Murder must advertise pdf

She said: "I am head charwoman to the firm of Pym's Publicity, Ltd. It is my duty to take the tea-waggon round the office building at about 3. That is, I start my round at about 3. I had nearly finished doing the first floor, and was returning on my way to the lift to take tea up to the top floor.

That would make the time about 3. I was coming along the corridor and was facing the foot of the iron staircase. I saw Mr. Dean fall. He fell all in a bunch-like. It was dreadful. He did not shout out or make any exclamation in falling. He fell like a dead thing. My heart seemed to stop. I was struck so I couldn't move for a minute or two. Atkins came running along to pick him up.

He said: 'He's broke his neck,' and I let out a scream. I couldn't help myself, I was that upset. I think that staircase is a wicked dangerous place. I am always warning the other women against it. If you was to slip you couldn't hardly save yourself, not if you was carrying anything. People run up and downstairs on it all day, and the edges of the steps gets that polished you wouldn't believe, and some of them is wore down at the edges.

The medical evidence was given by Dr. It is about five minutes from my house to the offices of Pym's Publicity in Southampton Row. I received a telephone message at 3. Deceased was dead when I arrived. I concluded that he had then been dead about 15 minutes. His neck was broken at the fourth cervical vertebra. He also had a contused wound on the right temple which had cracked the skull. Either of these injuries was sufficient to cause death.

I should say he had died instantly upon falling. He had also the tibia of the left leg broken, probably through catching in the banister of the staircase. There were also, of course, a quantity of minor scratches and contusions. The wound on the head is such as might be caused through pitching upon one of the knobs on the hand-rail in falling.

I could not say whether this or the broken vertebra was the actual cause of death, but in either case, death would be instantaneous. I agree that it is not a matter of great importance. I found no trace of any heart disease or any other disease which might suggest that deceased was subject to vertigo or fainting-fits.

I observed no traces of alcoholic tendency or of addiction to drugs. I have seen the staircase, and consider that it would be very easy to slip upon it.

So far as I can tell, deceased's eyesight would appear to have been normal. Miss Pamela Dean, sister of deceased, gave evidence that her brother had been in good health at the time of the accident, and that he had never been subject to fits or fainting. He was not short-sighted. He occasionally suffered from liverish attacks.

He was a good dancer and usually very neat and nimble on his feet. He had once sprained his ankle as a boy, but so far as she knew, no permanent weakness of the joint had resulted. Evidence was also called which showed that accidents had occurred on several previous occasions to persons descending the staircase; other witnesses expressed the opinion that the staircase was not dangerous to anybody exercising reasonable care.

The jury returned a verdict of accidental death, with a rider to the effect that they thought the iron spiral should be replaced by a more solid structure.

Bredon shook his head. Then he drew a sheet of paper from the rack before him and wrote down:. He filled himself a pipe and sat for some time staring at this list. Then he searched in a drawer and produced a piece of notepaper, which seemed to be an unfinished letter, or the abandoned draft of one. PYM,--I think it only right that you should know that there is something going on in the office which is very undesirable, and might lead to serious--".

After a little more thought, he laid this document aside and began to scribble on another sheet, erasing and re-writing busily. Presently a slow smile twitched his lips. But the job is, to handle it. One's got to go for the money--but where's it coming from?

Not from Pym, I fancy. It doesn't seem to be his personal show, and you can't blackmail a whole office. I wonder, though. After all, he'd probably pay a good bit to prevent--". Well, I think he's rather a lamb, and his shirts are simply too marvellous. He won't be able to keep that up on Pym's salary, bonus or no bonus.

Or the silk socks either. Lost all his money in the slump or something. She slimmed more strenuously than her colleague, and was less inclined to sentiment. I expect he's been one of these gilded johnnies who used to sell cars on commission, and the bottom's dropped out of that and he's got to do a job of work--if you call copy-writing work. Hankie nearly sniggered himself sick.

I think the Pet was pulling his leg. But what I mean is, he wouldn't think of a silly thing like that if he hadn't got brains. She had seen so many new copy-writers come and pass like ships in the night, that she was as well able to size them up as the copy-chiefs themselves.

