MICHAEL CARSON

Serving suggestions

Mr Widdowson watched the frozen carcasses of tuna slither noisily along the conveyor-belt and down the chute towards the gaping entrance to the vat with its oscillating knives. Though he knew that he should have been thinking about something else - something to do with his work - he could not think of anything except what the doctor had said to him the day before.

‘If I might make a suggestion, a change of scene is definitely in order.’ ‘Ah,’ said Mr Widdowson. ‘Ah, I thought you might make that sug-

gestion. You haven’t got any pills that might buck me up, I suppose? A change of scene is out, I fear. I‘ve used up all my days.’

‘I don’t give pills unless I have to. I’ve seen what happens.’ ’There we are then. It’s hell, but 1/11 just have to live with it, I suppose.

Worse things happen at sea!’ Mr Widdowson had told the doctor quite chirpily and was now telling the tuna as they passed stiffly by.

Half an hour later, Mr Widdowson was summoned by Tannoy to the office of his boss.

‘Any suggestions?’ Mr Grant of Grant, Maley and Duff, canners of meats, fowl and seafood for over a century by appointment to the discern- ing, asked.

Mr Widdowson looked at the open tin of Tuna in Brine that had been placed in front of him, trying to move his nose - without being seen to be doing so - from the fishy fumes which rose up from the damp flakes of tuna.

’Well . . . umm . . .‘ he said. ‘Yes?’ asked Mr Grant. ‘Well . . . umm . . . I would suggest that we use the sea-blue lettering

that shifted our soft cod roes so effectively. We could blow up the picture of the smiling tuna and, on the back, just next to the computer price code, put the serving suggestion.‘

‘And how do you suggest we suggest serving it?’ asked Mr Grant, a worrying touch of boredom in his voice.

’A pile of tuna next to a tomato, a piece of lettuce and a spring onion?’ suggested Mr Widdowson.

As he spoke he looked up into the face of Mr Grant, a face which always reminded him of a fully inflated red balloon with a moustache and horn-

Serving suggestions 55

rimmed glasses. He could see that Mr Grant was readying himself not to be pleased. He tried not to care.

’It just won’t do, Widdowson!’ said Mr Grant, confirming Mr Widdow- son’s worst expectations. ’Our research shows that housewives are bored to death with unimaginative serving suggestions. ’

Mr Grant went on to point out what Fairy Dell Fishy Foods had done with their labelling. A hologram showing leaping fish was truly inspi- rational. ’They sloughed off the past - and their Legionnaires’-Disease-in- the-Northern-Plant-scandal - in one masterly move. Children all over the country were demanding Fairy Dell Fishy Foods products and would not be put off by fear of a few bugs. On the other hand,’ he continued omin- ously, ’when I pass along the supermarket shelves and see our pathetic serving suggestions, those tatty tomatoes and bits of lettuce all over the plate, I curl up!’

‘Well, I’ll get my thinking cap on, Mr Grant,’ said Mr Widdowson, thinking that thinking would only make his headache worse.

’Make sure you do. And the term is ”brainstorm”, if I’m not very much mistaken. ’

’Right you are, Mr Grant. I’ll get my brain-storming cap on.’ He left Mr Grant’s office, counting the years he would have to survive at

Grant, Maley and Duff, before he would qualify for early retirement. ‘Bad day?’ asked Miss Fish in Quality Control through a haze of cigarette

smoke. ‘Par for the course,’ answered Mr Widdowson. ’Grant’s got a bee in his

bonnet about updating the serving suggestion on the label of the tuna in brine. ’

’I’ve never seen the point in serving suggestions, between you and I,’ remarked Miss Fish, doodling a moustache on a smiling fish, the new trademark of Grant, Maley and Duff.

’Me, neither,’ replied Mr Widdowson. ‘It just seems to be one of the givens that we have a plate on the tin and the product sitting on it in company with other comestibles that can be forced down with it on the same fork.’

’What’s a combustible?’ asked Miss Fish, all at sea. ‘Why shame on you. I would have thought that you of all people would

know what a comestible was.’ But Mr Widdowson did not go on to en- lighten Miss Fish. Instead he wondered how Serving Suggestions had originated. Perhaps before people could read. A good clear picture showed illiterates what they were buying.’

