A Village Dilemna (Turnham Malpas 09) Read Online Free PDF Page B

turned out the lights and made her way across the bar and upstairs to Bryn.
    She found him seated in a comfortable chair in the sitting room waiting for her. He stood up as she entered and it gave her heart a turn. He hadn’t done that for years. ‘I’m going to have a cup of tea.’
    ‘Like you always did after a busy day. Can I make it for you?’
    ‘Bel will be in the kitchen making herself a drink, so I’d better do it.’
    ‘Very well.’ He relaxed back into the chair and shuffled his shoulders about as though making himself comfortable for a long time.
    ‘You want one?’
    ‘No, thanks. Tea’s not my tipple any more.’
    When she came back with her tea she had the odd feeling that he’d been out of the chair poking through her belongings. The desk drawers were closed, the papers on top apparently undisturbed, all the same …
    Georgie sat down and sipped her tea, expecting that Bryn would be the one to open the conversation. But he didn’t. She heard Bel unlock the bathroom door, listened to a car roaring up the Culworth Road. Then the deep silence of the countryside descended. Eventually she said, ‘I thought you wanted to talk.’
‘I’ve a proposition to make.’
    ‘Spill the beans, then.’
    ‘While I’ve been managing bars on the cruise liners I’ve come into contact with a lot – and I mean a lot – of Americans, Americans who travel a great deal. Many of them want to come to Europe but haven’t the know-how to make a successful job of it. They want to see the real England, what makes us tick, what makes us what we are, to get the feel of our heritage. I’ve an address book crammed with names and telephone numbers, and I’ve planned a tour, an off-the-beaten-track kind of tour. When they come to London they’ll have two or three days there doing the Tower, Buckingham Palace, a performance at the Globe Theatre et cetera, then we’ll travel to Bath, on the way …’
    ‘You’re not thinking of bringing them here, are you?’
    ‘I’m coming to that. I shan’t have them staying in the kind of hotel that can be found all over the world and they could be waking up in Hong Kong or Sydney or New York. No, that’s not for me. They’ll be staying in typically English country house hotels, hotels with ambience, ones just that bit different from the usual tourist dumps, so I thought …’
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘I thought that on their way to Bath and Stratford they could call here for lunch.’
    ‘Here meaning here?’ Georgie pointed to the floor to emphasise her point.
    Bryn nodded. ‘That’s right, lunch here at the Royal Oak. They could have a tour of the church, call in at the Store for souvenirs, feed Jimmy’s geese, finish off here for lunch: typical old pub, talk up the history a bit, you know the kind of thing. Perhaps even visit a cottage for some more atmosphere. What do you think? It could be a real money spinner for everyone. Us included.’
‘Us? Who’s “us”?’
    ‘Well, you, I mean.’
    ‘How many?’
    ‘Groups of twenty, no more than twenty-five or the exclusiveness would be lost.’
    ‘How often?’
    ‘Well, this summer I’ve got one planned for August, one for September. That’s all. But it could mushroom. They’d be here Thursday, which is never a good day for lunches in our dining room, is it?’
    ‘You keep making the mistake of saying “us” and “our”. It isn’t yours, Bryn. You took the money, remember, and I got the business and my name is over the door.’
    ‘Sorry.’ Hastily Bryn spread his hands in a placatory gesture. ‘Habit, you know, you and me, a team for years, it’s hard to drop the habit.’
    Georgie sat sipping her tea, thinking about his plans. Twenty-five people for lunch on a Thursday would certainly be a boost. ‘If I decided to do it, I’d have to consult Dicky first. It would have to be the same menu for everyone, I don’t think the kitchen could cope with twenty-five people all wanting serving at once with different