The Big Over Easy

by Jasper Fforde

  “So you see our problem. We promote the cure, thus effecting the slow eradication of our own market.”

  Spongg pointed his silver-topped cane at several charts on the wall behind him.

  “This is the reported incidence of verrucas. You see how it’s dropped considerably in the last ten years?”

  Jack and Mary studied the chart on the wall. Apart from a few upturns now and again during hot summers, the trace headed progressively downhill. Spongg pointed to another.

  “Bunions. Down seventy percent since this time a decade ago.”

  He pointed to a third.

  “Athlete’s foot. Steady decline these past twelve years.”

  He faced them again.

  “Good for the planet’s feet, Inspector, disastrous for Spongg’s!”

  “And Humpty Dumpty?” asked Jack.

  “Ah!” said Spongg with a smile. “Now, there’s an egg with faith!”

  “Go on.”

  “He was our major shareholder. At the last takeover bid six months ago, all the nonfamily shareholders voted to take Winsum and Loosum’s offer. Humpty held firm. With his support we could rebuff the takeover. I was impressed by his fortitude, but puzzled also.”

  “Because…?”

  “I have no idea why he did so. Humpty’s plans for Spongg’s are a complete mystery to us all. He was no fool; I’ve done my homework. But as to what he had planned for Spongg’s—I have not the slightest idea.”

  He sighed again and gazed up at the painting of the first Dr. Spongg, whose likeness scowled out at the world holding the model of a foot in one hand and a pair of toenail clippers in the other.

  There was a pause. Spongg stared at the ceiling for a moment, then asked, “Anyhow, what else can I do for you?”

  “You helped Dumpty outside after his outburst at your charity benefit?”

  “Yes; if I’d known he was going to get so…er, poached, I would never have had him at my table.”

  “He said he could raise fifty million pounds just like that. What do you think he was referring to?”

  “A refinancing package? Who knows? As I said, his plans for Spongg’s were a complete mystery to me.”

  Jack looked at Spongg carefully, trying to find a chink in the man’s reserve. Pewter had said Humpty might have wanted to sell out to Grundy, so he watched closely for Spongg’s reaction to his next question.

  “Do you think he was going to sell out to Winsum and Loosum?”

  Spongg was unfazed. He shrugged. “Possibly, although I think he might have left it a little late. Grundy’s waiting for me to go under so they can buy what they want from the receivers. It’s not a question of if, it’s a question of when.”

  Spongg looked at them both and raised an eyebrow. “By your line of questioning, I can see that you are not satisfied with the circumstances of Humpty’s death.”

  “Correct, sir. We regard it as suspicious.”

  “Does this make me a suspect?”

  “I view everyone as a suspect,” said Jack politely. “Perhaps you would tell us your movements after the Spongg Charity Benefit ended.”

  Spongg smiled. “Of course. I was driven home to Castle Spongg by Ffinkworth, my valet, at about half past midnight. Past one o’clock until breakfast at seven, I am afraid I can offer no witnesses.”

  Mary made a note.

  “And did you see much of Humpty otherwise?”

  “Up until the night of the benefit, I hadn’t seen him for over a year. His death benefits no one here at Spongg’s, Inspector—quite the reverse.”

  “Would you have any idea who might want him dead, Spongg?”

  “A parade of cuckolded husbands, jilted lovers, disgruntled restaurateurs and unpaid wine merchants—I should imagine the list will be quite long.”

  “What about Solomon Grundy?”

  Spongg thought for a moment. “Did you hear about Humpty’s Splotvian mineral-rights debacle?”

  Jack nodded.

  “If you examine the list of people defrauded, I think you will find Mr. Grundy quite high up on it. I don’t think Solomon would resort to murder, but you should know about it.”

  “Indeed we should,” replied Jack, taking a note. “Mary, do you have anything else to add?”

  “Are you married, sir?” asked Mary.

  “Was. I’m single at present.”

  “Nothing else.”

  Jack handed Spongg his card. “Thank you for your help, and I hope the company picks up. We’ll see ourselves out.”

  They left Spongg staring at the model of his beloved factory. Jack had meant what he said: No one wanted to see Spongg’s go down; it had been a part of Reading for so long that its presence was alive all over the town. Apart from Sponggville, Spongg Villas and the Spongg Memorial Gardens, there was Spongg Street and Spongg Lane. The town hall was dedicated to the first Dr. Spongg, and outside the town was Castle Spongg, a vast country home built in the surrealist style in the thirties.

  “What do you reckon?” asked Mary.

