The Primrose Pursuit Read online

  The Primrose Pursuit

  SUZETTE A. HILL

  To the memory of Alexander Wedderspoon,

  who had a soft spot for Primrose

  Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  DEDICATION

  AUTHOR’S PREFACE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  BY SUZETTE A. HILL

  COPYRIGHT

  AUTHOR’S PREFACE

  The events of this tale are set in the Lewes area of Sussex towards the close of the 1950s. Primrose Oughterard is the assertive sister of the late Revd Francis Oughterard who, when living in Molehill, Surrey, had the misfortune of inadvertently slaying one of his parishioners, the cloying Elizabeth Fotherington. This caused the amiable vicar some consternation, and severely intruded upon his hitherto quiet and blameless life. Thus for several years he lived in constant fear of the hangman’s noose – and the officious attentions of his episcopal superior, Horace Clinker. His fumbling efforts to elude both are recounted in A Load of Old Bones and in his four subsequent diaries, the final being A Bedlam of Bones. Following his death (not on the scaffold but in an equally distinctive context), Primrose commandeered his dog and cat – the intrepid Bouncer and fiendish Maurice – and has taken them to live with her in her Sussex home. Meanwhile, her brother sleeps securely in the Molehill churchyard, his misdemeanour undetected by the police and his reputation intact.

  CHAPTER ONE

  My dear Agnes,

  Of course I am awfully fond of Primrose, she’s such a brick. But there are times when she is what you might call ‘overpowering’ … well she overpowers me at any rate! As I think she did that brother of hers: the vicar Francis Oughterard – he who died falling from the church tower rescuing that tiresome Briggs woman from being impaled on a gargoyle. Naturally, poor Primrose was terribly cut up at the time, but as you might expect she has coped bravely with the event and has actually taken custody of those slightly disturbing pets her brother would insist on keeping – Maurice, the cat is called, and that distinctly dubious mongrel dog Bilious or Bouncer or some such; begins with a ‘B’ at any rate.

  Still, the point is not so much the animals as their new custodian, our dear friend Primrose. She is behaving a little oddly – odder than usual I mean. Or at least it is not so much her behaviour that is odd as her words: she has been saying some rather strange things about the school’s new Latin master, Hubert Topping. You may remember my telling you about him: arrived in mid-term to replace old Appleyard who went gaga and had to be put away. Topping’s application was a godsend – there was nobody else – and the headmaster, Mr Winchbrooke, appointed him immediately. We were all very relieved, as grappling with Latin verbs has a most constructive effect on the third-formers. At that stage – when they know they are about to transfer to the big school – they become so bumptious, and a dose of classical rigour cuts them down to size. Topping has been doing that most successfully and we are all extremely grateful.

  So I was somewhat taken aback when Primrose announced to me across the tea-table that she proposed keeping her eye on him. When I asked why on earth she should want to do that, she replied that it was not a case of her wanting to but that it formed part of her civic duty.

  Well, as you can imagine, I had no idea what she meant! I don’t know about you, Agnes, but personally I have never associated civic duty with Primrose Oughterard … You will recall for example that awful fracas with the council over the town clerk’s allocated parking space: declared she had parked there all her life – since living in Sussex anyway – and had no intention of yielding her rights to ‘pettifogging public functionaries and that he must take his chances with the rest of us’. She got her way too! As she did in the matter of the proposed rates rise to fund the aldermanic robes: refused point blank to cough up, saying she didn’t toil away all day at her easel just to subsidise the mayor and his penchant for dressing up in a garb which made him look like a demented mushroom. Personally, I think that was fair comment – though had he looked less like a mushroom, demented or otherwise, and more like Errol Flynn I wonder if her views would have been the same?

  Well one thing is for sure, nobody could mistake Hubert Topping for Errol Flynn; a less swashbuckling man it would be hard to find. However, the boys seem to like him – which is why I cannot understand Primrose’s current concern. It has, I gather, something to do with the tone of his voice and the fact that he reads the Manchester Guardian: the first is too soft and the second too pink. But when I said, ‘My dear Primrose, you can hardly hold pink reading matter and a quiet voice against him,’ she said, ‘Oh yes, I can,’ and added darkly that there were other things too.

  What other things I failed to learn, as at that moment the new dog shambled into the room and all attention was directed to its bone, its basket, the type of dog food it should be supplied with, the state of its toenails and my views on whether it would look best in a blue or a red collar. As its facial features were largely obscured by fronds of matted fur and a cascading fringe, I thought the question immaterial. However, wishing to be tactful I said that since she was the artist I would leave such aesthetic choices to her, but whatever she selected it was bound to add to the creature’s undoubted charm. (NB My father used to say that if one were going to tell a lie it should be an absolute whopper – no point in sinning by halves.)

