Victory Disc Read online

  “Could you get the Hoover, please,” I said. There was sweat running down from my hairline onto my face, and I considered asking my beloved to get a towel and swab my brow for me while I laboured nobly, like a surgeon in an operating theatre with his loyal nurse at his side.

  But I decided I’d better not push my luck, and just settled for the Hoover.

  The first screw came free and fell ringing onto the floor. Fanny pounced on it instantly and batted it across the room, chasing it and moving like quicksilver. Tinkler in turn was chasing her. “That’s the original screw!” he cried. While he was retrieving it, I got the other three original screws out, falling one after the other musically onto the floor. Unlike her sister, Turk made no move to intercept the little bouncing objects. Instead, evidently bored by the whole enterprise, she disappeared out the cat flap into the garden.

  Tinkler came back with the rogue screw and I gave him the other three. Then I swapped the full-sized Phillips screwdriver for a miniature flat-headed one and carefully inserted the narrow leading edge of the flat blade into the hairline gap where the panel met the rest of the speaker. Tinkler said, “Be careful not to—”

  “Damage the original paintwork,” I said. “Yes, I know.” I used the screwdriver to gently pry the panel open. It gave way with a pop and a stale smell of dust, revealing a large hole in the base of the speaker cabinet. Tinkler aimed the flashlight inside.

  We saw it right away. There in the thick dust of decades, a fat blue curl of cable like a nesting snake, and the gleam of a phono plug. “Where’s that Hoover?” I said.

  Nevada bustled in. “Coming right up.”

  We switched it on and Fanny fled from the noise. Nevada held the nozzle by the base of the speaker as we drew the cable out, catching a rich flow of dirty grey dust and fuzz. The vacuum cleaner consumed it cheerfully, preventing it from becoming an airborne health hazard. As a result of these ministrations, the cables arrived shiny and pristine in Tinkler’s eager hands. “Are they the right ones?” said Nevada. “Your precious silver cables?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Tinkler happily, stroking them. “My pretties.”

  Nevada switched off the Hoover, and Tinkler and I were just discussing the possibility of giving the cables a test run in my system—“They’ve never been used. We’ll have to run them in for a few hours before they start to sound good”—when Fanny came streaking into the room.

  She took one look at the inviting new opening in the bottom of the big black box and, before we could stop her, shot straight inside.

  Our cat was inside the speaker.

  “Fanny!”

  “Wonderful,” said Nevada. “Now we’ve lost one of the cats.” She turned to Tinkler. “Your speaker has eaten her. You’re taking this with surprising equanimity,” said Nevada. “Aren’t you worried she’ll damage the delicate electronics inside?”

  “It’s a horn,” I said, in unison with Tinkler. He shrugged, as if to say, “You explain.” So I did. “There isn’t anything inside except air.”

  “Air in a cunningly shaped enclosure,” added Tinkler smugly.

  I went and kneeled on the floor by the speaker and listened to the mysterious scrabbling within. Nevada joined me. We tried to coax Fanny out, but she seemed entirely happy to remain in her cosy new dwelling place indefinitely. Tinkler sat on the sofa and watched our hapless efforts as if it was an entertainment being laid on especially for his benefit. “Have you got any grapes?” he said. He wanted to eat as he watched.

  Eventually, by using a saucer of catnip as an enticement, we just about managed to lure Fanny out. I say ‘just about’ because when she poked her head and shoulders forth from the opening we tried, rather precipitately, to grab her and drag her the rest of the way.

  But the nefarious cat managed a sinuous U-turn, twisting around in our grasp, and promptly scrambled back inside again.

  “Professional cat-handlers at work,” said Tinkler behind us, watching the proceedings.

  I managed to hold onto Fanny’s hind legs and, in a protracted and rather undignified fashion, succeeded in dragging her out. As she emerged reluctantly from the speaker, backwards, her front paws were the last thing to appear, desperately striving to retain a grip inside.

  Which is why she was, in turn, dragging something else with her.

  Between her paws was a square brown cardboard sleeve with a circular hole in the centre. Through the hole a bright maroon label was visible.

