THE most I could pay you is $20.
The child who had uttered these words looked around 10 years old. She wore a jumper featuring a Welsh terrier in a Christmas hat. Funny coincidence, was my thought at the time. My brother George and I have a Welshie; George had taken him out for his morning walk five minutes before this girl knocked on our door.
Her name was Lauryn Redgate. She turned out to be 13. She took three mince pies from the plate I offered her; her manner suggested no one was going to stop her, though no one had tried. She had made an appointment in the proper way and arrived on time; to some, this dual achievement might sound insignificant, yet it is a hurdle that fells more than half of George's and my adult clients. I was rather sorry that I was about to have to inform this child that we weren't able to take on under-18s as clients.
'I know $20 is almost nothing, but... well, this involves the attempted murder of a family member,' the girl said solemnly. 'Of mine and of yours, Mr Danes.'
'We have a relative in common?' I resisted the urge to offer my sympathies. George and I earned the strident disapproval of most of our family when we'd decided to set up as 'The Generalists' instead of going to university. They hated our description of our offering even more: 'Do you have a problem too outlandish or complex for any normal category of professional? Then you need The Generalists! No challenge too big, small, embarrassing or weird.'
It is, of course, understandable to worry if one's nearest and dearest choose an unconventional and untested path in life; less so, I would argue, once they are bringing in multiple six figures a year as the only operators in a ravenous market, the existence of which is denied by most. The Daneses are as stubborn as they are evidence-resistant, however.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 13 - 20, 2023 (Double Issue) من Country Life UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك ? تسجيل الدخول
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة December 13 - 20, 2023 (Double Issue) من Country Life UK.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
Give it some stick
Galloping through the imagination, competitive hobby-horsing is a gymnastic sport on the rise in Britain, discovers Sybilla Hart
Paper escapes
Steven King selects his best travel books of 2024
For love, not money
This year may have marked the end of brag-art’, bought merely to show off one’s wealth. It’s time for a return to looking for connoisseurship, beauty and taste
Mary I: more bruised than bloody
Cast as a sanguinary tyrant, our first Queen Regnant may not deserve her brutal reputation, believes Geoffrey Munn
A love supreme
Art brought together 19th-century Norwich couple Joseph and Emily Stannard, who shared a passion for painting, but their destiny would be dramatically different
Private views
One of the best ways-often the only way-to visit the finest privately owned gardens in the country is by joining an exclusive tour. Non Morris does exactly that
Shhhhhh...
THERE is great delight to be had poring over the front pages of COUNTRY LIFE each week, dreaming of what life would be like in a Scottish castle (so reasonably priced, but do bear in mind the midges) or a townhouse in London’s Eaton Square (worth a king’s ransom, but, oh dear, the traffic) or perhaps that cottage in the Cotswolds (if you don’t mind standing next to Hollywood A-listers in the queue at Daylesford). The estate agent’s particulars will give you details of acreage, proximity to schools and railway stations, but never—no, never—an indication of noise levels.
Mission impossible
Rubble and ruin were all that remained of the early-19th-century Villa Frere and its gardens, planted by the English diplomat John Hookham Frere, until a group of dedicated volunteers came to its rescue. Josephine Tyndale-Biscoe tells the story
When a perfect storm hits
Weather, wars, elections and financial uncertainty all conspired against high-end house sales this year, but there were still some spectacular deals
Give the dog a bone
Man's best friend still needs to eat like its Lupus forebears, believes Jonathan Self, when it's not guarding food, greeting us or destroying our upholstery, of course
