A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
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PASHLEY PICADOR - The only lasting physical effect of the assault to which I was subjected by my Grandfather Coe is damage to the inner ear that causes occasional disorientation. While I'm usually nimble, occasions have arisen when I've found myself unable to make my way down step-ladders or across narrow bridges. These obstacles can be negotiated, either by calling for assstance with my emergency whistle or resorting to an undignified descent on my buttocks. Since the day of the attack, however, I've been unable to remain on a conventional bicycle. Certain members of the extended family maintain that I never mastered this art in the first place: not so! I was, in fact, a precociously adept cyclist.
Rather than miss out on the healthy pleasures of cycling, I've owned a succession of trikes, the most recent of which has been the Pashley Picador, a product I wouldn't hesitate to endorse. My niece, Muriel, however is less enthusiastic about my Picador, claiming, in fact, to detest the sight of it. Until recently, I respected her request that I desist from cycling through the centre of Drumfeld between four and six, the hours when she and her friends were returning from school. Sensitivity, however, as I've had cause to remind her, should be reciprocal. The discovery that I've been savagely lampooned by Muriel both locally, in Drumfeld Churchyard and internationally, over the internet, has rendered me indifferent to accusations that I'm 'the most embarrassing man in the world'. Consequently, when cycling through town, if I see Muriel and her friends, I don't hesitate to ring my bell and wave.
PASSION – Word formerly synonymous with ardour and conviction, now commonly misused to condone absence of restraint. In the past ‘passionate' people were recognised by an inner glow, today they tend to be ill-mannered and violent advocates of idiotic causes.
PATERSON, DOUGLAS (1970 - ) Comedian. When Spencer located his so-called birth family, the Patersons, he formed a particular bond with Douglas or ‘Doug'. Doug had a comedy act that he performed in local night-clubs. This comprised of a litany of tedious observations about day to day life: toilet paper running out, dates taking a long time to get ready. Although I don't watch television, I could tell from audience anticipation of his punch-lines that most of his material was second hand. My brother's appearance obviously offered him a fresh, original approach and he started incorporating Spencer into his act. I'm ashamed to say that I felt the thrill of vindication watching Spencer watch Doug recount the various complications entailed by the appearance of a thirty-two year old baby brother. From the rear of the hall I could see his neck redden and foot tap the parquet floor in a semaphore of agitation. Part of the new routine involved his difficulty in dealing with an attractive new half-sister. Watching Spencer writhing in his seat, I could tell that Doug, whether by accident or design, had struck a nerve. Like a dog that habitually attaches itself to its owner's leg, Spencer has always been incapable of separating affection of the heart from that of the groin, an affliction that has clouded his judgement since puberty and blighted nearly all of his male/female relationships. I'm occasionally thankful that Patsy's transformation into womanhood has been blighted by acne lest she become subjected to her uncle's unwholesome fixation. His newly discovered half-sister, Lisa, certainly possessed the sort of charms to which someone like Spencer might be susceptible and, having observed his body language around her, I suspect that it was some compulsive indiscretion that led to his their final rift.
Apart from confirming Spencer's tendency to grossly inappropriate behaviour, my investigation into the Patersons established that at least four members of the extended family suffered from depressive related illness while three others were alcoholics. Spencer (and Doug's) mother was hospitalised on at least three occasions and died of drink related causes. His father was married four times and twice charged with spousal abuse. According to Doug's Uncle Charlie, the more pronounced of the alcoholics, who I approached in the guise of 'Sandy the sea-dog' and plied with whiskies in exchange for gossip, at the time of Spencer's father's death he was in a 'partnership' with his dog. I suspect that this last piece of information was an invention but the rest of my Paterson dossier was testament to a collection inherited traits replicated in Spencer and imported into the house of Coe.
Douglas Paterson
PEARSON, GUY (1964 - ) Former brother in law of Hamilton Coe, Dullard, Cheat, Heir to Pearson's Garden Centre Empire. It's always been my experience that people of limited imagination tend to be dogmatic in their opinions. The universal arrogance of the narrow-minded makes scant allowance for possibilities beyond the realm of logic, dismissing them with epithets like ‘charlatan', ‘lunatic' and ‘chancer'. More often than not, the so-called voice of reason has a limited vocabulary and is overly reliant on the word ‘no'. From experience, I can testify that the naysayer's faith in the natural order is shaken when the elderly ‘bellboy' at the hotel in which he's been conducting his affair suddenly steps from the wardrobe, straightens up, removes his beard and reveals himself to be the object of his scepticism. In Pearson's case, this agent of revelation was none other than Hamilton Coe!
Presented with a dossier of his transgressions, Pearson moved to Falkirk, where his father had recently taken over an existing garden centre, and assumed a managerial role. Guy's father, incidentally, once offered me a position shifting bags of mulct, a deliberate insult I believe he has come to regret.
