Murder Must Advertise (3 page)

Mr. Bredon bowed his head, as one who hears the Law and the Prophets. The copy-chief ran a thoughtful pencil over the scribbled list of headlines, and ticked one of them.

“I like that.

That has the right feel about it. You might write copy for that, and perhaps for this one,

though I'm not quite sure about it. These Dairyfields people are rather strait-laced about betting.”

“Oh, are they? What a pity! I'd done several about that. '
HAVE A BIT ON
–' Don't you like that one?”

Mr. Hankin shook his head regretfully.

“I'm afraid that's too direct. Encouraging the working classes to waste their money.”

“But they all do it–why, all these women like a little flutter.”

“I know, I know. But I'm sure the client wouldn't stand for it. You'll soon find that the biggest obstacle to good advertising is the client. They all have their fads. That headline would do for Darling's, but it won't do for Dairyfields. We did very well with a sporting headline in '26–'
PUT YOUR SHIRT ON
Darling's Non-collapsible Towel-Horse'–sold 80,000 in Ascot week. Though that was partly accident, because we mentioned a real horse in the copy and it came in at 50 to 1, and all the women who'd won money on it rushed out and bought Non-collapsible Towel-Horses out of sheer gratitude. The public's very odd.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Bredon. “They must be. There seems to be more in advertising than, so to speak, meets the eye.”

“There is,” said Mr. Hankin, a little grimly. “Well, get some copy written and bring it along to me. You know where to find my room?”

“Oh, yes–at the end of the corridor, near the iron staircase.”

“No, no, that's Mr. Armstrong. At the other end of the corridor, near the other staircase–not the iron staircase. By the way–”

“Yes?”

“Oh, nothing,” said Mr. Hankin, vaguely. “That is to say–no, nothing.”

Mr. Bredon gazed after his retreating figure, and shook his fair head in a meditative manner. Then, applying himself to his task, he wrote out, rather quickly, a couple of paragraphs in praise of margarine and wandered out with them. Turning to the right, he paused opposite the door of Ingleby's room and stared irresolutely at the iron staircase. As he stood there, the glass door of a room on the opposite side of the corridor opened and a middle-aged man shot out. Seeing Bredon, he paused in his rush for the stairhead and inquired:

“Do you want to know how to get anywhere or anything?”

“Oh! thanks awfully. No–I mean, yes. I'm the new copy-writer. I'm looking for the typists' room.”

“Other end of the passage.”

“Oh, I see, thanks frightfully. This place is rather confusing. Where does this staircase go to?”

“Down to a whole lot of departments–mostly group-managers' rooms and board-rooms and Mr. Pym's room and several of the Directors' rooms and the Printing.”

“Oh, I see. Thanks ever so. Where does one wash?”

“That's downstairs too. I'll show you if you like.”

“Oh, thanks–thanks most awfully.”

The other man plunged down the steep and rattling spiral as though released by a spring. Bredon followed more gingerly.

“A bit precipitous, isn't it?”

“Yes, it is. You'd better be careful. One fellow out of your department smashed himself up here the other day.”

“No, really?”

“Broke his neck. Dead when we picked him up.”

“No, did he? was he? How on earth did he come to do that? Couldn't he see where he was going?”

“Slipped, I expect. Must have been going too fast. There's nothing really wrong with the staircase. I've never had an accident. It's very well-lit.”

“Well-lit?” Mr. Bredon gaped vaguely at the skylight and up and down the passage, surrounded, like the one on the floor above, with glass partitions. “Oh, yes, to be sure. It's very well-lit. Of course he must have slipped. Dashed easy thing to slip on a staircase. Did he have nails in his shoes?”

“I don't know. I wasn't noticing his shoes. I was thinking about picking up the pieces.”

“Did you pick him up?”

“Well, I heard the racket when he went down, and rushed out and got there one of the first. My name's Daniels, by the way.”

“Oh, is it? Daniels, oh, yes. But didn't it come out at the inquest about his shoes?”

“I don't remember anything about it.”

“Oh! then I suppose he didn't have nails. I mean, if he had, somebody would have mentioned it. I mean, it would be a sort of excuse, wouldn't it?”

“Excuse for whom?” demanded Daniels.

“For the firm; I mean, when people put up staircases and other people come tumbling down them, the insurance people generally want to know why. At least, I'm told so. I've never fallen down any staircases myself–touch wood.”

