The Ill-Assorted Crew

4

The Ill-Assorted Crew

    They were an ill-assorted crew. True, Mark Dignam’s secretary had booked him in at the ecolodge, he hadn’t chosen the place himself, but still! After everything had gone pear-shaped he had considered cancelling the booking, but what the Hell. Othello’s occupation was well and truly gone, so he might as well be on the other side of the known universe as anywhere.

    And at the moment it certainly felt as if that was where he was. He had travelled Business Class to Auckland—well, Cynthia had made the booking, the thing was done, so why not? And God knew he had nothing else to chuck his lolly away on. Came of concentrating exclusively on your bloody so-called career for thirty years, didn’t it? He had once been married, true, but the posting to Ghana had finished that. Especially coming, as it had, after the posting to Canberra, Australia. Well—Gyppy tummy, or the Ghanaian variation thereof, on top of several years of solid boredom? What she had claimed was solid boredom, at any rate. Mark hadn’t minded Australia too much: Canberra itself was miles from anywhere and very boring, but the country was peaceful, and being almost wholly Anglo-Saxon, the multicultural stuff being largely lip service, required very little adjustment. And there was skiing, and if you wanted really good skiing you could always get over to New Zealand. Unfortunately Georgina didn’t care for skiing, only for après-ski lounges of the most luxurious sort, of which, unfortunately, Australia and New Zealand had less than a handful, all infested, her word, by raucous Australians, her expression. Also unfortunately most of the Australians they met, apart from the stuffed shirts from their diplomatic service, tended to address her as “Georgy”, her pet peeve. Well, one of her pet peeves. Put it like this: when it occurred, definitely her pet peeve.

    It was after the other persons bound for this New Zealand ecolodge had assembled that the phrase “ill-assorted crew” occurred. Forcibly.

    Mark had found the appointed spot and foregathered, as per the emailed instruction. All on his ownsome: nobody else was foregathering, as yet. The others in the group must have travelled Tourist Class. There was nobody there to meet them, but as he had encountered this sort of phenomenon before in the Antipodes, he wasn’t in the least surprised.

    The first couple to join him were a much-creased pair of tanned and khakied Germans in, at a guess, their early sixties—old enough to know better, at any rate. As their English was quite good, Mark didn’t bother to let on that his German was even better. They had heard of the ecolodge at Taupo through his brother-in-law, who worked for corporation X, whose CEO had had a delightful stay there with his wife, jolly laugh, and Willi had kept monitoring the Web—he would—and so they had booked to come on their next vacation! Highly idiomatic—yes. Mark swallowed a sigh, and smiled nicely. And how had Mark heard of the ecolodge, if Lotte might ask?

    “My secretary found it on the Web,” he said nicely.

    Indeed! And what did you do, Mark, if Willi might ask? –Jolly laugh.

    Mark was in his early fifties, so he was aware that saying it might strike as damned peculiar, but he said it anyway: “Nothing. I’m retired.”

    Willi opened his misguided mouth again but Lotte gave him a minatory look and quickly changed the subject. Ecolodges they had known and what would this one be like? It was better than being interrogated about his fiasco of a career, so Mark made the appropriate noises at the appropriate times, put the appropriate polite smile on his mug, and didn’t really listen. It wasn’t even an effort: he’d been doing it for so long in his professional life that it was second nature.

    The next arrival was a tall, scrawny, heavily tanned person of doubtful sex. Also khakied, so perhaps Mark had overlooked an email that ordered them to turn up safari-ready? No, on the whole he didn’t think so. Female. A Swede. Odd—didn’t Swedes abroad almost always travel in pairs? Christina. Okay, if she said so. Willi expressed great admiration of the giant, multi-pocketed haversack she was lugging and then they all three plunged into an animated discussion of hiking holidays they’d taken all over the entire wilderness of the known universe...

    Next to turn up was a young couple from Birmingham. Tony and Judy. Gosh, both tanned. He was in a new-looking tracksuit with the giant shiny sneakers to match and she was in a new-looking but very creased pair of tight jeans which must have been excruciatingly uncomfortable on the long flight, topped by, gee, a camouflage tee-shirt. What was in the tee-shirt was less than average, unfortunately. They’d found the ecolodge’s web page on the Internet, fancy that. And they were completely opposed to despoliation of the natural environment, explained Tony in lofty tones—yes, the badges on his tracksuit jacket alone would have indicated that—so they always looked for a place that was environmentally conscious for their holidays.

    “Not usually abroad, though,” put in Judy timidly at this point.

    And that was all she was allowed to get out for the next two millennia, as Tony bored on and on about the bonus he’d got last year—in this economic climate? Oh, don’t ask!—and the airline’s special offer for the short flight to London versus all the other forms of transport available to Homo technologicus, and the amazing coincidence of Judy’s old great-aunt leaving her a little nest-egg at just the right moment—of course most of it had gone towards the house, blah-blah-blah... And the environmentally conscious hiking holidays they’d taken all over Britain and one or two of the more environmentally conscious parts of Europe. Which of course was Christina’s, Willi’s and Lotte’s cue to top this with their much better environmentally conscious....

    “Hullo!” a flurried female voice broke into Lotte’s minutely detailed description of an ecolodge just outside Casablanca, designed to go not one up but several on Christina’s ecolodge in southern Spain. “Are you the group for the ecolodge at Taupo?”

    Anything would have been a welcome distraction, but actually she looked rather nice. “Yes,” said Mark, smiling kindly at her flushed and panting, plump person. “Do let me help you with those bags.”

    “Thanks!” she gasped, as he relieved her of a bag of duty-frees. “It’s heavy!” she warned.

    She was a plumpish five-foot-three or so with small, elegant hands and slender wrists, so to her it probably was. Mark was six-foot-two with wrists hardened by years of skiing and squash and, when forced to be more sedentary, a bit of gym work. “Not all that!” he said with a laugh.

    “Are you by any chance Merri Ferguson?” put in Christina severely at this point.

    “Yeah, hi; are you Christina?”

    “Yes. I have looked for you all over Heathrow Airport; why weren’t you at the designated meeting place?” she demanded in steely tones.

    “I’m awfully sorry, Christina! I got lost, Heathrow’s so bewildering, isn’t it?” gasped the flushed Merri, turning even pinker. She had, in sharp contrast to the assembled company of well-tanned travellers, though well-travelled tanners possibly put it better, one of those delicious pale skins with a touch of pink in it that one only seemed to find in England and Scotland. The sort of skin that did flush very easily. And an untidy mop of feathery black curls.

    “I did not find it bewildering and I am not English,” noted Christina grimly.

