The Gilded Man - Carter Dickson

Sheer chance led me to choose The Gilded Man as my final read for 2025. And waddya know? The book takes place on Dec 29-31, 1938 (even though it was published in 1942). In another neat coincidence as I was finishing up the book last night it began to snow.  We have about a half of inch covering the lawns and sidewalks (mostly still unshovelled) mirroring the final day in Carr's novel in which a heavy snowfall affects the plot in multiple incidents.

Like most of John Dickson Carr's murder mysteries this book has been covered by several vintage mystery bloggers and I won't go into great detail about the story. In essence it's primarily about a burglary that takes place during a house party, a tiresome cliche in detective fiction during the Golden Age, but in the hands of Carr and with the presence of Henry Merirvale you know you're going to get a lot of frothy farce and amusing incidents. This book is hardly tiresome.  It moves along at a clip, the action begins almost immediately with witty banter and a crucial scene involving two characters eavesdropping while completely unseen on two other characters.  That dialogue sequence pays a very important part in the plot.

The setting as well is pure Carr -- an immense four story mansion previously owned by a hedonistic, vain actress named Flavia Venner. She had a theater built on the top floor beneath the ornate cupola that tops the outside of the house. The architecture of the theater owes a lot to late 18th century theaters including two secret curtained booths called baignores (but spelled beignoir in the book). Nick Wood and Betty Stanhope are hidden in one of these curtained booths when they accidentally overhear the conversation between her father Dwight and his business partner Buller Naseby.

For a while it seems as if there will be no murder in this book. The burglar is stabbed but does not die.  He is dressed like a thief from a French silent movie - all in black with a mask covering his entire head. When the mask is removed they see the face of Dwight Stanhope. No one can believe that the man was burglarizing his own home and in the process of removing an El Greco painting from its ornate frame. We learn that his wife Cristabel wanted to have a masquerade party for New Year's Eve but her husband cannot abide dressing up of any kind and forbade her from staging such a party. Why then did he dress up as stereotypical cat burglar, break into his home, and attempt to remove the painting?

While Dwight Stanhope is recuperating Nick Wood makes sure that his bedroom is guarded so that when Stanhope is better and able to talk he can be questioned about who attacked him. Let's say that plan will not work out to Wood's advantage. When death occurs it is unnecessarily theatrical. Merrivale is astounded that the person who attempted to kill Stanhope would try again. Anyone would realize, Merrivale says, that an attempted murder would result in a punishment of only a few years while an actual murder is a capital offense and leads to the gallows. He is sure they are dealing with a vain individual.

Among the various puzzling elements of the burglary are footprints in the icy stone outside the French windows that forced to gain entry, some strange wounds on Stanhope's body and face that seem to indicate a person of small stature and lightweight physique stomped on him, scratches on some silver plates and bowls that were scattered around Stanhope's body, and a roll of adhesive tape with bloodstains on it. Other unusual clues include an oily saucer washed in a sink, a mini lesson in art history, and an offhand remark from the chauffeur who wants to see Merrivale perform the Indian rope trick. All of these clues and more are cleverly introduced into the story. Remarkably, all of them can be logically explained if one has been an assiduous reader. This is one of the Carr's most intricately laid out fair play detective novels with nearly all of the clues being front-loaded in the first three chapters. One remark in a casual conversation between Eleanor Stanhope (Betty's frivolous and sarcastic older sister), Christabel Stanhope, and Vincent James (a playboy athlete who Eleanor seems to be in love with) may be easily dismissed as fluffy chitchat. But no! It is in fact something that should be filed away because it comes back to play an important part in the final reveal.

The Merrivale books tend to show off Carr's love of slapstick and low comedy. Apart from The Punch and Judy Murders, an all out farce and probably Carr's most ridiculous detective novel, The Gilded Man is probably his second most successful mystery as a comic farce. It has several and laugh out loud funny moments from some slapstick with snowballs to Merrivale's blustery outbursts. We learn that Merrivale is adept at sleight of hand tricks as well as stage illusions. When the planned entertainment for NewYear's Eve - magician Ram Das Singh, aka the Great Kafoozalum - sends a telegram that he cannot make it due to the snowstorm Merrivale volunteers to be his substitute.  The resulting rehearsal and final performance make for some hilarious scenes. The magic show itself is a huge hit with the invited schoolchildren who make up most of the audience especially when one audience member who loudly spoils nearly every trick by loudly explaining the secrets receives a well-deserved comeuppance. I confess I roared with laughter.

Finally, I thought this was one of Carr's most cinematically written novels.  It would make a terrific movie and wouldn't need much adaptation because it reads as if it were a screenplay. There is one chapter in particular written as if it were a long parallel edited sequence showing five different characters in their bedrooms mulling over the preceding events all at the same time.  It was an excellent sequence which of course included five subtle clues to the solution to the various mysteries. The setting also cries out to be viewed, especially the theater where two crucial scenes take place and where the unveiling of the murderer takes place during which all riddles and puzzles are explained in full.

The Gilded Man is easily obtained in a variety of paperback and hardcovers from both US and UK publishers. I found close to 125 copies offered for sale from several online sellers and most of them are very cheap. While the book has not been reprinted since the US IPL paperback in 1988 I suspect it will turn up soon from one of the reprint houses. It certainly ought to be reprinted! It's one of the most fun reads in the Henry Merrivale series. A breezy read and thoroughly entertaining mystery novel. And it may be the only one that most readers will be able to figure out on their own.

IMPOSSIBLE PROBLEMS: Still Life with Pistol – Roger Ormerod

In Still Life with Pistol (1986), the second outing featuring ex-police detective Richard Patton and his paramour Amelia, we find the two taking part in a private art teaching seminar sponsored by Bruno Fillingley, reformed art forger turned teacher and mentor of the arts. Lucky participants rich enough to spend the high admission price get to spend a fortnight (that’s two weeks to us North Americans) at Bruno’s art-filled mansion painting, sculpting, drawing and indulging in whatever other medium tickles one’s fancy. Bruno provides not only lodging, meals and studio space in the price tag but tips and guidance to bring out the artist’s best work. Amelia is the artist of the two while Richard is merely along as an observer. He had formerly consulted with Bruno on an elaborate electronic security system to help protect the valuable collection of impressionist paintings and Chinese pottery Bruno has amassed over the years. The alarms are turned off during the day and go back on at 11 PM sharp each night. Only Bruno knows the secret code words that set the alarms.

