"Oh, dear." Mavis tried to rearrange her disordered dress. "Doctor Volospion, too…"
Volospion's tired tones issued from the howdah. "Yes, indeed. You were quite right, Abu Thaleb. I apologize. It is a spaceship. Well, if you feel you would like to descend, I shall not object."
The howdah came down to earth beside Argonheart Po and Miss Ming. Within, it was lined with dark green and blue plush.
Doctor Volospion lay among cushions, still in black and gold, his tight hood covering his skull and framing his pale face. He made no attempt to move. He scarcely acknowledged Miss Ming's presence as he addressed Argonheart Po:
"Forgive this intrusion, great Prince of Pies. The Commissar of Bengal is bent on satisfying his curiosity."
Argonheart Po made to speak but Abu Thaleb had already begun again:
"What a peculiar odour it has — sweet, yet bitter…"
"My creations…" said Argonheart.
"Like death," pronounced Doctor Volospion.
"The smell is all that is left," insisted Argonheart now, "of the dinner I was preparing for your party, Abu Thaleb. The ship's landing destroyed almost all of it."
Climbing from his howdah the slender commissar clapped the chef upon his broad back. "Dear Argonheart, how sad! But another time, I hope, you will be able to re-create all that you have lost today."
"It is true that there were imperfections," Argonheart told him, "and I would relish the opportunity to begin afresh."
"Soon, soon, soon. What a lovely little ship it is!" Abu Thaleb's plumes bounced upon his turban. "I had yearnings, you see, to embellish my menagerie, but I fear the ship is too small to accommodate the kind of prize I seek."
Mavis Ming said: "You'd be even more disappointed than me, Abu Thaleb. You should see the little squirt we saw just before you turned up. He —"
Doctor Volospion, so it seemed, had not heard her begin to speak. He called from his cushions:
"Your menagerie is already a marvel, Belle of Bengal. The most refined collection in the world. Splendid, specialized, so much more sophisticated than the scrambled skelter of species scraped together by certain so-called connoisseurs whose zoos surpass yours only in size but never in superiority of sensitive selection!"
Mavis Ming displayed confusion. Although Doctor Volospion appeared to address Abu Thaleb he seemed to be speaking for her benefit. She looked from one to the other, wondering if she should form a smile.
Doctor Volospion winked at her.
Mavis grinned. She had been forgiven for her outburst. The joke was at Abu Thaleb's expense.
She began to giggle.
"Go on, Doctor Volospion. I'm sure Abu Thaleb enjoys your flattery," she said.
"In taste, salutory commissar, you are assured of supremacy, until our planet passes at last into that limbo of silence and non-existence which must soon, we are told, be its fate."
Abu Thaleb's back was to Miss Ming and she seemed glad of this. She held her breath. She went deep red. She made a muted, spluttering noise.
But now the Commissar of Bengal was looking back at Doctor Volospion. "Oh, really, my friend!" He was good-natured. "You are capable of subtler mockery than this!"
"But I am a true showman, Abu Thaleb. I relate properly to my audience."
"Can that be true?" Abu Thaleb turned to Mavis. "You have seen the visitors, then, Miss Ming?"
"Briefly," she said. "Actually, there only seems to be one."
Abu Thaleb stroked his beard, his pearls and rubies. "He is not in any way, I suppose, um — elephantoid?"
She was prepared to allow herself a giggle now. She looked towards the lounging Volospion.
"Not a trace of a trunk, I'm afraid." She looked for approval from her protector. "Not even a touch of a tusk. He couldn't be less like a jumbo, although his nose is long enough, I suppose. He's more like one of those little birds, Abu Thaleb, who pick stuff out of elephant's teeth."
"Excellent!" applauded Doctor Volospion. "Ha, ha, ha!"
Abu Thaleb turned and regarded her with mysterious gravity. "Teeth?"
She giggled again. "Don't they have teeth, then, any more?"
Argonheart Po seemed much embarrassed. His glance at Doctor Volospion was almost disapproving. "I must away to my thoughts," he said. "I shall leave this sad scene. There is nothing I can save. Not now. So I'll wish you all farewell."
"Are we to be denied even a taste of your palatable treasure, Argonheart?" Doctor Volospion used much the same voice as the one he had used to speak to Abu Thaleb. "Hm?"
Argonheart Po cleared his throat. He shook his head. He glanced at the ground. "I think so."
"Oh, but Argonheart, you still have a few dinosaurs left. Can't I see one now? On the horizon." Miss Ming clutched at his hand but failed to engage.
"No more, no more," said the Master Chef.
Doctor Volospion spoke again. "Ah, mighty Lord of the Larder, how haughty you can sometimes be! Just a morsel of mastodon, perhaps, to whet our appetites?"
"I made no mastodons!" bellowed Argonheart Po, and now he was striding away. "Goodbye to you!"
Doctor Volospion stirred in his cushions. "Well, well. Obsessive people can be very boorish sometimes, I think."
Mavis Ming said: "He was more interested in his confectionery than any opportunity for contact with another intelligence. Still, he was upset."
"Then you are the only one of us to have tasted his preparations." Abu Thaleb looked doubtfully at the congealing lake between him and the spaceship.
"How were his dishes, by the by, Miss Ming?" Doctor Volospion wished to know. "You sampled them, eh?"
Miss Ming adopted something of a worldly air for Doctor Volospion's approval. She uttered a light, amused laugh. "Oh, a bit over-flavoured, really, if the truth be told."
His thin tongue ran the line of his lips. "Too strong, the taste?"
"He's not as good as they say he is, if you ask me. All this —" she rotated a wrist — "all these big ideas."
Abu Thaleb would not allow such malice. "Argonheart Po is the greatest culinary genius in the history of the world!"
"Perhaps our world has not been well favoured with cooks…" suggested Doctor Volospion slyly.
"And he is the most good-hearted of fellows! The time he must have spent preparing the feast for today!"
"Time?" inquired Volospion in some disbelief. "Time? Time?"
"His presents are famous. Not long since, he made me a savoury mammoth that was the most delicious thing I have ever eaten. An arrangement of flavours defeating description, and yet possessing a unity of taste that was inevitable!" Abu Thaleb was displaying unusual vivacity.
Doctor Volospion was incapable of diplomacy now. He was as one who has hooked his shark and refuses to cut the line, no matter what damage may ensue to both boat and man.
"Perhaps you confuse the subject-matter with the art, admirable Abu?"
Mavis Ming would also take hold of the rod, secure in the approval of her protector, inspired by his wit. "One man's elephant steak, after all, is another man's bicarbonate of soda!"
And now it was as if rod and line snapped over the side to be borne to the depths.
Abu Thaleb stared at her in frank bewilderment.
Doctor Volospion turned from his prey, his grey face controlled. There was a pause. His expression changed. A secretive smile, for himself more than for her.
The Commissar of Bengal had been saved from conflict and as a result became bewildered. "Well," he said weakly, "I for one am always astonished by his invention."