying. She lapped.

Then she rolled her huge length over and indicated that a scratch under the chin would complete her repast.

I knelt down and scratched as requested. What else could I do? Up close, she smelt of straw and fish. Her fur was amazingly soft. She was an astounding beast.

‘Tiger, tiger, burning bright,’ I said to her. ‘In the forests of the night. What immortal hand or eye dare frame thy fearful symmetry?’

It was fearful. Every stripe was in exactly the right place. She was a superb artistic creation. Blake knew what he was talking about, as poets usually do.

Then I heard the sound which Gordon and Kendall had wanted to record.

Tabitha was purring. I was sitting on a kitchen floor with a purring tiger. I froze momentarily, and Tabitha opened an eye, wondering why I had stopped. So I started again. She was very cat-like. Her whiskers laid back against her muzzle in just the same way as a domestic cat’s. But her teeth were like daggers in her tawny jaw and I judged that it was about time someone came to rescue me before Tabitha got bored again.

Just at that moment, the door edged open and Leonidas crept inside. Tabitha gave him a sniff of greeting, got up, aimed a lick at the side of my face, and allowed him to attach her purely symbolic leash. That was an interesting interlude, she conveyed, but I’m ready to go home now.

He led her out towards her travelling cage. I decided that I might just stay on the floor for the present. It was quite a comfortable floor. Outside there was dead silence. I could imagine Leonidas leading Tabitha to her cage, escorting her inside, shutting the door, summoning labour to wheel the cage out of the studio into the car park, and close the big doors. And as soon as that happened . . .

The noise broke out again. Doubled and redoubled. The whole of the kitchen staff, led by Tommy and Daniel, erupted through the door. They collided in the doorway and struggled to get in. I suddenly felt very tired.

‘Corinna! That was so brave! Are you hurt? Bernie, find the brandy! No, the good brandy! I got a new bottle!’

Daniel took my hands and pulled me up into his arms.

‘Come, sit up in this chair. Are you faint?’ he asked.

‘No,’ I said, realising that I spoke the truth. ‘I’m fine, really.’

Lance was still complaining. ‘It’s karma,’ he said. ‘She picked me out of all of us to attack.’

‘She didn’t attack you,’ I explained, trying to be heard over the babble. ‘It’s just that you smelt of her favourite snack. It was the
anchoiade
. She loves anchovies. And I’m afraid I’ve used them all,’ I added.

I didn’t feel faint but I would never turn down a glass of the good brandy. I sipped and began to feel very pleased with myself. I had done the GWH out of his shot. Tabitha was fine. And well fed. And safely out of Harbour Studios. A good morning’s work.

‘Corinna,’ said Daniel, ‘that was very brave. I swear, my heart was in my mouth. Are you sure you’re all right?’

‘Not a scratch,’ I said. ‘Here, have some brandy. You look like you could do with some, more than me. I’m fine. Truly. What’s happening on set?’

‘Oh, you should come and see it,’ he said affectionately. ‘If you feel strong enough.’

‘Of course,’ I said.

Even so, he kept hold of my arm. I had given Daniel a shock. Further shocks awaited us.

* * *

On set, Molly Atkins was sitting in a chair, with Harrison and Emily on either side. All were weeping freely.

‘But how?’ she sobbed. ‘How did you know?’

‘Easily,’ I said. Someone needed to get the explanations over with so we could get on with serving lunch. ‘Why don’t we all sit down and have a nice cup of something?’

Tommy, who had never been slow on the uptake, summoned her staff and soon people with trays were moving among the actors. They distributed tea, coffee, chocolate and fruit juice, with a selection of Bernie’s toastie treats and muffins left over from breakfast. Soon everyone was snacking, nibbling and sipping, which was great because it meant that they were no longer exclaiming, screaming or expostulating. Tash, who was reproving Kylie and Goss for protecting the tiger, took a cup of hot choc- olate and let them go. She gestured to me to take over. Everyone sat down and soon only Daniel and I were standing.

‘My colleague,’ I said, emboldened by Armagnac, ‘undertook to find Ms Atkins’ missing child. In case anyone was wondering, there was indeed a child. He was christened Zephaniah, poor kid, and adopted by a very religious family called Smith.’

‘And expired at an early age of acute nomenclature,’ observed Ethan. There was a laugh. Tash gave him a glare which would have smelted platinum. He subsided.

‘When he was fifteen he won the lottery. Left the Smiths. Vanished out of history. At least under that name.’

‘There are several people who might be Zephaniah on this set.’ Daniel took up the tale. ‘Harrison was adopted. But his adoption and subsequent career do not match what we know of Zephaniah. The other thing I was asked to research was, who was playing food-based practical jokes? Was it someone trying to ruin Tommy? Was it someone trying to injure or offend Ms Atkins? Neither of those motives appeared to match the people available.’

‘Then it started to make sense,’ I said. ‘Due to information received.’ I was not going to expose Mrs Dawson to this lot. ‘We found out that Zephaniah was not the only child of Ms Atkins. We were told, in fact, that she had borne twins. Both had been adopted out. Both might be playing tricks to seek her attention. Possibly also to revenge themselves on a mother who had deserted them. Was that the reason, Harrison?’

General sensation. All eyes turned to the beautiful boy. He did not blush or lower his gaze. He was used to the admiring public gaze.

‘It wasn’t me,’ he said. ‘I knew she was my biological mother. But I had a lovely adoptive mother. I couldn’t have been happier, more supported in my talents. I didn’t want to become a star—as I shall—because of her patronage. I was going to do it on my own. But when I saw the tiger attack her . . .’