He'll stay all right. Doesn't chuck the stuff at you as if you were dirt like young Willis. And he pays his tea-bill like a little gentleman. Gives me the pip, the way some of them make a fuss about it. There's Garrett. He was quite rude when I went to him on Saturday. Hinted that I made money out of the teas. I suppose he thinks it's funny. I don't.

Not altogether. And he's always grumbling. Whether it's Chelsea buns or jam roll, there's always something wrong with it. I said to him, 'Mr. Garrett,' I said, 'if you like to give up your lunch-time every day to trying to find something that everybody will enjoy, you're welcome to do it.

It's all very well, but you get very tired of it, especially this hot weather, fagging round. A plain biscuit and a cup of tea every day. That's his order. And he said he was quite ready to pay the same subscription as everybody else, though really he ought to be let off with sixpence. I do like a man to be generous and speak to you nicely.

Bredon came in and asked for Mr. Hankin's carbons. I was in an awful rush with some of old Copley's muck--he always wants everything done in five minutes--and I said, 'Help yourself. Ten minutes afterwards I went to look for something on the shelf and I found he'd gone off with Mr. Hankin's private letter-file.

Of course Hankie'd be in an awful bait if he knew. So I hared off to Bredon and there he was, calmly reading Hankie's private letters, if you please! Bredon,' I said. And he wasn't a bit ashamed. He just handed it back with a grin and said, 'I was beginning to think I might have. It's very interesting to see what salary everybody gets. And I said, 'Oh, Mr.

Bredon, you oughtn't to be reading that. It's frightfully confidential. They are all so sensitive about their salaries. I'm sure I don't know why. But they're all dying to find out what the others get and terrified to death anybody should find out what they get themselves.

If Bredon goes round shooting his mouth off, he'll stir up some awful trouble. The department will be better-tempered without him, I must say.

He did rile 'em sometimes. With the Oxford and Cambridge lot it's all give-and-take and bad language, but the others don't seem to fit in with it.

They always think they're being sneered at. When Willis starts on metaphysics, Ingleby recites limericks. Personally, I'm broadminded. I rather like it. And I will say the 'varsity crowd don't quarrel like the rest of them. If Dean hadn't fallen downstairs, there'd have been a good old bust-up between him and Willis. They had an awful row one day last March. Miss Meteyard heard them going at it hammer and tongs in Dean's room. Being Miss Meteyard, she first pounded on the partition and then went in and told them to shut up.

She's no use for people's private feelings. Funny woman. Well, I suppose we'd better push off home, or we shan't be fit for anything in the morning. It was quite a good show, wasn't it? Where's the check? You had two cakes more than me. Yours is one-and-a-penny and mine's ninepence. If I give you a bob and you give me twopence and the waitress twopence and settle up at the desk, we shall be all square.

The two girls left the Corner House by the Coventry Street entrance, and turned to the right and crossed the Piccadilly merry-go-round to the Tube entrance. As they regained the pavement, Miss Rossiter clutched Miss Parton by the arm:. Yes, it is! Look at the evening cloak and the gardenia, and , my dear, the monocle!

Unaware of this commentary, the gentleman in question was strolling negligently towards them, smoking a cigarette. As he came abreast of them, Miss Rossiter broke into a cheerful grin and said, "Hullo! The man raised his hat mechanically and shook his head. His face was a well-bred blank. Miss Rossiter's cheeks became flooded with a fiery crimson. A limousine car came rolling gently along from the direction of Leicester Square and drew up close to the kerb, opposite the entrance to the Criterion Bar.

The man in dress-clothes stepped up to it and addressed a few words to the occupant, flinging his cigarette away as he did so, and laying one hand on the handle of the door, as though about to enter the car. Before he could do so, two men emerged suddenly and silently from a shop-entrance. One of them spoke to the chauffeur; the other put his hand on the gentleman's elegant arm. A brief sentence or two were exchanged; then the one man got up beside the chauffeur while the second man opened the door of the car.