“You'd better not try,” retorted Daniels, evading the question of insurance. “You'll find the wash-place through that door and down the passage on the left.”

“Oh, thanks frightfully.”

“Not at all.”

Mr. Daniels darted away into a room full of desks, leaving Mr. Bredon to entangle himself in a heavy swing door.

In the lavatory, Bredon encountered Ingleby.

“Oh!” said the latter. “You've found your way. I was told off to show you, but I forgot.”

“Mr. Daniels showed me. Who's he?”

“Daniels? He's a group-manager. Looks after a bunch of clients–Sliders and Harrogate Bros, and a few more. Sees to the lay-outs and sends the stereos down to the papers and all that. Not a bad chap.”

“He seems a bit touchy about the iron staircase. I mean, he was quite matey till I suggested that the insurance people would want to look into that fellow's accident–and then he kind of froze on me.”

“He's been a long time in the firm and doesn't like any nasturtiums cast at it. Certainly not by a new bloke. As a matter of fact, it's better not to throw one's weight about here till one's been ten years or so in the place. It's not encouraged.”

“Oh? Oh, thanks awfully for telling me.”

“This place is run like a Government office,” went on Ingleby. “Hustle's not wanted and initiative and curiosity are politely shown the door.”

“That's right,” put in a pugnacious-looking red-headed man, who was scrubbing his fingers with pumice-stone as though he meant to take the skin off. “I asked them for £50 for a new lens–and what was the answer? Economy, please, in all departments–the Whitehall touch, eh?–and yet they pay you fellows to write more-you-spend-more-you-save copy! However, I shan't be here long, that's one comfort.”

“This is Mr. Prout, our photographer,” said Ingleby. “He has been on the point of leaving us for the last five years, but when it comes to the point he realizes that we couldn't do without him and yields to our tears and entreaties.”

“Tcha!” said Mr. Prout.

“The management think Mr. Prout so precious,” went on Ingleby, “that they have set his feet in a large room–”

“That you couldn't swing a kitten in,” said Mr. Prout, “and no ventilation. Murder, that's what they do here. Black holes of Calcutta and staircases that break people's heads open. What we want in this country is a Mussolini to organize trade conditions. But what's the good of talking? All the same, one of these days, you'll see.”

“Mr. Prout is our tame firebrand,” observed Ingleby, indulgently. “You coming up, Bredon?”

“Yes. I've got to take this stuff to be typed.”

“Right-ho! Here you are. Round this way and up this staircase by the lift, through the Dispatching and here you are–right opposite the home of British Beauty. Children, here's Mr. Bredon with a nice bit of copy for you.”

“Hand it here,” said Miss Rossiter, “and oh! Mr. Bredon, do you mind putting down your full name and address on this card–they want it downstairs for the file.”

Bredon took the card obediently.

“Block letters please,” added Miss Rossiter, glancing with some dismay at the sheets of copy she had just received.

“Oh, do you think my handwriting's awful? I always think it's rather neat, myself. Neat, but not gaudy. However, if you say so–”

“Block letters,” repeated Miss Rossiter, firmly. “Hullo! here's Mr. Tallboy. I expect he wants you, Mr. Ingleby.”

“What, again?”

“Nutrax have cancelled that half-double,” announced Mr. Tallboy with gloomy triumph. “They've just sent up from the conference to say that they want something special to put up against the new Slumbermalt campaign, and Mr. Hankin says will you get something out and let him have it in half an hour.”

Ingleby uttered a loud yell, and Bredon, laying down the index-card, gazed at him open-mouthed.

“Damn and blast Nutrax,” said Ingleby. “May all its directors get elephantiasis, locomotor ataxy and ingrowing toe-nails!”

“Oh, quite,” said Tallboy. “You'll let us have something, won't you? If I can get it passed before 3 o'clock the printer–Hullo!”

Mr. Tallboy's eye, roving negligently round, had fallen on Bredon's index-card. Miss Rossiter's glance followed his. Neatly printed on the card stood the one word

DEATH

“Look at that!” said Miss Rossiter.

“Oh!” said Ingleby, looking over her shoulder. “That's who you are, is it, Bredon? Well, all I can say is, your stuff ought to come home to everybody. Universal appeal, and so forth.”

