Free Corridors of Death by Ruth Dudley Edwards

good news for Milton tonight, thought Amiss as he put the phone down. He wouldn’t want more motives. His next call – to the Private Secretary to Gerald Hunter, Secretary of State for Energy – was also encouragingly negative. It was obvious that Hunter would have had difficulty in recognizing Sir Nicholas if he met him in the street. Amiss couldn’t think of anyone who could tell him anything about Norman Grewe, Chairman of Industrial Electronics Ltd, but he was pretty sure he could be ruled out. He couldn’t think of any occasion other than the odd formal business dinner where they could have met. Grewe was a recent recruit to IGGY and wouldn’t have seen Sir Nicholas there more than twice.
    Amiss decided to give up on Grewe. He had only one suspect left to investigate – Martin Jenkins, the President of the Fitters’ Union. He doubted if there would be anything positive here either. Clark wouldn’t have any dealings with Jenkins in the normal course of events. Amiss had had to give a lot of thought to fabricating an adequate excuse to ring the department’s trades union adviser, but it was a risk worth taking. Cronin was as gregarious and gossipy as Latham and liked nothing better than passing on discreditable bits of information about those people on whom he fawned professionally.
    Cronin was in. That was a piece of luck. He spent most of his time hanging round trades union headquarters looking for juicy bits of scandal (and useful birds to pull. Eligible bachelor – he had no trouble. He was even a challenge – at the first dinner together, she always heard how his heart was broken ten years ago and he could never love again. That also provided a useful get-out when a more tempting prospect came in sight. The place was littered with women who had succumbed. This was his idea of keeping in touch with the grass roots.) He was delighted to hear from Amiss – so delighted that there was no danger of his doubting his reason for ringing up. They got the pretext over with quickly – Cronin giving Amiss the figure that was already staring up at him from a memorandum on his desk. Amiss fed him a few harmless bits of inside information on the happenings of the previous day, and the conversation came round to the trades unionists present.
    ‘At least they’ll be in the clear,’ he said. ‘Sir Nicholas never had much time for them.’
    ‘I’m not so sure of that,’ said a gleeful voice. ‘It’ll be fun if the police get to know about Jenkins and Sir Nicholas’s missus.’
    ‘What?’ yelled Amiss, temporarily off his guard.
    ‘Didn’t you know? It’s been the talk of the Fitters’ headquarters for ages. A life-long socialist bachelor falling for a classy piece like that? Dynamite.’
    Amiss knew perfectly well that Cronin was capable of making a scandal out of the sight of two people chatting at a dinner party, so he couldn’t take this at face value.
    ‘You’re having me on.’
    Cronin was piqued.
    ‘I am not. They’ve been seen lunching together several times and Jenkins’s secretary says they’re always ringing each other up.’
    ‘Well, stone the crows!’ Amiss doubted no longer. Cronin’s way with secretaries was legendary. He knew that the hand that controls the telephone has access to one hell of a lot of gossip. It was amazing how pathetically people trusted their secretaries. There were very few invulnerable to Cronin’s seedy charm, and the drinks he lavished on any likely source.
    ‘I suppose the police will get onto it eventually,’ said Cronin hopefully.
    Yes, you shit , thought Amiss. There’s nothing you’d like better than seeing your avowed friend Jenkins embarrassed .
    ‘I wouldn’t count on it,’ he said. ‘They didn’t look to me as if they had much of a clue about anything. But then, I only saw them for a few minutes. They may have TUC moles for all I know. Anyway, thanks for your help with the Extrusion stats. I knew you’d be able to help. See you.’
    Amiss