Episode 107

🎼. Dum ti dum ti dum ti dum...

(sound of hens clucking)

Shula:  Hello, Mum, are you in here ?

Jill:  Oh hello, darling, I’m just collecting all the eggs I can find in the hen house.  I’ve got a lot of cakes to bake this  morning.  Ooh, that’s a nasty bruise on your elbow.

Shula:  Just a little riding accident, nothing serious.

Jill:  What can I do for you, Shula ?

Shula:  I hear your baking is in big demand at the moment, Mum.

Jill:  Well, it’s nice to be appreciated.  When you get to my age, people think you’re an old bat who needs help getting in and out of cars or going up and down steps when really you still have the mental age of a seventeen-year-old.

Shula:  That’s what I’ve come to talk to you about.

Jill:  Oh dear, I feel a sermon coming on.  Can’t you go and practise on someone else ?

Shula:  I’m not practising, Mum.  I’m very worried that the police are going to find out exactly what goes into your lemon drizzle cake and when they do, you could end up like Freddy.

Jill:  I don’t know what you’re talking about.  Freddy is a delightful young man and I couldn’t be prouder of him as my grandson, even if he has been in prison.

Shula:  I am talking about you putting veterinary drugs into your lemon drizzle cake and then selling it round the village.  I know from personal experience what happens if you eat that cake and can never look Jakob in the eye again.  Can you deny it ?

Jill: No, but it’s your fault, really.  It started out as something for my personal use only but then you took a piece from Brookfield and it all got out of hand.

Shula:  So why are you still making it ?

Jill:  Have you never heard of the placebo effect ?  I make the cake, minus the aphrodisiac, and people feel it has the same effect.  What I sell is perfectly harmless.

Shula:  Well, that’s a relief. I had visions of you being hauled off to jail.  At this rate there’ll be more Archers with criminal records than Horrobins !

Jill:  There’s no need to worry, Shula.  As long as the police don’t raid Brookfield and find my personal stash, I’m perfectly safe.

🎼. Dum ti dum ti dum ti dum...

(Ed.  Shula might be about to fall on her other elbow.)

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