Beating About the Bush

by M C Beaton

  “Do you get on well with your colleagues?” asked Agatha.

  “Mostly,” replied Jennifer, “though there’s a few as thinks they’re a cut above the likes of me. That dozy tart on reception for one.”

  “On reception?” said Toni. “Do you mean Mrs. Dinwiddy?”

  “Not her,” smiled Jennifer. “The one that got sacked. The young blonde girl, although Din-whatsit’s as bad. Everyone knows she’s only here because she’s keepin’ the boss’s batteries charged with a bit of rumpy-pumpy, if you know what I mean.”

  “Mrs. Dinwiddy is having an affair with Albert Morrison?” Agatha was incredulous.

  “You didn’t hear that from me!” said Jennifer. “I ain’t sayin’ no more. I likes workin’ here. Don’t want to lose me job. We got shepherd’s pie on Thursday.”

  Agatha dismissed the former trapeze artist, who waddled out of the room.

  “Interesting snippet of gossip there,” Toni said. “Morrison and Dinwiddy? Really?”

  “Gossip is exactly what it sounds like to me,” said Agatha. “It’s scarcely believable, but worth bearing in mind. He is a married man, so I suppose that might give his wife, or even Dinwiddy, a grudge against him and his company. And what happened to that young receptionist? We need to know why she was sacked.”

  “We should really set the files aside now,” said Toni, “and interview the people who were in the room when I made that unfortunate remark.”

  Biting down a sudden, almost liverish desire to quarrel with her assistant again, Agatha sighed and agreed.

  Those who had been present amounted to six people and the chairman, Albert Morrison. But before any of them could arrive to be interviewed, Mrs. Dinwiddy barged in.

  “I believe you want to know how many people heard the young lady’s remark about Mrs. Raisin talking about good places to hide bodies,” she said. “I am afraid most of the building was privy to it. Mr. Morrison believes in an open-office policy. You are in one of the only rooms shielded from the staff. Discussions of any kind are broadcast to everyone. It is based on a Japanese model that Mr. Morrison admired when he visited that country last year.”

  “Thank you,” replied Agatha bleakly. When the secretary had left, she said, “If only it had been a genuine leg. Then the whole police force would be on it and at least we could pick up some crumbs of information.” She lit a cigarette and blew a cloud of smoke up to the fluorescent lighting.

  “You can’t smoke in here, Agatha.”

  “Who says?”

  “Everybody says.”

  “Screw everybody.”

  A smoke alarm she had failed to notice went off above her head with a deafening screech. She clambered up on the table and, teetering on her high heels, flapped a handkerchief, the one Charles had lent her, at the gadget. Stepping sideways for balance, she planted one of her heels in her half-full coffee cup. The awful sound slowly died away, but when she pulled her foot free of the cup and shook it to dry it, she overbalanced and toppled off the table onto the floor.

  The door opened and a man in overalls walked in. He strode past Agatha, climbed onto the table and removed the smoke alarm. “Orders are you can now smoke.” Then he jumped down and left, leaving a bemused Agatha, still lying on the floor, staring after him.

  Toni ran round to help her boss to her feet.

  “This is creepy,” said Agatha, sinking gratefully into a chair. She dried her foot with her handkerchief. “I could do with a drink.”

  “There’s a pub not too far along the main road,” said Toni. “And you’re right, this place is creepy. Full of weirdos. Why didn’t that man help you up? Odd.”

  “Let’s get out of here,” said Agatha, and they headed for the pub.

  Chapter Two

  The pub was just under a mile from the factory entrance. It looked like a comfortable, slightly ramshackle country inn, yet it clearly wasn’t as old as its blackened wooden beams would have you believe. It had been built in the 1930s, when there had been a fashion for architecture with fake Tudor embellishments. Swinging lazily in the afternoon breeze was a badly weathered pub sign with cracked and peeling paint portraying a merry peasant in a smock dancing with a pig. It forlornly announced the establishment as the Jolly Farmer. Toni pulled into the car park. Apart from a rusting truck, there were no other vehicles in sight. This was clearly not a busy time.

