A Bedlam of Bones

by Suzette A. Hill

  ‘Could be,’ answered the dog. ‘Why don’t you go and take a look and see what he’s doing? If he’s grinding those humbugs and twitching his ankle it’s bound to be bad, but if he’s just smoking and blowing rings it’s probably okay.’ Thus, still feeling moderately cooperative, I did precisely that.

  I perched on the window ledge, peering in, but with the subject of my scrutiny largely obscured by a haze of smoke, it was difficult to see much. So I slipped into the room and up on to his lap. Although immersed in the letter he had the good grace to pause and say a few words of welcome which I duly acknowledged. There was no sign of the peppermints or twitching ankle so it would seem all was normal.

  I ducked my head under his wrist to see if anything intelligible could be gleaned from the paper in his hand. Alas, despite my several skills I have yet to master the art of deciphering human hieroglyphics (particularly when so carelessly scrawled). So all I could discern was that the writing was copious, which might mean that Primrose had something important to say – though if human speech is anything to go by, volume is no guarantee of interest.

  Feeling it polite to tarry a little longer, I toyed briefly with the crumpled envelope, gave a playful yank of his tie, and then suddenly glimpsing my woollen mouse lurking in a corner, disengaged myself and leapt in pursuit.

  I was just giving the creature a few prods with my paw when there was a gasp from the vicar followed by the exclamation, ‘Good grief, not that Felter, it couldn’t be!’ I glanced up and saw a startled look on his face, but then calming down again he resumed reading. Nothing more was said, and losing interest I picked up the mouse and went into the hall where I met the dog bounding in from the garden wanting its breakfast.

  ‘Things all right?’ he asked.

  I said that for the time being they seemed so, but that I had heard F.O. utter a name which had caused him momentary agitation and it might be useful to commit it to memory in case of repercussions.

  ‘What name?’

  I told him it was Felter, and knowing that Bouncer can be a trifle slow in these matters, patiently repeated the syllables for him.

  ‘Oh yes,’ he said carelessly, ‘Freddie Felter – nasty piece of work.’

  I am not often flummoxed by the dog but this was one such time, and jettisoning the mouse, I stared in astonishment. ‘How on earth do you know that?’

  ‘Easy,’ he replied, ‘it’s what the Tubbly was gassing on about when she was here the other day. Don’t you remember? When she brought old Gunga and I bit his bum again.’

  I nodded. ‘Yes, I do remember – a most indecorous scene.’

  ‘But funny!’

  I conceded it was funny but said I did not recall anything being said about someone with the name of Freddie Felter.

  ‘Don’t suppose you would. You had sloped off to the graveyard by then. But I stayed and heard everything. They thought I was busy with my bone, which I was to begin with, but then I stopped and just sat listening VERY QUIETLY!’ He wagged his tail, looking pleased with himself, while I readjusted my ears. For one uneasy moment I thought he might bark out a few of the French words he had learnt in the Auvergne, but fortunately I was spared that.

  ‘So what did you hear?’

  ‘Enough to know that this Felt fellow is a bad lot and looks like a walrus. The Tubbly said that her mate Jacko had been very good at sniffing things. Just like me! And also like me he could always tell when someone didn’t smell right, even from a hundred yards. And the Felt Fellow was one of those – got a very nasty pong to him. So you see, Maurice!’

  ‘Not entirely,’ I murmured. ‘All you have told me is that the Felt Fellow looks peculiar and is noisome.’

  He scowled. ‘Not noisy, smelly! Are you going deaf, Maurice? I said he didn’t SMELL right!!’ There was a belligerent look in his eye and I thought it unwise to argue the point.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ I said hastily, ‘I’ve got the idea – so what else was said?’

  There was silence while the dog furrowed his brows and gazed into the distance. I waited patiently.

  ‘Turnip,’ he said eventually.

  ‘Ah,’ I said encouragingly. ‘And …?’

  ‘Well, you see,’ he exclaimed eagerly, giving me a shove with his nose, ‘a LONG time ago Felt and Turnip knew each other and went around beating people up … What do you think of that? When the Tubbly told F.O. I could see he was quite shocked.’ He paused and then added, ‘But after that I rather lost the thread of things – you know how it is, sometimes they gabble so fast a chap can’t always …’ He trailed off lamely.