The man in dress-clothes got in, the other man followed, and the whole party drove off. The whole thing was so quickly done that almost before Miss Parton could turn round in answer to Miss Rossiter's exclamation, it was all over. I wonder what our friend in the monocle's been doing. It was all very well for Miss Parton to claim the credit, but only a few minutes back she had rather pointedly dissociated herself from the indiscretion and she could not be allowed to have it both ways.

Anyhow, if Bredon doesn't turn up tomorrow, we'll know it was him after all. But it could hardly have been Mr. Bredon, for he was in his place the next morning just as usual. Miss Rossiter asked him if he had a double. Miss Rossiter related the incident, with slight modifications. On consideration, she thought it better not to mention that she had been mistaken for a lady of easy virtue. Well known at Buckingham Palace, and all that.

It must have been some one quite different. Bredon had been a week with Pym's Publicity, and had learnt a number of things. He learned the average number of words that can be crammed into four inches of copy; that Mr.

Armstrong's fancy could be caught by an elaborately-drawn lay-out, whereas Mr. He also learned to find his way without assistance over the two floors occupied by the agency, and even up on to the roof, where the messenger boys did their daily physical jerks under the eye of the Sergeant, and whence a fine view of London might be obtained on a clear day. He became acquainted with a number of the group-managers, and was sometimes even able to remember off-hand which clients' accounts were in the control of which manager, while with most of the members of his own department he found himself established on a footing of friendly intimacy.

There were the two copy-chiefs, Mr. Armstrong and Mr. Hankin, each brilliant in his own way and each with his own personal fads. Hankin, for example, would never accept a headline containing the word "magnificent"; Mr. Armstrong disliked any lay-out which involved the picture of a judge or a Jew, and was rendered so acutely wretched when the proprietors of "Whifflets" put out a new brand of smoke called "Good Judge" Mixture that he was obliged to hand the whole account over, lock, stock and barrel to Mr.

Copley, an elderly, serious-minded man, who had entered the advertising profession before the modern craze set in for public-school-and-University-trained copy-writers, was remarkable for a tendency to dyspepsia and a perfectly miraculous knack of writing appetizing copy for tinned and packeted foodstuffs.

Anything that came out of a tin or a packet was poison to him, and his diet consisted of under-cooked beef-steak, fruit and whole-meal bread. The only copy he really enjoyed writing was that for Bunbury's Whole-Meal Flour, and he was perennially depressed when his careful eulogiums, packed with useful medical detail, were scrapped in favour of some light-headed foolishness of Ingleby's, on the story that Bunbury's Whole-Meal Flour took the Ache out of Baking.

But on Sardines and Tinned Salmon he was unapproachable. He lived in Bloomsbury, was communistic in a literary way, and dressed almost exclusively in pull-overs and grey flannels.

He was completely and precociously disillusioned and one of the most promising copy-writers Pym's had ever fathered. When released from Whifflets and fashionable footwear, he could be amusing on almost any subject, and had a turn for "clever" copy, wherever cleverness was not out of place. Miss Meteyard, with a somewhat similar mental make-up, could write about practically anything except women's goods, which were more competently dealt with by Mr. Willis or Mr.

Garrett, the former of whom in particular, could handle corsets and face-cream with a peculiar plaintive charm which made him more than worth his salary. The copy department on the whole worked happily together, writing each other's headlines in a helpful spirit and invading each other's rooms at all hours of the day. The only two men with whom Bredon was unable to establish genial relations were Mr.

Copley, who held aloof from everybody, and Mr. Willis, who treated him with a reserve for which he was unable to account. Otherwise he found the department a curiously friendly place. And it talked. Bredon had never in his life encountered a set of people with such active tongues and so much apparent leisure for gossip.

It was a miracle that any work ever got done, though somehow it did. He was reminded of his Oxford days, when essays mysteriously wrote themselves in the intervals of club-meetings and outdoor sports, and when most of the people who took firsts boasted of never having worked more than three hours of any day.

The atmosphere suited him well enough. He was a bonhomous soul, with the insatiable curiosity of a baby elephant, and nothing pleased him better than to be interrupted in his encomiums of Sopo "makes Monday, Fun-day" or the Whoosh Vacuum-cleaner "one Whoosh and it's clean" by a fellow-member of the department, fed-up with advertising and spoiling for a chat.

