Service With A Smile

13

Service With A Smile

    The five ladies had booked a table at Taupo Shores Ecolodge for a celebratory lunch. Well, Livia didn’t have much to celebrate, as Wal was still absorbed in the medical centre project and in fact threatening to go over to Thailand to supervise the site, but she was putting a brave face on it.

    Polly had brought some clothes down with her when she brought the kids down, and her outfit was a celebration all by itself. A sleeveless white silk cross-over blouse, a narrow white linen wrap-over skirt to about four inches above the ankles, and the holiday footwear. Rope-soled wedgies, topped with a twist of white raffia that tied round the slim ankles. Other dames might be wearing stacks of junk jewellery round the neck this year but Lady Carrano had one small mother-of-pearl offering, possibly a Pacific oyster shell, about one and half inches across, not that Jan was measuring it, of course, strung on a thin silver wire. More likely platinum wire. The little studs in the perfect ears were just silver. More likely platinum.

    Moyra’s outfit had probably cost even more but on her it didn’t look so good. For one thing she was pretty scrawny. For another thing bright floral splashes of coral, turquoise and lime green might have been the go in the Caribbean but out here they looked—well, as if they shoulda stayed in the Caribbean. Silk, of course, with three pieces to it, not counting the huge great drift of a trailing scarf—no, might as well face it, four. The necklace looked as if it weighed a ton, even though its component parts were weeny, weeny lime glass beads. About fifty strings of them intertwined in a sort of swag. Just for a change the dangly things in the ears were coral. The three large bangles on each wrist sort of matched in that two of them were shades of coral and white, two were solid turquoise and two were lime-green God-knew-what. There was a hat but she had mercifully removed it.

    Very fortunately Jan had seen Livia’s outfit before so she wasn’t driven screaming from the room. No, it didn’t attempt to rival Moyra’s—just as well, nothing could have. It had gone overboard in the other direction entirely, and if ever there was anything calculated to look completely absurd on Livia Briggs’s small, curvaceous figure it was tailored fawn linen slacks, a white webbing belt, and a tailored fawn silk blouse with pleated pockets on the tits. Pete had fetched her and Polly in the Tallulah Tub and had come into the kitchen especially to report on the pockets on the tits, drat him. Apparently one wore large real pearls in the ears with one’s safari lunch outfit in Livia’s and Wal’s income bracket. And one of those Australian Outback hats with the turned-up brims: as Pete said, not genuinely seen on any living being outside the Australian Army on parade since World War One. There was a word for the things but Jan’s virus scanner had long since excised it from her memory. The felt hat must have been as heavy as it looked because she’d taken it off for lunch.

    Bettany had possibly gone for the casually girlish look. The short-sleeved top was a knit—some sort of polyester, it was rather shiny, if knobbly—in candy-pink. A very low scooped neck, but that was par for the course. Had she noticed that Polly never got round with bits of lacy bra showing, on the occasions on which she wore a bra? Whatever, no bits of bra were showing and this, Jan freely admitted, was a merciful dispensation of a kindly Providence. One that wasn’t on Pete’s bloody side—quite. The gathered skirt was a black cotton scattered with little bunches of flowers in red and yellow and might have looked quite pretty on a girl. A girl that hadn’t slung it two inches below her waist. Though, again, Providence was merciful and the tummy-button wasn’t on view, or the ring with the glittery stone that in the past had been observed attached to it. The skirt came to about three inches above Bettany’s middle-aged knees. Even though it was a warm day she was wearing bright pink semi-transparent tights with, dig this, scarlet ankle socks and high-heeled black patents! Jan had seen the brass cut-out and its dangling beads round her neck before so she was enabled not to frankly stare in an effort to confirm that (a) it was in the shape of an elephant and (b) it was nearly four inches across. The long, dangling earrings were, or she, Jan Harper, was a Hollander in his clogs, fake EnZed greenstone from one of the tourist traps round Rotorua. Plastic—yep.

    Katy Jackson was just normal in a sleeveless blue summer dress but this didn’t count, really.

    They were celebrating the fact that Max’s Uncle Hugh had completely climbed down over both the burial thing and the adoption thing and had actually allowed Tommy Throgmorton’s body to be cremated with those of his girlfriend and her family and was now actively pushing for Max to adopt the little boy. Which, it seemed, wouldn’t be as hard as they’d assumed, since he was the child’s next of kin. Well, possibly General Throgmorton had paid off the right people but if he had the hoi polloi were never gonna know it. Still, as Moyra had put it on a very long phone call to Jan to make the lunch booking, at least he was on their side, now!

    Polly was also possibly celebrating the fact that she was due to vanish back home with her kids tomorrow as ever was but being Polly, she wasn’t letting this show.

    They’d all plumped for the starter of fresh peach, ricotta (or home-made goat’s cheese) and prosciutto (or just ham). Today it was the genuine article so Jan had recommended it. She’d had the recipe so long she’d forgotten where it came from. These days she sometimes went so far as to drizzle a tiny amount of olive oil onto the big white plates she sometimes served it on these days. As olive oil was expensive and Polly wasn’t taken in by that sort of thing, Katy would think it was a waste of olive oil and Livia and Bettany would recognise it was up-market and really with-it whilst not noticing its absence, she hadn’t bothered. And at least they hadn’t asked for avocado like those two bloody American dames at the next table who didn’t seem to know what season it was out here, what season avocados ripened or, indeed, what season “kiwis” ripened.

    “What’s up?” said Pete mildly as she tottered back into the kitchen and collapsed onto a chair with a sigh.

    “Nothing. Except that that outfit of Polly’s is to die for. To—die—for.”

    Pete looked at her uneasily. “Thought you were past all that stuff, love?”

    “No woman who ever breathed is past clothes like that, let alone one that grew up on Mum’s Woman’s Weeklies and the very occasional English Vogue or Harper’s Bazaar. Gee, and McCall’s: remember McCall’s, Betsy, honey?” she said in a strong American accent. “Sure do.”

    “Um, yeah,” said Pete uneasily. “Um, you’d have to have a figure like Polly’s to wear it, though.”

    “Thanks, Pete, that makes it better.”

    He gave her a hunted look.

    “Shit. Sorry, Pete. I’m just tired. Why have this season’s lot voted to lunch in almost without exception almost every day?”

    “The food’s so good they can’t pass it up.”

    “Thanks for the compliment. How much would it cost to excise all mention of avocados from our website, do ya reckon?”

    “Eh?”

    “That latest pair of American dames asked for them again. I mean, they’re the third lot of Americans who’ve asked for them. Oh, for good old Goldie and Sylvia!”

    “Yeah, they were pretty decent types.” Pete scratched his head. “Fruit of the season?”

    “Eh?”

    “On the website. Put fruit of the season instead of avocados. Or kiwifruit, come to that, Janet was saying three lots asked for that with their breakfast fruit salad. Will them ponces of web designers charge double, do ya reckon? I mean, once to take out avocados and kiwifruit and once to put in fruit of the season?”

    “Bound to, considering what they charged to add the word organic,” she sighed.

    “Jake might know a firm that’d be cheaper.”

    “I dunno that I can face the change.”

    “Cheaper and more sensible and do what you ask them when you ask them and don’t have to have you send them all the words and all the pictures on your computer?”

    “Email them,” corrected Jan limply. “Even Jake isn’t gonna find a firm like that this century.”

    “Pigs might fly,” he said optimistically.

    “Well, ask him, if ya want to. But don’t get your hopes up.”

    “Okay, I might. What are Polly and Co. having for their mains?”

    “The jellied duck,” said Jan, not bothering to say canard en daube because he wouldn’t remember that was what the menu called it. “Moyra decided on it when she rang. With a rosé. And kindly see that that doesn’t get back to Jake’s ears. And a side-serve of beans.”

    “All right,” he said obediently. “Beans?”

    “Everybody’s having beans, Pete, because there is a bean explosion out there in the garden,” said Jan heavily.

    “Right. Oh, ya mean everybody?”

    “Yes. Green beans vinaigrette are the salade du jour, that’s Frog for take it or leave it, and the vegetarian quiche has got three pounds of green beans to every half-inch cube of eggplant, and the so-called chicken salad that’s a main is composed of slices of cold chook sitting on green beans vinaigrette thinly disguised with two snow peas per plate and a couple of those revolting Japanese frondy things that Polly was quite right in saying people think are up-market these days but always leave on the side of the plate.”

    “The compost heap’ll be grateful.”

    “Yeah.”

    “What about the tomato explosion, or didja turn most of them into that great pasta sauce?”