  ‘Excellent, Bouncer,’ I mewed. ‘We are now in possession of certain facts which may come in useful.’

  He brightened. ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘Without a doubt. What you have ascertained is that Felt is distasteful and dangerous and is – or was once – somehow linked with the blackguard Turnip and F.O. seems perturbed by this. Such intelligence may be of value to us. After all, forewarned is—’

  ‘You mean a sniffy snout keeps the spies out!’ the dog shouted.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s what my old master Bowler used to say. He was always muttering it.’

  ‘Hmm. Probably about the only time your old master was right – he was not known for his acuity … Anyway, it has been a busy morning and I propose we go and play lions and tigers in the graveyard.’

  ‘RATHER!’ bellowed the dog.

  13

  The Vicar’s Version

  Later that morning, having extricated myself from Tapsell and the mice, i.e. by telephoning the rat-catcher and giving church and organ a wide berth, I retreated to a rare bolt-hole – the darkened snug of the Swan and Goose – and over an early restorative reflected on Primrose’s letter.

  Lavinia certainly seemed brazenly insouciant about her husband’s murder all right, and increasingly it looked as if she had indeed been Turnbull’s accomplice – or at the very least, cheerful accessory after the fact. I recalled our first meeting with her as the earnest and whey-faced chatelaine of their modest estate in the rugged Auvergne. There, she had been the model of other-worldly piety, amiably dull and a fit consort to the high-minded Boris. But now, shot of that role and returned to cosmopolitan life, she was fast taking on a persona altogether more chic – and possibly hard-boiled. I remembered her manner in Brown’s Hotel: charming and giggly – and yet somehow, beneath the suddenly fashionable attire and wide-eyed gaiety, subtly self-possessed. Interesting how a change in situation can reshape character …

  But in a way I was more intrigued by Primrose’s allusion to her companion’s elderly chum. The more I pondered on the name Frederick, the more I began to question my earlier doubts about Lavinia’s admirer having once been Turnbull’s distasteful housemaster. If Primrose’s assessment was right, then his age of sixty-five or thereabouts could certainly fit; but more significant was the fact that like Maud’s Freddie Felter, he had schoolmastered in Jaipur before the war. It was true, Frederick might be the man’s surname – but if Lavinia had mentioned him casually as being an old friend of the family wouldn’t she have been more likely to use the less formal title – i.e. his first name? ‘Old friend of the family,’ I mused. How far did the term ‘family’ stretch? Turnbull and Lavinia were cousins of sorts … Did their familial link include Freddie Felter, erstwhile housemaster at St Austin’s, the British college of Jaipur, and drummed out for dubious practices? Hmm.

  ‘Francis!’ a voice bawled from the doorway. ‘Spotted you, you rogue!’ I righted my glass and retrieved the scattered peanuts. It was Mrs Tubbly Pole.

  ‘You weren’t at my bun fight last night,’ she accused.

  ‘Er, no, I—’

  ‘Feet on fender, screwing up a crossword no doubt.’

  ‘Ah, well not entirely …’ I murmured defensively.

  ‘No matter, dear friend. You’ve pledged six copies as it is, so I owe you a pinkers!’ She gestured imperiously to the barman. ‘A large gin and bitters for the Can
on, and have something for yourself. Oh, and you can top mine up while you’re about it.’ She proffered her glass while I looked nervously for Gunga Din.

  ‘Left the little man at home,’ she explained, ‘sleeping it off. Heavy night last night and successful – although I have to say there were a few oddities in the audience. Somebody called Mavis – kept asking about the “moral dimension”. Hadn’t a clue what she was talking about. And then if you please she started to spout some plaintive doggerel. Sounded half-cut to me! Have you got many like that in Molehill?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘lots.’

  ‘Ah well, all in a day’s work. One gets used to it.’

  I nodded, and then asked her how she had managed to reach the Swan and Goose. ‘It’s over a mile and a half from the Gravediggers’. Did you take a taxi?’

  She fixed me with a beady eye. ‘Some of us, Francis, are sound in wind and limb and are able to drag ourselves the odd mile or so – unlike certain members of the clergy who, scraggy as they may be, evidently bust a gut getting up the pulpit steps!’