’I just don’t get on with tuna,‘ said Miss Fish. ‘Why?‘

56 Critical Quarterly, vol. 33, no. 3

’Well, I can get it down part of the way, but it just sticks in my craw somehow.’ And she stubbed out her cigarette on an ashtray bearing the legend: From Sea to Tin. Grunt, Muley and Duff lock Nature In!

‘Well, that’s as may be,’ said Mr Widdowson, as he often did, ’but as regards Serving Suggestions, maybe they’ve had their day now that people can read.’

’You‘d be surprised,’ said Miss Fish. ’Of course, there’s always the export market. Such as it is,’ said Mr

’My Ari . . .’ began Miss Fish. Mr Widdowson raised an eyebrow but said nothing. Miss Fish was

always talking about her Ari, but Mr Widdowson was of the opinion that her An was not strictly hers at all, but rather Mrs Theodoropoulos’s Ari. Mrs Theodoropoulos had five nasty children with skateboards to prove he was hers, after all.

But Miss Fish went on doggedly to say that her Ari thought the serving suggestion should be scrapped and that he be given credit in clear writing on the label for all the good things that he put into the Tuna in Brine.

Mr Widdowson humphed and sat down to meditate on a can of Korean Tuna in Brine that had acquired 43 per cent of the market in the six months it had been available. What, he wondered, did Je-Ju Tuna in Brine have over theirs? And, even if he did get early retirement, what was he going to do with the rest of his life? And then what? What would he say when brought in front of his Creator? Might not He feel that Mr Widdowson had buried his talents by joining Grant, Maley and Duff and consigning some of the Creator’s most elegant creations to the can? Might He not exact a fierce retribution? But his thoughts were interrupted by Miss Fish:

‘My Ari says that people want to know what goes into the tins . . . apart from tuna and brine, that is.‘

And Mr Widdowson saw a picture of Ari in his white coat and green wellies adding shovelfuls of white powders and pale blue pastes to the vast vat of churning Tuna in Brine in the processing plant down the corridor.

’. . . My Ari says’, continued Miss Fish, ’that we need to counteract the negative impression left on the public psychy-yoyo-ology by the last case of food poisoning. ’

‘No, I think Aristotle is barking up the wrong tree there, Miss Fish,’ replied Mr Widdowson knowingly. ’The public would not be in the least reassured by having chapter and verse about what Aristotle adds to the tuna in brine to help it past the tonsils. I think it is much better that we leave well alone. ”Permitted Flavouring” will do nicely. ’

Widdowson.

Serving suggestions 57

‘Ah, but will it?’ asked Miss Fish in her Archimedes fresh-out-of-the-

‘How do you mean?’ ‘What I mean is that the government is going to force us to come clean

’Is it?’ ’I have the redolent documents in front of me as I speak!’ ’Do you now?’ And Miss Fish rustled the relevant documents, though Mr Widdowson,

still imagining he could smell Tuna in Brine, wondering if there would ever be a time when he would not smell Tuna in Brine, did not feel he could face the government papers just at the moment. He did not take Miss Fish’s bait. Instead he thought, uncharitably: ‘If I were Aristotle, I’d throw Miss Fish back and do my best to please Mrs Theodoropoulos.’

But Mr Widdowson was not Aristotle. He was Mr Widdowson, married to Mrs Widdowson . . . with all that that entailed.

bath tone. ’Will it?’

about all the additives we put in.’

’I’m home, Darling!’ he called up the stairs, hoping against hope that Mrs Widdowson would be out.

’I know you are! I can smell you from here!’ Mrs Widdowson called down.

‘What‘s for dinner, Ducky?‘ Mr Widdowson asked his wife as she came down the stairs spraying Floral-Carbona at him.

