Page 47 of Sisters Making Mischief
At last we caught both of them and Isabel washed their paws and fur under a hosepipe while I hung onto their collars. The water was cold, and I don’t think either dog appreciated our efforts. It was a process, which meant that, of course, there was a lot of vigorous shaking from them both, and all four of us were soaked.
Pierre and Sylveste meanwhile shouted a lot of abuse at the dogs and each other. Luckily, it was all in rapid fire French and I couldn’t follow what they were saying. We dragged the dogs off, roughly towelled them dry and shut them up in the house while the young men set to work, trying to smooth out the surface again.
‘It’s going to be underneath a shepherd’s hut, no one will see if it isn’t perfect,’ Isabel said encouragingly.
‘You won’t be saying that when it starts to crack,’ Sylveste grumbled.
‘I’m sure it will be fine,’ I said, still trying not to laugh.
Behind him the cat slunk back into the barn, its belly low against the ground.
‘And I bet it’s going to rain later,’ Pierre added gloomily, ‘c’est un désastre– a disaster.’
‘It will be fine, I have absolute faith in you,’ Isabel replied, wringing water out of the sleeves of her coat.
Pierre and Sylveste glowered at each other and carried on smoothing out the paw marks.
‘Let’s go and get changed, and then you know what I always say; if in doubt, make food. I’ll sort out some sandwiches for them, that always cheers them up,’ she said.
The following day, Pierre and Sylveste, having called in to inspect their work, pronounced themselves reasonably satisfied, removed the tarpaulin and drove away, still not really speaking to each other.
We spent the morning sorting out more of Isabel’s junk finds and then I took out my laptop. The broadband was surprisingly good in some rooms of the house, particularly the sitting room, which was a long, low-beamed room with an enormous inglenook fireplace at one end.
Isabel finished clearing up the lunch and came to see what I was doing.
‘Just doing some research on a couple of things that we found this morning in thebrocante,’ I said.
She pulled a face. ‘You’re wasting your time. And I can assure you if you did find a lost Leonardo da Vinci, we don’t have many art collectors dropping in on the off chance.’
‘Still, it’s worth checking,’ I said.
‘At least thegîtesare finished. We should go and get them ready after lunch; the first visitors arrive in a week according to Felix’s new spreadsheet. You were so clever making him do that. Want to help?’
‘Of course,’ I said.
We found umbrellas and coats and went out to see what state they were in.
I was pleasantly surprised. They looked pretty much as I remembered, two tiny farm workers cottages that had been renovated some years ago when Isabel decided she wanted to make some money from the holiday makers. The paint had been freshened up and there were new blue and white curtains at the windows. It just needed a bit of dressing up to make them look appealing.
Isabel made up the beds with crisply ironed bed linen and I hoovered and dusted. The kitchens were fairly well stocked withenough basic crockery and cutlery for two people in each, but it all looked as though it had come from the nearest supermarket.
‘Why don’t we put some of your finds in here instead?’ I said. ‘You have all that rather nice china, all the floral plates and cups. We would only have to find a few matching ones. It would look more rustic and appealing. And then I can put in some of the ornaments you couldn’t sell last year. A vase or two, with some flowers. And I saw some lovely brass candlesticks in a box in the attic, which I could polish up and put on that sideboard. And I noticed two rather nice lampshades decorated with shells. They’ve obviously never been used. I could replace those boring ones on the bedside lamps if you like?’
‘Okay,’ Isabel said, ‘but that would mean I can’t sell them.’
‘You can tell your guests that all the decorative things are for sale if they like them. And then we could replace them with new things for the next people. That way you would have twice the chance of selling things.’
Isabel agreed this was a good idea and we set to.
By the time Felix returned at about six o’clock, we had just about finished our work, and Isabel was delighted with what we had achieved and dragged him out to have a look.
‘Very good,’ he agreed, ‘but I liked it the way it was before as well.C’est chic, very fancy.Ça a l’air– seems very girly.’
‘I don’t suppose men would even notice,’ I said, ‘but your female visitors will. And I think they will like it.’
‘I notice lots of things,’ Felix protested, ‘particularly how beautiful my wife is, and also how hungry I am.’
‘You have no soul,’ Isabel grinned.
