Plain Murder

by C. S. Forester

  And with that Morris emerged from the managing director’s room, hot and uncomfortable under his collar, and with a perfect volcano of suppressed rage within him.

  At half-past five the people in the copy room were beginning their usual unobtrusive packing up, ready for instant departure as soon as Morris should give the word.

  ‘Right,’ said Morris; his throat was dry with excitement and his voice sounded strained. ‘Miss Campbell you can push off now. And I don’t think I want Clarence or Howlett any more. Have you got those files finished, Lamb? Good man! Off you go, then. Right ho, Shepherd. Don’t be more than ten minutes late tomorrow, will you? Sorry, Oldroyd, but we’ll have to stay a bit this evening and run through those letters Anthony wanted sent off for him. Maudie’s only just brought them in.’

  Oldroyd forced himself to turn and look at Morris. He had, of course, not the least knowledge of what had passed this afternoon between Morris and Mr Campbell. All he knew was that Morris was a little excited, and that he had found a not very convincing excuse to keep him back alone in the office with him. It is very uncomfortable to foresee oneself left alone in an isolated office with a man who has attempted your life once, and whom you know to be ready to attempt it again.

  ‘I can’t stop tonight,’ said Oldroyd feebly, which was just what Morris expected him to say.

  ‘Sorry, but you’ll have to. It’s only for a minute,’ said Morris incisively.

  The others in the room looked at Oldroyd with small sympathy. They were delighted to hear the favourite being treated with so much brusqueness.

  ‘Come up here,’ said Morris, ‘and let’s get started, since you’re in such a hurry.’

  Oldroyd could not protest farther, literally not to save his life. There are certain things one cannot do in the public life of an office. With dragging steps Oldroyd mounted the dais to Morris’s table, and then he sat down in the chair that Morris indicated to him.

  ‘Well, good night,’ said Lamb, and he and Shepherd clattered out. They were the last of the staff left in the office save for Morris and Oldroyd.

  With their departure Oldroyd shifted his chair uneasily out of reach of Morris. He sat crouched forward, awaiting some new attack planned by Morris with his usual devilish cunning. Morris noticed the tension of his attitude, and was irritated and amused in equal proportions. It is gratifying to be considered a dangerous man, but annoying when it interferes with one’s plans, especially when one’s plans are being developed very much against one’s grain.

  ‘Confound it,’ said Morris. ‘Don’t be so hellish careful. I’m not going to kill you this evening.’

  That assurance, as was to be expected, counted absolutely for nothing with Oldroyd. He did not relax in the least.

  ‘Now pay attention to what I’m going to say,’ said Morris.

  Oldroyd said nothing, nor did his expression change.

  ‘Mac wanted to give you the sack this afternoon. It’s not the first time, you know. He spoke about it to me a week or two ago. Do you remember?’

  Oldroyd was not at all likely to forget that particular day.

  ‘Well,’ went on Morris, ‘he wanted to call you in and give you the sack then and there, and there was only one way in which I could stop him: I had to tell him all about a scheme I had made up and say it was your idea.’

  So far Oldroyd did not grant the least credence to what Morris had said. He took it for granted that this was all part of a scheme for his undoing.

  ‘The idea was this—’ said Morris, and he went on to describe, for the second time that day, the epoch-making Ultra-violet Soap Bonus Scheme.

  Oldroyd, who had worked in various advertising offices since he was sixteen, could hardly help but be impressed. He could not but admire the neat and inexpensive manner in which the attention of the Press, and the public, and the retailers was to be immediately caught. His face displayed a flicker of interest. Whatever designs Morris had on his life, he had certainly presented him gratis with a flawless idea worth a great deal of money and prestige to any advertising man.

  ‘Yes,’ snarled Morris, ‘that’s the idea I had to give away to Mac and say it was yours, you—’

  Morris called Oldroyd several names in quick succession; each name was unpleasant and filthy. Oldroyd did not mind in the least.

  ‘Well, dam’ you,’ asked Morris, ‘haven’t you got anything to say?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Oldroyd, wooden as ever.

