Cat O'Nine Tales: And Other Stories (4 page)

“And what value
have you put on the fish-and-chip shop?” was his next question.

“We will be
considering offers over one hundred thousand,” said Sue confidently “And how
much has the post office been valued at, remembering that it’s in such a prime
location?”

“Mr.
Quenton
says that the Post Office is looking for two
hundred and seventy thousand, but he assures me they would settle for a quarter
of a million, if they can find a suitable applicant.”

“So you’re
likely to be a little over one hundred thousand short of your target,” said the
analyst, not having to refer to a ledger. He paused. “What was the post
office’s turnover last year?”

“Two hundred
and thirty thousand pounds,” replied Sue.

“Profit?”

Once again, Sue
needed to check her figures. “Twenty-six thousand, four hundred, but that
doesn’t include the added bonus of spacious living accommodation, with rates
and taxes covered in the annual return.” She paused. “And this time we would
own the property.”

“If all those
figures can be confirmed by our accountants,”
said
Mr.
Tremaine
, “and you are able to sell the fish-
andchip
shop for around a hundred thousand, it certainly
appears to be a sound investment. But...” The two would-be clients looked apprehensive.
“And there always is
a but
, when it comes to lending
money. The loan would, of course, be subject to the post office maintaining its
category
A
status. Property in that area is currently
trading at around twenty thousand, so the real value of the post office is
55/595 as a business, and only then if, I repeat, if, it continues to have
category
A
status.”

“But it’s been
a category A post office for the past thirty years,” said Chris.

“Why should
that change in the future?”

“If I could
predict the future, Mr. Haskins,” replied the analyst, “I would never make a
bad investment, but as I can’t I have to take the occasional risk.

Britannia
invests in people, and on that front you have nothing to prove.” He smiled. “We
would, as with our first investment, expect any loan to be repaid in quarterly
instalments
, over a period of five years, and on this
occasion, as such a large sum is involved, we would want to take a charge over
the property.”

“At what
percentage?” demanded
Chris.

“Eight and a
half percent, with added penalties should increments not be paid on
time.
”

“We’ll need to
consider your offer carefully,” said Sue, “and we’ll let you know once we’ve
made our decision.”

Mr.
Tremaine
stifled a smile.

“What was all
that about category A status?” asked Sue as they walked quickly back toward the
seafront, still hoping to open the shop in time for their first customer.

“Category A is
where all the profits are,” said Chris. “Savings accounts, pensions, postal
orders, vehicle road tax and even premium bonds all guarantee you a handsome
profit. Without them, you have to rely on TV licenses, stamps, electricity
bills, and perhaps a little extra income if they allow you to run a shop on the
side. If that was all Mr.
Quenton
had to offer, we’d
be better off continuing to run the fish-and-chip shop.”

“And is there
any risk of us losing our category A status?” asked Sue.

“None
whatsoever,” said Chris, “or that’s what the area manager assured me, and he’s
a fellow member of Rotary.

He told me that
the matter has never even come up for discussion at headquarters, and you can
be pretty confident that Britannia will also have checked that out long before
they would be willing to part with a hundred thousand.”

“So you still
think we should go ahead?”

“With a few
refinements to their terms,” said Chris.

“Like what?”

“Well, to start
with, I’ve no doubt that Mr.
Tremaine
will come down
to eight percent, now that the High Street banks have also begun investing in
business ventures, and don’t forget, this time he will have a charge over the
property.”

The Haskins
sold their fish-and-chip shop for £112,000 and were able to add a further
£38,000 from their credit account. Britannia topped it up with a loan of
£100,000 at 8 percent. A check for £250,000 was sent to Post Office
headquarters in London.

“Time to
celebrate,” declared Chris.

“What do you
have in mind?” asked Sue.
“Because we can’t afford to spend
any more money.”

“Let’s drive
down to Ashford and spend the weekend with our daughter...” he paused...”and on
the way back...”

“And on the way
back?” repeated Sue.

“Let’s drop
into Battersea Dogs’ Home.”

A month later,
Mr. and Mrs. Haskins and Stamps, another Labrador, this time black, moved from
their fish-and-chip shop on Beach Street to a category
A
post office in Victoria Crescent.

Chris and Sue
quickly returned to working hours that they hadn’t experienced since they first
opened the fish-and-chip shop. For the next five years they cut down on any
little extras, and even went without holidays, although they often thought
about another trip to Portugal, but that had to be put on hold until they
completed their quarterly payments to Britannia. Chris continued to carry out
his Rotary Club duties, while Sue became chairman of the
Cleethorpes
branch of the Mothers’ Union.

Tracey was
promoted to sites manager, and Stamps ate more food than the three of them put
together.

In their fourth
year, Mr. and Mrs. Haskins won the “Area Post Office of the Year” award, and
nine months later paid off the final
instalment
to
Britannia.

The board of
Britannia invited Chris and Sue to join them for lunch at the Royal Hotel to
celebrate the fact that they now owned the post office without a penny of debt
to their name.

