Jinnie lifted Millie so she could press Izzy’s ring doorbell. Izzy answered the bell and said, “Hello, please come up, the flat door is open.” The door lock buzzed, and the door popped open. The twins said, “Come on,” and raced up the stairs. Jinnie said, “After you,” and followed Paolo, who was carrying a magnum of Veuve Clicquot Vintage Champagne, while she had a gift box of six crystal champagne flutes. Reaching the flat door, the twins had disappeared.
Entering the flat, the first people Jinnie saw were her parents chatting to George, who said, “The twins went into the kitchen with Izzy to get a drink. The bar is on the breakfast bar; please help yourselves.” Jinnie and Paolo passed the twins, who were heading back into the living room with what looked like glasses of cola. Izzy was putting a 2-litre bottle back in the fridge, and on seeing Jinnie, said, “It’s OK, it’s sugar-free.” Paolo handed over the champagne, saying, “I don’t think this is, but it is chilled.” Izzy said, “Thank you so much, but you really shouldn’t have, not after what you must have spent on this wonderful flat. Now I don’t know what we are going to drink it out of, I haven’t got any flutes.” Jinnie handed over her housewarming present and said, “You have now.”
Izzy asked Paolo to pour six glasses for the six adults who were there, and Paolo carried them through on a small silver tray that Izzy said had been a housewarming present from Mr and Mrs Walsh. Everyone took a glass and clinked them, saying “Cheers.” Just then, a buzzer sounded, and Izzy went over to the wall where a small screen showed the picture from the doorbell. Izzy spoke into an inbuilt microphone, saying, “Good evening, Sir Nigel, please come up,” pressed a button labelled ‘open’, before heading to the flat door, where Sir Nigel appeared with a bottle of champagne and some champagne flutes.
The next arrivals were two girls who Jinnie did know, but Izzy introduced as friends from her French evening class. On hearing this, the twins started talking to them in French, and before long, the twins realised they knew more French than the guests, and to their mother’s amusement, switched to speaking Italian, totally confusing the two girls. Eventually, they went off to talk to Granny and Grandad about how Izzy’s old room was going to be a new spare room and how Millie was going to have a new bathroom, so their shared one could be Millie’s. Then, when Auntie Penny and Uncle Dan arrived, they went to tell them the same thing.
The twins’ final target for the evening was George, who held his own by pulling their leg so much that they didn’t know if he was telling the truth or not. They asked him what he did with his gun at night, and he told them he slept with it in his bed. They asked where it was now, and he said that was a state secret and, if he told them, he would have to arrest them in case they told Miss Evans or one of their classmates. When Millie asked if he was going to marry Izzy, he asked them how she knew they weren’t already married. When Millie said that Izzy would have told them, he said, “Were they sure about that?”
George was eventually rescued by Jinnie and Paolo saying, “Good night,” and taking them home to bed. As the twins kissed everyone “Good night,” Millie said to Izzy, “You aren’t married to George, are you?” Izzy replied, “What do you think?”
***
On Saturday morning, Izzy was busy in the kitchen preparing the twins’ breakfast when Jinnie arrived. While the twins sat at the table attacking bowls of Rice Krispies, Jinnie crept up behind them and kissed them on the top of their heads. Accepting a mug of coffee, Jinnie said to Izzy, “Thanks for the invite last night, it was fun, and George held his own with the twins.” Izzy smiled and whispered, “He rather likes them, but he does like to tease them.” Jinnie chuckled and said, “I noticed. But he is really nice; you’ve got a good catch there.” Izzy blushed.
As they chatted over coffee and toast, Jinnie’s mobile pinged with an incoming message. Jinnie read the message, it was from Belinda and said, “Big news on SuperBurger, ring me when you can and I’ll tell you.” Jinnie said to Izzy, “I’m going to pop to the office and make a call, I won’t be long.” Turning to the twins, she asked, “Who wants to go swimming in a bit?” and got a chorus of “Me!” in reply.
