Who Is Simon Warwick by Patricia Moyes

Author:Patricia Moyes [Moyes, Patricia]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 0030447267
Published: 2017-11-20T16:00:00+00:00

9

Sir Percy Crumble’s office in Warwick House, Mayfair—a well-aimed stone from Berkeley Square could have broken its window—was opulent in the extreme. Percy Crumble had apparently never heard of the one-upmanship of the super-executive who chooses to work in surroundings of Spartan simplicity: if he had, he would have considered the idea to be potty, just as he had regarded it as a sign of senility when Lord Charlton himself had refused a suite of offices in the new steel and plate-glass building, preferring to do what work he did for the company from his library in Belgrave Terrace.

Cecily Smeed, of course, had until recently occupied an office not so very inferior to Percy’s at Warwick House, where she was always at Lord Charlton’s disposal for confidential secretarial work. Nevertheless, memos from the old man had frequently turned up on the desks of his top executives, handwritten with an old-fashioned pen dipped into the silver inkwell that Cecily was now to inherit. These memos always caused great confusion, because they photocopied very badly, and there was no authorized distribution list for them. Cecily would only smile infuriatingly and say, “I think Lord Charlton simply meant it as a personal note to you, Sir Percy.” If you asked Percy Crumble, Warwick Industries was bloody well better off without the both of them—Cecily and the old man. But, of course, one couldn’t say so in public.

He received the news that Chief Superintendent Tibbett of Scotland Yard wished to see him, with some irritation but no alarm. He had read his Sunday paper in Scotland and was well aware that Ambrose Quince’s candidate for Simon Warwick had been murdered in Ambrose’s own office. He realized that Scotland Yard would have to make an investigation, and that Warwick Industries was bound to be a part of it. He asked his secretary—an attractive but unostentatious blonde—if he could fit Chief Superintendent Tibbett into his morning schedule.

“You could see him right away, Sir Percy. You remember, we kept this morning free in case there was any delay in your flight from Scotland.”

“Okay. Send ’im in. Better get doon with it.”

Like most people meeting Sir Percy Crumble for the first time, Henry was impressed that such a titan of the business world should have been able to remain so unsophisticated, so North Country, so bluff and foursquare and commonsensical. With many people— those lucky enough never to find themselves in a competitive situation with Sir Percy—this impression remained permanent. Others had to learn the hard way that Percy Crumble’s provincial accent was a deliberately variable characteristic, and that his country-bumpkin facade disguised one of the sharpest minds in big business. Henry was deceived for about fifteen seconds. Then his brain took over.

“So poor yoong Finch was doon in, and in Ambrose’s own office? Well, ’oo’d ’ave thought it. I suppose ’twas t’oother chap did it.” Crumble beamed at Henry. “ ’Ave a cigar.” He pushed a Venetian tooled leather box across the gleaming desk.

Declining the cigar, Henry

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.