'Private affairs indeed! That depraved creature was stark naked and wearing a French tickler and if you call that a bed-bath, I most certainly don't,' said Mrs Clyde-Browne, managing to combine sexual knowledge her husband had never suspected with a grievance that he'd never bothered to use one. But before he could reply the bedroom door opened and the Matron appeared. Mr Clyde-Browne was grateful to note that this time she was wearing a skirt.
'Well I must say...' she began.
'Don't,' begged Mr Clyde-Browne, 'We're extremely sorry to have...'
'I'm not,' interrupted his wife, 'considering that that filthy man in there '
Mr Clyde-Browne had had enough. 'Shut up,' he told he violently and, leaving her speechless, explained the situation as swiftly as he could to the Matron.
By the time he had finished she was slightly mollified. 'I'll go and see if the Major is prepared to see you,' she said, pointedly ignoring Mrs Clyde-Browne.
'Well I like that,' Mrs Clyde-Browne exploded when the door was shut. 'To think that I should be told to shut up in front of a '
'Shut up!' roared Mr Clyde-Browne again. 'You've already done enough damage and from now on you'll leave the matter in my hands.'
'In your hands? If I'd had my way none of this would have happened. In the first place '
'Peregrine would have been aborted. But since he wasn't you had to delude yourself that you'd given birth to a bloody genius. Well let me tell you '
By the time he had got his feelings about Peregrine off his chest Mr Clyde-Browne felt better. In the next room Major Fetherington didn't. 'If he feels like that about the poor sod I'm not surprised Perry's gone missing. What I can't understand is why that maniac wants to find him. He'd be better off in the Foreign Legion.'
'Yes, but what are you going to tell them?' asked the Matron.
'Lord alone knows. As far as I can remember, he told me he was going to stay with his uncle and then pushed off. That's my story and I'm going to stick to it.'
Five minutes later, Mr Clyde-Browne's legal approach had changed his mind. 'Are you suggesting, Major, that my son was guilty of a deliberate falsehood?'
The Major shifted uncomfortably under the bedclothes. 'Well, no, not when you put it like that. All the same he did say he'd phoned his uncle and...'
'The inescapable fact remains that he hadn't and that no one has seen him since he was left in your care.'
Major Fetherington considered the inescapable fact and tried to elude it. 'Someone must have seen him. Stands to reason. He can't have vanished into thin air.'
'On the other hand, you were personally responsible for his welfare prior to his disappearance? Can you deny that?'
'Prior to, old boy, prior to. That's the operative word,' said the Major.
'As a matter of fact it's two words,' said Mr Clyde-Browne, getting his own back for being called an old boy.
'All right, two operative words. Doesn't make any difference. As soon as he said he was going to his uncle's and shoved off I couldn't be responsible for his welfare, could I?'
'Then you didn't accompany him to the station?'
'Accompany him to the station?' said the Major indignantly, 'I wasn't capable of accompanying anyone anywhere. I was flat on my back with a fractured coccyx. Damned painful I can '
'And having it massaged by the Matron no doubt,' interrupted Mr Clyde-Browne, who had taken out a pocket book and was making notes.
Major Fetherington turned pale and decided to change his tactics. 'Look,' he said, 'I'll do a deal.'
'A deal?'
'No names, no packdrill. You don't mention anything to the Headmaster about you-know-what
