Free Gently to the Summit by Alan Hunter Page B

a roofed rack in which cycles were stacked. Beside it were parked a few cars and a number of scooters and motorcycles. The office section, a long lean-to at the side of the workshops, was approached through fence-gates which stood open and unattended.
    They drove in and parked. They were met by no palatial reception. Beyond the door was a narrowpassage which received a dim light from the workshops . A girl came hurrying out of a doorway with a sheaf of work sheets in her hand. She stopped on seeing the two detectives and stared inquiringly before asking:
    ‘You want Mr Bemmells, is it?’
    Mr Bemmells was the general manager; he was a lean and hard-faced man of about fifty-five or so. He had a haggard, harassed look, his eyebrows slanting down from the centre, but this seemed a natural condition with him and no reflection of the current circumstances. He found them seats in his cluttered office and listened attentively to Gently’s preface.
    ‘So you want to know how we started up? Then you’ve come to the right person. I was in this firm from the beginning, back in nineteen-thirty-eight. We were in Walthamstow then, in a converted warehouse in Sibley Street, and we stayed there till forty-two, when Jerry copped us with incendiaries. Then we moved to this site – a priority job, building this was; we were turning out aircraft stuff in those days, cable conduit, jennies, starters. Then after the war we went back to appliances – you’ve probably seen our products about – and now we’re working up an export connection besides our regular contract work. That’s the story of Electroproducts: a good investment, if I may say so.’
    Gently grinned. ‘I’ll have to mention the name to my stockbroker. But I’d like more detailed information about the way the firm was formed. How did you come to be associated with it?’
    ‘I answered an advert in our trade journal. I was with London Insulated at the time and finding promotionrather slow. So I took a chance with a new firm, and I’ve never regretted it. We’ve been expanding all the time and we’ve acquired a site for a new premises.’
    ‘Was the firm organized when you joined it?’
    ‘No. It was just in the process. But Mr Fleece had formed a nucleus of technical staff and designers.’
    ‘Were there share issues at that stage?’
    ‘No, that came a little later.’
    ‘Where did the initial capital come from?’
    Bemmells looked blank. ‘From Mr Fleece, I suppose.’
    ‘Did he mention how it was acquired?’
    ‘Not to me he didn’t. But then it wasn’t my business. There’s no question about it, is there?’
    ‘Nothing of any importance.’ Gently’s tone was reassuring. ‘But since you’re second-in-command here I thought that Fleece might have dropped you a hint. You were fairly intimate with him, were you?’
    ‘Our relations were always excellent.’
    ‘You met his wife and family of course?’
    ‘I did on occasion. I’ve been invited to his home.’
    ‘Did you go to his wedding in thirty-nine?’
    ‘No … it occurred out of town, I believe.’
    ‘Did you know his wife before he married her?’
    ‘I’m afraid I didn’t. I moved in rather different circles.’
    Gently made a break. Bemmells’ expression had become increasingly wary, as though by degrees it was dawning on him that all was not entirely innocent. He flickered looks from Gently to the desk and again to Evans; but he didn’t, as Gently hoped, come out with something unsolicited.
    ‘Mrs Fleece told us that her husband was often away from home on business. That’s something you’d know about. Where did his business use to take him?’
    ‘Wherever there was a chance of a contract. Mr Fleece was all business. He’s been as far as Pakistan – South Africa – the West Indies.’
    ‘Had he been abroad lately?’
    ‘He went to Holland in the spring. And just lately he’d made one or two trips into Wales.’
    ‘Into Wales? What was that for?’
    ‘He didn’t tell me,