  ‘Anyway,’ said Morris, ‘that’s what I told Mac this afternoon. Of course he fell for the idea straight away – of course he did, blast you. He wanted to have you in and tell you he’d taken it up, and I had to stop him by saying that you’d only told me in confidence. So tomorrow I’ve got to tell him you’ve given me permission to tell him. Do you understand?’

  ‘I heard what you’ve said to me,’ said Oldroyd cautiously.

  ‘Oh, blast you, blast you!’ said Morris. ‘Aren’t you going to back me up?’

  ‘I don’t know about that.’

  Oldroyd probably had never heard any proverbial saying about the giving of Greek gifts, but he was acting with a caution which seemed to show that he had.

  ‘But you must; you must,’ said Morris.

  Morris of the iron nerve was finding all this strain too much even for him. The possibility that he might have thrown away his splendid idea to no purpose at all drove him almost hysterical, and the prospect of the complications which would ensue in the morning if Oldroyd disowned the authorship of the scheme was still more fuel added to the flames.

  ‘I don’t see any must about it,’ said Oldroyd sturdily.

  Morris beat with his fists on the table. He used vile language. Oldroyd found a certain amount of pleasure in the spectacle. It was some sort of repayment for all the trouble Morris had caused him recently.

  Then with a huge effort Morris engulfed his impotent rage in a fatalistic resignation.

  ‘Well, if you won’t you won’t,’ he said. ‘I’ve done all I could. If you don’t back me up I shall be in a bit of a mess, but not half so bad a mess as you. You’ll get the sack, although I’ve tried to save you. And if you care to go bleating to the police I can’t stop you. So that’s that. Anyway, when Mac calls you into his room tomorrow you’ll know what it’s for, so you needn’t make a fool of yourself unless you want to.’

  ‘I’ll see that it’s not me who’s made a fool of,’ said Oldroyd.

  Morris’s rage bade fair to overmaster him again. He was on the verge of giving it vent by hurling himself in a wild physical attack on the slight little man who was causing all this trouble, but his common sense told him that it would be hard to find circumstances more dangerous in which to commit murder. Oldroyd saw the possibility and held himself in readiness. Then Morris made a little gesture of surrender.

  ‘Oh, clear out!’ he said at last. ‘Get out of here before I kill you!’

  Oldroyd slid his chair cautiously to the edge of the dais before he stood up. He did not turn his back on Morris for a moment while he reached for his hat and coat and sidled through the door. Until he had gone, and for some minutes afterwards, Morris sat on at his table, drumming with his fingers and staring out into the darkness beyond the windows.

  17

  Next morning at the office it may or may not have been obvious that Morris had passed a very bad night. Nobody observed him at all closely, for the people who were most likely to do so were far too excited. Mr Campbell had hardly seated himself at his desk, he had hardly made a pretence of glancing through the letters which Maudie brought in to him, before he pressed the button which summoned Morris into his room.

  ‘Have you asked him yet?’ he demanded as soon as Morris opened the door.

  ‘Yes,’ said Morris.

  ‘And what did he say?’

  ‘He said all right.’

  ‘Fine! Call him in then, and let’s get going.’


  Morris opened the door and called Oldroyd into the presence.

  ‘Mr Morris has told me,’ said Mr Campbell, ‘about this bonus scheme of yours for Ultra-violet Soap. It’s a good idea. Quite a good idea.’

  Morris stared anxiously at Oldroyd, wondering what he would say. He said nothing at present.

  ‘In fact,’ said Mr Campbell, ‘I have decided to take it up with the company. I’m sure they’ll agree.’

  Oldroyd only nodded. It was not until that moment that he decided to fall in with Morris’s plans. He had puzzled all night over the situation and had failed to discover any trap in it, or any chance of Morris doing any damage to him by it. All his serious thought had only gone to convince him that for once in a way Morris had been speaking the plain truth – and for once in a way, of course, that is just what Morris had been doing.

  Mr Campbell was looking at Oldroyd in a puzzled kind of way. He expected him to show some kind of elation at this official endorsement of his suggestion, and was surprised to find no trace of such elation. But Mr Campbell was quite ready to dub the Oldroyd riddle as insoluble. If an apparently stolid, unimaginative, careless, lazy fellow like Oldroyd could produce the brilliant idea of the Ultra-violet Bonus Scheme, then there were bound to be other surprising points about his character and conduct. He gave up his internal debate.

