Miss Seeton Rules (A Miss Seeton Mystery Book 18)

by Hamilton Crane

  Sighing for her failure, with her umbrella she indicated Mr. Stillman’s window display.

  “Can’t draw beards,” she was promptly informed by an excited, and hopeful, chorus as it turned severally to look over its shoulder. “Nor hats, neither—nor make ’em. Nor—nor lend, like trousers ...”

  “Lend? You mean borrow?” The teacher’s attempt at enlightenment faltered. Had tradition, then, changed so much? “You mean you aren’t going to burn this guy on the bonfire after all? You intend to give everything back?”

  Misinterpreting the guilty grins on the faces before her—the children’s concept of borrowing differed considerably from that of most of the adults of their acquaintance—Miss Seeton smiled in sympathy. “Oh, I assure you the hat and feathers are of no further use to me. On the other hand,” she added, “if your parents ...”

  With the tip of her brolly, she prodded doubtfully at the straw-stuffed hessian Gargantua, at its assortment of strange attire. One could hardly, of course, say anything against the tastes of others; but these were not, in Miss Seeton’s eyes, clothes she could imagine anyone lamenting unduly if they were not, after all, given back once the business of collecting money to buy fireworks—or to hand to an adult to buy fireworks on one’s behalf—had been accomplished. Besides, the children had clearly worked hard, even on that apology for a face. While the sacking might bulge, it had not burst: it did not leak. “Someone,” said Miss Seeton with approval, “has spent a great deal of time stitching this together—and very neatly, too. How much money have you collected so far?”

  The chorus, much gratified, told her. People in cars, it said, had stopped to look: not but what they couldn’t do with more, to buy an even bigger box, like. Anxious feet nudged the cardboard collecting-tray still closer. “Get a whole heap more bangers,” ventured one brave soul, “iffen we was just t’have a proper face on it ...”

  Miss Seeton hid a smile. No doubt this was what they had intended all along, but had been too shy to ask. Would it be churlish to refuse if one felt, as in fact one did, that they could perhaps have made a little more of an effort for themselves? Although ... A slight twinge of disappointment, of guilt, made Miss Seeton sigh again. Her failure, her fault ... Yet a guy—even one which was not, or so it seemed, to be burned—ought surely to be the work of the children to whom it belonged. Not that one would be so foolish as to call it cheating: there was no pressure to pass an examination, no spirit of competition ... there was, instead, or ought to be, an element of fun, the pleasure of creation. And they had, one assumed, chosen to make the guy in their free, not their school, time, which they must have regarded as fun, because children didn’t do things out of school unless they wanted to do them. And their failure to see the face under their very noses was of course far more the fault of their teacher than of her pupils ...

  Miss Seeton stared at the display in Mr. Stillman’s window, memorising the bearded face and fanatical gaze of the figure on the firework boxes. “I can promise nothing,” she said, “but I will see what can be done—if you, too, will promise to try again. We will exchange notes,” she said, with another twinkle. “And, in the meantime, you may have not one, but ten, pennies for the guy ...”

  Amid a grateful hubbub, she opened her handbag, took out her purse, and popped two small silvery coins into the waiting cardboard box. “I suppose,” she added, “that you can all tell me who Guy Fawkes was, and what he did, or rather tried to do?”

  And the hubbub erupted once more as the children, in unison, told her.

  Four times the heavy door had creaked open; had whispered shut behind each of the conspirators in turn. The blinds were drawn, the one central light casting a dull, yellow gleam on the faces round the table in the darkened room.

  Breaking the pregnant silence came the sudden sounds of a clearing throat, the tapping of expectant fingers on age-hardened wood. There was no real need for Catesby to call the meeting to order: already subdued, the conspirators had long since conceded their leader’s authority. But it could do no harm to reinforce that authority whenever the chance should present itself ...

  “We are all here.”

  Even Winter, the light-hearted, did not smile at the self-evidence of this remark. Matters were too serious now for laughter. Three heads nodded gravely; voices murmured low acknowledgement of the universal presence.

  “To business, then.” Catesby, already sitting upright, seemed at once even taller. Cold grey eyes surveyed others which, uneasy, could not meet that steely gaze, and fell to the table-top, to their clasped and anxious hands.