    He was trying, poor old Pete. “Not yet,” said Jan kindly. “There’s a cold tomato soup masquerading under the name of gazpacho—used to be popular with the way-out set back in the Seventies, dunno if your second was into Tex-Mex but if so, that’ll have been high on the agenda, and funnily enough it seems to have come back. The dieters have it as a main but most of them have it as a starter. Requires no cooking, just blending and chopping, and good old Janet did all the hard yacker. Then there’s a very up-market little offering based on that frightful book of real cuisine minceur that Polly gave me ages ago. Basically a tomato custard.”—Pete blenched.—“Mousse de tomates, sauce haricots verts aux herbes,” said Jan with some relish. “The custard sits in a pool of green been mush—that blender’s a Godsend, I dunno how cooks ever coped before they were invented. Add a few sprigs of thyme or whatever you fancy to flavour, drizzle with a minute quantity of olive oil and if feeling really generous or not too busy, top with an excruciatingly thin slice of fried potato. There’s a couple in the fridge, in those funny little white dishes that look like ashtrays.”

    “I won’t look: might curdle me lunch,” he decided.

    “Hah, hah. Needless to state they ain’t getting no up-market version of a potato crisp this week. Then there’s a very useful tomato tart recipe that goes down really well with the vegetarians, best served warm, so you don’t have to worry about getting it straight from the oven to the table like the much nicer tomato tart recipe.”

    “What about meat?” said Pete on a weak note.

    “For summer lunch? They’d be lucky.”

    “Fish?”

    “Nope.”

    “So what was that revolting liver you were mucking about with last night in aid of?”

    Jan sighed. “Pâté. For that self-styled gourmet group from Hamilton that’s booked in for next Tuesday, just in case we thought the rush was over.”

    “Couldn’t that’ve waited till the weekend, love?” he asked mildly, getting a can out of the fridge.

    “No, it needs to mature; the flavours need to blend,” said Jan heavily.

    “Should of told them where to put it,” he said with a frown.

    “No, I shouldn’t, Pete, because in case you haven’t noticed, flaming Fern Gully is about to open its excruciatingly organic, up-with-the-play, twenty-first century restaurant and lure all our best-paying customers away!”

    Pete poured scientifically. “Get this down yer.’

    “I can’t serve the customers with beer on my breath,” said Jan limply.

    “I’ll serve ’em. Everybody ordered, have they? Right,” he said as she nodded and sighed. “Lunch!”

    Jan watched limply as he got out a hunk of mousetrap and a jar of the little pickled onions she’d done last year, and made them doorstep cheese sandwiches.

    “Um, Table Three’ll be ready for their mains,” she said on a weak note through a pickled onion.

    “Leddem wait.”

    “No, they need to be dished up, Pete.”

    “Right.” Stuffing a pickled onion into his mouth and wiping his paws casually down the sides of his elderly jeans, Pete rose. “What are they having?”

    “Something vegetarian: it’s the four trekkers from Cape Town.”

    “Dunno why they hadda come over here to trek, haven’t they got enough open country over there?” He examined the small blackboard by the door. “This squiggle’d be a 3, would it?”

    “If it’s between 2 and 4 on the right-hand side of the board, yes.”

    “Hah, hah. ‘2 chick, 1 tom p, bs, 1 veg q, bs’,” he read aloud. “Goddit. Where are they?’

    Jan cleared her throat. “There’s four piles of chicken salad in the fridge all ready, just tip two onto the big white plates. The pies are keeping warm in the oven. Can ya cut them into six? Eight’s easier but the slices come out too mingy. Um, ‘bs’ means bean salad on the side. –Ta. And do us a big favour and wash your hands before you get the plates out.”

    “Since it’s you,” he replied mildly.

    Jan looked wanly at his boots but didn’t dredge up the strength to tell him to change them, because (a) at least they weren’t gumboots, (b) at least they weren’t jandals, (c) she’d seen a lot worse, and (d) it’d be bloody silly to alienate him, wouldn’t it?

    “You oughta grab their dirty plates first,” she noted as he announced he was ready.

    “Eh? Aw—bugger that!” He seized the trolley that was normally only used for clearing the tables once everybody had finished. “Efficiency, see?”

    Yes. Well, so far they hadn’t found anybody but the absent Wendy Pohaka who was willing to combine some waitressing with helping with the beds, the vacuuming and the veges, and, if good old Michelle had got a bit behind, the bogs. All the rest of them—never mind if they were local high-school kids, local kids that had left school and couldn’t find a job, EnZed university students or foreigners of that age on a working holiday—assumed that you turned up at ten to twelve in your tight black skirt, white blouse and high-heeled shoes, swanned round the restaurant eying up any male customers between the ages of seventeen and thirty-five, and disappeared again at two-oh-five. With a free meal inside you. And if expected to wait at night, got driven home by Pete. More trouble than they were worth—exactly.

    After quite some time Pete ambled back with the trolley and a load of plates, announced than everyone was ready for their mains except Polly’s lot, the Moyra female was yacking nineteen to the dozen, and noted that Mr and Mrs Grant, who had been here before, had wondered why the potato salad wasn’t on the menu today and if he was her, Jan, he’d stick to the easy stuff like that and lasagna and the odd quiche or two. And did they need types like that gourmet lot from Hamilton or the blue-rinsed pair of gays from Auckland with the flaming Beamer that had ordered the flaming jellied duck?

    “At least you can do it in advance,” said Jan, sighing. “We need their money, yeah. The charge for duck for seven—don’t count on your fingers, Polly’s lot are having it, too, remember?—it more than covers the price of two permaculture ducks, a slosh of wine in the jelly, a few odds and ends of other ingredients and Janet’s wages for the day.”

    “What about the power and your labour?’ he replied brilliantly.

    “Them, too. And you can bet your bottom dollar that if Fern Gully offers duck they’ll charge twice what we do for it.”

    “Put our prices up, then,” he said, consulting the blackboard. “I’ll do the rest, then I’ll do the duck lot, okay? Them blue-rinsed gays can wait until the Moyra female’s stopped yacking.”

    Er—well, somebody had to be last. Feebly Jan conceded this. The whole procedure took him ages and he was ages in the restaurant, but never mind.

    “Them gays, they recognized Polly,” he reported.

    “Maybe they’re people she knows,” said Jan feebly.

    “No, they recognized her. Said they were so intrigued to see her here,”—he leered at her—“’cos they thought the place was their little secret.”

    “Gee, I needed to know that, Pete,” said Jan limply. “And all the time here was me under the impression they might be telling their wee gay mates about us and getting our name known!”

    “Right. Give ’em lasagna next time they come: do that table d’hôte thing Polly toleja, not flamin’ duck that takes a whole arvo.” He investigated the fridge. “This them? They look revolting!”

    “Well, the flesh is naturally pink and the wine in the sauce— No, you’re right, revolting’s the word. –Bugger, I forgot to carve them up!”

    “I’ll do it.”

    He could carve much better than she could—all those years of dismembering the unfortunate creatures he’d gone out into the bush and shot, yeah. “Ta. Give them all a helping of jelly, mind.”

    “It’s their funeral!” Pete got on with it. The resultant piled plates weren’t artistic—the salad was just dumped in a pile and the cherry tomatoes she’d reminded him to add, since that was what he grew them for—yeah, Pete, hah, hah—were sitting in little wee clumps of three per plate next to the salad, not artistically in amongst— Who cared? And the jelly was in lumps, not the neatly sliced cubes which according to flaming Jake was how the Tour de Flaming Argent served— Who cared? And she’d bet her bottom dollar that no-one but Polly would know. Um, well, possibly Moyra, but she was too polite to say anything. Um, well, just possibly the gays from Auckland, but too bad.

    “Where are the puddings?” he asked idly, dumping plates on to his trolley.

    “In that third fridge that you bought off your mate Steve Garber from Taupo Hardware & Electrical for a very good price. Having to install it in the back passage because there was no room for it—” Pete plonked a second can of beer in front of her. “Ta,” said Jan weakly.

    “Ma Cooper from Tawa Street sent it back because there was a scratch on it,” he reminded her mildly. “Toodle-oo.” He wheeled his trolley out.

    Right, and that meant Pete had to buy it, did it? Oh, well, it did come in handy when she did a cold main as well as puddings…

    In the restaurant Pete plonked the plates of duck in front of the blue-rinsed gays with the remark: “You are supposed to eat that jelly stuff, but no-one’ll mind if ya don’t. And if anybody asks ya why you’re getting something they can’t have, it’s not listed on the menu ’cos it has to be ordered in advance. See, half this lot aren’t capable of reading that brochure we put in their rooms specially for them to read. Just give us a shout if ya need anything else. Got enough wine to be going on with? –Good on ya.”

    He ambled on over to the five ladies’ table but before he could utter Polly pre-empted him with a sweet: “We haven’t got enough wine to be going on with, Pete.” At which all four other ladies uttered explosive giggles.

    “Well, shit, this is the backblocks,” he said weakly to the sub-text.

    “So you had to reinforce it for them,” she agreed.