Jinnie unlocked the garden office and found that, as usual, she had been beaten by Larry, who was sitting in his cat basket watching her. Jinnie smiled and stroked him before sitting down at her desk and putting her mobile in its cradle. Nigel had installed a new bit of software on her PC that made it work as if it were in the car. Jinnie said, “FaceTime Belinda Mobile,” and the phone called Belinda on FaceTime, with Jinnie’s PC displaying her phone’s screen and a camera on the PC sending the picture instead of her phone’s camera. Belinda’s face appeared on the screen, and she said, “Hi Jinnie, this is new. I don’t think you have FaceTimed me before. Are you in your office?” “Yes,” replied Jinnie, “I thought it might be better if I was alone.” As she said that, Larry meowed loudly, and Jinnie added, “Well, not quite alone, Larry is here.”
Belinda said, “Good morning, Larry,” before continuing, “I got a call from SuperBurger late on Thursday afternoon. They asked me to come to a meeting on Friday morning. I already had a morning meeting and an early afternoon meeting. I had planned to go home early and make dinner for Brian and myself. But knowing what we had discussed and just how much it was worth, I told Clive I could be there about 16:00. He said OK and could I bring the design team and someone from finance? So, Andrew, Willow, and Brian joined me, and we had a pre-meeting at Manor Royal at about 15:00. I briefed them on what I guessed they wanted to talk about. So, we went in prepared: Andrew to talk about a dedicated design team, Willow to talk about styling, and Brian about money. I had been thinking about things and decided that we should also try to tie them down to getting any new build orders and a rolling programme of redecorating, so as never to let the branches get into such a goddam awful state again.”
“Well, to cut a very long story short,” continued Belinda, “it was about 21:30 when we shook hands on a deal. We have agreed to set up the dedicated team in our spare office space and refurbish an average of 2 branches a day, 7 days a week. We will get a Letter of Intent for all remaining 920 branches for £23,000,000. That LoI will allow us to place subcontracts and be reimbursed for any costs we can’t mitigate if they were to cancel. The idea is the lawyers will now sort out a proper contract. They will release batches of around 30 branches to us every two weeks – that’s 31 packages. We have four weeks to set up the office, hire people, get the software in, get the subcontractors sorted, and start the contract off. But I am intent on getting things moving earlier if possible.”
Belinda added, “We also shook hands on a separate contract to refurbish the Chairman’s office, the Secretary’s office, the boardroom, and its ante-room. It is all going to be about as hi-tech as possible. I need to talk to group IT on this, but on the current spec, it comes to about £450,000 and will be handled by the dedicated team. We have agreed to quote for a complete upgrade to reception, including a new security system – again, I need to talk to Jed. They were a bit iffy when I started talking about an exclusive agreement to design and fit out new branches. Clive said they hadn’t opened a new restaurant in over two years. But I then pointed out how we, like most other fit-out and refurbishment contractors, work on a 15% profit margin, and that goes directly to the DKL bottom line. As they own 50% of DKL, that means they effectively get a 7.5% discount on everything they purchase from Wright Refurbishment. Anyway, they are giving us exclusivity for 3 years and say if it looks good, they will renew the agreement.”
Jinnie said, “The only reason they stopped opening new outlets was because they were getting a better return from having a cash pile in the bank than building new outlets. I think with the new menu and refurbishment, that is going to reverse, and that exclusivity deal is going to be worth its weight in gold.”
“I hope you are right,” replied Belinda. “Anyway, I just had to tell you, it’s our biggest ever order. It may be a week or two before the contract is signed, but we should get the LoI on Monday or Tuesday, so we could hit the press with it then.” “I have been asked to ‘leak’ the refurbishment story to the press,” said Jinnie. “So, I can’t see SuperBurger objecting. In fact, I rather think they might like it. They need to make people aware of the new menu and the refurbishment, so any publicity is good publicity.” “The same applies to Wright Refurbishment,” replied Belinda. “A contract like this will get reported in the trade press, and people looking for a refurbishment will see our name. If it brings in enquiries, we have a chance to get more work.” “I’m going to ring Bill Furr at the Barnet Press Group first thing Monday. He has a lot of contacts in the national press. He just might ring you for a quote or two. Please don’t try to bullshit him; he is very sharp.”
“While we are talking,” said Belinda, “Melissa and the family are due home in a fortnight. Steven has two weeks’ leave, and then he takes up a position as an Equerry to the King, just as Sir Nigel promised him. You know they have purchased Nigel and Camilla’s old house just down the road. I’m so looking forward to the grandchildren being able to just pop in all the time.” “You know that I want her to run Wedding Dress Bargains again,” said Jinnie. “Miranda has done a fantastic job as temporary Managing Director, getting the company back on target. But I know her first love is the events business, and she is itching to get back to it full-time. If you can get Melissa to ring me when she is back and ready to go back to work, we can sort out all the details, like where she is going to work from, pay, pension, and car.” “I’ll do that,” replied Belinda.
