Red Herrings Read Online Free PDF

a lot more than simple VAT irregularities. If we can find out exactly what or who he was on to, then we’ll have a motive and a suspect.’
    â€˜Does Guy have any ideas?’
    â€˜He’s going through all Wilmslow’s things. Presumably he’ll turn up some sort of notebook. Some of those sort of people use portable computers. There may be a disk.’ He walked over to the window and looked out on to the green, so perfect an example of British Tourist Authority England that it could have been run up by Disney. It didn’t go with corpses, not at first glance, but Bognor had always been suspicious about countryside. In his view cities were much safer.
    â€˜I still think it was almost certainly an accident,’ said Monica. ‘The trouble with people in your line of work is that you’re so melodramatic. You always subscribe to conspiracy theories. You always find niggers in woodpiles. You always make life complicated when it’s actually incredibly simple. It’s so boring of you.’
    Bognor shrugged. ‘That may be so in everyday life,’ he said, ‘but in my line of work, as you perfectly well know, it’s always wise to look on the black side and believe the worst of everyone and everything. I believe in original sin and universal guilt, and …’ he broke off for a second ‘… if I’m not much mistaken I think I see a ministry motorcyclist heading this way with a whole load of bumf from Customs and Excise.’ The thunder of Japanese horsepower cut through the somnolence of late afternoon, reached a crescendo and then suddenly stopped very cleanly, leaving a silence more silent than before.
    Bognor called down to the despatch rider, a burly man in late middle age.
    â€˜Do you have a package for me – Simon Bognor, Board of Trade?’
    The messenger looked suspiciously at Bognor, hesitated and then decided to make no reply. Instead he rummaged in one of his panniers and produced a large brown padded envelope. Without looking up again he walked towards the front door of the Pickled Herring with an air of considerable gravitas.
    â€˜Oh, God, I hate motorcyclists,’ said Bognor, furiously.
    â€˜He may not be for you,’ said Monica. ‘He may be bringing truffles hot foot from Perigord or the first of the season’s grouse as felled by Viscount Whitelaw.’
    â€˜Don’t be ridiculous.’ Bognor was not amused. ‘It’s not even August. Of course it’s for me. It’s one of the office messengers. I’ve seen him countless times in Whitehall. He knows perfectly well who I am. Stupid oaf!’
    He stomped out, slamming the door. Monica stared after him bleakly, then flopped full length on the bed and began to read a rude novel by Wendy Perriam. She supposed she loved her husband but he could be an awful bore. His time of life, she supposed; she personally believed men went through just as bad an emotional crisis in their early forties as any woman at any stage in her life. Bognor was like a passed over major or a perpetual curate. He had no serious prospects of advancement and yet he had to soldier on until he took early retirement and a pension. Quite a grim prospect, she could see that; but there was no need to be quite so beastly so often. She would have to talk it over with him. Woman to man.
    It was a quarter of an hour before he returned pink and bothery but definitely triumphant. He held the very large brown envelope which he had already opened, messily, so that the kapok stuffing was spilling out all over the very expensive, dense, macaroon-coloured carpet.
    â€˜God, what a palaver!’ he said. ‘Identification in triplicate; four signatures. I’m surprised he didn’t want a birth certificate or a reference from the vicar.’
    â€˜Personally,’ said Monica, ‘I’m rather pleased. It’s nice to have some secure security for a