She had dropped in to consult Bredon about googlies--the proprietors of Tomboy Toffee having embarked upon a series of cricket advertisements which, starting respectively from "Lumme, what a Lob! Bredon had demonstrated googlies with pencil and paper, and also in the corridor with a small round tin of Good Judge tobacco whereby he had nearly caught Mr. Armstrong on the side of the head , and had further discussed the relative merits of "Gosh" and "Golly" in the headline; but Miss Meteyard showed no symptoms of departing.

She had sat down at Bredon's table and was drawing caricatures, in which she displayed some skill, and was rummaging in the pencil-tray for an india-rubber when she remarked, as above mentioned, "Hullo! Yes, I knew that was there, but I didn't know whom it belonged to. It's not a bad thing. It's real onyx, though of course it's not Egyptian and it's not even very old. He thought it was a sure-fire mascot.

He always had it in his waistcoat pocket or sitting in front of him while he worked. If he'd had it on him that day, he wouldn't have tumbled downstairs--at least, that's what he'd have said himself.

Bredon poised the beetle on the palm of his hand. It was as big as a man's thumb-nail, heavy and shallowly carved, smooth except for a slight chip at one side. De mortuis , and all that, but I wasn't exactly keen on him. I thought he was rather an unwholesome little beast.

At least, I mean, I can't tell you about that. But he used to tag round with that de Momerie crowd. Thought it was smart, I suppose. Luckily, he missed the famous night when that Punter-Smith girl did away with herself. Pym's would never have held its head up again if one of its staff had been involved in a notorious case. Pym's is particular. Needed cash, I suppose. Had to have some sort of job. You can't lead a gay life on nothing, and he wasn't anybody, you know.

His father was a bank-manager, or something, deceased, so I suppose young Victor had to push out and earn his keep. He knew how to look after himself all right.

He had a certain kind of good looks. There is a nostalgie de la banlieue as well as de la boue. And you're pulling my leg, Mr. Death Bredon, because you know that as well as I do.

They start new copy-writers without experience at four quid a week--about enough to pay for a pair of your shoes. But it is evident, dear lady, that you do not do your shopping in the true West End. You belong to the section of society that pays for what it buys. I revere, but do not imitate you. Unhappily, there are certain commodities which cannot be obtained without cash. Railway fares, for example, or petrol. But I am glad you approve of my shoes.

They are supplied by Rudge in the Arcade and, unlike Farley's Fashion Footwear, are actually of the kind that is to be seen in the Royal Enclosure at Ascot and wherever discriminating men congregate.

They have a ladies' department, and if you will mention my name--". Thanks for your dope about googlies. Bredon shook his head mournfully as the door closed after her. Oh, well, I suppose I'd better do some work and look as genuine as possible. He pulled towards him a guard-book pasted up with pulls of Nutrax advertising and studied its pages thoughtfully. He was not left long in peace, however, for after a couple of minutes Ingleby slouched in, a foul pipe at full blast and his hands thrust deep into his trousers-pockets.

But," added Bredon, waving his hand negligently, "you have my permission to search. The priest's hole and the concealed staircase are at your service. Isn't it hot? And now I suppose we're going to have a week's dust and hammering. I was beginning to think you had some sort of personal feeling in the matter.

Just a matter of principle. Except that the staircase does seem to have had its uses in eliminating the unfit. I gather that the late Victor Dean was not universally beloved. I never saw much harm in him, except that he wasn't exactly pukka and hadn't quite imbibed the Pym spirit, as you may say. Of course the Meteyard woman loathed him. My motto is, live and let live, but protect your own interests. How are you getting on with Nutrax?

I've been trying to get out a name for Twentyman's shilling tea. As far as I can make Hankin out, it has no qualities except cheapness to recommend it, and is chiefly made of odds and ends of other teas.

