‘We’re housed in the new Echo building in Fleet Street. It’s a little large for the Echo, so they let some of it to us. Peex and Cuts are on the sixth floor, which is the top, and we have basement-room for negatives and messenger boys. You don’t want to keep negs in the same place as pix; it’s putting all your eggs in one basket, because there’s always a risk of fire.’
‘I’m putting all my negs in one basket,’ murmured Johnny outrageously, with a hint of the Fred Astaire tune.
‘Darling, really!’ said Sally, and Toby groaned.
‘Sorry,’ said Johnny. ‘Couldn’t resist it. Go on.’
Toby went on. ‘All our printing, and photo-statting of cuttings, is done by the Echo’s dark-room — on a business footing, of course. Also, we are allowed to use the Echo’s very excellent canteen.’ He paused and lit a cigarette.
‘So far, the Archives have proved a reasonably successful experiment. But we’re not an altogether happy office, principally because we’re a mixture of Fleet Street and Civil Service. The Archivist — the man who runs the whole thing — is a Civil Servant. His name is Lionel Silcutt, and the story goes that he was swaddled in red tape at birth. He means extremely well, and he’s really rather a nice man. But he can’t get on with the present head of Comic Cuts, who is a pure-blooded newspaperman and Irish at that — a man called Michael Knox.’
‘The man who wrote for the Sunday Reflector?’ asked Johnny.
‘The same. To my mind he made the Reflector — he’s a brilliant writer and a brilliant controversialist — and the circulation has dropped since he left. He’s an infuriating creature, but Fleet Street will put up with almost any eccentricities in a man who can really write, and I don’t think they’d ever have sacked him. He had a stupendous row with his editor about six weeks ago, knocked him down, and walked out. At that time his predecessor in the Archives, who was another dyed-in-the-wool Fleet Street type, had just handed in his resignation because he couldn’t get on with Silcutt. Michael thought he’d like the job because he’s writing a book and he wanted regular pay and hours which would leave him time for it — and easy access to pix for it. I’m not quite sure why Silcutt thought he would like Michael, but Michael was recommended by James Camberley. It was generous of Camberley, because Mike had just been slating him a bit in the Reflector. He’s very seldom wrong about a man, and I’m inclined to think still that Mike may have got something — something for us, I mean. He’s still on his month probation — everyone has to do that — and I wouldn’t be surprised if Silcutt gave him a bit longer. To return to the general set-up — I seem to be wandering a bit — he has eight assistants and three typists under him.
‘The head of Feelthee Peex is me. I can take it — more or less — because I’m something of a hybrid. I came to Fleet Street partly because I was still reacting against a clerical background, and I still like the free-and-easiness of it. But a year or so ago I began to react the other way and hanker after discipline and regular hours. So I took this job when it came along, and on the whole I like it. I temper it with the odd bit of newspaper work. I have a staff of eleven assistants and three typists. I am also — rather embarrassingly — set over the Negatives Department. The staff there consists of Miss Quimper and four assistants — no typists; they have very little typing and our girls do it for them. Miss Quimper is a problem. To begin with she’s well over fifty and I have no right to be set over her. She also reminds me vividly of a very devout and strong-minded church-worker of my childhood who wanted to hear dear Tobias’s catechism every time she came to tea. But the real trouble is that she was in the old Evans’s Picture Library for over thirty years, and although she’s extremely sound in her way she’s got immovably set in it. Her methods are very horse-and-buggy and really quite impracticable, but she won’t modify them, and when thwarted she bursts into tears.’
‘My poor Toby,’ said Sally. ‘How very upsetting for you!’
‘There is nothing more embarrassing,’ said Toby, ‘than making a woman cry. It makes one feel like a monster. To continue, however.’
