The G File Read Online Free Page A

at the house, which could only just be made out behind the rows of trees and flowering shrubs that had been planted alongside the street precisely to prevent passers-by from peering in, and tried to assess its market value.
    Not less than a million, he decided. Probably not even less than one-and-a-half. Mind you, they were only renting it, if he had understood fru Hennan correctly.
    The situation was ideal in many respects. A large plot with some kind of woods or overgrown park at one end, and another plot at least as big at the other end, with a house that was also half hidden among greenery. He guessed that must be where the Trottas lived – the pilot family with the awful children – but you can never tell for certain.
    On the side of the street where he was parked there were no buildings at all, just a steep slope down to an asphalted cycle path alongside the beck into town.
    Rather splendid isolation, in fact, decided Verlangen with an involuntary stab of envy. The Hennan house that he could just about see in among the greenery was pale blue – not the prettiest colour he had even seen, but what the hell? His own forty-five-square-metre flat contained more glaring nuances than Kandinsky could ever have dreamt of . . . And just to the right of the house was a clinically white diving tower – or at least, that’s what he thought it must be.
    So they had a swimming pool as well. And why not a tennis court and a sizeable cocktail terrace round the back? He couldn’t help wondering how easy it might be to torch the whole set-up – preferably with G surrounded by flames on all sides while the private dick played the hero and rescued the young wife, carrying her over his shoulder to safety. But he was forced to cut short all such thoughts when a shiny blue Saab glided slowly out between the two black granite pillars that marked the entrance to the drive of the house. They stood there like two immobile but well-dressed and somewhat ominous lackeys, making no attempt to hide their silent disapproval of any unwelcome visitors.
    The only occupant was the male driver, and Verlangen had no doubt that it was none other than Jaan G. Hennan himself – despite the fact that he only had a very vague impression of him.
    Who else could it possibly have been? Surely one could take it for granted that Barbara Hennan had given Verlangen the correct address . . .
    He gave the Saab a fifty-metre start, then switched on the engine of his faithful old Toyota and began tailing him.
    A classic set-up, he thought with an intentional lack of emotion.
    Hennan parked in one of the narrow alleys behind the church, then walked the hundred or so metres down towards the square and vanished through the main entrance of a three-storey block of shops and offices of typical beige-coloured fifties design. Verlangen managed to squeeze his Toyota into a cramped space on the other side of the street. Switched off the engine, lit another cigarette and wound down the window again.
    He fixed his gaze on the row of featureless rectangular windows in the storey above the ground-floor shops – a shoe shop, an undertaker’s, a butcher’s.
    After a couple of minutes one of the windows over the undertaker’s opened: Jaan G. Hennan leaned out and emptied half a cup of coffee onto the pavement below. Then closed the window.
    Typical, Verlangen thought. Born a bastard, always a bastard. He didn’t even bother to look down and see if he might be pouring the coffee onto a passer-by.
    He adjusted the back of his seat so that he could lean back in comfort, took out the sport section of the
Allgemejne
and checked his watch. A quarter to ten.
    So there we are, then, he thought. Out working again.
    When he had read even the obituaries for the second time and smoked about ten cigarettes, Verlangen began to regret his decision to have an alcohol-free day.
    It was twenty minutes past eleven, and he reconsidered his position and adjusted his abstinence to the morning. Surely