Murder by the Book by Eric Brown Read Free Book Online Page A

fellow travellers. Call me an old-fashioned liberal, if you will.’
    â€˜I will,’ Langham said, ‘but I’d be careful about going back there.’
    â€˜But the lure, the lure …!’ He squinted at Langham. ‘You obviously fail to see the attraction?’
    Langham laughed. ‘Charles, to be honest, and I don’t mean this as any form of criticism … but what I saw in Kenneth was nothing more than an ugly, underfed youth.’
    â€˜But underfed in such a romantic way!’ Charles waved his napkin. ‘But each to his own, is my motto. I, for my part, fail to see your attraction to Maria, for instance. And on that score, when do you intend to do something about it, my boy?’
    â€˜Do something about it? As if Maria would look twice at me.’
    â€˜Donald, Donald … For an intelligent man, you can be remarkably dense. Maria practically drools when you enter the office.’
    â€˜Nonsense!’
    â€˜Ask the girl out to dinner, my boy!’
    Langham felt himself redden. ‘Anyway, I thought she was seeing—’
    â€˜They went out a few times last year,’ Charles said. ‘But no more. Gideon Martin is an egotistical cad, and between you and me he is making her life a misery.’
    Langham looked up. ‘How’s that?’
    â€˜He trails her like a lovesick puppy and will not, will not , take no for an answer.’
    â€˜Gideon Martin …’ Langham said. ‘The name rings a bell.’
    â€˜He had a few faux literary novels published in the late forties, which went down well in Paris but failed miserably here. He’s reduced to penning travel guides and anonymous encyclopaedia entries, and hates the world for it. We are not exactly on best terms, ever since I turned down one of his efforts a few years ago.’ Charles beamed at him. ‘But the fact remains: you really should make a move and ask the dear girl to dinner.’
    â€˜That,’ Langham said as he finished his toast, ‘is hardly what I came here to discuss. The actual point—’
    â€˜The point? What is the point of life but the essence, the very quiddity, of our relations with our fellow man?’
    â€˜I’m not denying that, Charles, but I’m here because you’re being blackmailed and we need to do something about it.’
    â€˜Ah, that …’ Charles adopted a pantomime glum expression. ‘For a moment there I had almost walked out from under the shadow of that dark cloud.’
    â€˜The simple fact is that someone, a man in his fifties, short, fat, ginger—’
    â€˜You paint such an attractive portrait, my boy—’
    â€˜â€”is blackmailing you. There are a couple of reasons he might be doing this.’
    â€˜For the filthy lucre, presumably?’
    â€˜Obviously. But, is he attempting to extort the money from you because you’re a rich punter? Or is it more personal?’
    Charles squinted across the table. ‘Come again?’
    â€˜What if you’re being targeted because he bears you a grudge?’
    â€˜But my dear boy, I don’t have an enemy in the world!’
    Langham shrugged. ‘I don’t imagine you have. But that doesn’t mean to say that someone might not hold something against you for whatever reason. The description of this fellow doesn’t ring any bells?’
    â€˜Short, fat, ginger?’
    â€˜Ginger but balding.’
    Charles shuddered. ‘It brings no one of my acquaintance to mind, thank the Lord.’
    â€˜You’re absolutely sure? No one at all? No one in publishing, perhaps?’
    Charles shook his head.
    Mrs Bledsoe bustled into the room and cleared away the dirty plates. ‘Will that be all, sir?’
    Charles glanced at his watch. ‘My word, it’s ten o’clock already. I think the hour calls for a pot of lapsang souchong, Mrs Bledsoe.’
    â€˜I’ll be right back with it.’
    When she had