Murder at Kolt-Headquarters

“Boxer!  Boxer!”  I shouted as I knocked on his balcony window next to mine, with a hockey stick I keep nearby for just such purposes.  “Box-ER!”

As I delivered one final blow to the glass, my neighbour opened the door and caught the full force of my swing on his forehead.

“Charles!  Attempted murder will not look good on your record, although some future employer might be willing to overlook it.”

“Boxer!  Whatever happened to your head?”  He was wearing the sort of turban a mystic soothsayer swami magician might sport at the Variété.

“I was suddenly struck on the head.  And lucky for you, too, I dressed appropriately.  Your blow landed right here.”  He pointed dramatically to a spot covered with the cloth.

“So, what’s with the headgear?”

“Lockdown has got to me, Charles.  I have not had a haircut in so long, I look like, well, here, see for yourself.”  He took off the turban, revealing – Boxer with slightly longer hair.

“No wonder you’ve been hiding.  You’d be enough to frighten the children off the street.  I see what happened.  You were out earlier, weren’t you?”

“Yes.  And?  Go on, Charles.”

“I was banging on your window because I just had a telephone call from the old woman at number 21.  She was all alarmed.  She had seen a strange man entering your house and wondered if she should call the police.  That was you, obviously.  I told her I’d check.  She’s looking out her window now, actually.”

“Let us wave to her, Charles.  Not that way!  Use all your fingers.  That’s better.  You see, she is waving back – the usual way.” 

Another week into the lockdown, and one could sense tensions mounting.  There seemed to be more shouting in the streets, especially at night.  But, as one of the editors at KOLT told me, better to have shouting than shooting.

The magazine was planning a special edition for the lockdown and had invited a celebrity guest to edit that issue.

“Who is it, Adrian?”

“Carolina de’Longhi!”

“Oh?  And who is she when she’s at home?”

“You don’t know who she is?  Really?”

“Really.  Is she famous?”

“Carolina de’Longhi is the biggest fashion model and photographer in Europe – maybe even the world!”

“And she’s going to be the guest editor at KOLT?”

“We were lucky to get her, Charles.  All of us on the staff can hardly wait.  She’ll be staying at the Hotel Schweizerhof, and I’ve arranged for a car to drive her to the office.”

“Adrian, that’s practically next door to the hotel.  And – there’s no lift in your building.  Is someone going to carry her up the steps?”

“Oh!  Yeah, you’re right.  What should we do?”

“We?”

“Well, KOLT.  Maggie is a bit put out about all the attention Carolina is getting already.”

“Maggie?  Upset?  She’s the coolest, calmest woman I’ve ever met.”

“Well, you know how women get jealous of each other.”

“Men get jealous of each other, too, Adrian.  I’m jealous of your beard, for example.  I never could grow one out full enough to trim it short.”

“You’d look good in a beard.”

“Thank you, Adrian.  Glad you’re not jealous.  Oh, by the way, is there going to be something in your lockdown issue about haircuts and beauty salons still being closed?  Boxer has disguised himself until he can get a proper haircut.”

“I’ll mention that to Carolina.”

[The following scenes have been reconstructed from police reports, eye-witness accounts, and testimony given at the trial.]

Three days of Carolina de’Longhi at the KOLT offices were enough to drive everyone mad.  She refused to wear a facemask indoors and did not respect social distancing.  She demanded special Mongolian tea, was allergic to the sub-editor’s aftershave, and was either too warm or too cold, depending on whether the windows were open or shut.  AND she complained that the office boy ‘loitered’ too long outside her office.  At least Carolina wasn’t one of those ‘touchy-feely’ people, so much in love with themselves.  She was too cool and calculating for that. 

Since each editor had a separate office, the KOLT team managed to continue operations during lockdown.  Adrian had moved into the supply room to give Carolina his own office, but she complained that she had had to re-arrange all his things.  The lamp was on the wrong side of the desk; even the pencil sharpener was positioned the wrong way (as if Carolina de’Longhi would ever sharpen her own pencils).  Reference books were not shelved properly.  Everything was turned around, she claimed.  Of course, she always chose Maggie to complain to, and it was Maggie whose efforts to smooth over each day’s rough spots led to even more complaints the next day.

Adrian was worried that the special issue would not appear on schedule, and he had to keep pushing Carolina as far as possible without either of them reaching breaking point.  Something had to give.  All the other editors found inventive, even extraordinary, ways to avoid the tension.

As the deadline approached, Adrian praised Carolina once too often when she completed a quite simple task.  She had responded, “Of course!  I’m the one doing most of the work around here anyway.  And don’t forget that, Adi-boy.”

As Adrian retired to the supply room to seethe, Maggie came in, as full of rage as Adrian himself.

“Every little thing just sets her off.  She’s lighting her own fuse, that bitch.  Anyway, now there’s a real storm brewing.  Look out the — oh, I forgot, you don’t have a window in here.  The sky is as dark as night and there’s thunder rumbling all around the mountains.  They’ve even evacuated the maintenance crew at the air-filtration skywalk.  It’s going to blow, Carolina or no Carolina.”

With that encouraging news, Adrian suggested to Paul, the editor-in-chief, that everyone be sent home.  Unusually, Carolina said she’d stay on to work a bit longer.  Adrian and Maggie were the last to leave.  They walked together as far as the Aarhof, where Maggie turned to go down Amthausquai to her flat overlooking the Aare, whilst Adrian continued on up Frohburgstrasse to his flat at City Kreuzung.   Both were seen entering their respective buildings.

Adrian was first in the office just after eight o’clock the next morning, where he found the body of Carolina de’Longhi (real name Irma Schuh) outside his (her) office door.  He rang the police, who sent a team of investigators immediately to the scene from their headquarters on Jurastrasse.

The victim had been dead approximately eight to ten hours, stabbed from behind in the left side of her neck with a pair of long paper scissors, of a variety issued to each editor or supplied by them from a previous job.  The police gave out no more details.

Staff were kept away from their offices until all had been questioned.  They were then given ten minutes to collect anything they needed from their desks (except scissors, which had all been confiscated) and told not to return to the office until notified.  Adrian was furious that the lockdown special issue would be delayed indefinitely.

          *                  *                    *                      *

“Where were you last evening?  I rang but you didn’t answer.”

“I must have been out for a walk.”

“In that storm that passed over Olten?”

“We were lucky again.  Bit of wind, but no rain.”

“Nothing was open last night.”

“I was just walking – and thinking.”

“About us?”

“No.  That’s over.”

“I see.”

“Do you?  Have you ever seen it clearly?”

“One of us must leave KOLT.  Quit.”

“Shall we toss for it?”

“Perhaps the police will decide all that for us.”

“I won’t say anything about us if you don’t – agreed?”

“All right.  So – did you kill her?  Why?”

“I thought you had done it.”

“No.  Not me.  Or you.  So — “

[To be continued … ]

David Pearce ist ein Schweizer Schriftsteller, wohnt seit 2000 in Olten und hat amerikanische, englische und französische Wurzeln. Er schreibt auf Englisch Kurzgeschichten, Romane und Theaterstücke.