Where Memories Are Made (39 page)

Jackie shook her head. ‘I've got it written down in the office but I've not had any cause to telephone her there for the last few months so I don't remember it off-hand. Oh, but isn't she coming over anyway, to collect the accounts to take with her to her business meeting? That's why you were behind closed doors this morning giving them a check over to make sure everything was present and correct.'

‘Oh, yes, of course.' Harold looked at his watch. ‘She'll be on her way now. Her meeting is at eleven in Lincoln, I understand. Oh, dear, I don't know whether this means she will have to postpone it. The inspectors won't let her take the books anywhere until they've given us the all clear. I'd best go and wait outside for her to arrive, and tell her what is going on.'

He made to get up but was stopped by the sight of Drina herself hurrying across the lounge towards them, looking very smart in a blue woollen two-piece and matching coat, low-heeled black court shoes on her feet and a matching handbag over her arm. She was looking extremely puzzled. Harold shot out of his chair and went to greet her.

‘What is going on, Mr Rose? I've just tried to get into reception and it's locked. Why is that, and what are you all doing in here?'

As he explained, her face fell. ‘Major fraud! What on earth makes the tax inspectors suspect us of that?'

Harold gulped. The accounts were purely his domain so to him this situation was his worst nightmare. It was resurrecting old insecurities he had worked hard to conquer. ‘I've … I've no idea, Mrs Jolly. Someone has obviously given them a tip off that they have taken seriously enough to do an audit.' He began to wring his hands nervously. ‘But, Mrs Jolly, please let me assure you …'

Drina cut in with conviction, ‘You have no need to assure me of anything, Mr Rose. I know they won't find a penny out of place. Someone is obviously playing a mean-minded joke on us. What they hope to gain by this I can't work out, except for wasting all our time.' She then fumed, ‘Oh, damn and blast. I shall have no choice but to postpone my meeting as without the accounts there's no point in having it.'

A thought struck Harold then. ‘Mrs Jolly, it couldn't be that someone doesn't want your plans to go ahead, could it?'

She thought about this for a moment before she responded, ‘No one else is privy to my plans except Rhonnie, Artie and my bank manager. The other parties involved wouldn't want to stop this going ahead as they would stand to lose valuable commission.' She noticed Harold was still looking bothered about something. ‘What's on your mind?'

‘Oh! It's just that I found it odd the inspectors didn't want me near at hand to answer any queries that might arise, that's all.'

‘Mmm, yes, I would have expected that too.'

‘And I'm surprised they didn't ask me to dig out the Fiscal Reports for last year before they sent us off. I would have thought they'd need those to aid their investigation and I keep a set locked in the safe.'

Before Drina could make any comment she heard her name being called and turned around to see Rhonnie heading over to them pushing a pram. On joining Drina and Harold, she said with a bemused frown on her face, ‘I thought you would have collected the books by now and be on your way to your meeting in Lincoln. What's going on? After you left this morning, I was going to take Danny for a walk down the lane but then I thought why not come over here, pop in to see Jackie and accompany her on her walk around the camp today? The door to reception is locked though so I couldn't get in and it was the driver of your taxi who told me the same thing had happened to you and he'd seen you heading off into here.'

She looked extremely concerned when Drina enlightened her. ‘It's got to be some disgruntled camper behind this whose holiday didn't match up to expectations and they've stirred up the Revenue to get their own back. They won't find anything.'

This explanation seemed to hold weight with Drina. ‘Yes, of course, it's got to be.'

Harold sighed in relief.

Drina said, ‘Well, all we can do is wait until the inspectors have finished their audit and are on their way. I'll just go and make a call to cancel my appointment, then I'd better wait here with you all just in case the Revenue have any questions for me as the owner.' She asked Harold, ‘Would you be kind enough to go and tell the driver I won't be needing him today after all?'

Rhonnie suggested Jackie order tea and coffee for them all. Drina returned, having made her telephone call, and sat down next to Rhonnie.

Harold returned looking very preoccupied. Drina asked why.