    “No, um—help, do I sound English? I’m actually an Aussie. Um, but I’m hopeless at airports and things. Big shops, too: Mum wanted me to buy her a souvenir at Harrods but I got hopelessly lost every time I went there.”

    “Never mind that. We were supposed to sit next one another on the plane. Instead I had next to me a fat man who was a smoker. It was disgusting.”

    “But—but you’re not allowed to smoke on the plane, these days,” faltered Merri.

    “He smelled of smoke, I was breathing passive smoke all the way!” she snapped.

    “Oh, heck, I’m sorry,” said Merri miserably.

    “I really don’t see that you can be blamed for the bewildering nature of Heathrow,” murmured Mark.

    “No, it’s awful, isn’t it?” put in Judy unexpectedly.

    That did it, and Willi and Lotte immediately plunged into an antiphonal dissertation on all the most bewildering airports in the known universe...

    When they’d run down, which wasn’t for some time, Mark said: “I think we must all be here now. I wonder if something’s gone wrong with the arrangements? Perhaps we should try to phone the ecolodge.”

    “No, we are not all here,” retorted Christina crossly, “for where is your partner?”

    “Er—I’m divorced,” he murmured.

    Unphased, she returned: “No, obviously you travelled unaccompanied. I meant your roommate.”

    “Flatmate?” ventured Merri helpfully.

    “No, I just said he was unaccompanied, Merri! The person who will share his room at the ecolodge!” she said impatiently.

    “Um, yes, they were all twin-share in the ad,” Merri recollected.

    Christ, were they? But surely Cynthia would never have made that sort of mistake? “I sort of thought my secretary booked me a suite,” said Mark meekly.

    “The ad said half a dozen double rooms, twin-share, not suites,” stated Tony definitely.

    Willi and Lotte were conferring in their own language, ascertaining that the ad had said half a dozen double rooms, twin-share, not suites. Willi then reported this in English.

    Christina’s eyes narrowed. “When did your secretary make this booking for you, Mark?”

    “Er... well, some time ago, I suppose. Ex-secretary, really,” he said feebly.

    “Then there will be one more person to come,” she stated definitely.

    Merri counted on her fingers, looking confused. “Um, you and me, Christina, that’s one, um, Mark makes two, three, four—there must be two other couples as well.”

    Christina looked down her nose. “It is true that the tour advertised six rooms. However, when I got the email advising me to meet up with the group here, I emailed the ecolodge and ascertained that the occupants of four rooms only would be on this flight.”

    “I see,” said Merri humbly. “But I thought I was the last through Customs.”

    There was a short silence and then the brilliant Christina spotted: “No! Not if you’re an Australian! That was a different gate!”

     “No, it— Oh. Yes, I had to queue under a different sign. Weird, because I've actually come all the way from England, though I s’pose technically the plane did come from Sydney, eh? They all seemed to have masses of food that had to go in the bin,” said Merri on a weak note. “And one poor lady had been to Africa: she had some lovely carved ornaments and they wouldn’t let her bring them in, they said they could be full of insects or insect eggs.”

    Immediately Christina, Willi, Lotte and Tony plunged into a dissertation on the correct safe way to bring native artefacts from anywhere in the known universe into anywhere in the known universe, provided always that they were environmentally conscious modern artefacts and not irreplaceable archaeological and/or anthropological examples of indigenous culture...

    “Six rooms,” said Merri to Mark in a low voice.

    “Mm,” he agreed, smiling at her. “Two more couples must have made other travel arrangements.”

    “Ye-es... Only I thought the airfares were included? I mean, it was all one price, wasn’t it?” she said in confusion.

    “I really don’t know.”

    “Um, but you must know what you paid for,” she ventured uncertainly.

    “Well, no, actually, because my secretary did it all for me.’

    “I see,” she said in a small, squashed voice, taking another look at his casual slacks and lightweight jacket and not appearing consoled by the sight.

    “Of course theoretically,” said Mark with a laugh in his voice, “she could have run mad on my credit card and I wouldn’t have known until it was too late, but actually, Cynthia’s the sort of person who wouldn’t lower herself.”

    This sally failed of its effect: “Mm,” she agreed, avoiding his eye.

    The resourceful Christina was just deciding they should phone the ecolodge, as something must have gone wrong with the arrangements, when a hot-looking pair of middle-aged women lugging gigantic haversacks turned up. Terrifically khakied, so perhaps Mark had overlooked that email ordering them to turn up safari-ready? Not that Merri was: she was in tracksuit pants, certainly, but they were candy pink and rather fuzzy, and the top garments consisted of a non-matching violet and black hooded and zippered sweatsuit top that she’d now removed in the sweltering heat of Auckland’s international airport, and a washed-out, tight pink tee-shirt with a pair of very nice tits stuffed into it. Almost worth the trip, really!

    Okay, the new arrivals were Canadians, off the flight from San Francisco, Carrie and Greta, introductions all round... It was the same tour. Special offer, flight and accommodation, all found—yes, double room, twin-share—and they’d decided it was more economical to go down from Vancouver and then... Laboriously Willi and Tony worked out that their tours must have been arranged by the travel agency for the same price! Helpfully Lotte added much corroborative detail relevant to links on various websites...

    “I say,” said Mark to Merri, prudently lowering his voice—though he probably didn’t need to bother, the decibel level was reaching a painful point without the help of any planes taking off—“did I miss an email that said to turn up in safari gear?”

    “No. Um, well, maybe I did, too!” she gulped.

    “Mm. Er, I had the impression, though I freely admit I may be wrong, that the ecolodge wasn’t so very far removed from civilisation?”

    The plump little Merri Ferguson gave him a very dry look. “Taupo’s about four hours’ drive from Auckland, does that fall within the definition?”

    Promptly Mark collapsed in hysterics. He laughed so much that he had to out with his pocket hanker and mop his eyes. “Sorry!” he gasped at last.

    “Don’t be,” replied Merri with a smile.

    Tony was just ascertaining that neither his nor Christina’s mobile phones were connecting with anything in the ether so they’d better ring the ecolodge from a public phone, and squashing his wife’s helpful reminder that BT phone cards wouldn’t work here, when another hot-looking pair of middle-aged women turned up. Phew! No haversacks, no khaki, no camouflage nothing!

    Under cover of the loud complaints about the New Zealand Customs inspection which followed the introductions—Patsy and Rhonda, off the flight from San Francisco—Mark said in a low voice to Merri: “No safari gear.”

    “No email, then,” she murmured.

    “Either that or we all missed it.”

    Gratifyingly, Merri choked and clapped her hand over her mouth.

