Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
A Bird in the Hand
It was clear that a decision on hens had been taken with me
in absentia
, and that any opinions
I might have on the subject, like whether I felt we had enough livestock to be getting on with,
were now an irrelevance. The most I could hope for was to put it off for a while, call for the
family equivalent of a 'public inquiry' and just delay things until spring at least. The early year
weather was atrocious and, I argued, we should wait until we were outdoors more so that we
could make the hens feel at home. It would also give us more time to research exactly what
looking after hens entailed.
Subterfuge and chicanery are the only ways to operate sometimes. My family did it with me
to get what they wanted and Natalie and I were doing it with Monsieur Butard in order to
chivvy him along with a building quote.
'What sort of thing are you looking for?' he asked over the phone, already weighing up wheth-
er it was worth coming out to give us a quote or not, or whether to just amble by over the next
few weeks, if he had the time.
'Total renovation of the
dépendances
,' Natalie said, 'to create a classroom, an office, a kitchen
area and four or five en-suite bedrooms.'
'I'll be there after lunch,' Butard said, excitedly.
In truth, we did want a quote for all of that, but we knew that for now it was beyond our
means and that a classroom/office would be the first stage. Butard arrived shortly after lunch,
wheezing heavily, not because he'd rushed round but because since we'd seen him last he had
ballooned in size. He was still the only serious builder in town but the suspicion was that he
may have spent the last three or four years literally devouring the opposition.
He tapped walls, needlessly measured windows that would have to come out, shook his head,
sucked his teeth and all the while took extensive notes on the 'project'. It would be two phases,
we said, first the classroom/office and then once that was done we could set a timetable for the
rest of the work. Butard looked at us both over his glasses; he wasn't fooled at all but there was
the prospect that further on down the line he may hit the jackpot with us so he was happy to
play along. He would have a quote for us in a week, he said, which meant three if we chased
him up, and that his 'Phase one could start just after Easter and would be finished by June' -
also optimistic. It was his turn to play games and we all knew that while June was technically
possible, it was also unlikely in the extreme.