  “Holy shit,” said Tinkler. “Is that a record?”

  2. SIGMUND FREUD

  It was a record all right, a 78rpm disc. Tinkler had picked it up off the floor as soon as we’d got it away from Fanny—snatched it up, actually. He was staring at it, holding it so close to his face that it was almost touching his nose. “How the hell did this get in there?”

  I said, “The same way your silver cables did.”

  Someone, over the years, had dropped the record inside the speaker.

  Tinkler carefully hefted the 78 in his hands as if assessing its weight—which would have been considerable, compared to a modern record. “But how is it still in one piece?”

  “What do you mean?” said Nevada.

  “It’s a 78,” I said. “It’s made of shellac.”

  “Oh well, that explains everything,” she said.

  I reached out my hand for the record, but Tinkler wouldn’t give it to me. I turned to Nevada and explained, “It’s a brittle substance. Much more brittle than vinyl. When you drop an LP on the floor it generally doesn’t break. Drop a 78, and it invariably does. Let go of your favourite recording and basically it’s dustpan-and-brush time, as many a disgruntled music lover discovered.”

  “That’s why they invented vinyl,” said Tinkler.

  “Well,” I said, “it’s one reason.”

  Fanny, who had now apparently forgotten all about her adventures inside the loudspeaker, wandered off. I put the panel back in place over the hole in the side, though, just to prevent embarrassing repetition.

  Tinkler didn’t offer to help. He was studying the label on the record. “Who is it by?” I said, lying on the floor, operating the screwdriver.

  “Some jokers you’ve never heard of.” He showed it to me. “The Flare Path Orchestra. Those exciting music stars of yesteryear.” But he must have seen something in my face, because he changed his tune right away. “You’re kidding,” he said. “No way. You mean they really are exciting?” I didn’t answer immediately. I got up and went over to the record shelf. I wanted to be certain.

  But I knew I was right.

  Nevada and Tinkler were watching me now as I found what I was looking for. A collection of airshots by the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band, a double album in a gatefold sleeve. Nevada, unfortunately, recognised it.

  She said, “Is that the one the Danish nymphomaniac gave you?”

  “Swedish,” I said. I opened the sleeve and quickly scanned the notes inside, which described the career of the Miller band in England during World War Two.

  “Why do you always get to meet the nymphomaniacs?” said Tinkler. “You’re dating her.” He nodded at Nevada. “Nymphomaniacs are completely wasted on you.”

  I found what I was looking for. I was right. I set the Miller album aside and picked up the 78 again. “It’s them,” I said.

  Tinkler came over and scooped up the Glenn Miller cover and began poring through the liner notes. “What’s them? Them who?”

  I said, “The Flare Path Orchestra was considered to be the finest British swing band of World War Two. It was made up of air force personnel.”

  “Hence the name,” said Nevada.

  “Exactly. And they played on a couple of occasions in a ‘battle of the bands’ with the Glenn Miller Army Air Force Band, who were the finest American outfit, when they were serving over here.”

  “Army Air Force?” said Nevada. “Surely that’s a contradiction in terms.”

  Tinkler was reading the sleeve notes and whistling. “He’s right.
They were this fantastic British jazz and swing outfit. Apparently they kicked Glenn Miller’s khaki-clad ass on at least one occasion in those battles of the bands. They were great. Legendary, in fact. And it says here that almost none of their recordings survive in any form.” He looked hungrily at the 78, which I had now slid carefully from its cardboard sleeve.

  The surface of the shellac was thickly matted with dust, but other than that it looked positively pristine. Tinkler came and peered over my shoulder as I flipped the record and checked the other side. It appeared just as good. Tinkler gave me a look and I nodded. We were off to the races.

  Nevada came over and joined us. “It’s worth something, then?”

  I said, “I suspect it’s worth quite a lot.”

  Tinkler chortled happily. “I’m such a lucky boy.”

  “What do you mean?” said Nevada. “Why are you lucky?”