    Christina was just ascertaining that no-one’s mobile phones were connecting with anything in the ether so they’d better ring the ecolodge from a public phone—though Greta was grimly assuring them that her cell was supposed to have international calling and Rhonda, very flustered, was admitting that she was almost sure that Stephen, her eldest son, had said hers had, too—when a tall silver-haired man in jeans lounged up to them and drawled: “Hullo. You the lot for Taupo?”

    “We certainly are, and allow me to say, you’re late!” snapped Christina.

    “Yeah, we’ve been waiting an age,” put in Willi, consulting the giant leather-encased chronometer on his huge hairy wrist.

    “Sorry, got held up: hadda nip up to the city first and there was a pile-up on the motorway: big lorry jack-knifed.”

    “He means a big truck jack-knifed on the freeway,” said Merri helpfully.

    “Something like that, yeah,” he agreed unemotionally, though eyeing her with what Mark fancied was definite approval in his eyes. “Everyone here, then? Lessee, one, two, three... Yeah, that’s it.’

    “No, Mark’s roommate isn’t here yet!” snapped Christina.

    “Lessee,” he said unemotionally. “Two pairs of ladies—both off the flight from America, right? –Right,” he said as both the khakied Canadians and the polyestered and floral-bloused Americans beamed and nodded and eagerly introduced themselves—okay, all four of them were hetero after all, so much for thinking in clichés.

    “I’m Bob—Bob Kenny. Good to meet you. Then, one German couple—”

    “Yes: that’s us, Willi and Lotte Schumacher,” explained Willi.

    “Right, like the racing-car driver, eh? Good to meet you,” replied Bob unemotionally. “And one British couple.” Admitting that was them, Tony Bingham introduced himself and Judy. “Hullo, Tony; hullo, Judy. That leaves two ladies that booked separately, and one single bloke,” finished Bob.

    Promptly Christina introduced herself and Merri. Merri appeared fully as pleased to meet the good-looking Bob as the middle-aged Canadian and American women had, so gee, she must be hetero, too!

    “That leaves me,” said Mark meekly, holding out his hand. “Mark Dignam.”

    “Right, gidday, Mark. That’s the lot, then!” he said cheerfully.

    “But where is Mark’s roommate?” cried Christina.

    “Don’t look at me, they told me one bloke on ’is tod,” returned Bob stolidly.

    Christina’s mouth firmed, not that it hadn’t been bloody firm to start with. “We were under the impression, and I think I speak for the rest of the group in this, that this tour offered double rooms only, twin-share.”

    “That’s certainly what the website said,” agreed Willi.

    “Exactly, we checked that out carefully: there’s plenty of unscrupulous travel agents that advertise special offers on double rooms and then you find it’s per person, not per room,” said Tony grimly.

    “Cripes, do they?” said Bob on a weak note. “Well, uh, how much did you pay? Once or twice what the ad said?"

    There was a short silence. Then Tony admitted: “The total price was all-inclusive. But the ad definitely said the rate was for a double room, twin-share.”

    The Germans conferred, ascertaining that the tour was all-inclusive from Heathrow, the rate was for a double room, and that Willi had checked it twice on their credit card statement and Lotte had independently checked it twice on their credit card statement.

    “They paid the same,” murmured Mark.

    “Sure, that’s what we paid!” beamed Patsy. “I’m sure it’s okay, we’ve used that agency before, haven’t we, Rhonda?”

    “So have we,” admitted Greta. “They booked us on a real nice walking holiday in New Zealand’s South Island last year, didn’t they, Carrie?”

    “There you are, then,” said Bob unemotionally.

    “How much did you pay, Merri?” demanded Christiana sharply.

    Merri jumped. “Me? Um, well, half, I suppose... Um, but it was in pounds, Christina.”

    “Yes! In pounds!”

    Glumly Merri told her.

    Christina’s scrawny form was observed to sag slightly. “Yes. That’s correct. I paid the same. However,” she said, drawing a deep breath and pulling herself together, “that is not the point. If Mark is on his own, occupying a double room, that is not fair. The charge is for a twin-share room for two people.”

    “Yes, they ought to pay you half back,” said Merri in tones of huge sympathy.

    “No!” cried everybody except Mark and Bob.

    “You got it wrong, honey,” said the cosy-looking Rhonda kindly to Merri.

    “He’s getting away with a double room at half what each couple’s paid!” explained Tony crossly.

    “Tony, we don’t know that,” put in his wife uneasily.

    “No, you don’t, do you?” said Mark cordially. "Well, I’m afraid I’ve no idea what my secretary paid. But if anyone wants to share with me, they’re welcome to.”

    There was a short silence, during which Bob Kenny might have been observed—not that anyone was observing him at the precise moment except Mark—to be trying not to laugh.

    “I still think you could owe them,” said Merri firmly to Mark. “Um, no, I mean they could owe you!” she gasped.

    “Yes; it’s about fifty-fifty, Merri, isn’t it?” he agreed cordially. “Perhaps we could all agree it’s stalemate, and go? That is, if the ecolodge is four hours’ drive away?” he said courteously to Bob.

    “Uh—yeah. Well, bit more, this time of day, maybe,” he admitted, looking at his watch. “Yeah, come on. –Lemme help you with them bags, Merri.’

    “Thanks, but I’m okay now, Mark’s got my duty-frees.”

    “Rats.” Effortlessly Bob picked up her two suitcases. His eyes ran thoughtfully over the trolleys the others were provided with, apart from the haversacked Christina. “Didn’t manage to a grab trolley, eh?” he said kindly.

    “Um, no!” Merri gasped, hurrying along at his side. “They just seemed to vanish. I’m hopeless at that sort of thing.”

    “Got a few manners, I think ya mean,” he replied unemotionally, slowing his pace. “Sorry, didn’t mean to make you pant.”

    Really? Possibly he hadn’t, no: he seemed like a really decent chap. Many fellows would have: she definitely joggled when she hurried! Mark strolled in their wake, his eyes twinkling.

    After a while he realised that the two polyestered American ladies had ranged alongside and one of them was offering a share of her “cart.”

    “Oh—thanks very much, Patsy, but these aren’t heavy at all.’

    Apparently encouraged by this piece of mild politeness, Patsy plunged into speech. There was lot of it, ending with the observation that Bob seemed a real nice man and gee, Noo Zealanders and Awssies just seemed to come like that, tall and handsome, didn’t he put you in mind of Never-Heard-of-Him at the Oscars? As he never watched this fatuous piece of Hollywood homage to itself, Mark had nothing to say to this except: “I’m sure you’re right.” So he said it.

