Quail Seed
"The outlook is not encouraging for us smaller businesses," said Mr.
Scarrick to the artist and his sister, who had taken rooms over his
suburban grocery store. "These big concerns are offering all sorts
of attractions to the shopping public which we couldn't afford to
imitate, even on a small scale--reading-rooms and play-rooms and
gramophones and Heaven knows what. People don't care to buy half a
pound of sugar nowadays unless they can listen to Harry Lauder and
have the latest Australian cricket scores ticked off before their
eyes. With the big Christmas stock we've got in we ought to keep
half a dozen assistants hard at work, but as it is my nephew Jimmy
and myself can pretty well attend to it ourselves. It's a nice
stock of goods, too, if I could only run it off in a few weeks time,
but there's no chance of that--not unless the London line was to get
snowed up for a fortnight before Christmas. I did have a sort of
idea of engaging Miss Luffcombe to give recitations during
afternoons; she made a great hit at the Post Office entertainment
with her rendering of 'Little Beatrice's Resolve'."
"Anything less likely to make your shop a fashionable shopping
centre I can't imagine," said the artist, with a very genuine
shudder; "if I were trying to decide between the merits of Carlsbad
plums and confected figs as a winter dessert it would infuriate me
to have my train of thought entangled with little Beatrice's resolve
to be an Angel of Light or a girl scout. No," he continued, "the
desire to get something thrown in for nothing is a ruling passion
with the feminine shopper, but you can't afford to pander
effectively to it. Why not appeal to another instinct; which
dominates not only the woman shopper but the male shopper--in fact,
the entire human race?"
"What is that instinct, sir?" said the grocer.
* * *
Mrs. Greyes and Miss Fritten had missed the 2.18 to Town, and as
there was not another train till 3.12 they thought that they might
as well make their grocery purchases at Scarrick's. It would not be
sensational, they agreed, but it would still be shopping.
For some minutes they had the shop almost to themselves, as far as
customers were concerned, but while they were debating the
respective virtues and blemishes of two competing brands of anchovy
paste they were startled by an order, given across the counter, for
six pomegranates and a packet of quail seed. Neither commodity was
in general demand in that neighbourhood. Equally unusual was the
style and appearance of the customer; about sixteen years old, with
dark olive skin, large dusky eyes, and think, low-growing, blue-
black hair, he might have made his living as an artist's model. As
a matter of fact he did. The bowl of beaten brass that he produced
for the reception of his purchases was distinctly the most
astonishing variation on the string bag or marketing basket of
suburban civilisation that his fellow-shoppers had ever seen. He
threw a gold piece, apparently of some exotic currency, across the
counter, and did not seem disposed to wait for any change that might
be forthcoming.
"The wine and figs were not paid for yesterday," he said; "keep what
is over of the money for our future purchases."
"A very strange-looking boy?" said Mrs. Greyes interrogatively to
the grocer as soon as his customer had left.
"A foreigner, I believe," said Mr. Scarrick, with a shortness that
was entirely out of keeping with his usually communicative manner.
"I wish for a pound and a half of the best coffee you have," said an
authoritative voice a moment or two later. The speaker was a tall,
authoritative-looking man of rather outlandish aspect, remarkable
among other things for a full black beard, worn in a style more in
vogue in early Assyria than in a London suburb of the present day.
"Has a dark-faced boy been here buying pomegranates?" he asked
suddenly, as the coffee was being weighed out to him.
The two ladies almost jumped on hearing the grocer reply with an
unblushing negative.
"We have a few pomegranates in stock," he continued, "but there has
been no demand for them."
"My servant will fetch the coffee as usual," said the purchaser,
producing a coin from a wonderful metal-work purse. As an apparent
afterthought he fired out the question: "Have you, perhaps, any
quail seed?"
"No," said the grocer, without hesitation, "we don't stock it."
"What will he deny next?" asked Mrs. Greyes under her breath. What
made it seem so much worse was the fact that Mr. Scarrick had quite
recently presided at a lecture on Savonarola.
Turning up the deep astrachan collar of his long coat, the stranger
swept out of the shop, with the air, Miss Fritten afterwards
described it, of a Satrap proroguing a Sanhedrim. Whether such a
pleasant function ever fell to a Satrap's lot she was not quite
certain, but the simile faithfully conveyed her meaning to a large
circle of acquaintances.
"Don't let's bother about the 3.12," said Mrs. Greyes; "let's go and
talk this over at Laura Lipping's. It's her day."
When the dark-faced boy arrived at the shop next day with his brass
marketing bowl there was quite a fair gathering of customers, most
of whom seemed to be spinning out their purchasing operations with
the air of people who had very little to do with their time. In a
voice that was heard all over the shop, perhaps because everybody
was intently listening, he asked for a pound of honey and a packet
of quail seed.
"More quail seed!" said Miss Fritten. "Those quails must be
voracious, or else it isn't quail seed at all."
"I believe it's opium, and the bearded man is a detective," said
Mrs. Greyes brilliantly.
"I don't," said Laura Lipping; "I'm sure it's something to do with
the Portuguese Throne."
"More likely to be a Persian intrigue on behalf of the ex-Shah,"
said Miss Fritten; "the bearded man belongs to the Government Party.
The quail-seed is a countersign, of course; Persia is almost next
door to Palestine, and quails come into the Old Testament, you
know."
"Only as a miracle," said her well-informed younger sister; "I've
thought all along it was part of a love intrigue."
The boy who had so much interest and speculation centred on him was
on the point of departing with his purchases when he was waylaid by
Jimmy, the nephew-apprentice, who, from his post at the cheese and
bacon counter, commanded a good view of the street.
