Gervase Fen saw himself as an adventurer manqué (Moving Toyshop). And there is much evidence that this was no idle boast or piece of self-delusion. He was what P.G. Wodehouse would have called a ‘buzzer’: desperate to avoid boredom, he would let loose his tongue, or worse, without care for the consequences.
In Moving Toyshop, for example, he loosed, not the dogs of war, but an even deadlier school of inebriated undergraduates upon the forces of evil. His rudeness, whether calculated or merely thoughtless, is instanced elsewhere. Sometimes he could be downright silly, as when he asked Garratt, (HD), "If you’re an Inspector, what do you inspect?"
It is clear he loved to play with words to any audience, a trait that lasted his entire career, ranging in aspect from the marvellous punnery of "A terrible cutie is born" (GM) to his off-the-cuff speech to Captain Watkyn in Buried For Pleasure. Watkyn, posing as potential heckler, asked him, "What about exports?". In reply, Fen touched on imports, party politics, idealism, monkeys, and mentioned, once, exports, without ever answering the question. It seems reasonable to conclude that Crispin’s account was culled by political image-makes everywhere and used as text-book indoctrination by their employers.
Fen possessed a very low boredom threshold. Delays of any sort made him cough, groan, yawn, shuffle his feet and generally fidget. Until about his fiftieth year, he walked with enormous strides and boundless energy. In one instance — Gilded Fly? — he mounted a stairs so rapidly it seemed he must have taken it four steps at a time. Yet by Swan Song (1946), he is glad Joan Davis’s dressing room is on the second floor — a sad sign that even his vitality was not immune to age.
Fen was not averse to lying. Indeed, he was happy to lie and bluff when the occasion demanded, as in his interview with Dr Boysenberry in Buried For Pleasure. But it was not something he liked doing when it involved his emotions. He hated when he had to lie to Judith Hayes in Swan Song and only did it because he knew that if she learned the truth, he would never get the information he needed.
His very ebullience meant that it was extremely difficult to silence or offend him. The aged Wilkes was one of the few who could quell him, and had the sense to ignore his excesses. Elspeth Murdoch (Love Lies Bleeding) admonished him and so astonished him he shut up. And he could sometimes be argued over, as Captain Watkyn showed over the van in Buried For Pleasure . Insulting him was virtually impossible — and certainly unwise. Perhaps the nearest thing to genuine indignation he ever showed was in The Long Divorce, when, to an exclamation of ‘You can’t be serious!’, he responds with "Of course I can be serious. I often am."
Humility was not normally one of Fen’s patent virtues, making it all the more believable occasionally displayed. When Elizabeth Harding suggested he was better qualified to get on and solve the case than to offer silly advice on people’s personal problems (SS ), he simply, and movingly, responded, "I don’t think I’m very well qualified for anything."
Mr Crispin informs us in Holy Disorders that Fen’s spirits were raised by adversity, a claim that will not surprise anybody. The Professor’s reactions, though, are worth a study in themselves. Crispin tells us that when Fen went unexpectedly gloomy, it was a sure sign certain things were becoming clear to him. Indeed, Mr Crispin assures us in Gilded Fly that Fen’s mood was a good barometer of how he fared in a case. At the start, he adopted a formidable, ice-cold concentration, but when not interested in what was going on, he relapsed into an irritating form of boisterous gaiety. When he discovered something important he became melancholy, and when a case ended he sunk into a mood of prolonged gloom.
He was prone to sudden, unrehearsed pronouncements on life. To the psychoanalyst Peace (Holy Disorders) he said, "Dissatisfaction always breeds demands, even if they’re not for the particular satisfaction that’s lacking." When he considered this, he looked pleased with himself. This contrasts with his dislike of smugness when exhibited by others, such as the janitor, Wells, in Love Lies Bleeding.
Perhaps the best example of how he sometimes reacted to his investigations is found in Gilded Fly, when, following Robert Warner’s death, he looked suddenly old and tired.
One further point: he commanded the power of impersonal ruthlessness, when demanded. His harshness to Alice Winkworth in Moving Toyshop showed this at its most formidable, causing much surprise to Cadogan. How much, as that poet wondered, was simple expediency?
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