    The Canadians had providently put their giant hiking packs in one trolley. They came up on Mark’s Americanless side and Greta said eagerly: “There! That’s just what I was saying to Carrie, he reminds me of that real nice man who worked at that ecolodge we stayed at in Australia!”

    Agreeing eagerly, Carrie plunged into an ecstatic description of that real nice ecolodge and its facilities, only to discover—to their joint delight, apparently—that  the Americans knew it! Yeah, sure, that was it, Blue Gums Ecolodge! Did it still have that darling Jack? So you met him! Oddly enough, in spite of the giant haversacks and the khaki the Canadians seemed just as keen to compare notes, not on the walking facilities or tourist spots available near this Australian ecolodge but on darling Jack, that lovely man from the B&B down the road, and the wonderful food... Gosh, homemade scones with real farmhouse cream? Why the Hell hadn’t bloody Cynthia booked him in there instead of at this Taupo place, which, Mark was now gloomily convinced by the preponderance of khaki not to say of the environmentally conscious in the immediate vicinity, was absolutely bound to be organic, environmental, uncomfortable and quite possibly—nay, very possibly—vegetarian. And, in short, ’orrid. Bother. In fact, pooh! In fact he blew a nonexistent fly off his nose on the strength of it.

    There had been an argument, somewhere in the middle of a lot of rolling green, rather shabby-looking farmland—Mark couldn’t have put his finger on why he felt it was shabby, but so it was—as to the exact times they had got in at Auckland, but time zones apart—Merri confirming faintly that yes, there was two hours’ difference between Sydney and Auckland but she couldn’t remember which way it went—those apart, and discounting the U.S.-Canada border dispute over the International Date Line, it was finally conceded that as according to Bob Kenny’s watch it was now lunchtime and as they were all hungry, yes, the hired minibus he was driving them in would stop for lunch, yes. Forever after Mark was to wonder if the fellow had done it on purpose. Because where they stopped, in a small city called Hamilton—or possibly near to it, Bob had said something arcane about “the bypass”, but in any case, it was all one-storeyed suburbia, reasonably leafy, reasonably pretty—where they stopped was not a fully organic restaurant, Christina’s, Willi’s, Lotte’s, Carrie’s, Greta’s and Tony’s (but not Judy’s) preferred option, or at least vegetarian, Christina’s other preferred option, and not a reasonable hotel, Willi’s and Lotte’s other preferred option, but an establishment called Lucille’s Coffee Bar. Lunches available until 2.00 p.m.

    “This is not a restaurant!” gasped Lotte.

    “Yes, it is, look: ‘Lunches available until 2.00 p.m.’,” read Merri helpfully.

    “It looks nice,” put in Judy hopefully. –Mark was beginning to feel, quite strongly, really, that she did not deserve to be tied to an up-himself prat like Tony Bingham.

    “It’s a coffee bar,” stated Christina grimly. “I dare say the coffee will be unspeakable.”

    “Yeah; I’d have tea, if I was you,” drawled Bob. –It was at this point that Mark began consciously to wonder if he’d chosen the dump a-purpose. Unless perhaps it was run by his sister or his cousin?

    “English tea is revolting!” she snarled.

    “Um, New Zealand,” said Merri faintly. “Um, it’ll probably only be a tea-bag, Christina, and you can leave it in as long as you like.”

    “I cannot stand stewed English tea!”

    “Take it out, then,” drawled Mark. “I think it looks perfectly acceptable. Come along, Merri.”

    He attempted to take her arm, but she stood stock-still and gasped: “But I haven’t got any New Zealand money!”

    Exclamations of dismay: nobody had any New Zealand money, though the Schumachers and Carrie McGregor were providently provided with travellers’ cheques in U.S. dollars. At this point in Earth history? Oh, well, nowt so quare as fowk.

    “Ya booked for the lot, it’s included,” said Bob with no evidence of emotion whatsoever on his lean, wide-jawed face.

    Actually they had booked in, or Mark had completely misread Cynthia’s crisp, cogent, and to-the-point instruction sheet, as from three o’clock this afternoon. All meals inclusive from then on, up to and including breakfast on what would be the eighth day. Merri had presumably also had this intel, because a bewildered expression came over her pink-cheeked face and she began to count on her fingers, as the rest of them, with loud expressions of relief, surged into Lucille’s. Non-organic, non-vegetarian and most definitely non-trendy though it was.

    “Never mind, Merri,” he said kindly. “I dare say the place can afford to pick up the tab for a dozen lunches—presumably at a discount, I’m sure they have an agreement with Lucille.”

    Merri bit her lip. “Mm.”

    And they went on into Lucille’s. Gee, counter service. Plastic hutches with curved lids. Grab your plate at the end of the queue and go for it.

    “I wouldn’t have the ham,” advised Bob laconically just as Mark was hesitating outside its plastic hutch. “Think they inject it with saline solution these days—anyway, it’s watery as Hell. Wait till ya get down to the ecolodge, it’ll be real ham off the bone.”

    “Thanks, Bob. Er—cold chicken?” He eyed it dubiously.

    “That’d be a safer bet. It won’t taste of anything much, mind you.”

    Mark hesitated, but as Bob took some himself, followed suit. Besides that, the man had lettuce and tomato salad and potato salad. He himself had chosen the bean salad rather than the potato salad. “Nothing wrong with the bean salad, is there?” he murmured.

    “Eh? Nah. Well, it’s that three-bean mix. Out of a tin. Might have a bit of Paul Newman’s waved at it, if yer lucky.”

    “Paul Newman’s?” said Mark very weakly indeed.

    Bob scratched his jaw with a slight sniff. “Salad dressing. Supposed to be slimming, if I’ve got it right. Comes in bottles. Mind you, dare say good ole Praise does something similar these days, eh?”

    Mark just nodded numbly.

    Bob Kenny eyed him sideways as he proceeded down the row of hutches. No prizes for guessing what sort of life that bloke had been living! Well, the accent alone would of done it, eh? And that fancy watch. Like, it wasn’t fancy, geddit? Plain as all get out. Gold. Flaming Willi Fat-Face had already admired it and his wife had gasped, serve ’er right, when ’e’d got the poor bloke to tell ’im its make. Wondering with a sort of sick feeling in his flat middle just what Polly would make of him—you could take that any way you fancied, too!—Bob went on down to the club sandwiches, the inevitable fancy filled rolls most of the coffee bars went in for these days, the cream horns, wouldn’t be a patch on Jan’s, he wouldn’t bother, ta, the carrot cake, ditto, and the pav. Well, ditto, yeah, but it didn’t look bad. Probably not homemade, these days, and there was a rumour that the bought ones were made of  horse serum, but... Nah. If Libby asked him what he’d had for lunch she’d look all worried because of the cream. She wouldn’t say anything, bless her, not that sort at all, but—yeah, he’d give it away.

