A Death In The Office

A Death in the Office


I had supposed that Sweaty Adams was the type of man to keep moths. As soon as I saw him I thought: I bet he's the sort of man with a totally uninteresting hobby; at the time I thought it would be stamps or bee keeping or, worse still, bird watching. Lilla introduced me to him and told me what the girls thought of their boss.
"Sweaty by name," she said. "Sweaty by nature."
She was right. Adams perspired continuously, particularly it seemed, in the company of women. When his outstretched hand met mine I could feel the nervousness drip from his palm. I felt uncomfortable and embarrassed. Did he know, I asked myself, that I thought him grotesque? Probably.
                Sweaty Adams led me to my office on the second floor. It was a smart room, decorated with wooden paneling and a sleek buff carpet. It was a corner suite so I had the advantage of two windows which allowed plenty of light to fall on the large oak desk in the center of the room. Sweaty's office was adjacent to mine and I noticed a 'Do not disturb' sign hanging precariously from a drawing pin that had been hammered into the door.
"If you need me just knock," he said. He winked a knowing wink then left the room, locking his office door behind him.
                    I looked around, noting the dusty oil paintings on the wall; pictures of past presidents of the company proudly reminding me of their long gone extinction. One of them was a woman. Etta Valerie Simpson was her name. She looked stately and I felt that she was watching me as I took stock of the room. I decided then that I would move her to a different position, somewhere that I felt she could not see me, like into the cupboard. At that moment Lilla opened Sweaty's office door.
"I came to see if you'd like a drink" she said.
"Thank you, that would be nice, coffee please 2 sugars... Who is the woman?" I asked.
"Oh that's Miss Simpson," Lilla answered. "She had been a member of this company for a long time but she died suddenly of a heart attack two years ago... In this room as a matter of fact. Nobody knows what caused it. Perhaps it was Sweaty's moths!"
                  This was the first time the moths had been mentioned to me but I was not dismayed. I had no fear or disgust of small creatures; to me they were there and that was all. I had never felt the need to acknowledge their existence. If one were to pester me I would not kill it, I would simply leave it to it's own devices knowing that eventually, after having chased so many light bulbs, it would run out of steam and collapse in a heap at which point I would pick it up and chuck it in the waste paper basket without so much as a wince. I thought Etta must have been pretty frail anyway to have died so suddenly; a death after seeing a moth? Perhaps heart failure ran in the family. Perhaps it was just her time to go. I envisaged her galloping around the room being pursued by a two centimeter insect, wildly waving her arms around until finally giving up all hope of escape, she fell to the floor like an injured animal clutching her hand to her breast. Life is funny I thought. One minute you think you've got everything to live for and the next... She could just have easily been run over by a bus.
                Lilla returned with my coffee and I relaxed, smiling to myself at the scene I had conjured up in my mind. Lilla enquired after my euphoria
"I must stop sniffing that Ajax," I laughed and she smiled a knowing smile.
*                  *                  *

                      The following day, Sweaty brought me a back log of work; work that had built up in the time that it took for the company to find a new secretary. Sweaty placed the pile of letters on my desk and said,
"Miss Kelly if you could please get this correspondence typed before lunch, I would be ever so grateful." He sniffed and patted my hand which I drew away promptly. What a revolting specimen he was and I wished that he would leave. He hung around the room though, for a bit longer and noticed that Etta Valerie Simpson was missing from the wall.
"Where is she?" he enquired.
"In the cupboard," I said, "Where she belongs".
Sweaty giggled and rubbed his eyes like a little boy who'd just woken up and then he said,
"Miss Kelly, I know this is not in your job description but would you like to have dinner with me tonight?"
NO! NO!NO!
"Yes... um... Ok then," I muttered not wanting to appear unenthusiastic in my first week. "What time?"
He suggested six o'clock and I suggested that he collect me from the office at that time. He left and I dug into the correspondence feeling a fool for not refusing his very unattractive offer.
                        Six o'clock arrived and, on the dot, the office door was opened and Sweaty entered. I could see by the way he rubbed his eyes and shuffled around (not to mention the damp patches clinging to his armpits) that he was nervous. And I must admit that the thought of being seen with him made me feel the same way. In his hand he carried a bottle of wine, wrapped in tissue. He placed it on the desk and perched on the visitors chair that stood in the corner of the room.
"I thought we might eat here to save rushing about... What do you think Patty?" I cringed at this diminuation of my name but nevertheless told him that it was a good idea and hoped, secretly, that this would be a good opportunity to get away quickly.
"Well actually it's better for me," I said, "as I have to return home quite soon... my family will be wondering where I've got to."
"Right," he said. "We'd better get on with it then. I'll just go and change."
  Change? What was he talking about? We didn't need to change if we were eating in the office. I began to suspect that there was more to this than I'd thought. Sweaty went to the cupboard and opened the door. I could see Etta Valerie Simpson staring out from the gap where the door was only half shut and I heard Sweaty puffing and panting away as he changed his clothes. After about twenty minutes he was still puffing away and so had not yet emerged from the cupboard. I called out asking if everything was OK
"Just help me a moment Patty, could you? He asked, "I'm a little bit stuck."
I went to the half open door and what I saw made me want to run but I was so shocked I remained rooted to the floor. Sweaty was only half dressed from the waist upwards. From his navel down I could just about make out some sort of strange metamorphosis taking place. His legs, which were short and stocky seemed to be covered in fur. His arms seemed to be waving about erratically and they were obviously trying to escape his shirt. I took a step back, horrified at the scene before me. Sweaty's shirt ripped and there he was standing in front of me, a complete stranger. He was in fact a giant moth.
    All of a sudden he flew out of the door heading straight for me. I ducked and ran screaming to the other side of the desk with Adams in hot pursuit. For a while there was complete confusion on my part. I knew I would have to think quickly if I was to escape this monster. Hurriedly I headed for the light switch and flicked the button, lighting each of the four fluorescent bulbs. At first Adams seemed unperturbed but as I waited he seemed to falter, then, after what seemed like hours but was probably only a minute or so he changed direction heading for the tubes. As I watched he began to bang chaotically into the lights. Every few seconds he would stop and flick his wings then carry on knocking into the lights, never ceasing to be mesmerized by them.
    By this time I had calmed down, hoping that he had all the sense of a real moth; that he would eventually wear himself out and die a sudden death.  I was not to be disappointed. Adams, getting into a dither, took one last bash at the light, obviously misjudging his distance. He caught one of his fragile wings, losing his balance and fell to the floor in a heap. I was not sure though if he were dead so I waited for a long time before I took a look at him. Finally I plucked up enough courage to peer at his pathetic face and, realizing that he was dead I heaved a sigh of relief. It was all over.
      I stood up. As I did so I noticed Etta Valerie Simpson peering out of the cupboard into the brightly lit room. She seemed to be smiling a knowing smile and it was then that I knew how she had died. I made my way to the desk to open the bottle of wine that Sweaty had left me. Pouring out a glass, I decided to toast Etta and her sorry death.
"Cheers Etta," I said. "May you rest in peace." And I lifted up the moth and chucked it out of the window.