Lady Lennox-Stanley frowned. ‘The young are so selfish,’ she said, ‘but fortunately, Russell and David are practically passing my door.’
Meg’s sense of geography wasn’t very good but she was fairly certain this wasn’t true; however, she was extremely grateful to the two men for convincing her ladyship this was the case.
‘Isn’t it splendid?’ said Russell. ‘Now, who’s for a last turn round the garden? Let’s see what, if anything, needs to be done to make it into a proper open-air theatre.’
Vanessa came to see Meg in the kitchen while this was going on. ‘I can’t be spared to help you for more than a couple of weeks, I’m afraid.’
‘My mother will be home by then, I’m sure. To have any help in the office will be brilliant, so thank you.’
Cherry, who had entered the kitchen with a full tray, put her burden down. ‘I’d be happy to help in the office, when Vanessa has to go, if you like.’
‘And how am I supposed to manage without you in the kitchen?’ said Susan.
‘We could get someone else to do my job. Mary, for instance. She’d be fine and Auntie Kath would be delighted if she had a bit of work,’ said Cherry. ‘I want to improve myself. If I worked in the office here, I could tell people I have office experience.’
Susan sighed. ‘In my day a young woman was perfectly happy to work in a nice hotel; she didn’t want to “improve herself”.’
‘Times are changing, Mother,’ said Cherry. Having emptied the tray, she went back to the dining room.
‘It would be a great help to me, Susan, if you didn’t mind,’ said Meg.
‘Bless you, deary! If it helps you to have young Cherry to answer the telephone and welcome the guests, it’s fine by me.’
‘I’d be very happy to train her,’ said Vanessa, ‘just as soon as I’ve learnt what to do myself.’
The farewells that afternoon were long and effusive. When they were finally over, they all retired to the kitchen.
‘Thank goodness that’s over!’ said Meg. ‘It was fun but very hard work.’
‘I wouldn’t like to say your mother was a difficult guest,’ said Susan, obviously feeling the complete opposite, ‘but—’
‘At home the staff call her Lady Fussy-Knickers,’ said Vanessa.
‘That about sums it up,’ said Cherry. ‘Now, shall I put the kettle on?’
For the next couple of weeks, the hotel was a hive of busyness, and although Meg fell into bed exhausted every night, she loved the sense of purpose and achievement.
Bob, Susan’s husband, and various nephews, godsons and sons of old friends got the bathrooms in and decorated the rooms. There was a lot of ‘making good’ required, and the hotel bacon was saved by Ambrosine finding several rolls of wallpaper that had originally matched the wallpaper in the bedrooms. It no longer matched but the pattern was the same, just in much brighter colours. When there were four bedrooms with bathrooms attached, Susan sent the gang to do up the gardener’s cottage and any other suitable outbuilding.
‘Bob’s never been happier,’ she explained to Meg one lunchtime. ‘He loves the gardening, always has, but this plumbing’s got him really excited. And of course it’s more money. Longer hours.’
‘I’m so glad to hear that he’s happy,’ said Meg, hoping Justin would be as happy paying for the longer hours.
There were more hotel guests, too. People who had been for Sunday lunch or afternoon tea told their visitors about Nightingale Woods, and Vanessa and Cherry were kept busy finding rooms for them.
Louise telephoned from France the night before Vanessa was due to go home.
‘Well,’ Meg told her mother with satisfaction. ‘We’ve been going great guns. We have four bedrooms with their own bathrooms now, and they’re working on the gardener’s cottage.’
‘Who is “they”?’ asked Louise, obviously intrigued.
‘Various connections of Susan’s,’ said Meg. ‘She’s like Rabbit inWinnie-the-Pooh– she has a lot of friends and relations.’
‘Useful!’ said Louise.
‘Extremely.’ Meg drew a breath, about to ask Louise when she’d be home and did she need meeting at the station when Louise forestalled her.
‘Darling, would it be a frightful nuisance if we stayed a bit longer? It turns out that Andrew’s father had to have two wills, an English one and a French one. The French one is a nightmare. Apparently, he went round his farm saying, “Have this field,mon brave!” without giving a thought to the legal side of it.’