  ‘I’ll get through to them now, I think,’ he announced, and picked up his desk telephone.

  ‘Get me Mr White of the Ultra-violet people,’ he said over the instrument to Maudie in the outer office.

  He put back the instrument on his desk and began to wander round the room, his hands deep in his trousers pockets, where they rattled incessantly his keys and coppers. He was very clearly in a state of excitement. When the bell rang he grabbed the telephone expectantly.

  ‘Hullo!’ he said. ‘That you, White? Oh, I’m all right, thank you. Listen. I’ve got an idea. It’s a winner, I think. Yes, I know, but this time you’ll say the same when you hear about it. When can I see you? Oh, no, no, no, the quicker we get on to this the better. Have lunch with me today. Oh, that’s a pity. Well, what are you doing just at this minute? That’s all right. I expect you’ll put him off when you hear what I’ve got to say. I’ll get a taxi now. I’ll be with you in ten minutes if they haven’t got the Strand up again. Right. Goodbye. Where’s my hat?’

  With that Mr Campbell was gone; but what he had said over the telephone had told Morris and Oldroyd more eloquently than a dozen speeches just how highly Mr Campbell approved of the idea he believed to be Oldroyd’s. The glances those two exchanged after his departure were just as eloquent from another point of view, although anyone ignorant of the details of the situation would have found it a difficult task to explain them.

  Two hours later the buzzer at Morris’s table sounded again – a long note, significant of Mr Campbell’s good temper.

  ‘Just as I said,’ said Mr Campbell to Morris. ‘White liked the idea straight away. We can start getting out a few roughs at once. White said the usual thing – have to consult his fellow directors and all that; but I know what White says goes with that firm every time. We can call it settled. Now, look here. What space are we going to take for this stunt? What about—’

  There is no need to recount what Mr Campbell went on to discuss. It was a highly technical advertising matter, calling for frequent consultation of the statistics compiled from keyed advertisements, balancing of space charges against sales and all the other intricacies of the profession. Morris and Mr Campbell argued the matter back and forth with loving care, sketching out the huge noisy campaign in as much detail as experience could foresee. There was need for haste; Mr White wanted a complete scheme submitted to him that evening to tell his other directors about next day. So demand after demand went into the other room for figures and files and statistics. At one o’clock Morris hurried into the copy room for a moment, hurriedly looking over the work which had been done, distributed a few more urgent jobs, issued permission for lunch to be taken one at a time, twenty minutes each, and hastened back to continue the discussion with Mr Campbell. They lunched off a sketchy meal Shepherd brought in to them, and continued the debate with their mouths full. Once, and only once, did Oldroyd’s name come up in the conversation.

  ‘Look here,’ said Campbell, conscience stricken, ‘don’t you think Oldroyd ought to be consulted a bit on this matter? It’s his idea, you know.’

  There was a guilty pause before Morris answered. Then:

  ‘No,’ said Morris. ‘I don’t expect he’d thank us if we asked him. And I don’t think he’d be much good, anyway.’

  ‘Neither do I,’ said Mr Campbell in a relieved tone. ‘I’ll have to raise his wages, I suppose. But all he’s good for is ideas apparently. He’s got no head for detail.’

  Both of them seemed to be very glad to agree on this point. In the full flood of campaign planning Mr Campbell felt that Oldroyd would be de trop, somehow, while Morris simply hated the thought of Oldroyd intruding further into this, his first big scheme. But during the discussion Morris’s respect for Mr Campbell, and still more Mr Campbell’s respect for Morris increased by leaps and bounds. They were filled with exaltation and mutual esteem.

  Outside in the copy room the excitement grew with each further summons from the director’s room. No one (except Oldroyd) knew what was being planned; all they could guess was that it was something peculiarly promising and exciting. Even Miss Campbell knew no more than that, as she freely admitted. Morris was regarded with passionate interest by four pairs of eyes every time he appeared in the copy room, and debate ran high each time he came back again with a demand for some new data. In the end Oldroyd, who had been quietly working at his corner table, could not find any more patience for the discussion.

