The Altered Case by Peter Turnbull Page A

Hennessey inclined his head.
    Bateman stood. ‘I’ll go a few years either side, see what I can find.’ He walked out of his office.
    Hennessey and Yellich relaxed in their chairs as best they could. They both read a neatly kept office which spoke of efficiency. A large green vase of flowers on Bateman’s desk softened the room, as did a colour photograph of the Yorkshire Dales landscape in high summer in a wooden frame which hung on the wall behind his desk. Framed photographs of yellow and green painted earth-moving machines of various sizes hung on the walls of cream-painted plaster. The room smelled powerfully of air freshener, despite an open window, which looked out on to the main street of Catton Hill village. Within ten minutes Bateman returned carrying six slender ledgers, still glistening from evidently being wiped with a damp cloth.
    â€˜They were very dusty, as you might expect, so I wiped them down.’ Bateman handed three of the ledgers to Hennessey and three to Yellich.
    Hennessey took hold of the ledgers he was given. ‘Thank you, appreciated.’
    â€˜Just the covers,’ Bateman added, ‘the pages might be a bit dusty still.’
    â€˜We’ll cope with that.’ Hennessey opened the topmost of the ledgers at random and saw entries in neat, copperplate letters and numerals. He thought it to be very Victorian in appearance and commented upon it.
    â€˜Yes.’ Bateman resumed his seat behind his desk. ‘I dare say you could say that, Victorian . . . quite appropriate. I think we must have been the last plant hire company to introduce new technology and the last to computerize our records. My father didn’t like the new machines, as he called them. He was very conservative by nature and he didn’t trust what he couldn’t understand.’
    â€˜Your father?’ Hennessey queried.
    â€˜Yes, my father. Why, is that a problem for you, sir?’
    â€˜No . . . no.’ Hennessey shook his head. ‘It’s just your nameplate, Mr Bateman; I assumed that you were an employee of Marshall and Evans.’
    â€˜Oh no.’ Bateman grinned. ‘It does confuse people at times but you see Messrs Marshall and Evans retired and my father bought the business, and as part of the sale he was allowed to keep trading under the good name of the company. It is quite a standard business practice. So we then continued to trade as Marshall and Evans and they sold the company for more than it was actually worth on paper; the good name counted for something, you see. You can sell a good name.’
    â€˜I see.’ Hennessey thumbed through the ledger. ‘Beautiful handwriting.’
    â€˜Indeed . . . we have had our lean years. I mean, which company hasn’t? But unlike the majority of plant hire companies we are not tied solely to the building trade. Our customers include farmers and the agricultural industry as a whole. The building of houses might come to a stop from time to time as the national economy rises and falls but there’s always wheat to be harvested, potatoes to be scooped up in huge quantities and loaded into the back of huge bulk-carrying lorries, you’ll have doubtless seen the like . . . and there’s always ditches to be cleared. All used to be done manually, but nowadays it’s all done by machine, most of which are hired for the purpose.’
    â€˜I see,’ Hennessey said again. ‘That’s interesting.’
    â€˜So,’ Bateman continued, ‘it is because of our agricultural clients, and only because of them, that we have kept afloat in the inevitable lean times.’
    â€˜You are indeed fortunate.’ Yellich also leafed through the ledgers.
    â€˜Yes, we are.’ Bateman nodded. ‘And we are not unappreciative. We have a wide client base and farming has meant that this is a stable local economy. It takes a lot to bring agriculture to a standstill.’
    â€˜Dare say