A Banner for Pegasus by John & Emery Bonett

A Banner for Pegasus by John & Emery Bonett

 published 1951

‘Angela Wingless could act Elizabeth Brentbridge and dozen like her off any stage in the kingdom… And when Elizabeth’s wooden little face needs lifting, Angela Wingless will still be able to command an audience even with the back of her head.’

 

This is a most enjoyable crime novel to settle into; as far as I can tell, no-one is reprinting this crime-writing couple's 1950s-ish mysteries, but someone really should snap them up.

We are in Steeple Tottering, a small town somewhere in rural England, a place with a pub, tearooms, a local paper, farmers – and traditions and myths. A film company (Pegasus Pictures, hence that really not-very-good title) is descending on the town to make a movie about one of those myths, the story of Petronella and the healing waters. 

Well! 

I can tell you that if you wrote down 10 items you would expect in such a book you will not be disappointed: they will all be there. Our heroine, Hazel, is the most junior of reporters on the paper, and lives with her Mum and Dad, and enjoys the arrival of the film company  as much as we do. There is a very nice young art director in their midst…

There is a huge rock poised on a precipice – yes IKR? – and there are various badly behaved people annoying others. The situation is ripe for murder. (There is a period where we are meant to wonder if it was a natural death, but no need to bother with that.)

Hazel, it has to be said, behaves in a spectacularly stupid manner, in terms of trying to cover up, withholding evidence, believing the worst of someone else, being ready to lie and even to pretend she was present at the accident/crime. Even by the standards of female characters of the 1950s, her decisions are unforgiveable. The Bonetts’ series character, Professor Mandrake, is on hand to help sort out the plot, though I really have no idea how he came to his final conclusions. A reader would certainly find it hard to solve the crime. But that didn’t matter: it was just an enjoyable story.

There’s a local farmer whose sheep are going to appear in the film, and we are party to his negotiations: what he wants is a mention for his sheep in the credits. But he is also bothered that the animals have to be very dirty in one scene, and he wants it made clear that this is not their natural state. He also has a pretty daughter who – yes, tick off number 3 on your list – is going to attract the attention of film-makers, and who will be convinced she has a future in the movies.

There is an excellent leading man:

He had a magnificent torso and wore his shirts deeply unbuttoned. He had reached stardom on the strength of two ‘untamed’ parts and one schizophrenic. Watching him, in action or repose, Steeple Tottering felt it was getting its money’s worth.

 And a splendid bit of upstaging at a memorial event for the victim. It features the two actresses in the top quote:

Elizabeth went into her speech. But the sound recording men were not happy. There was too much background noise…from a car’s  horn.

A car draped and decked with enormous black satin ribbons.

A uniformed chauffeur sprang from the driving seat, dashed round and opened the door which disgorged the epitome of grief, Angela Wingless, white faced, slight, black-veiled from head to foot, frail and stricken – but absolutely determined not to yield one inch of her position as chief mourner in this perfectly built-up scene.

 

Meanwhile, Hazel’s role as journalist is interesting in some of the details – though the scene where she can’t find out what happened at the inquest is ridiculous. In any newsroom you would just ask the person who had covered it ‘what happened?’, NOT to do so would look odd in the circumstances. I worry that it means she is not a very good journalist…

There is some discussion of the status of a man’s necktie – if he had been courting a young lady, outdoors, would the tie be on or off? Might someone other than himself have put it back on him? Trying to account for all this gives us a splendid line:

Hazel replied in a lifeless whisper. ‘He was highly exhilarated.’

There is some interesting discussion of lipstick shades. There are two separate episodes where young women offer and share (and sell) lipsticks and discuss the best way to wear it.

 

‘If you don’t mind my saying so, that’s not your colour lipstick at all. What is it?’

‘It’s called Maidenbloom. I bought it because it seemed harmless.’

‘That’s just what it looks. You’re not giving yourself a chance.’ She regarded Hazel through half-shut eyes. ‘Your colour is Caribbean Orchid…Like to try?’

Mercedes plunged into her bag and after a struggled brought out an ornately encrusted gilt case and insisted on Hazel scraping off the Maidenbloom and replacing it with the luscious magenta of the Caribbean Orchid.

Magenta lipstick has form on the blog – see the discussion of this Patricia Wentworth book The Dower House Mystery by Patricia Wentworth (clothesinbooks.blogspot.com)

There have been two other books by the Bonetts on the blog – Dead Lion and No Grave for a Lady, both equally enjoyable.

Jonathan Coe book covers exactly this – film-making in the UK in 1950. His book The Rain Before it Falls features the making of a real film, Gone to Earth (based on a Mary Webb book). Blogpost here The Rain Before it Falls by Jonathan Coe (clothesinbooks.blogspot.com)

One of Ngaio Marsh’s grimmer efforts deals with healing springs too – Dead Water, a book I disliked so much I didn’t blog on it, no, not even to be rude about it.

Top picture is a still from a dramatic Italian film of roughly the era.