Kiss Kiss

by Roald Dahl

  Roald Dahl

  Kiss Kiss

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Contents

  The Landlady

  William and Mary

  The Way Up To Heaven

  Parson's Pleasure

  Mrs Bixby and the Colonel's Coat

  Royal Jelly

  Georgy Porgy

  Genesis and Catastrophe

  Edward the Conqueror

  Pig

  The Champion of the World

  Roald Dahl In Penguin

  Fiction

  Over to You

  Someone Like You

  Kiss Kiss

  Switch Bitch

  Tales of the Unexpected

  My Uncle Oswald

  More Tales of the Unexpected

  The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar

  The Best of Roald Dahl

  Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories (editor)

  Completely Unexpected Tales

  New Tales of the Unexpected

  Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life

  The Collected Short Stories of Roald Dahl Non-Fiction

  Boy

  Going Solo

  (also published together in one volume)

  Roald Dahl's Cookbook

  (with Felicity Dahl)

  The following stories originally appeared in The New Yorker: The Landlady, The Way Up To Heaven, Edward the Conqueror, The Champion of the World.

  Parson's Pleasure appeared in Esquire Magazine; Mrs Bixby and the Colonel's Coat in Nugget; Genesis and Catastrophe (under the title A Fine Son) in Playboy.

  PENGUIN BOOKS

  Kiss Kiss

  Roald Dahl's parents were Norwegian, but he was born in Llandaff, Glamorgan, in 1916 and educated at Repton School. On the outbreak of the Second World War, he enlisted in the RAF at Nairobi. He was severely wounded after joining a fighter squadron in Libya, but later saw service as a fighter pilot in Greece and Syria. In 1942 he went to Washington as Assistant Air Attache, which was where he started to write, and then was transferred to Intelligence, ending the war as a wing commander. His first twelve short stories, based on his wartime experiences, were originally published in leading American magazines and afterwards as a book, Over to You. All of his highly acclaimed stories have been widely translated and have become bestsellers all over the world. Anglia Television dramatized a selection of his short stories under the title Tales of the Unexpected. Among his other publications are two volumes of autobiography, Boy and Going Solo, his much-praised novel My Uncle Oswald, and Roald Dahl's Book of Ghost Stories, of which he was editor. During the last year of his life he compiled a book of anecdotes and recipes with his wife, Felicity, which was published by Penguin in 1996 as Roald Dahl's Cookbook. He is one of the most successful and well known of all children's writers, and his books are read by children all over the world. These include James and the Giant Peach, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, The Magic Finger, Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, Fantastic Mr Fox, The Twits, The Witches, winner of the 1983 Whitbread Award, The BFG and Matilda.

  Roald Dahl died in November 1990. The Times described him as 'one of the most widely read and influential writers of our generation' and wrote in its obituary: 'Children loved his stories and made him their favourite... They will be classics of the future.' In 2000 Roald Dahl was voted the nation's favourite author in the World Book Day poll.

  For more information on Roald Dahl go to www.roalddahl.com

  This book is for P.N.D.

  The Landlady

  Billy Weaver had travelled down from London on the slow afternoon train, with a change at Swindon on the way, and by the time he got to Bath it was about nine o'clock in the evening and the moon was coming up out of a clear starry sky over the houses opposite the station entrance. But the air was deadly cold and the wind was like a flat blade of ice on his cheeks.

  'Excuse me,' he said, 'but is there a fairly cheap hotel not too far away from here?'

  'Try The Bell and Dragon,' the porter answered, pointing down the road. 'They might take you in. It's about a quarter of a mile along on the other side.'

  Billy thanked him and picked up his suitcase and set out to walk the quarter-mile to The Bell and Dragon. He had never been to Bath before. He didn't know anyone who lived there. But Mr Greenslade at the Head Office in London had told him it was a splendid city. 'Find your own lodgings,' he had said, 'and then go along and report to the Branch Manager as soon as you've got yourself settled.'

  Billy was seventeen years old. He was wearing a new navy-blue overcoat, a new brown trilby hat, and a new brown suit, and he was feeling fine. He walked briskly down the street. He was trying to do everything briskly these days. Briskness, he had decided, was the one common characteristic of all successful businessmen. The big shots up at Head Office were absolutely fantastically brisk all the time. They were amazing.

