Chapter 5The old Otis lift came to an eventual halt, jerking repeatedly and issuing a feeble bing. The door slid open with a strained squeak. Ruth knew Broadcasting House well, having been previously commissioned by the BBC for several voice-overs and some script work—most notably their Nature and Earth documentaries—but never in that time had she visited the executive floor.
As she made her way down the corridor under a seemingly endless row of neon tubes, a man in a blue overall, giving the linoleum floor a fresh coat of wax, straightened, rubbing his back.
“Good morning, miss,” he said with a nod.
Ruth smiled in reply.
At the end of the long hall, Ruth found the door to Room 522 wide open.
She knocked on the frame. “Excuse me, are you Miss Putnam’s secretary?”
The pudgy, middle-ag
