She reluctantly handed Jack the phone. He cleared his throat and pressed the “answer” button.
“Arnold?” he said, using his stern, talking-to-children voice,
“This is Brian, Mary’s father. I must say that I am a little disappointed that—”
He stopped, listened for a moment, smiled and then said, “Well, that’s very kind of you to say so, Arnold, but I must make this point abundantly clear—”
There was another pause. Jack made a few “uh-huh” and “yuh” noises before laughing and looking at Mary.
“Did she, now? How about that. What’s your line of work, Arnold?”
Mary stared at him, aghast. She made throat-cutting signals, shaking her head and mouthing no… no… no.
“Really?” carried on Jack. “Well, of course we are immensely proud of her now that she’s joined the NCD…. Of course…. DI Jack Spratt…. No, with two t’s…. That’s the one…. No, as I understand it, only one was a giant—the rest were just tall…. She didn’t?”
The conversation went on like this for quite a few minutes, with Mary sinking lower and lower in her seat.
“Well,” continued Jack, “you must come around for tea sometime. Myself and Mrs. Mary would be very pleased to meet you.” He paused again, put his hand over the phone and said to Mary,
“Where do we live?”
She glared at him, crossed her arms and said, “Basingstoke,” through gritted teeth.
“Basingstoke,” repeated Jack into the mobile. He laughed again. “No, we’re not at all ashamed. Call us anytime. Mary has the number. Same to you. Bye.”
He pressed the “end-call” button, shaking his head and smiling. He passed the mobile back and caught Mary’s eye as she gazed daggers at him.
“What? He sounds like a great guy. I think you should cut him a little slack.”
Mary wasn’t amused. “I thought you were going to get rid of him for me.”
Jack thought for a moment, trying to figure out a plausible excuse.
“No,” he said finally, “what I said was that I’d pretend to be your father. How did I do?”
Mary sighed. “Spookily accurate, sir.”
“DI Spratt?” said a pencil-thin woman who looked as if she’d escaped from the cover of a fashion magazine.
“Yes?” said Jack as they both stood.
“I am Miss Daley, the secretary to Mr. Grundy’s personal secretary’s assistant’s assistant.”
She shook both their hands.
“Welcome to Winsum and Loosum’s. Mr. Grundy is a busy man but understands the importance of police work. He has delayed a meeting in order to be able to grant you an audience.”
“How fantastically generous of him.”
“Mr. Grundy is always eager to assist the police in any way he can,” said the humorless assistant, who had somehow lost something on the road towards highly cultivated efficiency. She led them across the atrium and into one of the lifts, which then shot them upwards like an express train. It deposited them in a noiseless corridor that led to an oak-paneled boardroom with a large oval table in it. Two well-groomed executives were just leaving as they entered, one of whom Jack thought he recognized. They were efficiently introduced to Mr. Grundy by the assistant, who then seemed to melt away.
Solomon Grundy was everything Spongg was not. He had a limp handshake, a false smile and pallid features that surrounded a pair of eyes that were of the brightest blue but projected no emotion. His suit was hand-tailored from Savile Row but looked out of place on his large, bullnecked frame—he reminded Jack of a gangster desperate to be respectable. He wore a well-fitting toupée, and his hands were liberally covered with heavy gold jewelery.
Grundy had got to his feet as he welcomed Jack and Mary and offered them a seat on intentionally low chairs. He opened a silver cigar box and said, “Cigar? They’re Cuban.”
Jack declined his offer, but Grundy put one in Jack’s top pocket anyway and winked at him, then gave one to Mary and said, “For the boyfriend.” He then sat down in his own huge, corporate comfy chair and spun completely around, lighting his cigar as he did so. He stopped facing straight ahead as he clicked off his lighter, then placed his hands on the table and blew out some cigar smoke. It seemed like a well-rehearsed routine.
“This interview, is, I assume, to do with Mr. Dumpty’s death?”
“Just an informal chat, Mr. Grundy.”
“Why should it be formal? Unless, of course, Mr. Dumpty’s death was suspicious. Is this the case, Inspector?”
You don’t get to be the ninth-wealthiest man in Britain without being astute, thought Jack—or perhaps he already knew?
“We believe there are suspicious aspects to his death, yes, sir. Who was that leaving as we came in?”
“Two of my junior board members. I expect you recognized Friedland’s brother?”
“How long has he been working here?”
“Does this relate to Humpty’s death?”
“No.”
“I’m a busy man, Mr. Spratt.”
Jack grew hot. It was not a very subtle put-down, but effective. Grundy had been leading the conversation since he’d walked in. Jack decided he’d have to get the upper hand again and invoked his secret plan: talk to other people as Friedland talked to him.
“So am I, Mr. Grundy,” replied Jack, staring at him coldly. “A man—well, an egg, actually—has died, and I think irrespective of who or what he was, he deserves that I investigate his death to the best of my ability. So tell me, how do you describe your relationship with Spongg’s?”
Grundy smiled. A smile of respect, thought Jack. To people like Grundy, straight talking was the answer. He still wasn’t going to make it easy, though, and his dispassionate eyes bored into Jack like augers.
“Rivals. That’s no secret. We tried to buy them out six months ago but were thwarted by a new shareholder.”
“Humpty Dumpty?”
“Indeed. I wager old Randolph is kicking himself. With Mr. Dumpty dead, his shares are wrapped up in probate. They’ll go bust, and we’ll take all we want from the receivers.”
He smiled an ugly smile, and Jack shifted his weight uneasily. He didn’t like Grundy one bit.
“Sounds as though his death has benefited you, Mr. Grundy.”
“It has benefited the company, Mr. Spratt. The same as if he had fallen off a bike or died in his sleep. Corporate business is a dangerous place; I do not own this company any more than you own the Reading police force. The shareholders will view Mr. Dumpty’s demise without grief. We thought perhaps Humpty had a refinancing package for Spongg’s, but his death will have put a stop to that. In under a year, we will have added their product lines to ours. I hope I am candid, Mr. Spratt.”
“Very,” replied Jack. “What did you and Mr. Dumpty talk about at the Spongg Charity Benefit?”
Grundy laughed. “Your information is good, Inspector. He offered me his thirty-eight percent share of Spongg’s for ten million. I told him the time for deals had long passed, and he told me I wouldn’t be laughing this time next year. We’ll take what we want from the receivers. I heard his private life was fairly colorful. Why don’t you speak to some of his girlfriends? Jealousy is a powerful emotion, Mr. Spratt.”
“So is revenge, Mr. Grundy.”
Grundy guessed Jack’s inference. “You have Splotvia on your mind, Mr. Spratt?”
Jack nodded. “I understand you lost a great deal of money?”
Grundy contemplated the end of his cigar for a few moments.
“It was that damnable mineral-rights scam of his. I should never have become involved, but then again, it was business.”
“So you weren’t bitter?”
“Of course not. I was furious. You’d better know the facts. He raised that share capital and spent it, not on securing mineral rights but on arming the rebels against the military dictatorship that ran the country. I tried to have him charged with fraud, but he covered his tracks well. They even”—he laughed—“made him a colonel in the Splotvian Imperial Guard.”