Trouble Brewing (11 page)

So why, in the face of all the evidence, to say nothing of his own careful accounting, did he think something was wrong? H.R.H.'s hints? Maybe, but the hints had been so guarded that he might have read too much into them. He'd been nettled, too, by Miss Mandeville's spotting of the discrepancy between the plantation price and the spot-market price. He should have been aware of that. Having their own plantation ensured a regular supply of high-quality coffee and that, surely, was worth paying a premium for, but . . .

He pulled down a set of accounts at random. 1919. That was too early. The market was still settling down after the war. He went forward a couple of years. Prices had steadied at 115 shillings. The next year showed a total rise to 131 shillings and the year after that it had shot to 146 before rising to 154 where it had been for the last two years. They were buying a lot more chicory than in previous years but that price had fallen slightly. Instead of buying chicory in Yorkshire, they were shipping it from Belgium, which, oddly enough, was cheaper. The total production of the factory had remained about the same for the last three years.

Hang on. If coffee was being bulked out by chicory, and the production was the same, that should mean less coffee – expensive, taxable coffee – was being imported which should mean a reduction in costs. So where was the saving? He glanced over his figures again, drumming his pencil on the table. Surely the profits should have risen more? There
was
a profit, but he would have expected it to have grown. With the last three years' accounts in front of him, he ran his eyes up and down the columns of figures while the idea for a fraud took root and grew in his mind.

He suddenly became aware of the complete silence of the office; lunchtime. He glanced at his watch. The siren had sounded ages ago. He had roughly half an hour to test out his idea. Through the open window overlooking the factory yard came the shouts of an impromptu game of football. The factory would be deserted too.

He walked rapidly down the stairs, out into the yard and across to the factory. The bottling department was eerily quiet. The great green-painted machines stood ready to clank into rattling life, jetting clouds of steam into innumerable waiting bottles before they each received a precise eight fluid ounces of ready-made Royale Coffee. When he had been here before it had resembled, with the heat, the noise and the hissing steam, a picture of a mechanical hell.

He had to shout at the man next to him to make himself heard; now his footsteps rang out on the tiled floor. He opened the far door into the outside air and skirted round the various buildings until he got to the warehouse, walking through the towering piles of sacks, with their clean, sharp smell of jute, until he reached the far doors looking out onto the slowly flowing Thames.

The watchman sat dozing in a chair pulled up to the open doors of the dock entrance. He looked round with sleepy eyes as Smith approached and put down the newspaper that covered his knees. ‘Would you be wanting anything, sir? The offices is round the other side.'

‘I know,' said Smith with a friendly smile. ‘I work there. I thought I'd come and have a look at the warehouse instead of sitting at a desk all day.' This eccentric behaviour was met with a nod which implied ‘suit yourself', better than any words could have done. ‘Smoke?' he asked, offering his case.

‘Thanks, guv. Don't mind if I do,' said the watchman. ‘There's many,' he said, obviously feeling called upon to make some remark, ‘who'd do better to come rhand 'ere a bit more often. Take old Mr Hunt now. He knew everyone who worked for him by name. Saw a lot of him, we did.'

Smith let this remark drop into silence. ‘There's an awful lot of coffee in there,' he said, with a glance into the warehouse. Now that was an idiotic thing to say. Of course there was a lot of coffee in there. ‘What happens when it comes in?' he asked quickly. ‘I mean, how d'you know where to put it all?'

‘It all depends. There's some bags we put up the side for storage and there's some going to be used right away. Mr Wilkins, the foreman, he takes care of that. He tells the lads where to put everything right enough.'

‘Do you store coffee for a long time?'

‘Sometimes. There's sacks in there we've had for the last two, three years and more.' He gave a slow smile. ‘Don't ask me why.'

‘I suppose you know how much you've got?'

‘Mr Wilkins does. He keeps tabs on it all. We don't want no one sticking one of these bags under their arm and walking orf with it, do we?' he said with a smile, jerking his thumb to indicate the warehouse.

This was the opening Smith had been waiting for. ‘They'd take some lifting, wouldn't they? They must weigh a ton.'