’What day is it?‘ asked Mrs Widdowson. ’Tuesday, Dear.’ ‘And what do we have on Tuesdays?‘ ’Three-Pulse Stew, Sweetness.’ ‘Well, there you are then.’ ‘I was only trying to be sociable, Honey.’ ’Liar! You were trying to be trying !’ replied Mrs Widdowson vehemently. ’I wasn‘t, Flower. Honestly!’ said Mr Widdowson, though, in *reality,

Mrs Widdowson had a point. He just could not stop himself. He had not been able to stop himself for years. God, forgive me. Z was not able to stop myself from being tying! God, please don’t send me to the Everlasting Vats with their white-hot oscillating knives! And Mr Widdowson sank farther into hell as he saw himself roasted on a plate with an orange in his mouth, cloves and bits of pineapple stuck into him, while devils wearing crimson brain- storming caps sharpened huge knives and forks and licked their lips.

Mrs Widdowson sniffed the air. ’Smoke. You’ve been talking to that dreadful Fish woman, haven’t you?‘

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‘Well, Petal, she is a colleague, after all!’ ’She’s an adulteress and a chain-smoker. I don’t know which is worse.

I’ve a good mind to send her your dry-cleaning bills.‘ ‘She’d plead poverty, Pet,’ observed Mr Widdowson, correctly. ’But tell

me about your day, Poppet.’ Mrs Widdowson ladled Three-Pulse Stew onto Mr Widdowson’s plate

and told her husband that she had licked stamps for ‘Save the Whale’ in the morning and got Rolfed in the afternoon.

’Rolfed, Lovey?’ asked Mr Widdowson. ’You wouldn’t understand. It’s a liberating form of massage.’ ‘Is it, Treasure?’ Mrs Widdowson had commenced masticating her first forkful of Three-

Pulse Stew fifty-six times, and therefore did not reply. On each chew she repeated a Sanskrit mantra inwardly.

Mr Widdowson took the opportunity to unburden himself about his problem with the labelling of the Tuna in Brine cans. After she had swallowed, she observed: ’Well you know what I think!’

‘What, Heart?‘ ‘I think you should leave that charnel house in which you work. It’s

‘But how would we eat, Precious?’ asked Mr Widdowson. Reply came there none. Mrs Widdowson had commenced chewing

throttling your spirit.’

another forkful of her dinner.

Mr Widdowson got up early the following morning, leaving his wife sleeping. He usually got up early, because if he waited for his wife to rise, he would have to eat breakfast with her. And if he had his breakfast with her, he would have to eat smoked tofu.

The front door went click-clack as he closed it quietly and headed up the road.

At work, he sat at his desk in the silent Administration building of Grant, Maley and Duff, looking at a can of Tuna in Brine. He had dreamed of Tuna in Brine - and much else - during the night, but his dream had not enlightened him about what to place on the label instead of a Serving Suggestion.

‘I’m losing my touch,’ Mr Widdowson told himself. At 8.30 he mooned out of his office, chewing a pencil, and made his way

down a dank corridor towards the Processing Plant. He came to the tuna in brine vat and stood over it, looking in. He could

see Aristotle, sitting, his back to him, on a packing case, reading The Daily Moon.

Serving suggestions 59

Mr Widdowson did not say hello, but peered into the churning mass of Tuna in Brine. The swirling fish flesh was browner than he remembered. Aristotle still had some way to go.

Then Mr Widdowson thought of the poster in the kitchen above the fridge at home. It showed dolphins jumping in a blue ocean. He had never taken much notice of it. It was just one of Mrs Widdowson’s causes. He had nothing against dolphins, though their association with his wife did nothing to endear them to him. But now, standing over the vat, he imagined the brown flesh coming together again and leaping out of the stainless-steel vat and flying, like dolphins, over his head, out of the window, over London, down the Thames, along the Channel, across the Atlantic, and travelling South, always South, into warm, jumping seas. And Mr Widdowson saw himself riding on their backs. He looked at himself in the shine of the stainless-steel vat and did not like what he saw at all. He was the wrong colour.

Mr Widdowson thought for a moment, but knowing that thought would paralyse him, stopped thinking and searched about in himself for his instinct. A dolphin broke the surface of his imagination and he followed it. ‘Let’s go!’ he shouted to the dolphin, to the fish-flesh in the vat, to his own sad psyche.

Aristotle turned from his paper and watched Mr Widdowson walking purposefully away. He did not know then that neither he, Miss Fish, Mrs Widdowson, nor any of Mr Widdowson‘s colleagues at Grant, Maley and Duff would ever see him again.