A Little Hotel in Cornwall

by Laura Briggs

  "Is this because you sneaked into the ball?" Molly half-whispered after me, as the door was closing.

  "Riley told?" I squeaked in dismay. That was almost enough to make me turn back, if only to defend myself from wild rumors that I was stealing hors d'oeuvres and champagne at the hotel gala.

  "I swore I'd keep it secret —" Molly reassured me. Just then, we both heard the sound of Brigette and someone else approaching. I closed the door quickly to avoid being caught by anyone else.

  It wasn't Sidney's jeep waiting for me in the car park, but his motorbike, which I didn't even realize worked. He lifted off his helmet as I approached, leaning against the seat as he waited for me.

  "What about my luggage?" I asked, puzzled. "Am I supposed to hold onto it as we ride?" I pictured a completely ridiculous situation involving my arms weighed down by my shoulder bag and heavy suitcase, sticking off either side of the bike.

  "Don't be ridiculous. We'll strap it on," he said. He held up two strong cables with hooks. There was a frame on the bike for carrying things, on which he stacked my luggage and fastened it tightly. He handed me a second helmet, one that was pink, to my surprise.

  "Borrowed it from a friend," he said, as if realizing what I was thinking. Another wicked little grin, for whatever speculations I might be making regarding its owner and himself. "Suit up and climb on."

  Holding tight to him as we sped along the road, I could almost imagine it was my dream about the Amalfi coast, with my hair whipping beneath the helmet. The sapphire blue sea glittering in the late morning sun, the palm fronds gently ruffled by the breeze, as romantic a scene as the Italian shores could offer. That must be why I felt sad, leaving on a day as beautiful as this one.

  The station was in Penzance, where Sidney pulled to a halt outside, and helped me with my luggage. I carried my shoulder bag with a few extras, including my tablet computer. I thought it was time to begin turning my final assignment from the Tucker program into a real first chapter for a novel, maybe on the train to London.

  We stood face to face outside of the station, with my bags at our feet. "So ... I suppose this is it," said Sidney.

  I nodded. "Suppose so." I smiled, although my heart wasn't in it. "It was fun, my two weeks in Port Hewer. And meeting you. More than fun, actually." I held out my hand to shake his — wondering if it would feel the same as Ronnie's — but Sidney didn't take it.

  He met my eye. "Change your mind," he said.

  "Why?" I asked, softly. I couldn't tell him the reasons why I shouldn't. I had already decided to keep my secrets by leaving.

  He shrugged. "Give this place a chance," he said. "You were hardly here. Two weeks isn't enough to know if you should stay or go."

  I shook my head. "It's not about Cornwall or the village," I said. "It's a beautiful place. The Penmarrow is — it's the kind of site where stories are born, like you said. A life in this place, in this county, is full of possibilities that you can't find anywhere else, I know —"

  "Then try it and find out," suggested Sidney. "Don't just imagine it. Live it."

  Something in his eyes wasn't just the gleam of a Port Hewer resident eagerly trying to sell me on what makes it special. He didn't have to say that he liked me or found me attractive, because I knew it already. He wanted me to stay because he wanted to see if we were meant to be more than friends.

  But for how long? And for what else, besides a real kiss and a summer of fantasies? I didn't think the key to my dream was in this place anymore. And even if Alistair Davies came back, even if Sidney Daniels turned out to be the most chivalrous, charming man on the planet both inside and outside — I was building an imaginary world which could be dissolved by the realistic chance at the Ink and Inspiration waiting for me in London, with some Oxford don's modestly-successful published friend for a mentor.

  "Thanks for trying to change my mind," I said. "I wish I could. I wish I could stay here for as long as I wanted. But I have to take the best chance I have for my dream." I tried to sound convinced about this, since it was for the best. "Goodbye, Sidney. Thank you for everything."

  He had given up trying to persuade me. His shoulders fell slightly, along with his glance, directed briefly at the pavement before he met my eyes again. "Goodbye, Maisie," he answered.