    “That’s right,” he admitted, rallying slightly. “And if Jake could see you lapping up that pink fizz he’d throw ten thousand fits.”

    “I love sparkling rosé,” said Polly firmly. “Get us another two bottles, wouldja?”

    “Two? No, the lot of you are pissed enough already!”

    “There are five of us, you moron. Two bottles works out at about two glasses each! And if you get two now and shove them in the ice bucket you won’t need to make another trip, will you?”

    “Oh, all right,” he said resignedly. “Here’s the duck, and if ya don’t like it there’s plenty of pie left.”

    “We’ll love it, Pete, dear!” Livia assured him with a giggle.

    “If you say so. No-one’ll give you a medal for eating that there jelly, so leave it if ya don’t like the way it’s looking at ya. Two more bottles of pink fizz coming up.” Pete ambled off, to the sounds of Livia informing the company he was so naughty and the Bettany female claiming he was lovely.

    When he came back Polly tried to tell him about a different version of the jellied duck that a mate of hers made that maybe Jan would like to try but he shut her up because Jan didn’t need more aggro. Added to which, how many people in Taupo had heard of lemongrass, whatever that was when it was at home?

    “None of the locals, I dare say, but your visitors will’ve had it with their finely chopped fake Thai cuisine along with the finely chopped chilli and the coconut milk,” Lady Carrano responded calmly. While he was still gulping she got in: “Is Jan overdoing it?”

    Pete made a face. “Yeah. Claims we need to keep the gourmet-type customers on side because of Fern Gully.”

    They all looked at him with such terrific sympathy he wished he hadn’t said it, and Moyra cried: “Oh, dear! I did try to tell Max that putting in their own chef wasn’t a good idea!”

    At this Katy and Pete exchanged glances.

    “Ye-ah,” he said slowly, pulling his ear. “No, I’m sure ya did, Moyra!” he added quickly. “No, well, me and Katy’ve seen him, eh?”

    “Mm. At least, we thought he must be the chef. He was at the service station the other day. He was in a terrible temper, wasn’t he, Pete?”

    “Yeah. Giving poor ole Ken Roberts an earful. Nothing that Ken had done,” he added quickly. “No, something about that wanker that’s running Fern Gully not being able to pull ’is finger out and nothing working properly and no help in the kitchen and having to find his own accommodation or something—well, it was all in yer gay lingo, but we got the drift.”

    “Every sentence ending with a question-mark,” explained Katy tranquilly. “It was interesting, actually. –What’s this white thing in the salad, Pete?”

    Pete peered. “Uh—dunno. She’d done a special bowl of it that I hadda give you and the two guh, um the types over here that are having the duck too, but I thought it was just beans.”

    “It’s a slice of water chestnut, Katy,” said Moyra with a smile.

    “It contrasts rather well with the slightly earthy flavour of the runner beans,” added Polly.

    Right, well, that was telling ’em. Living with Jake for eighteen years had rubbed off on her, all right, never mind the rosé drinking. “Given you the runners, has she? They’ll be the last of the smaller ones, most of ’em have gone big and hoary,” said Pete on a weak note. “Anyway, this type was thin and weedy with funny specs.”

    “Sunglasses. Sort of flattened rectangles,” said Katy. “Very thin wire frames. From a distance I thought he was bald, only he’s got very pale fair hair in a sort of, um, fuzz.”

    “Bit like a crew-cut,” said Pete thoughtfully. “Uh—yeah,” he said feebly as he found they were all smiling at him kindly. “Two small silver hoops in the lobe of one ear and two in the top of the other, though mind you, we weren’t looking that closely, eh, Katy?

    Katy exploded in giggles, shaking her head madly.

    “Yeah,” said Pete, grinning. “Them cargo pants with the pockets—could be quite useful, only his were ironed flat, so we concluded he wasn’t using ’em. And a pale yellow tee-shirt, went good with that really hollow chest. And the bangles,” he ended, looking bland.

    “Silver,” said Katy. “A chain, all tangled up with a flatter link one and a thin bangle-type one, only we weren’t looking that closely, of course!” She collapsed in giggles again.

    “Yes, but darlings, what did he say?” said Livia loudly.

    “Like I said,” said Pete.

    Katy wiped her eyes. “Mm. And something about a battery and, um cuisine? Only not battery chooks, we didn’t think.”

    “The batterie de cuisine. Perhaps he really can cook,” said Polly. “Um, sorry, Katy. It only means the pots and pans and kitchen stuff. Was he saying it was no good?”

    “Totally inadequate, question-mark,” said Pete. “But we concluded it was meant as a definite statement.”

    Katy winced. “Yeah. And there’s no sous-chef, that drove him really ropeable.”

    “Not what ’e’s used to,” said Pete with a wink. “We don’t think he’ll last out the month.”

    “Darlings, that’s excellent for you and Jan, and of course they should have come to an arrangement about sending the guests over here for their main meals,” said Bettany quickly, “but it isn’t very good news for Ran and Max, is it?”

    “That side of it it’s Hospitality, though, Bettany, and they’re with Development,” said Moyra.

    “No, but darling, one doesn’t want to see one’s very first project go down the tubes!”

    “No. I’d have put in someone who could do dainty breakfasts and nice but simple lunches,” said Polly thoughtfully.

    “Darling, and so say all of us!” cried Livia. “And if they really are aiming at the international back-packing crowd, lovely packed lunches! And book that darling Vern Reilly for tours with picnics and Outback campfires!”

    Pete cleared his throat. “Yeah. Well, not Outback, this isn’t Australia, Livia, but you’re on the right track, definitely.”

    “Have they done anything about tours?” asked Polly.

    “Not to my knowledge. ’Ve you heard anything, Katy? –Nope.” Pete shrugged.

    “But their website says ‘wilderness tours.’ –We looked it up on Alex’s laptop,” explained Bettany.

    “You’d better warn Vern to stand by, Pete,” said Katy.

    “Right. Stand by to charge like a wounded bull, eh? Sounds like the Pommy dweeb wants their Sir Maurice to fire ’im.”

    “Perhaps he feels he was thrown in at the deep end and it’s his way of protesting. What do they call it? Passive protest? Passive resistance?” offered Moyra.

    “Satya graha,” said Polly.

    “You have had too much plonk,” discerned Pete heavily. “Eat some of that duck, that’ll help sop it up. –No, well, passive resistance won’t cut it these days, ’e must be mad. Knuckling down to it and showing the boss what ya can do is what’s needed. Well, if they do have to send their customers over to us we’ll flaming charge ’em double. –Give us a shout if there’s anything else ya need.” He ambled off.

    “That last remark was deliberate,” warned Polly.

    “Yes, but lovely with it, darling!” said Livia with a giggle.

    Bettany looked after him with a sigh. “Definitely.”

    The blokes on site at Fern Gully had pulled their fingers out and the paving was finished, the landscaping firm had finished the visible bits that had been flattened during construction, the students were still planting in the wilderness area but that was as per schedule, and the second bottle cabin was finished. The third was still a-building but that was okay, Max had warned Sir Maurice that it wouldn’t be ready for the Opening. And after the builders had heard about Max’s dad being killed in the tsunami they’d started working twice as hard, where a hint of bonuses had only resulted in a slight quickening of the tempo. Well, good on them.

    What was going on inside the main building was not, of course, Development’s responsibility, except in so far as the final clean-up went, but— Ran gritted her teeth and went over there.

    The furniture was now all installed and Mum’s wall hangings were back on the walls where the plans drawn up by Max in conjunction with the people from YDI’s Interior Design section had decreed they oughta go, so that was all right. You wouldn’t have expected the serving staff to be here at this juncture, but nevertheless the place looked and felt really empty. Ran went cautiously through to the kitchen.

    “Hi, Stan,” she said somewhat weakly to the huge, black-singleted brown body at the stove.

    “Aw, it’s you,” he replied. “If you’re looking for the lady, she’s over in the other bit, but I wouldn’t go over there if I was you, ’cos she was bawling.”

    “Ugh, heck. What happened?’

    “Dunno. Wasn’t here, eh?” he replied cheerfully. “You know Kylie Pohaka, eh? Well, she was here a bit back. Could of had a row.”

    Kylie Pohaka was one of Wendy’s older sisters, and sister-in-law to that Kristel Pohaka who operated Lake District Cleaning Services in partnership with Sue Pritchard. Ran would have said she was a sensible woman. Well, she had three kids by two different partners, neither of whom had ended up marrying her, but that wasn’t her fault, she’d entered into the relationships with the best of intentions.

    “I wouldn’t of said Kylie was the sort to have rows, Stan,” she said cautiously.

    “Neh,” he agreed. “Well, don’t look at me.”

    “Um, were they taking her on or what?”

    Stan replied amiably: “I dunno if they were, but Mike Pohaka, he told me that she was looking for a job, like, something more fulltime, because that Mrs Ellsworth at Mountain View Motel, she keeps telling her not to come in, eh? Not in the school holidays, of course: in between.”