‘There's a hundredweight to each sack and when you've shifted a few of those you know about it. I've done enough of that in my time. I can't manage no more because of me back, but if I had a penny for every sack I've shifted, I'd be a rich man.'

‘I bet you would. Are some sacks lighter than others?'

‘Oh yes,' agreed the watchman. ‘Mind you, they don't feel lighter at the end of the afternoon, but you take the old coffee, for instance. I could move two of those for every one of the others.'

‘Why's that?'

The watchman shrugged. ‘Blessed if I know. But those sacks is a lot less heavy when they go out than when they come in. Mr Wilkins knows all about it. He often says, “Come on, lads, it's an easy job this afternoon.” Funny, innit?'

It was funny, thought Smith on the way back to the office. So funny he thought he'd like a word with Mr Wilkins. He felt a sense of tingling excitement. It seemed as if his idea just might be right after all.

‘Sherry, eh?' Thomas Littleton, K.C., taking Jack's assent for granted, jerked the liquid into a glass, completely heedless of the splashes on the silver tray or the faded but beautiful Turkish carpet and handed it to his guest. ‘What d'you think?'

Jack's eyes widened in appreciation. ‘It's a very fine oloroso, sir. In fact –' he took another sip – ‘I'd say it was what my Spanish grandfather would call a
palo
.'

‘Would he, by George? That means it's good, eh? Appreciate your opinion, sir.' He spoke in a succession of short barks and Jack found himself irresistibly reminded of a stout, tetchy but agreeably inclined Jack Russell. ‘I can't tell one from another myself but I got a case from a client. Oakshot versus Imperial Alloys, Stafford. Remember that?'

‘Indeed I do,' said Mr Stafford with feeling. ‘And I may say it was fortunate for Oakshot that you took the brief. He would have been a much poorer man without your assistance, although I cannot feel that justice was truly served.'

‘Justice?' Littleton flung himself in an armchair and raised two bristling eyebrows at Mr Stafford. ‘You mustn't confuse yourself with notions of justice, man. Justice is what the judge says it is or where would we poor barristers be? If the law was a simple matter of justice then every man could be his own advocate, the courts would be clogged with every Tom, Dick or Harry who has a fancied grievance and complete anarchy would reign.'

Mr Stafford mildly disassociated himself from any desire to inflict elemental chaos on the law courts, but Littleton had turned his attention back to Jack. ‘You ever read for the bar? I ask because you always get it right in your books. They're some of the few detective stories I can read without wanting to argue with the author.'

Accepting this, as indeed it was, as a compliment, Jack shook his head. ‘I've no legal training myself, but I check anything I'm not sure about with my godfather, Archie Wilde.'

‘Ah. I thought there was some expert knowledge there. So you're Wilde's godson, are you? Sound man.' He pugnaciously wriggled forward in his chair. ‘So what's your interest in trusts? Going to put them in a book?'

‘I sincerely hope not,' exclaimed Mr Stafford, shocked.

Littleton grinned suddenly. ‘Make a damn dull book, eh? Smoke if you want to, Major. The box is on the table beside you. I understand sherry's one of the few wines you can smoke with, not that it ever bothers me. So, what's it all about? I know the rough outline of Stafford's query, but what's your interest in the matter?'

‘I've been asked by Mr Harold Hunt to look into the disappearance of his nephew, Mark Helston. As the trust concerns Mark Helston's money, it might be relevant to the case.'

‘So old Hunt's got you involved in that, has he? Yes, that makes sense. It was you, wasn't it, who turned up that body on Gower Street the other day? I was glad to read in this morning's paper it wasn't Helston after all. I came across him a few times.'

Littleton relaxed back, his hands folded across his chest, and when he spoke it was in a softer voice. ‘Damn fine boy, Helston. He was with my son on the
Jupiter
. He came to see me on his first leave after Andrew had . . . Well, that's all over now. No point living in the past.'

He picked up his sherry and for a moment concentrated very hard on the light refracting through the glass. ‘Yes, a damn fine boy. Old Hunt did his best to ruin him, of course, together with that precious grandmother of his, but he came through unscathed. Anything that boy wanted he could have, which is the quickest way to the devil I know of, but he weathered all their efforts to spoil him. There's a sister, isn't there? Wouldn't be surprised if she had more than a touch of jealousy about the way they glorified young Helston. It'd only be natural.'