  Inside, the low ceilings of the pub were dressed with yet more fake beams. The walls were adorned with tarnished horse brasses alongside old photographs of miserable peasants scowling at the camera and, therefore, at Agatha. She scowled back. Unlike so many other pubs scattered across the Cotswold countryside, the Jolly Farmer had allowed the growing trend for serving good, tasty food to pass it by. No effort had been made to attract a regular following amongst either local foodies or the tourist trade. For those customers driven to foolhardy bravery by desperate hunger, a large jar of pickled eggs stood on the counter beside a glass case displaying a small selection of limp sandwiches.

  “What a dump,” muttered Agatha, who then noticed the barman smiling at her from behind the lager taps and said in a louder voice, “Very quiet in here.”

  The barman was a small, dapper man, more like an accountant or some sort of clerk than a pub landlord. His voice was high and reedy. “What will be your pleasure, ladies? Yes, it is quiet. But we do often get the odd alky before the evening rush.”

  Agatha blinked. She had a sudden vision of herself leaning over the bar, grabbing the little man by the throat and shouting, “Are you calling me an alcoholic?.” Instead she said, “A gin and tonic. Make it a double. What are you having, Toni?”

  “I’ll have an orange juice.”

  They carried their drinks over to a table in front of a fire of glowing fake logs that gave off no heat. They glowed only because they were illuminated by an electric bulb. The table was meant to resemble a tree stump. There was a toadstool lamp in the middle.

  “I feel like Alice in Wonderland,” said Toni.

  “Well it wouldn’t surprise me if we turned up a Mad Hatter at Morrison’s,” said Agatha. “I mean, that man who zipped in, dismantled the smoke alarm, and zipped out again without even offering me a hand wasn’t exactly normal, was he?”

  “And then there’s the trapeze artist,” said Toni, “and that Dinwiddy woman. None of the staff we’ve met so far are what you would call normal.”

  “They are not,” Agatha agreed, “but none of them seem like spies or saboteurs either. First rule in the spy game is to blend in, don’t attract attention. I sense there’s a twisted mind at work here. Someone really clever and utterly ruthless. We could spend weeks going through the files and not find a thing.”

  “What I find odd,” said Toni, “is why that trapeze girl was employed in the first place. I mean, you don’t need the brightest of workers packing boxes, but there are plenty of people out there looking for jobs. Why take on someone who clearly has problems?”

  “Maybe her circus training gave her quick hands,” Agatha joked. “She might pack boxes faster than anyone else. We need to find out if what she said about the receptionist is true, though. We need to talk to the man who does the hiring and firing.”

  “John Sayer,” said Toni. “Human resources. Better get a move on. Sayer told me that the factory workers are on shifts right round the clock, but most of the clerical staff leave at five thirty.”

  Agatha finished her drink. “Right, let’s go.”

  “Oh, leaving so soon?” came the reedy voice of the barman. Agatha cast him a withering look and was about to say something along the lines of “Not soon enough” when he piped up again. “Not you. The young one. Haven’t seen a good-looking blonde in here for weeks.”

  “And you never will if they see you first, you nasty little man,” snarled Agatha.

  Toni seized her arm and all but dragged her from the pub. “Honestly, Agatha. You are getting worse. You never used to be so bad-tempered all the time.”

  “I AM NOT BAD-TEM
PERED!” Agatha got into the passenger seat of Toni’s small car and lit up a cigarette. Wait a minute. What had that sleazy creep said? Toni had just turned the key in the ignition when Agatha flung open the door and clambered out.

  “I’ll be back in a minute,” she said, striding towards the pub door.

  Toni clasped the top of the steering wheel and rested her head on the backs of her hands. What on earth was her boss up to this time? She could never keep her nose out of trouble.

  “Couldn’t stay away, eh?” trilled the barman as Agatha walked in. “Where’s the pretty one?”

  “She’s outside being blonde,” smiled Agatha through gritted teeth. “Can’t find the car keys.”

  “Like a drink while you’re waiting?” the barman asked.

