Further Titles in the Series by Andrew C. Rouse

Level A2

Mr Codie of Scotland Yard

The British Pub

The Ride of Johnny Ringo

Level B1

My Christmases

Tales from Watchet

Small Ads

Level B2

The English Village

For all levels

with Audrey V. Rouse

Eating Around Britain

Further Titles in the Series

Level A2

István Fekete Thorn Castle

(Tüskevár)

Hungarian Folk Tales

(Magyar népmesék)

Hungarian Legends

(Magyar mondák)

Level B1

Frigyes Karinthy Please, Sir

(Tanár úr kérem)

László L. Lőrincz The Shame of the Great Dome

(A Nagy Kupola szégyene)

Ferenc Molnár The Paul Street Boys

(A Pál utcai fiúk)

Level B1

István Csukás Bowler Hat and Red Nose

(Keménykalap és krumpliorr)

Frigyes Karinthy A Journey Round My Skull

(Utazás a koponyám körül)

Géza Ottlik School at the Frontier

(Iskola a határon)

Small Ads

B1 (1100 headwords)

Written by ANDREW C. ROUSE

Illustrated by RONTÓ LILI

ISBN 978 963 05 9317 5

ISSN 2062-6150

Published by Akadémiai Kiadó,

member of the

Association of Hungarian Publishers and Booksellers

founded in 1795.

1117 Budapest, Prielle Kornélia u. 21–35.

www.akademiaikiado.hu

First edition: 2012

© ANDREW C. ROUSE, 2012

© AKADÉMIAI KIADÓ, 2012

Responsible for publication: Director of Akadémiai Kiadó

Responsible for editing: POMÁZI GYÖNGYI

Managing Editor: KÁCSOR LÓRÁNT

Page-Setting: LACZKÓ LÁSZLÓ

Cover Design: SÜTŐ RÓBERT

Technical Editor: KISS ZSUZSA

Print: Akadémiai Nyomda

Managing Director: UJVÁROSI LAJOS

Copyrights are the sole property of the copyright owners

listed above. Any copying, distributing and reproducing in any form

(electronically, mechanically, by print or photography)

without prior permission of all copyright owners is prohibited.

Printed in Hungary

This book is dedicated to my parents,
without whom I would not be here to write this book.

Small Ads

PREFACE

The titles of the four stories in this book are all real advertisements that I found in English newspapers. But I made the stories up afterwards, so I don’t know the real Mr. Phillpots, or Julia Wroughton, or the cat owner in Sussex, or the person who lost the silver ring. I only know my Mr. Phillpots and the rest of the characters in the book. They are all fictitious.

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

When you are reading in your own language, you want to enjoy what you are reading. This is very true when you are reading a novel or a story. Of course, when you are reading something in a language you are learning, you sometimes have problems. There are words and phrases that you do not know, and then you must go to a dictionary.

When I wrote these four stories, I was thinking, “Could Magdi or Viktor or Péter read these stories and enjoy them?” These three Hungarians started learning English when they were adults. They made a lot of mistakes when they spoke, but they knew a lot, and they all went on to pass intermediate English exams and to use English in their work.

Even in your own language, you do not always know every word you read, but you guess the meaning from the rest of the words. Try to do this when you are reading these stories. Only look the words up when you cannot understand the part of the story.

To help you, there is a short list of words and phrases that you may not know, at the end of the book. Look at them before you start, and then you may remember them when you meet them in the story, and you won’t have to stop to find out what they mean.

Most of all I hope you will say to yourself, “I am enjoying this,” not because the stories are easy to read, but because they are good stories.

ENGLISH ANCESTRY

If a person walked past the house Mr. Cholmondely Phillpots lived in, he would perhaps think, “What a nice old house!” But probably he wouldn’t think anything, because every house in Winchelsea Road, and the other streets leading off Winchelsea Road, looked exactly the same. If he went up to the door of No57, though, he would see that in the wall next to it there were six doorbells. Apart from the kitchen, the toilet and the bathroom, there were six rooms in No57. Mr. Cholmondely Phillpots, M.A., lived in one of these rooms.