  Jack thought for a moment. “He seems genuinely confused over why Humpty should be buying shares in the company. Humpty’s death doesn’t help him—with his shares in probate limboland, they can’t be sold, either to Grundy or anyone else. Spongg’s is going down the tubes, and it’s a shame. Next is Winsum and Loosum’s—and you’re driving.”

  He tossed her the keys and they were soon motoring towards the exit past packing cases full of unsold foot ointments.

  “Mary, why did you ask Spongg if he was married?”

  Mary delicately pulled on the turn signal lever and the Lucas relay clicked at her with a soft metallic chirrup.

  “I couldn’t help myself. Sorry. He is kind of attractive.”

  She pulled into the main road a little too quickly; a small sports car with the top down and a distinctive paint scheme appeared behind them and drove past at great speed, horn blaring.

  19. Solomon Grundy

  GRUNDY TO WED ON THURSDAY

  Billionaire financier, philanthropist and foot-care magnate Solomon Grundy will marry next Thursday, it was announced after Wednesday’s charity polo match. The sixty-five-year-old Monday-born financier who was ill last Friday departs for a walking holiday on Tuesday. He has dismissed calls from his board to stay in Reading until the latest acquisition goes through. “I’ll be dead tired on Saturday,” he quipped to waiting journalists, “but will bury myself in work again on Sunday. Those guys—they’ll be the end of me!”

  —Report in The Toad, April 21, 2000

  The security guard at the main gates of Winsum & Loosum was trapped behind toughened glass like a goldfish, and Mary had to speak to the bored and surly individual via a microphone. They were admitted after repeating their names several times and drove up to the crowded visitors’ parking area, which was adjacent to an unimaginatively landscaped grass mound.

  As Mary locked the car, she thought it odd that the two world leaders in foot-care products were situated within a mile of each other. Almost like two ships, she mused, close enough to fire corporate broadsides.

  The Winsum & Loosum headquarters was slick and elegant in a modernistic style, with a bright and airy lobby that rose six stories within the building. Jack and Mary announced themselves at the desk and were asked by the razor-thin receptionist to take a seat. They sat by the fountain and watched the glass lifts move up and down inside the lobby, disgorging hordes of expensively dressed executives who seemed to scurry purposefully in all directions but have very little to do.

  Mary’s phone rang. She pulled it from her pocket, looked at it and groaned audibly.

  “Same guy?” asked Jack. “What was his name? Arnold?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Give the phone to me,” said Jack. “I’ll pretend to be your father.”

  “I really don’t think—”

  “Has he ever met your father?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then hand it over.”

  She reluctantly hand
ed 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 Splotv
ian Imperial Guard.”

  “Sounds like a good motive to me, Mr. Grundy.”

  “I disagree,” replied Grundy evenly. “My loss to Humpty was only two-tenths of one percent of my fortune. Consider this: Even if I generously estimated your personal net worth at four hundred thousand pounds, the comparative loss to you would be only eight hundred pounds. Two million may be more money than you’ll see in a lifetime, but I could lose that sum every week for a decade before I might consider myself ruined. Do I make myself clear?”

  Jack gritted his teeth. He’d enjoy bringing this one down.

  “Abundantly, Mr. Grundy. I wonder if you could tell me your movements following the Spongg Charity Benefit on Monday?”

  “I returned home,” he replied, indignant that he should have to account for his actions to anyone, “with my wife. You can ask her, if you so wish, with my blessing.”

  Jack stared at Grundy, who looked back at him without sentiment. Jack wanted to make him sweat, so he tried a threat.

  “I’d like to interview the board of directors and read the company minutes for the past two years.”

  Grundy rolled his eyes and tapped some ash into a crystal ashtray the size of a hand basin. “It’ll require a court order.”

  Jack stared at him. “I thought you would be happy to assist, Mr. Grundy.”

  The bluff failed.

  “Of course. What you ask will require considerable expenditure of time and resources. A court order gives me peace of mind that you really need what you ask for. I won’t be given the runaround on a non-Guild NCD officer’s whim. And I’ll tell you now I don’t frighten easily. I have been investigated by the FBI, the CBI, the CID, the MCC and the FO. I have weathered four stock-market crashes and suffered monetary losses that exceed the GNP of East and West Woppistania combined. I survived all that, and I’ll certainly survive you.”

  His voice had kept the same modulation, although red blotches had been breaking out on his pale face. Jack feared for any junior board member who had this to contend with. Grundy paused for a minute as his face returned to its normal pallid complexion, then spoke again: “Is there anything else?”