Read Online Just Desserts by Jan Jones - Free Book Online

heard laughter in the background and felt better. ‘It’s this Women’s Institute paperwork. I just don’t know where to start. The first entry in the minutes gives the names of those attending the inaugural meeting – including my grandmother, by the way – and the date of the next. But that’s just facts , Leo, and stilted little newspaper reports. A history shouldn’t be completely boring, should it?’
    â€˜Try fast-forwarding through the routine stuff until you get to anniversaries. One year on, five years, ten years. Quite often those are the times when reports are compiled. No sense you working things out from scratch if someone who was actually there has already written it up for you.’
    Penny was stunned at such a simple solution. ‘That’s brilliant!’
    â€˜I know,’ Leo said modestly. ‘It’s not foolproof, but it’s a good start.’
    â€˜Thanks. I’ll let you know how I get on. Are you having a nice weekend?’
    There was a slight pause. ‘Yeah. It’s good. See you next week.’
    â€˜OK.’
    She put the phone down. He wasn’t very happy, she thought. Oh, but what a good tip about looking for already-written accounts of the WI history. All of a sudden, the project had become far less daunting.
    Penny didn’t have to work too far forward to strike gold. At five years in, she found a history written by a Mrs Ingle, who had apparently been the one to put forward the idea of forming a Women’s Institute in Salthaven in the first place. Young and lively – to judge by the energetic tone of her writing – Henrietta had been off visiting friends and brought various cosmopolitan ideas back with her. She was at pains to point out in the account that the WI was a complementary organisation to the Women’s Voluntary Service. Penny guessed there had been comments about diluting the war effort! She hadn’t been the president, though. That honour had gone alternately to Lady Ribblethwaite and Mrs Barnes for the first few years.
    Penny sat back at that point. How interesting. The Ribblethwaites had owned Thwaite Hall for generations before death duties had forced them to sell it to be used as a retirement home. The Barnes family were prominent in the local business community. Neither set of descendants were friendly with the other and it looked as though, in those early days, the WI presidency had been a power struggle between old families and new money. It wasn’t the sort of tussle that could go into a sober account of the history of Salthaven WI unless she worded it very carefully. It was a pity Grandma Astley was no longer alive to ask. She’d have known the ins and outs of it for sure.
    Penny returned to Henrietta Ingle’s report. The first few years of the WI seemed to have been a lot livelier than they were now. There had been worthy lectures on Wartime Cooking, Make Do and Mend, and Writing Diaries in Code. But there had also been morale-boosting dances, birthday parties, and – intriguingly – exercises in diverting the enemy forces.
    Penny eyed the piles of paper on the table that she’d skipped over. It was no good. Her appetite had now been whetted. She was going to have to read through them anyway!
    â€˜I might have found your Famous Daughter, but you’ll have to work for it,’ said Penny on Monday. ‘I’m not going to have time to go through this lot, what with the show at the end of the week.’
    She was amused to see Leo look greedily at the Women’s Institute records. ‘Just my sort of thing,’ he said. ‘Who is she?’
    â€˜Henrietta Ingle. Only they all called each other Mrs and Miss in those days. Mrs Ingle got them fired up to start the WI and seems to have been the prime mover in some of the more adventurous escapades.’
    â€˜Escapades?’ Leo’s voice rose in disbelief.