PEOPLE WHO SAW TOMORROW, THE – In the wake of NINA KELLY's disgraceful conduct at my home (see SUICIDE, ATTEMPTED) we expected her employers to dismiss her and send someone competent to the task of investigating my powers. Instead they produced not one, but four episodes of The People Who Saw Tomorrow in which I was portrayed by SAMUEL NIMMO, a malign looking dwarf with a metabolic disorder who attempted to convey an impression of psychic intuition by pointing at people and shrieking in a hideous falsetto. Nimmo, incidentally, has subsequently been arrested on numerous occasions for acts of gross depravity. Nina, meanwhile, wrote her first book on the subject of psychic detection, a volume in which charlatans and schizophrenics are glorified and I'm dismissed in the chapter Frauds, Sharks and Weirdoes as a “morbid Scottish adolescent who spends his time stealing underwear and sifting through his neighbours' rubbish.” This was a deliberate misinterpretation of incidents that occurred in the course of investigations. Sophie Haggard's technique, in contrast, comprises entirely of throwing teabags at people, yet Nina, perhaps empathising with the plight of a fellow psychotic fat woman, afforded her an entire chapter, crediting her with the resolution of various cases including at least one that occurred in the realm of fiction. The fact that I had been extensively tested under laboratory conditions and had received laminated certificates of authenticity from research facilities and universities in London, Munich and Tampa Bay, Florida went unrecorded.
PERTWEE, JON (1919 – 1996) Actor. Any parent of a clairvoyant child must be constantly on guard for potential causes of psychic disruption. While microwaves mobile phones and even digital watches can interfere with thought patterns, the most pernicious enemy of the clairvoyant child's development is television. This is hardly surprising when one considers the number of images with which the ultra-receptive mind is bombarded. Apart from the unfolding narrative seen by everyone else, the psychic has to deal with mental images projected by the writers, actors and others involved with the production. In my experience, shows such as Dr Who are particularly upsetting, not because of the preposterous plots and characters, but the private lives of the unsavoury individuals involved in the programme's production. Jon Pertwee, the third actor to play the Doctor, but the first with whom I was personally ‘acquainted', also played Worzel Gummidge, a turnip-headed symbol of cruelty emanating from depths of the universal subconscious. Gummidge was adapted from the stories of Barbara Euphan Todd in the sort of sadistic frenzy that normally results in murder. Had parents been aware of the damage this monstrous scarecrow was wreaking in their children's psyches they would have destroyed their television sets.
Unable to recover from the psychic disruption of assuming the roles of Who and Gummidge, Pertwee's latter years were spent on the Isle of Wight where he gained a reputation for shooting any dogs that wandered onto his land.
Jon Pertwee as Dr Who
PIRIE, ROBERT (1860 – 1920) Artist. For years the Scott Room of Drumfeld Museum contained the Pirie Collection. It was the one room in the building I was loath to enter. Pirie's gloomy landscapes never failed to cause me apprehension, prompting feelings of isolation and escalating panic. Staring into the canvases, I had the distinct impression of something trapped behind the paint. As a teenager, my impressions became more specific: frightened women wandered lost through Pirie's hills and forests. Researching his life and times, I was intrigued to discover that Pirie was a member of the Sons of the Morning sect and resident in London throughout the period of the Whitechapel murders. Forming an unlikely alliance with Pauline Semple, a feminist agitator, I campaigned to have Pirie's paintings removed from the museum and analysed: a simple enough request, strenuously resisted by the local council. It only recently occurred to me that the individuals who most strenuously opposed the aims of the Coe/Semple coalition were members of the Round Table, the society that evolved from the Sons of The Morning.
The Pirie collection was largely destroyed in a fire at a Glasgow Museums' warehouse where they were in storage having been lent to the city for an exhibition of Scottish landscapes. While the blaze was attributed to an electrical fault, I have every reason to suspect the involvement of Rotarians desperate to retain their secrets.
POE, EDGAR ALLAN (1809 – 1849) Fiend, Murderer. A so-called creative person is invariably driven by exactly the same motives that might compel someone else to break a window. It's unfashionable to advocate the destruction of art-works, but nothing produced in a malevolent spirit can do anything other than replicate that ill-feeling in others. Edgar Allen Poe, for example, wrote while in such a foul humour that nobody reading him can fail to be effected. My brother, Spencer, became infatuated with his work while in his early teens and was subsequently prone to bad skin, moodiness and solitary pleasures. I vividly remember the embarrassing circumstance of being trapped under Spencer's bed while he unsuccessfully attempted to seduce Tara Gibb. Looking up, I was startled by the appearance of Poe's scowling face pressed against the window-pane, forefinger pointed toward me. Unable to restrain myself, I cried out and suffered the indignity of being dragged from my hiding place by the ears. To this day, Spencer remains afflicted by Poe's baleful influence. He sulks and loiters, leaving disgusting emissions.