There was a brass plaque screwed on to the door of Mr. Phillpots’ room. It read: C. Phillpots M.A. Specialist in Ancestry Research.

Phillpots read this plaque with pleasure every time he entered his room. It made him feel far more professional. After all, not many people were specialists in ancestry research. He really was, and he knew that he was good at his job, and thorough. He could not understand why he got so little work. He advertised in the daily papers every week, when he had enough money, but very few people answered his small ad. Sometimes he was worried, because there were long weeks when he could get no work at all, and then he had to walk around the streets of London until late at night so that he would not meet his landlord, who wanted the money for the rent. But in the end he always got new work, and then he was happy. The first thing he did was to pay his landlord, not only for the overdue rent but for the next two months as well. This was the most sensible thing to do, because then the landlord went away smiling and forgot about the weeks when Mr. Phillpots didn’t pay his rent.

The landlord was an idiot, who was not at all interested in his ancestry. He said he had an aunt in Australia, and a cousin in Dartmoor Prison, and he didn’t need to know any more about his relations. Phillpots was disgusted with this barbaric point of view. He thought that a knowledge of a person’s ancestry was one of the most important things in their life. Without an ancestry a person is not a person. This was a sad fact of life. It was a fact of life not many people knew about. Phillpots knew. He was an orphan.

Every orphan likes to know something about his lost family. They try to find a parent or a brother or sister, and then they continue living in the same way as before. But Cholmondely Phillpots, Specialist in Ancestry Research, was different. He now knew that he would never find out about his parents. Every time he thought he had a new clue, he discovered that it led to a dead end. One night he was sitting in his room, when he came to a decision:

“I have looked everywhere, asked everybody, looked through every possible document. I have got nowhere. I must realize that my own ancestry is an eternal secret. Well then, I shall stop looking for my own ancestors. But I will spend my life looking for the ancestors of other people. I have the qualifications and I have the patience. And I shall enjoy doing the work.”

He did enjoy doing the work, but generally it was too easy. He just went to Somerset House, found a complete list of ancestors, and then went back to his room to draw up a family tree in the Gothic letters that he was so good at writing. And then he waited for the next client, and walked late at night around the streets of London when his money ran out, to escape the landlord.

It was long after midnight when he arrived home. He looked nervously in his letter-box, expecting to find another threatening letter from his landlord, or an electricity bill. So he was very surprised when he found instead a letter from an insurance company. Because he lived alone, and because he was an orphan, he had no life insurance, for there was nobody who could benefit from it if he died. He had no car, because he never had any money. He looked at the address again. There was no doubt that the letter was addressed to him. Even the “M. A.” was there, after his name.

He opened the letter. His fingers trembled a little. When he reached the last line of the letter they were trembling even more, and he could hardly read the words.

Dear Mr. Phillpots,

We have been looking for an expert in ancestry research, and Dr. Luckland of Somerset House has recommended you as one of the best in this field. (“Dear old Luckland,” thought Mr. Phillpots.) Our company is responsible for finding an heir to a considerable sum of money, left by a client who unfortunately died without making a will. Nobody seems to know of any living relatives, but it is our duty to discover one if such exists. Our company will pay you, should you accept the work, one thousand pounds per month plus all expenses. If you do not find a claimant within three months, the inheritance will be given over to the State.

Yours sincerely,

Charles Wickmanfield

(Section Manager)

One thousand pounds! Phillpots couldn’t even imagine that amount of money. Quickly he took a sheet of headed notepaper out of the drawer of his bureau and wrote a reply. Some of the reply was not quite truthful, but the letter which, one hour later, was lying in a nearby letter-box, waiting for the morning collection, sounded very professional.

Dear Mr. Wickmanfield,