Death and Mr. Pickwick (36 page)

So he produced
A Water Party
, showing anthropomorphic cats holding a picnic at Richmond. On the very spot where Seymour sat, the felines sat too, at a cloth spread with platters, raising their wine glasses in their paws. Afterwards, he drew cats playing whist, then an army-officer cat courting a well-dressed lady cat in her parlour, bending to kiss her paw. Then stray cats caterwauling in the streets, dressed as ragged beggars, accompanied by a one-legged cat-fiddler. The musical theme led to
Musical Mousers
, showing an entire orchestra of cats – but, suddenly overcome with fatigue, Seymour decided to pause in his drawing and take a doze in the sun.

He lay back on the grass with his jacket under his head. By a natural tendency of the mind to play with words, ‘mousers' suggested ‘Moses'; and in a dreamy state, with the warmth of the sun upon his eyelids, he wondered what had happened to that strange publican and coachman.

 

*

IN A DESK DRAWER IN
Moses Pickwick's office at the White Hart lay a curious green ledger in which the overall profit-and-loss account for the inn was kept. Common opinion holds that arithmetic is the field of human knowledge most likely to be true, but the Pickwick family had a congenital dislike of subtraction, addition and matters mathematical. Moses had once cried inconsolably in school when the headmaster gave him a problem concerning compound interest, and Eleazer seemed especially delighted that his cousin shared the family aversion to manipulating numbers. As long as his cousin knew that the family owned about three times as many horses as miles between Bath and London, Eleazer was happy to make Moses his successor.

So Moses and Eleazer put figures in the ledger when the mood struck. If a total looked about right, it
was
right. Yet in the Pickwicks' ledger, if errors were the rule and correctness a fluke, accuracy was the miraculous result. Figures in the pessimistic way by Eleazer were counteracted by figures in the optimistic way by Moses, and vice versa. Whatever their exact income, the Pickwicks were well-to-do. Their three hundred horses proved it. If they
should
need to make an exact calculation, they could always hire a clerk.

The account-book's pages proved accommodating to all types of material. This began when, rather than become involved in numerical calculation, the Pickwicks wrote down the names of items they had acquired year by year, in lists, with no monetary values attached. At first glance, these lists resembled recipes. It was but a short step to actual recipes making their appearance in the pages – for gingerbread, Sally Lunns, milk punch, prepared hams, stewed cucumbers and pickled lemons. Soon there were prescriptions for ailments, such as for treating a wasp sting, and then methods of killing flies, and then contractual terms for footmen, and then pieces of proverbial wisdom, and then anything that Moses and Eleazer Pickwick considered worthy of note. Eleazer once told Moses – after Eleazer swatted a bluebottle with a twelve-inch ruler, because he could not concentrate on compiling a waybill, and after he had remarked that they must make some more flypaper – ‘Anything can have an effect upon profits, even a buzzing fly.' A piece of wisdom which Moses duly committed to the account book.

On rare occasions, Moses Pickwick brought this book out into public. One Saturday evening, when visitors in the White Hart's bar talked of the actor James Quin's legendary appearance as Falstaff, one man remarked that it was a shame nobody was alive who could have seen it. This led Moses to fetch the account book – he announced that he would ask the cook to prepare Quin's Sauce, using the recipe recorded in its pages. In the bar, he read the ingredients and directions aloud to the visitors, beginning with ‘Pound six large anchovies in a mortar' and passing through sundry items including black walnut pickle, mushroom catchup, and a double-glass of claret.

‘Quin's Sauce is one of my favourites,' said Moses in his alternation of bass and falsetto, ‘but did you know the sauce is the secret basis of Quin's Siamese Soup?'

The men in the bar had heard of neither sauce nor soup. ‘Shall I tell you a story about the soup?' said Moses.

Having caught the attention of his audience, Moses Pickwick told his tale of James Quin, the renowned actor and gourmand; for the subject of Bath's distinguished citizens, from Bladud to himself, never tired him at all.

