Caption:
“Reginald Perrin, 46, has disappeared, clothes found abandoned on beach, presumed dead. Still very much alive!”
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Reggie is in an unassuming town in Dorset, dressed in a purple velvet suit and polo neck jumper. He pretends to be an Australian, but is ignored by a passer-by. After counting the town's four antique shops, three potteries and two boutiques he decides against settling here anyway. He catches a lift on a digger to another village, where he pretends to be a Frenchman. With the same line in shops as the first village, he moves on again, catching a lift in a motorcycle sidecar. He arrives in his schoolboy-holiday haunt of Chilhampton St. Peter, and is convinced he has found his new home.
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He visits the local pub, and makes acquaintances with the barmaid. He reminisces about his childhood and his conquests with a promiscuous horse-rider called Rosie. She turns out to be the barmaid. Reggie leaves quickly. In another pub, he is dressed as a distinguished gentleman in tweed, and calls himself Sir Wensley Amherst, mountaineer, explorer, cement tycoon, bandleader, gourmet and sex maniac. Another day, another pub, and Reggie is Lord Amherst, who gets chatted up by Jean Timpkins who invites him to her home. For the first time since his pseudocide, Reggie remembers his evenings at home with Elizabeth, and makes his excuses to Jean and leaves. Reggie makes a trip back to Sunshine Desserts, remembers that it's lunchtime, and heads for the pub, The Feathers, where he sits close to C.J., Tony and David to hear what, if anything, they are saying about him. He then returns to Coleridge Close, but a neighbour tells him that Elizabeth is in Worthing, as her mother is in hospital there.
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Reggie has travelled to Worthing, posing as Signor Antonio Stifado, an Italian tourist. He waits for Elizabeth to leave the hospital, but when she does, Reggie is horrified to see her with a new man, her old friend Henry Possett. Reggie imposes on her for directions to the railway station, and gets a lift in his own car. Henry Possett, a government official, talks to Reggie in Italian, and Reggie has to think fast to get out of replying to the unintelligible question. Elizabeth is impressed with Henry's fluency, and Henry informs her of all the languages he can speak, much to Reggie's chagrin.
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Reggie is now calling himself Donald Potts, a scruffily-dressed, goofy-toothed man, and is lodging in a bedsit of Mr. and Mrs. Deacon, where Mrs. Deacon thinks everyone is coloured, where the lights go out whenever she watches BBC2, and where an Ethel Pershore lives downstairs and keeps making advances towards him. Reggie is writing a letter to Elizabeth, unsure whether he will be able to post it when he's finished.
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Reggie attends an interview with a Mr. Thorneycroft, where he applies for a job with the parks department. He gives Reggie a job in the North Hillingley Sewage Reclamation Works.
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On a hot summer's day, Reggie is toiling hard at the sewage works, cutting the long grass with a scythe. Poised on the edge of one of the sewage tanks, he loses his balance and falls in.
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After work, a smelly Reginald Perrin waits for a bus, upwind of a number of other people. They move away when they get a waft of Reggie.
A week later, Reggie is still in his bedsit writing his letter to Elizabeth, where Mrs. Deacon accuses Reggie of being a 'nig-nog', and charges off to watch the television. The lights go off, and Reggie continues his letter by candlelight.
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Ethel Pershore has invited herself in again, claiming she has run out of coffee. She chats Reggie up on the settee, and boasts about her virginity.
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Reggie strides up Coleridge Close again, determined to tell Elizabeth the truth, but he imagines her with Henry Possett, and walks off.
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Reggie visits his daughter Linda and tells her the truth instead. She shows him the local paper with a notice about his forthcoming memorial service. Elizabeth visits, and Reggie has to pretend to be the plumber. Elizabeth announces her engagement to Henry Possett, and Reggie leaves the house in frustration.
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