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Felter discovered what had been going on, retrieved the photograph but said nothing.’
    Here Mrs Tubbly Pole paused and made a further assault on the crisps, which she proceeded to crunch loudly.
    I waited, letting the sound subside, and then asked: ‘So what happened? Didn’t you say there was a beating?’
    ‘Oh yes, there was that all right – but not until a month later. Pure revenge. The boy was so bruised he had to spend three days in the school sanatorium. They say his spleen was ruptured.’
    ‘Good Lord! So the housemaster had laid into him – how frightful!’
    ‘Oh no, not Felter – Turnbull. At the former’s behest. There was an enormous brouhaha, and master and satellite left under a joint cloud, each blaming the other. I heard that Felter went back to England – joined some accountancy firm near Oxford I rather think; but what happened to Turnbull I had no idea. Didn’t care either.’
    ‘But you do think that was him at tea the other day?’
    ‘Oh yes, the more I think about it, the more I am certain. It would be too much of a coincidence otherwise. Seems to have done well for himself with those language schools. Perhaps he has changed his spots. But I doubt it – they don’t generally, that sort.’ She nodded confidently, and by way of illustration embarked on a graphic résumé of one of her wilder novels in which the detective, a man of unimpeachable probity, had turned out to be the grandson of Jack the Ripper – and with similar propensities.
    ‘Did it sell?’ I enquired innocently.
    ‘Sell?’ she boomed. ‘I should say. Kept Gunga in gin for at least two years!’
    * See Bones in the Belfry

The Vicar’s Version
     
     
    As predicted, after my talk with Eric and his cryptic reference to the bishop’s ‘pickle’, the telephone rang with an episcopal summons. The thin voice of Clinker’s secretary informed me that his Lordship would be obliged if I would call at the Palace at my earliest convenience, i.e. Monday, or Tuesday at the latest. Monday was Bouncer’s day to have his teeth scrubbed, and as far as I was concerned if there was to be a clash between diocesan business and the dog’s dentistry the latter had priority. Thus I opted for ‘the latest’.
    There was a displeased pause at the other end. ‘Hmm, I think his Lordship would have preferred the Monday.’ I murmured something about there being an urgent christening. ‘Very well,’ the voice sighed, ‘I’ll slot you in for nine thirty sharp. You’ve made a note of that, have you, Canon?’
    I assured him I had and asked tentatively if he knew what it might concern.
    ‘Not the least idea,’ was the pained reply. ‘I am merely the messenger.’ He rang off and I lit a cigarette and brooded.
    Clearly, after the enforced intimacies of France and its dramas, Clinker had reverted to official mode – thankful perhaps to resume the mantle of rank and distance. Provided it meant I was not to be embroiled in fresh embarrassment, this mattered not a jot. However, coming so soon after Eric’s news, I suspected that the summons signalled only two things: grief and gloom. I went to the piano and embarked upon Chopin’s Funeral March.
    As was his habit, Bouncer came and took his place beside me, staring up intently at the keys. For a dog of such extrovert temperament, he has a curious penchant for such dirges, and I can never decide which is his favourite, the one from Handel’s Saul or the Chopin. Either way he is apt to punctuate the notes with a series of gurgling whines which I fondly interpret as discerning appreciation – though of course one can never be entirely certain with that dog.
    Maurice, on the other hand, hates all music; and the moment he sees me making for the piano stalks from the room in dudgeon … Although there was one memorable occasion when Savage had lent me his precious gramophone record of Joe Venuti playing ‘Honeysuckle Rose’, and the cat had pranced in curious boogie fashion up and down