  “Finding such a rare record. And because that speaker’s mine, and that record was in the speaker, the record is also mine.” He paused to see if we followed this complex chain of legal reasoning. “All mine, do you hear me! And I’m going to sell it. And make lots and lots of money. My profits will be obscene.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Nevada. “You never would have found that rare record in your speaker if it wasn’t for our cat.” She went over and stroked Fanny, who had wandered back in to see if she could wreak any more havoc. “Don’t try and pull a fast one, mister.”

  “I love it when you call me mister,” said Tinkler.

  “I insist on a cut of your obscene profits. For Fanny.”

  “Oh, for Fanny, of course.”

  “I think thirty-five per cent would be fair.”

  “I suppose I could give you one per cent.”

  “Dream on,” said Nevada. And they began negotiating in earnest. While they haggled I went in the kitchen to make some more coffee and to think and—I must admit—gloat. The record was a real find. When I went back into the sitting room with the coffee, Nevada and Tinkler had come to an amicable settlement and she was looking at the 78.

  “Why don’t you play it?” she said.

  “I can’t play 78s on my system.”

  She looked at me sceptically. “But your turntable has a 78rpm speed option. I’ve seen it.” It was true. I’d been teaching Nevada turntable skills on the Garrard, and she was beginning to know her stuff. But a little bit of knowledge can be a dangerous thing.

  I said, “I can spin the record at the right speed, all right. But if I tried to play it, it might damage our cartridge and stylus, to the tune of about a thousand quid.”

  “Ouch,” said Nevada. “So you need to get a different cartridge and stylus?”

  “That’s right.” Maybe a Stanton, I thought.

  Tinkler said, “They used to play 78s with cactus needles.”

  Nevada laughed, then looked at me. “Really?” she said. “He’s not pulling my leg?”

  “Nope,” said Tinkler. “It was an earlier, simpler, and more innocent time.”

  I looked at the record in my hands, cold and heavy and terribly fragile. “That’s right, simpler and more innocent,” I said, “with the entire world at war.”

  * * *

  In the end Tinkler and I pooled our resources and bought a suitable cartridge from Lenny at the Vinyl Vault, who was something of a 78rpm specialist, and we were able to play the record.

  “Lenny?” said Nevada. “Is he the chap who served us the lovely Chablis?”

  “Served you the lovely Chablis.”

  “It was Grand Cru.”

  I said, “He’s also the chap who asked me if I would ask you on his behalf if you would go away on a romantic holiday with him to a Greek island. For some reason I declined to do so.”

  “How selfish of you. Which island?”

  “Mykonos.”

  “Pity. It’s lovely there.”

  Nevada and Tinkler and I squeezed together onto the sofa, joined in short order by both the cats, and listened to the 78, using Lenny’s cartridge. It was in astonishingly good shape for its age, and it sounded great. I began to reluctantly realise that at least some of the claims made for the audio quality of shellac were true. It was a different sound to vinyl, sharper yet also somehow smoother. However, each side of the rapidly spinning disc only lasted about three minutes.

  Side one was the great Mercer/Arlen composition, ‘Blues in the Night’. Side two was ‘Elmer’s Tune’, possibly the finest dance number ever written by a mortician.

  The playing of the Flare Path Orchestra was virtuosic, both bluesy and swinging. They also sounded startlingly modern. I might have been listening to a Ted Heath recording from the late 1950s. It had the same assurance and densely organised quality. But there was a quirkiness to the instrumentation that put me in mind of Spike Jones and, from a later era, Esquivel. It still sounded fresh today, first-class British jazz played by a bunch of young guys who were fighting, and dying, in a war against the forces of darkness.

  We agreed that I would blog about the discovery of the record on my website. A lot of high rollers, big dealers and specialist collectors made a point of checking my site, and a mention of it there would actually drive the price up when Tinkler eventually came to auction it.

  “It’s like insider trading,” said Nevada happily.

  She took a photo of Tinkler’s speaker, with Fanny posing on top of it, and I included that on the blog. She also wrote a first person cat’s-eye point of view account of the discovery of the record and signed it with Fanny’s name. This I didn’t include. I told Nevada that the presence of talking cats on the website wouldn’t exactly reinforce my reputation as a leading authority on rare records.

  She took my point.

  The page went live at midnight on a Friday and, by Monday, things started to happen.