So we have the setting for a possible art heist, don’t we? And it all sounds very much like Ormerod’s sophomore mystery novel, The Silence of the Night, previously reviewed here at PSB. The security system, Chinese vases, fake art work, a burglary and a violent death that might be accident or might be murder are all features of that other novel. But there the similarity ends. There is no theft – fake or otherwise – in this novel. It’s an unequivocal murder that takes place.

Like most of Ormerod’s books we also are dealing with a crime in the past in the intricate plot. The victim is former police detective Roy Towers, currently Bruno’s newest security man and a painter in his own right. And he was the lead detective responsible for arresting a murderer in a crime of passion that involved Roy's former mistress. That murderer, now behind bars, has a wife who is hounding Roy for sending her husband to prison. The oddity is that woman was Roy’s mistress and the reason for the murder her husband was convicted for. That old murder case seems to be at the core of the motive for the killing that takes place at Bruno’s estate.

Roy’s odd hobby is taking part in the bi-weekly art seminars and working on an acrylic still life that gives the book its title. He has painted the same still life made up of a Chinese vase with yellow flowers, a hunter’s trumpet and a pistol (see the illustrations on the dust jackets) for several months. The full set is handled by a gallery owner in London and bizarrely the paintings are extremely popular and sell quite regularly. [Still lifes popular in the 80s? And selling repeatedly? Hard to believe.] Roy’s latest painting and the still life props are crucial to the plot of this mystery. Most interesting is that the novel involves not one, but two impossible problems! Nowhere is this indicated on the book jacket of my copy or anywhere else. You won’t know this until you actually read the book...or this review.

Roy is found shot and through ballistics tests the gun from the still life is proved as the murder weapon. But Richard who found the body had noted that the gun had been sitting on the table unmoved and matching exactly the position as depicted on Roy’s canvas. Further complicating the impossibility of the gun being used to kill Roy is the fact that there were four flower petals on the gun itself, also seen on the exact spots on the gun in the painting. Richard who just happened to have his trusty Konica with him immediately takes several photographs of the crime scene in case the police disturb the still life while conducting their investigation. The problem of how the petals were on the real gun and the one in the painting will be a cause of much debate and obsession for Richard, Amelia and the police inspector in charge of the case.

This impossible problem reminded me of the clever ideas Edward D. Hoch dreamt up in the hundreds of stories he wrote for Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. It would be a fantastic idea for a short story. But it wears out its welcome in this novel. The two possible solutions can be thought out rather quickly by any reader with a modicum of common sense. Richard and Amelia come up with the more improbable of the two solutions. But it takes Inspector Poynton to point out to Richard the real explanation of how the gun was used to kill Roy and still end up on the table in the exact spot with the flower petals undisturbed.

What does keep the book interesting as a murder mystery is trying to figure out which one of the guests at the art seminar killed Roy. There are multiple suspects and multiple motives, some of which are trickily exposed in the usual surprise-filled chapters Ormerod so often delivers in his crime fiction. The second impossible problem, one of lesser intricacy but still quite baffling, is the puzzle of the Chinese vase and the nine fakes up on display in a corridor upstairs. How did the genuine vase used in the still life get switched with a fake one after the murder when the studio was locked and sealed? And why is one of the artists who is interested in recreating that Chinese vase so intent on getting into the studio to use the kiln to fire his vase?

Still Life with Pistol seems to be thought out too intricately and I confess that its complexity left my mind reeling a couple of times. I found myself re-reading passages trying to keep straight which vase was where and who was trying to get into the studio. The plot smacks of the kind of overly fanciful plots that hearken back to the Golden Age. Of course Ormerod is a huge fan of these types of mystery novels, but there is a kind of overkill in Still Life with a Pistol that defies logic. The methods employed in the murder scheme are baroque and time consuming and in the end senseless. Even the motive seems unreal. And then Ormerod delivers one more unexpected touch in the melodramatically macabre final pages. It all ends with a kind of a fizzle despite the sound of the final bang from a pistol in the last scene.

But... even lesser Ormerod is good Ormerod. Unlike Reginald Hill who criticized his mystery writer colleague for being overly complicated in devising his crime plots and accusing him of being a failure I disagree. I’ll keep coming back for more. Roger Ormerod has a fascinating and teeming imagination. There was enough here to tantalize me and keep me reading to the end.

I have more Roger Ormerod books to read and more reviews planned throughout the summer. Stay tuned!

FFB: The Silence of the Night - Roger Ormerod

THE STORY: Weary of the world of police work David Mallin is now in security work, his most recent assignment is to guard the artwork – in particular, a Chinese vase from the T’ang dynasty – at an upcoming gala in the home of Hillary Keane, art collector and real estate mogul. But the night before the gala Keane’s home is burglarized, a man is murdered, and the vase is smashed to pieces. Mallin offers to help find out exactly what happened when his girlfriend’s uncle is implicated in the burglary and possibly the murder. Because Mallin was on site at the time of the burglary and was suspiciously knocked out by an unknown assailant the police immediately suspect the security guard of being involved in the crimes. Mallin works furiously to clear Elsa’s uncle and himself of all culpability.

THE CHARACTERS: Dave Mallin is modeled on the American private eye heroes of the 1940s. The entire book is imbued with the conventions of an action-filled pulp thriller. He speaks just like one of the generic wiseguy private eyes from books and movies of a bygone era. Very odd for a British book published in 1974. But he’s inherently likeable as a protagonist and I liked his irreverent treatment of his former police colleagues. He has all the inside dope on how police officers think and operate and this gives him an advantage over them as he resorts to a battle of both wits and methods in figuring out what happened at Killington Towers.

Elsa seems to be present only as a foil for Mallin’s coarse personality. In contrast to her boyfriend Elsa is refined, a wannabe sophisticate, who longs for a better behaved, more gentlemanly man in her life. She’s constantly bickering with Mallin and adding insult to injury flirts with all the well-to-do art collectors. One of these men, Martin Vale, spends a lot of time with Elsa. She accepts his attention mostly to irritate Mallin and because the guy has a Porsche. There is a running gag about her own car that has a faulty starter and a kind of stupid subplot about trying to get it repaired. Her Rover sometimes starts up fine, and at other times fails to start at all. This serves as a gimmick to keep the arguing flowing throughout the story. But what at first I thought was just dumb jokes and filler turns out to be an important plot point. Cars, their engines and whether they run well or not all turn out to be significant to the story and help Mallin defeat the villain in the end.