  When I held out my hand, he grasped it in his own this time. It didn't feel anything like holding Ronnie's — this sent electricity traveling through my arm and deep inside of me. Looking into his face, I felt more regret for leaving him behind than all the rest this life offered me. Even more than the adventures the fictitious Marjorie Kinnan offered, as crazy as it seemed.

  Kiss me goodbye. I willed this silently, even though I shouldn't be.

  It was a long moment before I let go. With one last smile, Sidney put on his helmet and started the motorbike. I watched him drive away, then lifted my luggage and went inside to wait for the train to London.

  Announcements for the train came over the public announcement system. I found I didn't feel like writing, so I just sat on the bench, waiting for one of those messages to apply to me. The other passengers were scattered around the station, all busy playing games on mobile phones or listening to digital songs.

  I reached into my bag for my tablet, and my fingers brushed the tin box Sidney had given me instead. I pulled it out, turning it in my hands to look at all four of its imperfectly-painted sides creating what surely had to be his childhood memory of the TARDIS and not anything he'd copied from the last season with Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman.

  A faint rattling still came from inside. My fingers pried against the top once more, trying to break the 'airtight seal,' as Sidney referred to it, which had been firmly stuck every time before.

  At last, it popped open. Inside wasn't a pebble or an old broken piece of biscuit, which was what I had really been expecting, but a piece of paper wrapped around something. I pulled it out, and the objects it had been wrapped around and muffled now clattered freely inside. I poured them into the palm of my hand, a tangle of metal, plastic, a shiny bit of ribbon looped through one.

  Keys. Five or six, all different shapes and sizes, with no two even remotely alike. An old-fashioned door key with a twisty top, a modern automobile one with its teeth worn down, a tiny key meant for winding up a music box, a sparkly silver Victorian one meant for a Christmas tree ornament. Even a broken key for an old cupboard, its top half missing and the rest coated in crackly white paint.

  The paper was a torn scrap of sepia-colored stationery, its edges burned to make it look like an old message. A smile pulled at the corners of my mouth as I unrolled it to read the message written inside.

  There's more than one key to happiness.

  Short and simple. He didn't need to write anything else, because these seven words could mean so much more. Possibilities abounded in them — just like possibilities in the keys in the box, in the adventures I had yet to live out in this place.

  The speaker broadcast the time for the London train, but I only half-heard the announcement. For a moment, my vision grew hazy, the sparkly key and ribbon becoming a blur of silver, the rest disappearing from my sight. This time it wasn't the sunlight reflected on the sea which caused it.

  I dropped the keys into the TARDIS again and closed its lid, putting it into my bag, beside Mr. Bubbles and a single postcard of the hotel. Gathering my things, I lifted my suitcase to go as the second announcement for the train came over the speakers.

  ***

  Sunlight filled the foyer with golden light, bringing out the hues of rose, red, green, and ivory white. I smelled cinnamon and spices in the air, and the fresh scent of newly-watered plants among the lush, tropical jungle in pots in the main hall.

  "Where have you been?" Brigette looked up from an open binder of brochures, then scurried around the desk to join me. "Marjorie — er, Maisie — you were supposed to be on carpet duty today — didn't you see the notice on my schedule?"

  "I didn't," I said. "I'm sorry. I thought I was goin
g to leave — I packed everything and went to the station, then I thought I would come back and see if there really was a place for me here."

  I knew there wasn't, but I came back anyway, as if I could sneak back to my secret role as Marjorie Kinnan and never be caught. As if when I walked into Mr. Trelawney's office to tell him the truth, he would accept me as part of his staff afterwards without so much as blinking an eye.

  "Well, hurry — Mr. Trelawney has been wanting to see you." Hastily, Brigette stowed my bags behind the desk. Maybe she hadn't realized what I was talking about — or noticed this was my luggage, for she didn't seem at all surprised by it. "He's in his office. Go, go."

