Espresso Tales - Alexander Hanchett Smith [119]
76. Bruce Has Uncharitable Thoughts about Crieff Bruce had been deeply disturbed by what George had said to him over the telephone. He had been buoyed by his purchase of the Petrus at such a favourable price, but had been completely deflated by George’s suggestion that the wine might be something quite different – an ordinary wine put into bogus Petrus bottles by calculating forgers.
At first, he had denied the possibility that George might be right. He had not even seen the wine in question; how 250 Bruce Has Uncharitable Thoughts about Crieff could he pontificate on it? The problem with George, of course, was that he was so unadventurous. The idea of making an unconventional purchase, of buying something other than through the regular channels, was obviously alien to his cautious, accountant’s personality. Poor George! He had always been the timid one, even at Morrison’s Academy, where he would never do anything that was remotely likely to get him into trouble. What a mouse he was! But then mice sometimes had their uses, thought Bruce – especially if they had money.
But then, but then . . . perhaps George was right, to an extent at least, in saying that one had to be suspicious of bargains. If the Petrus was worth what it appeared to be worth, then why should Harry sell it to him at such a marked-down price? If it was worth more, and if, as Harry claimed, people were clamboring to get it, then why should he sell it to him at such a reduced price? It was not as if he had given him an extra few per cent discount – the sort of discount one feels that one has to give to a friend – he had cut savagely into the market price. He had effectively given away the three cases of wine.
The thought that George might be right made Bruce very uncomfortable. He had paid a lot of money for the wine and he had done so out of his own bank account. He had also paid the first month’s rental on the shop, again from his own account, and the debit side of the business would be mounting up rather sharply. And yet he had not obtained a single penny from George, even although George had assured him that the money would be available once he had sold the bonds. But how long did it take to sell bonds? Surely a call to one’s broker was all that was required ?
He spent his second day in the shop taking delivery of stock he had ordered from a wholesaler in Leith. It was good, knockabout wine, in Bruce’s view – the sort of wine that Stockbridge people would buy to drink with their dinner or take to their parties – large Australian reds, various Chardonnays and even a range of sweetish German wines which he planned to place in Bruce Has Uncharitable Thoughts about Crieff 251
a special section called Wines for Her. That last idea he considered rather good, and he thought it not unlikely that other wine shops would follow suit when they saw how appealing it was to women.
The shelves in his shop were now filling up. The New World was in the front, in accordance with Bruce’s personal tastes, and France and Italy were at the back. Spain was only represented in a very small way – again based on Bruce’s belief that Rioja was virtually undrinkable (“I wouldn’t even gargle with the stuff,” he was fond of saying; a rather witty remark, he felt) and there was a similarly small South African section. This was based on Bruce’s dislike of the tactics of South African rugby, he being of the view that South African supporters had poisoned the All Blacks on more than one occasion when they were due to play the Springboks. “Entire rugby teams don’t all get diarrhoea on the eve of a match by accident,” he observed. And had the Scottish team been similarly poisoned?
Bruce laughed at the question. “Who would bother?” he asked, bitterly.
The Petrus was not displayed. It was in the back room, under a table, three unopened cases with the keys of St Peter stencilled on the side. Bruce looked at them and felt a pang of doubt and regret. If the wine was not what it purported to be, then he would