  ‘I know what they’re doing,’ he said quietly.

  Lamb and Howlett looked at him with disbelief.

  ‘What is it?’ they demanded.

  ‘It’s a bonus scheme for Ultra-violet. They’re going to—’ Once more the scheme was outlined in the premises of the Universal Advertising Agency. When he had heard it all Lamb whistled with admiration.

  ‘That’s a stunt, by George, now, isn’t it?’ he declared.

  ‘Whose idea was it?’ demanded Howlett. ‘Morris’s, I suppose. Sounds too good for the old man.’

  ‘It wasn’t either of them,’ said Oldroyd.

  ‘Well, who was it?’ asked Lamb.

  ‘Yes, who was it, Mr Oldroyd?’ asked Miss Campbell.

  ‘It was me,’ said Oldroyd modestly, and a shocked silence greeted his words.

  ‘Go on!’ said Lamb.

  ‘Tell us a few more like that,’ said Howlett.

  ‘It was, really,’ said Oldroyd, a little nettled by this unbelief.

  ‘Well, upon my sainted Sam,’ said Howlett.

  ‘Really and truly?’ asked Miss Campbell.

  ‘Yes,’ said Oldroyd.

  ‘Well, I think it was very clever of you,’ said Miss Campbell, and it was obvious that everyone in the room agreed with her.

  ‘Mac ought to raise your screw for that,’ said Lamb.

  ‘Perhaps he’s done it already?’ said Howlett.

  ‘No, not yet,’ said Oldroyd.

  ‘Well, he will,’ said Miss Campbell with decision.

  ‘It’s the biggest thing for years,’ said Lamb, and the envy of his tone was balm to Oldroyd’s soul.

  ‘People will still be talking about you when you’re dead and gone,’ said Howlett.

  The candidate for immortality almost blushed. He found even this undeserved praise most intoxicating; the more so as he had felt rather a pariah lately in the office.

  ‘We’ll want a bigger staff now,’ said Shepherd. Roseate visions were conjured up in his mind by those words. He might be promoted to copy writer and clerk, and another office boy might arrive for Shepherd to bully. That would be exceedingly pleas
ant.

  ‘Promotion all round,’ said Howlett. ‘Bit of a bonus, too, perhaps.’

  It was just what Mr Campbell was saying in other words to Morris at this very moment. ‘Do you think you can handle this with the staff we’ve got?’ he asked.

  ‘M’m,’ said Morris. ‘No, I don’t think I can.’

  ‘Braithwaite was talking to me a couple of days ago,’ said Mr Campbell. ‘He’s looking for a job. If he’d come to me three months back he could have had Harrison’s, but of course I won’t do anything like that now. Do you think you could use him?’

  Braithwaite was a man of considerable reputation as a copy writer. There had been a time when Morris had looked up to him in awe. Now he thought the matter over calmly, without a quickening of the pulse.

  ‘Yes, Braithwaite’ll do,’ he said.

  Mr Campbell was tolerably impressed by his calm self-reliance. They went on to discuss the reorganization of the office, in which they came to decisions which sadly disappointed most of the staff with regard to promotion, although they were all to be gratified in a few weeks’ time, when the Ultra-violet Scheme had attained its historic success, by a substantial bonus based on salary scales. Only Oldroyd was pleased with the knowledge of an immediate rise in wages.

  Morris announced the forthcoming changes in the copy room with characteristic abruptness.

  ‘Mr Campbell’s taking the office across the corridor as well,’ he said. ‘There are three rooms there. That’s where I’m going. Mr Braithwaite – you’ve heard of him, haven’t you? – will be coming in here to look after you lot, except the ones who come with me. Clarence, I’ll want you next door – Mr Braithwaite’s bringing another artist here with him. There’s another typist coming, too. She’ll be over with me.’

  He paused, while the others hung on his words. He could not control his voice properly as he said the next words. He knew he was going to announce a decision of the utmost importance to himself; why his voice changed was because he was not at all sure that it was altogether a wise one.