    “Right. Well, she’d do a great job for them, if they’ve got the sense to take her on.”

    Stan sniffed. “If. Hey, you wanna plug the jug in for us, Ran? –Ta.”

    “Have you seen the chef?” asked Ran, having checked whether the jug needed water, filled it, and plugged it in.

    “Saw ’im bawling yesterday, does that count?’” he replied with a grin.

    “Oh, shit. Well, yeah, it does count, because if he’s bawling this close before the Opening, I’d say it’s not a good sign, wouldn’t you?”

    “Yeah.” Stan inspected his fry-up. “Julia Roberts, she run out of white sliced, those students, they got down on it, so I hadda buy wholemeal. It won’t be the same, will it? Don’tcha reckon?”

    “Like, for fried bread? No, it won’t. I’d do toast instead, if I was you.”

    “That Mr Basildon-Pugh, he said we weren’t to touch the toaster and ’e’d see we never worked for the ruddy firm again if we did,” Stan reported on a mournful note. Mournful but with distinct undertones of pleased to be telling on Mr Basildon-Pugh.

    “Well, it is one of those huge industrial-type ones; ever seen one working?’

    “No,” he said on a sour note.

    “They’re neato: the toast goes under the whatsit, the grill part, I suppose, only it does it on both sides, and it’s like a conveyor belt, see: and it goes slowly under there and just when you’re thinking it’s gone and the thing’s gonna burst into flames, it flips it out the top!”

    “Ya don’t say.”

    Ran smiled weakly: she hadn’t meant to get carried away. “Yeah. But unless ole Steve Garber down Taupo Hardware & Electrical actually is a miracle worker like him and those ancient mates of his like Pete McLeod reckon, there won’t be anyone round these parts that can fix it when it goes wrong, so it’s probably just as well Simon won’t let you use it. ’Cos if it ever did go wrong, he’d be sure to blame you, geddit?”

    “Yeah. Well, Steve, he couldn’t fix that flamin’ waffle-iron Wiremu gave Mum last Christmas,” he allowed.

    “Exactly. Um, where is Simon?”

    As she might have expected, Stan replied with sour satisfaction: “Don’t ask me.”

    Cringing, Ran went off to look for him. Or possibly the bawling Gillian Prendergast. Or anybody, really: the place should be a bustling hive of activity: what the fuck were they all doing?

    What Simon Basildon-Pugh was doing was making enquiries on the phone in his room—his bedroom, not the decent-sized office he rated as manager—about another job. Fortunately the door was slightly ajar and it dawned on Ran in time. She retreated noiselessly, grimacing.

    What Gillian Prendergast was doing was bawling—not in her room, though as second-most senior Hospitality person on site she did rate one—and not in the housekeeper’s small office with its ranks of cupboards that were supposed to contain linen supplies and spare crockery and glassware but, as Ran ascertained grimly, didn’t—but in the small sitting-room of the suite at the far side of the patio. The one with the verandah that was artfully overhung by the tree that had had to be transplanted there—that one.

    “What’s up, Gillian?” said Ran on a resigned note. The shenanigans of the Hospitality staff were not, of course, her problem. Theoretically.

    Gillian burst out with it. It was very muddled and there was a lot of it but you could have summed it up as “everything.” Simon wasn’t supporting her. Suppliers that had promised supplies weren’t providing them. Interviewees who had turned up—half of them hadn’t—had proven unsatisfactory. Simon wasn’t supporting her. Interviewees who had turned up were sloppy. The chef was uncooperative and Simon wasn't supporting her. Fresh burst of tears. And there were noises on her bedroom roof at night and Simon wouldn’t believe her!

    “Yeah. Probably possums,” said Ran feebly to this last.

    Ms Prendergast’s tears dried up out of sheer astonishment. “But this is New Zealand!”

    Right, and the possums that had been introduced from Australia years back by some thick-witted Pommy immigrants were a pest over here. In plague proportions.

    “Yeah, they’re a pest here. If it gets too bad I know a bloke that’ll shoot them for ya.”

    “Isn’t that illegal?” she gasped.

    “No. They’re a pest: not native,” said Ran heavily. “Look, have you taken anybody on?”

    She burst into tears again but the short answer was “no.”

    “Gillian, the Opening’s in a week, and Sir Maurice’ll fire you if there’s no staff,” said Ran brutally.

    “Whuh-who?” she quavered.

    Jesus! “The CEO, Sir Maurice Bishop. He’s coming out for the Opening; didn’t Simon say?”

    More tears and wails of “He’s being unsupportive!”

    Yeah, right. Possibly because he’d washed his hands of the whole bit and was looking round for another job; in fact possibly he’d only accepted this job in order to get a free trip to the Antipodes and had never planned to stick it out. Now she was on about no infrastructure, but Ran had heard that sort of thing before from that sort of person and didn’t take any notice, because in the first instance they didn’t know what the word “infrastructure” actually meant and in the second instance wailing wasn’t gonna help.

    “Right well, staff are the most important thing.”—Followed closely by dishes and glasses to eat and drink out of, yeah.—“Didja manage to isolate any possibles, at least?”

    The short answer was “no” but Ran got the list out of her and looked through it.

    “Yeah. Well, the students’ll be off back to university in a month, but they might do as stop-gaps. Didja let them go back to Auckland and Hamilton?” –Yes, ’course she had. Three out of four, anyway. That left Derek Hanson, who lived down the road from Vern Reilly, and Ran knew perfectly well he was slated to get back to his B.Com. in Auckland this March, in fact earlier, because he’d have to find somewhere to live. Unless he was relying on his scungy mates to find a scungy flat they could all fit into.

    “Look, you’d better take Derek on as waiter. At least he’s had a bit of experience on that working holiday in Australia last year.”

    “In Outback pubs?” she said tearfully. “And I haven’t verified his references!”

    The copies of them in her extensive files—the files were organised enough, why the Hell wasn’t she?—looked okay. “It won’t matter, he’ll only be a stop-gap. And he’ll be used to pitching in and doing whatever’s needed, that’s a plus: you need someone like that in a place like this.”

    Ms Prendergast blew her nose. “I understood the ecolodge was to be run in accordance with the best principles of modern hospitality practice.”

    Down here? Was the woman barmy? “Look, by Aussie distances it’s quite close to Auckland, but over here it’s like the Outback, Gillian. No-one wants to work here—not as employees. Once you’re away from the cities you’ll find most of the fancy modern B&Bs and that sort of place, they’re owner-run. Actually nearly all the motels are, too. People only stay if they’ve got a stake in the area. If you’re running a place like this you have to be prepared to pitch in and do some hard yacker. Hands-on stuff. And your staff likewise. Actually, Jan Harper at Taupo Shores Ecolodge, she’s had endless trouble finding waiting staff, too, because these days if it’s waiting they don’t expect it to include peeling veges or helping out with the beds and the vacuuming—see?”

    Ms Prendergast blew her nose. “Well, what does she do?” she asked dolefully.

    Gee, Gillian, why weren’t you over there two weeks back making friends with her and asking her? “Mostly she pitches in and does the waiting herself, her and her partner that’s the co-owner, and they’ve got a Maori girl for their busy season, only she’s not very reliable about turning up.”

    “These people are unemployable!” she cried.

    Ran didn’t ask whether she meant Maoris in general, the locals, whether Maori or pakeha, modern waiting staff, or even the New Zealand workforce as a whole, because in her terms actually they all were. “Well, yeah, in your terms, Gillian—yeah. Ya have to learn to work round it. And heck, you’ve only got the three suites and the four double rooms in the house, and the two bottle cabins that are finished, it shouldn’t be too hard to manage those.”

    But Simon wasn’t being supportive and he expected her to manage all the staff herself, including the reception staff that weren’t her responsibility! And there were no kitchen staff hired and the chef was a broken reed!

    This last didn’t surprise Ran—well, the expression in Ms Prendergast’s mouth did: she wouldn’t of said she had the imagination for it. “Yeah. Well, kitchen staff definitely aren’t your responsibility. Lemme see that list of cleaning staff you interviewed.”

    “They were all impossible!” she said viciously. “To be perfectly honest, half of them looked slutty, Ran! I’m sorry, but there’s no other word for it! We cannot possibly take on staff of that sort: it conveys completely the wrong message to the clientele! And all three of the older women tried to set their own terms!”

    Ran winced. They would do, yeah. “Yeah, that’s pretty normal for these parts. Most women have families. Well, everyone over about twenty, really. See, if they don’t take off for the cities that’s what they do: settle down and have kids. And a lot of the blokes work in the forestry: like, sawing the logs or felling the trees or driving the timber-trucks. They have to get up at crack of dawn and so usually their wives can’t manage a job until, um, well, given they’ve gotta get the kids off to school as well, um, nineish. Half-past eight at the earliest. Um, well, I dunno what your background is, but see, a bloke that does a heavy, dirty job, he needs a solid breakfast, ya can’t just send him off to work with a plate of cornflakes inside him. There are families that do: ya see the dads buying pies from the service stations or the dairies first thing, but they’re the dysfunctional families, mostly.”

