Castle Kennedy

Castle Kennedy by Francis Grose (1789)

          I had my showbiz pals Orson Welles and George Melly over for dinner. The Chivas Regal flowed like the River Bladnoch where we had spent the afternoon fishing, our waders pulled up so high they brushed against our man boobs.
         
          We had just finished the entrée - an old boot we had caught which my cook, Felching, had cut into strips and soused in milk and Galloway honey - when Melly became lugubrious, talking about "the ones that got away". Now, I'm more than a little dense (I think I was even denser at the time of which I write, the bell-end of the 1970s) but I gathered that he wasn't talking about fish!

          Over subsequent courses the saturnine demeanour of the crooner did not alter one iota. I too became a trifle peevish, for I had overseen the preparation of the main course myself and had fervently hoped that it would be, as we say in the business, "a showstopper". As it turned out, the edible scale model of my old ancestral home, the castle, with its outer walls constructed from interlocking potato waffles and its moat of marrowfat peas, was barely acknowledged and only slightly nibbled at before my crack team of serving wenches swooped in and cleared away the plates.

          The Wall's Vienetta did not fare much better. George looked thoroughly depressed as he chipped away at the dessert's minty ramparts with his mini chisel. Orson, too, looked as if he were mentally elsewhere, probably in the same place as his appetite. I just knew that he'd be checking in somewhere for a kebab on the way home.

          We retired to the smoking room and kicked the gong around. Orson, thank Christ, became loquacious. He reminisced about his experiences as a torerito, a "little bullfighter", in Sevilla in the early '30s. By the time that our auteur friend had moved on to a tale about narrating a film for Ernest Hemingway and coming to blows with him, George was his old self, animated and with a naughty gleam in his eye.
          "Show us," he said.
          "Show you what?" Orson asked.
          "Show us how you fought the bulls."
          "No, George, I don't really think..."
          "We need a demonstration!" George insisted, but gently.
          "Well, I'm not a bullfighter anymore. Those days are long gone. A lifetime ago. But if our host permits... I'll be the bull..."
          Not waiting for my nodded assent, Orson jumped on the floor and started scampering around, breathing heavily through his nose. Melly whipped off his red velvet pantaloons and thrust them at me.
          "Your cape, Sir."
          I thanked him and, trying to get into the spirit of the thing, held the cape out in front of me. Orson was now on the other side of the room, rearing up on his hind legs and pointing horn fingers at the ceiling. George, standing proudly in his Y-fronts, began to sing "I'm A Ding Dong Daddy". Orson made a noise like the last trump and charged straight at me.

          When it was all over, we collapsed exhausted into the cream leather seats. Orson mopped his face with a handkerchief the size of a bed sheet. I wished I had some lemon scented moist towelettes to give them. I rang for the butler, Lurpak. He steamed in and informed us that hot, reviving beverages were out of the question. I had quite forgotten that the kettle had been sent away for polishing. George had to make do with a tablespoonful of Mellow Birds while Orson and I sucked on teabags.

          In the morning we rose at the crack of dawn, went into the meadow and played Frisbee with a stack of Findus Crispy Pancakes. The Chicken and Bacon flew much better than the Minced Beef.

B.R. 23/11/2014