  “She is coming,” said Catesby. “There has been no last-minute cancellation: there has been no substitution of one who would be less ... less useful to us.”

  Again, this was something they already knew: but nobody cared to point this out.

  “The Beacon,” volunteered Keyes, “has just announced the winner of the competition.”

  Catesby looked a question. Keyes shook his head. “As you know, we tried ... a little pressure, but we couldn’t risk being too ... obvious, in this particular instance. We had, in the end, no influence over the eventual choice.”

  “A pity, in some ways—but not an insuperable problem,” said Catesby, frowning. “We have at least managed to exert our influence in ... other areas.”

  The others nodded. Keyes said, slowly:

  “Everyone has their price—or almost everyone,” as Winter stirred on his chair. “There are always secrets to discover—pressures to be applied. If only everything goes according to plan ...”

  “But we didn’t plan for a child from Plummergen, of all places.” Rookwood, trying not to sound anxious, sounded instead almost too calm. “There will, however, be a large local presence as ... compensation.”

  “As large as possible, I trust,” Catesby said. “The larger the crowd, the greater the confusion. The greater the confusion, the better for our purpose.”

  Winter looked up. “Plummergen. Isn’t that where that old girl with the umbrella comes from? The one the papers call the Battling Brolly—you know, Scotland Yard’s tame art consultant they never mention by name any more.”

  Catesby frowned again: it was Rookwood who replied, as Keyes sighed softly, a look of concern in his eyes.

  “Yes.” His voice was as calm as ever. “Yes, it is.”

  Winter nodded. “Thought so. They used to write her up rather a lot a few years ago, didn’t they? But she’s obviously someone with clout—or else she’s got friends who can lean on the editors—that’s why I wasn’t sure.” He shrugged. “I can’t remember her name. Sort of dropped out of the public eye a bit now, hasn’t she? Unless you live near her, I suppose,” he added, venturing a sideways look in the direction of Catesby.

  He did not need to enlarge the point. Catesby, still frowning, clasped white-knuckled have on the table. “There is no need to worry about this woman, whoever she is. It is simply a coincidence that it is a child from her village who has won: I see no reason why this ...”

  “Beeton,” supplied Rookwood, as the grey eyes searched for inspiration. “Something like that, anyway.”

  “I see no reason why this Mrs. Beeton,” continued Catesby, “should hinder us in our plans. She might, indeed, be of use, if even half of what the papers have said about her is true. As I said, the greater the confusion, the better for our purpose.”

  “And according to the papers,” said Winter, “this Brolly woman—I think it may have been Beeston—doesn’t half let everyone in for confusion once she gets going.”

  “Beecham?” ventured Keyes. Winter, despite the gravity of the situation, grinned.

  “Sargent,” he suggested. “Boult? Or maybe even von Karajan?”

  Catesby’s eyes narrowed. “Winter, this is no time for your infantile jokes! Nor is this the place to flaunt your knowledge of orchestral music, or its conductors. The only interest you, or any of us, should have in music at present is knowing exactly what will happen from the instant the National Anth
em has been played ...”

  “Sorry.” Winter’s apology sounded forced: at the bleak look in Catesby’s eyes, he tried again. “I’m sorry. Though I’m not sure what the anthem’s got to do with anything. Surely it—it all starts happening ... some time after the girl’s cut the ribbon and made her speech? After the Plummergen brat has handed over the flowers?”

  Catesby, through gritted teeth, spoke in a tone so controlled that Winter quailed. “From the instant the anthem has been played, I said—and that is what I meant. Everything depends on accurate timing, on knowing her movements and those of ... others. On knowing where everyone will be ... and when. Among ‘everyone,’ of course, I include our ... agents. Willing,” came the grim qualification, “or ... less so. There is no room for mistakes. Is that clear?”

  And, as on every previous occasion, there came murmurs of uneasy, but resigned, acquiescence as the other three bowed to the will of the conspirator called Catesby.

  * * *

  Plummergen seethed with excitement. The teaching of Miss Maynard, of Mr. Jessyp, had paid off: a local child—a girl, fortunately, because of having a best frock already, while a boy’d mean a new suit and trying to get away with a borrowed tie, not to mention no Plummergen boy but secretly thought bowing over the hand of a lady a sissy notion—had beaten all competition to win the glory of presenting the bouquet to Her Royal Highness Princess Georgina. Young Sally was the envy of her friends, while her mother was the object of much behind-the-back remarks in the post office and other village emporia.