    After a moment Ms Prendergast said: “Mum and Dad are both accountants. She always worked, but when we were little she was only part-time… She used to manage our breakfast and drop us off at school and get to work on time!” she ended on a cross note.

    “Right, two-car family, eh?” She nodded, looking puzzled, and Ran said with a sigh: “Ordinary families can’t afford two cars here, Gillian. Cars are a lot dearer over here.”

    “Um, I’ve noticed a lot of second-hand cars on the roads,” she offered.

    “That’s right, nearly everybody drives a second-hand car. But they’re still bloody dear compared to Aussie prices. Anyway, most of the women that applied here, they’d have to get the bus part of the way and then walk, or walk all the way, and ts a real hike from town. I think it’s why you didn’t get more applicants, actually.”

    “I see. I didn’t expect it to be so different from Australia,” she said wanly.

    No, well, she would’ve done her Internet research before applying for the job, Ran was sure, and that would have resulted in loads of tourism lies and meaningless statistics. Though it wasn’t very different, just different in small things, of which the proportion of new, large cars on the roads was certainly one: Ran had been astonished by them when she and Max went over there with Jim Thompson to look at the Queensland ecolodge. She was in no doubt that the huge working-class suburbs in Sydney or Melbourne were full of families just as badly off as Taupo’s small population—probably worse off, under John Howard’s bloody Liberal government. But nice middle-class families like what Gillian’s obviously were would never even see those suburbs. Like Aunty Rosalie up in Auckland never went near South Auckland: it was full of Maoris and Islanders, unquote.

    She looked through the files. Jesus, the woman had put Kylie Pohaka down as “disorganised, sloppy, no knowl. of 1st-class hosp. criteria”! She took a deep breath. “I see you had Kylie Pohaka in this morning.”

    “Um… yes. A Maori woman.”

    “Yeah. I know her, she’s a very hard worker and completely reliable.”

    Ms Prendergast took the file. “She had no reference from her current employer!”

    “No, because she doesn’t want that bitch Ma Ellsworth from Mountain View Motel to give her the sack! As opposed to telling her half the year not to come in, because she’s doing it herself. You can’t altogether blame her, if they haven’t got the customers she can’t shell out wages for cleaning staff, but the thing is, she rings her with the bad news just before she’s due to leave in the morning, when she must know the night before whether she’ll need her or not.”

    “That’s very bad management practice.”

    “Exactly. Look, Kylie won’t have a notion of what best practice in hospitality is, Gillian, but you’ll find she’s very willing to learn. See, Ma Ellsworth, she always puts a little pot of artificial flowers on each, um, like a chest of drawers, right? Those low ones lots of the motels go in for. –Yeah. She tried six other women before Kylie—they’re right in town, right on the bus route, see, she got plenty of applicants—and none of them put the little pots the way she liked them, but Kylie got it exactly right. Not to mention cleaning the bogs and showers whether or not they looked like they needed it.”

    “Ugh!” she gasped, recoiling. “Surely—”

    “This is a small country town. You might hear New Zealanders claiming you Aussies invented the expression ‘She’ll be right,’ but believe you me, it’s the motto in the EnZed backblocks! Um, sorry: in the country.”

    “I see. As a matter of fact Mum worked in one office where she said the cleaners never touched the toilet floors, you’d see the same marks on the floor day after day…”

    “Yeah, cleaners tend to be like that. If I was you I’d give Kylie a chance.”

    “Um…” She looked dubiously at the file. “The thing is, Ran, I showed each of them a picture of what the bedrooms should look like when they were finished and asked them to show me how they worked, and none of them got it right! Mrs Pohaka certainly didn’t.”

    It was technically “Miss”, but Ran didn’t bother. “Which room?”

    “This one—over there,” she said dully, nodding at the suite’s bedroom door.

    “Right.” Ran got the pic off her and went over to the bedroom. Er… the photo was a pic of one of the other rooms! The layout was completely different! Didn’t the woman understand that cleaning staff wouldn’t necessarily be capable of the leap of logic required?

    “What did Kylie do wrong?”

    “She made the bed neatly enough, though no hotel I’ve worked in would have accepted the result,” she said grimly. “And dusted quite thoroughly—I asked them to show me how they’d dust, even though the room didn’t look as if it needed it, and not one of them pointed out that she’d dust anyway as part of her daily routine!”

    Ran winced, though it wasn’t exactly surprising news. “Right.”

    “But then she just put the clean towels on the bed in an untidy pile, not in the right position and certainly not folded as in the picture, and completely ignored the mess round the telephone!”

    Ran looked dubiously at the current state of the bedroom’s phone and its environs.

    “Yes!” said Gillian viciously. “Like that! None of them even touched it!”

    Right. In the photo the phone was sitting neatly on top of the phonebooks. Next to it, on the side furthest from the bed, was a neat fan of brochures and the ecolodge’s Room Service menu. Currently the brochures and phonebooks were piled up between the phone and the bed. It was quite a neat pile: no wonder the poor women hadn’t realised it was All Wrong.

    “I see. You’ll need to show her exactly how you want all the little touches to be done, Gillian. Um, you might have to show her more than once, but once she’s got it you’ll find she’s reliable.”

    After a moment Gillian said with a grim smile: “This Ma Ellsworth had to show her how to place the little pots more than once, did she?”

    “Yes. Kylie said to me that it was a fuss about nothing but if she wanted them done like that, it was no skin off her nose. Um… you’ve got ‘poor’ under ‘Appearance.’ Um, well, nobody dresses up round these parts, and any spare money goes on the kids. But if you give her a couple of uniforms and explain the appearance you expect I don’t think you’ll have any problems with her.”

    “She was one of the women who were wearing thongs,” said Gillian heavily.

    Eh? Oh! “Yeah, um, I wouldn’t say that round here, Gillian, people’ll think you mean those awful panties. We say ‘jandals.’ Well, yeah, it’s summer and jandals are cheap, and, um, most Maoris have very wide feet, their ancestors haven’t had hundreds of years of cramming them into unsuitable footwear like us Europeans. I think you might have to provide shoes, if that’s what you want her to wear. Though personally I don’t mind brown toes,” said Ran mildly.

    Poor Gillian went very red. “Nor do I! Australia is a multicultural society!”

    Yeah, and the rest. “Mm. Well, shoes are pretty expensive.”

    “Very well, shoes,” she said grimly. “Is there a uniform shop? I couldn’t locate one.”

    Ran’s jaw sagged. She hadn’t known that such places even existed! “Um—no. Not here, I wouldn’t think,” she croaked. “Not if it’s not in the phonebook. I think you might—well, there might be one in Hamilton, I suppose. Auckland’d be your best bet.”

    “I see. I had such high hopes of this job,” she said wanly. “YDI’s a big international firm…”

    “Well, not that big by overseas standards, but yeah, it could lead to great things for you. Jim Thompson did try to explain to the Hospitality people at Head Office that there might be problems out here, but it didn’t sink in, they’re used to having their pick of the huge workforce in Britain. It’s up to you to sort things out and adapt your style to suit, Gillian.”

    “Without compromising standards?” she asked bitterly.

    “As much as possible,” said Ran kindly.

    After a moment she admitted: “I have seen some awful things in Australia, too… Though the population’s bigger, I suppose there is more choice. I’d better ring Mrs Pohaka and—which student was it, again?”

    “Derek Hanson. He’s pretty hefty, he could probably do porter for you as well.”

    “Simon was supposed to arrange— No, all right,” she said tiredly. “You realise if I do manage to—to salvage anything out of this mess, he’ll take all the credit for it?”

    “He is the sort of boss that does, but don’t worry, I’ll tell Sir Maurice myself that he’s a dead loss. Actually I overheard him on the phone just now applying for another job.”

    “That’s beyond the pale!” she gasped.

    “Yeah. Um, where’s all the linen and crockery and stuff?”

    “Simon swears he ordered it all,” she said tightly.

    Shit, could he have been embezzling as well as the rest? But the budget wasn’t that big, it would hardly be worth taking the risk. “Yeah. Well, if he ordered it just before Christmas it’s not surprising nothing’s happened.”

    “But it’s nearly February!” Gillian paused. “Well, admittedly Mum’s new bed didn’t come until April, but they did warn her the factory mightn’t be able to supply… But these would all have been standard lines, surely?”

    “Mm. I’ll check it out. We might end up having to drive up to Auckland and buy some cheap glasses and crockery and visit a uniform shop in person. And at that I wouldn’t hold your breath: ten to one they won’t have a range of sizes in stock.” She went over to the door.