*   *   *

Not everyone held James Quin's acting in high esteem. The novelist Tobias Smollett once said that the movements of Quin on stage resembled heaving ballast in the hold of a ship. Certainly, if a play script required an actor to tremble with fear, Quin threw all twenty stone of limbs and body into tremulous emotion. In his novel
Peregrine Pickle
, Smollett singled out Quin's seismic handling of the first-person singular for particular comment:

His behaviour appeared to me so uncouth that I really imagined he was visited by some epileptic distemper, for he stood tottering and gasping for the space of two minutes, like a man suddenly struck with the palsy; and, after various distortions and side-shakings, as if he had got fleas in his doublet, heaved up from his lungs the letter I, like a huge anchor from foul ground.

In 1751, as a result of these attacks, Quin retired to Bath, taking his style of acting with him. Here, he devoted himself to his two true loves: eating and drinking. Before his retirement, Quin had merely played Falstaff; now he
was
Falstaff – Falstaff in the flesh, in real life, and proud of it! By half-past eight of a Friday evening, Quin would have emptied six full bottles of claret from the White Hart's cellar. He grew
so
stout that even sedan chairmen in Bath in low season had been known to turn down his custom. If two chairmen
did
accept him as a passenger, his limbs had to be lifted into the vehicle, for he was too far gone in his cups to bring them to life himself, and the two men hauled his legs up one at a time. If they took Quin to the street door of his house, they earned a large gratuity if they could then help him to bed, aided by two servants. And, once in bed of a Friday night, Quin gave orders not to be disturbed until Sunday at noon. ‘The bear must hibernate,' he said, before he collapsed into his own fat and snores.

Yet for all his gluttony, Quin had a fierce abhorrence of particular victuals. Any food that was ordinary and unadorned was intolerable. ‘I would rather
starve
than eat a plain boiled potato or a piece of unseasoned meat,' he often said. He confessed that as a lad, when he was starting out in the acting profession, he was once reduced by financial circumstances to a dish of raw potatoes after a performance as a citizen in
Coriolanus.
‘There they were, these potatoes, sitting white and round on a white plate,' he said when he reminisced about the experience. ‘For a long time, I simply stared at them. Summoning up courage, I forked a potato towards my mouth at least five times – but I
still
could not overcome nausea. At last, by sheer force of will, I got a small one into my mouth. But the smooth curves of the peeled potato, like a child's alabaster marble sitting on my tongue, induced such revulsion that I
had
to spit it out on to the plate. I went hungry that night, and I have never attempted a plain potato since.'

Spiciness and exoticism of food were so important to James Quin that he would waddle into the kitchen at his house, sample a steaming spoonful of liquor from a pot and declare, with great authority, the
exact
adjustments to seasoning that his cook had to make – from half-a-trimmed-fingernail-of-the-little-finger of pepper to a tweezerload of salt. He took it as absolutely true that, just as men exist in different shapes, sizes and colours, so there are men born with exquisitely sensitive palates, capable of discerning minute differences in taste, men for whom the plain and ordinary on the dinner plate are the greatest horrors the world can contrive. Thus, anyone receiving an invitation to his table would be sure of exotic food and drink, as well as gossip of the theatre and general good cheer, marred only by Quin's tendency to talk too much of himself.

There was one meal he served that was prized by his guests above all others: Quin's Siamese Soup.

The legend of this pottage spread so widely that its reputation was itself a rich aroma arising from the surface of the soup bowl. It was without question the most sought-after meal in Bath, and made all the tastier because, despite every inducement short of blackmail, Quin refused to reveal the recipe. Rumours circulated about the ingredients. Was it made from pulverised turtle? Or flaked John Dory? Did all its ingredients come from the East? Was there – as some claimed – a supernatural ingredient, and was it true that water blessed by an anchorite in an Athenian cave was used to boil the onions? Attempts were made to bribe his cook, but she could not reveal the secret even if she had wanted to do so – for Quin always made her stand outside the kitchen, and locked the door while he added seasoning in the right proportions, as well as ingredients known only to himself.

To taste the famous soup was worth enduring an entire evening of Quin's anecdotes.

