The Reginald Perrin Omnibus (89 page)

The scientist described his favourite sexual activity. After eleven seconds he was buzzed for deviation.

The football hooligan spoke for one minute about a knee trembler in a back alley in Tinsley.

‘Super,’ said David Harris-Jones, when he had finished.

The automation consultant described a night he had spent with a lady electronics expert in Geneva. After fourteen seconds he was buzzed for repetition.

The Superintendent spoke for a minute about the prostitutes of Trudworth New Town.

‘Super, Super,’ said David Harris-Jones, when he had finished.

The extremely shy vet was buzzed after one second for hesitation.

Mr Winstanley spoke of Mrs Winstanley’s uncanny resemblance to Kim Novak. He illustrated this with a snapshot and was very upset when he was buzzed for inaccuracy. He grabbed the photo and shoved it back in his wallet.

Suddenly he began to examine the contents of the wallet very carefully.

‘I’ve been robbed,’ he said. ‘I can’t believe anybody here would take money.’

The extremely shy vet spoke, so softly that only dogs could have heard him.

‘What was that?’ said Reggie.

‘I lost ten pounds last Friday,’ he said.

‘Why didn’t you say?’ said Reggie.

‘I did, but nobody heard me.’

‘You ought to send for the police,’ said the Superintendent.

‘Two cases isn’t much,’ said Reggie. ‘Leave it for a bit, eh?’

The Highways Officer talked about his obsession for Andrea Bovington of Accounts. Reggie didn’t listen. He knew that, if the thefts continued, they could destroy the delicate balance of faith and trust that had been created in the community.

He tossed and turned long into the silent Botchley night.

‘What’s wrong?’ Elizabeth murmured sleepily, shortly after three o’clock.

‘It’s those thefts,’ said Reggie. ‘It’s like a rape in a nunnery.’

‘Stop exaggerating, Reggie,’ said Elizabeth.

‘This is supposed to be a place of trust and faith, darling,’ said Reggie.

Elizabeth switched on the light.

‘Men!’ she said. ‘Everything goes well for several months, then you get two puny little thefts, and you start panicking.’

‘You’re right, darling,’ said Reggie. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘This is a test of
your
trust and faith,’ said Elizabeth. ‘You’ve got to have faith in the thief’s conscience. Trust him to see the error of his ways.’

‘You’re right, darling.’

‘You expect everything to go well all the time. It’s impossible. It’s through set-backs that you prove your strength.’

‘You’re absolutely right, darling.’

‘Don’t just agree with everything I say, Reggie. It’s extremely irritating.’

‘You’re abso . . . lu . . . go to sleep, darling. It’s gone three.’

He kissed her and turned over to go to sleep. She was right. Faith and trust. Everything would be all right. Quite soon he was asleep.

He woke to find that she was no longer in the bed. She was over at the dressing table, hunting through her handbag.

‘What are you doing?’ he asked her sleepily.

‘You made me wide awake with all your not sleeping, and then you went straight to sleep.’

‘I’m sorry, darling.’

‘I came for one of my pills. I’ve got cramp.’

‘I’m sorry, darling.’

She put her handbag down on the dressing table.

‘My purse has been stolen,’ she said.

‘Are you sure?’ said Reggie, wide awake now.

‘Of course I’m sure. You’re going to have to take some firm action over that thief, Reggie.’

‘You’re absolutely right, darling.’

He tossed and turned until dawn.

That morning Reggie called everyone together in the living-room of Number Twenty-one.

The room was packed. There were seventy people present, including al the staff, all the guests, and McBlane.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ said Reggie, standing on a chair so that he could be seen by everyone. ‘I’ll be blunt. We have a petty thief in our midst. Three cases have been reported.’

‘Four,’ said the Deputy Borough Engineer of Botchley Council. ‘I lost ten pounds last night.’

‘All right,’ said Reggie. ‘Four cases of . . .’

‘Five,’ said Clive ‘Lofty’ Anstruther. ‘I’ve lost twenty pounds and my watch.’

‘Are we to put at risk everything we’ve built up so painstakingly,’ said Reggie, ‘because we’ve lost seventy-five pounds and a watch?’

‘Digital,’ said Clive ‘Lofty’ Anstruther.

‘We mustn’t let ourselves be eaten away by suspicion,’ said Reggie. ‘I regard these lapses as relics of a past, mis-spent life, committed by somebody who hasn’t been here long enough to come fully under the spell of our community. I say to this person: Cease your crimes, and free your conscience, by handing back the seventy-five pounds.’