    “What is it?” Mark was asking. “Some kind of millefeuilles?”

    How much? “Eh?” said Bob weakly.

    The bloke had made that nice-looking Merri go ahead of them—English good manners, presumably—which meant of course that she hadn’t been able to take her time: Bob was ruddy sure she didn’t really want most of what she’d put on her plate. “It’s called pavlova,” she explained. “Um, it is a meringue, but it’s a soft meringue mixture.”

    “Softish, if it’s a commercial one,” Bob amended before he could stop himself.

    “Yes, of course!” she agreed, smiling at him. See? Really nice little woman. Fingers crossed that she hadn’t fallen for the Mark bloke like what it looked bloody like she might’ve, because he’d take one look at Polly and that’d be all she wrote, Bob Kenny would bet his right arm.

    “I see,” the bloke was saying. “So, er, do you recommend the cream?”

    “Um, do you mean it might be off?” she replied, going very red. “Well, it isn’t nearly as hot here as it gets in Australia, but... Well, the thing is, Mark, it depends how long it’s been sitting there, really!” she added on a desperate note.

    “I’d leave it,” advised Bob briefly.

    Merri nodded gratefully, and the bloke left it. He then discovered there was some fruit salad, so the three of them chose that. Most of it was straight out of one of Mr Wattie’s giant commercial tins, Bob woulda known that mixture anywhere. Finely diced peaches, small amount of finely diced pear—gritty, right—small amount of finely diced indistinguishable, one theory was marrow, and one very artificial cherry per every pint of the stuff. But gee, Lucille had gone all out and added some tinned pineapple pieces off ’er own bat! Good for her!

    Funnily enough everybody else ended up with the fruit salad, too, even though, as Fat-Face Willi and Christina Sour-Puss pointed out in chorus, it was incredible to find tinned fruit at this time of year, when New Zealand’s fruit must be ripe! And if there were strawberries on the dessert with the cream, why were there none in the fruit salad? Bob didn’t say because this here was EnZed fruit salad, he’d leave that to dawn when they rejected lunch at the ecolodge in favour of a foray to Taupo...

    They drew in to Taupo Shores Ecolodge at around three—not bad going, really. They all got out—it was a race between the bloody Schumachers and Christina as to who’d be first off but the Swedish team won—and then most of them just stared at it.

    “This is it,” said Bob helpfully. “Taupo Shores Ecolodge.”

    Promptly a babble of voices broke out—the German team winning that one, by a mile.

    Mark’s shoulders shook slightly but he managed to say to Bob: “I think some of the group were expecting something quite different.”

    “That right? Whaddabout you?”

    “Ah... I did have the impression it would be more avant-garde, but that was a pure assumption when my secretary mentioned the word ‘ecolodge’, Bob.”

    “I had heard that it was architected-designed!” cried Christina, very loudly.

    Bob scratched his head. “Uh—no.” He looked limply at the view of, to your left, a pretty standard row of EnZed motel units, except that Pete had stuck a nice verandah all along ’em and creosoted the lot, barring the posts, sills, door jambs, etc, that were in a kind of fawnish paint what Jan reckoned looked environmentally friendly. And to your right, the big main lounge; it didn’t look exciting from this angle, it was creosoted, too, of course, but when you got inside it was super. High gabled ceiling, totally lined in nicked kauri by Pete’s loving hands: that golden glow, ya know? Ditto the floor. And the end wall, over to the far right, was all glass, with a lovely view of the lake, given that Pete had accidentally managed to flatten the stretch of native bush that there was probably a regulation about not flattening, these days. The main lounge was much higher but the whole ecolodge was one-storeyed, with corrugated iron roofs. Well, be that colour-steel stuff these days, same diff’. Painted an environmentally-friendly dull green that kind of merged into the surrounding bush. True, as Jan had acknowledged, paint was paint, it would be just as environmental if it was flaming-hot red, but your average ecolodger wasn’t capable of working that one out.

    The German babble was rising practically to screaming point.

    “What are they on about?” cried Bob.

    “Balconies,” replied Mark on a wry note.

    “Eh?”

    “BALCONIES!” he shouted.

    Gosh, suddenly there was a ringing silence on the heavy grey gravel of Taupo Shores Ecolodge’s main sweep.

    Mark cleared his throat. “Some of us had expected balconies, Bob.”

    “Yes!” cried Willi angrily, his English audibly deteriorating. “They vere on the website! This iss nothing like it!”

    “I also expected balconies, from what I saw on the Internet. In fact a room with a balcony: I was quite sure that the rooms in the main building had balconies providing one with a view of the lake,” stated Christina grimly.

    “Gee, no, honey,” said nice Patsy Weinberg. “You got it all wrong.”

    Her friend Rhonda Furbank nodded agreement. “We checked it out on the Net, too, and decided we better email them—just in case, y’know? Well, one year Susi and Hal Feinstein made a real mistake, booked in at what sounded like a real pleasant place, and all the activities were things like that awful bungee jumping!” She shuddered all over her plump frame.

    “Ugh!” agreed Merri sympathetically.

    “Yeah, you’d of had to be real athletic to do any of them. What was that thing Susi said they did with canoes, hon’?”

    Neither of them could remember exactly, but it had been real terrifying. Over the rapids, y’know? And the sort of canoe—yeah, maybe they had been kayaks, Greta—where you were kinda enclosed in the thing!

    “Be that ass it may,” said Willi loudly and crossly, “this iss not vhat we were led to eggspect!”

    By this time Bob was looking round frantically for Andrew to pour oil, but there was no sign of him. Blast! What had gone wrong? Usually he was right out here on the sweep, all smiles, helping them out of whatever-it-was. Well, they didn’t usually have a whole busload, this tour-group thing was a new venture, usually it was couples driving themselves, but yeah. Out here welcoming them.

    Tony Bingham was angrily consulting his mobile phone. Why? They already knew the ruddy things weren’t working, everybody had more than verified that on the way down. Or re-verified: at one point Merri had murmured that they’d already checked them. Aw—probably be one of them fancy new ones that could do everything but cook the dinner for you. But if it wasn’t connecting to anything it wasn’t connecting to anything, was it? Unless them fancy ones were different.

    Nah, couldn’t be, the bloke said angrily: “Still no signal! Okay, I’m sure I saved some—” More angry muttering and poking at the thing with his finger.

