Before delving into the rather bizarre behaviour of Cousin Prue, I must bring up another thing of interest regarding my father's second cousin P, whom I have long suspected of some kind of skulduggery. The fact is that P left us with a final mystery. The question is: if P was not involved in some dark pursuit, and spent all her time knitting or working at telephony, how did she, upon leaving this mortal coil, manage to leave a handsome fortune approaching two million pounds? Aye – a good question, is it not? I will allow you to ponder over that one.
Getting back now to Cousin Prue, the most obvious thing that she had in common with P was that they were both short of male companionship. Neither of them married and I think for Prue at least, this was a source of anxiety.
Prue makes her first appearance in 'Rhymes for no Reason', where we learn that she has turned a blue shade. This she attempts to correct by eating pea soup, but this has the effect of restoring her original green shade. Nobody knows why her skin was originally green; doctors told her that it was probably a genetic fluke of some kind. Anyway, it was certainly not helpful in the quest for a mate, as 'The Green Man' was usually the name of a pub. Prue was not one to give up easily though, and she appears next in the next book in 'The Running of the Bath' in which her bath grows legs and marches defiantly out of the bathroom and down the road. This presents a golden opportunity for Prue to display her charms to local gents. However, this ploy is unsuccessful for a very unexpected reason, as you will see in 'Rhymes of the Newfangled Mariner'.
Undaunted, Prue decides on radical action in 'A Life at Sea' in 'The Curse of the Square Crow', where she decides to try, for a change from men, to live on the seabed with a community of lesbian octopuses that are trying to form a modern soundless orchestra – The Frondphonic. She gets on well, being musical, but eventually the salt water and seaweed conspire to force her to consider a return to a more conventional hunting-ground.
Fortune finds her in the fifth book, 'Tricked by the Kippers' Knickers', (coming soon), in which she takes the pragmatic view that a doctor would be an ideal companion. Seduced by his shining stethoscope and crisp white coat, she plays all her cards at once, but fails to elicit sufficient interest in the medic to carry off the project successfully. Slightly crestfallen, and a 'woman of needs', she vows to return to the fray to continue the search. She will return, and possibly with a vengeance!