But he didn’t continue at once. He hesitated for a moment or two. Then he said a little abruptly, ‘There’s one other person of importance. A man in Peex called Frank Morningside. He’s neither fish nor fowl — neither Civil Service nor Fleet Street — but several other people on the staff are in the same position and don’t find it a handicap. He went to a grammar school and a provincial University. A lot of other people went to a grammar school and no University at all, and neither they nor we find it a cause of embarrassment. But Morningside has all sorts of peculiar ideas about public-school types. He was just too young for the war, and did his National Service without distinction, as far as anyone knows. Then, when he’d taken his degree, he taught for several years, and came to this job from that, because he wanted a change. Or possibly because his last job was at a prep school, and he couldn’t cope with the brats.’
Toby broke off again. The lines were back in his forehead, and he was concentrating hard — making a sharp effort of some sort. When he spoke again every trace of cynicism had gone from his voice.
‘There’s nothing wrong with him. He has no vices — I’m quite sure of that. He doesn’t drink — except beer; he doesn’t smoke, and his life is wide open to anyone who cares to look. He’s intoler— he’s very smug. He has no sense of humour, but that isn’t his fault. He’s very good indeed at his job — very steady and methodical. He also has a superb visual memory, which is a great asset in a place like ours. We’ve taken over a lot of old pix and negs from Evans’s and one or two other picture libraries — mostly unidentified stuff salvaged during the Blitz — and he’s very clever at spotting well-known people and places in them. He wants to syndicate a sort of “Myself when Young” series — Churchill in a sailor-suit, and Lloyd George in golden ringlets, and so on. The typists call him the Memory Man. There is no doubt that he’s an admirable person. There is no doubt that he’s a very irritating one, too. But that’s no reason for writing him filthy letters.’
There was a short silence. Then Toby went on again, his voice tired now, as if his effort had been a little too much for him.
‘It started in a perfectly harmless way, about a month ago. Someone left a rude rhyme on his desk. It was typed on a torn-off piece of office paper. It was quite funny, but not all that clever, and not all that rude either. I can’t remember it now. Morningside didn’t see the joke. Then he received another, slightly more ribald, but still quite mild, and he was definitely annoyed. And then other things began to happen — silly, irritating things. Someone patronised a joke shop — there’s one quite near us, incidentally, in St Barnabas’ Lane. Morningside would find blobs of ink on the pix he was going to send out, and they’d turn out to be tin. He opened his desk drawer one day, and one of those snakes on a spring shot out. He plays squash one evening a week and brings a suitcase to the office with a pair of shorts and a sports shirt. One evening when he changed at the courts, he found itching powder in the shorts. And there were other things of the same kind. All very prep school. Meantime the rude rhymes continued and got ruder.
‘I should have explained that Morningside has a small private office off Peex. So have I, and so have our typists, and we’ve always locked our doors at night. Our stuff isn’t intrinsically valuable, but it would be tiresome and sometimes impossible to replace. The cleaners come in the morning, and they get duplicate keys from the Echo porters’ room downstairs. But until this business started not even Morningside, who is extremely conscientious, thought of locking his door when he went to lunch, or when he left his office for a few minutes during the day. But when the persecution got really tiresome, he began to do that. It was hideously inconvenient for everyone else, because clients came in for pix which were in his office, and his telephone rang and no one could answer it, and we wanted his reference books, and so on. But it didn’t last long, because it wasn’t worthwhile. When his office was locked by day nothing happened. But the th
ings began to happen by night. There was no sign of interference with the lock, so we assumed that the joker had acquired a key. The porters were questioned at once and said that to the best of their knowledge no one but the cleaners had ever had the duplicate. But it seemed quite possible that someone else — almost anyone else — had had it long enough to take an impression, or even to have a new key professionally cut. The porters’ room isn’t continuously occupied. Since they were questioned one of them has always carried it on him, except when the cleaners have it, but that isn’t much good now.
