There was a lino who ran a café, all on her own, at her own easy pace.
She had one or two customers a day, but since she liked taking things slowly, that suited her rather well.
At the end of the day's work she looked in the coffee-bag drawer of the red cupboard, and there were only a few coffee beans left. "Please deliver 100 grams of coffee beans," she telephoned the bean seller. "I'll be out tomorrow, so just leave them at the shop." Tomorrow, first thing, she was going out to pick strawberries and bake a lovely strawberry cake.
When Cafe Lino came back to the shop with her arms full of strawberries, there was a note on the door.
"Delivered 100 kilograms of coffee beans. Put them all inside."
The lino tilted her head, opened the door, and with a great whoosh a wave of coffee beans swallowed her up. "Oh dear. Not 100 grams. 100 kilograms have come," said the lino, buried in coffee beans.
So she swam, somehow, up through the sea of coffee beans, and found a gap under the ceiling just big enough for one face.
"I must telephone that scatterbrain," she was thinking, working out which way the telephone was, when from somewhere below came a squelch, squelch. The lino was gazing toward the sound when, with a pop, a gentleman's face came up. For a moment he only turned his head this way and that. Then he saw the lino and said, "One coffee."
"One coffee it is," said the lino, and swam over to about where she thought the cupboard must be, and dove.
Before long she found the red cupboard, managed to get it open, took beans from the little bag, fed them into the gap of the mill, and ground them. She couldn't use the gas flame, so she poured hot water from the thermos. Carrying the coffee she had somehow brewed, she came up toward where the customer had been, and happily, it was right in front of the gentleman's face.
The lino raised both arms and poured the coffee into a cup, and the gentleman drank it with some difficulty.
"That was delicious," he said, and went on his way. She was about to telephone the bean seller when a voice came from outside the shop.
It was the gentleman again. "...Excuse me! That was such good coffee, I'd like to buy some beans too!" So the lino answered, "Beans? Aren't there some in your pockets?" "Oh! My pockets are full of beans!" he said. "Then please take those!" she answered.
Now, she was about to dive down and telephone when again there came a squelch, squelch. Passersby who had overheard had come in for coffee.
And so, each time she tried to make the call, another customer's face would rise from the sea of beans, and the lino would swim off and make coffee. The customers kept surfacing without a pause, and she was terribly busy. By the time night had settled over the shop's roof, all those coffee beans were gone.
At last there were no more customers. She looked calmly into the coffee-bag drawer of the red cupboard, and there were only a few coffee beans left. "Please deliver 100 grams of coffee beans," she telephoned the bean seller. "I'll be out tomorrow, so just leave them at the shop."
Tomorrow she is going out to pick wild grapes, to make grape juice.
The end