    “Thank you, Ran,” said Gillian in a small voice. “You’ve been wonderful.”

    “That’s okay. Don’t let it get to this stage again without letting me or Jim know, okay?”

    “No, I won’t. –I’m so sorry, I forgot to ask! How’s your fiancé getting on in Sri Lanka?” she gasped, turning fiery red.

    Smiling, Ran replied: “Goodoh!” And gave her the latest update on Max’s Uncle Hugh’s extraordinary about-face.

    After that she felt quite invigorated, really, and marched straight off to confront Basildon-Pugh.

    He was in his office, doing nothing. Ran said without preamble: “Where the Hell’s the linen and the crockery?”

    “Don’t ask me! This is your bloody country, not mine! All I know is it was all promised for the second week in January and nothing’s come!” he snarled.

    “Most of them won’t even be back from their Christmas holidays yet. But I’ll ring them. Gimme the files.”

    Surprisingly enough he did have the paper files that YDI required be kept as well as the computer records. Ran grasped them tightly. “Right. What about reception and kitchen staff?”

    “The woman I hired for reception hasn’t turned UP!” he shouted.

    “Got a better offer or thought better of working two hundred and eighty K from the Big Smoke,” discerned Ran. “What about your second choice?”

    “The bitch has accepted another job!” he snarled.

    “Right. I’d get onto it right smart, ’cos Sir Maurice will expect to see something attractive, smiling and polite behind that desk out there. Preferably with knowledge of the local conditions.”

    “Very well, send your sister over!” he snarled.

    “I dunno that she wants to work for you, Simon, but I’ll speak to her,” replied Ran calmly. “Gillian’s onto a boy that can do waiter and fill in as porter for you, but he’ll have to be back at university by the end of next month. What about kitchen staff?”

    “They’re the bloody chef’s responsibility! Do I have to do EVERYTHING around here?” he shouted.

    “Pretty much, yeah. Don’t worry, I’ll tell Sir Maurice that they made the wrong choice and it’s not all your fault.”

    “How DARE you?” he shouted.

    Ran gave him a dry look. “Or if you’d rather, I’ll tell him that you’re applying for other jobs.”

    “How did you—” He broke off, breathing heavily. After moment he managed: “I've been grossly deceived as to the nature and scope of my responsibilities here and given no facilities or back-up: they can hardly expect company loyalty under those conditions!”

    “They can’t, but they will. You shouldn’t have told them you’d enjoy a challenge.”

    “There’s nothing HERE!” he shouted.

    Ran of course had visited several of YDI’s houses in Britain and as part of her induction had had the intricacies of their supply chain explained to her by a very competent young woman with superb organisational and IT skills. She replied with a certain sympathy: “I know. I suppose you’d be used to working in established hotels where the supply chain’s been set up and you just have to ensure that the staff follow the right procedures.”

    “Not just, but yes, in essence,” he said sulkily.

    “Yeah. Well, New Zealand is frightful over Christmas and New Year’s: everything closes down; and in any case no-one really cares about the concept of service—and whatever Gillian might have told you, most of Australia sounds pretty much the same, too: my cousins were over there on holiday a few years back and they said the local McDonald’s couldn’t even manage to serve up hamburgers without cold bottoms. I’ll see if I can ginger the suppliers up, but if I can’t, we’ll try and cancel the orders and buy something cheap retail. They may not accept a cancellation, of course, but you can always send the deliveries back and refuse to pay. Is the grog on tap, at least?”

    “What? This isn’t a pub!”

    “Uh, no, I only meant has the wine been delivered?” said Ran feebly.

    “Yes: the liquor wholesalers don’t seem to close down over Christmas,” he said sourly.

    “No, it’s their big time of year. Well, that’s a plus. Has the chef even tried to get kitchen staff?”

    “I don’t know, because all I’ve heard from that direction have been outbursts about the state the kitchen’s in and the lack of a batterie de cuisine!”

    “Right. Well, it’s not as if he has to cook for a huge crowd, with only nine rooms available, but he’ll need a bit of help with chopping stuff, and at the least someone that’s capable of loading a dishwasher. I’ll talk to him,” said Ran heavily.

    “Good luck.”

    Ran didn’t ask if she could use the phone on his desk, because she couldn’t stand another second of his company. She’d use her mobile. She went off to the main lounge, now looking very nice with lots of sofas that were a mixture of recycled old ones re-covered and made-to-order ones with arms and backs of recycled wood—something after the style of those fake Spanish Colonial ones Livia had in her sitting-room. They were all upholstered in a heavy pale cream canvas-like fabric. The ecolodge also featured a lot of very odd-looking coffee tables and occasional tables largely made of branches and driftwood, which she was less sure about, though they certainly gave it the eco-friendly look. Sir Maurice was rumoured to have demanded houseplants but there were none of those, as New Zealand natives usually died inside. Well, Jim had suggested that they could have some pots of flax inside and put them outside overnight, but had then admitted that the firm didn’t want to be liable for some unfortunate’s putting his back out—no.

    The first place she rang didn’t even have an answering machine on: the phone just rang out. Okay, forewarned was fore-armed. Ran rang the next place, which had claimed to be able to supply several dozen individually-blown glasses for water, wine, whisky and cocktails. After absolutely ages a breathless little voice gasped: “Hullo? Mum’s in the shower!”

    “Is your mum the lady that makes glass?” she replied grimly.

    “Yeah! She’s in the shower!”

    “Right. Go and get her. Tell her it’s about an order, okay? Tell her not to hurry: I’ll hang on.”

    “Okay!” Silence. Though Ran thought she could hear voices and a dog barking somewhere off in the distance.

    After absolutely ages a woman’s voice said: “Hullo-o?” in the usual high-pitched local nasal drawl that Ran had never realised was, until she’d had the shock of encountering it on her return from Britain.

    “Hullo. Is that Molly Molloy Glassware?” she asked grimly.

    “Um, yes. Is it about an order?”

    “Yes. This is Ran Jackson from YDI South Pacific,” said Ran carefully and slowly. No response. “I’m ringing about the order we placed for sets of glasses for Fern Gully Ecolodge at Taupo.”

    “Um, yee-ee-uss?” she replied, with a doubtful intonation.

    “Where is it? It was promised for last week,” said Ran grimly.

    “But I sent it all!” she gasped.

    “Did your delivery man get a signature? Because according to our records,” said Ran grimly, wondering just how inefficient bloody Simon Basildon-Pugh really was, “it never arrived.”

    There was silence. Then she wailed: “I’ll kill him!” And burst into noisy sobs.

    Ran made a face at the phone. After a bit she could hear the kid saying something and the woman replying: something about “your father”. Ooh, heck. Then she came back on the line, sniffing juicily, and said: “I’m awfully sorry. I’m splitting up with my husband. He was supposed to deliver that order. He swore blind he’d do it, the bastard.”

    “Maybe he just forgot, if you’re at sixes and sevens,” said Ran kindly.

    “No,” she said soggily. “He’ll of done it on purpose: probably threw it all away. It was weeks of work!” She burst into tears again,

    Eventually she pulled herself together enough to apologise and Ran said: “Forget it, Molly. ’Tis Molly, is it? –Yeah. Forget it. We’ll get some commercial glassware—hire it, if we have to.”

    “But I need the money!” she wailed. “Couldn’t I do some more for you?”

    Oh, shit. “We can’t wait. We’re opening at the end of next week. Um, well, look. We’ll hire some for the meantime,”—she thought of Sir Maurice Bishop being faced with cheap hired glassware, and winced—“um, and you do the order again, okay? And don’t trust anyone to deliver it. Ring me and I’ll either pick it up myself or arrange for someone really reliable to do it.” She suffered Molly’s fervent thanks and gave her her mobile number and the number of the Auckland office, and told her not to ring the Taupo number. That woulda covered it but for the continuing picture of Sir Maurice looking at a cheap Woolie’s-type wine glass… “Um, listen, have you got any wine glasses in stock, Molly? Like one-offs?”

    “Um, yes, loads, but no sets of a dozen,” she said dazedly.

    “Okay, good. I’ll come up—or I might send my sister or brother, depends—and see what you’ve got. We’ve got our British CEO coming out for the ecolodge’s Grand Opening, and no way am I gonna sit through a dinner with him with a cheap glass in his fist: he’s the sort that’s used to dining at the Ritz.” She got her address—it was south of Auckland, near Clevedon. An old farmhouse. The directions included coming past the polo grounds but Ran didn’t think that’d be a problem, the area wasn’t that big. And, added Molly, sniffing juicily, if she saw the sign for Keith Britten, Potter, ignore it: that was him and he’d gone.

    Right. Other people’s lives, eh? Promising that someone would be up there very soon, Ran rang off, to the accompaniment of the glass-blower’s fervent thanks.

