Free Eat, Drink and Be Buried by Peter King

lot more sense the way Dick put it. “You often hear the comment, ‘Mutton dressed as lamb’—well, we serve lamb dressed as mutton,” he said.
    I settled on a roasted pheasant. The birds were introduced some years ago into the Hebrides but did not do well until plantations were established for them. They are really best when roasted, but I told Dick that would be too much for me for lunch, so he proposed the pot roast.
    He confided that this method was usually used so the cook could choose birds too tough for roasting, even though those he could obtain here in London were tender enough. Nevertheless, he was proud of the pot-roasted pheasant. It was cut into pieces and boned, cooked with carrots, onions, and celery, seasoned with bayleaf, thyme, and lemon peel, with some quince jelly added at the end.
    Every housewife in the Hebrides has her own way of making scones. Some sweeten with sugar, some with treacle, some use sour milk to lighten the texture. They are known by the names of their originator, so Mary Ann MacSween’s scones and Kathleen Morrison’s scones are two of the best known. Dick brought me a couple of each when I declined dessert. Golden brown, light but not airy, they tasted as good as they looked.
    At the beginning of the meal, I had asked, “They are still not producing wine in the Hebrides?” Dick’s answer was inevitable, but he brought me a half bottle of a wine from Hampshire, “only thirty miles from here.” It was a sound, light white with a firm finish.
    I left Harris House fully satisfied, having assured Dick that his food was better than ever. I also had a headful of notions for augmenting the castle’s medieval table.
    London’s supply of fish in earlier days came from Billingsgate Market, where the turrets of the Tower of London made a splendidly appropriate background. It was a dour Victorian building with spidery iron girders. I remembered my father taking me there when I was at a very young and impressionable age. I recalled the stalls in the bays, the hundreds of porters carrying their impossibly heavy loads, the dead eyes of the fish, the haggling and bargaining that took place before the porters hoisted the dripping wet boxes of purchases out to waiting transport.
    Today, much of the fish trade has moved to Docklands, five thousand acres of recently developed land just beyond fabled Limehouse. The elevated railway gave fine views of it; the sky had now stopped raining and sunshine threatened.
    A large warehouselike building was at one end of the road I was looking for, and had a sign: “London Original Fashions.” I peered in a side door, but all I could see was row upon row of Asian girls sitting at sewing machines, sewing labels onto garments. Next to it, another warehouse-type structure housed several small vans that were being loaded with leather clothing. I hadn’t realized that so much leather was worn or that so many items of the clothing were so skimpy. Then I noticed that one of the vans was stenciled “S and M Specials,” so I supposed that explained much.
    By the time I reached the end of the row, I had come to the conclusion that this was not the elite part of Docklands. An unpleasant odor was in the air but I could see nothing to account for it. The buildings were not numbered, but the one at the end must be the one I was looking for. “Seven Seas” had been a supplier of fish to Harlington Castle for some time, according to the files, though the name was not known to me. The unpleasant odor increased as I got nearer and there was no doubt that this was the place. A sign proclaimed “Main Entrance,” followed with the admonition, “No salesmen, no visitors,” which sounded forbidding. I went in.
    I was in a small office, one of a row of small offices. The walls were made of glass close to the ceiling, but not for reasons of visibility because they were too dirty to see through. An