Redundancy 4/8

The young lady in question had just got home from school, her dad had come down to the kitchen for a cup of tea and they were all chatting while they waited for the kettle to boil. Mary and Jennifer Jane turned to look at the back garden as Dave remarked, “Crumbs here comes another lot, two of them this time!”

Walking towards the house was a fairy, wearing the rather bulky jumper that was necessary in this world when they needed to disguise their wings. She was holding hands with a young man, both of them looking happily at each other as they approached.

Jennifer Jane grinned. “It’s Polly and Robert; they’re sweet on each other, as if you couldn’t guess. Though I don’t think I’ve seen them in this world before, I wonder what it is they want?”

“I wonder if something has happened to the wings we keep in Robert’s workshop,” said Dave in a worried tone of voice, “but I don’t see why there have to be two of them to tell me.”

His mind was soon set at rest, as Robert opened the door to let Polly come in first.

“Oh good the kettle’s on,” said Polly as soon as she came through the door, “do you mind if I make us all a cup of tea? I’m really rather good at it, although I say so myself!”

“We’ve got a bit of a problem,” said Robert while Polly was busy with the tea things, “so I suggested that we came here to ask if Jennifer Jane could help us.”

He explained the situation and was surprised when the whole Bell family burst out laughing.

“I’m sorry,” said Dave, “but we’ve been trying to think of an answer to the same problem ourselves and we can’t think of anything either.”

“Wait a minute dad,” said Jennifer Jane while Polly began handing round the filled cups, “they’ve only been able to ask around Lurbridge. That area supports mostly farmers and timber workers, what they need is someone who knows of a market for luxury goods. Suppose Robert gave his samples to George, he must know hundreds of people who would like some special jewellery to show off to their rich friends. There would be no need for either of them to go round any more trying to sell the goods. Robert could spend his time making the stuff, I’m sure Polly could design lots off different things for him to try out and everyone would be happy!”

Polly cheered up immediately and smiled at Robert, “I rather like the idea of becoming a jewellery designer. I told you she’d think of some way to help us!”

“If you give me your samples,” continued Jennifer Jane, “I’ll take them over to Lower Dene as soon as I can and then we can all sit back and wait for results.”

Mary got up and handed round some biscuits, while Dave and Robert began to talk about the difficulties of machining teeth into fancy shapes, while Polly chatted happily to Mary and Jennifer Jane, describing the fun she was having learning to fly.

Immediately after the very next lesson Jennifer Jane had at the Witches’ Home, she flew off to find George. She started her search at his office in Lower Dene and was not too surprised to find Morwenna sitting behind a desk in the first room she entered.

“Hello young lady is there anything I can do to help you?”

“Good afternoon Morwenna, I was hoping to see Sir George, do you know where I can find him?”

“I’m afraid not really, he’s off on a long round delivering pigeons to customers and collecting the money he’s owed. He could be anywhere for the next couple of days. I’m acting as his assistant now, is there anything I can do to help?”

Jennifer Jane explained how she was trying to help Robert and Polly solve the problem of getting rid of the surplus teeth collected in her world.

“It’s really rather serious, because if they don’t succeed lots of the fairies will be out of work!”

She showed Morwenna the samples that Robert had carved. Morwenna looked at them critically.

“I don’t think these will sell in any place I can think of, still George has all sorts of contacts so maybe he can find someone. Some of the local squires might be persuaded to keep them in a curio cabinet to show off to their friends, but I don’t think selling a few like that will be of much help to your friends.”

Jennifer Jane left most of the samples to be collected by George when he returned to his head office. Then she took the rest back to the George and Dragons at Lurbridge. She’d suddenly had a thought that after George, the best bet to try and interest people in her goods were the sailors who drank at the pub.

After all, sailors in her world were well known to buy strange things in strange lands to take home as curios. She had no reason to suppose that the sailors in this world would be any different.