    She’d sort it while she thought of it, so she rang Sean.

    “Yeah, I’ll do it,” he said amiably. “I can take a load of stuff up to Tim’s greengrocers, too. Lessee… Leave now, I’ll be there for afternoon tea!”

    Ran hadn’t meant right away, but so much the better. She gave him all the details and told him to buy as much as he liked unless it struck him as really horrible.

    “Righto! Got any dough?” he said cheerfully.

    “She’ll have to give you an invoice, Sean. Tell her if she gives you the number of her bank account I can pay her straight away, I’ll do it over the Internet. But you’d better make sure she gets it right; she doesn’t sound very business-like.”

    “Okay, sure!”

    That seemed to be that. Ran thanked him somewhat limply and rang off. Oh, blast: petrol! She was about to ring him but he rang her back.

    “What about petrol? Alex says I can use his card, but can ya pay him back?”

    “Yeah. Just keep a record of how much it comes to, okay?”

    “Wilco, Squadron Leader. Over and out!” said Sean with a laugh.

    Ran rang off, smiling feebly. Had she come over that strong? Oh, well, someone had to sort it.

    She rang the next supplier. Mountains of table linen. The female voice at the other end, much older than Molly’s, sounded very confused and kept telling her they were only a shop, dear, they only sold retail. No, there must be some mistake, they couldn’t fill an order that size, they only sold retail. No, they didn’t represent any of the manufacturers or the big wholesalers—did they, Sonya? In the background Sonya sounded as wavery and out of it as she was, so Ran didn’t ask her to put her on instead.

    “Look, our records show that we sent you an email order back on the 26th of November for ten dozen sets of matching tablecloths and serviettes in avocado or sand!”

    “Oh no, dear: we do have those shades, but we don’t sell in those quantities, we only sell retail, you see... What was that, Sonya? Oh.”—Confab in the background.—“Are you thee-are? Sonya says there might of been a funny fax, but that was ages ago, back before Christmas, but we don’t supply those quant—”

    Ran hung up on her. Boy, the risks of ordering stuff through the flaming Internet, not to say believing the websites of cretins, were well and truly being demonstrated today! She chewed on her lip for a bit. Then she rang Aunty Rosalie.

    “Of course, Ran, dear! No, I know exactly what you mean, dear, they’re all hopelessly unreliable, these days! I’ll try the factory shops in South Auckland first, that’ll be the best bet. But don’t worry, there’s always Farmer’s! Do you need sheets and towels as well?”

    Grimly Ran asked her to hang on. Grimly she looked through Simon’s files. Amazingly, the order for towels and bathmats had been received. No sheet sets seemed to have come, though: they’d been ordered through a different supplier again. At one point Gillian had come through heading for her office, so Ran popped in there. Yes, the towels had arrived and Gillian had already put the first lot in the rooms, but she’d had to go out and buy sheets for her own bed and for the interviews, though Simon swore—

    “Are you there, Aunty Rosalie? …Um, did you? Yes, Australian,” she admitted. “Well, they do need sheets and pillowcases. Nine rooms. –Hang on, I’ll ask her.” Gillian informed her that two of the rooms had twin beds and the suites all had an extra single bed. Aunty Rosalie had got that. “Um, yeah, Aunty Rosalie, I can put the money into your account through the Internet,” agreed Ran weakly.

    Promising merrily that in that case she’d put it on the plastic and Ran’s Uncle Joe could lump it until Ran paid her back, the old motor-mower was perfectly good anyway, Aunty Rosalie rang off.

    “Sorted!” said Ran in huge relief to Gillian.

    “Great. Um, did you mention colours?”

    Ulp! Aunty Rosalie’s taste ran to bright mauve blooms not seen on any plant in the entire natural world against pale mauve backgrounds. “No. Well, too bad: if they’re all awful we can nip into town and buy a fancy set for Sir Maurice’s bed, eh?”

    “Yeah!” she said with a guilty laugh.

    Ran went back to the lounge. Cutlery. This was a commercial hotel and catering supplies place, thank God, and totally on the ball. They were quite sure they hadn’t received an order from YDI South Pacific or Fern Gully Ecolodge, in fact they had never had any business in Taupo, but yes, they could supply immediately: the warehouse would process the order tomorrow, and it would come down in the truck on Monday. What were the quantities? Ran told him and there was a slight pause. Then the gent at the other end said weakly: “Is that all? There won’t be any problem there!”

    “Really? Look, do you do plates and stuff as well? ’Cos I think we’d better have the lot: none of our orders seem to have gone through.”

    Cheerfully he agreed they could do crockery and the entire batterie de cuisine, did their kitchen need outfitting?

    Ran gave in and ordered the lot. Including some cheap glasses, why not? Giving the Auckland office as the place for the invoice to be sent because she didn’t want to risk bloody Simon losing it and this nice man’s firm not getting paid. Yes, she’d expect his email confirmation of the order and delivery times. She rang off, and sagged.

    She was just trying to gird her loins and go in search of the chef when Gillian appeared with a mug of tea on a tray and some biscuits.

    “Ta, Gillian: life-saver!” said Ran with her merry laugh. “These are all yours, right? –Right. Well, I’ve ordered the lot for the kitchen and the restaurant. Um, what about soap and stuff?”

    “The toilet paper has come, and boxes of tissues for the rooms. They’re not very fancy but they’ll have to do, I suppose. Simon said that all the soap had been ordered specially from an organic supplier,” said Gillian faintly. “It—it did sound very nice, Ran.”

    “Uh-huh. Was the word ‘Internet’ mentioned in this connection? –Yeah. Well, I dunno if he’s just incompetent with the computer or if he’s had really bad luck with the suppliers he picked, or if it’s a bit of both, but I don’t think any organic soap’s gonna arrive in the near future.”

    She swallowed. “No. I—I haven’t got the authorisation.”

    “I have. Well, the number of Jim Thompson’s company account and a YDI credit card, same diff.”

    “Oh, good! Is there a Body Shop in town?’

    “Um, I shouldn’t think so, Gillian, but actually I dunno what that is.”

    “Oh,” she said limply. “The Body Shop. They do lovely natural soaps: um, brazil nut and coconut and pink grapefruit, y’know? It was started by an English lady.”

    Edible soaps: right. “I think I might of seen the name when I was in London,” said Ran kindly.

    “Of course!” Brightening terrifically, Gillian launched into it. Ran didn’t listen, she just nodded kindly from time to time.

    Then she said: “Mum knows a lady that does hand-made soap, I think we better drive over and get some off her, okay? I’ll just give her a bell.” She did so. Marianne McCarthy was thrilled to get the custom and, since the soap was largely goats’ milk, offered eagerly to supply them with the milk and cheese as well. Because their website did say goats’ milk! she added eagerly.

    Eh? Feebly Ran asked Gillian to get the ecolodge’s website up on her laptop.

    Oh, cripes. What moron at Head Office in London wrote this lot? “Um, yeah, Marianne,” she said feebly. “There is a lady nearby that has goats but she usually uses up their milk, so, um, provisionally, yeah. Starting near the end of next week, okay? And, um, I think we better bring the chef over to talk to you, too.” Marianne assured her warmly that she was always here, come any time!

    “It’s about a half-hour’s drive,” Ran explained, ringing off. “Where is the chef?”

    Apparently he had been complaining about the inadequate parking provided for his Porsche, she should be so unlucky! After that Gillian thought he’d gone down to the lake. Gee, maybe he’d chucked himself in? Ran went off to look for him.

    Er… crikey. That must be him: small, skinny, caved-in-chest type, so pale you’d think he was a Pom—well, it was an indoor occupation, but honestly!—talking to a couple of hulking great brown figures wielding weapons down by the lake.

    “Hi, Rewi. Hi, Nelson. Started on your carvings, have you?” she said somewhat limply. What in God’s name could they be talking about?

    “Hi, Ran,” replied Nelson Rawiti. “Yeah, we thought we’d come over and suss it out, eh? Didja know they’ve dumped all the logs up behind the garage?”

    “Eh? Near the main building? Shit.”

    “That’s okay, we can carry a few logs!” Rewi assured her.

    “Um, good, only they were supposed to bring them down to the shore for you.”

    “That was Simon Basildon-Pugh’s doing!” said the chef viciously.

    “Yeah. Hi, you’d be Dwayne Richards, the chef, right? I’m Ran Jackson, I’ve been doing the on-site project management during the development stage.”

    “I’m glad to know someone’s been managing something!” he retorted.

    “See, all the kitchen stuff and that, that won’t be Ran’s job,” Nelson explained kindly. “She only does the outside stuff, eh, Ran?”

    “Yeah, pretty much, and I hadda make sure the furniture all came, but the rest of it’s the Hospitality side, ya see. I gather Simon’s a dead loss?”