  Before I could react or reply, she hurried me through the dining room, past the double doors for the ballroom in the drawing room, and towards the door leading to the narrow servant's stair which led to the manager's office. Mr. Trelawney wants to see me — to fire me??

  I was cold inside as I climbed those steps. The fanciful confidence which had walked me through the hotel's front door a second time rapidly dissolved; a part of me was a little afraid of the stolid, unsmiling manager. All those whispers about strictness and decorum — what reason could he really have for seeing me, except to fire me for skipping work scarcely two weeks into my time here?

  On the second landing was the private door to the manager's office, hidden away from the rest of the hotel. It was partly open, but I knocked on the door frame. I could see a massive desk inside, a red leather armchair, and several bookshelves with beautifully-bound volumes on them, and two large windows positioned just behind the desk. Mr. Trelawney was busy filling out some forms, looking up as I stood waiting on his threshold.

  "Come in," he said. I obeyed. "Sit down." His pen indicated the leather armchair situated before his desk.

  I sat down. I felt dwarfed by this chair, which was swallowing me up a bit. I thought of a ludicrous illustration of Alice sitting in one at the Mad Hatter's tea party, and had to bite the inside of my cheek not to laugh out of nervousness.

  "Miss Kinnan," he said. "It has come to my attention that you have been here two weeks now. Correct?"

  "Yes, sir," I answered.

  "And during this time, you have managed to be late for work — twice, I believe? And you were not at work at all today."

  "That's right," I admitted, my cheeks hot with embarrassment. "The first two times were accidents," I said. "Today ... it was on purpose. I figured you were going to dismiss me, so I thought I'd just dismiss myself and save you the trouble."

  "Yet, you came back."

  "I did." I didn't have a better answer than this one. Certainly not an explanation.

  I hadn't told him yet about my nonexistent 'papers,' or the made-up name I'd been using — or the fact that this was my first week ever to work in a hotel. I supposed that should be my next words, because it would make me seem less like a crazy person.

  "On the other hand, I heard about the incident with Mrs. Wickles' medication," he said. "If I understood correctly, you rode a bicycle without brakes into the village to fetch it. And walked back in a downpour afterwards."

  "I'm really sorry." My mouth was too dry to moisten my lips this time. "I would've taken the car, but it was missing a tire. I know I was overstepping my boundaries, but I really did think she probably needed it. An emergency, I mean."

  Mr. Trelawney hesitated, as if not quite sure what to reply. "I wasn't — scolding you, Miss Kinnan," he said, after choosing the word he wanted.

  I realized I should have kept quiet and waited for him to finish. "Sorry," I said.

  "You really must stop apologizing every five minutes, Miss Kinnan," he said. "It is 'Miss Kinnan,' isn't it? Or is that — perhaps — the reason why I have no official documents on my desk from you. So I can draft a paycheck in that name, for instance."

  Somehow, he had learned the truth. I was so surprised that I couldn't say anything, even if I had forgotten my previous vow of silence.

  "Therefore, I assume that no official documents bearing that name will materialize on my desk," said Mr. Trelawney. "Will they?"

  I moistened my lips. "No," I said, quietly. "They won't be."

  The real Marjorie must have contacted them. Maybe at long last she was on her way to claim her job as one of the foreign representatives on the Penmarrow staff. That meant it was time for me, the imposter and interloper, to leave, as the manager was no doubt about to suggest.

  "There were reasons, no doubt, why you chose to represent yourself somewhat falsely upon arriving," said Mr. Trelawney. "You would not wish to discuss them, perhaps ... I hope for reasons unrelated to criminal activity?"

  "I'm not a criminal, I promise," I said. "I'm not fleeing Interpol or anything like that."

  Mr. Trelawney was silent. He was waiting for further explanation, I perceived — the reasons why I was here.

  I hesitated. "I was lost," I said. "I was looking for an escape, you could say. But when I walked through the doors of this hotel, I was so struck by it. It was beautiful, elegant ... so different from everywhere else I had been. But —" Here, I paused again. "But the longer I was here, the longer I wanted to stay. I couldn't imagine passing up a chance to find out what this place and everybody in it was really like. When one landed in my lap, I took it."