‘These investigations were made because Morningside complained to Silcutt. He might have come to me, but he thought I might be responsible for his troubles. Silcutt decided, reluctantly, that he’d better take action. He discussed it with me, and I agreed. We were both inclined to think that either the younger typists in Peex or, more likely, the messenger boys were responsible for the kid-stuff. Silcutt saw the head typist — a nice woman called Mrs Beates — and the two girls, Pat and Pam, who are a little apt to be at the bottom of any trouble. As soon as they understood it was serious, Pat and Pam admitted the two original rhymes. But they persistently denied all knowledge of the rest of it, and Silcutt was satisfied that they were telling the truth. I thought so too. He then saw the boys. There are four of them. Two are probably innocent. The third was christened — or at least registered — Gordon Parston but is known as Teddy because he is a Teddy Boy. He’s a crazy mixed-up kid and a hot suspect, and the fourth boy is a buddy of his and easily led. Neither of them would admit anything, but there was a strong presumption of guilt.
‘But it wasn’t as simple as that. The boys might well be playing about with itching powder. But they were certainly not responsible for the written stuff. It had improved in literary quality, if in nothing else, and was undoubtedly the work of an educated person. Morningside realised that, and thought it was probably Michael Knox’s or mine. Or else’ — he hesitated a moment, and then went on in a carefully flat voice — ‘Selina Marvell’s. She’s my principal assistant in Peex, and what Morningside would classify as a public-school type. She was also engaged to him recently, and he turned her down — I wouldn’t know why. But he thought she might be writing the stuff out of spite.’
So that was it, thought Sally. Toby was in love with this girl with the charming name. That was why he had made his painful effort to be fair to Morningside; he hadn’t wanted his portrait to be distorted or obscured by jealousy. He was carrying his passion for integrity in writing over to this story — and probably to his own emotions.
‘Here’s a sample,’ he said, and produced a battered wallet, from which he took a piece of paper. ‘One of the earlier ones. Morningside’s burnt all the others. He said they were indecent.’
Johnny looked at it. ‘No one thought of fingerprints, I suppose. Why should they, after all, at that stage?’ He took the paper and read. He grinned once, uncontrollably, and then studied the thing carefully. After a moment he asked, ‘Whom did you suspect yourself, Toby?’
‘I wasn’t sure. I’m still not sure. I don’t think Pat and Pam have the intelligence or the literary skill. Selina certainly has.’ Toby’s voice was still flat. ‘It seems a little too hot for her, but one never quite knows. But I thought — and I’m still inclined to think — it was probably Michael. He’s quite clever enough, and the ruder stuff didn’t start till after he came. And he and Morningside don’t get on at all.’
‘I see. Let me just get another point clear. Which actually started first, the prep school stuff or the ruder rhymes?’
Toby considered. ‘The prep school stuff,’ he said definitely. ‘I remember because I happened to be with Morningside when the snake popped up, and that was the first incident in this second stage of the campaign. And I think an ink blob appeared before the first of the ruder rhymes, too.’
‘Right. Please go on.’
‘Well, then the nature of the thing changed again, but gradually this time. The prep school stuff became more serious. Real ink was spilt on Morningside’s pix. Then some of them were torn up. Some of the old glass negs he was working on in his leisure moments were smashed. Then his overcoat was slashed. During the same period the ruder rhymes became ruder still, began to give evidence of an ugly mind, and finally degenerated into obscene letters. Here you are. No one thought of fingerprints on them either, I’m afraid.’
Johnny took the dirty envelope, drew out a paper, unfolded it, and read it through. He didn’t smile this time.
‘Quite so,’ he said. ‘Rather different from the earlier stuff. Cheap paper — rather cheaper than the other — and cheap envelope, both obtainable at almost any stationer’s. Message and name on envelope printed in ballpoint ink, as the rhyme was, but the printing of the rhyme was educated, and this definitely isn’t. Still, that doesn’t mean it was done by an uneducated person. One must deduce, I suppose, that it’s the effort of a well-educated degenerate.’ He paused. ‘All these things were left in Morningside’s office, I gather, and none of them came by post? Yes.’ He restored the paper to its envelope and returned it, with the ruder rhyme, to Toby. ‘But, you know, the police could tell you far more about it than I can. Why not the police, Toby? It wouldn’t necessarily mean publicity.’
