CHAPTER XXIV
IN THE KITCHEN
Leaving John and Nancy to deal with the boats in the boathouse, all the others walked back across the lawn to the house entering through the kitchen door. There was no sign of Titty. Peggy walked through to the hall to hang up her coat and she could see through the open door Titty sitting at the desk in Captain Flint's study. She walked across the hall and spoke to her.
"Hello, what are you up to?" Titty looked up with a start.
"Oh you're back! Sorry, I didn't hear you. I've been reading Captain Flint's book, I've not seen it before."
"We hadn't either, John and I found that copy in a briefcase of his papers in the box room upstairs, you knew about the dedication I suppose?"
"No, not at all! Do you and Nancy still get the royalties?" Nancy who had come back in to the house heard their conversation and came in to the room before Peggy could answer.
"No we don't! Nobody seems to know who gets them, it's still in print too, I've seen copies in bookshops in London, you can get it in paperback too." Titty looked confused, she knew from what Dot told her how these things operated.
"Didn't your mother know who got them?" Nancy continued.
"No, I asked her after Uncle Jim died, she always thought you did, but she couldn't understand why in the few years before he died that there were no copies anywhere." Titty thought of something, again from what Dot had explained to her about publishing.
"I never knew he had dedicated it to me. Didn't he have a proof copy, or a first edition? If it was signed it could be worth a lot!"
"We only found that copy, and John has looked everywhere for any others." Peggy seemed equally confused. John joined them, wondering why none of them were in the kitchen with the others. He saw what Titty had been reading.
"You found it. Very odd! I did write to the publisher for Peggy, they just sent a letter going on about confidentiality. Come on, Daisy needs some help and Susan's gone upstairs to see to Roger, has he been alright?" Titty answered him thinking it was typical of John expecting Susan and herself to deal with all these things.
"Yes, fine, I'll just put this back." The others left the room for the Kitchen and as Titty put the book back on the shelf she wondered why Captain Flint had become secretive about it, she knew after the war he still made quite a bit on money from it, John and Peggy seemed to forget he had used some to help with their wedding. Making a mental note to look in to at some time she went back across the hall to the kitchen.
Daisy, of course, had already started preparing dinner and begun to organise the others. Titty remembered the dining table.
"Sorry Daisy, I haven't done the table yet, I didn't know what you were cooking so I wasn't sure what you would need."
"Don't worry, I'm making a Thai green chicken curry, so we'll need spoons and forks. If you look in there," she pointed to one of the cupboards, "there's a box of chutneys and so on Nancy and I brought down her a few months back." Titty was impressed, she had eaten it once in London but would never have thought about making it herself, but then she was never much of a cook. Having retrieved the box and found what was needed she went to the dining room and laid the table.
Half and hour or so later John called out to everyone, they found him in the kitchen, he had opened bottles of wine and served everyone a glass, other than Nancy of course.
"You're still never tempted?" John returned to a well-worn conversation between them. Nancy was irritated and went on the attack.
"Did you never see the drunkenness when the ships you were in charge of went in to port?"
"Of course, but…" he had second thoughts, what had Nancy witnessed back then that made her feel so strongly about it? "Sorry Nancy!" She ignored him and went to the fridge to get the bottle of sparkling water she had put there earlier.
Susan had returned to the kitchen with Roger and encouraged him to sit down, he seemed, to Titty, as she thought he would, more sociable than he had been earlier in the day.
"Can we do anything Daisy?" Susan asked her more out of politeness than any urge to do something, all these years later this still surprised Peggy.
"No, that's alright, nearly done, just got to wait for it to finish cooking and then I'll prepare some rice. You could all go in the drawing room?" She knew they wouldn't, Peggy always told her it was the most unused room in the house.
They sat around the kitchen table all trying to make sure they were not in Daisy's way.