  “No thank you,” said Agatha, “but I was interested in what you said about blondes. I’m … er … involved in compiling a survey for … um … Lovely Locks, the hair fashion magazine. They say blondes are a disappearing breed—an endangered species, so to speak. You said you hadn’t seen one for weeks?”

  “Nope,” said the barman. “Not since Josie went off to travel the world.”

  “Josie?” said Agatha. “Was she a regular?”

  “Fairly regular. She worked on reception at Morrison’s. Came in after work from time to time. She’d have a couple and then head back to the factory.”

  “Why would they need a receptionist at night?”

  “Oh, I don’t believe young Josie spent none of her night shifts on reception,” twittered the barman with a leer. “More like on her back … on a couch in the boss’s office! Now, if that lovely daughter of yours has lost her keys, maybe you should phone for help and bring her back inside.”

  “She is NOT my daughter,” Agatha assured him. “And if in any doubt, a gentleman would have said ‘sister’.”

  “Ah, but it’s plain she ain’t that,” said the barman. “You’re too long in the tooth and broad in the beam to have a tasty youngster like that for a sister.”

  “I’ve changed my mind,” said Agatha. “I will have a drink after all.”

  “What will it be?”

  “A pint of lager.”

  She slapped some cash on the counter as the barman poured the golden liquid into a tall glass.

  “Wouldn’t have had you down as a lager drinker,” he said.

  “I’m not,” said Agatha, “but it has its uses.” She picked up the pint, poured it over the barman’s head, and stomped out.

  * * *

  As Agatha and Toni drew up at the gates to Morrison’s, a gaggle of factory girls bustled past, heading down the main road towards Mircester, a few minutes’ walk away.

  “So Albert Morrison was sleeping with Josie?” said Toni.

  “I doubt they did much sleeping,” said Agatha, watching the girls go by and wondering if Morrison had tried it on with any of them as well. “And if she was his bit on the side, why would he get rid of her? We’re going to have to be very careful who we question about this and what we ask if we want to get to the truth.”

  She peered through the windscreen at the factory buildings. The lights were on, the Cotswold stone walls glowing yellow near the windows, but gradually submitting to the grey of the gathering evening gloom further from the light. Suddenly the old farm steadings, despite their sympathetic extensions, looked remarkably small.

  “And another thing,” she said, as Toni eased the car through the gates. “This place isn’t very big. I mean, if they are producing batteries, we should have heard machinery operating, shouldn’t we? How big are these batteries? We need to know more about what’s going on here.”

  They were halfway up the short, shrub-lined approach to the factory when Agatha cried, “Stop!”

  Toni looked uneasily into the bushes on either side, but saw nothing. “What?” she asked.

  “There’s no guard on the gate,” said Agatha. “There are supposed to be two, aren’t there? One who does nights and one who does days. For an organisation that’s paranoid about industrial espionage, they’re not taking security very seriously.”

  They parked the car outside the entrance to the main building and walked in to find Mrs. Dinwiddy sitting at the reception desk.

  “I understand that you decamped to a public house,” she said disapprovingly. “Well, it’s too late for you to talk to anyone now. As you can see, it’s five thirty and the workforce has left for the night.”

  “We were told that only the clerical staff left at five thirty,” said Agatha. “The factory workforce operates in shifts, twenty-four hours a day.”

  “Yes, but not here,” tutted Mrs. Dinwiddy, adjusting the wristband from which dangled her dictation recorder. “How could you think we made anything here? This is our head office, but its function is mainly administrative. Yes, we have a packing and dispatch department to send out small orders and samples, but there is no manufacturing facility here.”

  “Where is the factory?” asked Agatha.

  “It’s in Sekiliv. Eastern Europe. Other side of Poland. No trouble with unions. Cheap labour.”

  “And have you started production of the battery pack for electric cars?”

  “Not yet. Our other products are still being manufactured, but the fire in the research and development department has delayed the new electric car pack.”

  “The fire seems more than a mere delay,” said Agatha. “I’ve seen the R&D building. It was gutted.”

  “Development is continuing nevertheless. That work is now being undertaken in Sekiliv.”

