‘An invitation, sir.’ So said Charlie shoving the silver salver under my chin.
‘How do you know?’
‘I got an identical envelope.’
‘So, you’re standing there, waiting for me to open it, when you already know what’s inside.’
‘I wouldn’t want to spoil your enjoyment.’
‘I see. Oh look, who’d have thought, an invitation to attend upon the day that County Estates open their new branch.
‘Should be a laugh.’
‘Absolutely. We shall combine it with a visit to Bernard, I’ve got all of father’s Trust related documents sorted and ready to pass over. And, with your cooperation, we could have some fun viz-a-viz, the basement.’
‘Oh, yes?’
‘I’ll explain later. Meanwhile you might add these invitations to the growing collection above the fireplace in the reception room.’
‘I notice Mrs Hayward’s portrait remains unhung, with her face turned to the wall, sir.’
‘There are some things it’s better she doesn’t see.’
Arriving at the old bank, we paused to survey the properties on offer in the window display. Most, as one would expect, were for desirable rural homes plus a few farms. One stood out, shouted-out, its exceptionalism. ‘Melbury Buildings!’ Exclaimed Charlotte; ‘All I did was mention it in passing at the first online Owl meeting. You wouldn’t think a place like this would “soil their hands” with it.’
‘Ah, well that’s part of the deal; that business should trickle down from the top of the building to the bottom, then creep along the street to the new bank.’
‘Who was Melbury anyway?’
‘You’ve never heard tell of “One-coat” Melbury?’
‘Sartorially challenged, sir?’
‘Well, no doubt he was, on many occasions. But no, the sobriquet came from him having started-out as a jobbing builder. New residents would move in and discover his one concession to interior design was a single coat of whitewash.’
‘Whitewash?’
‘An early soluble paint, the emulsion that didn’t stick. You must have found yourself pressed-up against a few old barn walls in your time, only to discover later you were covered in white power.’
‘What an imagination you have. But he must have made it big in the end?’
‘One of the first to call himself a developer, became a councillor, chair of the Bay Council planning committee.’
‘Named the building after himself then?’
‘His vanity soon caught up with him. Took to cutting corners in a big way, went bankrupt. Then it emerged, he’d offered and taken backhanders, did time for it.’
‘Blimey.’
‘The gossip was that he liked to check-in to various B&Bs and Guest Houses all along the coast road, sign his name simply, Melbury, hoping to be taken for a Lord by gullible proprietors.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘Well, I overheard odd things as a child, but he does appear in father’s office day books quite a bit, not the gossip as such, but the old man was clearly keeping an eye on this particular development years before the Trust actually acquired it.’
‘But if this Melbury had cut corners...’
‘Nerves of steel father, hung-on through the whole bankruptcy thing, the discovery building standards hadn’t been met. Arguments over obligations to tenants, government covering the cost of bringing it up to standard. The legal obligation to put it on the market, waiting through the lack of interest.’
‘So, in the end he gets it at his price.’
‘Precisely.’
‘I’m Thayer.’ Said the man who approached us as we entered the cut-above property emporium, speaking with a distinctly local accent, from north of the Moor if I had to guess.
‘Pleased to meet you. I say, pardon me for being so forward and all that, but I thought your lot all buggered off to Essex in the seventeenth century?’
‘We did, but we weren’t all convinced by the puritanism, neither did we want to build a new England, so we came home. I was told you was local, but didn’t sound it.’
‘Ah, well, the old school. Anyway, let me introduce to my PA, Charlotte Sparkwell. Do excuse the cardboard box, more work for Merriweather.’
‘Welcome to County Estates, Ms Sparkwell. Much more than a PA, if the press is to be believed.’
‘Greatly exaggerated, sir.’
Then we were interrupted; ‘Tony! Ms Sparkwell.’
‘Charlie has a present for you Bernard.’
‘Good Lord!’
‘The gap in the Trust archive has been closed, and is indeed intriguing.’
‘Excellent, Lawrence will be exited.’
‘They are the original documents, I’ve scanned those I’ll want to look at again, I think we need to make this a bit formal, demand a receipt and all that.’
‘My goodness, I’ll ring upstairs, we can creep up the back staircase, once you’ve had a good look around.’
‘Talking of which, what’s the current situation with the basement?’
‘I’ve no idea. Haven’t been down there since the reinforcements for the lift shaft were done. Dusty and a lot of rubble I should imagine.’
‘Are the doors still locked?’
‘Doors? Plural? Tony, you’ve had access to this place a lot longer than Lawrence or I!’
‘Yes, but I don’t hold any keys.’
‘Ah. Point taken. What’s the sudden interest in our nether regions?’
‘It’s in the box, if you can read between the lines. A search for any and all keys please.’
‘Very well, this may be altogether too much for Lawrence, he may need to take one of his power naps.’
To cut a long story short, I managed to cause a good hour’s disquiet on the two floors above whilst we enjoyed snacks, nibbles and a glass of something, all the time interrogating Thayer about the top-end property market throughout the county. Bernard looked quite flushed when he finally returned. ‘This is your receipt, this is the key for the basement that’s kept at reception for whenever the lift engineer turns up, and that, is the ever-expanding collection of unidentifiable-s!’
‘Excellent, shall we proceed?’
‘Can anyone come along?’ Asked Thayer.
‘The more the merrier.’ I replied.
The lighting was better than I remembered, updated when the lift was seen to no doubt. I pointed out to my companions, the scars on the walls and floor. ‘Once upon a time there was a cage, with a locked gate, with the strongboxes and safe inside. Now, that should be it.’ I kicked aside various collapsed old packaging and debris.
‘Should be what?’ Asked Bernard.
‘The original safe of the old bank.’
‘Doesn’t look anything like a safe.’
‘Top loaded, like an old washing machine, there you go, two keyholes.’
‘Good lord! Well, we sure as hell haven’t got keys here for anything like that!’
‘You were lying.’
‘Well...’
‘You spent the whole time watching the rest of us, you knew the layout, the fact it was used as a safe room. You’ve already got the keys.’
‘It was question of flushing Bernard out onto open ground. I needed to know what he already knew. He, will wait for Brinkley to go through the documents with his accountant’s eye for misplaced details. Eventually the two of them will realise there is a story, and that some of the documents are missing, but of course they can’t demand them. As for the keys, it’s not a question of getting the right ones, but whether they will turn the locks which haven’t moved for at least sixty, possibly a hundred years!’
‘Well?’
‘Well, what?’
‘What do you expect to find inside?’
‘I don’t expect anything. Now, time for an unannounced visit to Cat Mackintosh.’
‘Don’t tell me, he has safecracker on his CV along with everything else.’
‘Not quite, but he will know about cleaning, lubrication, rust removal etc. I’m also expecting to get his situation report on the state of the Park, post Summit.’
‘Oh, yes?’
‘I asked him to do a sweep, for any bugs left behind by the conference dwellers.’
‘Foreign spies, disguised as diplomats?’
'Oh no, I’m much more concerned about our own side.’
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