The Secrets of Ice Cream Success (24 page)

Herbert stared at Carlo,
looking disgusted at the thought. ‘I’m not shaking hands with you!’
he said.

‘
You might
want to rethink that.’ Carlo said, indicating that Herbert should
look behind to where Mr Hill had arrived and was walking towards
them followed by a camera crew.

Herbert swore and stuck out his
hand. With a fixed grin he shook hands with Carlo, gripping
unnecessarily hard, before turning to greet his employer.

‘
That’s what I
like to see!’ Mr Hill brayed for the benefit of the camera.
‘Camaraderie in competition!’

Mr Hill continued to ramble on
to the interviewer as he took Herbert about the shoulders and
introduced him to the camera. Carlo took his opportunity to make a
quick exit to the safety of the Leodoni’s van.

As the day and the competition
drew to a close, it became clear that it was going to be very
close. Business had been brisk throughout the day for both teams
and despite the mid-afternoon shenanigans regarding busloads of
ringers, ghostly goings-on and insect laden ice cream, the day had
been a relative success. Leodoni’s was certainly back and the
public seemed happy.

Just after three o’clock the
town mayor arrived and made a big fuss of greeting Mr Hill in front
of the cameras before offering Carlo a half-hearted handshake. It
was obvious to all that he and Mr Hill were old friends and the
gang sensed that this did not bode well for their chances.

‘
We’re going
to lose.’ Ben said, watching the two old men chortling in front of
the media.

‘
You don’t
know that.’ Carlo said. ‘I’m sure the Mayor will be
fair.’

As they watched the Mayor
accepted a huge Hill’s Ice Cream cone from Herbert and made a comic
display of it being too big to fit in his mouth as photographer
from the local papers snapped away happily.

‘
We’re going
to lose.’ Abi echoed her brother. Carlo didn’t even bother to
reply. He knew she was probably right.

‘
I never liked
him.’ Luigi grumped from somewhere near the ceiling of the van.
‘Can I Ice Cream him?’

‘
No.’ Carlo
said automatically. ‘Well… perhaps.’ He amended.

With the afternoon of the first
town fair in fifteen years drawing on, there were still plenty of
customers to be found and most were stood politely waiting at the
Leodoni’s van, despite a rather despondent Mr Jones hanging out of
Hill’s hatch trying to attract the attention of a few passing fair
goers. As the final minutes before four o’clock counted down,
Lumsden and Carlo continued to serve as many people as possible
whilst the rest of the gang stood outside watching the hearty
backslapping and unnecessarily loud laughing that was taking place
across the way. The Hill’s van team seemed to have given up
actually serving ice cream in favour of cavorting with the mayor
who had at one point taken Mr Hill and Herbert on a tour of some of
the carnival rides in order to get some “juicy photo ops”. They
seemed all smiles as they returned with a matter of seconds
remaining as the Mayor hopped onto a small podium that had been
erected between the two competing vans and made a big show of
counting down the final 10 seconds of the competition to the small
crowd that had gathered.

Carlo handed out the last ice
cream of the day as the Mayor shouted ‘Three… two… one!’ and looked
at Lumsden who inspected the ice cream machine carefully and turned
back to his employer with a grin on his face.

‘
Almost eleven
litres.’ he said, giving a thumbs up.

Carlo did some quick
calculations. The machine could hold twelve litres and had been
refilled twice during the day. ‘Nearly thirty five!’ he said,
happily.

‘
That’ssss
good going for one day!’ Lunsden acknowledged, shaking Carlo’s
hand.

Lumsden busied himself wiping
down the van as Carlo jumped to find his father, fully visible,
peeking around the bonnet to see what was going on at the podium.
The Mayor was making at very tedious speech about the success of
the fair, which touched frequently on his own record in office.

‘
Dad, someone
will see you!’ Carlo said, standing next to Mr Leodoni.

‘
Shhh! I’m
listening.’

‘
But Dad!’
Carlo protested, only to be waved into silence once
more.

Looking around, Carlo was
thankful to see that no one was behind them, with all eyes on the
Mayor and Lumsden too busy inside the van to notice. Shrugging he
joined his father as the Mayor droned on.