  “It’s not so much to say as three of ’em,” announced Mrs. Scillicough, “wouldn’t’ve looked a treat together, because the paper did say school age—only I can’t help but think, even if it did keep ’em out in the normal run o’ things, an exception might’ve bin made on account of three together being so out o’ the ordinary. When there’s that Sally just the one—and her mum’ll’ve helped her write it, I don’t doubt,” she added. “Which, if it was accepted as fair, I’m sure I don’t know as other mums couldn’t’ve done just as well, if they’d’ve bin given the chance.”

  Mrs. Newport nodded vigorously at her sister’s side. Mrs. Newport’s quartet of under-fives was far better behaved than their triplet cousins, and Mrs. Newport herself—in her own opinion, at any rate, she having passed O Level English (Grade 6) while her sister only managed CSE—was far better able to write an essay on Nuclear (or any other type of) Power than anyone else in the family. Why couldn’t Alice Maynard (demanded Mrs. Newport) have given lessons to any as asked? Open to everyone, such a competition did by rights ought to have bin, with everyone wanting the chance to meet a real live princess, and Georgy Girl so popular and pretty, though with no kids to look after and no real worries t’weren’t no surprise ...

  “She’ll be wed and worrited soon enough, poor lamb,” said Mrs. Spice. “And brought to bed within the year, knowing her duty as the whole family’s raised to do. Let her have her fun while she’s able, the pretty dear, that’s what I say. She’ll be stuck with him for life, whoever he turns out to be, them not holding with divorce, and the kiddies when she’s had ’em hardly her own, with bin so close in line to the throne, and—and national treasures,” she concluded, quoting a recent article in that much-read (and occasionally accurate) periodical, Anyone’s.

  Heads were nodded gravely as Mrs. Spice, sighing, reached her rather wistful conclusion. Even Emmy Putts, on whose imagination the royal lifestyle had inflicted daydreams more bizarrely optimistic than her wont, had to admit, with some regret, that the life of a princess wasn’t everything it was cracked up to be. Fun, did Mrs. Spice say? For all that she wore beautiful clothes, and jewels, and was for ever having her photograph took, well, it wasn’t what anyone’d call private, was it? Not ever. And being dragged off—or sent, which came to the same thing—visiting all manner o’ places you could be sure she’d never really wanted to see—that was hard on her, and no mistake. Never any freedom for the poor girl; never the chance to choose. And if anyone thought Emmeline Putts could be talked into traipsing over Nuclear Power Stations day after day, well, they’d got another think coming, on account of you could never be sure what it mightn’t do if someone was to drop a match, and blow the place to smithereens ...

  “They won’t,” said Mrs. Stillman, sternly. “Neither ask you, nor blow the place up—so you just stop your nonsense, young Emmy.”

  Emmy tossed her head, and sniffed. Mrs. Skinner was even more outspoken than the postmaster’s wife. “The very idea of you being curtseyed to—it’s downright blasphemous, Emmy Putts!”

  “Treacherous, you mean.” Mrs. Henderson, gleeful, was quick to correct her rival. “Pretending to be royalty, why, that’s treason. Torture you in the Tower o’ London if you don’t watch your tongue, they will!”

  Emmy sniffed again. “What’s wrong with a curtsey? They say Maggie Laver over t’Ashford’s had ’em acurtseying to her all around the station, and not in the Tower yet. And young Sal’s bin practising to Alice Maynard, I heard tell, ready to meet the princess ...”

  “Which she’d better get right,” someone said, “or else we know what’ll happen if she doesn’t. Don’t we?”

  A long, penetrating stare raked the horrified assembly, which let out its breath in a shuddering sigh. There was no doubt of what would happen if young Sally let them down: the local paper had printed the name and address of the runner-up, winner of the second prize.