  There were no shops on this wide street that he was walking along, only a line of tall houses on each side, all them identical. They had porches and pillars and four or five steps going up to their front doors, and it was obvious that once upon a time they had been very swanky residences. But now, even in the darkness, he could see that the paint was peeling from the woodwork on their doors and windows, and that the handsome white facades were cracked and blotchy from neglect.

  Suddenly, in a downstairs window that was brilliantly illuminated by a street-lamp not six yards away, Billy caught sight of a printed notice propped up against the glass in one of the upper panes. It said BED AND BREAKFAST. There was a vase of pussy-willows, tall and beautiful, standing just underneath the notice.

  He stopped walking. He moved a bit closer. Green curtains (some sort of velvety material) were hanging down on either side of the window. The pussy-willows looked wonderful beside them. He went right up and peered through the glass into the room, and the first thing he saw was a bright fire burning in the hearth. On the carpet in front of the fire, a pretty little dachschund was curled up asleep with its nose tucked into its belly. The room itself, so far as he could see in the half-darkness, was filled with pleasant furniture. There was a baby-grand piano and a big sofa and several plump armchairs; and in one corner he spotted a large parrot in a cage. Animals were usually a good sign in a place like this, Billy told himself; and all in all, it looked to him as though it would be a pretty decent house to stay in. Certainly it would be more comfortable than The Bell and Dragon.

  On the other hand, a pub would be more congenial than a boardinghouse. There would be beer and darts in the evenings, and lots of people to talk to, and it would probably be a good bit cheaper, too. He had stayed a couple of nights in a pub once before and he had liked it. He had never stayed in any boardinghouses, and, to be perfectly honest, he was a tiny bit frightened of them. The name itself conjured up images of watery cabbage, rapacious landladies, and a powerful smell of kippers in the living-room.

  After dithering about like this in the cold for two or three minutes, Billy decided that he would walk on and take a look at The Bell and Dragon before making up his mind. He turned to go.

  And now a queer thing happened to him. He was in the act of stepping back and turning away from the window when all at once his eye was caught and held in the most peculiar manner by the small notice that was there. BED AND BREAKFAST, it said. BED AND BREAKFAST, BED AND BREAKFAST, BED AND BREAKFAST. Each word was like a large black eye staring at him through the glass, holding him, compelling him, forcing him to stay where he was and not to walk away from that house, and the next thing he knew, he was actually moving across from the window to the front door of the house, climbing the steps that led up to it, and reaching for the bell.

  He pressed the bell. Far away in a back room he heard it ringing, and then at once - it must have been at once because he hadn't even had time to
take his finger from the bell-button - the door swung open and a woman was standing there.

  Normally you ring the bell and you have at least a half-minute's wait before the door opens. But this dame was a like a jack-in-the-box. He pressed the bell - and out she popped! It made him jump.

  She was about forty-five or fifty years old, and the moment she saw him, she gave him a warm welcoming smile.

  'Please come in,' she said pleasantly. She stepped aside, holding the door wide open, and Billy found himself automatically starting forward into the house. The compulsion or, more accurately, the desire to follow after her into that house was extraordinarily strong.

  'I saw the notice in the window,' he said, holding himself back.

  'Yes, I know.'

  'I was wondering about a room.'

  'It's all ready for you, my dear,' she said. She had a round pink face and very gentle blue eyes.

  'I was on my way to The Bell and Dragon,' Billy told her. 'But the notice in your window just happened to catch my eye.'

  'My dear boy,' she said, 'why don't you come in out of the cold?'

  'How much do you charge?'

  'Five and sixpence a night, including breakfast.'

  It was fantastically cheap. It was less than half of what he had been willing to pay.

  'If that is too much,' she added, 'then perhaps I can reduce it just a tiny bit. Do you desire an egg for breakfast? Eggs are expensive at the moment. It would be sixpence less without the egg.'

  'Five and sixpence is fine,' he answered. 'I should like very much to stay here.'

  'I knew you would. Do come in.'