  * * *

  The doorbell rang, and I opened the door to see a young man standing there in a black tunic and black trousers. It was a well-cut outfit, almost but not quite a uniform. In his hands he held a flat black cap. He had short blond hair and sunglasses and looked lean but athletic.

  He gave me a noncommittal look and said, “Are you the Vinyl Detective?” His accent sounded South African. I told him I was and he nodded. “Would you mind waiting here a minute, please?” Then he walked off, leaving me bemused. It was a warm spring morning, so I didn’t mind standing there in the open doorway, but I was baffled as to what the hell was going on.

  Just then I heard the back door slam and Nevada came hurrying through the house to join me. “I was out in the garden,” she said, “and I saw everything. Were they asking for directions to the Abbey?”

  This was a common enough occurrence, and given the steady flow of wealthy high-fliers who ended up detoxing there, the most likely explanation for a liveried flunky turning up at our door. I shook my head. “No. Someone is looking for me.”

  Nevada did a little controlled Snoopy dance of excitement.

  “Someone with a chauffeur! A genuine, honest-to-god chauffeur.”

  She fell silent as the young man came back. This time he was preceded by a woman. She was, I guessed, in her sixties or seventies. Well-preserved and clearly well-heeled, wearing a chic and expensive-looking black-and-white checked business suit and some gleaming, simple shoes which I saw Nevada eyeing enviously.

  The woman was making agonisingly slow progress, leaning on a cane in her left hand while the chauffeur followed, walking a careful and polite step or two behind her, ready to intervene if she slipped.

  She didn’t slip.

  I could see why the chauffeur hadn’t wanted her to make the trip to our front door until he was sure I was at home. The woman smiled at us as she drew near. “Good morning,” she said. “I apologise for this ludicrous thing.” She indicated the cane. “I hope to be off it soon, when the new hip has settled in.” She smiled at us toothily. “I trust this isn’t too ungodly an hour.”

  “No, that’s all right,” I said. “We’re dressed, just about.�
�� Nevada gave me a sharp nudge. She scented money and didn’t want me putting anyone off. “Why don’t you come in and have a coffee?”

  “Thank you, that would be lovely.” She paused, leaning on the cane, and extended her right hand. “I’m Joan Honeyland.” We shook hands. Her fingers were long and cool and had a dry, papery feel. She turned to the chauffeur. “Thank you, Albert. I’m all right now.” Albert nodded and left, heading back to the car presumably.

  I was quite interested to see what that car was and, as soon as we were inside, with the door shut and the coffee on, I left Nevada making a fuss over the woman and slipped out the back door. Fanny followed me as I crunched across the gravel and mewed at my feet as I took a furtive look over the back wall. There was a gleaming black vintage Mercedes parked in the street. It was old, but immaculate.

  Like the record we’d found.

  I went back inside to find Nevada and Miss Honeyland sitting at the table with coffee. “What a lovely place,” she said, looking up at me as I came in. “So full of sunlight.”

  “It is when it’s not full of huge ugly loudspeakers,” said Nevada. Presumably for the benefit of the absent Tinkler, who had finally hired a van and some local goons and moved the damned thing to his place in Putney. He was going to have to remodel his house to make room for it. It was a measure of our shared obsession that this seemed entirely sensible to me, laudable even.

  I sat down and poured myself a coffee. I noticed that Nevada had also set out our finest assortment of biscuits. She was smiling at the woman. “That’s a lovely scarf,” she said. “Is it Hermès?”

  “Yes. It belonged to my mother.”

  “Is it silk or cashmere-silk?”

  “Cashmere-silk.”

  At this point we were spared a detailed disquisition on neckwear because Fanny followed me in from the garden and headed straight for our visitor, rubbing herself around the legs of her chair. “What a lovely cat. May I pat her?”

  “Of course,” said Nevada. “Be our guest.” She shot me a happy, we-just-got-lucky look. The woman was obviously a prospective client, and the kind who came from a long line of Hermès scarf wearers. The woman stroked Fanny, who dodged around under the table, circling her chair, always apparently fleeing but always ultimately returning to get a little more attention.