  Anyway, rather frustratingly the dog palaver diverted us from the school’s most recent appointee; though doubtless the topic will be resumed. As you know, unlike her late brother, Primrose has an impressive faith in her own judgement, and once she has a bee in her bonnet few things will dislodge it. Such a bee is evidently mild Mr Topping and her conviction that his surveillance is to form part of her social responsibility. I shall be rather glad when you and Charles return from Tobago. Charles has a firm hand which on the whole I think Primrose rather respects. She defers to few people but your husband is one of them.

  How nice it will be to see you both back here in May with the first call of the cuckoo and the boys at the nets. I am already planning my new series of nature walks – those South Down rambles are such an education for the London boarders and even our local boys seem
to enjoy them, or so they tell me (though in my experience a measure of sharp scepticism rarely comes amiss when dealing with the young). I wonder if I can get Mr Topping to join our jaunts – a means of escape from P’s vigilance perhaps? … Heigh-ho, bring on the summer I say. Won’t be long now!

  Your good friend,

  Emily

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Primrose Version

  Curbing the dog may be a problem. I do not mean quelling the racket he makes in the garden or indeed persuading him to remove his bones from the conservatory … No, it is simply that he will keep on staring: occasionally at the cat, but principally at me. Not being used to others in the house I find such scrutiny unsettling and wonder whether he did the same with my brother. I daresay. But then Francis may not have noticed, his mind usually being otherwise engaged – largely with the matter of Elizabeth Fotherington, his tiresome victim (or at any rate with the police and how to foil their intrusive curiosity). Well thank goodness one has seen the back of that palaver! Death does have its compensations, and dear Francis has gone to his grave without a stain besmirching the family name. One must be thankful for such mercies. Indeed that is largely why I have seen fit to adopt his companions Maurice and Bouncer. Under the circumstances it was the least I could do. I think Francis would have approved, and it is a way of giving thanks that Ma and Pa continue to rest easy in their own graves, reputations untainted by one of their son’s more unfortunate gaffes …

  I wonder if the dog stares because it is expecting me to sit down and play the piano as its master used to. I gather it rather enjoyed the ritual. Well I am afraid there is no piano in this house – though I suppose the creature could come and watch me paint if it wanted to. However, a musical ear is no guarantee of a discerning eye – least of all with that fringe! – and it might feel short-changed. Perhaps I could persuade the prep school band to come in once a month and give a little display. Would that suit it? I can hardly ask. And what about Maurice? Does he have preferences? Francis would recite long catalogues of the cat’s phobias but it was never made clear what it actually liked. Not much I suspect, except for haddock and making mischief … Though I must say that so far it has been strangely civil – too civil really. In fact like the dog’s, its behaviour is slightly unnerving. Just now, for instance, after I had come down from the studio, there it was sprawled in the middle of the hall rug mewling like a kitten and waving one of its paws in the air (the one with the white glove). ‘Hello,’ I said, ‘what’s up with you?’ Whereupon it leapt up, twirled round in circles and then slowly approached me doing what I can only describe as a feline version of a rumba. Then with a sort of falsetto purr it parked itself on my foot and wouldn’t budge until I had ruffled its ears. I am not used to such mateyness from Maurice. During my visits to the vicarage the cat would spend most of its time on the top stair looking poisonous; and on the few occasions that Francis brought the pair of them down here to Lewes it stalked about in calculated disdain. I find the current warmth slightly sinister.

  And talking of sinister, I am not enamoured of the new Latin master at Erasmus House: Topping by name but not topping by nature – not in my book anyhow. There’s something about him that I know to be pure fake. Pa was awfully good at spotting fakes, human ones at any rate – couldn’t tell a Landseer from a Lautrec, of course – and it is something I have inherited. I mentioned my doubts to Emily and she seemed bemused. She often is I have noticed. Now I am fond of Emily, but I have to say that while she may be a very sharp school secretary (the headmaster would be lost without her) I sometimes feel she is not entirely on my wavelength … though that may be said of a number of people. Curious really. Ah well, it takes all sorts. And it must be admitted that Francis and I were not always at one; but we did share a kind of stumbling empathy and now that he is gone I feel oddly naked.

  Still, it’s no use looking backwards as Pa would say: not that his forward looking was especially clear. The great thing is to grasp the nettle, carpe the diem, gather the rosebuds and stride ahead … Which takes me back to Hubert Topping. A man who makes a fetish of wearing a rose in his buttonhole every day is immediately suspect, particularly as the colour is invariably the same: pink. Goes with the shade of his newspaper presumably. Besides, where does he get such things at this time of year? Flown in from Madeira? Especially cultivated at Kew? If so, he must have a great deal of money to afford such daily indulgence – and in that case what is he doing teaching Latin declensions in a minor prep school on the south coast? Perhaps he is a shopwalker manqué, or a stockbroker gone bust and spending his final shillings on frippery, or a retired actor keen to retain the thespian mode (was that the flash of a crêpe sole I saw in church the other day?). Well whatever he is, a bona fide schoolmaster he is not. Apart from anything else the voice is too quiet – you need strong lungs to deal with those little Turks, as I know to my cost when I go there periodically to judge their questionable daubings. I arrive home so hoarse I can barely swallow the gin. So I doubt that his dulcet mumbling of ‘amo, amas, amat’ can do much for their education.

