The Puzzlemaker

The Puzzlemaker

Murder is Only a Word Away

By Brian Christopher

CHAPTER 1

London, Wednesday, October 10. 12:15 PM

The sprawling Sunday Times editorial office was, as usual, a hive of activity and a slight distraction to his train of thought as he made his way across the floor to his own quiet, odour free domain. Around him, journalists, researchers, and editors rushed to make their deadline in the dry, poorly regulated air-conditioned room. At least it was not filled with smoke as it was thirty years ago when he first began. However, the blue nicotine hue that once hung over the cigarette smoking staff was replaced by wafts of men’s aftershave competing against women’s perfume, which, at times, seemed like chemical warfare. Maybe smoke was a healthier option, he thought. 

These days, George did not recognise many of the younger faces; few were employed at the newspaper as long as he. 

A young intern, early twenties, with short-cropped purple hair and multiple piercings in her nose and mouth, stared as he walked past. “Who’s tha’?” she asked her colleague sitting opposite. 

15 years her senior, fashion editor Beverley Grange glanced over her reading glasses at the man, early sixties, carefully weaving his way through the rows of desks, avoiding eye contact. His non-distinctive, ill-fitting dark brown pinstriped suit, with an overcoat folded over his left arm and a brolly hanging from his wrist, looked very much from a bygone era. 

“Oh, that’s George,” she sighed, then went back to preparing her copy for publication.

The intern tapped her circular nose bar with her Bic pen. “I’ve seen him before. Floats in and out without a word. Never seen him at any of the editorial meetings. Looks a bit of a nutter. What does he do?”

“Compiles the crossword puzzles,” Beverley replied, uninterested.

“You mean those cryptic crosswords? He does them? My dad used to crack his brain on them every Sunday afternoon. Drove my mum mad, that did. Dead hard they are. I could never solve ‘m.”

“Me neither.” Beverley said, abandoning her text. She removed her reading glasses. “I don’t think anyone here has ever completed them twice in a row. He always comes up with brain crunchers.”

“Brain crushers, you mean. So, he is a nutter,” she sneered.

No one knew how George managed to avoid the compulsory editorial meetings, annual Christmas parties, receptions of expired, retired, or job-changing colleagues, but he did. The thought of shaking hands, explaining his work to someone new, or listening to drunken co-workers with bad breath bathed in a vapour of alcohol and vomit, was too much to bear. 

There was only one person of course, and that was enough.

Unmindful to the clatter of keyboards and general chatter, he strolled unobtrusively towards his own tiny office in the corner. A treasured luxury in an age of desk sharing and cutbacks, he had successfully negotiated an irreversible clause into his contract when he first joined the newspaper; a guaranteed private office. However, the actual metered space had significantly diminished over the years. Now there was just enough room for a small desk and a chair, and no more. During the last downsizing, his own late-Victorian hat and coat stand was made redundant.

The moment his door closed, and the noise subsided – tranquillity returned.