Page 33 of A Perfect Devon Pub
Conscious of her thumping heart, Fiona took quick, shallow breaths. Was the thief down there? Rose dashed to the door, yanked it wide and disappeared, her footsteps thudding on the stone steps. Fiona heard raised voices: Rose’s and a man she couldn’t identify, nor could she detect what either was saying.
Suddenly, George strode out, a bottle of wine in each hand, his face red and mutinous. ‘It’s a bog standard chardonnay.’
Rose followed her husband into the corridor, hands on hips. ‘I messaged you – Fiona thinks there’s some wine missing, and you promised you wouldn’t take anything until after I’d checked.’
George marched towards Fiona, who flattened herself against the wall. ‘I can’t run a kitchen around the school run.’ He held out the bottles of wine, jabbing his head at them. ‘Ask our sommelier – this is just plonk. We need it to poach the halibut for tonight’s fish special.’
‘Nothing else?’ demanded Rose.
He held his arms aloft. ‘Frisk me. Fiona, satisfy the detective superintendent here.’
Rose muttered something under her breath. Poor woman. Like Fiona, she managed staff – a challenging role with its share of uncomfortable dilemmas. Fiona recalled suspecting one of her own employees of skimming cash tips. The experience had been awful. Doubting your team eroded trust and weighed heavily on the mind. She figured Rose must have handled the London theft and didn’t envy her boss having to face an ordeal again.
Since Fiona knew much more about wine than her employer, Rose kept score – using Fiona’s pen, after spending a fruitless five minutes looking for her own – while Fiona moved from bin to bin, calling out the contents. Each time missing bottles were identified, Fiona tried to ignore the sinking feeling in her stomach by concentrating on her ideas for Josh’s wine tutorial this evening. By 11.30 a.m., they’d scoured Europe, identifying over £25,000 worth of missing wine. A chunk of that was a rare bottle of Champagne by the famous house Krug, a Clos du Mesnil. The pale silver shiny wooden box was still on the shelf, but it was empty. ‘I’ve got the replacement cost down as £750,’ exclaimed Rose.
‘Sounds about right,’ Fiona confirmed.
‘Who pays that sort of money for a bottle of fizz!’
Fiona winced. It was sacrilege to refer to any bottle of Krug as ‘fizz’. In Fiona’s expert opinion, Krug was the finest non-vintage Champagne; a complex, rich blend of over a hundred wines spanning overten vintages, offering layers of flavour and a long, elegant finish. But the Clos du Mesnil was a vintage Champagne. The combination of high quality, limited availability and the Krug reputation made it a Champagne gem. ‘It’s pretty special, Rose.’
‘Well, itwaspretty special,’ groaned her boss.
Footsteps thundered on the stone stairs, then George strode in. ‘Rose, how much longer is this going to take? The blinking phone keeps ringing, and we can’t keep interrupting prep to answer.’
Rose sighed. ‘All right. Let’s finish this off tomorrow, Fiona.’
In the space of a morning, the scale of the loss had more than doubled.But it was the pattern of disappearances, not just the value, that made Fiona’s throat feel tight. Someone with intimate knowledge of the collection was behind this – someone who knew exactly which bottles were less likely to be missed. Yet another black mark against the sommelier.
Fifteen
When Fiona arrived at the pub to give Josh his wine lesson, he wasn’t in the staffroom. She tried the kitchen. George was hunched over his computer screen, and Ru was filleting fish, making the task look as simple as peeling an orange.
‘Where’s Josh?’ she asked.
Clearly absorbed in the culinary world, George didn’t reply.
‘Ruben?’ she nudged. ‘Seen Josh? I thought we’d arranged another wine tutorial.’
Ru scraped fish bones into a saucepan, adding a hand-tied bouquet garni of herbs, leaving the string dangling outside the pan. ‘Yes, he did mention something about that. He’s gone to fetch some more baking parchment – stocks are running a bit low.’
‘Baking parchment?’ she asked, rolling the words round her tongue. Why was that urgent?
‘Yes,’ said Ru in an offhand manner. ‘I decided to cook the halibut ‘en papillote’ as one of tonight’s specials.’ He flashed her a smile. ‘And to do that I need more baking parchment.’
Hmm, thought Fiona. This morning the plan had been to poach the fish in a wine-based stock. She was itching to ask if the inspiration to switch the recipe coincided with Ru’s discovery of Josh’s wine tutorial. ‘Fine. Please tell him we’ll reschedule.’
Deciding she might as well help Rose lay the tables, Fiona marched out, leaving the door swinging behind her. Rose stood at the bar, the booking sheet in front of her.
‘Anyone special in tonight, Rose.’
‘You’re in early,’ mumbled the boss. ‘And yes ... now you ask – Richard and Cora Hastings. I’ve put them on Table 5. Cora made the booking and was very complimentary about you. Apparently, you recently recommended a very interesting wine to go with her rare steak.’
Fiona blushed, recalling Steakgate, and the man with the florid face. She hoped her boss would not ask her to look after the couple. The man had been rude and arrogant – the last person she wanted to serve again. ‘Cora asked if you were on duty tonight, and when I told her you were, she asked for you to be on hand when they place their wine order.’ Fiona’s chest swelled with pride as her boss’s praise echoed in her ears, a smile spread across her face and Fiona stood a little taller. She suspected Florid Face was a classic wine snob who assumed fine wine must hail from Europe, whereas his wife was more open to advice and delighted to drink similar wines at a cheaper price. ‘That would be my pleasure,’ Fiona responded beaming.
Later that evening, Fiona approached Table 5, where Kim, despite wearing an apron, and having an order pad tucked under an arm, looked more like a guest about to join the couple for dinner than a waitress.
Kim revealed both customers had ordered the fish special–halibut en papillote, with hazelnut butter and fresh thyme.‘I’ll make sure Ruben himself prepares it for you,’ Kim said, winking at the woman. ‘I think he’s got a crush on me.’