Speaking of subplots -- in addition to all the talk about art and antiques, specifically ancient Chinese porcelain, there is a parallel story about 17th century playwright manuscripts making this both an art mystery and a bibliomystery. The murder victim is Cameron Frazer, an oddball researcher obsessed with proving that Christopher Marlowe was the true author of Shakespeare’s works. He has managed to infiltrate the Keane household without invitation and holed himself up in the library refusing to leave. All this because in addition to the fine art collection Killington Towers houses a library of rare books and manuscripts. Keane inherited the library from the previous owner. Among those rare manuscripts is a Shakespearean first folio that Frazer was poring over at the time of his death.

T'ang dynasty jar with lid

Even more intriguing is the fact that Frazer is deaf. This presents an intriguing impossible crime of sorts. The police presume that the burglar was startled in his theft of the vase, dropped it, broke the thing, and then murdered the researcher so that he could not identify the burglar. But Mallin maintains that the murder was an inside job and that the killer must have known that Frazer was deaf otherwise he would not have attempted the burglary in the first place. So if it was an inside job why was Frazer, a deaf man, killed? He would not have heard anything, not a door being jimmied or a window being raised, and certainly not the smashing sound of the vase when it broke. It’s all rather mysterious. Mallin wonders which was the intended crime – the murder or the burglary? Was there even any crime at all? Was the burglary faked? Was the murder an accident?

Elsa’s uncle was involved in a shady deal trying to acquire the first folio for one of Keane’s collector friends, Alton Bloome who is visiting from Minnesota. Bloome is also interested in the Marlowe/Shakespeare conspiracy theory and has made manuscripts a hobby of sorts. The police are convinced the murder is the primary crime and that the vase being smashed was an accident as the murderer fled. But Mallin is not so sure it’s as easy to explain away. Elsa insists Mallin get to the truth and prove himself worthy after having failed to do his job of protecting the vase and other artwork.

Then it turns out that there is a copy of the T’ang vase in the possession of Martin Vale, local automobile dealer and the same man Elsa has been hanging around. Mallin begins to wonder if the burglary has something to do with collector jealousy and the murder was not at all the primary crime.

INNOVATIONS: As usual Ormerod fills his story with loads of red herrings among the well placed valid clues. I fell for the most obvious red herring while dismissing all the automobile talk as filler. None of the car talk, however, is filler. You don’t need to know the difference between a Rover (Elsa’s car with the faulty mechanism), an Oxford (Mallin’s car) or a Porsche (Vale’s alluring car) but any reader ought to pay attention to scenes when Dave and Elsa are arguing about whether the starter works or not. I should have known better having just read a book where I skipped over all the talk about photography and missed one of the best clues in that other book.

The smashed vase is of greatest interest to Mallin. He collects all the pieces and has it reconstructed by an art forger/expert he knows. When the vase is reassembled there is a small piece missing. This sets Mallin’s imagination afire. Elsa’s uncle was in the area of the library where Frazer was killed on the night of the murder and burglary. But he claims he did not hear the vase being broken. Mallin uses this as proof of his theory that the vase was broken elsewhere and the pieces were scattered around the floor to make it appear that it was broken. The missing piece is most likely to be found in something that belongs to the burglar/murderer. He believes the vase was stolen. He mentions this to the police referring to the incident as “the crash that wasn’t heard” -- The Silence of the Night, as it were. Alwright, the detective in charge, quips, “Like the dog that didn’t bark?” and laughs at Mallin.

ATMOSPHERE: In keeping with the American private eye influences that permeate The Silence of the Night Ormerod creates a cinematic set piece for his climax. All of the car business leads to a breakdown in both mechanics and Elsa and Dave’s relationship. The two hot headed lovers break up seemingly for good and Elsa storms off to find Vale. Mallin ends up being pursued by one of the bad guys and we get a full blown car chase, shoot out culminating in a explosive wreck as the book’s climax.

Humor is interspersed making the book all the more engaging and readable. I particularly liked the absurd bit of business when Mallin wants all the male suspects to speak in a pretentious American accent in order to figure out who faked a phone call. The scene allows Ormerod to make fun of American gangster movies with one of the more amusing characters doing a near perfect impression of James Cagney snarling out 1940s movie dialogue. The tension is cut in an original way and the entire scene undermines the villainy of the professional criminal who was exploited by the murderer.

Overall, The Silence of the Night is an entertaining and unusual detective novel blending traditional Golden Age plot motifs, American hardboiled narrative style and Ormerod’s original use of contemporary and popular culture in spreading out innovative clues. My only complaints are 1. the villain in this book is rather obvious (if not his motive) 2. the only American character in the story, Alton Bloome, tends to speak in British idioms that no American would ever use. For instance, he says “set that down” rather than “put it down over there”. But this is just nitpicking on my part. I enjoyed meeting Dave Mallin, Elsa and the rest of the regular gang and look forward to reading other books in the Mallin series. There are sixteen books in this series, most of which are available in digital book format from Lume Books as well as fairly affordable used copies from online sellers and used bookstores.

BONUS!  Try to find a copy of the 1993 Black Dagger reprint (pictured at top and the one I own). There is a brief introduction with some biographical info on the author written by our friend Martin Edwards!  He was writing introductions back in the 1990s for the CWA sponsored "Black Dagger" reprint series. This book and five others were selected by CWA members Peter Lovesey, Marian Babson, and Peter Chambers.  If all of them are as unique as this book I'll be looking for more of them.

Dave Mallin Detective Novels
Time to Kill (1974)
The Silence of the Night (1974)
Full Fury (1975)
A Spoonful of Luger (1975)
Sealed With a Loving Kill (1976
The Colour of Fear (1976)
A Glimpse of Death (1976)
Too Late for the Funeral (1977)
This Murder Come to Mind (1977)
A Dip into Murder (1978)
The Weight of Evidence (1978)
The Bright Face of Danger (1979)
Amnesia Trap (1979)
Cart Before the Hearse (1980)
More Dead Than Alive (1980)
One Deathless Hour (1981)

FFB: By Death Possessed – Roger Ormerod

Photographer Tony Hines inherits a painting from his grandmother and takes to it to be appraised by experts on the Antiques Road Show (yes, the TV show). Dr. Margaret Dennis tells him that he has a rare painting by British ex-pat Frederick Ashe. Rare because only six of his paintings are known to exist and are held in a few museums in Europe and in private collections. Tony disbelieves her. He was always told that it was the work of his grandmother. Margaret says she knows Ashe’s brushwork and she points out the distinctive overlaid FA initials in the corner of the painting as his unique signature. “No, you’re looking at that the wrong way,” Tony tells Dr. Dennis. The initials actually read AF which stands for Angelina Foote, the name of his grandmother. Margaret assures him that he is the mistaken one. There is no doubt in her mind that the painting is by Frederick Ashe. She urges Tony to take the artwork home and insure it for £20,000. So begins Tony Hines’ unwanted adventure into the world of manic art collectors, art theft, and con artistry.