‘Oh what
japes
we had in those days!' he said, turning his large face so that he observed the reactions over the soup bowls. ‘Oh what
laughs
!' His shirt was unbuttoned to show off even more of his profound physique. He blamed a mild head cold for not eating his own soup that night, which had blunted his tongue's keenness but had not in any way affected his voice. Still, he looked with a keen eye upon the sips of others, and seemed to take in the taste through his pupils, as he recounted events in theatrical life.

Most fascinating, in his own opinion, was the occasion he was put on trial for murder, later recorded in that illustrated collection of outrages known as the
Newgate Calendar
. At his dinner table, punctuated by long, long pauses to heighten the drama, and long, long gulps of claret to make the guests wait, Quin told of the extraordinary events surrounding his appearance in Addison's Roman drama
Cato
.

‘When the great Booth's infirmities meant that he was obliged to leave the stage, the general clamour was that
I
should be his successor at Drury Lane,' he said, ‘and there was no part more popular than his Cato. I doubt that any role in any dramatic performance in history had attracted more interest from the public. No one else had acted it, and no one else should. So I refused. Still, it was
demanded
I step into his shoes. So, with reluctance, I accepted. Although – I
insisted
the playbills should read “The part of Cato will be
attempted
by Mr Quin”. My friends, I entered the fray. I especially remember when the body of Cato's dead son, slain in battle, was brought on stage. I said the line “Thanks to the gods, my boy has done his duty” – and the cry came up from the audience: “Booth outdone! Booth outdone!” Oh! And then when I expired!' He swilled the claret round his mouth to prepare himself for the reciting of the line from his death scene. ‘“Oh when shall I get loose from this vain world, Th'abode of guilt and sorrow.” The audience cried “Encore! Encore!” Well, I had no alternative but to repeat the soliloquy. And when the curtain finally fell, the applause! Oh the applause!'

Quin nodded a bow to all sides of the table, before resuming his tale.

‘This acclaim continued night after night, until there came a performance when a low actor called Williams, a Welshman, took over the part of a messenger. He was – perhaps understandably – nervous being near me. He had never, I believe, had his name upon the bills. When he came on stage, he should have said “Caesar sends health to Cato.” But he pronounced Cato as “Keeto”.
Keeto
! I was outraged! So I departed from Addison's text and said, “Would he had sent a better messenger.” It went down very well, because many in the audience had of course seen my performance before. But when the scene was over Williams followed me to the green room. He said I had made him contemptible in the eyes of the audience. Then the fool demanded that I either apologise or fight a duel. I said that I would give him an answer when he had learnt to read a script. And he flew into a worse rage! He uttered a torrent of threats and abuse. I remained calm, gentlemen. My response was to repeat his words back to him, but changing the vowels. He had said, “I will make you pay.” I said back, “I will meek you pee.” He said, “Take the smile off your face.” I said, “Teek the smile off your feece.” The fellow was frankly outdone, and he stormed out of the room in a complete state of fury!

‘Later that night, I was on my way back to my lodgings. But Williams lay in wait for me under the piazza of Covent Garden. Suddenly he emerged from the shadows and drew his sword. He tried to mock me, saying, “I will MEEK you PEE, Quin.” Well, I drew too. My years of experience in stage swordsmanship were now matched against this puppy – though, I confess, he was better than many an actor I have fenced with. But, in defending myself, I ran him through.' Quin jabbed the air with his butter knife. ‘He fell down dead upon the spot.'

‘Instantly?' asked one distinguished guest, whose squeezed face appeared involved in sucking even when not at the soup.

‘As good as instantly.' Detecting some scepticism, Quin said: ‘A man be dead 'ere he dies.' This profundity apparently assuaged any misgivings about the story's strict veracity. ‘But I had killed a man. So I surrendered myself without delay to the authorities.' There was the longest gap in the anecdote so far, and Quin slowly, slowly, shook his head, reliving the emotions stirred by that anxious time.

Suddenly he said: ‘The trial, oh the trial! Yet, gentlemen, I knew I had justice on my side. I was found guilty of manslaughter. I was soon back on the stage.'