The Case of Miss A.'s Missing Switchboard Operator

A strange and skittish young woman came into my office the other day.   She refused to give me her name, except to say that I may call her Miss A.  It seemed bizarre, if you ask me, to just give me one initial but I did not question it.  She assured that she will pay for my services in cash, which was fine for me.  No paper trail, no tax claims – everyone’s happy. 

“The machinery has not been working for quite some time now,” she said before I even had a chance to offer her to sit down. 

“The machinery?” I said.

“Yes.  You see, in order for the machinery to work properly, you have to have a switchboard operator, and I’ve had one for years now.  But something happened; the operator has abandoned me, I can’t find him.  I still believe that he is hiding somewhere within the machinery but at this point, I really can’t be sure.”

“This machinery you speak of – what is it made of?”

“Well, I thought that was obvious – gears of course!  All kinds of gears, and I have to tell you, things have been moving and grinding in the wrong direction for quite some time now.  They are not getting the right message.  The switchboard operator’s duty was, as you might imagine, to relay messages from one part of the machinery to the next, and through the “optikon” as a final destination,” she said almost in one breath.

“And this has not been happening?” I said what seemed to be a rather slow pace.

“Well, of course not!”

She was getting impatient and irritable.  I wasn’t sure if she was irritated by my linguistic slowness or her already bad predicament.  Either way, she probed me with her big eyes, her face showing no emotive power and at the same time a hint of colossal anger.  I had to figure out a way to keep her in the office, so that I might be able to get a better hold on her problem, and obviously, to insure a payment. 

“When was the last time you saw your switchboard operator?”

“A month ago.”

“And you waited this long to take action?”  I knew I should have been kinder and should not have used such words of quick judgment.  She was already very sensitive and any sudden movement would undoubtedly frighten her.  Surprisingly, though, she remained calm in this instance.

“Sometimes, he comes and goes, you see, and I thought that is what happened.  I thought he’ll be back within a few days but it’s been a month now, and nothing.  And I am worried.”

“Worried?  About what will happen to the operator?”  I said, expressing further confusion.  What a stupid series of questions, I thought to myself!  By this point, this woman will lose any confidence (if she even had any to begin with) in me as a detective, and she will leave the office, never to be seen. 

“Well, yes. But more importantly, I am worried what will happen to me!  If they get a hold of him, I can’t even imagine what will happen to me.  So, you have to help me.  I have nowhere else to turn,” she said.

I wasn’t sure this was the case – a woman with such a problem would have plenty of places to turn, and what made her come into my office was beyond me.  But my curiosity won over my general self-loathing and so I kept going with this, what seemed to me, more of a game that a proper case.

“They?  Who are they?”

Miss A. got distracted by the noise coming from the outside.  The office was on the first floor and the window was open.  Maybe she was paranoid, I don’t know, but she got up quickly, and said that she will contact me with further instructions.  She gave me that big eyed glare, only this time with a hint of plea and a soft smile, and said: “Please tell me that you will help me.”

“But Miss, I don’t even know your name.  How can I possibly help you?  And this machinery – it sounds like a bunch of nonsense if you ask me.  I think you’re pulling some kind of prank.  Did John send you?”

“John?  What John?  Look, I don’t who John is.  I’m telling you, I need help in finding my switchboard operator, and I need to know whether you will take the case or not.”

“Ok.  Fine,”  I heard myself say it. 

“I will be in touch,” she said and left, forgetting to close the door on the way out.

■■■

I remained seated in the chair, wondering what just happened.  I was new at this, and I have never heard of such a request.  I had reluctantly and fearfully accepted this job of a private detective because the agency was left to me by a man who owned it – Francis Macomber.  Frank was, to put it simply, a jerk.  I was an assistant in his office, doing everything and nothing.  My role was never assigned, never defined, and so the job was many different things.  I really hated him, and I hated myself for even having feelings of hatred. 

One day, I was coming back to the office from an assignment – some jealous girlfriend was convinced her boyfriend was cheating on her, but it turns out he was just working a second job – and, not to my surprise, the light in the office was on.  The radio was on, with some weird static – a mixture of Rush Limbaugh and A-ha’s “Take on me.”  I didn’t know if it was real or whether I was imagining it because I was prone to hallucinating.

“Frank?”

Nobody answered.  I opened the office door and there he was, on the desk.  His head and upper body anyway.  I didn’t move.  I just observed his limp body for a good forty seconds.  At forty-one, it occurred to me that I should check his pulse.  He was dead.  It turned out that it wasn’t foul play, nothing ominous or weird, just a plain old heart attack.  I didn’t know whether I should be happy or sad.  Despite the fact that I hated working for him, he was still my salary.  Now that he was dead, I became unemployed again, and quite depressed at the prospect at looking for another job.

After all the paperwork was completed, I found out that the bastard actually left me the detective agency.  This was not an act of generosity.  I also received his debts – late rent payments.  But what was I to do?  I took up the task.  And so, here I am, barely knowing what exactly am I doing here, in this detective agency, with a new case that looked and sounded more like one of my hallucinations rather than a real problem.

But I couldn’t help it either.  Curiosity keeps winning.  Miss A’s request, however weird and un-worldly it seemed, and her silent obsession for control was far more powerful than any possibility of giving up.