The man proffered the card.
"Sole: Sauce Tartare. That means sole with tartar sauce," Nicky translated glibly for the benefit of her untutored relative. "We had better not have that. Tartar sauce always makes him sick," she explained to the waiter, indicating the fermenting Stiffy. "What else is there? Let me see—ah! Blanchailles!—er—Blanchailles! A very delicate fish! Quite so. You may bring us"—her brain worked desperately behind a smiling face, but fruitlessly—"a blanchaille, waiter."
There was an ominous silence. Then the waiter asked, in a voice tinged with polite incredulity—
"A whole one each, madam?"
"Certainly," said madam in freezing tones.
The waiter bowed deferentially, and departed.
"Stiffy," inquired Nicky in agonised tones, "what is a blanchaille? Don't say it's a cod!"
Stiffy devoted three hours a-week to the study of Modern Languages, but so far no blanchaille has swum into his vocabulary.
"I've a notion," he said after a prolonged mental effort, "that it is a sturgeon."
"How big is a sturgeon?"