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underestimated the power of the sea and, within a generation, many brewery wells had been breached and contaminated with salt water. Unless it had access to other sources of water, the
brewery was doomed, which is why only a handful of them survive on the coast itself.
    It was not the fact that there was a brewery in Seagrave that was surprising, it was that there was
still
a brewery there, and still there since 1849 according to the date woven into the
wrought-iron gates of the main entrance.
    The gates were probably original. Certainly the main entrance into the brewery yard was. No company would have been allowed to build a brewery from scratch there today, shoehorned as it was
between a supermarket and a library on what passed for the town’s main drag, Seagrave’s High Street. But then the Victorians probably built the brewery first, then the town around
it.
    I could always have asked the white-haired old man who opened a window in the gatehouse and yelled at me. He looked old enough to know.
    I slid down Armstrong’s window and cupped a hand to my ear.
    ‘I’m sorry?’
    His face seemed to fill the open sash window and his white moustache bristled impressively. I wondered what rank he told people he had held in the war. I wondered which war.
    ‘No one here’s called for a taxi,’ he shouted although we were only about two feet apart.
    ‘I’m not collecting, I’m visiting,’ I shouted back.
    He consulted a green clipboard, then waved it at me.
    ‘No brewery tours booked for today.’ He was going a lovely shade of rose pink as he yelled. Maybe I shouldn’t have been revving Armstrong’s engine so much. ‘You
have to make an appointment.’
    ‘I’m not here for a tour and I do have an appointment.’
    ‘Whom with?’
    I let the pedal up from the metal.
    ‘With Mr Seton,’ I said smugly.
    ‘Which one?’ he snapped back.
    ‘How many have I got to choose from?’
    I only said it to wind him up. I didn’t think for a minute he would rise to it, but he did.
    ‘Well, Mr Wilfred only comes in on the second Friday of the month these days.’ He held up a hand and began to count them off. ‘Mr Hubert is in court today . . .’
    ‘Oh dear, how sad,’ I said.
    ‘He’s a magistrate,’ he replied, glaring at me. ‘And Mr Edgar is on his annual skiing holiday.’
    He put his head on one side, his mouth twisting into a smile, waiting for me to make my move.
    ‘So that just leaves Mr Murdo,’ I said, nodding as if agreeing with him on some fundamental piece of philosophy. ‘And I think you’ll find he’s expecting me. The
name is Angel and I’m representing Rudgard and Blugden. I was told he liked people to be punctual.’
    I had been told no such thing but it sounded impressive, or at least I hoped it did to the gatekeeper.
    Something worked. With reluctance, he looked at his clipboard, then he looked at me and then he looked over the length of Armstrong then he looked back at his clipboard. Then he shook his head
and levered himself to his feet. When he emerged from the gatehouse he was wearing a peaked cap to go with his brown uniform jacket and trousers. I had just known he would be.
    He rattled a couple of bolts and pulled on the gates until they swung open on small iron wheels which had worn grooves in the concrete yard, but he himself remained smack in front of
Armstrong’s radiator.
    ‘Park over there,’ he shouted, pointing to a corner of the yard, ‘in the space marked “Visitors”. Health and Safety regulations require me to tell you that if you
park anywhere else you could put yourself and your vehicle at risk. This is a working area and our dray lorries are constantly loading and unloading. The company can accept no responsibility.
Someone will come and collect you from your . . . vehicle.’
    I gave him a big smile as I accelerated by him, missing his toes by at least an inch, and aimed Armstrong across the brewery yard to where an ancient Citroën Safari was parked in