Mr Stafford gave a little legal cough in the back of his throat. ‘It is about the sister I wish to consult you. As far as I am aware, her relations with her brother were always cordial, although, as you say, there was a marked difference in the treatment of brother and sister by my client, their grandmother, Mrs Enid Burbage. I might have ventured to remonstrate with her about the extremely unequal division of her property, but, at the time her will was drawn up, I had no idea of the sums involved. She gave no indication that she was a wealthy woman and, indeed, I questioned more than once the expense she incurred by her lavish partiality for Mark. She insisted on making him a most generous allowance which I believed she could ill afford.'

‘What was Mark's reaction?' asked Jack. ‘How did he feel about getting the dibs?'

‘He had considerable reservations, Major, if I understand your question correctly.' Mr Stafford gave a thin smile. ‘However, he managed to overcome them, as I believe most young men would. To be just, he probably believed Mr Harold Hunt was his real benefactor. He was rather inclined to accept matters at face value and not probe too deeply into what lay behind them. As he was aware that the situation pleased his grandmother and most certainly suited him, he was content to let sleeping dogs lie.'

‘What about this trust?' snapped out Littleton, rather in the manner of an abruptly wakened dog himself.

‘I have the original documents with me,' said Mr Stafford, ‘but the essence of the case is this: under the terms of Enid Burbage's first will, Patricia, née Helston, received two thousand pounds free of duty, but, after various small bequests to servants and charities, the whole of the residue went to Mark. Now, I may say that Mrs Burbage was a very strong-minded old lady, but her physical condition was no match for her mental state. She was very upset by Helston's disappearance, the more so because of a tactless remark made by the police officer in charge of the case. Two weeks after his disappearance, she suffered a minor heart attack. As far as she was concerned, the writing was on the wall and she felt it her duty to make a new will in case Mark's absence should be prolonged. Acting upon her instructions, I drew up a will whereby she put her entire property, minus the bequests to servants and charities, which were to be paid upon her death, into a trust.'

He paused. ‘I may say that at the time I drew up the will I had no idea of the amounts involved. Her property, which was chiefly in shares, amounted to two hundred thousand pounds, which results, as it is currently invested, in an annual income of eight thousand pounds. Patricia and her husband, Gregory Jaggard, could draw upon the income from the trust, but the capital sum was to remain untouched. If Mark reappeared within seven years, then the provisions of the original will as they related to himself and Patricia, would stand. However, if within seven years following Mrs Burbage's death, Mark was proved to be deceased or there was still no trace of him, thus allowing the legal presumption of death to be made, the trust would be dissolved and Patricia Jaggard would become her grandmother's residuary legatee.'

‘No mention of the husband in that final disposition?'

‘None.' Mr Stafford sat even straighter, if that were possible, in his chair. ‘Mrs Burbage, remember, thought Mark would return in the near future and none of these provisions would, in fact, be enacted. If the trust did come into operation she wanted Gregory Jaggard to have an equal hand in the administration.'

‘I see. So what's your problem?'

‘The problem, Mr Littleton, is this: the trust documents refer to Gregory Jaggard in his capacity as Patricia's husband.' Mr Stafford paused with an unconscious flair for drama. ‘Last night that marriage was proved to be invalid.'

‘Good God! Why?'

‘By the return of her first husband, Laurence Tyrell. Laurence Tyrell married Patricia Helston in April 1916, whilst serving as a lieutenant in the Irish Guards. He was later reported missing, presumed killed, at the battle of the Third Ypres—'

‘Passchendaele.'

‘Or, as it is more popularly known, Passchendaele. Patricia remarried two years ago in the firm belief that she was a widow. I need hardly tell you that the question which most concerns me is the implication for the trust.'

Mr Littleton's eyebrows shot up to alarming heights. ‘The question which concerns me is the human one. Good Lord, Major Haldean, this is like one of your books. Have you met the feller?'