Page 50 of Bad Luck Bride (Scandal at the Savoy #3)

“It’s right here,” she told him, gesturing to the modest building of white stone and black wrought iron nearby as the cab rolled away. She pulled out the key, but when she started up the front steps, he didn’t, and she turned in surprise. “Aren’t you coming?”

“I just thought of something I have to do.” He gave a nod to the front door of the building. “You go in. I’ll catch up with you in a quarter of an hour.”

“I’ll come with you, if you like?”

“No need. Go in and start looking around. I’ll be interested to hear your opinions when I get back.”

“But I don’t know anything about hotels,” she protested as he started walking away down Piccadilly. “I’ve only been working for the Mayfair for a week.”

“You know more about hotels than you think.” He paused and looked at her over his shoulder.

“You’ve been assessing them with me for over three hours.

And besides,” he added before she could point out that three hours was hardly an adequate education on the subject, “you’ve stayed in dozens of ’em. You told me so.”

With that, he turned and resumed walking down Piccadilly the way they’d come.

Kay watched him for a moment, baffled. He really was the most unaccountable man. Where was he going? And why was he leaving her to assess this place on her own?

Still, perhaps he had a point. If she considered this place from a customer’s point of view, what would she think?

Intrigued by the challenge, she turned her attention to the building in front of her.

The Woodville wasn’t much to look at. A modest three-story building of white painted brick and wrought-iron railings.

But it was at least clean and tidy. She went inside, trying to follow Devlin’s advice in forming her opinions, assessing it with the business considerations he had mentioned during their time at the Marchmont and with her own experience of having lived most of the past year as a hotel guest.

The lobby, she decided, was quite nice, if somewhat old-fashioned, with its walnut pillars and malachite floors.

The kitchens and laundry, she noted, had no hot water taps, only cold, which meant a boiler would have to be purchased and more plumbing added—a major expense. Worse, however, was yet to come.

When she reached the first floor, she tried to look beyond the worn and faded carpets and the stained cabbage rose wallpaper, for those could be replaced, but as she began to explore the rooms, she was reasonably sure Devlin would advise against purchasing this building.

For one thing, the rooms seemed awfully tiny. There was no furniture to provide a sense of scale, however, and unwilling to trust her eyes, she pulled out the tape measure Devlin had asked her to bring.

“Eight feet by nine feet?” she muttered. “That’s not nearly enough room.” Put a bed, armoire and dressing table in here, she thought, looking around, and there’d be no room to move. There were storage lockers for customers’ luggage downstairs by the laundry, but even so—

“Kay?”

At the sound of Devlin’s voice floating up the stairs, she snapped the tape measure, causing it to roll up inside its casing, and shoved it in her handbag, then she stepped out into the corridor.

“I’m up here,” she called down the stairs. “On the first floor.”

“Well, come down. I’ve had an idea.”

“I’ll be right there.” She retrieved her clipboard and jotted down the measurements she’d just taken, then shoved her pencil behind her ear and went down to the ground floor, where she found Devlin standing by the front desk, an enormous picnic basket at his feet, the basket’s origins stamped in big black letters on its side.

“Fortnum & Mason?” she cried in delighted surprise.

“I thought we could do with some lunch.”

“Rather. I’m famished.”

“Where shall we dine?” He glanced around the dim and dusty foyer. “Doesn’t seem to be anywhere suitable in here.”

“Perhaps the kitchens?” she suggested. “I saw a deal table in there and a few chairs. Not much else, though.”

“That’ll do.” He bent and picked up the basket. “Lead me to it.”

She complied, taking him across the foyer and down the long, dark corridor to the kitchens. “Here we are,” she said, gesturing to the battered table and a trio of rickety-looking ladderback chairs. “It’s not much, but from what I’ve seen so far, this is the only furniture in the entire place.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. If they went bankrupt, all the furnishings would have been sold.” He set the basket on the table, reached inside, and pulled out a napkin, laying it across the wooden seat of one of the chairs. “Your seat, my lady.”

“Playing waiter, are you?” she asked as she sat down and began pulling off her gloves.

“Well, someone has to play that role, and it can’t be you. You outrank me.”

She laughed at that as he unfolded a second napkin with a professional flick of his wrist and spread it across the table.

“Now,” he said, rummaging in the basket, “let’s see what we have in here.”