    The chef looked marginally happier. “I’ll say! He hasn’t been able to tell me a thing, let alone do anything! And I’ve never been to Taupo before, I don’t know anything about your local suppliers, y’know? He hasn’t even got a list for me!”

    It’d be a bloody short list. Ran managed not to say so.

    “We were just telling him, you can get most stuff down the supermarket,” explained Rewi.

    “Um, yeah; well, the basics, Dwayne,” said Ran on a weak note. “But don’t worry, I’ve sorted out the batterie de cuisine for you, a complete order’ll be arriving on Monday. I dunno what happened to Simon’s original order, or if he ever placed it, but anyway.”

    “Oh. Thanks. –I’ve brought my own knives, of course!” he added.

    “He’s just been showing them to us, eh? German steel,” said Nelson with relish. “Go on, show her, Dwayne.”

    The chef unrolled the bundle he was holding. Cripes. Knives and a half, no wonder the two carvers were looking excited! As much as their peer group of two solid blokes in their late teens would allow them to, of course.

    “They’re beautiful, Dwayne,” said Ran, wondering if that was the right sort of thing to say.

    It must have been, because he cheered up terrifically and gave her a short dissertation on the proper care of knives, the two huge carvers nodding at intervals as he did so.

    “Like, if ya don’t take care of ya chisels, the work suffers,” explained Rewi.

    “Right,” agreed his brother. “Jim Wilson, he hammered that into our thick heads good an’ proper!”

    Jim Wilson was their tutor: it was a local scheme for promoting traditional Maori crafts and giving the local young people something to do, and since it entailed hauling huge logs around and laying into them with, in the first instance, the chain-saws that were a much more recent tradition, he’d had quite a lot of takers for it. Not all of them had stayed the course but the Rawiti brothers had got really keen. Perhaps fortunately, in Maori culture carving had always been regarded as a very macho thing to do, and two centuries of European occupation, for a wonder, hadn’t managed to persuade the indigenous population that, like almost everything else  associated with art, it was sissy or, in later years, on the gay side. Not that anyone who’d ever seen Rewi or Nelson laying into a huge radiata pine log with a giant chisel like the ones they were both clutching at this moment would ever have thought of the word “sissy”. Terrifyingly macho, was more like it.

    They were on deck because Sir Maurice had demanded an ethnic touch, though after Max had sent him some photos of the genuine Maori meeting-house in the Auckland Museum he’d conceded that they didn’t want that: it was magnificent, of course, but, well, frightening and eerie, he had to admit. But perhaps some, er, totem-poles? Peering from amongst the greenery, just here and there? Perhaps use them as posts for the jetty? The thing he thought was a totem pole was actually a pole for food storage, but no-one bothered to point this out. It was Pete who’d suggested the boys from the crafts centre: he knew Rewi’s and Nelson’s Uncle Mike quite well, in fact he sometimes went possum-shooting with him, not to mention on expeditions after other game. The carvers had eagerly offered to make canoes as well as carved poles, and though Pete had noted that any canoe they produced was almost bound to sink like a stone, he’d allowed that it wouldn’t look bad sitting on the shore being built. Once they were past the chain-saw stage.

    “So, um, what stage are you up to at the moment?” asked Ran.

    Rewi and Nelson slung their chisels back onto their carpenters’ belts and explained they were only just starting: they hadda haul the logs down here, first; and reminded her Max had said they could build a whare down near the lake.

    “Or a hut,” added Nelson fairly. “How’s he getting on, Ran?”

    Beaming, Ran replied: “Goodoh!” And updated them on Max’s Uncle Hugh’s about-face.

    “Good,” concluded Rewi.

    “Yeah,” agreed Nelson. “The kid’ll be much happier out here, dunno why anyone’d want to bring a kid up in England.”

    Ran could think of a few reasons, when the kid’s family had dough. Like, good schools, wonderful cultural facilities, opportunity for going over to the Continent and learning foreign languages from their native speakers, not to say visiting other cultures, but as in her heart of hearts she completely agreed with them, she just grinned and nodded.

    “They have got fabulous hotels and restaurants: really first-class cuisine, and some of their chefs are really leading-edge, y’know?” said Dwayne on a wistful note.

    “Like, ya could get good experience there, Dwayne, but ya wouldn’t wanna live there,” explained Nelson seriously.

    “No. Well, I got really fed up with Sydney, I have to admit. They kept saying I had an accent, y’know?” he reported aggrievedly.

    The two locals looked at him blankly.

    “Um, yeah. Well, I can’t hear it, but I got that when I was in London, yeah,” said Ran quickly. “At least Sydney would have been warm, though, Dwayne.”

    Immediately Dwayne launched into the full saga. As he was not only using “y’know” liberally, he was also ending most of his sentences with a question mark, Ran concluded he was feeling okay, and didn’t interrupt him.

    “Neh, I wouldn’t like to live there,” concluded Rewi. “Be all right for a visit. Mind you, the Gold Coast doesn’t sound too bad.”

    Before they could launch into that one, Ran said quickly: “I’ll check with Max about your whare. He’ll have to approve the design, but ole Sir Maurice is keen to see some Maori carving, so if ya wanna do one of those, um, central posts and carved bargeboards—sorry, dunno if that’s what you call them, but like bargeboards—it’ll probably be okay. But you definitely need some shelter and somewhere to store your stuff, yeah.”

    “Yeah. Uncle Mike, he was saying maybe get a shed from Mitre 10?” suggested Nelson.

    “You know, and stick some bargeboards on the front!” urged Rewi.

    Er—yeah, Ran had seen that effect. “The thing is, everything has to be recycled or renewable, and I think those Mitre 10 sheds are just ordinary colour-steel, aren’t they?’

    “Corrugated—yeah. Well, we can build from scratch, no problem, only who’s gonna pay for the materials?” asked Rewi.

    “Don’t worry, YDI’ll pay for everything. Just give me a list, okay? Um, Dwayne, I’ve found a lady that can supply goats’ cheese, so I thought ya might like to come over to see her, suss the quality out, okay? And the other suppliers while we’re at it. We can take my car, I don’t think the back roads are gonna do your Porsche’s suspension any good.”

    “No, and that reminds me! I was promised proper under-cover parking!”

    “Yeah. I’ll sort that out for you. And any other complaints, I think you’d better tell me.”

    “Well, the first complaint—though mind you, it’s hard to prioritise them, y’know?” he said nastily. “But in the first instance, I can’t even move in my own kitchen for huge builders!”

    “Stan,” explained Rewi. “See, they start around six, so they’re ready for a fry-up by ten.”

    “Yeah. Well, I did tell Simon they hadda have access to the kitchen, but that was before you came, Dwayne. It’s your kitchen: if you wanna chuck them out, do it.”

    “They gotta boil their jug, though!” objected Nelson in patent horror.

    “I cleaned that stove myself!” he said tearfully.

    “Oh help, didja? I was gonna get in professional cleaners next week,” said Ran limply. “Um, you might not like this idea, but what say you try out the stove and cook for them?”

    “Waste my cuisine on huge galumphing builders?” he gasped.

    “Well, nobody that can actually cook has tried that stove: God knows how it’ll perform.”

    “Rotten, prob’ly, if it come from ole Steve Garber, eh?” noted Rewi. He and his brother collapsed in horrible sniggers.

    “No, of course it didn’t, it’s a proper industrial stove. But as I say, no-one’s tried it.”

    Dwayne gave in and agreed, also agreeing to meet the suppliers, though he did note sourly, as Nelson pointed out they’d better have their lunch first, that lunch was impossible.

    The brothers exchanged glances. Then Nelson retreated into the bushes, to return with a large iron pan and a bundle. He unwrapped it, revealing a quantity of grass and—

    Dwayne gave a gasp. “Rainbow trout! Look at them! Huge!”

    “There’s plenny. What say you cook them, and we can share them?” said Rewi kindly.

    And with that the company adjourned to the ecolodge, where, since the lady was no longer bawling, she was allowed to join them. And with the aid of the Rawiti boys’ butter and white bread and a couple of bottles of white Ran grabbed from the cellar, an elegant lunch was produced. And since young Derek Hanson had just arrived, complete with his waiter’s white shirt, he was allowed to serve it ceremoniously in the dining-room—as well as join in the feast, of course. True, the plates consisted of Gillian’s own dinner plate and bread and butter plate, an enamel thing which belonged to the brothers, and some decorative pottery platters that Ran borrowed off the mantelpiece, and the glasses were a cheap half-dozen water tumblers Gillian had bought, but the food was truly superb. And the service, Derek: the job’s yours!

    Gillian did ask afterwards how old those boys all were and where that wonderful fish had come from, but considering how much better it all was than it had been, Ran just lied.

Next chapter:

https://theecolodgesbythelake-anovel.blogspot.com/2021/10/seans-saga.html