A quick visit to Grandma Angelina for background and the final word on the real artist behind the painting reveals a secret relationship and the discovery of Tony’s true heritage. His grandmother was in an arranged and loveless marriage but prior to the actual wedding had an affair with Ashe when she lived in Paris. She returned to England engaged to marry the man she did not love and pregnant with Ashe’s child. Tony's father was that child making Ashe Tony's grandfather.

She tells Tony that Ashe recognized in her a talent for painting that he fostered. As a joke she learned to paint exactly like Ashe and had so much fun that they made a ritual of their art creations. They would literally stand beside one another and paint the same scene or person, but each with a slightly different viewpoint, at a slightly different angle. It was almost impossible to tell the two paintings apart from each other as they both painted in the same style, used the same brushstrokes, shading and even shared the same palette of paint. They also signed their works using the same overlaid initials of F and A. That was Frederick’s idea – a monogram that would work for both of them on paintings that each of them had created.

Shortly after this remarkable life history Tony’s grandmother dies unexpectedly but not before he has uncovered 81 paintings in the attic. But who painted them? There is a story about the other set of paintings that involved Angelina’s enraged husband who in a fit of jealousy destroyed all the art work by Ashe and his wife – all but one painting that Angelina managed to rescue from a huge bonfire her husband lit in their backyard. It is this painting that Tony had appraised. His grandmother cannot remember exactly which ones were burned and which managed to survive. She is sure that Ashe’s were all destroyed. Only one other person may know the truth -- Angelina’s lifelong companion and servant Grace with several secrets of her own.

Together Margaret and Tony do some complicated detective work trying to figure out who painted the 81  paintings stored in the attic. They track down a British collector of rare art work with the wonderfully evocative name of Renfrewe Coombes, who claims to own two of Ashe’s paintings. Coombes is like a modern day Count Fosco in both his physical appearance and his sinister persona.  As disreputable as Wilkie Collins' archetypal Victorian villain Coombes surrounds himself with thugs and bodyguards and a secret treasure trove of rare art work. Tony at one point dwells on Coombes as a formidable adversary:  

 "I realize now that I must have been in a state of euphoria, brought about by the sheer magnitude of Coombe's villainy. To a person like me, he was so far from anyone I had ever before met I was quite unable to contemplate him as a serious obstacle. I was nervous, but strangely confident.  I was over simplifying."

Will Coombes be able to help Tony and Margaret or is he after the Ashe paintings to complete his own collection?

I may have given too much info about the set-up for this novel but all of that happens in only the first three chapters!  By Death Possessed (1988) may seem like pure suspense, but it is a definitely murder mystery with some surprising twists which I have learned to expect from the inventive and devious mind of Roger Ormerod.  I enjoyed this book quite a lot.  Some readers may feel there is an avalanche of double crossing in the finale and that some of the wrapping up is too pat and convenient. Despite that I'm all for a writer who will fully enter the world he has created. Ormerod is not afraid to wallow in the Machiavellian betrayals of these people who will do anything to own one of kind art.

This is quite a good example of the art caper subgenre and a nifty addition to the many crime novels featuring an Average Joe caught up in a world of con artists and criminals who uses his own knowledge (photography, to be specific ) to outwit them at their own game. Ormerod was a photographer himself and we get abundant detail on how Tony's photo lab operates. It's not just the author showing off, it's all for a purpose. Pay attention to the sections on photography and you may see what Tony is up to.  I missed it all and it was right in front of me.

Recommended for both Ormerod fans and those who enjoy mystery novels about art forgery and rare paintings.  By Death Possessed, like many of Ormerod's books is now available as a digital book (Kindle format) from Lume Books and -- luckily! -- is available for purchase in both the US and the UK.

NEW STUFF: The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne – Elsa Hart

Collector mania. Why have I read yet another book about an aspect of my own life? Am I really that self-obsessed? Must I read about collecting in order to understand my own obsession with obscure genre fiction and my almost pathological acquisition of hundreds of these books? Do I really need to read one more novelist’s ideas about the psychology of monomania? Yes to all questions! And after all this book is set in the 18th century. (OK, that was just a feeble excuse to look the other way when faced with answering those questions I posed) But guess what? This was quite a page turner. And the best part? The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne (2020) is a legitimate detective novel.

Until I stumbled across Elsa Hart’s fourth novel in the library I knew nothing of her or her books. According to the jacket blurb and her bio she has written three other mystery novels featuring Li Du, a librarian of 18th century China living in exile near the Tibetan border who accidentally becomes a detective. The subject matter of each of those books seemed a bit eggheady to me and would not have appealed to me. But The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne despite its possibly dreary 18th century setting and a self-consciously decorous writing style won me over almost immediately. Hart knows how to tell an engaging story, creates lively and flawed characters, is masterful with her plotting and actually employs fair play detective novel conventions. I devoured this book the way a mad collector goes after a rare specimen to complete a set of wondrous objects.

Cecily Kay travels from her ex-patriated home in Smyrna where her husband is a diplomat to London in order to study the collection of plants in the awe-inspiring and vast collection of oddities in the museum like home of Barnaby Mayne. While conducting a tour of his home for Cecily and other like-minded collectors there to marvel at the shells, plants, insects, taxidermized animals and esoteric artwork Mayne is distracted by an urgent message. He excuses himself allowing his guests to wander his home on their own. Shortly afterward he is found brutally murdered in his private study. His assistant is found in the room holding a knife in his hand and screams out “I killed him!” and then flees.

Is it all over before it has even begun? Oh no, my friends. Cecily has noticed things that just don’t add up. She disbelieves the confession from the meek assistant and is convinced he is protecting someone. She and her friend Meacan, a talented illustrator hired to do some drawings of Mayne’s collection, turn amateur detectives to ferret out the truth. When Lady Mayne arrives to take care of her dead husband’s estate she is encouraged to have the collection catalogued. Meacan and Cecily are quickly appointed to undertake the daunting project. Their presence is the house then allows them opportunity to investigate the murder site. They can also pore over the rooms without being questioned as they simultaneously carry out the cataloguing task and hunt for evidence the police might have overlooked since they have in custody the confessor and think the case is closed.