  The runner-up who hailed from Murreystone ...

  chapter

  ~ 9 ~

  THE ROAD BETWEEN Plummergen and Dungeness is almost level over the entire distance. On normal occasions there are those with a bent for natural history who often bicycle in a south-easterly direction across the marsh to go fishing, or to study the many varieties of bird-life—gulls, terns, grebes, shelduck, mallard, and many more—which frequent the flint-grey, pebbly peninsula.

  On this particularly momentous occasion, however, it was considered neither practical nor dignified for even the most devoted cyclists to travel from the village to the Official Opening under their own power. Car owners with unoccupied seats offered lifts to their pedalling—and pedestrian—friends; Crabbe’s Garage laid on both the regular bus, and the spare.

  Crabbes have been mechanics for four generations. Old Crabbe (whose son, Young Crabbe, died in the last War) is well advanced in years, and has been forbidden by his family to drive either of the buses, much as he would relish the challenge. A distant connection of Daniel Eggleden, most recent in the line of village blacksmiths, Old Crabbe moved to Plummergen at the request of a previous Cousin Eggleden around the turn of the century, when the coming of the internal combustion engine could no longer be ignored. Though trained as a smith, Old Crabbe (as he soon became) felt more at home with the petrol-driven beast than he ever had with any number of hay-eating horses.

  Old Eggleden, Dan’s grandfather, accordingly agreed with his Cousin Crabbe to divide responsibility for local transport between the two establishments; and thus it remains to this day. The bus, taxi, and hire car services are run from the garage on the eastern side of The Street; the farrier’s and smithy stands where it always did, its double doors freshly painted in a rich grass-green, farther down on the western side, near Miss Wicks’s little cottage with the wrought-iron balustrade which is one of Dan Eggleden’s finest creations.

  Very Young Crabbe, Young Crabbe’s son, drove what might be termed the civilian bus: pensioners (including his grandfather, grumbling loudly), car-owners unwilling to lay out good money on petrol, and non-car-owners unable to obtain a lift. His son Jack had the arguably more important task of driving the bus which carried Plummergen’s fifty-odd Junior Mixed Infants (including young Sally and—a concession which irritated every other parent in the village—her mother) with their three teachers: Mr. Martin C. Jessyp, Miss Alice Maynard, and Miss Emily Dorothea Seeton.

  “I think it’s very sensible of Mr. Jessyp to invite Miss Seeton to go with them on the bus,”
said Lady Colveden, as she tidied her wavy brown hair beneath her hat, a beautiful and costly Monica Mary original from the renowned Brettenden milliner. “Goodness, how one feels constricted, dressed like this—but it’s only for an afternoon, thank heavens, and rather fun, once in a while. Naturally, I’d planned that we should offer her a lift, but he’d already spoken to her, as she’s really very good at keeping them on their best behaviour. Only think how awful it would be if HRH saw them the way they can sometimes be. She rang earlier, you know, to ask me what to wear,” she added, tucking a final mischievous curl in place.

  “Georgy Girl?” enquired Nigel. “I should’ve thought she had enough advisers at Buck House, without having to phone all the way to Plummergen for help.” He loomed over the top of his mother’s head, checking the knot of his tie in the hall mirror. “Perhaps I’d better do it again—what do you think?”

  “I think you’re trying to annoy me. You know very well I meant Miss Seeton. She’s a teacher, after all, even if it is only part time—and it would be like a lady-in-waiting, wouldn’t it? So HRH will understand. Poor Sally—she’s as jumpy as anything, even though Miss Maynard’s rehearsed her for simply ages. And so’s she—and her mother is, too.”

  “I would’ve thought,” said Nigel, “that if Mrs. Maynard’s been curtseying all over the place she’d be more than jumpy, she’d be crippled. The number of times that poor woman’s been stuck in bed with her back, with her daughter rushing off to look after her ... Hence Miss Seeton’s part-timing, of course, which saves us taking another car, as Dad’s not coming and the two of us can easily fit in the MG.”

  Lady Colveden sighed. “Such a shame he had a sitting today, of all days—but justice has to be done, and someone has to do it.” She frowned. “Dispense it? Anyway, you’ll never make a magistrate, Nigel, while you have such a dreadful sense of humour. I meant that Miss Maynard is jumpy, and so is Sally’s mother. Miss Seeton is always so wonderfully calm, she’ll do them a tremendous amount of good, especially now she doesn’t have to worry about her clothes.”