Play@YSDC

"I´ll accompany you ladies, of course." Laws smiles and decapitates an egg with a spoon.

"Smashing," beams Rosa. "I just know that if we all work together, we'll soon get to the bottom of this unpleasant business."

"I say, the quality of the BBC keeps decreasing, doesn't it? What rotten luck!", Exeter finishes his second coffee and lights another cigarette.

"Top of the morning to you, Doctor Laws, I trust you slept well? I had the most dashing dream about ritual sacrifice and all that hocus pocus! Must be last night's consternation!"

"Do you really think so, Lord Exeter?" replies Rosa. "I thought the feature on the ''Opping 'Olidays' was very interesting."

"Oh very droll, Rosy! Don't tell me you're into that bucolic idolisation shmarmy marmy! Honestly, the state of public broadcasting these days!"

Exeter crushes his cigarette in the ashtray and takes another sip from his coffee.

"It's Ros-ah," replies Rosa tartly. "Please do me the pleasure of getting my name right." There is a moment's awkward silence, then she gets up and moves over to the sideboard. She studies the dials on the wireless set and then turns the tuning knob to try to get a signal.

Exeter seems to blithely ignored Rosa's comment and rants on.

Oh yes, I remember when my brother Perry was reading archaeology at Oxford, you could at least tune in to a decent concerto. These days all you have to look out to if the shipping forecast.

Despite her best attempts, Rosa struggles to tune the radio to any station. As she tries, the salesman gets up from his table and walks over to join her.

"I say, do you mind tuning back to the news, I'd just like to hear the end of that piece on Czechoslokakia?"

"Oh I do apologise," says Rosa. "I don't seem to have had any luck. Please do tune it back to the programme you were listening to."

She stands to one side to allow the salesman to re-tune the radio, a kernel of suspicion growing in her mind.

The salesman smiles politely and steps up to the set. Adjusting the dial he aligns it with the 'BBC' marker on the display and spends a couple of seconds fine tuning it. He steps back beaming. "There you go. Thanks very much, awfully kind of you, and there's only a couple of minutes left. Feel free to tune it to whatever you want when the programme finishes".

All characters in the dining room except Pedro,Strange - it's still the case that all you can hear is static. Must be something wrong with this chap...

For Pedro only,You hear the BBC news, currently an item about India.

"How very odd," says Rosa returning to her seat. "He seems to be happy with the tuning but I can't hear anything but static." She looks around the room, trying to gauge if anyone else is having problems with the wireless.

Helen looks up at Rosa's question and looks around the room. She shrugs her shoulders and makes a face, then says in a whisper loud enough to carry to the entire room, "What else would one expect from this centre of inbred country oafs. Don't you agree Exy dahling? Perhaps that strange noise is Czechoslovakian or some other ridiculous foreign lingo."

She turns her head and smiles at Pedro, "What do you think?"

To Exeter, Laws says. "Not a wink, old chap."

A bit later at the radio, he says. "Soon, we'll see the Lady in white, right?" He steps away from the malfunctioning apparatus and pulls Rosa by the elbow. "We off to the photographers yet?"

"Once we've finished breakfast, Dr Laws," replies Rosa. She glances out of the window to see if the weather has changed. "I think I'll be needing my coat and headscarf as well."

Helen also glances out the window and sighs,

Helen thinking:   no change still bloody awful

Looking at her empty coffee cup she addresses the company at the table, "Well, that's breakfast done. So if you're ready Rosa dear, shall we be off? Who knows we may even find an establishment that provides decent coffee"


Once more she briefly glances out the window to the gloomy rain swept streets of Keswick. "However" she adds, again in that loud whisper, "I somehow doubt it"

Yes, well, it's bally obvious it' not Czechoslovakian, is it, Hels? If you'll pardon the expression and all. This whole situation is highly unusual!

Exeter seems to ruffle his feathers and peers out of the window from his chair.

"What an idea to travel North, Pepe old boy, we should have gone to the Guernsey!"

Helen bridles at the misuse of her name by the obnoxious Count, but lets it pass.
"Yes Exy dahling, I'm sure you would have been much better suited to Guernsey. Still you toddle off to the library I feel certain that you will find something to interest you there, a Beatrix Potter perhaps?"

Finishing her breakfast, Rosa says, "Shall we go and grab our things and meet back at the reception in ten minutes?"

Pedro seems distracted with something he hears.

— Excuse me ladies, I was hearing something that caught my attention.You want to go now? Would you want a vehicle to get around in the rain? I can give you a ride.

For Abdul Alhazred,I can spend a point of credit rating for owning a car or buy one?