Bad Quarto IV

Imogen is taken aback by the dumb show and the implication that a lecturer however tiresome Venton Gimps is, could have killed a student. However Mottle tells her and her friends from the drama group that he knew John Tallentire from when he was a child and he went climbing with him for years, and trusted him absolutely as a climber. He further demonstrates to her that if Tallentire had tied a knot that slipped a bit, (which he would not do) it still would not result in his falling right into the street and dying. He would have bounced off the walls in the narrow street and just been a bit injured. Mottle is angry about John's death and feels that there is a conspiracy to hide what happened, and that is because it might have been deliberate murder by one of the academics. Imogen feels she has to agree with him, that young Tallentire's fall was caused by someone else. However she meets Duncan Tallentire, his father, an eminent scientist who has come to Cambridge to take up a part time post. He tells her angrily that Mottle has an obsession about the fall, and that he knows what happened to his son, that he was killed but that no good can come of pursuing an investigation. She is startled. Then Susan disappears from college. Some of the staff think that she is just not up to Cambridge standards, and that she knew she didn't fit in there and wasn't clever enough, and that she just left. Imogen likes the girl, so she agrees to go and search for her - starting with a visit to Mary Ollery, her adoptive mother. Mary tells Imogen that most kids in care are damaged by their experiences, and relatively few of them ever manage to get out of the trap they are in, of being poor, lacking social skills and education. Imogen looks up Inchman, her surname, on the net, and finds that there was a woman Valerie Inchman who was jailed for killing her children some years ago.. and then she finds that Susan is Valerie's daughter. Valerie is now dead. Imogen finds out that Duncan Tallentire is often called as an expert witness for scientific issues in court cases, and that there is controversy about how accurate expert witnesses are. There were some cases of mothers being accused of shaking or battering their babies and it is not at all clear if the expert testimony that more than 2 injured children in a family means that the injury is non accidental.

Bad Quarto III

Imogen meets Susan as she is Samantha's room mate.. and can see that the girl while clever is not really happy in Cambridge. Frances tells her that Martin Mottle, who is the student who has offered the Drama society money to perform Hamlet, is still acting very badly, and the group are worried that the performance will damage their reputation. On the night of the play, Mottle insists that 2 friends of his should be in the gallery. The performance does not go too badly; his acting seems to suit the shorter blunter version of Hamlet.. but at the point where there should be a dumb show, Mottle's friends stage a replication of the accident that killed the young climber John Tallentire... with a rope and a window frame, and a student dressed like one of the more eccentric lecturers, Venton Gimps, appears. The real Venton Gimps has a room near to the one where Tallentire fell, and he likes to air controversial opinions and dress extravagantly so he is not much liked. He is appalled by this implication that he had some part in the death of young Tallentire and storms out, telling everyone that he will call his lawyer.

Bad Quarto part II

Frances tells Imogen that the student who insists on playing Hamlet is a terrible actor, but they are hoping that the one performance wont ruin their reputation as actors and that the money will solve all their problems. Imogen finds herself reading up on theories about Shakespeare, and is surprised to find that nowadays a lot of critics dislike his plays for being Imperialist, conservative, anti feminist etc. She gets a visit from Samantha, a literature student who is suffering from anxiety about her work and doing her exams. Samantha also complains that Susan, her current room mate, is a difficult girl and adds to her worries. Susan is from a poor background and she got into Cambridge via a scheme to help young people who missed out on education at school level but are bright. She is clever enough but she has a hot temper and a chip on her shoulder about her being poor and ill educated and is always complaining. She also brings in a young male friend who is dirty and seems to be taking drugs. Imogen finds that Susan was brought up largely in care, and that her foster mother adopted her when she got a bit older, to try and give her some stability. Drama happens when Samantha is found unconscious in her room and it seems like she's taken an overdose. Imogen gets her to hospital, but she is suspicious about the overdose. She thinks that Samantha didn't intend to kill herself, she just wanted to make herself ill and if she was ill at the time of her exam, she might be given a pass because of illness.

Bad Quarto an Imogen Quy Novel

This is I think the last novel written by Jill Paton Walsh about Imogen Quy. She was then employed by the Sayers estate to write continuations of the Lord Peter novels and concentrated on that. However I have never felt that these were very good and found them hard to read. The Bad Quarto refers to a version of Hamlet which has been around for centuries; it is a shorter less elaborate version of the play, and is occasionally performed. At the beginning of the novel, we learn of a tragic accident, where Imogen was called when a young student fell while jumping from building to building in the college, a dangerous hobby pursued by some students who like mountaineering. The student was killed and Imogen was upset but it was seen as an accident and measures were taken to make this leaping hobby more difficult to pursue. Soon afterwards Imogen goes to a meeting of the college drama society, as her lodger Frances Bullion is a member. They need someone to take minutes and she offers to help. At the meeting, the group discuss a major problem... They had a fire in their rehearsal room probably caused by carelessness by the students, and the room was damaged and the part time caretaker was hurt and is still unwell from smoke inhalation. They had let their insurance lapse through a foolish member of the group forgetting.. the member has now left. So they are liable for the damage and worry that Fred the caretaker might sue them though he is slowly getting better. They dont want to renege on their duty of care but the group is seriously in debt. However they are offered a chance to earn a large sum of money. Another student whose father is rich, proposes that they do a one off performance of the Bad Quarto, with him playing lead, and he will pay them a lot of money. It seems odd but they feel that they need to get the money somehow so they decide to accept the offer. M/F