  I fell quiet for a moment. "If I owe you an apology at this point, then you have it. That, and anything else you deserve. I knew it was wrong, but I did it anyway. So please, don't think I'm going to beg for my check before I leave, because I know you can't pay me, and I don't deserve it."

  I started to rise, but Mr. Trelawney spoke before my hands even touched the chair's arms. "Are you saying that this decision was entirely about the hotel?" he asked, mildly. Amusedly, even. I wondered if he thought this was funny — it made me sound a little like a starry-eyed tourist girl with no self control.

  I paused. "Not entirely," I said. "But, yes. It would be mostly true, I suppose."

  "I see." He signed the report on his desk and put it into a file folder. I moved to leave.

  "However," continued the manager, "the question of the maid's position still hasn't been answered."

  I was only a few steps away from the chair; I paused, sensing the manager was not yet done.

  "I suppose it's entirely possible that if the right official documents were to materialize on my desk sometime in the near future that I would be willing to overlook the delay," said Mr. Trelawney.

  A moment of quiet, in which I considered exactly what this meant.

  "What is printed officially on them, however, need not be discussed with the rest of the staff," said Mr. Trelawney. "The reasons for this person's secretive nature may remain entirely their own."

  I didn't know what to say. "Are you sure?" I said, when I could speak again. "Are you saying —?"

  "That will be all — Miss Kinnan." Mr. Trelawney reached for his next report. "See you tomorrow."

  I took the stairs to the lobby at a virtual gallop, bursting out of the private stairway door and startling three tourists on their way to the terrace. Brigette was behind the desk, gazing my direction worriedly as I reappeared and gathered my luggage from its hiding place.

  "What happened?" she asked, losing all her usual primness. "Did he — he scold you?" she added, hesitantly.

  "He was wonderful," I said. "I really like Mr. Trelawney. He's just ... the best. Don't ever let anyone say he isn't." I stuffed my suitcase underneath my arm, and gave Brigette a dazzling smile. "I'm going upstairs to unpack." I hurried away.

  "But why were you packed?" she called after me.

  "What's she doing, carrying luggage like that?" Riley appeared in the lobby, looking outraged as I disappeared up the stairs. "Come back! That's my tip you're stealing!"

  ***

  That night, I watched the sun set from my bedroom as I propped open the little window facing the sea. Soon, I would have to catch another train, this time to a government office to begin the necessary visa paperwork to officially remain
a maid at The Penmarrow Hotel. But tonight, I was going to start work on the reason I was here: my novel.

  With my tablet computer propped on two pillows, I lay on my stomach and gazed at its screen. Part of it reflected my face, while the other part reflected my maid's uniform hanging on a wall hook, and the crossword puzzle book fanning open in the breeze, a gift from Molly. The little splash of blue in the foreground belonged to the tin TARDIS sitting on my table.

  I lifted myself on one elbow and reached for it. The keys rattled inside as it moved, and I couldn't help but smile. I certainly hoped Sidney was right, and that mine was somewhere in this random chance that I had created here by accident.

  My reprieve by Mr. Trelawney had given me time to know my rescuer better — beyond just Doctor Who episodes, stray dogs on sofas, and a lack of clever skills for anything but bicycle repair. With a little luck, I might even learn what secrets were hiding behind that charming smile while here in Cornwall.

  Most importantly, when Alistair Davies resurfaced, I would have more than just a first chapter from my workshop days for him to read.

  I clicked on the document on my tablet, opening my last assignment from the Tucker Writer's Workshop, and began typing. Annabel dreamed of many things nightly. The least of these was not love — no, it was the strongest, among the shadows and the midnight bells, and darkness surrounding her in her waking hours. It was the constant and the solace, yet she did not know what form it would take in the world.

  I had a feeling that could change, given a chance. And not just for Annabel, either.

  Learn more about Book 2, A Spirited Girl on Cornish Shores, HERE