May 23

A couple of years ago, a Canadian woman and her Kiwi boyfriend stayed.  They were very friendly and chatty, but, to use John's words, 'shifty'.  They had not paid us when they arrived, citing a problem with having money sent to them.  On the day they were due to leave, I was sitting out on the veranda and saw them get in their hire car and go.  I quickly ran to the cottage and found a note that read something like this: 'Dear John and Bryony, thank you for a lovely stay.  Sorry we did not see you before we left, but we didn't know where to find you.'

Didn't know where to find us?  Try the great big house next to the cottage for starters!  I leapt in my car and zoomed off down the road, only to find them at Spar.  Of course there was the 'Oh dear, I can't believe we didn't pay!' stuff accompanied by big wide eyes of astonishment.  I made sure they drove ahead of me back to the house where they counted out all their money in very small change. 

In our first year, we also had two ballroom dancers from Harare stay for a weekend. They were very young, about eighteen or nineteen and obviously totally unskilled at being crafty. The cottage had been booked by one of their mothers who knew a friend of ours who often used to stay.  They came for some sort of ballroom dancing competition, and then had sneaked an extra friend into the cottage.

I often think that if you are going to do something illegal or deceitful, do it in the open because then no one will think what you are doing is wrong.  When you see people in films, looking in all directions before entering a room or quickly darting into a building, they look so obviously suspicious that you can't understand why they aren't nabbed at once.  People in dark sunglasses and long coats with the collars turned up may as well walk round with a board on them saying: "I am a criminal".

These people were equally unskilled.  I just happened to see them come out of the front door of the cottage, look quickly left and right and then, BENT OVER, scurry to their car and jump in!  How suspicious is that?  The extra guest even left her makeshift bed on the floor while they went out for breakfast.

John soon sorted the 'issue' out by phoning the mother and telling her what happened.  'Leave it with me' were her words and soon after, we received payment for the third guest.

The moral of both stories is this: if you are going to be a good criminal, you need to be clever.  It's much easier to be honest.