He pulled out plates, a knife, a chunk of ham, a pot of mustard, a wedge of bright orange Gloucester cheese, and a baguette of bread. A bottle of claret followed, along with two glasses and a corkscrew. “Unwrap the ham, will you?” he asked and began to open the wine.

“I thought you were the waiter,” she teased, reaching for the ham. “Isn’t this your job?”

“Well, when you’ve hired only one waiter, you have to help him out.”

“Fair enough.” Taking up a knife, she cut the twine netting and unfolded the cheesecloth wrapping, then began slicing it while he poured the wine.

“A shame we don’t have candles,” she murmured. “It’s quite dim in here. There’s gas jets,” she added, nodding to a point high up on the wall behind him, “but no electricity.”

“That’s not uncommon in a hotel kitchen.”

“It isn’t? Well,” she added when he nodded, “there’s no electricity in the rooms, either. To add it would be costly, I imagine?”

“Through the entire hotel? Very. Do you think it’s important?”

“Don’t you?”

“Forget what I think.” He paused, pushing a glass of claret toward her and reaching for the wedge of cheese. “I’m asking what you think,” he reminded as he began paring cheese.

“Oh.” Startled, Kay set down her knife and sat back with a slice of ham and cheese, laughing a little, feeling suddenly self-conscious. “It’s so seldom a woman is asked what she thinks, unless it’s about clothes or something equally trivial. We’re never consulted about anything important.”

She paused, nibbling on ham and cheese as she considered.

“I think,” she said after a moment, “there’s probably two kinds of customers.

The ones who care about tradition and keeping with what’s familiar and the ones who prefer the latest modern comforts.

So putting in electricity rather depends on which sort of customer you wish to cater to, doesn’t it? ”

“Quite right.” He took a slice of cheese and his wineglass and leaned back against the wall behind him. “You must be the modern sort. After all, you are a woman with a career. That’s very modern.”

“I’ve had this career for a week,” she reminded.

“I’m not sure it counts. But I do prefer electricity, I confess.

Mama hates it. When we first came to the Savoy, she fretted about all the vapors in the air.

Jo and I both tried to explain that electricity isn’t like gas, and there are no vapors, but we don’t think she quite believed us.

Either way, I think electricity is the way of the future, and that putting it in would probably be worth the cost. Unless, of course, there’s heaps of other work to do to the place. ”

He nodded. “Are there any water closets?”

“I saw only one on the first floor, but I don’t know how many others there might be.

There’s no boiler, so no hot water. And the rooms are very small.

Still, the location is first rate. It is St. James, after all.

So, even if you had to gut the building or demolish it altogether, it might be worth it, depending on the—what? ” she broke off as he began to laugh.

“And you said you don’t know anything?” he chided. “If we do this much longer, you’ll be more knowledgeable about the hotel trade than I am.”

“With three hotels to your credit, I doubt it. How did you do it? What got you started? And even with the money from my father, how did you ever afford it?”

“Oh, well, that last question’s easy. After I landed in Cape Town, I spent the first year just exploring, trying to determine where I wanted to settle and what I might want to do.

I had my education as a mining engineer, so I thought at first I’d get myself hired on with some British mining firm, but somehow, I just didn’t fancy it.

So I wandered through South Africa for a bit, looking for the right opportunity.

I toured some of the mines at Kimberly, and De Beer offered me a job, but I didn’t want to be a cog in their wheel.

I did safari work in East Africa for a while, then I wandered through Rhodesia.

It was there that I stumbled onto a gold mine.

And I mean that literally. I’d like to brag that it was my extensive education in mining that led me to it, but no.

It was just instinct. When I saw the terrain, I just had a feeling there was something there. ”

She eyed him dubiously. “A feeling?”

“Yes,” he said firmly. “A feeling of knowing, of… destiny. It’s hard to describe, but it’s just a certainty that something important is happening, and I’d best pay attention.

” He paused, tearing a hunk of bread off the loaf between them and smearing it with butter. “I’ve had it a few times in my life.”

Suddenly, his hands stilled, and he looked up, meeting her eyes across the table. “I had it the first time I ever saw you.”

“Me?” Kay stared in astonishment. “You did?”

“I did. I looked across that ballroom, and saw your face, and I had that feeling.”