David Dickinson - Death of a wine merchant

‘And what, pray, is your question, madam?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘I want you to send a message to that Edward the Seventh for me,’ she began.

‘You mean the King?’

‘I do. I want you to tell him that we, his loyal subjects of Brighton, wish him to have a Jubilee. Those two his mother had, Diamond and Golden, were the happiest days of my life. He’s not looking well, that King. If he doesn’t have a Jubilee soon he’ll be dead before they have time to organize it. If he likes he can just have it down here in Brighton, he needn’t bother with the rest of the country and all that Empire beyond the seas stuff. I’m sure we could find a foreigner or two to wave a flag at him if he thinks it’s important. He could eat the big dinner in our Royal Pavilion. Maybe the Prince Regent and Mrs Fitzherbert could come back from the dead to join him. I’m sure they’d have a lot in common.’

‘Have no fear, Mrs Baker,’ said Powerscourt gravely, ‘I shall make every effort to pass your request on to the appropriate authorities.’

‘Look here, Vicary, I’ve had another idea.’ Septimus Parry and Vicary Dodds were in conference about the progress and performance of their wine business, Piccadilly Wine, a recent arrival in the London area and a challenger to the supremacy of the Colvilles. Septimus Parry looked after the acquisition of the wine, Vicary Dodds looked after the accounts. Septimus stared up at the great blackboard where they kept a summary of their current stock. ‘The thing is,’ Septimus was a very slim young man, looking, his friends used to tell him, rather like a Spy cartoon, ‘we’ve got all the conventional products on offer in our shops, port, claret, champagne, all of that stuff. What happens if we go for the cheapest red and maybe the cheapest white we can find? Genuine vin ordinaire , as drunk by the solid citizens of La Belle France, comes to England’s capital. The Entente Cordiale in a glass. Maybe I wouldn’t actually use the word genuine now I come to think about it, but cheap is the way to sell it. That should bring the customers in. Then they save so much on our vin ordinaire that they buy a load of other wine as well. What do you think, Vicary?’

‘I’m not sure I like the sound of your reservations about the word genuine, Septimus, but I’ll let it pass for the present. Where do we get hold of this vin ordinaire ?’

‘Kind of you to ask,’ said Septimus. ‘I’ve got some samples here in my bag.’

He pulled out a bottle with no label that appeared to contain red. He fetched a couple of glasses and a corkscrew and poured it out. ‘Don’t think you need to swirl it around or give it a sniff, if you see what I mean. Straight down the hatch, that’s the thing.’

Both young men took a respectable gulp of the liquid. Septimus did not seem affected one way or the other. Vicary Dodds turned rather pale. He coughed as if he were suffering from the final stages of consumption. Tears began trickling down his cheeks.

‘My God, Septimus, where did you get this?’

‘You don’t like it then?’

‘As you can see I’m not exactly wild about this consignment. If Christ had produced this for his miracle at the Feast of Cana they’d have been asking him to turn it back into water as fast as he could. Do you have any more poisonous mixtures in there?’

‘As a matter of fact, I do, Vicary. Try your tears on this one.’ Septimus whipped out another bottle and fetched some more glasses. Vicary tasted his incredibly slowly, a fraction of a mouthful at a time. This time he did not cough. No tears rolled down his cheeks. Instead he screwed his mouth into a rictus of dislike and peered incredulously into the glass.

‘My God, Septimus, I think this one is even worse. I tell you what we could do with it. We could market this one as a means of giving up alcohol. Have you tried to give up the demon drink? Is alcohol ruining your life? Is your wife on at you all the time to forsake the juice of the vine and the products of the malt and the barley? This is the answer to your prayers. One tablespoonful of Piccadilly Wine’s special elixir three times a day and you’ll never want a drink again. I’m sure we could find some medicine man to give it the seal of approval.’

‘Might not do a lot for the rest of the business, my friend,’ said Septimus. ‘Can’t sell wines and spirits with one hand and try to turn them all teetotal with the other. We might go out of business rather quickly if the elixir proved a success.’

‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ said Vicary sadly, staring hard at Septimus’s bag. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve got another foul bottle in there, I don’t think my taste buds would stand it.’

‘Last one,’ said Septimus, ‘it’s closing time after this.’

Vicary Dodds eyed the red substance with maximum suspicion, as if he were Socrates inspecting the hemlock that would kill him. At last, very reluctantly he took a small sip. A quizzical look crossed his features. He took another, slightly larger sip. Slowly, very slowly, a smile spread across his face.

‘Good God, Septimus,’ he said, ‘this one isn’t at all bad. A bit thin perhaps, but it’s not going to send you mad or make you blind like those other two. Where on earth did you find them all?’

‘Don’t you trouble yourself about where they came from, Vicary. Let me just say that my contact said one of them might do rather well in Bulgaria and Rumania. Those Eastern Europeans like their wine a bit rough apparently, like their women. Anyway I could lay in enough of the final one to last a couple of weeks. Sort of trial run. What do you say?’

‘Let’s do it,’ said Vicary Dodds, ‘and let’s throw some more mud in the Colvilles’ eyes.’

‘Let’s not forget the white,’ said Septimus, heading for the door. ‘I’ll bring a couple of bottles of that in next week.’

‘White? Did you say white?’ Vicary stared at his disappearing friend. ‘I may need some time to build up my strength for a white like those. God save us all.’

Powerscourt thought it was one of the best-kept house fronts he had ever seen. The black door glistened and shone in the afternoon sun. The windows on either side looked as if somebody cleaned them once a week if not once a day. The orderly brickwork was immaculate. This little house in Weltje Road in Hammersmith, close to the Thames, was the home of his second Colville senior acountant, one Wilfred Jones. Apart from his name and his previous position Powerscourt knew nothing about him. The door was opened after he rang the bell twice by a fully clad yeoman warder of the Tower of London, resplendent in a red and dark blue uniform with spear in hand and Tudor bonnet on his head.

‘I’m terribly sorry, I must have come to the wrong place,’ said Powerscourt, beating the retreat.

‘I don’t think you have,’ said the gentleman warder. ‘I’m expecting a visitor but I’m damned if I can remember his name.’

‘I presume you’re expecting one of your colleagues from the Tower,’ said Powerscourt, nearly out of earshot.

‘I was an accountant once,’ said the yeoman warder, ‘before I went to work at the Tower. An accountant. I think that’s what you have come to see me about. An accountant at Colvilles.’

Powerscourt began to retrace his steps. He had seen stranger transformations in his time than accountants turned into yeoman warders, but not in England.

‘Wilfred Jones,’ said the man, escorting Powerscourt into the front room of his house. Powerscourt wondered if it would be full of ceremonial swords and halberds and tabards and antique spears. It was not. It was full of sheet music, mainly religious works, Powerscourt observed, Handel’s Messiah , Bach’s St Matthew Passion, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.