‘And the digital watch,’ said Clive ‘Lofty’ Anstruther.

In the morning there were two more cases of theft, and none of the money had been handed back. Reggie called another emergency meeting. Once again he stood on a chair and addressed the crowd packed into the living-room.

‘We have not yet been successful in reclaiming the soul of our erring brother,’ he said. ‘I don’t believe that this thief is evil or greedy. I believe that he’s bored. The conventional channels have failed to provide the challenge that he craves. It’s the risk, not the money that is the motivation here. I ask you therefore to eliminate the element of risk, and at the same time put this criminal to private shame, by a supreme act of faith. Leave your valuables lying around the house tonight.’

‘Asking for trouble,’ said Clive ‘Lofty’ Anstruther. ‘I know the criminal mind.’

‘Sometimes we have to ask for trouble,’ said Reggie, ‘in order to overcome it.’

That night three hundred and eighty-two pounds, four watches, two rings and a bracelet were stolen.

Reggie held his third emergency meeting in the crowded living-room.

‘Help me nail the sod,’ he said.

The Superintendent was about to depart on one of Jimmy’s expeditions when Reggie asked him to lead the inquiries into the thefts.

‘It’s what I’ve come here to avoid,’ he groaned, following Reggie into the sun-room.

The March sun was streaming in through the wide windows. In a gap between the houses in Lisbon Crescent a street lamp glowed a faint orange. There was a fault in the timing device.

‘Please!’ said Reggie.

‘The Superintendent sighed.

‘How can I refuse you when you ask me so nicely?’ he said.

There was a knock on the door. It was the automation consultant. He wanted to leave. He was disturbed by the petty thefts.

‘Do you mind if the Superintendent asks you a few questions? Purely routine, of course,’ said Reggie.

‘Not at all,’ said the automation consultant.

The Superintendent cleared his throat.

‘Did you commit those thefts?’ he asked.

‘No,’ said the automation consultant.

Thank you,’ said the Superintendent.

When the automation consultant had gone, Reggie remonstrated with the burly policeman.

‘Why didn’t you ask him any more?’ he said. ‘It wasn’t exactly a searching inquiry, was it?’

‘No point,’ said the Superintendent. ‘He isn’t the type.’

‘You shouldn’t look at people that way,’ said Reggie. ‘That’s stereotyped thinking.’

The Superintendent set off to pursue his inquiries, but not before Reggie had emphasized the importance of being discreet.

There was a faint knock on the door of the sun-room. Reggie had to call ‘Come in’ three times before the extremely shy vet entered.

‘I’m leaving,’ he mumbled.

‘It’s the thefts, isn’t it?’ said Reggie.

‘It’s burst the bubble,’ mumbled the vet, ‘but I would have had to have gone sooner or later.’

‘You aren’t conquering your shyness as quickly as you’d hoped.’

The extremely shy vet nodded.

Could he be the thief? Anybody could be. Even the Superintendent.

‘Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?’ said Reggie.

‘No,’ said the extremely shy vet.

‘Did you commit those thefts?’ he asked.

‘No,’ said the extremely shy vet.

‘Thank you,’ said Reggie. ‘No further questions.’

Reggie knew that he hadn’t made a conspicuous success of his first police inquiry, but he consoled himself with the thought that the extremely shy vet wasn’t the type.

That afternoon both the football hooligans departed in high dudgeon, after their rooms had been searched. Before they left they punctured the tyres of every car in Oslo Avenue. Reggie was angry with the Superintendent.

‘I suppose you searched their rooms first of anybody,’ he said, as they reviewed the day’s events in the sun-room that evening.

They’re the types,’ said the Superintendent.

‘I wish you hadn’t done that,’ said Reggie. ‘You didn’t find anything, I suppose?’

‘No, but it was one of them. You run a nice, middle-class place. No crime. You bring yobbos in. Crimes begin. What they did to those tyres proves what they are.’

‘They did that because you searched their rooms,’ said Reggie. ‘You force people into the roles you want them to play.’

‘God save me from idealists,’ said the Superintendent. That’s the one good thing about Trudworth New Town. No idealists.’

The Superintendent handed Reggie fifty pounds.

‘What’s that for?’ said Reggie.

‘I’m leaving,’ said the Superintendent. This place has failed me.’

At the door he turned.

‘You won’t get any more thefts,’ he said.

There were no thefts that night, nor the next night.

The exodus continued. The trendies decided that Perrins was no longer fashionable and proved mean with their money.