Silver Wedding V

Deirdre's mother Eileen worries about her daughter as well, telling her that she thinks she failed her. She allowed Deirdre to live a superficial life, trying hard to keep up with the Joneses, and never finding reality. Deirdre had been a bright student, but she gave up studying and the idea of working when she got married. She dedicated herself to trying to make out that Desmond was doing as well as Frank Quigley. She tells her mother that at home her parents seemed obsessed with social standing and getting on, and that she felt inferior to her sister who married a rich man. Eileen says that while Sophie, Maureen's mother and some of their friends were indeed obsessed by social ranking and appearances, she honestly just wished for her children to be happy. And now she fears that Deirdre is so fixated on superficial things that she will never learn to be happy. Deirdre continues to fuss about the whole issue of the wedding anniversary and the day finally arrives. Frank Quigley comes and so does Maureen. He talks to Helen and she seems calmer and more rational; she has given up the idea of being a nun.. He says that he knows of a woman who has a small child. She is a career woman, and needs someone to take care of him, and would she like the job? Helen gets on well with children and she says it might be easier than what she had been trying to do so she agrees to take it on for a while. Des is occupied with his new work as Mr Patel's partner, and does his best to tolerate Deirdre's fixation on the party. He is happy with the new shop, but it does not look as if his marriage will ever be a very close one. He knows that he has disappointed his wife, by the fact that they had to get married and then lost their baby who was the reason for the marriage.. and that his lack of success in big business made her unhappy. At the party, Fr Jim, who is still depressed about his nephew's misbehaviour, thinks that Desmond and Deirdre are still not really happy- they seem to him to be playing at being husband and wife.. As a priest, he should be glad that the marriage has lasted 25 years but it still does not seem real to him. But the party goes fairly well. Frank tells everyone that he and his wife Renata are going to adopt a child, from South America. Brigid the nun has helped him arrange it. So he has found a new centre for his marriage. Maureen is happier too because she has found her father, now a widower, and is thinking of opening a shop in the UK near where he lives. Anna who broke up with her boyfriend a few months ago, has a new admirer and is happy. Brendan is glad that he made the effort to come back for his parents but he prefers Ireland. Helen hopes her new job will work out and Eileen hopes that her daughter will be happy now that she has celebrated 25 years of marriage, but is glad to be with her new beau.

Silver Wedding Part IV

Mr Patel who runs the little shop near the station in Desmonds suburb is relieved when Des offers to take over running the business while he is recovering from his injuries. Des finds that he enjoys being involved in a small hands on business much more than having a vague managerial position in a big firm. He and Mr Patel talk a lot and finally he decides to ask for redundancy and buy into the Patel business. Deirdre is not at all happy. She is still focussed on her preparations for the Silver Wedding, still worrying that people wont admire their party giving abilities and see how well she and her family have done. And she very much dislikes Desmond giving up being a manager to run a corner shop. Anna who is the helpful one in the family tries to soothe her and tell her that it doesn't matter that Brendan works on a farm, and that Helen seems to have no direction in her life. Brendan agrees to come back to London for the anniversary party, though he has always hated having to pretend that the family is doing much better than they really are. Deirdre tries to make the best of things, but she's not happy with all the changes in her family's life. Fr Jim had wondered when she told him she wanted to get married quickly, that she might be pregnant, and she denied it. But it turns out that she was pregnant, and went through a fairly speedy marriage, but she lost the baby early in the pregnancy, and her next child Anna was born a respectable time after the wedding. But Deirdre will never admit to this, to being less than perfect.

Doris Langley Moore Born 1902.

Doris was a writer and historian, who was passionately interested in fashion and items like furniture. She was born in Lancashire but was educated in South Africa; her father was a newspaper editor. She went to university and then in the 1920s she began to write books. She married and had a daughter. She had an interest also in art and theatre, and was the founder of a Fashion Museum in Bath. She also wrote several biographies, she was something of an authority on Byron and wrote biographies of him and his daughter. She also produced several novels, including one called Not At Home, which Ive just read. It is set in London just after the war, and is a wry comedy about Miss Farren, a middle aged woman who is not very well off and has a house which she is renting.. She is trying to reduce expenses and decides to let some rooms in the house. There is a terrible shortage of housing in England because of the war damage and people are desperate to find any place. She settles on a younger married woman who is married to an American journalist who is in the Forces. The lady has 2 children who are in the US, and tells Miss Farren that she will be a very careful tenant and no trouble at all.. However, it doesn't work out as she had hoped. Mrs Banks the new tenant is a silly childish woman who is both selfish and dishonest. She moves in and continually has guests staying and she creates a lot of work for Miss Farren's servant. She then cajoles her friends into helping out with the housework, to the point that she drives some of them away. She breaks things and lies about it, and is reluctant to pay for damages. Her husband comes to stay on leave and he is a sensible kind man who gets on well with Miss Farren. She can't understand how he tolerates his wife's silly selfish personality.