Simon Brett - A Shock to the System

He knew there was a school of thought that classified all taking of human life as aberrant behaviour. But that was surely just a moral viewpoint, circumscribed by the great taboo which surrounds the crime. He, Graham Marshall, by his initially inadvertent breach of that taboo, had transcended such inhibited thinking. He knew he could commit murder and gain satisfaction from doing it, so his recent actions were no less logical and positive than his behaviour had been for the rest of his life.

Besides, he thought, giving himself the final warmth of comfort, if what he had done was madness, surely it couldn’t make him feel so good.

No, if he couldn’t sleep, it was simply excitement. And strain. The athletic metaphor returned to his mind. He had given of himself in the big event, he had won, and he must expect some reaction. He needed to wind down, take it easy, as he selected his next challenge.

In the short term what he needed was a large Scotch.

On the landing he heard moaning from inside the bathroom and threw the door open.

The noise was coming from Lilian, who lay in the bath.

Graham’s first shock was the sight of her naked body, and its similarity, in shrivelled parody, to Merrily’s. To the body that was now compounded to a little scattering of dust.

Then he saw the redness in the water.

He raised first one limp hand, then the other. On each wrist a narrow slit trickled blood.

But the cuts barely scraped the skin. Her arteries were in no danger.

God, if that was her idea of a cry for help, it was hardly worth answering.

‘I’ll ring the doctor,’ he announced, fully aware that she was conscious. At the door he turned back suddenly, and was rewarded by the sight of her open eyes. Their expression was of sheepishness at having been caught out.

Downstairs by the phone was a note in Lilian’s handwriting. He didn’t bother to read it.

Bloody amateurs, he thought as he dialled the doctor’s number, I’m surrounded by bloody amateurs.

Graham looked across his desk at Terry Sworder with distaste. The young man had chosen to come into the office in an open-necked tennis shirt under a hooded cotton zip-jacket like a tracksuit top. A soggy little cigar dropped from his lip. Graham pitied the lack of style. In the days when he himself had sought to shock management by dressing boldly, it had been done with a sense of elegance; he had never been merely scruffy. Graham had passed comment on the inappropriateness of the costume when Terry arrived, but been told that ‘Bob’s taken me off normal Personnel stuff at the moment. Wants me to check some of the projections we’ve run through the computer for this survey.’

‘What survey?’ Graham had asked.

‘Basic staffing survey. Model for Human Resources Requirements in the late ’Eighties. Bit hush-hush at the moment. Management don’t know it’s on,’ Terry had replied gnomically.

Graham had not enquired further, recognising one of his own tactics, the deployment of a verbal smoke-screen to obscure issues. But he knew that the survey would be looking for ways of cutting staff in the Department.

Presumably it was the survey that was keeping Terry Sworder preoccupied, unaware of his superior’s scrutiny. Sheets of concertina’d computer papers spread across his desk. These he pored over, stopping occasionally to use his calculater or jot down a note.

Graham pointed his foot towards his opponent, back with his favourite fantasy of the loaded shoe. A slight pressure of the toe and, in Graham’s imagination, Sworder flicked back with the impact of a bullet in his neck. Red from the exit-wound splattered the wall-planner behind and the young man’s body twitched backwards twice before slumping still over his papers. Blood spread slowly across the tightly-massed figures.

But the fantasy failed to bite. Like pornography to an adolescent who has lost his virginity, it was no longer adequate. Reality had diminished its effect.

Graham’s thoughts wandered off briefly in a more pleasing direction before he reined them in. No, he had no reason to murder Terry Sworder. That would be stupid, tackling the symptom rather than the disease.

Robert Benham was his enemy, Terry Sworder a mere irritant. The young man was only being used by his master to get at Graham, to undermine his confidence and status in the company.

Graham smiled as a new thought formed warmingly in his mind. Using Terry Sworder was a game at which two could play.

Crasoco’s staff management system, like that of many other large corporations, relied on annual interviews. Each member of staff, above a certain level, had a confrontation once a year with his immediate boss, who would read a report on the individual’s work. This was a device to give the illusion of open management, an opportunity for commendation or criticism from the senior party, and the airing of any grievance by the junior. The report would then be placed (confidentially, the story went) on the individual’s personal file. In this way honesty and democracy were in theory upheld.

In practice, the system was toothless. Though appeal procedures existed, few staff members would risk making waves by too overt complaints or criticisms, which were bound to reflect on the senior who was interviewing them. And, for their part, the bosses, except in cases of total incompetence or insubordination, tended to moderate any criticisms they might have of their staff. At a time when the management was known to be on the look-out for staff reductions, Departmental Heads had no wish to help them in their search. Any suggestion that someone was not pulling his weight might easily be interpreted as proof that a department could run as efficiently with one less member. And, empire-builders to a man, the Departmental Heads did not like the idea.

The result was that almost every annual report filed was bland and uncontroversial.

But it needn’t be. That was the thought which comforted Graham Marshall. Over the last couple of years, as George Brewer’s assistant, he had been writing most of the departmental reports. It was one of those routine jobs which George had been happily shedding and, though his signature appeared on the relevant pink form, the words above it were Graham’s. Indeed, on occasion the signature had been Graham’s too — or rather Graham’s version of George’s. He had found the ability to forge his boss’s writing useful more than once, and even kept a Parker fountain pen and bottle of blue ink in his desk drawer for the purpose. The skill was not one he had used for criminal applications, merely for convenience and — particularly as George grew more dilatory with age — for speed.

Graham had also, as his annexations of responsibility increased, begun to conduct more and more of the interviews. For George it was a routine chore, one that he had happily relinquished to the man who, after all, he had regarded as his heir apparent. The Head dealt with the more senior members of the Department, but the lower echelons had their annual interviews conducted by his assistant.

By Graham’s reckoning, Terry Sworder was just about junior enough to fall into the second category.

It had to be done quickly, before George retired.

Whistling softly between his teeth, Graham left his office for the room where the personal files were stored. Robert Benham, rumour had it, planned to put even these records on computer, but the change-over had not yet taken place and Graham had no difficulty in finding the box-file which contained the history of Terry Sworder’s life with the company.

He had been there for seven years. Each previous annual report had been enthusiastic, a little more enthusiastic than the required establishment-preserving minimum. Graham recognised his own sentences on the previous year’s form. He even thought — though he couldn’t be certain — that the George Brewer signature at the bottom was one of his.