Looking for a Hotel.
It was the Sunday before the August Bank Holiday. We were tired and
hungry and when we got to Datchet we started off to look for shelter for
the night.
We passed a very pretty little hotel but there was no honeysuckle about
it, and for some reason or other , I had got my mind fixed on honeysuckle,
and I said:
“ Oh’ don’t let’s go in there ! Let’s go on a bit further , and see if
there isn’t one with honeysuckle over it.”
So we went on till we came to another hotel. That was a very nice
hotel, too, and it had honeysuckle on it, but Harris did not like the look
of a man who was standing near the front door. He said he didn’t look a
nice man at all , so we went on the further. We went a goodish way without
coming across any more hotels, and then we met a man , and asked him to
tell us the way to a few .
He said “Why , you are coming away from them. There are only two hotels
in the place.”
“Oh, we had been there , and didn’t like them. And no other hotels?” –
Harris asked.
“None”, replied our informant.
“What are we to do ?” cried Harris.
Then George spoke up. He said Harris and I could get a hotel built for
us , if we like. For his part, he was going to the hotels we had passed.
We had to follow Gorge. When we came to the hotel we had seen first ,
the landlord came up and said: “Good evening, gentlemen.”
“Oh , good evening,” said Gorge, “two will do. Two of us can sleep on
one bad.”
“ Very sorry , sir,” repeated the landlord , ‘ “ but we really haven’t
got a bed vacant in the whole house. In fact , we are putting two , even
three gentlemen in one bed , as it is. Three gentlemen sleeping on the
billiard-table already, and two in the coffee-room. Can’t possibly take you
in tonight.”
We picked up our things, and went to the other hotel. The people at the
hotel did not wait to hear us talk. The landlady met us on the doorstep
with the greeting that we were the fourteenth party she had turned away
within the last hour and a half. As for our weak suggestions of stables,
billiard-room, or coal-cellars, she laughed them all off; all these places
had been occupied long ago.
Did she know of any place in the whole village where we could get
shelter for the night?
Well, if we didn’t mind it- she didn’t recommend it , but there was a
little bar half a mile down the road. We waited to hear no more; we picked
up our bags and ran.
(After J.K.Jerome)
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