‘…
of course,
both of these great companies are local institutions, serving the
good people of this county and beyond the Nation’s best ice cream
through the decades. My good friend Mr Hill opened his first
business serving his Ice Cream in the 1960s and he and I have
shared a tub of Hill’s best raspberry ripple on many occasions down
the years.’ He smiled indulgently at Mr Hill.

‘
I bet you
have.’ grumbled Luigi, making Carlo laugh.

‘
And our good
friends at Leodoni’s have been operating even longer.’ the Mayor
continued.

‘
Good
friends?’ Luigi muttered.

‘
I remember
enjoying Leodoni’s Ice Cream as a youngster.’ The Mayor said,
motioning to where Ben, Abi, Norton and Newton were standing in
front of the van, with Lumsden leaning through hatch. ‘Many people
will know that the very first Leodoni’s ice cream parlour opened in
1922 and, apart for a short period recently…’ the mayor said with a
strange smile and what appeared to be a wink at Mr Hill. ‘have
stood the test of time extremely well, passing down the reigns of
control from Grandfather, to father to Son.’

‘
Did you see
that?’ Carlo asked his Dad, who was seething next to him. Noticing
the look on his father’s face, he decided it was time to make an
appearance. ‘Look I’m going over. You just stay here and be… less
visible.’ he finished indicating Luigi’s presence.

His father looked as if he was
going to argue, but then sighed and nodded agreement. Carlo went to
pat him on the back in understanding, but found his hand drifting
through his father’s shoulder, so coughed as if nothing had
happened and strode past, around the van and towards podium to
whoops and applause from the Leodoni’s team.

‘
Ah, I see we
have both owners present now. So I think it’s time to collect the
results.’ the Mayor said, motioning to one of his staff who
immediately strode to each van, taking time to study the sales
figures and vending machines in each before making a note and
returning to podium where he handed the results back to
Mayor.

The Mayor took the paper,
flourished it in front of him and drew himself up to his full, if
not very impressive, height. ‘The results of the competition are as
follows. Hill’s Ice Cream, represented here by Mr Haverton Hill,
have today sold thirty three and a quarter litres of vanilla soft
scoop ice cream!’

A polite round of applause
rippled around the crowd, many of whom had gathered without really
knowing what they were watching. Carlo looked over to his team to
see Abi and Newton clapping politely, whilst Ben steadfastly
refused to do so and Norton merely looked bored. Lumsden, however,
had a smile on his face and threw a wink at Carlo. “He knows we’ve
won” Carlo thought to himself, trying not to smile. He gave Lumsden
a little nod and turned back to the Mayor.

‘
Leodoni’s Ice
Cream, represented here by Master Giancarlo Leodoni, have today
sold thirty four and a half litres of ice cream.’

There was a slight pause as
everyone caught up with the Mayor’s pronouncement before a huge
shout erupted from Lumsden, Abi, Newton and Ben, before finally
being joined by Norton who had initially struggled with the maths
and finally gave in assuming the cheers were a sign of victory.

Carlo gave a slight wave to
acknowledge the cheers and polite applause from the crowd before
beckoning his team to silence with his hands and a smile. He was
determined not to let Mr Hill see him acting in anything but a
professional manner.

‘
So I believe
this make’s Leodoni’s the winner of today’s fun competition.’ the
Mayor continued, ‘And I am to understand there was a penalty for
losing? Haverton, my old friend, it seems you are to be… err,
dunked?’

Mr Hill attempted a smile but
couldn’t really hide a grimace at the thought of the impending loss
of dignity.

‘
Your
Lordship, if I may?’ Carlo asked stepping towards the
podium.

The Mayor nodded as the gang
looked on slightly confused, whilst Carlo whispered something to
the Mayor who eventually nodded again and beamed at the crowd.

‘
Excellent
news!’ he brayed. ‘In the spirit of fun and solidarity with his
fellows in the Ice Cream Community, Master Leodoni has offered to
also take a good dunking!’

Carlo bowed to the crowd as his
friends started cheering again.

‘
I now have to
go and judge the “Largest Turnip” competition, but I shall see you
all at the fairground in thirty minutes. Hard luck, Haverton.’ The
mayor finished shaking hands with his friend before bustling away,
still followed by a herd of journalists.