The name must suggest solid worth and respectability. Nothing could sound more reliable and obviously nothing could suggest so much dreary economy. I'll put it up to him. I don't think anybody ought to have to work at half-past two in the afternoon. It's unnatural. Oh, my God! Here's somebody with something on a tray! Go away! Hankin says, will you please taste these samples of porridge and report upon them? They're numbered A, B and C, and here's the questionnaire paper, and if you'll let me have the spoons back I'll get them washed for Mr.

Look for the Piper on the label. Bredon solemnly rolled the portions upon his tongue, and detained Miss Parton. Vintage A: Fine, full-bodied, sweet nutty flavour, fully matured; a grand masculine porridge. Vintage B: extra-sec, refined, delicate character, requiring only--".

Bredon, "what was wrong with my lamented predecessor? Why did Miss Meteyard hate him and why does Ingleby praise him with faint damns? He was always snooping round other people's rooms, picking up their ideas and showing them up as his own. And if anybody gave him a headline and Mr. Armstrong or Mr. Hankin liked it, he never said whose it was.

This explanation seemed to interest Bredon. He trotted down the passage and thrust his head round Garrett's door. Garrett was stolidly making out his porridge report, and looked up with a grunt. I mean to say, it's just a question of etiquette, don't you know, and what's done, so to speak. I mean, look here! You see, Hankie-pankie told me to get out a list of names for a shilling tea and I got out some awful rotten ones, and then Ingleby came in and I said, 'What would you call this tea?

And what I wanted to know was, isn't it done to ask people? Ingleby didn't say anything, but of course, if I've made a floater--". You take any help you can get and show it up with your initials on it, but if Armstrong or whoever it is simply goes all out on it and starts throwing bouquets about, you're rather expected to murmur that it was the other bird's suggestion really, and you thought rather well of it yourself.

Oh, thanks frightfully. And if, on the other hand, he goes right up in the air and says it's the damn-silliest thing he's seen since , you stand the racket, I suppose. If it's as silly as that you ought to have known better than to put it up to him anyway. They weren't brought up to the idea of lending round their lecture notes. They've a sort of board-school idea that everybody ought to paddle his own canoe. There's some kind of feeling--I don't know quite what. Anyway, I just thought I'd warn you.

I'm really most frightfully obliged to you. Clearly Mr. Bredon was a man of no sensibility, for half an hour later he was in Willis's room, and had introduced the subject of the late Victor Dean. The result was an unequivocal request that Mr. Bredon would mind his own business. Willis did not wish to discuss Mr.

Dean at all. In addition to this, Bredon became aware that Willis was suffering from an acute and painful embarrassment, almost as though the conversation had taken some indecent turn.

He was puzzled, but persisted. Willis, after sitting for some moments in gloomy silence, fidgeting with a pencil, at last looked up. He went about with a gang of people I didn't care about, that's all, and from the look of you, I should have said you belonged to the same bright crowd. They'd think me terribly ancient. They would, really. Besides, I don't think they're nice to know.

Some of them are really naughty. Did Mr. Pym know that Dean was a Bright Young Thing? What business is Dean of yours, anyway? I just wondered about him, that's all. He seems to have been a sort of misfit here. Not quite imbued with the Pym spirit, if you see what I mean. And if you take my advice, you'll leave Dean and his precious friends alone, or you won't make yourself too popular.

The best thing Dean ever did in his life was to fall down that staircase. But it seems a bit harsh, all the same. Somebody must have loved him. Hadn't he any family? There is a sister, at least, isn't there? I just asked, that's all. Well, I'd better tootle off, I suppose. I've enjoyed this little talk. Willis scowled at his retreating form, and Mr. Bredon went away to get his information elsewhere. As usual, the typists' room was well informed. She and Victor ran a little flat together.

Smart as paint, but rather silly, I thought, the only time I saw her. I've an idea our Mr. Willis was a bit smitten in that direction at one time, but it didn't seem to come to anything. He went back to his own room and the guard-books. But his attention wandered. He paced about, sat down, got up, stared out of the window, came back to the desk. Then, from a drawer, he pulled out a sheet of paper. It bore a list of dates in the previous year, and to each date was appended a letter of the alphabet, thus:.

