The 'Cousins'

Part Sixty-Nine: Ali Has a Surprise for Greg

 This chapter is dedicated to @CarolinaC. Her radio serial, 'Daring Dashwood's Wasteland Wanders' is as hilarious as it is zany and well worth following for those times when you need a belly laugh to give you a lift.

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A/N: This chapter continues when Greg comes back from his meeting at the bank and meets up with Ali and Tomas in the stable to see what they have been doing while he has been away.Now read on:-

Part Sixty-Nine

Timeline: 11:25, Friday 20th April. Town Hall Stables.

Ali took a deep breath, pursed his lips, exhaled nosily and pointed at the ragged green lines he and Tomas had painted on the cobbled floor of the stable. 

“You can see we gone to a whole lot of trouble to get these lines  straight as we can over them stones and in  the right places.”

Greg scratched his ear in confusion and snapped. “Gimme that plan from Wayne.”

Ali handed it over with a loud chuckle in which Tomas joined in adding to Greg’s confusion. Greg held the plan out at arms length to compare it to the fresh, green lines on the floor.  Ali and Tomas stood watching with grins of amusement, saying nothing until Greg angrily waved the plan in their faces.

“What the hell are you two playing at? You've changed everything around. You’ve painted lines for things where I said we had to keep the space clear for the trailer. Are you two playing me for some sort of a sucker? Here I am…”

That was as far as he got before Ali put a finger across his lips smiling broadly. Greg stood dumbfounded as Ali took over the conversation.

“Take it easy Mr. Mitchell. We done this like this ‘cos we don’t think it’d work the way you had it down on that paper there.” Ali smiled kindly at Greg and continued.

 “Before I tell yer what me and Tomas done here while you been gone, I need to make sure I got it right what you told me about how this thing will run.” Greg still seethed, but stood silent, nodding his acquiescence.

For the next five minutes Ali repeated from memory all that Greg had told him about the mechanics of the intended waste oil refining operation. The big man lost all semblance of his belligerence as he involved himself in the details of the process, which he repeated with a growing enthusiasm for the work. Greg listened more closely to Ali, astounded by how much the man had retained of the rather sketchy and hurried briefing Greg had delivered before he had hurried away to his meeting at the bank. 

Ali spoke without consulting the notes he had written down during that briefing. Yet, to Greg’s amazement, it was all there. His doubts about these men turned again to a warming confidence in them. Greg was impressed and became aware that the secret of working painlessly with these men was to involve them in the details of what he was doing, and keeping them busy.

“Did I miss sumpun'?” Ali stood smiling, arms akimbo, confident he had repeated it all.

Greg had momentarily lapsed into thinking these other thoughts and shook himself free of them to concentrate on the matter in hand.

“Ehh. Yes Ali, you got it all there. Well done. But what you didn’t say was what we're going to do about the trailer and why the plan won’t work the way Wayne had it laid  out.”

Ali slapped his hands together and loped over to the doorway.

“Let’s get all talk of that there trailer out o' the way first. You did say you’re gonna have to buy a trailer and a portable air compressor to drive barrel pumps to pull behind the truck for making waste oil collections?”