Death of a Bore Read Online Free Page B

police station when he saw the Strathbane Television van approaching along the waterfront. He stood out in the middle of the road and held up his hand.
    Jessma Gardener was in the front seat. She rolled down the window. ‘If you’re on your way to the writing class, you’re too late,’ said Hamish. ‘It’s
finished.’
    ‘Oh, good,’ said Jessma. ‘I couldn’t bear the thought of it. But the lights are still on in the village hall.’
    ‘Cleaning up,’ lied Hamish, who well knew that some of the audience were still there. ‘Why does Strathbane News want to cover a village writing class?’
    ‘There’s a new drama executive who handles the soap. John’s written a script for it. The exec says it’s brilliant, so we’re asked to cover anything John Heppel
wants us to. Still, thank goodness for an early evening.’
    She waved to him. The van did a U-turn and headed back out of the village.
    ‘I’ve been very petty,’ Hamish told his dog when he entered the police station. ‘I should have let the wee man have his bit of glory, and him all made up for it. But I
don’t like him and that’s a fact. It’s not because he’s a bore. It’s something else. I feel he means trouble.’
    ‘Do you usually talk to your dog?’ asked a voice behind him.
    Hamish blushed and turned round.
    Freda Garrety stood there, smiling. Hamish had left the kitchen door open.
    ‘Can I help you?’ he asked stiffly.
    ‘I wanted to talk to you about John Heppel.’
    ‘All right. Shut the door and sit down. Tea or something stronger?’
    ‘I wouldn’t mind a dram.’
    Hamish took down a nearly full whisky bottle from the cupboard and two glasses.
    ‘That’s a very odd-looking dog,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen a dog with such blue eyes.’
    ‘Water?’ asked Hamish, ignoring her remark because he was cross with her for finding him talking to Lugs.
    ‘Just a little.’
    Hamish filled a jug with water and put it along with the whisky and glasses on the table. He poured two measures.
    Freda added a little water to her glass. ‘He presented a copy of his book to the school library. Because he’d won a literary prize and all that, I didn’t think of checking it.
Then I found one child after another was asking to borrow it. So I took it home and read it. It’s full of swear-words and explicit sex. Now, I know they get a lot of stuff on television and
on the Internet these days, but I do try to keep them children as long as possible. I mean, I don’t want to contribute to fouling up their minds.’
    Hamish shared her worry. Despite all the encroachments of the modern world, there was still a certain innocence about the village children which had been taken away from their counterparts in
the cities.
    Again he had a feeling that John Heppel was a cancer eating into local society.
    Freda spoke again. ‘A lot of the parents are furious, but then there are others who are seduced by the idea that they, too, could write a book. They say John’s book is literature and
there are a lot of nasty things in Shakespeare.’
    ‘I think we’re worrying ower-much,’ said Hamish slowly. ‘He’s so self-obsessed, so conceited, and so boring that people will stop attending his classes. This will
hurt his vanity. I think he moved here to be a big fish in a small pond. Once the locals have got over the romance of writing, they’ll ignore him and he won’t be able to bear that. What
made you decide to come here?’
    ‘I was working in a comprehensive in Lanarkshire. The kids’ parents were mostly on the dole. It was a miserable existence. Some of the boys were violent. One day one of them held a
knife to my throat in the playground. He was overpowered by two of the masters. The school tried to suspend him, but the bleeding hearts at the education authority decided he had to stay. I saw the
job up here advertised. I love it. I love the children.’
    ‘It’s a lonely life for a young woman.’
    ‘Oh, on my weekends off I go