  She seemed terribly nice. She looked exactly like the mother of one's best school-friend welcoming one into the house to stay for the Christmas holidays. Billy took off his hat, and stepped over the threshold.

  'Just hang it there,' she said, 'and let me help you with your coat.'

  There were no other hats or coats in the hall. There were no umbrellas, no walking-sticks - nothing.

  'We have it all to ourselves,' she said, smiling at him over her shoulder as she led the way upstairs. 'You see, it isn't very often I have the pleasure of taking a visitor into my little nest.'

  The old girl is slightly dotty, Billy told himself. But at five and sixpence a night, who gives a damn about that? 'I should've thought you'd be simply swamped with applicants,' he said politely.

  'Oh, I am, my dear, I am, of course I am. But the trouble is that I'm inclined to be just a teeny weeny bit choosy and particular - if you see what I mean.'

  'Ah, yes.'

  'But I'm always ready. Everything is always ready day and night in this house just on the off-chance that an acceptable young gentleman will come along. And it is such a pleasure, my dear, such a very great pleasure when now and again I open the door and I see someone standing there who is just exactly right.' She was half-way up the stairs, and she paused with one hand on the stair-rail, turning her head and smiling down at him with pale lips. 'Like you,' she added, and her blue eyes travelled slowly all the way down the length of Billy's body, to his feet, and then up again.

  On the first-floor landing she said to him, 'This floor is mine.'

  They climbed up a second flight. 'And this one is all yours,' she said. 'Here's your room. I do hope you'll like it.' She took him into a small but charming front bedroom, switching on the light as she went in.

  'The morning sun comes right in the window, Mr Perkins. It is Mr Perkins, isn't it?'

  'No,' he said. 'It's Weaver.'

  'Mr Weaver. How nice. I've put a water-bottle between the sheets to air them out, Mr Weaver. It's such a comfort to have a hot water-bottle in a strange bed with clean sheets, don't you agree? And you may light the gas fire at any time if you feel chilly.'

  'Thank you,' Billy said. 'Thank you ever so much.' He noticed that the bedspread had been taken off the bed, and that the bedclothes had been neatly turned back on one side, all ready for someone to get in.

  'I'm so glad you appeared,' she said, looking earnestly into his face. 'I was beginning to get worried.'

  'That's all right,' Billy answered brightly. 'You mustn't worry about me.' He put his suitcase on the chair and started to open it.

  'And what about supper, my dear? Did you manage to get anything to eat before you came here?'

  'I'm not a bit hungry, thank you,' he said. 'I think I'll just go to bed as soon as possible because tomorrow I've got to get up rather early and report to the office.'

  'Very well, then. I'll leave you now so that you can unpack. But before you go to bed, would you be kind enough to pop into the sitting-room on the ground floor and sign the book? Everyone has to do that because it's the law of the land, and we don't want to go breaking any laws at this stage in the proceedings, do we?' She gave him a little wave of the hand and went quickly out of the room and closed the door.

  Now, the fact that his landlady appeared to be slightly off her rocker didn't worry Billy in the least. After all, she was not only harmless - there was no question about that - but she was also quite obviously a kind and generous soul. He guessed that she had probably lost a son in the war, or something like that, and had never got over it.

  So a few minutes later, after unpacking his suitcase and washing his hands, he trotted downstairs to the ground floor and entered the living-room. His landlady wasn't there, but the fire was glowing in the hearth, and the little dachshund was still sleeping in front of it. The room was wonderfully warm and cosy. I'm a lucky fellow, he thought, rubbing his hands. This is a bit of all right.

  He found the guest-book lying open on the piano, so he took out his pen and wrote down his name and address. There were only two other entries above his on the page, and, as one always does with guest-books, he started to read them. One was a Christopher Mulholland from Cardiff. The other was Gregory W. Temple from Bristol.

  That's funny, he thought suddenly. Christopher Mulholland. It rings a bell.

  Now where on earth had he heard that rather unusual name before?

  Was he a boy at school? No. Was it one of his sister's numerous young men, perhaps, or a friend of his father's? No, no, it wasn't any of those. He glanced down again at the book.

