‘That’s right. Now it’s for the great and good of the neighbourhood. People look forward to coming all year. People see friends they don’t see at other times, which makes it especially important.’ Ambrosine paused and looked down at her plate for a second. ‘This year is the first year that the colonel and I haven’t been invited. The chef said we took up too much space in the dining room. And he’s got a point. It’s a lovely event but always a little cramped.’
‘Well, I’m inviting you!’ said Meg. ‘If the chef could uninvite you, I can invite you. Now, I’ve got a menu here: vichyssoise, coronation chicken and chocolate mousse.’
‘Not sure who chose that,’ said Ambrosine. ‘Cold soup isn’t very popular with country folk, and chocolate mousse can be very indigestible.’
‘What about the chicken? Do you like curry-flavoured mayonnaise with rice?’
‘I do, as long as it’s not too hot a curry. Although chicken can be a bit dry, can’t it?’
‘It can. But I know a way of cooking it which keeps it much more moist and I think if I’m careful I could get it going before it’s defrosted. I’ve no idea how Geoff thought that he was going to get it all done in time.’
‘He was expecting the food to be brought ready-made from the agency. Cherry, one of the girls, who I really hope will come back when your mother asks her to, told me she heard him ordering it. He was negotiating a very cheap price for what was going to be a very substandard meal.’ Ambrosine raised aneyebrow. While enormously friendly, she had an aristocratic air about her, Meg thought.
‘Even the chicken?’
‘I suspect he had that in the freezer,’ said Ambrosine. ‘He was a great lover of the freezer and the packet. The vichyssoise was coming out of a packet. And the mousse.’
Meg shuddered.
‘I know!’ said Ambrosine. ‘Absolutely frightful! He was doing the hotel no good at all, you know. Andrew – lovely man; his father was an old friend of mine – isn’t very interested in food. Some people aren’t, you know.’
‘How can you run a hotel if you’re not interested in food?’ said Meg.
‘You employ people whoareinterested,’ said Ambrosine. ‘So,’ she said brightly. ‘Now that dreadful man has left, what are we going to have for lunch tomorrow?’
‘I’ll have to stick to the menu we have, I think,’ said Meg. ‘Someone will have chosen it and be upset if they don’t get it.’
‘Never in life, my dear!’ said Ambrosine. ‘They won’t remember, and if it’s delicious, they won’t mind anyway!’
Meg exhaled. ‘I’m limited by my ingredients. I won’t have time to go shopping.’
Ambrosine waved a hand. ‘You have a garden full of vegetables.’
‘Have I? I had no idea. My tour of the hotel didn’t get as far as the garden. That’s really useful.’
‘Geoff got rid of the gardener but not very long ago and the vegetables will still be there.’
‘So we could have vegetable soup?’
‘Excellent idea!’
‘Followed by the chicken. What would we like instead of the packet mousse?
‘Almost anything would be an improvement.’
Meg thought of the stale bread she’d taken out of the fridge. ‘I wonder …’
‘You look as if you’ve had an idea.’
‘It is a bit unusual for a formal event but what about bread-and-butter pudding?’
‘I can’t imagine anything nicer!’ said Ambrosine.
‘We would need an awful lot of bread, dried fruit, milk and cream, which might be difficult at short notice.’
‘If you telephoned them now, you could order the bread from the local bakery. They’d sell you today’s leftover loaves very cheaply.’
‘But there might not be any leftover loaves!’ protested Meg. ‘Don’t they have a good idea exactly how many they need to bake?’
