You can imagine all the characters reaching for the whiskey, gritting their teeth, clutching the arms of their chairs. You imagine they would want to change the subject as soon as possible. But no one does. Can there be more? Oh, yes there is--
The prelude to this ghastly murder and subsequent disappearances of other children was the slaughter of lambs killed in a similar fashion and just as ignominiously disposed of. Verner's narrative style is so detached, so British, presenting such monstrous acts in as tasteful a manner as possible. The guests feel more challenged by how to conduct themselves with decorum rather than show their true feelings. The men shake their heads and dismiss it as the actions of a lunatic, the woman utter euphemistic platitudes. Collectively the dinner party basically shakes their head mumbling about “nasty work”. We expect outrage but get lackadaisical resignation.
If that weren’t enough their hostess Helen Wymondham is more concerned about how the evening was ruined, "all gaiety vanished" no matter how many “valiant efforts” she made to restore it to a pleasant evening for all. She babbles on interminably as she tries to say her good nights to her nephew Peter Chard and his wife Ann: “Such a dismal atmosphere, I’m really quite relieved that the evening is over. I do wish it hadn’t happened today of all days. It would have been so nice if we could have had a really jolly evening…”
Of course this is just a precursor to more unspeakable acts.
The next day four people, two men and two women, are discovered dead at another party held in a reputedly haunted house known as Witch House. It had snowed on Halloween and footprint trails travel towards the house showing all four entered, but none travel away showing anyone left. The door was locked from the inside and had to be broken down. All four people are found seated at a dinner table, some meats are still on a sideboard, a wine bottle is empty, and all four have eaten and drunk wine. There is a fifth place setting at the table but the plate and glass are untouched, empty of food or drink. Examination of the bodies indicates cyanide poisoning, later corroborated by autopsy, administered via the wine. When mass suicide is ruled out the police are faced with what appears to be a locked room and four impossible murders. Who poisoned the wine, locked the room, and escaped without leaving footprints in the snow?
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxMPZN5oi3JA7hsxuLhEiAC4gX9viezUka9Q3O2LgLbyiuHLUOzIIwi2F4uBZlBLoqmV9uqj9Dr01DFOZrzL80dqAQ0qoagIDYX_afBzFwDBKsbwt7bWImLa756nhxrog9DuOTUWKNFOw/s320/Walton-Witch+House-UK+pb.jpg)
The detection and clues are here, but Verner is sloppy in his handling of his sinister plot. While we watch Peter discover things like an ornate jeweled brooch in the shape of capital L in the home of victim Laura Courtland, and read up on witchcraft and horrid occult rituals in the library of Anthony Sherwood other pieces of detective work are shaded in ambiguity or just plain unfair. There are two blatant references to an aspect of one character’s unusual past that stick out like a sore thumb indicating a major clue as to how the the impossibility was pulled off, but on the other hand we never learn (until the last chapter) what Peter found when he investigated the front porch of the Witch House. All the reader knows is that he sees it, smiles and walks away.
Verner seems to lack the confidence to play fair with his readers. He’ll hide a couple of aces up his sleeve but then let one drop out onto the table ineptly. Too much detection happens offstage or is described so obliquely that the reader is unclear what has been discovered. The clues are a mix of the utterly absent or completely obvious. When the solution to the impossible crime comes many readers may be disappointed by its familiarity in the impossible crime subgenre, a gimmick used almost as frequently as knife throwing.
