Stockholm has been more like Hersonissos on the Greek island of Crete or Puerto de Morgan on Gran Canarias for the past few days. The Swedish evening paper Aftonbladet refers to it as grillvädret…which is either a call for barbecues in Djursholm or a warning against making common cause with Mad Dogs and Englishmen by parading in the midday sun. Temperatures have been in the high twenties all week with no sign of abating…30o C is 86o F.

One of Cultura’s clients works from a studio on Trädgårdsgatan…the street where my son bought an apartment. Yesterday Alan had some recording to do and I had some whisky, cognac and Imperial Leather soap to pass on so we met up for lunch in no-man’s land…not the best of metaphors but distances are much the same. Lunch at 20 paces.

I came away from lunch with an invitation to visit the family seat Svedudden on the island of Ljusterö north of Stockholm up Norrtälje way for a couple of days over the weekend…Sunday to Tuesday. I am not the oldest friend of the family but as Alan’s Best Man we go back some way…37 years to the wedding…and have watched our children gradually convince themselves that they have nothing to learn from their parents…as all children do…for a while.

Over the meatballs and rice Alan mentioned that his daughter lived close by. It was as well he did because I bumped into her this evening going through the next check-out. Had Alan not forewarned me I am not sure I would have accosted the beautiful young lady with the rather sad chat-up line: ‘haven’t we met somewhere before?’ But Nikki recognised me upon the instant…unless she is in the habit of throwing her arms around strange men who make approaches to her at supermarket checkouts. In Boldness is Genius. We chatted for a while before going our separate ways. ‘Hälsningar till Mamma och Pappa! Two days later I did…and was told it made her mother’s day.

I was on my way home after parading up and down Skeppsbro in the midday sun like some demented Englishman. I was searching for the offices of the Blidösundsbolaget who ferry passengers out to Östernå Färjeläge at nine o’clock every Sunday morning. From here it would be a short 5-minute ferry ride to the southern end of Ljusterö and a waiting car…compleat with plain-clothes chauffeur. Two months in India and Pakistan in June of ’74 taught me that in hot weather…without air conditioning…the trick is to move slowly. The advice served me well.

I found out that the Östernå boat is called Sjöbris…Sea Breeze…that it departs from the Grand Hotel at 0900 and that the single fare is just five pounds…65 kronor…which is very reasonable for a 90-minutes voyage at peak season. Unfortunately it also transpired that tickets are sold onboard and not in advance so my polite questioning and everybody else’s helpful directions were of no avail. But to give myself a sense of success before returning home on the Orient Express I dropped in at Vette Katten between Centralstation and Hötorget…an old journal-writing haunt.

I must wean myself off these nostalgia trips before I turn into a grumpy old man….you are there before me. It wasn’t like it used to be…and for good reason. Just as hospitals no longer have the Matrons and Ward Sisters who once ran their world with military discipline, so the old-style Konditori Madams have disappeared…as a species. The modern style may give benefits to someone but none of them trickle down to the customer…but then trickle down never does.

I am 5-days into my 5-week sojourn in this Venice of the North so I am betwixt and between the hither and thither. A postcard is more fun on your mantelpiece than an e-greetings card from an inkjet printer so I acquired half a dozen postcards before settling down to my coffee. What joy and happiness I would unleash upon half a dozen households!

One postcard gave authority in my absence for Martin Hutchings to pour ladles-full of tender loving care upon Vemara…once his pride and joy. She needs to be pumped out now and again and there are no longer any decent batteries aboard. So instead she is set up for shore power to do the job at the flick of the pump switch. But the shore power needs connecting and disconnecting at the mains box up on the bank.

Then there is this year’s maintenance job…Vemara’s mast. Martin has been given authority to negotiate a deal with any passing crane. I was hoping for one before I left but he never came. I am thinking of taking Vemara out of the water over the winter. One reason Connie gave for not berthing Vemara in Visby over the winter of ‘98/’99 was her need to be pumped regularly. We could have rigged-up some sort of ball-cock system. But Connie had other worries.

Another recipient was a PO Box…not a household. The Occupier has received postcards from William Shepherd for years. ‘Arrived here at the weekend. Wonderful having decent digital access again. Have really been going to town. Put up a climate website. Well on the way to organising a proper site for selling books. Few more days of webwork. Then over to creative writing. Best wishes. William Shepherd.’ William Who? And why the telegramese?

One day these postcards will stop coming. Later they will provide reliable evidence of the activities of the Green Pimpernel at the turn of the century. They seek him here...they seek him there...but he moves beneath their radar everywhere. Twenty Thirty Four is set in the Baltic and on the edge of the North Atlantic Ocean. Who is William of Salisbury?