Chapter Eleven - Klempner
1149 Words
Chapter Eleven - Klempner
What to do today?
Aimless, I amble through the house, seeking inspiration.
I find the female half of the family in the dining room. Mitch, Beth and Jenny. Cara and Adam sit on the carpet amid a scatter of discarded A4 sheets, each clutching a crayon the size of a banana, gurgling delightedly as they commit hell in red and green.
Vicky’s carrycot lies by Mitch’s feet at one end of the long table, but Vicky herself is with Jenny, sucking contentedly from a bottle. My older and younger daughters make unlikely siblings, but both seem happy with the arrangement.
Mitch, choosing a pastel from the rainbow in the tin by her side, is working on sketches for something or other. Dolphins and sea horses in improbable colours battle for space with smiling octopuses and what I’d judge to be a blue whale were it not pink.
“Since when did octopuses smile?”
She glances up. “It’s a few ideas for Michael. He’s thinking of getting the crèche pool tiled to be more child friendly. It’s plain white and blue right now and it looks a bit sanitised.”
“Oh.” I look over her sketches. “Are sea horses really purple and green?”
“It’s for a children’s pool.”
“Can I help?”
She sets down her pastels. Irritation crackles through her voice. “I don’t know, Larry. Can you help?”
Hmmm…
Beth sits at the other end of the table, tapping into a calculator. Clicking her tongue at the result, she jots down a note. A ledger lies open to her left, a sheet of paper to her right. Columns of figures, written in a careful hand, are annotated with scribbled comments on sticky yellow notes. She taps in again and adds another note then, clucking, red pens out an entire column of figures, dropping the paper to the carpet.
My granddaughter chortles in delight, grabbing the sheet in pudgy fingers. Wielding her crayon like a cook stirring soup, she completes the work Beth started with her red pen, babbling some comment in Baby-Speak to Adam. He stabs down with a crayon at his current work of art and babbles agreement back.
“What’s that you’re doing, Beth?” Jenny, milk bottle in hand, gazes over the table at the mess of documentation spread over the dining room table.
Beth pencils another note, adds it to one of the sheets, then jots something on what looks like a summary page, so far listing several dozen other similar jottings. “I’m going over the stocktake figures for the hotel.” Her pencil hovers over the last note and she adds some further annotation. “I’m not happy about some of the supplies.”
“Which supplies?”
“The hand washes, the shampoos and the grooming products. Some go into the rooms for the guests. Others supply the spa section. But it seems to me we’re going through too much. And with what they cost I want to know why. Michael pays for designer brands, and they don’t come cheap.”
Jenny’s forehead wrinkles. “Why on earth are you bothering with that?”
Beth gives her a cool look. “I’m a shareholder. I’ve an interest. And besides, I don’t like the idea that someone might be ripping us off.”
Michael, soundless, has materialised behind me. “You think someone has their hand in the till, Beth?”
“For now, let’s just say I’m looking into the possibility.”
Propping himself over her, knuckles resting on the tabletop, “Where’s the problem?”
Beth taps a file with a painted fingernail. “The inputs are fine. I have all the invoices and delivery notes along with the stocktake figures from stores and housekeeping. I’m tying that in with what is likely to be used by guests in the hotel or the spa facilities…”
“But?”
“But I’m having to make assumptions about how much disappears due to guests who simply rifle the lot. You know, the ones who pocket the mini-shampoos and soaps as freebies. I can’t believe it’s all of them, but that’s what the numbers suggest.”
Michael straightens up, rubs the back of his neck. “You worked as a hotel maid for a while, didn’t you? You’d have an idea from that surely, of what’s typical.”
Beth smiles. “That was only for a few days. I encountered Richard and that was the end of my Maiding Career.”
Jenny pipes up. “It was maybe a third of the guests when I was doing the job.”
All heads swing her way. “Sorry?” says Michael. “When was this?”
“I worked as a hotel cleaner for a while…” Jenny sets the bottle to one side and tucks the now unconscious Vicky into her cot. “… About one in three of the rooms would have all those little shampoos and soaps and stuff stripped out when I went to clean.”
“Ah…” Beth nods, crosses out a figure at the head of a page, replaces it, tots down the column, tapping with her pencil tip, muttering under her breath as she goes, replaces the figure at the bottom and draws a double line under the result. “If we assume that’s typical, we definitely have a discrepancy. Michael, want a look at what I have?”
“Sure.” Michael pulls up a chair.
Jenny watches the pair and shudders. “Sounds boring as hell,” she mutters.
“Maybe that’s why your cousin is a competent businesswoman…” I say… “… and you’re not.”
She scowls. “You think I’m not competent?”
“I think you’re not a businesswoman.”
Michael’s head pops up. “Nearly forgot what I came over for. Charlotte, can you take over the self-defence classes this morning? The ten and eleven o’clock sessions in the gym. Chad’s away for a few days.”
“Sure.” She glances at the clock. “I’ll get changed and head across now. Beth, you’ll be okay with Cara?”
“No problem.” Beth regards the mayhem in wax crayon being committed on her discarded paperwork. “So long as I can keep them off the wallpaper.”
Haswell appears at the door, suited, booted and briefcased. “Elizabeth, I’m going now… No…” He sets a hand on Michael’s shoulder as he starts to rise… “… don’t disturb yourself. I can see you’re busy.” He stoops, kisses Beth on the mouth. “I’ll see you this evening, my Love.”
“Is James going with you?”
“No, he’s working here today. If you’re looking for him, you’ll find him in the kitchen.”
He turns, makes for the door but Jenny touches him on the arm. “Richard, your tie’s crooked. Here…” She reaches up, nudges it to one side, then tuts, unravelling it, adjusting his collar. Haswell looks down at her, mouth twitching at the corners as she reties the knot. She stands back, examines the result. “That’s better.”
He kisses her on the cheek. “Thank you, Charlotte.” He exits and is gone.
“I’d better go too.” Jenny follows him out.
Mitch is lost in her sketching. Beth and Michael, heads close, don’t even seem to realise I’m there.
Something’s coming from the kitchen area. I amble through.
James is there, along with…
What’s her name…?
Sally…
… Michael’s chef. She’s tasting something from a tureen. “More garlic maybe?”
“Don’t you think that might be too much for the non-Spanish palate?”
“Maybe.”
They don’t notice me.
I suppose I could walk the dog…
*****
- Writer
