The Attending Truth
A review of The Attending Truth by E R Punshon – 230819
Originally published in 1952 when Punshon was eighty and reissued by Dean Street Press, The Attending Truth is the thirtieth in his Bobby Owen series. Called in by the local Chief Constable, Mr Lawson, Bobby is faced with a mysterious murder, that of John Winterspoon, a commercial traveller specialising in groceries, a stranger to the area, Pending Dale, who had only just arrived, had only spoken to two people, and yet had had his stoved in in a copse, which had gained local notoriety for peeping Toms.
With little to go on by way of hard evidence, Owen has to embark upon a painstaking study of the psychological make-up of the key characters, ramping up the pressure on them to see who cracks and what emerges. As he says, when defending his methods, the policeman’s methods might be described as plodding but the truth, the attending truth, is waiting there to be discovered. Of course, Bobby’s tactics work and what he discovers is a tale of black marketeering, bigamy, and revenge.
As Bobby is working for much of the time on his own and he does not have the stalwart Olive to use as a sounding board for his concerns and theories, she is surprisingly absent from the story, much of the narrative consists of his introspective thoughts, reasonings, struggles to make sense of perplexing details or coincidences, and his theories. It can give the impression that the story is going round and round in circles, never seeming to get anywhere conclusive, but this is the nature of police work and the reader is given enough clues to work out how the pieces come together and who the culprit is.
Key to understanding the whodunit aspect of the case are names and the identity of the fourth blunt instrument that Bobby keeps referring to. The whydunit aspects to the case are not as easy for the reader to determine independently, save for the inescapable impression that Winterspoon is not the unknown quantity that he seems at first sight to be and has links with several of the key characters.
There are some strong characters in the book, mainly, as is Punshon’s wont, including the formidable Mrs Holcombe, who has the village in her pocket and discovers the body, her sculptor daughter, Livia who is conducting a clandestine affair, Annie Mars, the all-knowing local beauty whose abduction leads to the denouement and the revelation of the truth, and the archetypal ‘er indoors, the redoubtable and domineering grocer’s wife, Mrs Jones. The male characters, including the other worldly vicar, Duggan, and the outwardly aggressive Yeo-Young, complete with snarling dog, Pompey, and the belligerent Mr Mars are no match for the female quartet.
I enjoyed Punshon’s sympathetic treatment of the tramp, Walker. Usually, they are stereotypical, objects of scorn and obvious scapegoats for any misdemeanour. However, Owen sees that this gentleman of the road could be an asset and, rather to the tramp’s surprise, improves his lot in return for assistance in bringing the case to its conclusion.
In Poirot style Owen summons all the principal characters to a meeting at Mrs Holcombe’s house and as he slowly reveals his theories and thoughts on the case unleashes a series of events which bring drama to a story that had hitherto been lacking it and the case to its resolution.
Punshon can always be relied upon for a little tongue-in-cheek humour and a sharp observation on life. I enjoyed his observation that it was possible to get first-rate food in England as long as it had not been cooked, prompted by an execrable meal Bobby had to endure at the pub he was staying in.
While the plot is not overly complicated, it was interesting enough to keep this reader entertained. Punshon rarely fails to deliver.