In the end They Walk in Darkness comes off as an inferior homage to a Dennis Wheatley occult thriller moreso than a traditional detective novel. Verner has been described as being inspired by Edgar Wallace in that even when he sits down to write a detective novel he ends up with action oriented thrillers, often with gangsters and career criminals as the antagonists. However, the more I read of Gerald Verner the more I'm reminded of a similarly prolific crime writer who wrote under multiple pseudonyms. Edwy Searles Brooks whose "Ironsides" Cromwell books written in his “Victor Gunn” guise are very much in line with what Verner wrote. Both include impossible crimes, haunted houses, Gothic atmosphere galore, elements of weird and supernatural fiction always rationalized, and the standard heightened melodrama exemplified by this Lovecraftian passage:
Something had come into that quiet, warm, cosy room -- a disturbing, unpleasant something, as though a door had partially opened and through the crack had come writhing abominable and hideous things from an unspeakable hell.…
Luridly cliche? Yes, but a perfect evocation for what's to come. And it would have been fine if Verner ended the chapter there. Instead he undermines the terror with the prosaic by tacking on this absurd coda:
Peter slid the brooch into his pocket."Let’s go to bed, shall we?" he said soberly. "I think I’ve had enough horrors for one day.…"
Despite all the flaws in construction and fair play technique Verner is a born story teller and the book does not fail to grip hold of the reader. Of all the books I've read this one seems his most mature, he is trying to do something than merely entertain. There is social criticism and satire of British stoicism in the face of "nasty business." Amid the lathered on histrionics and the intentionally melodramatic prose there is a subversive thread being played out. They Walk in Darkness slowly transforms from occult thriller with detective fiction elements into a contemporary morality play with a motive for murder steeped in vigilantism presented as the only true course for justice and retribution. We watch the disintegration of a community and witness them suffer in helplessness, rise up in anger and violence in order to stop the unseen malevolent force terrorizing their village. Who among them will be brave enough to dispel the superstition and at long last see the truth no matter how improbable? The novel begins in tragedy and ends in tragedy when at last two characters step out of the shadows take the law into their own hands and fight evil the only way they can. Even Peter Chard recognizes this as the only solution possible in the final pages.
This sounds like an interesting impossible crime novel, in spite of its flaws, but I have a different locked room mystery by Verner on my TBR pile. The Last Warning from his Detective-Superintendent Robert Budd series. I hope it's a good one and more original than the novella "The Beard of the Prophet," which obviously borrowed from Christie's Murder in Mesopotamia. Right down to the archaeological background.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, thanks for directing my attention to this one.
This is a messy review. For some reason my first draft harped on Verner’s laziness regarding fair play rules. But after attending a play that gave an ancient drawing room mystery a very modern shake-up I saw Verner’s book in a new light. I realized that the characters’ understated reactions to the overwhelming evil was a commentary on real shock. We are often literally left speechless and helpless in the face of such unspeakable acts. I went back to the draft, removed huge chunks of my heavy criticism, and added all the bits about the vigilante mob scenes. The motive and the identity of the killer truly make up for the flaws in plotting technique. If you do pick up a copy (available in either a digital version from Endeavor or a new Ramble House paperback) I’m sure the impossible crime element will not really mystify you. Carr put it to use a couple of times.
DeleteI don't want to put another gory crime novel on your path, but your comment has convinced me that you should read Paul Halter's The Vampire Tree and compare it with Verner's They Walk in Darkness. A village in The Vampire Tree is plagued by a serial killer who targets children and there are supernatural elements hovering in the background, but the villagers come across as detached. And they hardly bat an eye at all the bloodshed going on around them. If I remember correctly, children were even allowed to go out after dark and roam the woods.
DeleteAt the time, I thought this was just poor writing and characterization on Halter's part, but perhaps he nailed the English character better than I thought. It would be interesting to see what you make of it.
Oh very interesting! I think I may just get a copy now. Thanks for picking up on the similarities in the two books. But I’ll have to wait a few months. I’m seeking out light fantasies and comic crime for the rest of March and early April. Need a breather from the heavy bloodshed and perversity.
DeleteMore Verner coming in March and April! I have a post planned on the Simon Gale books. He’s like Verner’s version of Henry Merrivale or Prof. Stubbs. Hilarious scenes and a lively character. Then some books with Trevor Lowe as detective and two under Verner’s “Nigel Vane” pen name.
ReplyDeleteA few years agho I read a collection of Verner's Lattimer Shrive short stories and a novella called The Whispering Man that had been released together in a double edition, and he exhibited there pretty much all the flaws and points of interest you talk about here, John. The atmosphere was delightfully stifling when necessary, but then he'd up-end it all with a sudden change of pace or tone, or he'd whip out a clue that you had no idea was even part of the setup.
ReplyDeleteI wonder the extent to which he was trying to write in a manner that deliberate echoed other authors -- Shrive is, kindly, a rip-off of Holmes (perhaps unsurprising, given the era and style of story-telling, but if you swapped out the names there'd be no need to change much -- if anything -- else), and The Whispering man felt to me like Edgar Wallace. I've read nothing of his since, but the fact that you mention his evocation of Wheatley above makes me wonder how much he simply wanted to write in a popular idiom rather than try out anything too challenging or new himself. Nothing wrong with that, it's what plenty of authors (arguably even most of them) do, but it's interesting to consider.