The suspects are numerous but mostly confined to the men and one woman who were present in the house during the tour. Over the course of their sleuthing and probing Cecily and Meacan uncover an investment project that is financing the search for sunken treasure at a shipwreck, a cabal of occultists who may have been involved in secret rituals, and meet with a sinister coffee house owner who is part con man and part vigilante. Hart gives us an abundance of thriller conventions like abduction and eleventh hour rescues in addition to the requisite, sometimes slyly underhanded, questioning as part of the murder investigation.

And while there are some well-placed clues that I missed the book suffers from one of the cardinal sins of this type of adventure thriller – a not so well hidden villain.  I immediately suspected one character the moment he first appeared and was proven correct. I didn’t have to examine his motives or behavior, My targeting him was based solely on the fact that he exemplifies a certain archetype found in Gothic and neo-Gothic novels from which The Cabinet of Barnaby Mayne has most definitely evolved whether Hart is conscious of it or not. When I see that type of character in a novel of this sort I always expect the worst outcome, underhanded manipulations of even seemingly good actions.

On the final page Cecily mentions she has received a letter about the current tenants fleeing her home that she and her husband leased while they were in Smyrna. The letter writer implies something rather mysterious was going on. She offers Meacan a chance to travel with her and investigate the reason why the family left. This most likely indicates a sequel in the works. Perhaps the second book of another trilogy? I’ll be sure to check out the next adventure of Cecily Kay and Meacan. Even with its obvious villain this was one entertaining contemporary mystery novel -- well written with a couple of excellent lead characters and a cast of eccentric people who hide unexpected secrets and so detailed and steeped in its milieu that I felt I was reading a book written centuries ago rather than only last year. Elsa Hart is worth watching. I may even try one of the Li Du mystery novels now.

FFB: The Upfold Farm Mystery - A Fielding

THE STORY: A group of artists staying at Upfold Farm are forced to abandon their creative pursuits and deal with the harsh realities of the life when one of them is found horrible murdered. Playwright Eugene Matlass assists the local detective with the investigation mostly because the policeman is an admirer of Matlass's detective hero Michael Hare who appears in a series of radio plays. Adding intrigue is a strange brass box with a "St. Mark's lion" that seems to be at the heart of a series of mysteries surrounding the death of painter Herbert Walsh. Inspector Pointer makes a last minute appearance and tidies up a complicated and fascinating murder case.

THE CHARACTERS: As usual with A. Fielding the opening chapters of The Upfold Farm Mystery (1931) are crammed full of exposition, character introductions and relationships, and all sorts of minutiae, some of it extraneous but some extremely important to the solution. The story is all the more interesting because all of the suspects are creative types. There are three painters, a pianist and a playwright as well as two friends staying at the local rectory who make up the motley group. Hillock, is the farmer landlord for four of the men and his daughters Lily and Verbena round out this large cast. Remarkably, every single person figures into the complex plot and there are more than a couple of miscreants among them in addition to a clever killer who manages to complicate the case with machinations and exploitation.

I usually talk about the story along with the characters but this is one that practically defies any type of summary. Just as with my experience with Tragedy at Beechcroft I kept reading at a rapid pace eager to know what else would happen, who else would mess about with evidence, and how much the killer would get away with. In lieu of the usual character sketches and highlighting key scenes I'll give you one of those Dell Mapback summaries and tell you this mystery is about: a brass box with a winged lion atop, a missing clothesline, several well done landscape paintings, a cord with two stones attached at either end, a dying message, a blind eyewitness, and a llama ranch in Peru. The detection here is top notch and the surprises in the final wrapping up are the kind that make me smile with admiration and have me shaking my head at the outrageous manipulation in the storytelling.

INNOVATIONS: Fielding is one of the unsung masters of misdirection in the early part of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. His plots can, as in the case of this excellent novel, be labyrinthine in their intricate construction and teeming with clever red herrings and clues that lead you down the garden path. Among the clues and red herrings in The Upfold Farm Mystery there is one feature in this story that is absolutely mindblowing. Reminiscent of a convention that Christie used repeatedly and expertly I wish I wouldn't fall for this one nearly every time I encounter it. Largely my gullibility is due to giving myself over to an expert teller of tales who, like a good magician, knows where to draw your attention when in fact you should be looking at something else altogether.

Verbena Hillock, the younger daughter, is blind and Fielding inventively uses her as a highly unusual witness. Like many blind characters (especially blind detectives) Verbena is equipped with nearly superhuman senses to make up for her loss of sight. Her hearing is so acute she can tell who is approaching by the sound of footsteps. Changes in the usual rhythm of someone's gait give her hints about their state of mind. If the steps are more rapid, the person is in a rush and preoccupied, for example. She also has refined sense of smell that tells her who is near -- smoke trapped in a woolen coat, perfume and even the dampness of rain on clothing all play a part in the story. This is clueing that most readers will overlook as colorful detail, just part of her personality. Not so in a Fielding detective novel. One of my favorite parts reminded me of The Moonstone when Verbena pulls off a Rachel Verinder style bit of evidence tinkering that took me by surprise and made me smile a bit too knowingly.

Early in the book the characters bring up rural superstitions that I thought were going to play a big part in the story, but this talk only serves as atmosphere setting up a tone of ominous menace and hinting at Nature working its uncontrollable way on characters' lives. Someone burns elderwood and sends Hillock into a nervous fit as he knows it's unlucky and brings bad luck. A brown owl hoots several times in the daytime also causing uneasiness and worry as an omen of future ill events.

THINGS I LEARNED:  The winged lion on the brass box is referred to as a St Mark's Lion. The lion's raised paw (see DJ illustration above) is supposed to be holding a small book symbolic of Mark's gospel. In the novel the small book has broken off and is lost. The lion seems to be raising its paw as if it were a dog commended to "Shake!" I went looking for images of a St Mark's lion and found a zillion of them! St Mark is, of course, the patron saint of Venice. Why did I not remember that? He and his famous lion can be seen everywhere throughout that Italian city. Several of the most often photographed winged lions, like the one pictured here, are found in and around the Doge's Palace in Venice.