  I smiled, glancing at my thin knees (but then flinched, recalling my panting efforts trying to hoist her bulldog up the belfry staircase*). ‘I’ll be happy to drive you back anyway.’

  She beamed and we embarked on this and that. Mainly that – i.e. the current parlous state of the publishing world, the conservatism of the reading public, the peculiar foibles of forensic experts, and then – perhaps as a nod in my direction – the equally peculiar foibles of the nineteenth-century Oxford Movement. I contributed a couple of observations on the last item and listened fascinated to the rest. Eventually I ventured a question.

  ‘I say, Maud, you know the Freddie Felter you were talking about, did he ever drink Sidecars?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she said carelessly, ‘all the time. In those days in India it was considered a bit raffish – black cha and whisky being the usual. But of course beastly Freddie had to be different.’

  As Ingaza might have said: well, what do you know!

  She paused and looked at me quizzically. ‘If you don’t mind my saying, Francis, your question strikes me as a mite inconsequential … What on earth does Freddie Felter’s penchant for American cocktails have to do with anything?’

  I told her that my sister had seen someone like him talking to a friend of hers recently.

  ‘Is she rich?’

  ‘Who, Primrose?’

  ‘No, the friend.’

  ‘Well,’ I said reflectively, ‘not short of a bob or two. In fact, now you mention it, probably quite—’

  ‘Could be him I suppose. Little toad always had his eye to the main chance, snooping here, fawning there … If you want my advice, tell your sister to steer clear. Felter and Turnbull: a nasty pair then and probably much worse now!’ She gave a derisory snort, and then glancing at her watch exclaimed that it was long past the ‘little fellow’s biscuit time’. And thus we made a rapid departure to the Gravediggers’ and the charms of Gunga Din.

  That evening Primrose telephoned, grumbling about Ingaza’s tardiness in remitting her latest dues for the ‘Canadian project’.

  ‘He’s so slippery,’ she fulminated. ‘And besides, it’s high time he increased my whack – those sketches are being snapped up like hot cakes! Can’t you do something, Francis?’

  I hesitated. ‘Er, I don’t suppose he would listen to me. But in any case, Prim, he’s a bit preoccupied at present—’

  ‘Oh yes,’ she exclaimed scornfully, ‘doubtless cooking up some fiendish heist with that awful Eric!’

  ‘You mean more fiendish than yours?’ I asked innocently.

  The explosion was swift and predictable, but I cut her short, saying, ‘If you really want to know, he is being blackmailed – and so is Clinker.’

  There was a silence, broken by a spluttering whistle. ‘Who on earth by? Canterbury?’

  Patiently I explained the situation of the letters; and then on the principle of in for a penny, in for a pound, unfolded my suspicions about Turnbull.

  There followed another silence. And then she said musingly, ‘You might have something there. I gather from Lavinia that since getting back from France, Rupert and Clinker have been socializing.’

  ‘Socializing? In what way?’

  ‘The usual way. Apparently they bumped into each other at some education conference in Oxford, and Rupert got quite chummy with Clinker – started to reminisce about Berceau-Lamont and poor old Boris, and quizzed him about his time as a don before the war. It seems Turnbull managed to screw some funding out of Hor’s old college for another language institute he is busy setting up, something to do with the foreign intake on their postgraduate courses. Anyway, according to Lavinia, since then he and Hor have been getting on quite well. She seemed to find it rather amusing.’

  ‘Well, she would, wouldn’t she,’ I replied tartly, ‘knowing that the noble bishop is unwittingly consorting with a murderer?’

  ‘Hmm,’ replied Primrose smoothly, ‘as he does unwittingly with you …’

  I glowered down the telephone, but let it pass and instead asked her: ‘Do you think I should warn him off – you know, sort of suggest that Turnbull is a bit iffy and he would be wise to steer clear?’

  ‘Well if he is the blackmailer, it’s a little late for that, isn’t it? He has obviously delved into Clinker’s past and, alias Donald Duck, already made his approach. Besides, there’s absolutely no proof that he is involved. He may have dispatched Boris and be fundamentally nasty, but that doesn’t mean he is now putting the screws on old Horace. So far it’s mere conjecture … Best to keep quiet if you ask me. As Ma used to say to Pa, “Close your eyes, dear, and it will all dissolve.”’

