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.She didn’t mind the slow pace.It was peaceful, with only the call of the bellbirds and the noisy darting of scarlet and blue rosella parrots, to interrupt the silence.A broken wooden sign with peeling white paint lying on the ground caught her eye.Hotel was all it said.Queenie stopped and dismounted.An overgrown track led into the grove of pines.It was only one hundred yards through the pines when she came across two stone posts and rusty grand gates hanging crookedly at the end of a driveway.She looped the reins over the gate and walked up the driveway, past the old fountain and overgrown gardens, and caught her breath as she saw for the first time … the hotel.It looked like it had fallen off a Bavarian mountain — a pastiche of a romantic, fantasy castle, its turrets, balconies and domed roofs faded and peeling.The building was immense, perched on the edge of the cliff facing the breadth of the valley.All the rooms looked across to the Kurrajong Mountains — sandstone cliffs capped by dense bush.Once-formal gardens ran in tiers on either side of the building.Queenie spent an hour wandering about entranced, attempting to peer through dusty windows and stained glass doors.It was impossible to tell how many rooms and chimneys there were, but it had all been built on a grand and lavish scale.A growing feeling of excitement crept over her as she stood on the deserted terrace.Then she swivelled on her heel and marched purposefully back down the drive, mounted the browsing horse and kicked her into a reluctant trot back to the farm.The next day Queenie visited a local real estate agent who scratched his head and confessed he didn’t know a thing about the old hotel.‘Been closed up for years.Used to be a real posh place in the twenties, from pictures I’ve seen.Then it got a bit seedy … was the place blokes brought their girlfriends for a dirty weekend.Then it finally folded.No, I don’t know who owns it.It’s not listed for sale, that I can tell you! No one in their right mind would buy it.Motels get all the trade now.’Queenie returned to the Paragon for a coffee and unearthed some more local knowledge.The hotel had been built by a British shipping magnate just before the First World War, and she was told that there was a lot of information about it in the local historical society.In the small museum Queenie found a helpful old man who agreed to do a little detective work for her.‘I want to find out who owns it and if they’ll sell it.’‘My goodness, whatever for?’‘It’s a hotel, isn’t it?’The old man simply shook his head and took Queenie’s phone number in Sydney.John and Sarah were aghast when she told them her plan.‘A hotel in the mountains? Nobody goes there.’‘They will when I open the Kurrajong.’‘How much work is there to do? It may be beyond restoring.’‘I have the keys and I’m taking a builder up to check it out on Wednesday.I’d like you both to come.’John muttered all the way to the mountains, listing the negative aspects and the craziness of the whole idea.Until he saw it.Then he, too, fell under the spell of the building and its setting.‘It’s like a dream,’ breathed Sarah.‘A fairy-tale place.’‘But it certainly needs work,’ said John.‘Do you still think I’m crazy?’‘Yes!’ They both laughed.In the cold, rational light of the next day, Queenie explained to John that her plan to restore the old hotel was based on more than a romantic whim.There was a huge swing towards interest in nostalgia and ‘the good old days’.Life styles were changing, the affluent middle class and young couples were looking for weekend pastures.There was a creeping awareness of environmental and conservation movements and with the peaceful and beautiful Blue Mountains only one and a half hours from Sydney, it’s time for resuscitation was near.The negotiations went smoothly.A tired old man, the last of the family who originally built the hotel, was only too happy to have this white elephant off his hands.He readily agreed to Queenie’s absurdly low offer.Triumphantly she told Millie and Saskia.‘We’re in the hotel business.I’ve called it the Kurrajong and it’s going to put the Blue Mountains back on the map as a tourist resort.You wait and see.’Saskia hugged her mother in delight, thinking it a great adventure.Millie raised a sceptical eyebrow.‘Is it going to make money?’‘That’s the idea, Millie.I’m moving closer to my dream — I know it.’Later, Queenie sat in John’s office with the final papers and picked up the pen.John stilled her hand with his.‘Are you absolutely sure you want to sink all your savings into this crazy venture?’‘Yes, I am.Would you?’‘I’m not sure.I bought that waterfront place so thankfully I’m not forced to decide.It’s a big gamble … but if you pull it off …’Queenie patted his hand and signed the documents.‘There, it’s done now, for better or worse.’Queenie spent the next few weeks travelling to and from the mountains, drawing up plans, seeking advice and quotations, and getting a pile of paperwork from the council.It was while waiting for some documents to be certified at the council that she idly mentioned to the fellow behind the counter that she had decided on renovating a hotel rather than a whole street of houses in Randwick.‘What street in Randwick?’ asked the councillor with sudden interest.‘George Street, beautiful oldhomes that …’‘Lady, were you ever smart.’‘What do you mean?’‘They’re putting a freeway through there, the whole lot are coming down.I gather the guy that bought it lost a packet.Someone pulled a bit of a swifty on him.’‘Who was it, do you know?’‘Yeah, some Italian millionaire — or now ex millionaire — Camboni.That was the name.Apparently he paid way over the odds in the first place.’‘Too bad,’ said Queenie, picking up her papers, and smiling, left the council chambers [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]