    “Um, should we knock?” said Merri timidly, looking doubtfully at the closed front door. Kauri, again. Actually an interior door that Pete had salvaged from an old house that, or such was his claim, was falling to bits and abandoned. Sanded down lovingly in the usual maniacal manner and with six coats of environmentally unfriendly polyurethane on ’er, she’d come up a treat.

    Bob came to with a jump. “Uh—nah, don’t need to do that. Come on, let’s get your bags, eh?” He started unloading them and the Mark bloke came to give him a hand, couldn’t be all bad, then.

    They all had their bags and Willi, though still very angry, and positive this wasn’t what they’d booked for, had officiously rung the front doorbell, and still nobody had appeared to welcome them. Bob by now was feeling rather sick: had Jan had another heart attack? Something happened to Pete?

    “It’s open,” he said heavily to the fat-faced German nit. “Turn the flaming knob.”

    Gee, he turned it and it opened.

    “It’s a lovely door,” said Merri shyly to Bob—as usual the rest had rushed forward leaving her behind. Plus and Mark, looking down his nose at the lot of them.

    “Yes, isn’t it? Kauri, of course.” He wouldn’t have bothered with most, but as she was so nice he added: “Agathis australis, native to New Zealand. Think it might grow in a few places in Australia, too.”

    “Yes, I think it does grow naturally in some places. I’ve seen one in the Adelaide Botanic Gardens. But I’ve never seen the wood before. It’s beautiful.”

    “Uh-huh. Bit more of it inside,” acknowledged Bob. The scrum had cleared so he stood aside to let her in.

    “Ooh, gosh!” gasped Merri, gaping upwards.

    “Yep!” said Bob with satisfaction, the more so as none of the rest of the buggers were so much as— No, actually: Mark was also standing stock still, gazing up at Pete’s miraculous golden kauri ceiling.

    “Its lovely, isn’t it?” said a familiar contralto from somewhere to Bob’s rear.

    He jumped. “Aw—there you are, Polly. Where is everyone? What’s up?”

    “Nothing much, Bob, don’t worry. –Hullo!” she boomed.

    Funnily enough there was dead silence and the wankers all swung round.

    Smiling that lovely smile of hers that by now Bob Kenny was well aware hid a Helluva lot, she said: “Welcome to Taupo Shores Ecolodge. I’m so sorry the manager couldn’t be here to greet you; there’s been a slight emergency with the boat.”

    “Shit! Is Libby all right?” cried Bob.

    “Yes, ssh. I said, there’s nothing to worry about. The silly thing’s motor broke down in the middle of the lake, that’s all. –If you’d all like to sit down—this is the main lounge—I’ll see about checking you in, and Bob can get you something to drink.”

    “Um, righto, Polly,” Bob agreed numbly. “Um, well, it’s afternoon teatime, really.”

    “Yes, but Jayne’s down by the lake.”

    “Uh-huh. Janet?”

    “No, she’s down there in a flap, Bob.”

    “Right, goddit. So where’s Jan?”

    “Over at Wal and Livia’s place, trying for the Nth time to show Livia how to make jam. She bought two buckets of strawberries from the permaculture place, God knows why.”

    “Making it for ’er,” he deduced wryly. “Righto, drinks on the house, then?”

    “Yes. I’ll just check the computer to see what rooms have been allocated.”

    Bob cringed. “Can you?” he croaked.

    “Of course.” She walked over to the bar, so he shambled in her wake. “If I can just have your attention, please.”—They were all angrily muttering again and Tony Pommy-Wanker was looking at his phone again, or maybe still.—“Until you’re checked in you’re very welcome to use the restaurant’s toilets. Through this doorway, then down the little passage to your right.” Lovely smile and then she burst into yer Hunnish lingo. Presumably saying the same thing. Finishing up with another lovely smile.

    Bob just tottered weakly behind the bar as she vanished out the passage door.

    The did all need to go, of course—be all that bottled water the most of them had drunk, not only at the coffee bar at lunchtime, by no means. He’d hadda make three stops between Hamilton and here, no kidding, for them to buy the stuff! Well, and several stops to go to the bogs, QED, but yeah, three. Hadn’t all bought it at the same time, was one. Drunk it all and needed more, was two. Oh, forget it! He watched sourly as the American dames beat bloody Christina and Lotte in the Bog Stakes by a short nose.

    “Come on, Merri, what’ll it be?” he said as she came up looking hesitant.

    “Um, I think I’d better go to the loo first, thanks, Bob!” she gasped.

    “Yeah, ’course. But I can get it for ya now, eh?” She was looking at a loss, so he suggested what he’d give Libby or Jayne. “Nice shandy?”

    Mark watched with a smile in his eyes as she accepted this offer gratefully. Sweet, wasn’t she? Not, however, in the same class as the glorious vision in very tight, if very old, jeans and a very tight, if very old, yellow tee-shirt tucked into ’em, more precisely stretched over ’em and tucked into ’em, that had just swayed out on a pair of high-heeled gold sandals. And what the Hell Lady Carrano was doing, checking in this ill-assorted crew to this improbable ecolodge in the middle of nowhere—!

    When Polly came in again with a print-out from Andrew’s computer and the six room keys, there was only the pretty plump dark-haired woman and the tall Englishman who’d been admiring the ceiling left. “Where are they all, Bob?”

    “Queuing for the bogs, whaddelse?”

    The Englishman came over to them—she couldn’t for the life of her remember his name, but he’d been at the High Commission in Canberra, that was right. “One presumes there are only two, one male and one female?”

    “Yes. –It’s a curious usage, isn’t it? A toilet is a thing, it can’t be either male or female,” replied Polly detachedly.

    “Ah... une toilette?” he drawled, raising his eyebrows.

    She shrugged. “Les copains disaient toujours ‘une vessie’, mais sans doute vous avez raison.”

    “I was thinking that,” put in Merri, going very pink. “That’s very interesting, isn’t it? Vessie was the word for bladder, originally, but they’ve assimilated ‘W.C.’ to it—at least that’s my conclusion!” she gasped, pinker than ever. “Your French is very good,” she added shyly.

    Okay, Polly told herself, she should have known from the way she’d been admiring the ceiling! One could still be verging on middle-aged, plump, pink-cheeked and very ordinary-looking—in fact, apart from the hair, not all that different from Mum at that age!—and still be really bright. Served her right for thinking in clichés. “Thanks. I did my doctorate in France, yonks back. They all beat you in the rush for the bogs, did they?” she said sympathetically.

    “Too right!” put in Bob crossly.

