The Late Mrs Prioleau – Monica Tindall (1946)

The third of the four and half books I read while I was in hospital was The Late Mrs Prioleau from Dean Street Press. I had had it for some time on my kindle – and I think I wanted to read it for the simple reason that I hadn’t seen anyone else talking about it and was therefore intrigued. It was the only novel that Monica Tindall published – and some background to the novel and to Monica and her family is provided in the introduction written by her niece Gillian Tindall.

Gillian Tindall tells us that her aunt came to think of the book as weak – and while there are a few small weaknesses in the novel, I think overall it is a novel of some subtlety and is definitely worth reading. In terms of style and story, it is rather different to many of the books being re-issued by Dean Street Press. Certainly, Monica Tindall does an excellent job of very gradually building up a picture of the titular character – who we first encounter in her coffin on the day of her funeral – as does her new daughter-in-law Susan, our narrator.

“The first and only time I saw my mother-in-law was when she lay dead in her coffin. Beside her knelt Austin, her eldest son, his face buried in a wet handkerchief and his fat body shaken by sobs. The patchy spring sunshine flickered against the drawn blinds and outside a wind from the sea blew thinly over the marshes. The air in the bedroom was at once cold and stuffy, smelling of damp and illness and old clothes.”

New Zealander Susan is newly married to Henry, the youngest of Mrs Prioleau’s four adult children – Henry has had little to do with his mother, or indeed any of his family for years. Gradually it seems Mrs Prioleau drove everyone away, everyone that is but Austin, her eldest son, her spoilt fat baby, who on the day of the funeral can be heard weeping, wailing, and carrying on to the most ridiculous extent – making himself rather ill in the process. Susan senses that there is a darkness at the heart of this family, a darkness she wants to understand for her husband’s sake.

It is 1939, war is expected any day – and of course soon the whole of Europe is swept up in the conflict. The novel takes us from these early days of war, through the dark days of the blitz to around the middle of the war. With everyone it seems, busy or away – it is Susan who is gently persuaded by the family solicitor to help Austin go through Mrs Prioleau’s belongings, sorting through and disposing of what needs to be got rid of. It is a long way from being a job she wants. Austin had not made a very good impression on Susan at the funeral – and now she must spend several days with him in his mother’s house. Both the family solicitor and the family doctor want to get Austin away from the house for his own good – they consider him to be rather fixated on his late mother – who had been his whole life while she was alive. If Austin isn’t bad enough – there is also the parrot to contend with, a fairly sinister creature with the uncanny knack of mimicking his dead mistress – much of what he says sounding really quite malevolent.

“A shrill voice from down the stairs broke suddenly in on the silence. “Austin!” it called. “Austin!” Then came a low, rather malicious chuckle which made me think I was not going to like Henry’s sisters. “Draw in now,” said the voice on a gentler note. “Draw into the fire and warm yourself.” I went downstairs wondering that they had arrived so silently and that I had not heard them talking to Henry. “Fine morning!” An uncertain tenor voice greeted me. “Fine morning!” Through the open door of the kitchen Mrs Prioleau’s grey parrot looked at me with a hard, yellow eye and chuckled. “That parrot!” Henry appeared and threw a cover over him. “How they put up with him I don’t know. I hated him when I was a child, and I think he’s worse than ever now.”

It is the time that Susan spends in Mrs Prioleau’s house with Austin that starts her wondering as to what kind of woman her mother-in-law was. Having spent time working as both a journalist and a detective fiction writer, Susan is fairly well placed to try and get to the truth behind her husband’s dysfunctional family.

As the years of the war go on, Susan is separated from her Henry for long periods of time, waiting as so many did during those years for the dreaded communication one hoped would never come. She has the chance to spend time with both her sisters-in-law – and with the late Mrs Prioleau’s sister. Bit by bit a picture emerges of the woman Helena Prioleau was. What was it though, that turned a popular, attractive, witty young woman into a bitter, spiteful old woman who drove most of her family away from her? Helena’s story is told in flashback, taking us back to the end of the nineteenth century, a story of disappointments, rash decisions, a great love affair and a marriage of convenience. There are some shocking stories from Helena’s later years, including an incident of animal cruelty, a rumour that a servant was driven to suicide, and a plethora of nasty letters.

There is a little twist in the tale too – which I must say I saw coming, but it didn’t spoil the story for me. A quick, engrossing read overall, psychologically it is very astute, and it such a shame that the author didn’t produce more books.