Tom Sharpe - The Throwback

As the song died away and the thin call of the pipes was lost in the silence of the house. Mr Bullstrode, shivering more from future fears than present cold, crept quietly back to bed. What he had just heard confirmed his premonition. Lockhart Flawse was out of the dim and dangerous past when the moss troopers roamed Tyndale and Redesdale and raided cattle from the low country on the east coast. And having raided they had hidden in their strongholds in the high hills. With that wild lawlessness there had come too poetry as harsh and unflinchingly tragic in its view of life as it was gay in the face of death. Mr Bullstrode, crouching beneath the blankets, foresaw dire days ahead. Finally, with a silent prayer that Mr Wyman would listen to reason and not invite disaster, Mr Bullstrode managed to snatch some sleep.

But there were forces already at work to nullify the hope expressed in Mr Bullstrode's prayer. Mr Wyman was quite prepared to listen to reason next morning when the solicitor returned to Hexham with his warning but Her Majesty's Collector of Taxes for the Middle Marches was no longer in control of the situation. In London a far more formidable figure in the person of Mr Mirkin, Senior Collector Supertax Division (sub-department, Evasion of) at the Inland Revenue offices had been alerted to the possibility that Mr and Mrs Flawse, previously of Number 12 Sandicott Crescent and now of no known address, had withdrawn £659,000 in used one-pound notes with the intention of not paying Capital Gains Tax. This had been brought to his notice by the bank manager of the East Pursley branch of Jessica's bank who happened to be a close friend of Mr Mirkin and who had been piqued by her refusal to accept his advice. He had been more than piqued by Lockhart's attitude. In his opinion something very fishy was going on. In the opinion of Mr Mirkin it was more than fishy; it stank.

'Tax evasion,' he said, 'is a crime against society of the very gravest sort. The man who fails to contribute to the economic good deserves the most severe punishment.' Which, since Mr Mirkin's income derived entirely from the contributions of socially productive persons, was an opinion both understandable and self-serving. The very magnitude of the sum involved merely increased his sense of outrage. 'I shall pursue this matter to the ends of the earth if need be.'

But such lengths were not needed. The late Mrs Flawse had written to the bank manager informing him of her change of address. That she had changed it yet again made no difference to Mr Mirkin. He consulted the tax register for Northumberland and confirmed that a Mr Flawse, who had in fact paid no tax for fifty years, nevertheless lived at Flawse Hall on Flawse Fell and where the mother was, her daughter was likely to be. Leaving all other duties aside Mr Mirkin travelled first class at the country's expense to Newcastle and then, to emphasize his status in the hierarchy of Tax Collectors, by hired car to Hexham. Within two days of Mr Bullstrode's visit and warning, Mr Wyman found himself trying to explain to a very superior superior how it was that a Mr Flawse who owned an estate of five thousand acres and seven tenant farms had failed to make his contribution to the national Exchequer by paying any income tax for fifty years.

'Well, the estate had always run at a loss,' he said.

Mr Mirkin's scepticism was positively surgical. 'You seriously expect me to believe that?' he asked. Mr Wyman answered that there was no proof to the contrary.

'We shall see about that,' said Mr Mirkin. 'I intend to make the most thorough investigation of the Flawse accounts. Personally.'

Mr Wyman hesitated. He was caught between the devil of his past and the deep blue sea of the Senior Collector Supertax Division (sub-department, Evasion of). On the whole he decided that it might be as well for his future if Mr Mirkin learnt from personal experience how difficult it was to extract taxes from the Flawse family. He therefore said nothing and Mr Mirkin drove off unwarned.

He arrived at Wark and was directed via Black Pockrington to Flawse Hall. There he met his first obstacle in the shape of the locked gate on the bridge over The Cut. Using the intercom which Lockhart had installed he spoke to Mr Dodd. Mr Dodd was polite and said he would see if his master was at home.

'There's a man from the Inland Revenue down at the bridge,' he told Lockhart who was sitting in the study. 'He says he is the Senior Collector of Taxes, You'll not be wanting to speak to him.'

But Lockhart did speak. He went to the intercom and asked Mr Mirkin by what right he was trespassing on private property.

'By my right as Senior Collector of Taxes,' said Mr Mirkin, 'and the question of private property does not arise. I am entitled to visit you to inquire into your financial affairs and…'

As he spoke Mr Dodd left the house by way of the kitchen garden and crossed the fell to the dam. Mr Mirkin, by this time too irate to observe the landscape, continued his argument with Lockhart.

'Will you or will you not come down and unlock this gate?' he demanded. 'If you don't I shall apply for a warrant. What is your answer?'

'I shall be down in just a moment,' said Lockhart, 'I have an idea it's going to rain and I'll need an umbrella.' Mr Mirkin looked up into a cloudless sky. 'What the hell do you mean you'll need an umbrella?' he shouted into the intercom. 'There's not a sign of rain.'

'Oh, I don't know,' said Lockhart, 'we get very sudden changes of weather in these parts. I have known it to pour down without warning.'

At that moment Mr Dodd undid the main sluice gates at the base of the dam and a white wall of water issued from the great pipes. Ten feet high it hurtled down The Cut just as Mr Mirkin was about to protest that he had never heard such nonsense in his life.

'Downpour indeed…' he began and stopped. A horrid surging noise sounded round the corner of the hillside. It was part hiss and part thunder. Mr Mirkin stood and looked aghast. The next moment he was running hell for leather past his car and up the metalled track towards Black Pockrington. He was too late. The wall of water was less than ten feet deep now but of sufficient depth to sweep the car and the Senior Collector of Taxes (Supertax Division, etc.) off their tyres and feet and carry them a quarter of a mile down the valley and into the tunnel. To be precise, the water carried Mr Mirkin into the tunnel while the car lodged itself across the entrance. Only then did Mr Dodd close the sluice gates and, taking the precaution of adding three inches to the rainwater gauge on the wall beside the dam, he made his way back to the Hall.

'I doubt he'll be coming back the same way,' he told Lockhart who had observed the Collector's submergence with relish.

'I wouldn't be too sure,' said Lockhart while Jessica, out of the kindness of her heart, hoped the poor man could swim.

There was no kindness in Mr Mirkin's heart by the time he had issued from the tunnel a mile farther on and having been bounced, bashed, trundled and sucked through several large pipes and two deep tanks, finally came to rest in the comparative calm of the subsidiary reservoir beyond Tombstone Law. Half drowned and badly grazed and with murder in his heart, not to mention water everywhere, he clambered up the granite bank and staggered towards a farmhouse. The rest of the way to Hexham he travelled by ambulance and was lodged in the hospital there suffering from shock, multiple abrasions and dementia taxitis. When he could speak again, he sent for Mr Wyman.