***
As Jinnie walked back to the house, she looked up at the extension. It had shot up during the week, and with some satisfaction, she realised the roof trusses would be going on very soon. The twins were impatient to go swimming and had even managed to talk Paolo into joining them. Jinnie told them she would be back in a couple of minutes and headed to her bedroom to put a swimsuit on. As she took the one-piece out of the drawer, she thought, ‘No,’ and put it back, then took out the bikini she had bought in Barbados. No one was going to look at her scars. She grabbed her robe and clothes to change back into and hurried downstairs.
“Come on, kids,” said Jinnie, leading them out of the back door and down the garden to the gate in the wall. They were soon all playing with a ball in the pool, and Jinnie was amazed at how the twins’ swimming ability improved every week. They were totally at home in the water, swimming strongly and diving in. They had both mastered the breaststroke and what Jinnie had always known as the front crawl, but Willie informed her Miss Evans said was called freestyle. Paolo asked the twins if they had heard of the backstroke, and when they said no, Paolo demonstrated the stroke to them. Millie said, “That’s easy,” and floated on her back, paddling with her arms.
Jinnie was laughing so much she didn’t see Sir Nigel come in through the pool house door. It was only when he shouted, “That’s not right, here comes Uncle Nigel to teach you the right way!” and leapt into the pool that she noticed him. Willie shouted, “How did you know we were here?” and Uncle Nigel answered, “Larry was asleep in his basket in the kitchen. He only ever does that when you’re swimming. Normally, he comes and says ‘Hello’ wherever I am in the house. Now, Millie, let’s get the stroke right. I used to swim the backstroke for my university team, and I was good.”
Ten minutes later, Millie and Willie were both doing a reasonable backstroke, and Nigel said, “That’s not bad for a first lesson. I bet your teacher will be surprised when you show her next school lesson.” Turning to Jinnie and Paolo, he said, “Seriously, they are pretty good swimmers, and they have picked that up really quickly.” Jinnie smiled and replied, “I just wanted to ensure they’re not afraid of the water and can swim in the event of an accident.” Watching the twins racing the length of the pool, Sir Nigel replied, “You seem to have succeeded there.” Then he said loudly, “Who wants to come to lunch on Uncle Nigel? He’s going to the ‘Duke of York’ for a steak, but I hear they do a fabulous fish finger sandwich.” Jinnie asked, “Is that the pub on the way to Potters Bar?” “It is,” replied Sir Nigel. “And the menu is rather good, and they do an excellent pint. It has become one of my weekend lunchtime favourites.” Willie said to his mother, “Please, let’s go. I want a fish finger sandwich.”
Jinnie sat back and sipped her coffee, which was rather good, and reflected on the huge lunch she had just consumed: leek and potato soup; honey roast ham with two fried eggs and chunky chips; and blackberry and apple crumble with custard. It wasn’t exactly gourmet, but it had, as Sir Nigel had promised, been pretty good. The twins had loved the fish finger sandwich, and Izzy said her smoked haddock and salmon fish cakes with salad had been delicious. Paolo and Sir Nigel had demolished 10oz Aberdeen Angus sirloin steaks with a pepper sauce, mushrooms, tomatoes, and chunky chips. Jinnie had thought how good it had looked.
The Manager had come across to chat to Sir Nigel, who was obviously well known, and he had introduced Jinnie as the COO of the Trattoria Trevi Group and the Manager said that they couldn’t hope to compete with a two Michelin Star restaurant, this was only a country pub with a decent chef but hoped she had enjoyed her meal. Jinnie said she had been impressed, the food had been very good, now she had found the pub she was sure to come again, which seemed to please the manager who gave her a card with his mobile number on and said to ring him to ensure they got a table as Friday and Saturday night and Sunday lunch tended to be very busy.