Mr Linklater, from the Town Clerk’s Department of Botchley Borough Council, was ushered into the sun-room on the following day. He was a neat, concise man, who looked as if he was trying to cram his body tight into an invisible box. He sat very upright, holding his hands firmly into his sides.

‘You have eleven of my staff here, Mr Perrin,’ he said.

Twelve, including you,’ said Reggie.

‘I won’t be staying, though,’ said Mr Linklater.

‘They all said that,’ said Reggie. ‘A cup of my coffee, a couple of my ginger nuts, a quick gander at my community, and they’re hooked. Would you like coffee and biscuits?’

‘No, thank you,’ said Mr Linklater firmly. The decimation of our staff cannot continue.’

‘I didn’t force them to stay,’ said Reggie. ‘It isn’t my fault if working for the council is boring, the offices are dreary, the corridors are dusty, and the food in the canteen is vile.’

‘May I see my staff?’ said Mr Linklater.

‘Certainly,’ said Reggie. ‘Let me show you around.’

They set off along Oslo Avenue. The bright sun was deceptive, for the air was still quite sharp.

‘What a strange walk you have, Mr Linklater,’ said Reggie. ‘The way you bounce up and down, and hold your backside in so tightly, as if you’re walking through Portsmouth on a dark night.’

That afternoon Mr Dent called on Reggie and told him that the Botchley Council contingent were all leaving.

‘I’ll be sorry to see you all go,’ said Reggie.

‘We’ll all be sorry to see us all go,’ said Mr Dent.

‘Is it the thefts?’ said Reggie.

‘I suppose they’ve brought it on,’ said Mr Dent. ‘That and Mr Linklater explaining about our benefits and back pay and how we wouldn’t lose any if we came back now.’

Mr Dent remained standing, by the door.

‘Sit down,’ Reggie urged him.

‘No thank you,’ he said. ‘You’d be offering me your ginger nuts next and then where would we be? Back at square one. We couldn’t stay for ever, Mr Perrin.’

‘I hope we’ve had an effect,’ said Reggie. ‘I hope you won’t forget that real you that you spoke of. That friendly, genial, delightful man.’

‘Don’t you worry,’ said Mr Dent, smiling. ‘He’s here to stay.’

He looked embarrassed.

‘We . . . er . . . I’m collecting a sum of money from everyone. We’ve agreed how much we’ll all pay, according to how long we’ve stayed. I’ve . . . er . . . I’ve done a cheque for us all.’

Mr Dent removed the cheque from his wallet and looked it over carefully.

‘It’s not a lot,’ he said. ‘You aren’t millionaires if you work for the BBC.

He handed Reggie the cheque. It came out at more per head than the amount donated by all the trendies.

‘Thank you very much,’ said Reggie.

‘May I ask you a question?’ said Mr Dent.

‘Of course.’

‘What did you say to Mr Linklater this morning?’

Reggie told him.

‘Out of my own pocket,’ said Mr Dent, handing him two five pound notes.

That evening Clive ‘Lofty’ Anstruther’s room-mate handed Reggie an envelope.

It contained two hundred pounds and a note.

The note read: ‘Dear Mr Perrin. Couldn’t face you. Sorry. Yellow streak. Had to leave. Place destroyed for me by thefts. Peace of mind gone. Mankind rotten through and through. Please find £100 for you, £100 for Jimmy. More follows. Lofty.’

Five days later, Reggie received a letter, second-class, post-marked London.

‘A thousand pounds gone from your safe,’ it read. ‘Sorry. Rotten through and through. Fact of life. Don’t want anyone else to be suspected. Not vicious. Don’t try and find me. Waste of time. Love to Jimmy. Lofty.’

Reggie hadn’t even known that there were a thousand pounds gone from his safe. He had failed the two yobbos. He had lost nineteen of his fifty-two guests. He called a meeting of his staff, in the living-room of Number Seventeen.

They sat around the walls in the wildly assorted chairs, and drank coffee out of the brown mugs, each of which bore its owner’s name.

In a gesture of solidarity, they never drank out of their own mug. The names were on the mugs merely to remind them of other, less fortunate organizations, where a less happy spirit prevailed.

Reggie was smoking an opulent cigar.

‘The petty thefts have knocked Perrins, but they haven’t destroyed it,’ he said. ‘Things were too easy. We’ll be all the stronger for the experience. It may even be a blessing in disguise as new guests will soon take up the slack, and will probably prove better payers than the trendies or the council officials. We’ve all got to work a little harder, but don’t worry. We shall succeed. Any questions?’