‘Yes. I just hit my head when Titan smacked me in the ear.’
Felix stared at her, as if he was wondering whether he’d been transported into some strange parallel-universe. ‘The cat smacked you in the ear?’
‘It normally means he’s hungry or someone wants me,’ Daisy elaborated. ‘If I’m working on one of the engines, I don’t always hear people come in. So they tell him to fetch me. He kind of thinks he’s a dog. Or maybe a human, I’m not sure.’
A second later, the cat leapt from the engine onto her shoulder; absent-mindedly, she scratched behind his ears and he began to purr.
‘Or Captain Flint?’ Felix suggested, the corners of his mouth tilting.
Long John Silver’s parrot. Daisy’s smile was genuine for the first time. If the man had a sense of humour, it would take the edge off his pristine appearance—and it meant that maybe she could work with him. ‘I’ve been trying to teach him to talk, but I’m afraid he’s sticking with “meow” rather than “pieces of eight”.’
‘Daisy, would you show Felix round for me?’ Bill asked.
‘Course I will.’ She looked at her uncle, narrowing her eyes slightly. He really didn’t look that well. She made a mental note to have a word with Nancy and find out what Bill wasn’t telling her about his health. Maybe it was just the worry about the fairground and whether their new visitor was going to invest in them or consider a big sponsorship deal. She could identify with that; she hadn’t slept particularly well for the last few nights, either.
So she’d better put on a good show when she took Felix round the site, because she had no intention of letting her uncle down, or the part-time staff and volunteers who’d stood by them for years. If getting Felix Gisbourne to invest in them meant schmoozing, then she’d schmooze to Olympic gold medal standard.
Gently, she lifted the cat from her shoulder and set him back on the engine. ‘We’re going walkies. See you in a bit, OK?’
Titan purred.
‘I’ll bring Mr Gisbourne back to the office when I’ve shown him round, Bill.’
Bill smiled at her. ‘Thanks, love.’
When Bill had left the workshop, she turned to Felix. ‘What would you like to see first, Mr Gisbourne?’
‘Felix,’ he corrected. ‘I prefer informality.’
‘With that suit?’ She clapped a hand to her mouth in horror as soon as the words were out. So much for the promise to herself to schmooze the guy. Why had she opened her mouth? ‘Sorry. Forget I said that. Please,’ she added belatedly.
‘Whatever. Just walk me round and tell me what I’m looking at,’ Felix said.
‘OK. First off, this is a working museum, so our collection here is original rather than replica. But we believe that it’s better for them to be used than just moulder away in glass cases while people look at them and think, “So what?” We want people to enjoy them, just like they have for the last hundred or so years. To get the real experience of an old-fashioned fairground.’
‘You have rides dating from the 1800s?’ he asked, sounding surprised.
‘Yes. The gallopers date from 1895.’ She shrugged. ‘But I imagine you saw them in the paper.’
He nodded. ‘Have they found whoever did it?’
‘Not yet. Though, when they do, I’d like to have them under my command for a week,’ Daisy said.
‘So you could teach them a lesson?’
‘It depends what you mean by lesson. When I saw what they’d done, I admit I was furious. But when I’d calmed down a bit, I realised that if they’re the kind who enjoy smashing things up, it’s a fair bet they’ve grown up where nobody around them respected anything and they’ve learned to value nothing. If they worked for me, it’d give them a channel for their energy, and they might learn that they have a talent for something. It’d give them some self-respect—and that’s the first step to being able to respect others.’
‘So you’d let them off without punishment?’ Felix said.
She spread her hands. ‘Chucking kids in jail won’t solve the problem—if they’re stuck somewhere without an outlet for their energy, they’ll brood and get more resentful, and they’ll lash out as soon as they’re out again. I want to show them that there’s another way. Give them an interest and a stake in things. They’re not going to destroy something they’ve spent time building—they’ll want to protect it.’
He nodded. ‘So you see the good in people.’
His face was impassive; was he saying that was a bad thing? Maybe it was, where business was concerned. ‘Look, I’m not naïve enough to look at things through rose-coloured glasses, but seeing the good in things is a lot healthier than being cynical and believing that everyone’s out solely for what they can get.’
‘Indeed.’
‘There’s good and bad in everyone. The trick is finding how to maximise the good and minimise the bad.’ She stopped, realising that she was getting carried away. ‘Anyway, you didn’t come here to listen to me on my soapbox. You want to see what we have here.’ She took him round each ride, explaining their history as she did so. ‘All the ones before 1935 were built by our family’s firm. Though I couldn’t resist the 1950s dodgems when we had the chance to buy them.’
Felix asked lots of questions as they walked round; each one seemed to be more critical than the last. By the time they reached the last ride—Daisy’s favourite, the old switchback gondola—she’d had enough of his blatant criticism, and her intention of schmoozing him dissolved. She faced him, folding her arms. ‘You seem to have a problem with just about everything I’ve told you, and I get the impression you think that Bill and I are amateurs. Let me tell you, he’s run this place for nearly thirty years, and I’ve been working here for ten of them. He does a damn good job and you’re judging him unfairly.’
‘I’m assessing the business. It’s what I do—and I’m good at it,’ Felix replied, looking completely unfazed.
‘This is what we do, and we’re good at it,’ Daisy countered, lifting her chin and wishing that she was six inches taller and fifty pounds heavier. If she were five feet ten and hefty, maybe he’d take her seriously.
‘You might be a brilliant mechanic and understand everything to do with how the rides work and their history, but your business sense leaves a lot to be desired—and so does Bill’s. There are lots of areas where you could be making money and you’re not taking advantage of them, and you’re definitely not using your assets to their full potential. That’s why you don’t have the money to cope with any setbacks, such as the vandalism. Your margins are way too tight.’
‘This is heritage, Mr Gisbourne,’ she said frostily.
‘Felix,’ he corrected.
Daisy deliberately didn’t repeat his first name. ‘The whole point of this place, Mr Gisbourne, is to make our heritage accessible to people. There are so few of these rides left, and even fewer of them are in working order; quite a few of those here were just left to rot, and we’ve rescued them and restored them.’
‘Without enough money to run the place, you’re not going to be able to make it accessible to people or afford the restoration costs. You’ll go under. So you need to compromise.’
‘That’s why we’re looking at sponsorship deals.’ It was the whole point as to why he’d come to see them, wasn’t it? To see what they could offer him and what he could offer them?
His eyes narrowed as he looked at her. ‘You’re not a woman who compromises easily, are you?’
Daisy