***
Sunday was Penny’s turn for lunch, and she served up roast pork with crackling and apple sauce. Jinnie quite liked hot pork but wasn’t keen on it cold, so she didn’t cook it often herself, and it made a nice change. The twins loved the crackling and crunched it hard, much to Jinnie’s consternation, who worried about their teeth. They both refused apple sauce, saying it looked like baby food.
Penny got Jinnie alone and told her that there seemed to be little movement on the mission to stop the boats. The problem was still the ammunition. Apparently, the Americans were still having production problems. The only bit of news was that planning had realised there were direct British Airways flights to Catania from Gatwick, which was a lot cheaper than a special RAF flight. The SIS had recently signed an agreement with BA to upgrade employees flying with them to match Virgin. However, as they only offered economy and business classes on European flights, it meant they were only going to be upgraded to business.
After lunch, the twins collared their grandparents and told them all about going swimming in Uncle Nigel’s pool the previous morning and how he was teaching them backstroke. They said they were going to show Miss Evans when they had their next lesson. Willie explained that they had already swum a length of Nigel’s pool, but because they had to keep away from the ‘learners’ in the school pool, they could only do widths. Millie added that Uncle Nigel was going to show them how to do a ‘racing turn’. Grandpa asked, “Do you mean a tumble turn?” The twins looked at each other and said, “No, a racing turn.”
***
On Monday morning, Jinnie went into Maple House. While waiting for the order to travel, she was determined to keep as busy as possible. As soon as she was seated at her PC, Janet arrived with a mug of coffee, and as it was placed in front of her, the delicious aroma wafted her way.
Jinnie looked up and said, “Thank you, Janet. Do you have any idea when Alberto will be in?” “He rang earlier,” replied Janet. “He was at Trattoria Trevi very late last night, so he won’t be in until lunch.” “Thank you,” said Jinnie. “I may have to pop out for a meeting, but I should be back before then. It’s just that I wanted his opinion on something. I have an important call to make; would you mind closing the door on your way out?” Jinnie called the number for Bill Furr stored in her mobile phone, and it was answered on the third ring. “Good morning, Dame Jinnie, how can I help you?” “Good morning, Bill, I’m sure I told you to call me Jinnie. I wonder if you could spare me an hour this morning? I have a little story you might find interesting.” “I’m working in the Potters Bar office this morning, so I could be in Hadley in about 15 minutes,” Bill replied. “I’m not there,” said Jinnie. “I’m working from Maple House today. Could you meet me in the reception coffee area in 15 minutes? I’ll buy you a coffee, and we can talk.” “See you there,” said Bill.
Jinnie was waiting when Bill came in the door, and they were soon seated on one of the sofas with whole milk flat whites. Bill asked, “Should I record this?” “I suspect so,” said Jinnie. “There’s quite a lot I’m going to tell you, and it’s important you get the details in the story correct.” She then launched into the tale, starting off by explaining what he knew: that she was the MD of the 50% owned subsidiary of Trattoria Trevi, DKL, and that the other 50% was owned by SuperBurger. Then she moved to things that Bill didn’t know, carefully not mentioning how. She told him she had been invited to join the SuperBurger board and had been advising them on a reboot of the business, as the offering was getting a bit stale.
Jinnie had thought about how much to reveal and decided that Bill had no need to know about her shareholding or the current poor performance of SuperBurger. If he dug into the published financial reports, he might be able to read between the lines and pick up on the slipping sales, but it was well hidden by the dividends from the 50% investment in DKL and the return on SuperBurger’s reserves. So, Jinnie skipped the details and talked generally, saying that she had been in the County Mall in Crawley, visiting another of her businesses, and had happened to see the dark, depressing SuperBurger outlet in the Mall. She had been unimpressed by it and its food and drink offering.
Consequently, she told Bill, she had been told at a board meeting that the Crawley branch was typical of all the 932 branches in the U.K. She had expressed the opinion that, if that was the case, the company needed a reboot and had eventually got the backing of the long-time company chairman, who agreed that the food and drink offering had slipped, and the appearance of the Crawley outlet was poor. He had set the board the task of rejuvenating the business. Other members of the board had concentrated on the menu, but she had gone to her friend and fellow DKL director, Belinda Quarendon, who ran the DKL construction and refurbishment division, Wright Refurbishment, and they had come up with a scheme to refurbish the Crawley outlet that could be rolled out universally.