Mr. Bredon smiled apologetically.

“You startled me so,” he said. “Pooping off that howl in my ear.” He took up the card and finished his inscription:

DEATH BREDON
,
12A, Great Ormond Street,
W.C.1

EMBARRASSING INDISCRETION OF TWO TYPISTS

F
or the twentieth time, Mr. Death Bredon was studying the report of the coroner's inquest on Victor Dean.

There was the evidence of Mr. Prout, the photographer:

“It would be about tea-time. Tea is served at 3.30, more or less. I was coming out of my room on the top floor, carrying my camera and tripod. Mr. Dean passed me. He was coming quickly along the passage in the direction of the iron staircase. He was not running–he was walking at a good pace. He was carrying a large, heavy book under one arm. I know now that it was
The Times Atlas
. I turned to walk in the same direction that he was going. I saw him start down the iron staircase; it is rather a steep spiral. He had taken about half a dozen steps when he seemed to crumple together and disappear. There was a tremendous crash. You might call it a clatter–a prolonged crashing noise. I started to run, when Mr. Daniels' door opened and he came out and collided with the legs of my tripod. While we were mixed up together, Mr. Ingleby ran past us down the corridor. I heard a shrill scream from below. I put the camera down and Mr. Daniels and I went to the head of the staircase together. Some other people joined us–Miss Rossiter, I think, and some of the copy-writers and clerks. We could see Mr. Dean lying huddled together at the foot of the staircase. I could not say whether he had fallen down the stairs or through the banisters. He was lying all in a heap. The staircase is a right-handed spiral, and makes one complete turn. The treads are composed of pierced iron-work. The hand-rail has a number of iron knobs on it,
[Pg 22]
about the size of small walnuts. The stairs are apt to be slippery. The stair is well lit. There is a skylight above, and it receives light through the glass panels of Mr. Daniels' room and also from the glass-panelled corridor on the floor below. I have here a photograph taken by myself at 3.30 p.m. yesterday–that is the day after the accident. It shows the head of the spiral staircase. It was taken by ordinary daylight. I used an Actinax Special Rapid plate with the H & D number 450. The exposure was
¹
/
₅
second with the lens stopped down to
f.
16. The light was then similar to what it was at the time of Mr. Dean's death. The sun was shining on both occasions. The corridor runs, roughly, north and south. As deceased went down the staircase, the light would be coming from above and behind him; it is not possible that he could have the sun in his eyes.”

Then came Mr. Daniels' account:

“I was standing at my desk consulting with Mr. Freeman about an advertising lay-out. I heard the crash. I thought one of the boys must have fallen down again. A boy did fall down that staircase on a previous occasion. I do not consider it a dangerous structure. I consider that the boy was going too fast. I do not recollect hearing Mr. Dean go along the passage. I did not see him. My back was to the door. People pass along that passage continuously; I should not be paying attention. I went quickly out when I heard the noise of the fall. I encountered Mr. Prout and tripped over his tripod. I did not exactly fall down, but I stumbled and had to catch hold of him to steady myself. There was nobody in the corridor when I came out except Mr. Prout. I will swear to that. Mr. Ingleby came past us while we were recovering from the collision. He did not come from his own room, but from the south end of the passage. He went down the iron staircase and Mr. Prout and I followed as quickly as we could. I heard somebody shriek downstairs. I think it was just before, or just after I ran into Mr. Prout. I was rather confused at the time and cannot say for certain. We saw Mr. Dean lying at the bottom of the staircase. There were a number of people standing round. Then Mr. Ingleby
[Pg 23]
came up the stairs very hastily and called out: 'He's dead!' or 'He's killed himself.' I cannot speak to the exact words. I did not believe him at first; I thought he was exaggerating. I went on down the staircase. Mr. Dean was lying bundled together, head downwards. His legs were partly up the staircase. I think somebody had already tried to lift him before I got there. I have had some experience of death and accidents. I was a stretcher-bearer in the War. I examined him and gave it as my opinion that he was dead. I believe Mr. Atkins had already expressed a similar opinion. I helped to lift the body and carry it into the Board-room. We laid him on the table and endeavoured to administer first-aid, but I never had any doubt that he was dead. It did not occur to us to leave him where he was till the police were summoned, because, of course, he might not have been dead, and we could not leave him head downwards on the staircase.”