Although giving up her wages would be a sacrifice, she was excited by the prospect of improving things at the hotel.
‘How would your mother feel about you giving up your wages?’
Justin had put his finger on the weak spot. ‘I’ll convince her it’s a perfectly good idea,’ she said. Then she smiled. ‘Tell me, what’s the new favourite pudding of the smart people who eat at your hotel?’
He smiled back. ‘Why should I tell you?’
‘Because you owe this hotel something!’
‘Fair enough. What they really like is the sweet trolley. You know, crème caramel, fruit salad for the dieters, an apple tart, profiteroles, Black Forest gateau, things like that. They’re more likely to order a dessert if they can actually see it. We let people have a selection.’
‘Isn’t there a lot of wastage?’
‘Some. You have to keep an eye on it. But it means people order something they hadn’t intended to have.’
‘Thank you,’ said Meg, her mind full of puddings that she could put on the trolley.
‘It’s good if you can do desserts. So many chefs, me included, haven’t got the patience for them.’
‘I do like doing the fiddly stuff,’ said Meg, forgetting that Justin was her enemy. ‘I used to have to make trays and trays of canapés when I worked in London, for my evening job.’
‘I can’t imagine anything I’d like less. But good for you. It’s an art.’
Meg thought how much she’d like to go on talking to Justin about food. Her mother was only partially interested, and Vanessa didn’t really care about it at all, in spite of attending Mme Wilson’s course. Not for the first time, she wished that David lived in England. He had always shared her passion.
Justin got up from his chair. ‘Time I wasn’t here. Look, I won’t let you work for nothing, but I’ll make the budget for making changes a bit bigger than I would have done.’
He walked out of the office and a few minutes later, Meg heard his motorbike roar away.
Chapter Eleven
Meg had contrived to take a look at the bathroom that Bob had put in his and Susan’s house. It had turned out really well and Susan was proud of her husband’s handiwork and had been only too keen to show it off. Meg decided she could ask Bob to do the work. But not without talking to her mother about it first.
She waited until she and Louise were both off duty and had taken a tray of tea and some cheese scones (her mother’s favourite) into the office. She had poured the tea and her mother had just put some butter on a scone when the phone rang.
‘Andrew!’ said her mother delightedly. Since she turned away from Meg as she did this, Meg took the hint, and her tea, and left her mother to it.
‘Andrew’s coming back!’ Louise said delightedly a little while later, joining Meg in the kitchen. ‘He can’t stay, but he needs the deeds to the hotel.’ She paused, her eyes sparkling with excitement. ‘I suggested I could post them but he said no, he wanted to come back.’
‘To see you?’ Meg suggested.
Her mother nodded, too happy to speak.
‘I can’t wait to meet him,’ said Meg.
She had been using the time when she was waiting for Louise to make tiny meringue stars with egg whites left over from the crème caramel she’d prepared for the sweet trolley. Although the trolley was proving very popular, Meg was careful to make sure it wasn’t too expensive. So two puddings from half a dozen eggs was satisfying.
‘I know he’s going to really like you,’ said Louise. ‘And you’ve done so much for the hotel.’
‘I’d like to do more,’ said Meg. ‘I’d really like to ask Bob to create a couple of bathrooms. Well, three, actually, for the biggest bedrooms, which already have dressing rooms. Then maybe think about some others.’
‘Those dressing rooms are now singles,’ said Louise. ‘We’d be losing that money if they were bathrooms.’
‘We could charge so much more for the doubles though, Mum. And single rooms aren’t used all that much, are they? We don’t get travelling salesmen needing them.’
‘We’ll have to ask Andrew about it. We couldn’t do anything like that without his knowledge and agreement.’
Meg realised that she hadn’t made allowances for Andrew having a say in the matter. Because Justin had said she could go ahead, she felt this was permission enough. ‘But I can ask Bob to quote for doing them?’ she said. ‘Then Andrew can make a decision having all the information he needs.’