The board had decided to refurbish 12 typical outlets as a test, and a new menu would be tested in all 12, with Crawley being the lead. The design drawings had already been produced for the board presentation. In effect, SuperBurger owned 50% of Wright Refurbishment, so it made sense for them to receive the order for the first 12 branches. The refurbished Crawley outlet had now been open for nearly 4 weeks, and in total, 9 refurbished branches were open today. The final 3 would be open by the end of the week. Jinnie continued, saying that at the board meeting last week, there had been reports of increased sales, a very favourable customer satisfaction survey, and staff satisfaction had leapt. So, a decision had been made to roll the refurbishment programme out to all remaining 920 outlets. The new menu was being rolled out immediately and would be limited only by subcontractors gearing up to deliver the new products.
“Interesting,” said Bill, “and something I can write up and perhaps sell to the national press, but there is no local angle.” “Oh, but there is,” said Jinnie. “The Potters Bar SuperBurger in Darkes Lane is one of those 12 test sites, and I understand that it opened this morning at 9 o’clock, having been refurbished over the weekend, and is selling the new menu. Now, we have not advertised the changes. No one in Britain has reviewed the new menu or the refurbished restaurants. No one outside the SuperBurger organisation knows that Wright Refurbishment has won the contract to refurbish all 932 branches and are today setting up offices and a dedicated team to start refurbishing 2 outlets a day for the next 15 months.”
Jinnie continued, “In the next few weeks, a major radio and TV campaign is to be launched. It will be asking the country if they ‘have tried the delicious new SuperBurger menu yet’. People will be seen enjoying the new all-British Beef burgers, Chicken Burgers, and Wraps in a refurbished branch, and the voice-over will say the new, improved menu is available in every branch at the same old prices right now, and that over the next 15 months, every single branch in the nation will be refurbished and restyled. If you come with me now, we can try the new SuperBurger experience together. Oh, you might like to drag your restaurant critic and photographer along too. You realise that if you hurry, you will have an exclusive—not only the first review of the new menu and a refurbished branch but Belinda Quarendon and her designer are waiting for us, and I’m certain they will be more than happy to talk about the design concept in detail. They have secured an order in the region of £20 million.”
Jinnie and Bill entered the newly refurbished branch, and Jinnie directed Bill over to the booth already occupied by a smiling Belinda and Willow. Looking around, Jinnie said, “No Andrew,” and Belinda replied, “No, we needed two directors to sign paperwork at SuperBurger this morning, and he and Brian have gone. It was supposed to be Brian and Andy, the Sales Director, but he is busy with a client who is looking for someone to refurbish 25 sets of toilets at a school over the summer holidays. The only problem is that I know the toilet cubicle suppliers always have problems meeting demand from schools over the summer holidays.”
Bill was introduced to Belinda and Willow and started talking about the bold red and white design, and what a difference it was compared to the last time he had popped in for a coffee and found it to be not a very nice experience. Jinnie smiled and said, “What did you think of the coffee you had just now at Maple House?” “That was pretty good,” replied Bill, “but that was coffee shop coffee.” “Well, we now serve exactly the same blend here,” said Jinnie. “How can you afford to do that?” asked Bill, looking at the menu. “Coffee here is so much cheaper.” “It’s a loss leader,” replied Jinnie, “but honestly, we’ve found that by offering good coffee, we sell a lot more of it, and then people also buy something to eat, and we make more money.”
Bill said to Belinda, “Do you mind if I record our conversation on my phone? My shorthand is awful.” “Not at all,” said Belinda, “but I would ask to have a quick look at what you write before it’s published. I promise you I’ll have whatever you write back within the hour; it’s just that I need to be certain I haven’t inadvertently told you something commercially confidential.” “That’s acceptable to me,” said Bill, “but I want to try to get the story out tonight, so that it’s on our website late tonight and in tomorrow’s edition.” Bill reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out his mobile phone, turned its recording function on, and placed it between them on the table, just as the waitress arrived. They ordered four white coffees and a cheeseburger and fries for Bill, who said, “I’ve got to test the food.” The waitress asked, “Would you like that with salad, fried onions, or both?” Bill looked surprised and asked, “You do fried onions?” “Yes, sir,” came the reply, “It’s part of the new menu.” “I’ll have both, please, but no gherkin.” “Okay, sir, it will be a few minutes, as another part of the new menu is that we cook everything fresh and don’t keep things warm on the pass.”