‘We’re in Fleet Street,’ said Toby. ‘Everything gets around, and we’re not much liked, because we’re more or less a government concern. I had quite enough trouble persuading Silcutt and Morningside to let me talk to you. Morningside agreed because he doesn’t think its respectable to be involved with the police — and because the letters are driving him nearly out of his mind. Silcutt agreed — finally — because of your amateur status. You could be consulted unofficially — a word which covers a multitude of sins. Even so he had to consult someone else about consulting you. He felt he must take it to a higher level. So I suggested he should talk to Camberley, who of course was on the Loughbridge Commission. As the Echo’s Lobby Correspondent, he’s in and out of the building a good deal, and he takes an interest in the Archives. He said we must certainly go ahead. I gather he’s met you. He gave you a very good Press.’
‘That was nice of him,’ said Johnny. ‘He doesn’t really know me — he’s an occasional customer of ours. He’s interested in anything we can find on North Africa.’
Toby nodded. ‘That’s his speciality, of course. Well, Johnny, what about it? Do you think you could help us? We should be quite enormously obliged to you.’
Johnny didn’t answer at once. He sat frowning at the fire, and Toby waited patiently. He had a curious look of docile resignation — the resignation of a sick person, thought Sally. But his eyes behind his spectacles were anxious.
Johnny turned abruptly. Sally saw his face change a little. Then he said, ‘All right. That is, if I’m allowed to ask questions within the Archives.’
‘Oh, yes. Silcutt expects that.’
‘Good. But I take it you haven’t mentioned me to anyone there except Silcutt and Morningside? Then I’d like to sit about for a day or two before anyone else knows what I’m after. Perhaps I could be doing a book on something you’ve got plenty of stuff on.’
When Toby was really pleased his smile was surprisingly warm and wholehearted.
‘That’s grand,’ he said. ‘I’m frightfully grateful, Johnny. The entire collection of Feelthee Peex is at your disposal. We’ve got a lot of French stuff—’ He broke off as Johnny began to laugh. ‘All right, all right. I only wanted to suggest something on your own subject.’
‘You’re only making it worse, Toby dear,’ said Sally kindly, and Toby laughed too.
He left them at half past ten, looking a little younger.
Johnny went downstairs with him. When he came back to the drawing room, he looked at Sally and said, ‘Do you mind my taking on a job like this?’
‘No, I don’t,’ she said. ‘I think poison-pens are things that particularly need to be dealt with. But you weren’t going to, were you?’
‘No. I thought they ough
t to go to the police, and it did seem fairly messy. And then’ — Johnny sounded slightly exasperated — ‘I looked at Toby, and he looked exactly as he did when I first saw him after the war — when he was still a kid and still a bit of an invalid — and I said yes more or less without thinking. I hope it wasn’t a mistake.’
‘I shouldn’t think so. Johnny — I’ve been wondering if I couldn’t help you with this. If I’d be any use, that is. You can’t leave the shop all day, can you?’
‘No,’ said Johnny, but he looked rather doubtful.
‘If you mean you don’t think it would be quite nice for me, that’s really nonsense, darling. I don’t mind.’
‘Very well. Thank you, Sally. I’ll tell Toby tomorrow that you’re sitting in on it. I do feel that we should take the simple and obvious course of noting and recording the people who go into Morningside’s office when he’s not there. We may get something that way.’
Sally nodded. ‘Toby’s in love with this girl,’ she said irrelevantly.
‘The one with the attractive name? Yes, I think so. I hope to God she’s not our joker.’
‘Is it likely?’
‘Probably not. I didn’t ask him what she’s like, because it would only have embarrassed him, and his opinion is obviously valueless, anyway. We shall just have to wait and see.’
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