    Yes, well, if Bob Kenny liked her, that showed you, didn’t it? Mind you, not actually liking them hadn’t stopped him in the past from doing the wrong ones, but we’d all been there in our time, hadn’t we? Well, most of us. You had to be a really nice person to earn Bob’s approval.

    “Yes, well, let me check you in and then you can use your ensuite.” Polly had now remembered the bloke’s name, and though she was positive the wife had been someone else entirely back then, well, there’d been a fair amount of water under the bridge since, hadn’t there? But she didn’t say, “Mr and Mrs Dignam, is it?” For one thing this nice little woman would be hideously embarrassed if they were together but she wasn’t. He wouldn’t, though, that stuck out a mile. And for another thing, if the bloke had followed the usual path of ruddy Pommy diplomats, wouldn’t he now be a flaming Sir? To get that nowadays, if you weren’t an elderly pop star that had outlived your generation, or very rich, like Jake, you had to be a top diplomat, or an ageing actor that had outlived your generation, no pun intended, and made a huge success in a Yank SF series, then returning to further glory in really serious plays by W. Spokeshave and his mates at the R.S.C., or contrariwise made a huge success as the creepiest sicko ever to hit the silver screen in a blockbuster Hollywood epic, then returning to ditto, plus and a stint as Zorro’s grandfather, or failing that made a huge success as a dotty old wizard in some misguided kiddies’ epic filmed in the middle of the muddy EnZed bush that had unexpectedly turned into a blockbuster and netted its makers multi-megabucks. Some of those. And thank God Jake had refused to put any money into the said frightful epic!

    The nice little woman was shyly revealing her name as Merri Ferguson; she was booked in, she added quickly, to a twin-share with Christina Nordquist.

    “Nordquist? Sounds Swedish,” said Polly thoughtfully.

    After a blank moment Merri got it and collapsed in giggles, nodding madly. “Yes!” she gasped. “Like Borg!”

    Polly grinned. “You got it!” It was plain that Bob had, too: he was trying not to laugh. Whether Poker-Face Pom had was anyone’s guess, however. She got Merri checked into Room 3 and then turned to deal with him. Room 1. There was no special privilege attached to this, except that it was handiest to the guests’ lounge, but on the other hand it was opposite the office and nearest to the front door, so it was noisier than some.

    “Do forgive me,” he said languidly as she checked him off on the list, “I’m sure you must hear this all the time, but haven’t we met?”

    Right. Sod that. “Yes, I do, actually,” said Polly coolly. She could feel poor Bob wincing behind the bar, but too bad. She waited, but Mark Dignam—he still hadn’t said whether it was Mr or Sir—only dredged up a pale smile in reply. Hah, hah.

    “Okay; now, do you understand about your room fridge?” she said briskly. –She had just explained it carefully to nice Merri.

    “Well, I did gather it all goes on my bill, but I thought I’d already paid?”

    What? The wanker! That plaintive tone was completely put on! Very, very luckily she didn’t have to say anything because another Pommy wanker—different accent, different age, and clearly different social milieu, but the same in essence—came in right at this minute and said officiously: “No, no, Mark. What you paid was the inclusive costs of travel from Heathrow or San Francisco, plus meals and accommodation here. Anything you consume from your room fridge or order at the bar here, you pay for separately. Plus any phone calls on their phone, naturally.”

    “Yes, that’s right. Or if you have a guest to dinner here,” said Polly in a meek voice.

    Younger Pommy Wanker didn't spot her: he smirked. “Quite right! –Polly, is it? Yes, that’s quite right, Polly. I gather that tour groups are a new venture for your employers?”

    In the background, Bob gulped.

    “Yes,” Polly agreed mildly. “Now, I’ll just finish getting this gentleman checked in. Let me see...”

    “Mark Dignam. Room 1,” prompted Number One Pommy Wanker, smooth as silk, would you believe? Be the diplomatic training. No point whatsoever in trying to counter that.

    “Yes, of course, Mark,” she agreed, awarding him a blinding smile of the don’t-see-you variety—as Jake’s wife she’d had plenty of practice at that sort of thing over the last twenty-odd years. After starting off swearing she wouldn’t do that to people, too! Well, you had to grow some sort of protective shell, or they ate you up. “Here’s your key.”

    “Thank you,” the bloke said, mercifully slinging his hook.

    “My wife’s still queuing for the toilets,” Younger Pommy Wanker then informed her in an annoyed voice. “You’d better check these ladies in next, I think.” He retired into his mobile phone looking huffy, as two plump, cosy-looking older women in polyester trouser suits and floral blouses came in, smiling expectantly.

    Patsy Weinberg and Rhonda Furbank. Okay, make that polyester pant suits and floral blouses. “You’ve got Room 6,” she said, with a real smile—why not? They seemed perfectly okay, the complete norm for Taupo Shores Ecolodge: that was, you’d go stark, raving mad if you had to live with them for more than ten minutes, but pleasant, kindly, well-mannered and well-meaning. Don’t discuss politics, religion or race and that impression’d remain with you, in short. “It’s the one at the far end of the passage. It’s the quietest room.” –This was true, so long as none of the other guests had brought their cars, because the way to the carpark was round that corner of the building, and there had been instances in the past of loud complaints about loud car engines at dawn, as very keen ecolodgers took off to tramp over National Park. –Driving there in the gas-guzzler, natch, before setting off in the expensive safari boots.

    Mrs Weinberg and Mrs Furbank had several questions—if you wouldn’t mind telling us, honey?—largely about when breakfast would be served and did the rooms have ice-boxes, and they’d heard that the ecolodge specialised in real Devonshire teas just like you got in England, was that right? During this the solid, safari-suited middle-aged German couple came in and glared round generally and a tall, scrawny, very tanned safari-suited person of doubtful sex came in and also glared.

    The two ladies had just taken their keys and were thanking her nicely, when Younger Pommy Wanker brandished his mobile phone and shouted: “I knew it! The ecolodge’s website was deliberately misleading!”

    Immediately a loud German babble broke out and they and their safari-suited mate rushed to peer over his shoulder.

    The scrawny tanned one shouted something in what was probably a female voice—sounded Swedish. Polly tried not to actually laugh, Jayne and Andrew wouldn’t like it. Then the Germans began shouting in their own language about balconies.

    “Hey,” said Bob’s voice cautiously to her rear.

    Polly turned and leaned on the bar, smiling at him. “Mm?”

    “They’re cracked,” he muttered. “I picked them up at the airport, they were expecting me.”

    “Mm-hm. And their names are right there in Andrew’s computer,” she agreed, holding up her sheet of print-out.

