Free Sisterchicks Go Brit! by Robin Jones Gunn

you made up your minds, then?” the driver asked.
    “We could stay here,” I suggested.
    “That means I’ll have to call the hotel in London again and cancel before six o’clock. I hate doing that.”
    “Well, we can go back into the station and take the express coach. I’m fine with whatever.”
    The driver stretched his hand through the separating window. He held out his cell phone. “Would you like to use my mobile?”
    “No, thanks. That’s okay.” Kellie reached for the door handle. “We can find a phone booth.”
    The driver kept his hand extended with the phone. His cocky grin didn’t leave his face. “I’m sure it’s not my place to mention this, but if the two of you weren’t able to find the right coach to London, what might your odds be of finding a phone booth this evening?”
    He was right, and it was funny. But neither of us was ready to laugh about it. Not right then.
    Kellie reached for his phone. Her cancellation call took only a few minutes.
    I asked the driver, “What hotel do you recommend here in Oxford?”
    “I have just the one. I’ll take you there directly.” He pulled into the traffic, and we inched our way down a street that obviously was designed centuries before the first automobile puttered through Oxford. The stone walls and brick buildings were as charming, if not more so, than the simple cottages in Olney.
    “Oxford seems much older than I expected.” I tried to steer the mood away from the gloom that had settled on Kellie.
    “That we are, mum. We’re a college town, you know. Sixty colleges.”
    “Sixty?”
    “That’s right. Students have come here for hundreds of years. Have you heard of the poet Byron?”
    “Yes, of course.”
    “He called Oxford the town with the ‘dreaming spires.’ Many greats—poets, authors, statesmen, England’s finest—havecalled Oxford home at one time or another in their noteworthy lives. You might find you’ll want to stay longer than a day or two.”
    “I’ve read a lot of books by British authors,” I told the driver.
    “Have you a favorite?”
    “C. S. Lewis,” I said. “The Narnia tales are wonderful, of course, but I think my favorites are the space trilogy.
Perelandra
is my all-time favorite.”
    “Ah! Then you’ve come to the right town, and you’ve found the right cabby. I can drive you past Magdalen College where Lewis taught.” The way he pronounced the word
Magdalen
, it sounded like Mawd-lynn.
    “Is the college far from here?” I asked.
    “Not at all. Would you like me to take you?” He put on the turn signal.
    “No,” Kellie answered for both of us. “I think we should go to the hotel first.”
    “Right, then.” He kept driving and caught my gaze in his rearview mirror. “You’ve heard of the Inklings, now haven’t you?”
    “Yes.” I knew that was the name of a writers’ group Lewis and Tolkien belonged to for many years. This, however, didn’t seem like the best time to show off my interest in Lewis lore since Kellie was in a gulley.
    Secretly, I was pretty excited about ending up in Oxford. I hoped I could talk Kellie into some touring in the morning before going to London.
    I couldn’t believe I now was willing to delay our arrival in London, but here we were, right in the middle of Oxford. Many of my favorite British authors had lived here.
    Our driver was explaining a bit about the Inklings—bits I already knew—but then he added, “They met at the Eagle and Child Pub, in the Rabbit Room. You can have a look at the pub whenever you like. Of course, the Rabbit Room sounds more in keeping with the literary themes of the other Lewis.”
    “Lewis Carroll?” I ventured.
“Alice in Wonderland
? The White Rabbit?”
    The driver grinned. “You do know your British literature, don’t you?”
    “I read a lot when I was younger.”
    “Do you know his real name?” the driver asked.
    “Who? Lewis Carroll? No, I don’t.”
    “Ah! So I can teach you something. It was Charles Lutwidge