  “Why were we not told about Sekiliv?” said Agatha, a tone of sceptical frustration creeping into her voice. “In fact, why have we never been offered a tour of the premises here? How can we be expected to do our job if we’re not fully in the picture—”

  “Mrs. Dinwiddy,” Toni interrupted, anxious to avoid any kind of row, “we are very curious about the business of the leg in the bushes.”

  “A practical joke at your expense, no doubt,” said Mrs. Dinwiddy.

  “No doubt,” agreed Toni, “but aren’t you a little concerned that someone tried to make it look like your leg? I mean, why go to that trouble? Could it be that someone is trying to frighten you? Someone with a grudge against you?”

  Mrs. Dinwiddy gave a surprisingly girlish laugh. Agatha studied the small wrinkles at the corners of her eyes, the crease at the side of her mouth. She saw a faint flush appear on the receptionist’s cheeks and suddenly realised that, apart from a rudimentary smear of lipstick, Mrs. Dinwiddy was wearing no make-up. This woman, she thought, doesn’t do herself any favours with her drab dress, her comfortable shoes, her frumpy hairstyle, and her lack of essential investment in cosmetics, but she is probably no older than me. If necessary, Agatha would admit to being in her early fifties; younger if a combination of recent diet, flattering haute couture, and gin made it seem achievable. Mrs. Dinwiddy, she mused, might not be the dowdy widow they had assumed her to be. But was she the merry widow who bedded the boss? That stretched the imagination further than the trapeze girl’s knicker elastic.

  “Members of staff sometimes tease me,” said Mrs. Dinwiddy calmly. She looked Toni up and down with hard eyes. “Immature young women can be so thoughtless and cruel.”

  Toni shifted uncomfortably.

  “There are times, at office functions when they have drunk more than is good for them, and places, such as when they go gossiping in corridors, when they let their stupid mouths run away with them. They say more than they should. That is why I always carry this.” She held up her slim little electronic dictation machine. “I record their vicious tittle-tattle and play it to them the following day. They know that if I ever hear them utter another word, I will play the recording to Mr. Albert.”

  Mrs. Dinwiddy normally had a face as bland as her clothing, with no strong feature, no remarkable aspect, but with her last remark, it was as if it had grown bones of malice. The eyes narrowed, the mouth became trap-like.

  “In other words,” said
Agatha, “you know where the bodies are buried.”

  “In a manner of speaking,” said the secretary. “The security guard is waiting to lock up. Please leave.”

  “Mrs. Dinwiddy,” said Toni, “the leg we found had a brogue on it just like yours. Can you think of an explanation?”

  “Not really … Oh dear. Of course! I keep a spare pair of shoes in my locker. You see, during the floods last year, we had to wade through a sort of lake to get into the office. I’ll go and look.”

  Mrs. Dinwiddy’s sensible low heels pounded the dull linoleum on the floor of the corridor leading away from the reception desk. There was silence as she barged through the door into the staff locker room. A murmur of wind wafted round the building. Then she came clumping back. “They’ve gone! How very odd.”

  Agatha exchanged a glance with Toni. There might now be a way to begin narrowing down the list of suspects for the false leg prank. And that might shed some light on the industrial espionage affair.

  “We need to talk to John Sayer,” Agatha said. “We will have to look at attendance records and work rotas to help us determine who might have had the opportunity to leave here and plant the leg in a place where I was sure to spot it.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Mrs. Dinwiddy, pulling on her coat and looking over her shoulder, “but Mr. Sayer has left for the evening and the guard is coming. He will want us all out. You will have to come back tomorrow.”

  Agatha prided herself on giving credit where credit was due, and as they walked to Toni’s car, she said, “That was smart of you. I really should have thought more about why it was Mrs. Dinwiddy’s leg—fake leg—left in the undergrowth.”

  “I find her a bit intimidating,” said Toni. “Those pale eyes of hers have a sort of blind look, and then when they suddenly focus … well, it’s like some shark thingummy sighting its prey.”

  “I’m usually the one who notices things like that,” said Agatha. “I mean, I am sensitive to all that kind of thing. Hypersensitive, in fact.”