FFB: Fatal Purchase - Anne Rowe

THE STORY: Rhana Haines, owner of an Asian antique gallery in New York City, is sent to Boston by her employer, wealthy Henry Maxfield, to bid on two specific items at an art and antiques auction. Rhana has $5000 and Maxfield wants her to win both items: a Sung ivory of Lao Tse and a Siamese bronze Buddha, neither of which Rhana knows is worth anything near the amount of the check she is given. She spends a mere $238 for both and has little competition during the bidding. An easy job but a curious one. Why does Maxfield want such unassuming and unimpressive trinkets?  On her way out she barely misses a collision with a man in a hurry who she overhears mentioning bidding on the Buddha. But he's obviously too late. Thanks to the wiles of Wong Riley, Maxfield's servant and right hand man, both items had their lot numbers reassigned and moved up in the auction order.  It's the beginning of a series of adventures for Rhana that begin with Maxfield's sudden death, a murder investigation that uncovers family rivalry, art smuggling, espionage and an unexpected secret dating back to Rhana's childhood in China.

THE CHARACTERS: Fatal Purchase (1945) is a fast paced, incident-filled detective novel modeled on the woman-in-peril books that were pioneered by Mignon Eberhart. Anne Rowe has done an excellent job of avoiding the usual formulaic pitfalls of the subgenre in the creations of her willful, smart and sassy heroine Rhana Haines. No whining, no wimpiness, no dithery-brained delayed decisions, no HIBK nonsense here at all. Rhana is on her own after losing her parents to the Asian flu epidemic in China. She was raised by her uncle who taught her all she knows about antiques, especially Asian art. Prior to the opening of the novel her uncle has died and Rhana has taken over the antique gallery in Manhattan. She lives on her own and is doing very well.

Henry Maxfield is one of those middle-aged demi-gods we often encounter in detective fiction of this era. A bit too much time is spent describing his unearthly good looks and powerful build for a man who is over 50 years old. In addition to his handsome looks and physique he' is aloof, mysterious and as inscrutable as the Chinese he so admires. His entire home is a replica of a Chinese palace right down to a re-creation of a Chinese water garden in his immense backyard.

Thai Buddha

Rhana feels she has traveled back in time while staying at the Maxfield home where she has been hired to catalog the vast collection of Asian art. It is so eerily reminiscent of the home where she was born and raised. But the vaguely recalled memories become tinged with Henry's perverse obsession. Reluctantly Rhana agrees to dress in a gown that was previously owned by Maxfield's deceased Chinese wife. Later, Rhana sees a life size portrait of the woman and notices that they are uncannily similar in looks. Is Henry trying to have Rhana replace his wife? She shudders at the thought but doesn't have much time to worry about the dangers of such a weird role playing because shortly after the dinner where she made her odd clone appearance Henry is found impaled on the dagger-like point on the Siamese Buddha's headdress.

There are other family members who arrived that night after the auction and the successful purchase of the art object that becomes a murder e weapon. Henry's second wife Edna, her daughter Connie, and Edna's paramour Frederic Trueman-March, a Czech aristocrat who has anglicized his name. The three are antagonistic to Rhan from the start. Family relations are bitter and tainted by avarice and jealousy. Connie is a haughty, vain wannabe actress with dreams of Hollywood and a rich husband. Edna and Fredric seem to have some sly plot they are cooking up. The Czech claims to be interested in Maxfield's vast and valuable Asian art collection but Rhana hears him says things that clearly indicate he hasn't a clue. Trueman-March has shifty con artist written all over him, she thinks. Could he also be a murderer?

Who would have wanted Henry dead beside his family? Well, there's John Kilbourne, a granite quarry manager who has wanted to take over the business since his father's death. Maxfield owns the quarry, likes John well enough but does not trust his business sense. There's Judd Norton, a mysterious stranger and associate of Maxfield's. Who exactly is he? Why is he immediately deputized by Sheriff Web Walker? Why does he seem to be in charge of the murder investigation with the sheriff following Norton's lead? What exactly was his business connection with Maxfield? Is he also an art collector as he claims? Rhana is highly suspicious of Norton especially since he appeared at the front door minutes after she found her employer's body in his study. SO was I. My notes have this comment: "It's The Unexpected Guest gimmick." I won't say if my intuition proved right or wrong. Let's just say Rowe has lots of tricks up her sleeve in this novel.

Another Thai Buddha, with a point
that looks like it could be fatal

The murder seems to be about the acquisition of the Siamese Buddha, an art object of unknown value that only Henry Maxfield seemed to understand. But then Trueman-March and Edna are also showing an abnormal interest in the item. Sheriff Walker and Norton won't let anyone near the statue. It's evidence now. Rhana is puzzled as the Buddha is hardly as valuable as some of the other treasures she has uncovered in Maxfield's collection. Some of them seem to be unique copies of Japanese masterpieces, but Maxfield assured Rhana that he had the originals. However, she knows the originals are practically priceless and are held in government museums. The mystery of the art objects' origins will be revealed along with the unusual motive for Maxfield's murder in the triple twist finale.

The star of the book is not our plucky heroine at all. Wong Riley, a Chinese-Irish servant who might as well have stepped out of a Harry Stephen Keeler novel, steps into that spotlight and rarely leaves. He has been with Henry Maxfield for close to thirty years and is more of his friend and confidant than his chauffeur, butler and man-of-all-work. Unique among all the characters in the book Wong has an odd split personality flitting between a colloquial Irishman who speaks fluent, unbroken and unaccented English peppered with "to be sures" and an "inscrutable Oriental" adopting both oracular enigmatic speech and the expected deferential demeanor. Rhana isn't the least bit disturbed by it, she finds this personality switching to make Wong all the more endearing. Though there is a point in the novel when it seems that Wong may in fact be a sinister turncoat, the reader can rest assured that he is the true hero of the novel.

Hikone screen section

THINGS I LEARNED: Reading Fatal Purchase is like taking a crash course in Asian art history. Rowe has scattered fascinating cultural and historical tidbits throughout the story, but never overwhelms the action with marathon lectures. I have two pages worth of "T.I.L." notes but I'll only mentions two.

Maxfield owns what Rhana thinks is a copy of the Hikone screen. He claims it's the original. Sections of this 15th century Japanese work fo art have been duplicated as posters, post cards and wearable art over the past two centuries when art became commercialized by museums. You'd immediately recognize some of its images like the one at the left. The six-panel byobu is dated to be from the Edo Period’s Kan’ei era (1624-44) according to Japanese website about the Shiga Prefecture. First displayed to Western culture at the Paris Exposition of 1900 the Hikone screen, considered a National Treasure, is now housed in Hikone Castle Museum.

