2001 School Magazine

original works : 7 ^

May I SpeakTO The Boss? The crisp morning air was filled with the delicate scent of incense and jasmine. Brilliantly blue pools edged with bougainvillea lapped at the tiny bridges delicate Iy positioned above them. The morning shift at Ball's deluxe Sumbukl Hotel had started. Exotic birds chilluped above the red-roofed pagodas, lending a keenness and piquancy to the experience of being up at sunrise and watching the first scarlet and orange rays slip above the water All was wild confusion in the main restaurant Saucepans were hurled, full plates slid through hatches - people were everywhere at once. Only one maid was untouched by the hurricane sweeping through the pristine kitchens Ellen was cooking Mr Cramelli's breakfast Every morning, three loaded trays disappeared upstairs. When they returned, they would be completely bare. Clearly the boss had a large appetite though this was all they could guess about him. No one had seen Mr Cremelli in more than twenty years, no matter how they schemed. They all theorized and Invented as to why they had never seen him, but none of them was any closer to knowing why their mysterious boss refused to be seen They were confident of his past history, however if not of the present. His parents, secure and well-off in Naples, had been assailed by a wild fancy to go to bne of the islands. ' Two days after arriving in Bali, they decided to live there, infatuated with its sultry splendour A1ack of prudence and a rash ignorance of foreign travel meant they were soon victimised by the infamous Bali Belly. Three days later they were dead. The infant A1berto Cramelli was summarily handed over to a sympathetic Balinese lady No one ever thought to contact the enormous Neapolitan clan of Cramelli, and likewise family Cramelli assumed that their adventurous cousins were drinking coconut milk as they spoke. or over-seeing the rice paddles The blistering heat was dangerous. The heat-maddened servants would attack on sight. Tourists were out of the question, and in any case the majority were still asleep. but there was one easy mark for cruelty. Mary led the attack 'Hey. you no-good lazy cow. You call those eggs? You eat those and you come down with realBali Belly, I tell you You warina kill the boss, huh?' Mary continued with similar comments until the trays were ready, then she let fly with a Parthian shot - 'Hey, I see Chungo other day and I tell him you no good. You get fired soon. find newjob!' Ellen wheeled the trays out of the sweltering kitchen, her cheeks burning. As she passed reception, Sue called out. 'Could you take these up for me? Mr Cremellisaid it was ready, but I haven't yet got an answer. Why do we never see the man?' 'Sure, I take them, Sue, 'replied Ellen, as she tucked the document under the napkins Twenty-five years ago, a tourist suggested to Ellen that she work in tourism. Soon her quick mind was determined to run a hotel. She loved the tourists, and spent hours chatting to them. But would anyone believe a Balinese woman could run a hotel on the scale she intended to? The banks wouldn't even give her a loan. Therefore she must become a man Ellen carefully thought out the tale she would present to the world. She wove the tales of many tourists into It. adding threads of her own invention along the way. She hired an Italian man to impersonate'Mr Cremelli: but when he moved five years later, she gave up. No-one had seen their boss since then. nor had anyone uncovered her deception. Still. she could not risk discovery, being exposed as a laughingstock, which was why she still avoided seeing the staff Stretching, Ellen twined her feet around her lavish chair's mahogany legs. There was work to do. She began typing

DeorMory

You'reor3 service was OPPrecioted by the Sumbuk4 but OS of Mondayyourjob will be terminated Mary didn't matter anyway. Ellen could easily do the slothful Mary's work in twice the time Mary took A sum will be given toyou to enable you to fudanotherjbb

Good luck in the future,

A1berto Cramell!

Revenge was sweet!

F1izobeth Pointz 9Eng!and

Dono HDyes 10 Liney