POE, HARRISON - My fictional American counterpart, contrived by my cousin Pamela for the enterainment of numbskulls. The experienced investigator recognises that the most elaborate of fantasies are invariably constructed around a kernel of truth. Pamela's narrative, unravelling over the course of 'Harrison's' mother's funeral, is indisputably based upon actual events. Pamela makes a great deal, for example, of the reception 'Harrison' hosts to give notice of his mother's passing. I've no compunction in conceding that a similar event was held in the House of Coe. I'm not sure why she finds this so remarkable. She must have witnessed stranger events during her time in Los Angeles. Certainly there was a minor incendiary incident involving one of my mother's friends, but the blaze was extinguished without any of the hullaballoo described by the story's precocious narrator 'Patsy', (a figment borne of characteristics borrowed from Christine, Muriel and Pamela herself.)
See also MACLACHLAN, KYLE and MALCOLM, PAMELA.
POP MUSIC - For some reason, Spencer finds this term offensive, becoming particularly agitated when it's used to refer to his own oeuvre. In it's literal sense, the term is certainly inappropriate: his songs aren't 'popular' in themselves. They are, however, derivative of ones that are. His intention in writing them was to imitate the baleful influences of his youth and, consequently, make himself a baleful influence to others. The fact that he's failed to interest more than a handful of people can be attributed to a lack of practical diligence and unsavoury fixations rather than absence of ambition.
PORTKIRK – For months now, users of the Station Road public convenience have been confronted by crudely scrawled claims that Drumfeld is “the suicide capital of the Western Highlands.” I'm happy to reassure visitors that this is not the case. That dubious title, if allotted at all, must be given to Portkirk whose suicide rates per head of population are comparable to any of the Japanese city in which self-destruction is the only socially acceptable response to the most minor disappointment or humiliation. Portkirk, it should be said is situated within half a mile of Rannoch Moor: ill-will is retained in mires making them unsuitable places for human habitation. For slightly different reasons, towns in the vicinity of mines, disaster zones or battlefields are also psychically unbalanced and, in my opinion, should be abandoned. Such drastic measures, however, certainly wouldn't apply to Drumfeld which is situated in accordance to every conceivable natural law.
PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSAULT - With the co-operation of various dubious characters, NINA KELLY proceeds through my adolescence and man-hood, dismissing what she understands of my philosophy and investigative techniques and completely ignoring what she doesn't. As has always been her wont, she's in her element when dispensing with any pretence of academic objectivity and resorting to personal abuse. As far as Nina's concerned, when no lucid argument can be summoned, insult will suffice. Few of us can withstand the shock to the system generated by three hundred and ninety pages of unkind observations. For most people self perception is largely determined by the response they elicit from others. Experimenting with volunteers, I've established how effectively the average person can be demoralised by candid observations. One negative comment is sufficient to cause anxiety, five or more total despondency! One of my subjects, someone I considered relatively thick skinned, was so dismayed by a relatively innocuous remark about her personal hygiene that she broke down and subsequently resigned from her position in the Foundation. Naturally, I'm made of sterner stuff. After a lifetime of peering into the darkness I seldom recoil from what looks back at me. In any case, while I'm astonished that Nina hasn't moved on, I've heard it all before.
PSYCHOMETRY - Five years ago, I enjoyed my most celebrated success as a detective, the Dillon Forrest murder. Having established NINA KELLY'S credentials, is it necessary to point out that her version of events is wrong in nearly every respect? She refers to me constantly appearing in trees or patches of foliage, items of underwear pulled tightly over my scalp, a comical image, perhaps, but one with little bearing in reality. While this isn't the place to go deeply into my method, I should briefly explain the art of the psychometrist. To the receptive mind, every object retains impressions. It's entirely possible reconstruct an entire life-history from a discarded cigarette butt. Certain objects can be analysed more effectively than others. Underwear, for example, retains the essence of its wearer. An experienced psychometrist knows that a sock, vest or pair of underpants will yield more information than less intimate items. Over the years I've been the victim of various misunderstandings on this account, most of which have been repeated by Nina with leering relish. Anyone who knows me, however, is aware that if I'm wearing a bra on my head, some darker business is indicated than the indulgence of a puerile fetish.
Like most forms of clairvoyance, psychometry is potentially hazardous. An emotionally or mentally fragile practitioner has to exercise caution. Every clairvoyant knows at least one horror story of someone overwhelmed by what, for want of a better phrase might be termed the psychic residue contained within some apparently innocuous object. I've always been robust. Perhaps that's why in investigating the murder of COSMIN BALCESCU I behaved so incautiously. When I held his glove over my brow I immediately went into a seizure. I've no memory of what happened. According to Christine, I convulsed violently and bellowed in a dialect she instinctively associated with gypsies. When I emerged from the fit, the front of my brain hissed gently, like a damp sponge placed on a hot ring. The mind previously sensitive to information gleaned from a bar of soap or a cigarette butt, was as sluggish as gum discarded on a radiator. For the first time in my life, my mind was blank.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z