Bill turned to Belinda and said, “Tell me about how you first came to quote for this project.” Belinda smiled and said, “Well, initially we weren’t bidding for the project. Jinnie came to me straight from a SuperBurger board meeting where the directors had been asked to come up with ideas to rejuvenate the business. Jinnie explained that she had no experience on the food side—plenty of other directors could look after that—but she had built several chains, from the high-end Trattoria Trevi to Aunty JoJo’s Chicken Shack. What she wanted to do was revitalise the branch network, which was looking very tired.” “I’ll not argue with that,” said Bill.
Belinda continued, “Jinnie knows just how talented my design team are, so she asked me to come up with a design concept for the chain. She got us permission to have a look at the Crawley branch, and I got Andrew and Willow here to draw up a design concept that could be rolled out across the network. We presented it to the board, and they liked it and commissioned 12 restaurants across the country to be refurbished as a test. I believe, and Jinnie can confirm if this is correct, they also had a food tasting and chose a new blend of coffee and all sorts of items on the menu. I understand the coffee is now in all branches, and the menu is being progressively rolled out.”
Jinnie said, “That’s right, the coffee is in every branch right now, and I understand that random polling shows that it is seen as a vast improvement on our previous offering. 95% of those questioned think it is among the best fast food coffee, matched only by Artisan Sandwiches and Aunty JoJo’s, which is hardly surprising as it’s the same blend. As I already told you, the new menu is being rolled out as quickly as the suppliers can manage to cope. The refurbished Crawley branch is now over three weeks old, and sales are growing fast without any advertising. This is refurbished branch number nine, and three more will be opening this week, completing the full 12 test sites.”
Belinda resumed her story. “The colour scheme is designed to make the outlets bright, airy, and cheerful. The styling is similar in every refurbished restaurant, but as you can see, it is localised. The pictures on the walls show local transport like buses, trains, and footpaths, while the tabletops are a map of the area surrounding the branch. The condiments trays are new, and we have condemned the plastic tomato with a spout encrusted with dried sauce to the bin, as you will see when your burger arrives.”
As they spoke, the photographer and the food critic slid into the booth behind them. Jinnie watched as the waitress arrived and took drinks orders: a large Pepsi Max and a flat white. The waitress said she would be back in a minute with the drinks and to take their food order. Bill’s burger arrived, and he was offered a choice of ramekins of tomato sauce, brown sauce, mustard, or mayonnaise. He chose tomato, bit into the burger, and said, “This is good, very good.” He dipped some fries into the sauce and said, “And I like this.”
Behind them, Jinnie saw the drinks arrive, and the waitress take orders for a double cheeseburger and fries, and a ‘BigUn’ and fries. She then listened to the waitress again ask about fried onions and say it would be a few minutes while they were cooked fresh. With the waitress gone, the food critic tried his coffee and said over his shoulder to Bill, “This coffee is good. What’s your burger like?” Jinnie was delighted to hear Bill say, “Fabulous, and I love the fried onions. Why doesn’t anyone else offer them?”
***
Jinnie left the branch feeling quite happy. The write-up and review would be good, and the photos would show the restaurant at its newly refurbished best. Jinnie parked at Maple House, took the lift to the Trattoria Trevi Group floor, and found Alberto sitting at his desk. Jinnie joined him and said, “Good morning, Alberto, I have a bit of news for you about DKL. As a fifty percent owner, I think you are entitled to know what is happening before it hits the media tomorrow morning. The construction division this morning signed a refurbishment contract with SuperBurger for all 932 branches, valued at about £23 million. Along with that, they have signed agreements for ongoing maintenance and all new builds for the next three years.”
Jinnie continued, “On top of that, and this won’t be in the media as it has only been subject to a handshake, they are to refurbish several areas of the SuperBurger HQ. Belinda says she can’t put a total value on the maintenance and new builds as the costs will only be apparent when they are required, but she thinks it could be several million a year. Now don’t forget, like other refurbishment businesses, Wright Refurbishment works on a 15% profit margin, so this project alone should generate over £3.4 million in profits for DKL, and half of that will come to the Trattoria Trevi Group.”
In Chapter 29 – Stopping the Boats
© WorthingGooner 2025
