"Damn fine soup, eh Lichfield?" Cuthbertson asked me. "Bit like Mulligatawny," he added, and seemed to roll this idea about his mind for a time. "Only fishier," he decided.

As one of those leathery, heavily moustachioed Anglo-Indians, it still amazed me that Cuthbertson should end up with us, rather than at Boodle's, or the Savage Club, but I gather he met up with some Theosophists in the East, or some similar creatures, so I suppose that explains it. Whatever the case, I sincerely prayed that Benoit would never hear of his bouillabaisse having been described in the language that Cuthbertson had just used. Suppressing a shudder at the thought of our chef giving his notice, relegating us to the era of Lancashire hotpot as prepared by the club manservant, Billingsly, I humphed non-committally. It was only because there were too few of us to fill the dining room that night that we were forced to endure each other's company at all. But it seemed inhospitable to scatter ourselves at separate tables.

"I say," Milford piped up, "has anyone else ever tried swell-fish?"

"What?" Cuthbertson asked, startled from his Mulligatawny reveries.

"Swell-fish." Milford repeated. "It's a fish," he explained.

As we waited for him to expand upon his chosen topic, I chewed another portion of rouille-seasoned bread.

"It swells up," he continued, "when it's alarmed. Like a bladder."

This image of Milford's gave us all, I think, pause for reflection. Selkirk, keeping to himself, merely winced at every new contribution to the discussion, unless he was responding to the garlic in the rouille. Cuthbertson set down his spoon.

"What the devil do you mean? My bladder doesn't swell up when it's alarmed!"

Milford seemed to grow abstract at this objection, staring off into the middle distance. "They call it fugu in Japan, of course," he said. "Should the fish be prepared in the wrong manner, the poison of the internal organs can mix with the flesh. Any diner unfortunate enough to consume such an ill-prepared dish suffers total and irreversible paralysis, while remaining completely and horribly conscious, in a nightmare-like living death. Finally, asphyxiation overcomes him, and he mercifully succumbs to oblivion."

Cuthbertson's moustache trembled slightly, and he pushed away his fish soup.

"Damn fool thing to do, if you ask me. Eating poison bladder-fish. Nonsense. What do you want to do a thing like that for?"

After spooning up some more broth, Milford considered the question. "Always interesting to try new things, I suppose."

"Madness," said Cuthbertson. He took a swig of the Provençal Rosé that Benoit had imported specially, from Tavel. "Had elephant once m'self," Cuthbertson said. "Bit tough. Trunk's the best bit. Like veal. What about you, Lichfield? Ever eaten any odd-ball stuff?"

While I cannot claim to have supped on the exotica of the East, there was one thing that rose to the surface of a lifetime of memorable meals. "You know, I think the strangest thing I ever ingested was something I had once in Glasgow. A fellow there sold me a deep-fried pickle. Never had anything like it. Quite extraordinary."

Having finally lit upon a common area of interest, we were all now leaning back in our chairs with our glasses, recollecting meals gone by. Milford, again, was going on about some monstrous fruit from the Indies that smelt like an old boot and tasted of sherry custard.

"Ye gods," Cuthbertson broke in, "your palate belongs in Bedlam, Milford." He shook his head at the thought of the other fellow's lunatic indulgences, and then turned on Selkirk, who was sitting aloof, sniffing his rosé. "And what about you, Selkirk? Tell me your greatest ever tiffin wasn't some Chinese stink-berry."

"Wasn't Chinese," Milford protested feebly, before Cuthbertson waved him into silence. "Give Selkirk a chance," he insisted.

"Yes," I agreed, "I'd be fascinated to know, Selkirk."

Selkirk returned my gaze with his usual half-squint. He rubbed his chin, apparently sorting though his own culinary adventures. "Well, do you remember Peterson?"

"Peterson?" Milford asked.

"Yes," I muttered, the name coming back to me now. "Entomologist or something, wasn't he? Went out on your South American trek, up the Amazon?"

Selkirk nodded, gravely.

"Peterson died out there, if I remember correctly," I said.

A strange pallor fell over Milford's silent face. Cuthbertson's moustache twitched. "You don't mean to suggest..." he began, breathily, when Selkirk failed to elaborate.

"Surely..." said Milford.

Selkirk nodded again, in the same sad way.

"It's true," he admitted. "Disgusting, I know. I wouldn't want to make a habit of it, of course."

"Dear God," Cuthbertson said, retreating from Selkirk as far as possible without actually moving his chair.

Selkirk let out a long, world-weary sigh. "Yes. Yes, indeed. Makes you think, doesn't it. Poor fellow. The flesh had a nutty flavour, as I recall. Not bad at all, though, really. Cooked up quite nicely. Shame he never had a chance to add the grubs to his collection, but as a snack they weren't half bad."

As the waiter arrived bearing cutlets and claret, I sensed a certain loss of appetite in a couple of my companions, even if their colour was coming back. Just after the waiter had slipped away again, a heavy thump, as of a door slamming, sounded somewhere above us, causing a gilt gasolier in the centre of the dining room--fashioned in the shape of five sinuous fire-breathing dragons--to sway gently, casting shifting shadows.

"McCavour must be tiring of our banter," I suggested.

"Fool's missing some good nosh," Cuthbertson opined, spreading butter on a slab of still-steaming bread. "What's he do with his time up there, anyway?"

Milford turned on his cutlet with such concentration that we knew he must be hiding something.

"Well?" Cuthbertson demanded. "What's he up to?"

Contorting his face like a man biting an unexpected olive stone, Milford lowered his voice. "He's a bit embarrassed just at present, I've heard."

"Embarrassed?" Cuthbertson exclaimed, far louder than even his normal boom. "'bout what? Hasn't got some filthy disease, has he? Knew a fellah in Rangoon, got a filthy disease. Auchenleck was the name. The fellah, not the disease."

I cleared my throat. "Impecunious, Milford means."

"Eh?" Cuthbertson said, looking from one to the other of us.

Milford's mouth dropped open and just as quickly swung itself shut again, as he evidently hunted for a polite synonym or euphemism. Selkirk abandoned his dinner and sat back, arms folded, shaking his head.

"What?" Cuthbertson demanded. His face umbered a trifle, as though basking in the heat of an over-banked moustache. He seemed to grow suddenly palsied in his annoyance, his fork shivering in his fist. But then it shook itself free and shot upward like a dart, burying itself in the high moulded ceiling.

"I say!" said Milford.

"What'n blazes!" exclaimed Cuthbertson.

"That's odd," I observed.

Even Selkirk rallied from his funk to join us in gawping up at the implement embedded overhead.