Chapter 2
Chapter Two
THE DUCK DID NOT APPROVE . . .
‘Give over, Drake!’ Hattie snapped as she rolled a dusty suitcase from the shed beside her office and, pulling it behind her, made her way along the path to the kitchen. The duck waddled beside Hattie in a flurry of feathers, quacking his outrage as he pecked at the suitcase.
‘Watch my legs!’ Hattie cried out as Drake’s sharp beak narrowly missed nipping her soft pink thigh peeping out of her fluffy dressing gown. When she paused to open the kitchen door, Drake flapped his wings and stood on the case, looking up to eyeball his boss.
‘You can’t come with me.’ Hattie sighed as she shooed him off. ‘Egypt is no place for a duck, especially one as daft as you.’
Drake staged an exaggerated flop.
‘Drama queen,’ Hattie muttered and pulled her case free. The duck retaliated by following Hattie into the kitchen and launching into a loud, indignant quack. She tried to step around him, but Drake shuffled forward, spreading his wings and puffing out his chest.
Hattie was on the point of walloping the duck, but Alf appeared in the doorway. Raising his eyebrows, he grinned as he watched the performance. ‘I was about to ask for a bacon buttie and a mug of tea, but I can see that you’re occupied,’ he said.
‘Can you please remove this blasted duck?’ Hattie theatrically danced around Drake, avoiding his beak as she grabbed the kettle, sloshed it to check for water and clattered it onto the Aga.
‘He wants to come with you.’ Alf chuckled and pulled out a chair. He patted Drake’s soft, silky head and sat down.
‘Ha, ha, hilarious, Alf. A duck at thirty thousand feet stowed away in my hand luggage.’
‘You took him last time you went away,’ Alf pointed out as he reached for the biscuit tin and began to tuck in.
‘And look what a rumpus that caused.’ Hattie shook her head. She rubbed her behind on the warm door of the Aga, enjoying the comforting heat. ‘I thought Jo was never going to speak to me again when I arrived at her hotel and Drake leapt out of the back seat of my car.’
‘She’s plenty of room to accommodate him with all those fancy gardens.’
‘I agree. But try explaining that to the bride whose wedding video featured my duck waddling all over the cascading tail of her dress and honking like a foghorn in a shipping lane. That was before he ate all the confetti and regurgitated it on a flower girl.’
Hattie buried her face in her hands as the memory returned, while Drake gave a self-satisfied quack.
‘Ah, nothing to worry about; they soon got over it,’ Alf said as he pushed a whole Hobnob into his mouth.
‘Only when I coughed up for a case of champagne.’ Hattie glared at Drake. The kettle whistled, and reaching for two mugs, she began to brew up.
As she fussed about, Alf picked up a folder that lay on the kitchen table. He noted a sticker that read, SS Nefertari – Hattie’s River Nile Itinerary. Alf studied the cover, then flicked it open to glance through the pages.
‘Is this the holiday then?’ he asked as Hattie’s neatly typed itinerary fell out.
Hattie turned and, seeing Alf’s grubby fingers rifling through her holiday plans, she reached out and snatched the folder away. ‘Yes, it is,’ she said, tucking it into her suitcase.
‘A river cruise, eh?’ He grinned. ‘You don’t even like a boating lake, never mind a boat on the Nile. Last time you went on a pedalo in the park, you toppled in, and they had to call a lifeguard.’
Hattie was about to remind Alf that a Nile cruise was his suggestion in the first place, and that she loved cruises and had travelled on several ships with Hugo.
But they had been ocean-going palaces with spas, grand dining rooms, endless decks and stabilisers the size of houses.
Riverboats, she thought, were a different breed entirely.
Small and shallow, they might be at the mercy of every current and sandbank.
Still, she determined, if Agatha Christie could sail down the Nile, so could Hattie Mulberry.
Ignoring his remarks, Hattie handed Alf his tea and noticed that the kitchen door had edged open and Ness was making her way in. Seeing Alf with a biscuit, the old dog began to thump her tail.
‘Give over with those biscuits, will you,’ Hattie said, snapping the lid. ‘You spoil these two. It’s a wonder that I can afford a holiday with my biscuit budget bigger than the national debt.’
As she turned her back to reach for her own tea, Alf reopened the tin and tossed a custard cream to Ness, whose tail swept the floor like a broom as she crunched contentedly and eyed the Garibaldi in Alf’s hand.
‘It will have cost a pretty penny,’ Alf mused. ‘Have you booked a fancy room?’
‘They’re called cabins and, in truth, I have opted for something special, a French balcony room with a view, all to myself.’
‘Very nice.’ Alf nodded. ‘I’ve heard the only view you’ll get when the boat is parked up is the view of another boat.
It’ll be like sitting in traffic.’ He bit into the Garibaldi then broke the remainder into pieces and handed them to Ness and Drake.
‘They say the drains smell too. Eau de ancient Egypt,’ he added.
Hattie arched one eyebrow, and with her lips flattening into a thin line, she stared at Alf.
‘You should write holiday blogs,’ she said, ‘for people who hate travelling.’ Plonking down opposite him, she began to sip her tea.
‘And as you often talk about going abroad, but have never holidayed further than Blackpool, I hardly think you’re qualified to comment. ’
Closing her eyes, Hattie ignored Alf and let her mind wander.
She smiled softly as she imagined graceful feluccas sailing past riverbanks where temples of delicately carved columns rose into the desert sky.