Guanyin by Muqi

Rhana also finds the White Kwannon by Mokkei in Maxfield's fabulous collection. Once again he claims it is the true original though Rhana doubts him. I learned that this is now known as the white-robed Guanyin by the 13th century Chinese monk and artist Mu Ch'i or Muqi. The Guanyin is the central panel of a triptych that is officially named Guanyin, Crane, and Gibbons found at Daitoku-ji, a Buddhist temple, in Kyoto. Mokkei is the Japanese name of the artist. The use of Mokkei is a clue for Rhana indicating that Truefield-March has gained his knowledge of Asian art from Japanese sources.

Unlike many American mystery novels the war features prominently. Rhana mentions the dim-out helping her hideout on the estate at night. Much of the plot eventually involves POW exchange and espionage work. The setting is Maine where there were several work camps for German POWs. Maxfield owns several quarries that provide limestone for rock wool. Prior to the invention of Fiberglass, our most modern form of building insulation, there was rock wool, a fibrous mineral composition. This insulation product is used for improved sound absorption and fire protection in residential wood & steel construction projects. The rock wool from Maxfield's quarry is, as John Kilbourne says: "...needed for the war effort. Don't ask me for what. They're not telling me." More secrets to unfold!

THE AUTHOR: Anne von Meibom Rowe (1882-1961) has very little about her life or work on the internet.  I only found this ultra brief biosketch at the FictionMags Index. "Born in Germany; married Leon Randall Rowe; died in Alameda, California." That's it! Very few of her books have been reviewed in the vintage mystery blogosphere. Two reviews are at Mystery*File (Too Much Poison and Up to the Hilt) and Tomcat has also reviewed Too Much Poison.  A terse opinion (along with culled info from multiple websites) of her debut, Curiosity Killed a Cat is here.  Now with my review we have covered three of books. I own five of her six books and will be reading and writing about the remaining titles very soon. I'm looking into the mystery of a seventh book that I am suspicious might be one of the US titles re-dubbed by a UK publisher.

She had two series characters neither of whom appear in Fatal Purchase, her only stand alone, mystery but one of four books set in Maine, a favorite locale for her mysteries. Her first series detective is Inspector Josiah Pettingill, a policeman based in Maine who appears in two books, the other is Inspector Barry from Manhattan who is in three books. Mystery*File lists a UK title The Painted Monster with Pettingill, a title that appears to have only been published in the UK. But I am sure this is incorrect. I think Painted Monster is an alternate title for Up to the Hilt which is a Barry mystery novel. I have some photos coming my way to either prove or disprove this literary detective work. I'll update the post when I know for sure.

Anne Rowe's Detective Novels
Curiosity Killed a Cat (1941) [Pettengill]
The Little Dog Barked (1942) [Pettengill]
Too Much Poison (1944) [Barry]; UK title Cobra Venom (1946)
Fatal Purchase (1945)
Up to the Hilt (1945) [Barry]; possible UK title (?) The Painted Monster (1945)
Deadly Intent (1946) [Barry]

FFB: Villainy at Vespers - Joan Cockin

THE STORY: The lost art of brass rubbing, crooked antiques dealers, and smuggling all figure in this tale of an unidentified man found naked and ritually murdered on the altar in a Cornish church.  Inspector Cam, on vacation with his family, is asked to help out the local police in this superbly plotted and literary mystery novel.

THE CHARACTERS: Inspector Cam who appears in only three novels by Cockin, is having a field day in this entry in the subgenre known as the policeman's holiday mystery. Nearly every mystery writer has at least one of these novels in which their detective attempts to get away for a vacation until murder interrupts and in a combination of professional routine and curiosity ends up investigating the crime or crimes. Sayers (Busman's Honeymoon) , Christie (Evil under the Sun), Stout (Death of a Dude) and Brand (Tour de Force) come to mind immediately.  But Cam is with his family and we are reminded of his distractions with the crime when his family pop in periodically to get him back to the business of relaxation.  His wife is impatient with him and in his absence and apparent disinterest in their family she befriends Betsey Rowan, an American schoolteacher. Betsey is travelling with a group of rambunctious students who have all set up tents while camping on the beach.  Cam's children pester him hoping they can get an insider's look at the gruesome crime scene simply because their father is a police officer. The harried policeman manages to take it all in stride with good humor and minor irritation, only twice scolding his unruly children for their lurid curiosity.

Joan Cockin has created a perfect microcosm of the Cornish village in Villainy at Vespers (1949) and delights in populating the town of Trevelley with all manner of eccentric locals and oddball tourists. Apart from gregarious and engaging Betsey Rowan and her entertaining gang of students there is a cast lively and eccentric characters.  These include: spinsterish Miss Cornthwaite who is nearly done in by the ruthless villains in an astonishing sequence along a cliff side; Red Cowdrey, a cantankerous old man with a reputation for smuggling and other unscrupulous business; John Briarley, a visiting historian and antiquarian, obsessed with getting the best possible rubbing from the Pollpen brass, a 13th century work of art embedded in the floor of St. Poltraun's; a travelling antique dealer who may know the identity of the naked corpse; and Mr. Copperman, the town vicar, and his wife Mrs. Cooperman who have been sly and elusive in answering routine questions about who the murder victim is and how he came to be in their church.

Leading the investigation is a nearly incompetent and irascible local policeman named Honeywether who enlists the help of Cam though it is mostly the promise of free beer that decides the vacationing copper to join the investigation. Together Cam and Honeywether (though it is mostly Cam doing the abstract thinking and true detective work) uncover the identity of the naked corpse, connect a spate of thefts of art work and artifacts from local churches to the murder, and unravel a web of deceit and cover-ups among the mistrustful citizens who succeed in mixing up the police by not fully cooperating with the murder investigation. Along the way the reader is treated to some fascinating local legends, one ghost story featuring a visit from Satan, and more than anyone would ever want to know about monumental brass rubbing.

INNOVATIONS: Mostly it is Cockin's writing that makes this a noteworthy if completely unknown detective novel.  The first paragraph alone led me to buying the book. It is almost impossible to put the book down after this startling opening:

Human sacrifice --primitive physical sacrifice-- has long been out of favour in England. A considerable stir was, therefore, created when the body of a man, naked and with his throat cut was discovered upon the altar of St. Poltraun's Church in the village of Trevelley. Murder -- and from the beginning it was assumed that not even the most theatrically-minded suicide would make his way without his clothes into church, lie upon the altar, and cut his throat with a pruning knife -- murder, then, is at least a diversion from the grim perplexities of the daily news.