“We still have
to earn back our original investment,” Chris reminded them.

“A mere matter of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds.”

“If you keep
going at your present rate,” suggested the chairman of Britannia, “it should
only take you another five years to achieve and then you could be sitting on a
business worth over a million.”

“Does that mean
I’m a millionaire?” asked Chris.

“No, it does
not,” butted in Sue. “Our current account is showing a credit of a little over
ten thousand pounds. You’re a ten thou-
sandaire
.”

The chairman
laughed, and invited the board to raise their glasses to Chris and Sue Haskins.

“My spies tell
me, Chris,” added the chairman, “that you are likely to be the next president
of our local Rotary.”

“Many a slip,”
said Chris as he lowered his glass, “and certainly not before Sue takes her
place on the area committee of the Mothers’ Union. Don’t be surprised if she
ends up as national chairman,” he added, with considerable pride.

“So what do you
plan to do next?” asked the chairman.

“Take a month’s
holiday in Portugal,” said Chris without hesitation. “After five years of
having to make do with the beach at
Cleethorpes
and a
plate
offish
and chips, I think we’ve earned it.”

That also would
have made a satisfactory conclusion to this tale, had officialdom not stepped
in once again; this time with a letter addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Hoskins from
the finance director of the Post Office. They found it waiting for them on the
mat when they returned from
Albufeira
.

Post Office Headquarters,
148 Old
Street, London EC1V 9HQ

Dear
Mr
and Mrs.
Hoski

The Post Office is in the process of re-evaluating its property
portfolio, and to that end, will
he
making some
changes to the status of some of its older establishments.

I therefore have to inform you that the board has come to the reluctant
conclusion that we will no longer require two
category
A status facilities in the
Cleethorpes
area. While
the new High Street branch will continue as a category
A
post office, Victoria Crescent will be downgraded to category B. In order that
you can make the necessary adjustments, we do not propose to bring in these
changes until the New Year.

We look forward to continuing our relationship with you.

Yours sincerely,

Finance Director

 
“Does
that mean what I think it means?” said Sue after she had read the letter a
second time.

“In simple
terms, love,” said Chris, “we can never hope to earn back our original
investment of two hundred and fifty thousand, even if we go on working for the
rest of our lives.”

“Then we’ll
have to put the post office up for sale.”

“But who will
want to buy it at that price,” asked Chris, “once they discover that the
business no longer has category
A
status?”

“The man from
Britannia assured us that once we’d paid off the debt it would be worth a
million.”

“Only while the
business has a turnover of five hundred thousand and generates a profit of
around eighty thousand a year,” said Chris.

“We should take
legal advice.”

Chris
reluctantly agreed, although he wasn’t in much doubt what his solicitor’s
opinion would be. The law, their advocate dutifully advised them, was not on
their side, and therefore he wouldn’t recommend them to sue the Post Office, as
he couldn’t guarantee the outcome. “You might well win a moral victory,” he
said, “but that won’t assist your bank balance.”

The next
decision Chris and Sue made was to put the post office on the market as they
wanted to find out if anyone would show an interest. Once again Chris’s
judgment turned out to be correct: only three couples even bothered to look
over the property, and none of them returned for a second viewing once they
discovered it was no longer category
A
status.

“My bet,” said
Sue,
“is that those officials back at headquarters knew only
too well they were going to change our status long before they pocketed our
money, but it suited them not to tell us.”

“You may well
be right,” said Chris, “but you can be sure of one thing–they won’t have put
anything in writing at the time, so we would never be able to prove it.”

“And neither
did
we
.”

“What are you
getting at, love?”

“How much have
they stolen from us?” demanded
Sue.

“Well, if by
that you mean our original investment...”

“Our life
savings, every penny we’ve earned over the past thirty years, not to mention
our pension.”

Chris paused
and raised his head, while he made some calculations. “Not including any profit
we might have hoped for, once we’d seen our capital returned...”

“Yes, only what
they’ve stolen from us,” Sue repeated.

“A little over
two hundred and fifty thousand, if you don’t include interest,” said Chris.

“And we have no
hope of seeing a penny of that original investment back, even if we were to
work for the rest of our lives?”

“That’s about
the sum of it, love.”

“Then it’s my
intention to retire on January the first.”

“And what are
you expecting to live off for the rest of your life?” asked Chris.

“Our original investment.”

“And how do you
intend to go about that?”

“By taking advantage of our spotless reputation.”

Chris and Sue rose early the
following morning: after all, they had a lot of work to do during the next
three months if they hoped to accumulate enough capital to retire by 1 January.
Sue warned Chris that meticulous preparation would be needed if her plan was to
succeed. He didn’t disagree. They both knew that they couldn’t risk pressing
the button until the second Friday in November, when they would have a six-week
window of opportunity–Chris’s expression–before “those people back in London”
worked out what they were really up to. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t a lot
of preliminary work to be done in the meantime.