She envisioned her riverboat cruising past bustling villages as history whispered secrets of mysteries and hidden tombs. ‘Ah,’ she sighed contentedly.
It was as though she were Agatha Christie herself!
‘Didn’t the pharaohs dump their kings inside mountains and embalm them as mummies?’ Alf asked, waking Hattie from her daydream.
‘For heaven’s sake, Alf, kings were buried in personalised tombs, and what do you know about mummies? Other than wrapping yourself in loo roll at the village pub’s fancy dress, last New Year . . .’
‘We learned about them in school – Tuten what’s his name and all that . . .’ Alf waved his hand vaguely. ‘Wasn’t he the pharaoh with the pointy hat? The one that they shoved in a box with all his stuff?’
Hattie sighed. ‘You should be a tour guide. Your knowledge is about as deep as a puddle in the Sahara.’
But as Hattie dunked a custard cream in her tea, she knew that her own knowledge of Egyptian history and the River Nile wasn’t much better than Alf’s. She’d have to get clued up and invest in a couple of travel guides before she set off on her trip.
‘I expect you’ll want a lift to the airport?’ Alf interrupted Hattie’s thoughts.
‘No thanks, I’ll get a taxi. It’s an early flight, so I’m booked into a hotel the night before.’
Hattie had no intention of starting her holiday with a white-knuckle ride in Alf’s old Land Rover, where the smell of diesel and damp shaggy sheep was enough to question whether she’d survive the first mile.
Pushing back her chair, Hattie finished her tea, then gathered her gown, tying it tightly around her tummy. ‘I’m busy and need to get on with my day and I would have thought that you’d got lots to do too.’
‘But what about my bacon buttie?’
Hattie shot him an incredulous look over her shoulder.
‘You’ve enough carbs from all the biscuits you’ve gobbled down to keep you working till sundown. You’ll live. Now crack on,’ she ordered, ‘and take those two daft animals with you.’
Hattie’s busy day involved sitting in her office, still in her nightwear, studying videos of Nile river cruises on YouTube.
Wishing to glean as much useful information as she could to prepare for her trip, she scrolled through glossy films from tour companies, highlighting the wonders of life on the Nile.
Amateur videos showed wobbly footage of multiple temples and sumptuous onboard buffets, but travellers detailed the perils of Egyptian travel too and she scribbled furiously on a notepad as she read of upset tummies and bug bites.
Her shopping list lengthened as she added hand sanitiser, antibacterial wipes, pocket loo roll, sun cream, rehydration salts, anti-diarrhoeal meds, antihistamines, insect repellent and after-bite cream.
‘By heck, I’ll be like a mobile pharmacy on a field mission,’ Hattie muttered as she stared at the list, ‘and I haven’t even thought of my outfits.’
Sitting back and staring out at the garden, Hattie wondered what Agatha Christie wore when she accompanied her second husband, Sir Max Mallowan, a distinguished archaeologist, on digs in Egypt.
Sir Max, Hattie read, dressed in English formality with pale suits, laced shoes, and a wide-brimmed felt hat.
In contrast, Agatha preferred casual attire in cool coats and skirts, and, a creature of habit, she always wore her pearls.
Lightweight and comfortable in heat, the jewellery had no fussy clips or chains.
‘Well, I shan’t be digging anything up,’ Hattie decided and, closing her eyes, visualised herself more in the role of a glamorous film star sweeping down the gangplank of a Nile steamer.
She ought to wear an appropriate hat, a row of pearls like Agatha, and something long and floaty that covered all her bumps.
Her cruise wardrobe consisted of a variety of colourful kaftans, and loose trousers and tops which, Hattie thought, would work well.
With dark glasses and a cloud of perfume for effect, Hattie’s first stop would be the observation deck, where she’d sip a delicious cocktail.
A knock on the window brought Hattie back to reality.
Alf stood on the path with a package in his hand. ‘Postman’s been!’ he called out, reaching into a box to pull out a canvas hat.
Thrusting the window open, Hattie almost did herself a mischief as she grabbed the hat from Alf’s hand. ‘Give me that!’ she yelled.
Alf began to chuckle and dodged away. He placed the hat on his head and grinned. ‘You’ll look like Indiana Jones.’ He laughed. ‘What’s with the headgear?’
Hattie scowled at him. Her dream of looking more like Lauren Bacall than a twitcher on a bird-watching expedition was in tatters. ‘It’s a Tilley hat,’ she said, ‘and this wonderfully designed headgear is recommended for keeping the sun and rain out.’
Alf removed the hat and handed it to Hattie. ‘Let’s see it then,’ he said.
Placing the hat on her head, Hattie tweaked the wide brim, then straightened the flat crown and adjusted the chin strap. Her fingers fiddled about until she found the hidden pocket. ‘It’s got air vents to keep you cool and it will float on water.’
‘That’ll be handy when you fall overboard.’ Alf nodded. ‘You look like a geography teacher with a bucket on your head.’
‘Oh, be off with you,’ Hattie snapped. ‘It’s a wonderful hat, and you shouldn’t go poking about in someone else’s mail.’
‘The packaging was damaged.’
‘Aye, a likely tale,’ Hattie muttered, shutting the window.
But as she turned back to her laptop, Hattie caught her reflection in a mirror on the opposite wall. ‘Oh rats!’ she mumbled.
Alf had been right. Hattie looked like Nile-bound Indiana Jones with a hint of Crocodile Dundee.
If only Tilley hats came embellished with sequins!