of cake. It was my first act of spinning-wheel sabotage.
Chapter 4
Meici Jones stood with his hands on his hips and complained about death taking away his customers. ‘It’s a dying business, all right. The young ones aren’t interested in spinning, and the rest get fewer each year. The number of funerals I attend! You wouldn’t believe, sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it. It costs me more in dry- cleaning getting me togs ready than I ever get out of the will when it’s read.’ He shook his head in disgust. ‘It’s not like the old days. What did you say your name was again?’
‘Louie, and this is Calamity, my niece.’
Meici Jones sized us up, and nodded. ‘Mooncalf’s a good guy.’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘one of the best.’
‘I do a lot of business through him, a lot.’ He tapped the side of his nose. ‘The sort of business that if you asked about it I’d have to say was none of your business, if you see what I mean.’ He was short, in his thirties, with the melancholy eyes of a spaniel. ‘I was quite surprised when he said you and your niece wanted to learn. Not many people do these days. You hoping for some action on the bequests and legacies stuff, are you? You’re wasting your time if you are.’
‘No, it’s for the coming apocalypse.’
‘What’s that then?’
‘You know, end of the world, nuclear Armageddon. Civilisation will be destroyed, it will be back to the hoe and plough, armed marauding gangs infesting the radioactive countryside, a man will need to survive by his own wits. Spinning will be an essential.’
‘I hadn’t thought of that.’ He stood back and surveyed the scene. His Cavalier estate was parked outside our office in Stryd-y-Popty, the boot raised. Sample cases and bits of wood and rubber were strewn around the boot. ‘Let’s see what we have here, then. Good salesman always runs through the checklist.’ He pulled a sample case forward and opened up the lid with two snaps of the fasteners. Bits of spinning wheel, cut into sections, lay embedded on green velour in form-fitted depressions. The high-gloss finish flashed in the sun like a welder’s torch. ‘This is what the guy in
He closed the case and ran his hand across the various items in the boot, talking to himself as he mentally ticked them off. ‘Gasket, polish, order book, resin, spare treadle, distaff balance, counterweights . . .’ His hand came to rest on two stovepipe hats. ‘Not forgetting the most important thing of all . . .’ He turned round and said with a wink, ‘Couple of stoveys for the ladies!’
We drove up Penglais Hill, windows wound right down, squinting at the bright asphalt that rose ahead of us. Meici had a Tupperware sandwich box balanced on his knee, and took periodic bites from a bacon sandwich that dripped fat on to the steering wheel.
‘My mam makes them extra greasy,’ said Meici. ‘I told her I like them like that but I don’t really. I’ll cop it if she ever finds out the truth. She says every time I tell a lie an angel marks it down in a book. Does your mum say that?’
‘My mum died when I was little.’
‘Oh. Who do you live with then?’
‘Nobody.’
Meici looked across at me as if to check whether I was being serious. ‘Really? Where?’
‘I have a caravan out at Ynyslas.’
Meici nodded. ‘We live near Bwlchcrwys.’ He considered for a second and then said suddenly, ‘Guess how many games teachers there are in our family? Go on, guess.’
I looked puzzled.
‘Four,’ said Meici with evident pride. ‘Three uncles and my grandad. What do you think of that?’
‘Very good.’
‘Yeah, isn’t it?’
‘Weren’t you tempted yourself?’
‘No, not for me. We thought for a while my brother Esau might . . . he was born hairy, you see . . .’ A thought clouded his brow. ‘But I don’t want to talk about Esau.’ He turned round to Calamity in the back. ‘Did you bring any crayons?’
I could sense her eyes narrowing.
‘What for?’ she said.
‘You might find it a bit boring watching me doing the old black magic. Thought maybe you could go outside and draw some nice pictures or something.’ He finished the last sandwich and handed me the Tupperware box. ‘Hold on to that, Lou, I’ll be needing it later.’ He licked the snail trails of grease that ran down the back of his hand.
We drove over the brow of Penglais Hill, a flow of cars bumper to bumper headed past us on the right, into town. Some were going to work but their numbers had been swollen by those staying in caravans up and down the coast. Meici expounded on the subtle art of the spinning-wheel salesman. ‘The main drawback with wheels is they are traditional, see, so there aren’t many firms left that still make them and the ones that do take a lot of pride in their work. The stuff they make lasts a lifetime, but what’s the good of that? One month on the road and you would have saturated the market. This drawback is your opportunity, too. Delicate things they are, spinning wheels, that’s if you want to keep the yarn at its optimum, so they always need a little tinker under the hood. They could probably do it themselves, the dears, but it voids the warranty doesn’t it? That’s the trick, you see. Always sell the extended warranty, and all the other bits and bobs, the wheel is just the beginning.’ He looked over and asked, ‘Know what of?’
‘Er . . . I don’t know.’
‘Beginning of a beautiful relationship.’
‘Of course!’
‘They get to trust you like a son after a while so then you can start hitting them for stuff they don’t need, persuade them to have a service that isn’t necessary.’
‘How do you do that?’
‘Fiddle the log book, put it down for more spins than it’s had. Sometimes, if you’ve been with them for a few years, and they seldom change once they’ve got a relationship, they start asking you to fetch their pension. You can always skim some off that. “Oh it’s not as much as it used to be,” they say, and you sympathise: “Oh I know, it’s the economy, you see.” Stuff like that. Here listen—’
Meici reached across and turned on the cassette player. A tape squeaked into life and a female voiceover chirruped in that bedtime story voice that all adult education audio tapes seem to have:
Welcome to unit 5 of Selling Isn’t Telling, the pro-salesman’s guide to Ninja selling. In the last unit we discussed the key importance of the ‘close’ as the foundation of all successful sales pitches. Do you remember how novice salesman Frankie Marshall saw all his hard work go to waste because he was too shy to ask for the order? We learned that it often helps to memorise this lesson in the form of a little mnemonic, didn’t we? Did you do one? If you did, repeat your mnemonic now.
Meici said, ‘Don’t sell like a girly, close that sale and close it early.’
Meici turned to me. ‘Some of this stuff might be a bit advanced for you, Lou, but try and follow as best you can.’
Today we will be looking at an advanced closing technique based on the trademark exit routine of the famous