    “Balconies, again?” drawled a very superior Pommy voice from the passage doorway, and Number One Pommy Wanker strolled in. Aw, gee, he wasn’t in that hugely expensive light-weight tweed jacket any more, and could this be because, although the temperature was only around 24 Celsius, the humidity, as was not unusual in New Zealand’s North Island at this time of year, was up around 80 percent?

    “I told you I checked it on the Net!” shouted the younger Englishman. Um... Birmingham? Sounded a bit like Julie Walters—if you could imagine her being really nasty.

    Bob scratched his head. “Dunno that he did tell us that, actually. Think it might of been Christina.”

    “I also checked it on the Net!” shouted the tall Swede. Okay, female, Polly recognised. Well, fifty-fifty, eh?

    “The ecolodge was advertised as having balconies!” shouted the solid safari-ready German woman. “Palconies,” really, but being very angry in a foreign language, Polly had long since discovered, could take you two ways. Either you completely forgot your inhibitions and nerves, and used the language perfectly, like you never could, cold, or you went off the rails and lost your carefully acquired speech patterns and reverted to the way you’d spoken it when you started learning it.

    “Ja, ve research the Taupo ecolodge fery carefully, und it vas advertised vith PALCONIES!” shouted the safari-ready spouse. “Und this proves it!”

    A sort of ’orrible, sneaking suspicion was beginning to overcome Polly. She looked uneasily at Bob. He was gulping. Help!

    “Now you come to mention it,” drawled superior, could-be-Sir-or-not Mark Dignam, “I think my secretary did mention balconies when she made the booki—”

    “They’ll of been looking at Fern Gully!” gulped Bob.

    Polly swallowed desperately. “Yes.” She cleared her throat. “Yes. EXCUSE ME!” she boomed. Not surprisingly, they shut up. It was a good boom, that: she’d only had to use it a few times in her professional life, when faced with particularly cretinous First-Year Linguistics classes, in the stream that had chosen Linguistics as preferable to Anglo-Saxon, that you had had to take at that particular institution of higher learning if you intended majoring in English. A year of English had been mandatory for a B.A. Either First-Year Linguistics or Anglo-Saxon had been mandatory if you were taking—yeah. Though neither of them was listed as mandatory for a B.A. A lecture theatre full of six hundred dim, jabbering faces that were never gonna get more than a C in any subject. This lot—nice Merri apart—were clearly almost half as bright.

    “There are two ecolodges by the lake on this side,” she said, “and I think you must have been looking at the other one. Fern Gully Ecolodge. It does have balconies. It charges two thousand dollars per night.”

    Gee, you could have heard a pin drop on Pete’s perfect golden kauri floor!

    Finally the Swedish woman rallied slightly. “Is that per room or per head?”

    From the doorway a North American accent said: “Gee, Christina, does it matter? Two thousand! At the current rate of exchange? The New Zealand dollar’s just about at parity!”

    Okay, Canadian: that had definitely been “aboot”—it was the Scottish heritage, undoubtedly.

    The Germans had once again burst into speech in their own language. He was an idiot, and what was his boss going to think, was the gist of it. Though her not being blameless was definitely in there, too. Also, no wonder they’d been able to afford the place! Uh—and something about his brother-in-law’s CEO as well? Okay, if you were that sort of social climber doubtless your brother-in-law’s CEO’s opinion did count. But using ecolodges to keep up with the Joneses? ...Forget it, forget it, forget it! Humanity was mad, was all you could say.

    “I dunno what that’s about, but I can guess,” muttered Bob at this point.

    “Keeping up with the Joneses, mainly, I think, Bob,” said Polly weakly.

    Christina was now explaining the whole thing very bitterly in words of one syllable to the two Canadian women and they were waxing sympathetic, though at the same time making the point that that was a different ecolodge, and they had checked this one’s website. Ouch!

    Polly did manage to get them all checked in without laughing, but it was a close-run thing.

    So did that leave her and lovely Bob to have their laugh out in private? No, it bloody well didn’t, because up-himself Mark Dignam was right there!

    “Come into the office a mo’, Bob,” she croaked.

    “Could I possibly have a whisky first, Bob?” the wanker immediately said.

    “There’s no single malt, Andrew’s put the kybosh on that,” said Polly to the ambient air two feet from Bob’s head.

    “Shuddup,” the poor man muttered, swallowing hard. “Uh—well, Teacher’s?” he croaked, reaching for it.

    “Certainly. No ice, if you wouldn’t mind: just a little water.”

    “We’ll leave you to it, then, Mr Dignam,” said Polly nicely as he took his glass. There was a bottle of Black Label on the shelf right in front of him, and he hadn’t so much as blinked! True, it was possibly not in Bob’s line of sight. She went over to the passage door and paused. “Or is it Sir Mark?” she asked blandly.

    “Oh, please just call me Mark.” Smooth as silk! Um... though you couldn’t blame him for not wanting the handle to be bandied about for the delectation of this lot! Well, nice Merri would probably be embarrassed and feel shy, it was odds-on she’d never met a bloody Sir before—and good on her, why should she have? The Aussies had abolished flaming titles years back! The American ladies would probably be terribly impressed and fawn on him. Um, actually the Canadians as well, never mind the safari gear bit. Younger Pommy Wanker and that nice little squashed wife of his would doubtless be impressed, and she’d be shy like Merri, and he’d loathe the bugger for it as well as fawning on him. Which left the three Europeans, eh? Odds-on the Germans’ reactions ’ud be the same as Tony Whatsisface’s. Left Christina. Stolidly unimpressed overtly and terrifically impressed underneath would be Polly’s bet, and what was more, the wanker would know it!

    Um, no, you couldn’t really blame him: she wasn’t mentioning her surname for exactly the same reasons. On the other hand... She looked at that bland face. “Yeah, Mark, sure,” she said indifferently. “Come on, Bob.”

    “Yeah,” he agreed thankfully, following her out.

    “Shut the blimmin’ door,” said Polly as they reached the sanctuary of the office.

    Bob shut it and leaned against it, looking at her weakly. “Thought it was Fern Gully,” he croaked.

    “Balconies!” she gulped, nodding.

    Bob gave way entirely and collapsed in roars of laughter. Promptly Polly gave a shriek, and joined in.

    They had closed the door to the passage after them but nevertheless Mark Dignam was in no doubt as to what he was hearing. He wandered down to the wall of glass at the far end of the big lounge and looked at the view of the huge lake. Mm, well, that more or less answered the question of whether the super-tactful Cynthia had known just how he’d blotted his copybook and what his political masters were about to do about it, didn’t it?

Next chapter:

https://anothercountry-apuririchronicle.blogspot.com/2023/08/happy-new-year.html