  ‘Yes,’ I said wryly, ‘and I remember Pa’s response. It wasn’t pretty!’

  She giggled. ‘No, it wasn’t. But just occasionally Mother was right: it doesn’t do to jump the gun.’

  I wasn’t entirely convinced, but reflected that it would be tricky giving a cogent warning without also disclosing other matters to Clinker – i.e. our conviction that Turn-bull had been Boris’s assassin in France: a revelation whose reception could be exhausting to say the least. Yes, I counselled myself, Primrose was right – let sleeping bishops lie …

  They were not to lie long. The following morning I was startled awake by an early phone call. And after blearily stumbling downstairs and nearly breaking my neck on the dog’s bone, I was even more startled to hear Ingaza’s nasal tones. Dawn raids are not his speciality.

  ‘I’ve heard from Hor,’ he announced. ‘He’s had another letter.’

  ‘Er, sorry – what?’

  ‘Clinker. He’s had a second letter … from the fucking duck.’

  * See Bones in the Belfry

  14

  The Vicar’s Version

  ‘Oh no,’ I groaned, ‘this is really a bit much!’

  ‘I should think it is a bit much!’ Ingaza snarled. ‘It’s sodding too bloody much!’ A rant ensued involving terms of a similarly robust ilk.

  ‘So it is only Clinker – you haven’t received another?’

  ‘Not yet, but I’m bound to get one – or,’ he added sadistically, ‘you will.’

  I paled. ‘Me!’

  ‘Well yes, old boy,’ he replied, reverting to his usual drawl. ‘He may have started with Hor and me, but you have to admit that you rather have the edge on us in the high stakes. I wouldn’t be complacent if I were you.’

  Complacent? That would be the day!

  ‘I am far from being that, Nicholas,’ I replied evenly, ‘but for the moment I think we should address the immediate threat which is to you and Horace. No point in crossing hypothetical bridges.’ (That last utterance had a familiar ring and I recalled it had been one of Pa’s favourite sayings. Did my tone sound as patronizing? I hoped not.)

  ‘Hmm. That’s as may be. Anyway, Hor’s in a right sweat. Wants to meet us pronto at his London club this Saturday. He’s up there for some function at Lambeth Palace and it�
��s the only time he can manage. He sounded pretty rattled so I suppose if he wants to talk about it we had better go. I gather the club is one of those swish jobs in Pall Mall and does quite a decent lunch. Actually offered to foot the bill, so he must be desperate!’ He gave a hollow laugh.

  There was a busy week ahead and Saturday would be the first break in the schedule. So the prospect of flogging up to London to listen to the bishop and Ingaza lamenting their collective plight was not enticing. I had enough perils of my own to consider without augmenting them with other people’s.

  But the instant the thought came, it vanished in a puff of guilt. It was precisely because I was so familiar with the condition of fearful panic and the isolation it brings, that I should now give what small support I could. ‘That’s what pals are for, Francis,’ I heard my sister’s voice pontificating in the treehouse decades ago, ‘they help you out of jams!’ I wasn’t sure that either Clinker or Ingaza fitted the category of ‘pal’ exactly (bane, more like), but you get accustomed to people and owe them a jaundiced loyalty … Besides, as Nicholas had hinted, and which had already passed through my own mind, there was always the possibility that I too might be caught in the orbit of the Donald Duck character. And as Nicholas had also so charmingly observed, in my case the stakes were higher. One did not get the chop for buggery, but one did for murder … No, this was not a time for wry disinterest. The jam was sticky, and one way or another we were all up to our ears in it.

  ‘Yes, Nicholas,’ I said easily, ‘Saturday should be fine. If the Lord Bishop requires our presence in London, who are we to deny him that whim?’

  ‘My sentiments exactly, old cock,’ was the dry reply.

  The next few days were both trying and bumpy: trials via the Vestry Committee with its interminable ramblings and agitated phone calls; bumps from the Mothers’ Union, the Confederacy of Church Wardens and other assorted complainants. Three funerals brought relief from their cheerless attentions, but by Friday night I was ready for some emollient rest. Not that any was in prospect, for a day in London with the bishop and Ingaza was unlikely to soothe a troubled spirit. However, I recalled grimly, all part of one’s moral duty …