Part XXXV

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I didn't like the sound of this compliment equally loaded, I felt, with  

threat and promise. Was there also a hint at the possibility that we  

were to graduate from vicarious cannibalism in effigy? Could I be  

engaged in a process that would lead to my being tricked into eating  

human flesh, for which this ersatz Balmoral ordeal was a mere  

prelude? I had already weakened to the point that I had demonstrated  

that I would eat comestibles whose origins were a mystery to me, and  

for that I had only my appetite to blame. How could I have held back  

at that moment? I had been fasting from the outset of my mission. A  

gin and tonic and a mouthful of durian ice-cream were all that had  

passed my lips for days. My attempts to gorge on smoked  

capercailley had been thwarted, the forced ingestion of some scraps  

of salmon did not merit even a listing as cocktail food. And now I was  

being called upon to eat a queen-empress and her consort in  

apparently living scale models without the goad of appetite.

'I think I've had quite enough for the moment, if you don't mind,' I  

ventured, 'besides I'm really not suitably dressed for such an honour.'  

even as I spoke I realised that I would not be able to side step this  

dubious honour, for had I not eaten the brilliant little princess in her  

summer frock, all in one mouthful complete with her hoop and stick -  

and very good she was too.

'Take these,' said the engineer politely as he handed me some quick  

bamboos of flattened, silvery appearance, 'they are our Excalibur  

model, swift and deft, even a novice could handle jellyfish salad with  

them.'

'Dither! Dither! Dither!' put in the MarkVI, 'if there is anything worse  

than sausages without mustard, it has to be dithering. I would ask my  

prime minister to pass an act against it, if he were here.'

'I'm not dithering,' I had the temerity to reply, 'I'm being solemn. It's  

not every day I'm so honoured.'

For ikizukuri enthusiasts this had to be a supreme moment. The two  

most tempting morsels of the feast stood with their backs to the  

ruined castle, roofless like a ravaged pie, emptied to the last footman  

by the lancing sticks of the diners, bravely awaiting their fate. I knew  

that I was projecting onto them feelings that they did not, could not,  

have. That, whatever they were, they were not sentient human  

beings, and yet to eat as a symbol is, on some level, to eat in reality.  

My Excaliburs flashed above the mensal plane. The royal couple  

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