  Emily asked me recently whether I was being a mite pernickety. ‘Certainly not,’ I replied, ‘you need your wits about you in this life.’ And I reminded her that had I been less pernickety with the town clerk his dastardly requisition of that parking space would have gone unnoticed. Fortunately with my intervention he lost it within the week. It also occurred to me – though naturally I didn’t say this to Emily – that had poor Francis been a little more pernickety about his choice of woodland walks he might never have encountered Elizabeth that fatal day, and thus been spared the distasteful consequences …

  However, as said, it doesn’t do to dwell on the past; one must look forward, such as to an aperitif and then a downland ramble with the dog. I just hope he doesn’t alarm our Sussex sheep as he did the goats in the Auvergne … but they were French, of course, and couldn’t cope.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The Cat’s View

  Being of a sensitive nature I have found these last few days somewhat trying. Our master’s untimely, and characteristically careless, demise was an unsettling experience for all of us, and the period following his spectacular plunge from the church tower was not only vexing to the spirit but also bad for my digestion. One gets used to certain humans – even one as insane as the vicar – and naturally his sudden loss occasioned some dismay. But being deprived of our customary victuals for at least two days was, I consider, the height of ill-manners: a disgraceful oversight which only goes to show how thoughtless the human species becomes when faced with the unexpected.

  Oh I do not mean that they left us to starve exactly, but their idea of a suitable diet was far from satisfactory. Would you believe it – they resorted to tins. Even F.O. in his wildest moments would have baulked at that. However, all is not lost, for today the vicar’s sister, Primrose, arrived to take us to live with her near Lewes in Sussex. Naturally, I reserve my optimism as it doesn’t do to anticipate things. Nevertheless during our previous visits here I had found the territory not uncongenial and so like to think that there is an even chance of things being acceptable. We shall see …

  In my kittenhood I was regularly reminded by my illustrious great-uncle that circumstances alter cases. He was a fund of sage observations and I clearly benefited from his tutelage. It has made me the cat I am: shrewd, practical and well versed in the inanities of human psychology. However, I have to say that in this particular instance Great-Uncle Marmaduke’s dictum may have been a trifle flawed. You see, while our circumstances are undoubtedly changed following our master’s loss, as far as I can make out the case of Bouncer remains resolutely static. Since our arrival, I have watched the dog closely in the vain hope of seeing some improvement; but alas, as yet there is not one sign of alteration. Brazen, loud and barbarous, the dog and its manners remain much the same in the sister’s domain as they had been in the brother’s. There is a faint chance that the Sussex air and coastal winds may have some amelior
ative effect but on the whole I suspect the odds are against. No, I have to admit that contrary to Marmaduke’s pronouncement, cases do not always alter – however shifting the circumstances.

  Take today, for example. He had made his first visit to the rabbit hutch in the garden, or at least his first since our arrival – there had been an unfortunate previous encounter with these creatures as noted in my past memoir – and the result was disastrous. For the inmates, of course. You would think that our transfer from Surrey to Sussex being permanent the dog would be on its best behaviour and ready to bury old hatchets (or bones). Not one bit! He came racing back to the house whooping and roaring, and telling me what a fine fellow he was for having ‘buggered up’ the chinchillas’ morning. Apparently Karloff had collapsed in dazed stupor and Boris had flown into a rage of gothic frenzy, a fact that afforded Bouncer much merriment. I was less amused – indeed, I remonstrated with him fiercely.

  ‘Really, Bouncer,’ I protested, ‘has it not occurred to you that we are no longer mere guests in Primrose’s household but residents? It doesn’t do to antagonise the natives, there could be unfortunate repercussions.’

  For a moment he looked puzzled, and then said, ‘You mean if I badger them enough the bunnies might go even more bananas?’

  ‘Exactly,’ I said, glad that he had grasped the point.

  ‘Whah-ho!’ was the response. And with tail flailing like a manic windmill he floundered off into the kitchen in search of food.

  I closed my eyes in despair; but opened them quickly for at that moment P.O. had appeared draped in one of her paint-spattered smocks (not unlike F.O.’s surplice, though the defacements on his had tended to be cigarette burns). She carried a brush in one hand and a turpentine bottle in the other and was evidently on her way to or from the studio.