  Christopher Mulholland 231 Cathedral Road, Cardiff

  Gregory W. Temple 27 Sycamore Drive, Bristol

  As a matter of fact, now he came to think of it, he wasn't at all sure that the second name didn't have almost as much of a familiar ring about it as the first.

  'Gregory Temple?' he said aloud, searching his memory. 'Christopher Mulholland?...'

  'Such charming boys,' a voice behind him answered, and he turned and saw his landlady sailing into the room with a large silver tea-tray in her hands. She was holding it well out in front of her, and rather high up, as though the tray were a pair of reins on a frisky horse.

  'They sound somehow familiar,' he said.

  'They do? How interesting.'

  'I'm almost positive I've heard those names before somewhere. Isn't that queer? Maybe it was in the newspapers. They weren't famous in any way, were they? I mean famous cricketers or footballers or something like that?'

  'Famous,' she said, setting the tea-tray down on the low table in front of the sofa. 'Oh no, I don't think they were famous. But they were extraordinarily handsome, both of them, I can promise you that. They were tall and young and handsome, my dear, just exactly like you.'

  Once more, Billy glanced down at the book. 'Look here,' he said, noticing the dates. 'This last entry is over two years old.'

  'It is?'

  'Yes, indeed. And Christopher Mulholland's is nearly a year before that - more than three years ago.'

  'Dear me,' she said, shaking her head and heaving a dainty little sigh. 'I would never have thought it. How time does fly away from us all, doesn't it, Mr Wilkins?'

  'It's Weaver,' Billy said. 'W-e-a-v-e-r.'

  'Oh, of course it is!' she cried, sitting down on the sofa. 'How silly of me. I do apologize. In one ear and out the ot
her, that's me, Mr Weaver.'

  'You know something?' Billy said. 'Something that's really quite extraordinary about all this?'

  'No, dear, I don't.'

  'Well, you see - both of these names, Mulholland and Temple, I not only seem to remember each one of them separately, so to speak, but somehow or other, in some peculiar way, they both appear to be sort of connected together as well. As though they were both famous for the same sort of thing, if you see what I mean - like... like Dempsey and Tunney, for example, or Churchill and Roosevelt.'

  'How amusing,' she said. 'But come over here now, dear, and sit down beside me on the sofa and I'll give you a nice cup of tea and a ginger biscuit before you go to bed.'

  'You really shouldn't bother,' Billy said. 'I didn't mean you to do anything like that.' He stood by the piano, watching her as she fussed about with the cups and saucers. He noticed that she had small, white, quickly moving hands, and red finger-nails.

  'I'm almost positive it was in the newspapers I saw them,' Billy said. 'I'll think of it in a second. I'm sure I will.'

  There is nothing more tantalizing than a thing like this which lingers just outside the borders of one's memory. He hated to give up.

  'Now wait a minute,' he said. 'Wait just a minute. Mulholland... Christopher Mulholland... wasn't that the name of the Eton schoolboy who was on a walking-tour through the West Country, and then all of a sudden...'

  'Milk?' she said. 'And sugar?'

  'Yes, please. And then all of a sudden...'

  'Eton schoolboy?' she said. 'Oh no, my dear, that can't possibly be right because my Mr Mulholland was certainly not an Eton schoolboy when he came to me. He was a Cambridge undergraduate. Come over here now and sit next to me and warm yourself in front of this lovely fire. Come on. Your tea's all ready for you.' She patted the empty place beside her on the sofa, and she sat there smiling at Billy and waiting for him to come over.

  He crossed the room slowly, and sat down on the edge of the sofa. She placed his teacup on the table in front of him.

  'There we are,' she said. 'How nice and cosy this is, isn't it?'

  Billy started sipping his tea. She did the same. For half a minute or so, neither of them spoke. But Billy knew that she was looking at him. Her body was half-turned towards him, and he could feel her eyes resting on his face, watching him over the rim of her teacup. Now and again, he caught a whiff of a peculiar smell that seemed to emanate directly from her person. It was not in the least unpleasant, and it reminded him - well, he wasn't quite sure what it reminded him of. Pickled walnuts? New leather? Or was it the corridors of a hospital?