Carlo happened to glance at Mr
Hill as the crowd dispersed and found the older man staring
intently at him. ‘Well played, sir,’ Carlo said, offering his hand,
‘I think we can claim today as a success for both companies.’

Mr Hill looked at Carlo’s hand
with distaste, as if being offered a dead fish, before turning and
striding back to his employees bellowing for Herbert to attend
him.

‘
Not so
friendly when the cameras aren’t around.’ Carlo mused, and with a
shrug set off back to his team only to find them rushing towards
him sporting huge grins.

‘
We won!’
screamed Newton and Abi.

‘
You’re going
to get dunked!’ shouted Ben and Norton.

Lumsden strolled up behind them
and took Carlo’s hand in a firm grip, shaking it enthusiastically.
‘Great job, Sssssir. Great job! I think your Dad would be very
proud.’

Carlo beamed at the attention
and happened to glance up to see a piece of paper floating oddly
above the van with the words “We Won” scrawled across it in large
letters. Hoping that anyone who noticed it would mistake it for a
piece of paper caught in a slightly strange breeze, Carlo grinned
back at his Lumsden. ‘I think he is, yes.’

Not long after everyone
gathered at the fairground to witness the dunking. The apparatus
itself was an old piece of equipment consisting of a chair hung
over a large wooden tub filled with what the operator, Mr Gardener,
called “gunge”, a green substance which he assured was mainly
corn-starch, water and food dye, though Norton suggested, and
probably hoped, there were some less savoury ingredients in
there.

The chair was suspended over
the tub by a large metal arm, which in turn was part of a mechanism
that was activated when a target to the left of the tub was hit
cleanly with a heavy sack ball. Only a direct hit would cause the
chair to tip forward, ejecting the occupant into the tub of gunge.
Behind the chair and tub the hydraulic apparatus disappeared
through a hole cut in large plywood screen with the words
Gardener’s Gunge Tank painted on it in bright colours, which
prevented the customers seeing or indeed hitting the expensive
equipment that powered the chair.

Ben and Norton had to be
restrained from investigating the tub further as the crowd gathered
and the Mayor smiled his way to the front where, what Abi had
christened his “Swiss Army Travel Podium”, had once again been
erected from out of nowhere. He raised his hands towards the sky to
request silence and noticing only a slight dampening of the
revelry, he coughed loudly, before one of his aides shouted ‘Quiet
Please!’ to finally achieve a semblance of attention.

The Mayor then took the
opportunity of an audience to drone on about the success of the
day, a speech he had given on three previous occasions already when
judging the Largest Turnip, Cutest baby and Most Comical Hat
competitions, all three of which had apparently been entered by Mrs
Lumsden and their young child.

The opposing Ice Cream teams
stood to either side of the Mayor awaiting their introduction
whilst Mr Gardener stood proudly next to his machine, beaming like
George Stephenson next to his Rocket Locomotive, but a lot less
impressive. Occasionally the gunge bubbled ominously.

The Mayor finally moved on to
the competition and described the day in thoroughly tedious detail
before bringing everyone’s attention to the final score and the
decision that both Carlo and Mr Hill would subsequently be dunked.
This brought a large cheer from the crowd who were beginning to
grow bored and two dunkings were better than one.

Mr Hill, shadowed by Herbert
was joined at the podium by Carlo as The Mayor flipped a coin,
asking Mr Hill to call a side as it span in the air.

‘
Heads!’ he
barked as the coin arced and fell, bouncing off the outstretched
hand of the Mayor and landing in the well-trodden dirt, tails up.
Mr Hill glared at the Mayor as if this was his fault.

‘
So, Master
Leodoni, you win the toss, so I believe Mr Hill will be the
first…’

‘
I volunteer!’
Carlo interrupted, sensing a “Final Straw” moment on the horizon
with Mr Hill having already lost the competition. Carlo decided to
spare him the worry of being the first to be dunked seeing his face
grow redder and temper rising. Mr Hill nodded and grunted an
acknowledgement that may have been a grateful thanks had he not
followed it with a baleful stare at Carlo. The Mayor, deciding to
ignore his old friend’s mood, clapped his hands together and said
‘Shall we?’ to Carlo, steering the young man towards Mr Gardener
who was still beaming away.