‘Oh, it's maybe nothing, Mrs Jolly, but I was just heading back here after giving the taxi driver your message when I saw a Rolls-Royce coming through the gates. It drove down to reception and then a chauffeur got out to open the passenger door.'

Frowning quizzically, Drina asked, ‘Did you see who got out?'

Harold shook his head. ‘No, a crowd of campers were walking past on their way into the Paradise and blocked my view.'

Sitting next to Drina, rocking her sleeping son in her arms, Rhonnie piped up, ‘Who would be visiting Jolly's in a chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royce?'

Jackie, who was sitting next to her, had a think and said to Drina, ‘Mr Butlin has a Rolls-Royce, doesn't he? Maybe he's heard you're back and has brought Mrs Butlin over to congratulate you on the arrival of Danny. He's very thoughtful like that, isn't he?'

Drina smiled. ‘Yes, he is. I'm sorry to have missed him. They will have gone off by now, finding reception locked … can't imagine what he'll be thinking about that … but I'll telephone Billy later and ask them both over for dinner the next time they're up visiting their camp in Skegness.'

Ginger, who had already had one reprimand that morning so really didn't want to risk getting another so soon, had until then managed to keep quiet. By now mortally fed up with sitting around doing nothing, however, she didn't realise she was speaking her thoughts aloud.

‘Them inspectors are taking their time, aren't they? How long does it take to look through a set of accounts anyway? I know they've locked us out but I've a good mind to climb up the fire escape and let myself in through the door on the second floor, ask them how much longer they're going to be.'

Harold shot her a stony glance. ‘You'll do no such thing! I know from working for the tax office before I came to Jolly's that we could be in serious trouble for interrupting an audit by Her Majesty's Government Inspectors, for any reason. Now sit there and keep quiet until we're given the all clear to get back to work.'

Shamefaced, Ginger sat back in her chair, folded her arms and pressed her lips tightly together.

Drina hid a smile. Ginger had only voiced what she would like to do herself.

For the next hour the gathering kept themselves entertained by talking amongst themselves. Except for Olive and Harold. She took a set of knitting needles and some vivid lime green wool out of her capacious handbag and used the time to add some more rows to what could have been a scarf … a sleeve … it was hard to tell. Harold sat quietly with his own thoughts. He knew the tax inspectors wouldn't find anything suspicious in his meticulously kept books, but that didn't stop anxiety from gnawing away in the pit of his stomach.

It was approaching twelve o'clock and the inspectors had been carrying out their audit for almost two hours when a barman came hurrying over to speak to Drina. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Jolly, but we've just had a telephone call. You've all been asked to go up to the office.'

She smiled at him. ‘Thank you, Robin.' As he returned to the bar, looking relieved, she said to Harold, ‘This must mean the inspectors have done enough of an audit to satisfy themselves that any information they've received is a hoax and this has all been an utter waste of everyone's time. Hopefully it's not too late for me still to have my meeting today.' She clapped her hands to gain everyone's attention and announced, ‘You'll all be pleased to hear we can return to work.'

Rhonnie said to Jackie, ‘Danny is due a feed so I'll come back to the office, give him his bottle and change his nappy, if that's all right?'

Jackie looked aghast that Rhonnie was asking her permission. ‘Yes of course it is. And you'll still come with me on the walk around afterwards?'

‘I'd love to.' Then it became apparent that Rhonnie's terrible bereavement and new motherhood had not diminished her abilities to sense when something was up with the young girl she had befriended and helped to transform into a sophisticated young woman. ‘I've a feeling you've had some suffering of your own to deal with while I've been away. When we're walking about, if you want to talk about it and I can help you in any way, then please feel free.'

Jackie smiled at her by way of acceptance.

As they all trooped out no one noticed Olive was still sitting knitting, oblivious to what was going on around her.

T
hey found the door into reception had been unlocked already in readiness for their arrival and several bewildered campers were already standing at the counter wondering where the staff were. Ginger and the other receptionists immediately went to deal with them, while Drina, Harold, Rhonnie and her son, and Jackie all went upstairs.