"We have some very fine Jaffa oranges," he said hurriedly, pointing
to a corner where they were stored, behind a high rampart of biscuit
tins. There was evidently more in the remark than met the ear. The
boy flew at the oranges with the enthusiasm of a ferret finding a
rabbit family at home after a long day of fruitless subterranean
research. Almost at the same moment the bearded stranger stalked
into the shop, and flung an order for a pound of dates and a tin of
the best Smyrna halva across the counter. The most adventurous
housewife in the locality had never heard of halva, but Mr. Scarrick
was apparently able to produce the best Smyrna variety of it without
a moment's hesitation.
"We might be living in the Arabian Nights," said Miss Fritten,
excitedly.
"Hush! Listen," beseeched Mrs. Greyes.
"Has the dark-faced boy, of whom I spoke yesterday, been here to-
day?" asked the stranger.
"We've had rather more people than usual in the shop to-day," said
Mr. Scarrick, "but I can't recall a boy such as you describe."
Mrs. Greyes and Miss Fritten looked round triumphantly at their
friends. It was, of course, deplorable that any one should treat
the truth as an article temporarily and excusably out of stock, but
they felt gratified that the vivid accounts they had given of Mr.
Scarrick's traffic in falsehoods should receive confirmation at
first hand.
"I shall never again be able to believe what he tells me about the
absence of colouring matter in the jam," whispered an aunt of Mrs.
Greyes tragically.
The mysterious stranger took his departure; Laura Lipping distinctly
saw a snarl of baffled rage reveal itself behind his heavy moustache
and upturned astrachan collar. After a cautious interval the seeker
after oranges emerged from behind the biscuit tins, having
apparently failed to find any individual orange that satisfied his
requirements. He, too, took his departure, and the shop was slowly
emptied of its parcel and gossip laden customers. It was Emily
Yorling's "day", and most of the shoppers made their way to her
drawing-room. To go direct from a shopping expedition to a tea
party was what was known locally as "living in a whirl".
Two extra assistants had been engaged for the following afternoon,
and their services were in brisk demand; the shop was crowded.
People bought and bought, and never seemed to get to the end of
their lists. Mr. Scarrick had never had so little difficulty in
persuading customers to embark on new experiences in grocery wares.
Even those women whose purchases were of modest proportions dawdled
over them as though they had brutal, drunken husbands to go home to.
The afternoon had dragged uneventfully on, and there was a distinct
buzz of unpent excitement when a dark-eyed boy carrying a brass bowl
entered the shop. The excitement seemed to have communicated itself
to Mr. Scarrick; abruptly deserting a lady who was making insincere
inquiries about the home life of the Bombay duck, he intercepted the
newcomer on his way to the accustomed counter and informed him, amid
a deathlike hush, that he had run out of quail seed.
The boy looked nervously round the shop, and turned hesitatingly to
go. He was again intercepted, this time by the nephew, who darted
out from behind his counter and said something about a better line
of oranges. The boy's hesitation vanished; he almost scuttled into
the obscurity of the orange corner. There was an expectant turn of
public attention towards the door, and the tall, bearded stranger
made a really effective entrance. The aunt of Mrs. Greyes declared
afterwards that she found herself sub-consciously repeating "The
Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold" under her breath, and
she was generally believed.
The newcomer, too, was stopped before he reached the counter, but
not by Mr. Scarrick or his assistant. A heavily veiled lady, whom
no one had hitherto noticed, rose languidly from a seat and greeted
him in a clear, penetrating voice.
"Your Excellency does his shopping himself?" she said.
"I order the things myself," he explained; "I find it difficult to
make my servants understand."
In a lower, but still perfectly audible, voice the veiled lady gave
him a piece of casual information.
"They have some excellent Jaffa oranges here." Then with a tinkling
laugh she passed out of the shop.
The man glared all round the shop, and then, fixing his eyes
instinctively on the barrier of biscuit tins, demanded loudly of the
grocer: "You have, perhaps, some good Jaffa oranges?"
Every one expected an instant denial on the part of Mr. Scarrick of
any such possession. Before he could answer, however, the boy had
broken forth from his sanctuary. Holding his empty brass bowl
before him he passed out into the street. His face was variously
described afterwards as masked with studied indifference, overspread
with ghastly pallor, and blazing with defiance. Some said that his
teeth chattered, others that he went out whistling the Persian
National Hymn. There was no mistaking, however, the effect produced
by the encounter on the man who had seemed to force it. If a rabid
dog or a rattlesnake had suddenly thrust its companionship on him he
could scarcely have displayed a greater access of terror. His air
of authority and assertiveness had gone, his masterful stride had
given way to a furtive pacing to and fro, as of an animal seeking an
outlet for escape. In a dazed perfunctory manner, always with his
eyes turning to watch the shop entrance, he gave a few random
orders, which the grocer made a show of entering in his book. Now
and then he walked out into the street, looked anxiously in all
directions, and hurried back to keep up his pretence of shopping.
From one of these sorties he did not return; he had dashed away into
the dusk, and neither he nor the dark-faced boy nor the veiled lady
were seen again by the expectant crowds that continued to throng the
Scarrick establishment for days to come.
* * *
"I can never thank you and your sister sufficiently," said the
grocer.
"We enjoyed the fun of it," said the artist modestly, "and as for
the model, it was a welcome variation on posing for hours for 'The
Lost Hylas'."
"At any rate," said the grocer, "I insist on paying for the hire of
the black beard."
_________
-THE END-
[Hector Hugh Munro] Saki's short story: Quail Seed
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