Simon Brett - The Sinking Admiral

Whether he’d ever been married or in any kind of permanent relationship no one knew. Certainly there had been no romantic skirmishes since he’d moved to Crabwell. Amy knew she was an attractive woman, and long experience in the pub trade had inured her to the advances of landlords, but the Admiral had never so much as touched her on the shoulder. She was certain he wasn’t gay, but his emotional history – like many other areas of his life – remained unknown to the people of the village.

In spite of the more annoying aspects of his personality, Amy still had a fierce loyalty to the Admiral, remembering the generosity with which he had welcomed her when she first arrived in Crabwell.

She had been quite surprised, though, when he’d agreed to the intrusion into his pub of Ben Milne and the camera crew. She didn’t think he would buy into the theory of the publicity bestowed by the documentary turning around the Admiral Byng’s fortunes, and it seemed out of character for him deliberately to threaten his protective secrecy. But there was no doubt that the television people were there with the Admiral’s consent.

They didn’t see much of him, though, on that first day of filming. Running the whole width of the Admiral Byng’s first floor there was a long, low gallery. In a previous incarnation it had acted as the pub’s function room, but fewer and fewer people in the Crabwell area seemed to be having functions these days. Or maybe for weddings, birthdays, and post-funeral wakes they now booked venues slightly less shabby than the village pub.

Besides, Geoffrey Horatio Fitzsimmons had rather colonised the space for himself. Though his bedroom was on the floor above, this gallery, which he referred to ironically as ‘the Bridge’, was where he spent most of the time when he was not downstairs in the bar. And the clutter of his files and documents had spread over time until there was no surface in the room uncovered. It was from the Bridge, with its broad view across the steely expanse of the North Sea, that the Admiral conducted his business. But none of his employees was bold enough ever to ask him what that business was.

On the first day of Ben Milne’s filming at the Admiral Byng the landlord spent most of his time up in the Bridge. Amy Walpole had been kept so busy at the bar dealing with the uncharacteristic flood of custom that she hadn’t checked them out in detail, but she’d been aware throughout the day of a procession of visitors going up the side stairs to visit the Admiral. Presumably he’d made some private arrangement with Ben Milne to be interviewed another day. There was no way the journalist was going to make his film without talking to the Admiral Byng’s landlord.

Amy Walpole’s unenthusiastic attitude to the invasion of documentary-makers was not typical of the Admiral Byng’s staff and regulars. Most of them responded with the customary reaction of ordinary people to the prospect of being ‘on the telly’. They all wanted their fifteen seconds of fame.

Of no one was this truer than Meriel Dane, the queen of the pub’s kitchen. Honey blonde since anyone could remember, and always dressed a good ten years younger than her real age; she was a woman of unbridled aspiration. Nobody who didn’t dwell inside Meriel Dane’s head could be aware of the glorious futures she constantly created for herself (despite some less than successful experiences in her past). Frequently these fantasies involved impossibly glamorous men who would succumb to her substantial charms, but she had career ambitions too. Meriel Dane was convinced that she was about to become the next big thing in television chefs, so she regarded her participation in Ben Milne’s documentary as a kind of audition.

‘You see, Ben,’ she confided as she rolled out the pastry for the day’s pies, ‘I always add a couple of special ingredients when I’m doing steak and kidney. They impart a subtlety to the taste, which is commented on by many of the Admiral Byng’s customers. Satisfied customers, I should say. People who order my steak and kidney pie never regret their choice. They are always satisfied . One of my secret ingredients,’ she went on slyly, almost winking at the camera, ‘is Worcester sauce – just a little shake of the bottle into the mixture. I’m never one for measuring things too exactly. I have an instinct for the right amount. Most of my cooking is instinctive . I am rather a creature of impulse , you know.’

She leaned forward to the camera, fully aware of the amount of ample cleavage that the movement revealed. It was Meriel Dane’s view that there was a lack of glamour in the current stock of television chefs. Most of them were men, for a start – and not very attractive men at that. What British television needed was a series by someone who put the sex back into cookery. Someone remarkably like Meriel Dane, in fact.

‘And my other secret ingredient, Ben, no one suspects . But being here by the sea in Crabwell – and me being the kind of person who is really drawn to the sea, I do add a little maritime flavour to my steak and kidney. Oysters. Not a lot of them – it’s not a steak and oyster pie – but just enough to provide that little salty tang. And nobody – but nobody – can identify what gives the pie that oh so distinctive flavour.’

Meriel Dane smiled. A warm smile, promising who knew what delights ahead. She reckoned the little piece she’d just done to camera, confiding the secrets of her steak and kidney pie, would edit neatly into a show reel to engage the enthusiasm of even the most jaded television executive.

She looked at her watch and felt a little frisson , knowing the delights that lay ahead for her that evening… if she played her cards right… and Meriel Dane was always confident in her ability to play her cards right. In the meantime, flirting with Ben Milne was a reasonably pleasant way of passing the time. He was quite attractive in an angular way, and Meriel Dane always rather fancied herself in the role of cougar.

And then Ben went and spoiled it all by asking her about the budgetary restrictions on the Admiral Byng’s food operation.

Because they had driven up from London that morning, Ben Milne’s cameraman Stan, according to some abstruse ruling known only to his union, had to stop work at five for a three-hour break. He left then, and went to the B & B in a nearby village, which he’d booked in preference to one of the Admiral Byng’s bedrooms. Ben, though, was staying in the pub. Unable to shoot any further footage for the time being, he bought himself a large glass of Chilean Merlot and sat in a corner of the bar, drinking as though he’d earned it. Amy Walpole still didn’t trust him. Though without his cameraman he couldn’t actually record anything that happened, she still sensed that he was vigilant, listening out for those telling details that might contribute something to his eventual hatchet job.

But the absence of the camera had an immediate effect on the day’s business. All of those locals who kept away from the Admiral Byng most of the year but had ‘just happened to drop in’ that day suddenly vanished when there was no further chance of them being immortalised on video. Though Amy was in no doubt that a lot of them would be back the following morning.

The stresses of the day were catching up on her. She’d been so busy that she hadn’t had a chance to get any lunch and she felt headachey. What she needed was a brisk walk along the Crabwell front to blow away the cobwebs. And Ben Milne was now the only customer in the bar.

Grabbing from its hook the beaten-up Barbour jacket that Fitz had given her, Amy Walpole told him she had to go out for a while. If he needed a refill or anything else before she was back, he should call through to Meriel in the kitchen. She’d help him out.