There were other papers in the desk in the same handwriting--presumably Victor Dean's--but this list seemed to interest Mr. Bredon unaccountably. He examined it with an attention that one would have thought it scarcely deserved, and finally folded it carefully away in his pocket-book. Bredon of the world at large.

Then he laughed. Pym, the presiding genius of Pym's Publicity, Ltd. His theory was that it was useless to lecture people about their work till they had acquired some idea of what the work actually was. He was a conscientious man, and was particularly careful to keep before his mind the necessity for establishing a friendly personal relation with every man, woman and child in his employment, from the heads of departments down to the messenger-boys and, not being gifted with any spontaneous ease and charm of social intercourse, had worked out a rigid formula for dealing with this necessity.

At the end of a week or so, he sent for any newly-joined recruits, interrogated them about their work and interests, and delivered his famous sermon on Service in Advertising.

If they survived this frightful ordeal, under which nervous young typists had been known to collapse and give notice, they were put on the list for the monthly tea-party. This took place in the Little Conference Room.

Twenty persons, selected from all ranks and departments, congregated under Mr. Pym's official eye to consume the usual office tea, supplemented by ham sandwiches from the canteen, and cake supplied at cost by Dairyfields, Ltd. This function was supposed to promote inter-departmental cordiality, and by its means the entire staff, including the Outside Publicity, passed under scrutiny once in every six months.

In addition to these delights there were, for department and group managers, informal dinners at Mr. Get any books you like and read everywhere you want. We cannot guarantee that every book is in the library! Victor Dean fell to his death on the stairs of Pym's Advertising Agency, but no one seems to be sorry. Until an inquisitive new copywriter joins the firm and asks some awkward questions Disguised as his disreputable cousin Death Bredon, Lord Peter Wimsey takes a job - one that soon draws him into a vicious network of blackmailers and drug pedlars.

Five people will die before Wimsey unravels a sinister and deadly plot. Compatible with any devices. The affluent Lord Wimsey takes up a bet and goes to work for an advertising agency, where he ends up investigating a suspicious death at the agency.

Though he displays a surprising talent for the business of selling margarine, alarm clocks, and nerve tonics, Bredon is not really there to write copy. As he tries to navigate the cutthroat world of London advertising, Lord Peter uncovers a mystery that touches on catapults, cocaine, and cricket.

But how does one uncover a murderer in a business where it pays to have no soul? Murder Must Advertise is the 10th book in the Lord Peter Wimsey Mysteries, but you may enjoy the series by reading the books in any order.

This ebook features an illustrated biography of Dorothy L. Sayers including rare images from the Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College. A detective novel and a collection of short stories featuring Lord Peter Wimsey. Murder must advertise: When ad man Victor Dean falls down the stairs in the offices of Pym's Publicity, a respectable London advertising agency, it looks like an accident.

Then Lord Peter Wimsey is called in, and he soon discovers there's more to copywriting than meets the eye. Hangman's holiday: Amusing and absolutely appalling things happen on the way to the gallows when murder meets Lord Peter Wimsey and the delightful working-class sleuth Montague Egg.

This sumptuous feast of criminal doings and undoings includes a vintage double identity and a horrid incident of feline assassination that will tease the minds of cat-lovers everywhere.

Dorothy Leigh Sayers 13 June - 17 December was a renowned English crime writer, poet, playwright, essayist, translator and Christian humanist. She was also a student of classical and modern languages. She is best known for her mysteries, a series of novels and short stories set between the First and Second World Wars that feature English aristocrat and amateur sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey, that remain popular to this day.

However, Sayers herself considered her translation of Dante's Divine Comedy to be her best work. She is also known for her plays, literary criticism and essays. A Detective Story. Dorothy L. Sayers was one of the "Queens of Crime. Her characters, particularly Lord Peter Wimsey and his investigative partner Harriet Vane, struggle with the complexities of life and love in a rapidly changing world while solving some of the most intricate and complex mysteries ever offered to the reading public.

Unfortunately her writing career was cut short unexpectedly in when she died of a sudden heart attack. Sayers Society Available Formats. This book is in the public domain in Canada, and is made available to you DRM-free. You may do whatever you like with this book, but mostly we hope you will read it.

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