Drina entered the general office first, expecting the two inspectors to be waiting for them, and was surprised to find just one man perched on the edge of Jackie's desk. He was tall and slim, dressed in a smart grey striped suit, expensive shoes on his feet. His dark hair was fashionably long, touching the collar of a white shirt. A heavy beard obscured the lower half of his face, and his eyes were hidden behind black-framed spectacles.

Standing beside Drina, Harold looked at him quizzically. This wasn't one of the inspectors he had encountered before. Jackie too was eyeing the man with bemusement.

Unaware of this, Drina held out her hand to him, announcing, ‘I'm Mrs Jolly, the owner of the camp.'

Expecting him to respond politely, she was stunned when he didn't attempt to take her hand but instead replied in a sardonic tone. ‘I know very well who you are. We need no introduction.' He then took off his glasses and the eyes staring fixedly at her held malicious amusement.

She stared at the man for a moment. She was sure she had never met him before … but somehow he was familiar to her. Then it hit her and she issued a shocked, ‘Michael!'

At this announcement, Jackie clamped a hand to her mouth, Harold's eyes filled with alarm, and Rhonnie, who was holding her son in her arms while concentrating on getting ready what she needed to feed and change him, stopped what she was doing and walked across to join the others. The four of them were well aware that Michael's unannounced visit was not a social one.

He smirked nastily at Drina. ‘So you do recognise your son after all, Mother? I don't know why you're looking so shocked to see me. After all, I did warn you the last time I saw you that I would some day get what was due me. I was in a position to bring my plan to its conclusion a while ago, but what fun would that have been in your absence? No, I wanted to see your faces … especially yours,
Mother
… when you discovered what I've done. You might even, for once, be proud of me.'

Rhonnie demanded, ‘And just what have you done, Michael?'

He turned his attention to her, shooting her the same nasty smirk as he had his mother. ‘Oh, the Merry Widow. I can't offer you my condolences for your loss because my father's bastard son meant nothing to me.'

Jackie then spoke up. ‘Those men weren't tax inspectors, were they?'

He settled his malicious eyes on her then. ‘Oh, the little girl speaks.' He then shot a derogatory glance at Harold, standing mutely by the side of her. ‘Cat still got your tongue, I see. Still jump a mile if anyone sneaks up on you? Oh, how many laughs I had doing that to you when I had the misfortune to work under Mr Green in the accounts office and you were just his clerk, you pathetic creature.'

Harold desperately wanted to show this odious man that he was no longer the same timid individual that Michael had relentlessly teased at every opportunity, before he'd fleeced his parents out of a considerable amount of money one too many times and they had seen no other option but to banish him. But then Harold thought it might be better to let him carry on talking, believing Harold to be that same timid man. That way it might be possible to take Michael off his guard and render him incapable while they fetched the police to deal with him. Whatever he had done, Harold had no doubt it would be illegal, knowing Michael's past criminal activities.

Having returned his attention to Jackie, Michael said to her, ‘To answer your question, no, those men weren't tax inspectors. They did a damned good job of making out they were, though, enough to fool you all.'

‘Michael, what have you done?' Drina demanded.

He appeared to ignore her as he jumped up off the desk and went to lock the door, using Jackie's spare set of keys from the bottom drawer of her desk. The door safely locked, he then returned to perch on the edge of the desk and informed them, ‘Just a precaution, in case any of you try something stupid like slipping out to fetch the police.' He then fixed his eyes back on Drina.

‘So, Mother, you asked what I'd done. I'll give you a clue. A certain Mr Hewitt might not be very happy if you continue introducing yourself as the owner of this place. You might have heard of him? He owns several successful camps down on the south coast and now believes he's just expanded his empire by buying this one too. He's on his way back down south as we speak, planning to celebrate his new acquisition with his family, though I know very shortly he's going to be drowning his sorrows. Stupid man.'

Drina gasped in horror. ‘Are you telling me you've sold this place to Mr Hewitt? But how could you have? It's not yours to sell.'