(Vegetables) Chapter Thirty Four: Cooking With The Enemy

The three potato chilli was bubbling away on the stove, and Morwen was mixing up the batter for the cherry clafoutis. Rosa was busily turning herself and the countertops red, while trying to stone the cherries.

Outside the kitchen window, a row of chickens⁹³ were perched on the windowsill, looking in. The sound guy, he of the shifty behaviour and the bushy beard, was nervous.

“Those chickens are freaking me out,” he said, in a low voice.

Horace and the cameraman both glared at him. Rosa stopped stoning cherries and turned to give him a long, appraising look. Then , with one stride, she strode over to him, and yanked hard on his beard.

“Hey!” he yelled, as his beard came off in her hand.

“I knew it,” said Rosa triumphantly, brandishing the false beard. It was the not-policeman. “Didn’t my girlfriend threaten you with a cheese grater if you ever came back here again?”

“She’s not here, is she?” he replied quickly.

“Luckily for you she’s not. But if she finds out that you’re back, well, you’ll be thinking longingly of the cheese grater!”

As everyone’s attention was on Rosa and the not-policeman, Morwen carefully and slowly reached up to the ladybird pendant around her neck and gave it a swift yank. It came off in her hand and she tucked it into her pocket.

“Enough!” barked Horace. Then, in a smoother tone, “let’s get on with things. The light’s going, and we don’t want to have to be filming late at night, now do we?”

“Hmph,” muttered Rosa, turning back to the cherries. “I think this is a set up.”

“Ya think? Really?” replied Morwen quietly.

“What are we going to do?” Rosa whispered.

“Later,” hissed Morwen, conscious of being closely watched. Then, louder and more cheerfully she said:

“Oh damn, you forgot the dark chocolate – guess the clafoutis isn’t going to happen after all.”

Horace sighed.

“Cut,” he said.

The cameraman pressed buttons and put his camera down. The sound guy/not-policeman lowered his microphone and glared at the chickens out the window.

“Dave,” said Horace to the sound guy/not-policeman. “Do us a favour and nip down the shops and pick up some dark chocolate.”

He paused to check the cookbook text.

“Two hundred grammes of seventy per cent cocoa solids, if you’d be so kind. And while you’re there, grab me a chilli chicken wrap and a bottle of bubbly.”

Dave hit the floor for the second time that evening, as one of the chickens⁹⁴ launched herself at the window and flapped manically, clucking loudly.

Even Horace and the cameraman recoiled.

“What’s going on with those things!” yelled Horace.

Rosa looked worried. “They should be in bed asleep by now. I’ll go out and check.”

“Here,” said Morwen, thinking quickly. “Take some bread out for them, to tempt them into their run.”

She handed Rosa a couple of slices of bread, with the ladybird sandwiched in between them. They exchanged a look as Rosa felt the hard lump in the bread.

“Stewart, go with Rosa,” ordered Horace. “Sort those stupid birds out, or I will.”

“You know,” chattered Rosa to the silent cameraman as they went out into the back garden. “I think I’ve gone off Feasts with Friends now.”

The chickens jumped off their perch by the window and disappeared into the garden as Rosa’s voice was raised with the call of “chook, chook, chook, chooookie!”

Morwen and Horace simply stood there, watching each other⁹⁵. Dave, the not-policeman, fidgeted, reaching out one hand to poke at the plants on the kitchen windowsill.

“Hey,” snapped Morwen, and Dave pulled his hand back as if stung. “Don’t touch my plants.”

“Why not?” asked Dave, with a touch of bravado.

“They’re carnivorous,” replied Morwen.

Dave slowly backed away from the windowsill. Horace sighed and rolled his eyes.

Rosa and Stewart came back inside, Rosa stamping and blowing on her hands.

“It’s gone cold out there,” she said. “But the girls are all tucked up in bed, safe and sound. No more flying around for them this evening.”

She winked at Morwen.

Horace watched this exchange with a dubious look on his face. Then suddenly, he came to a decision.

“Forget the clafoutis. We don’t need it. The potato chilli should be ready, let’s test it.”

___

⁹³ Gingernut, Kimberley, Bourbon, Coconut Cream and Mikado. Snowball was on the roof again.
⁹⁴ Bourbon
⁹⁵ It wasn’t a staring match. Not yet anyway.