With wit and panache Cockin tells an entertaining story of rogues and con men, satirizes British tourism and foreign visitors, pokes fun at the sensational nature of newspapers, and the public's prurient interest and insatiable desire for blood, guts and gore. That we have Cam along as our wise detective with a sense of humor as sharp as his creator makes the reading all the more satisfying.

Lithograph of original brass rubbing done in 1891,
from a British 14th c. monumental brass
(click to enlarge)

THINGS I LEARNED:  The phrase "Dog in a manger" is as old as the hills, but I swear I've never come across it anywhere in my reading until it popped up on page 90 of Villainy at Vespers. I wasn't at all sure of what it alluded to nor was I too clear on its meaning. After diligent Googling I uncovered its source in Aesop's Fables. The phrase alludes to a person who stubbornly refuses to give up something that he is not entitled to and, more importantly, has little real use of just like the dog in the fable refuses to give up his relaxing in the manger to allow the cows to feed.

Palimpsest also comes up over the course of the story.  My only other encounter with this unusual word is seeing it as the title of Gore Vidal's dishy memoir.  The modern definition of the word -- "something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form" -- vaguely refers to its origin from ancient monasteries when supplies for manuscripts were scarce which led to the practice of recycling and reusing old, outdated manuscripts to create new works. In the context of this mystery novel the word applies to the legend that the Pollpen brass may in fact be a palimpsest, that an earlier brass work is possibly visible on the reverse side.  Briarley is excited to get his hands on the brass and examine it to prove that the legend is fact.

QUOTES: Cam: "The work of a police officer in a case like this is to discover and explain the abnormal. It is in the deviation from the normal that a crime reveals itself."

Edmund Crispin allusion (!!):
"A humorist! Do all our village policeman try to model themselves on Gervase Fen, do you suppose?"

"This is no way to spend a holiday. Bothering your heads about death and murder when you ought to be out in the fresh air and sunshine."
"We can do both at the same time," reasoned one [son], but Cam made a threatening gesture.
"I don't want any lawyers in my family. So be off with you and don't give your poor father as much trouble as a Royal Commission."

Mr. Copperman admonishing his congregation prior a ceremony to re-sanctify the despoiled church:
"You are no body of people gathered together for the united purpose of prayer and thanksgiving. Instead, you are inspired by an infinite variety of motives -- curiosity, superstition, vanity, perhaps a little pity, perhaps a little awe. But there is no common ground amongst you. You are spectators, not participants. You have come to take all you can and give nothing."

Cam, at the beach in swimming attire, receives patronizing glares and smirks from younger men:
"Look on. Take your fill. And please heaven that you may one day be like me. Fat, over forty, and free from the need to prove I'm a man by excessive athletics."

THE AUTHOR: I've uncovered another moonlighter!  "Joan Cockin" was in reality Edith Joan Burbidge Macintosh, PhD, CBE, one of the first women to work in British diplomatic service during World War Two. According to to her obituary published in The Scotsman, June 12, 2014 her "illustrious career" was cut short within a few years when she was forced to resign her position as First Secretary to the High Commission in New Delhi after marrying a Scottish banker.  Foreign Office "bureaucratic red tape" prevented women who married non-diplomats from remaining in diplomatic service.

Prior to her diplomatic career she had attended Oxford as a history major and worked for the BBC upon graduation. The Ministry of Information sent her to Washington, DC where she was charged to create anti-Hitler propaganda and encourage Americans to join in the fight against the Third Reich.

In addition to three detective novels she wrote educational books for children as well as local and ancient Scottish history.  Long involved in charitable work dating back to her days in India Macintosh helped found several charitable organizations, and was largely involved in consumer advocacy. She appeared on a Scottish radio program inspired by her work on the Citizen's Advice Bureau which led to her becoming the first chairman of the Scottish Consumer Council. Finally, her work led her to legal advocacy and she held chairman positions on the Scottish Constitutional Commission, Scottish Child Care Centre and was a member of Victim Support Scotland's council.

Macintosh had three children with her husband Ian and died in June 2014.

EASY TO FIND? It's a rare one, my friends. Nothing new there. Only four copies out there as of this writing and all of them rather pricey.  I stumbled across a very cheap copy of the book in some eBay listings which included a photograph of the first page of text.  I read that from beginning to end and wanted to read the rest of the book. So I hit the Buy It Now button. That proved to be one of the best impulsive book buys of the past couple of years. I have already been looking for the other two books with Cam as detective. I've found the first one, Curiosity Killed the Cat (1947), and will be reviewing that one soon.

Inspector Cam Detective Novel Trilogy
Curiosity Killed the Cat (1947)
Villainy at Vespers (1949)
Deadly Ernest (1952)

FFB: Murder Draws a Line - Willetta Ann Barber & R. F. Schabelitz

THE STORY: Christopher "Kit" Storm has a moderately successful career as a commercial artist in his Manhattan studio. On occasion he serves as an artistic consultant to police drawing sketches of crime scenes and evidence in lieu of using a police photographer. Kit becomes implicated in a murder when the across-the-hall neighbor is found brutally stabbed inside his studio and the police start viewing Kit as a suspect rather than a colleague.

THE CHARACTERS: The narrator for Murder Draws a Line (1940), and the entire series, is Sheridan Locke, Kit's fiancée in this book, later his wife. Sherry is a children's book writer and is cajoled by her artist paramour into becoming the documentarian, so to speak, of their adventures in murder. But she goes about it in an entirely verbose and overwrought manner. One imagines that Sherry read way too many Mary Roberts Rinehart novels in her day (or at least Willetta Barber did). The narration is drowning in words, bursting to the seams with minutiae and unnecessary tangents, and burdened by the often annoying intrusion of the phrase "Had I known..." Even Rinehart never resorted to those telltale words as often as Barber does in the guise of Sherry Locke. In a review of this book in the August 10, 1940 issue of The Saturday Review the pseudonymous Judge Lynch said "Plot excellent, characters vivid, numerous illustrations -- but superabundance of had-I-but-knowing annoys cranky judge." I started to count them all but gave up when it exceeded 15 instances well before the novel's midway point.

Our heroes: Sherry Locke,
Kit Storm and Det. Tony Shand

I sincerely hope that Barber abandons this type of writing in later books because she is a fine storyteller and an excellent plotter. Her debut novel is a fine example of a traditional detective novel and its most unique aspect, what makes it truly noteworthy, is the inclusion of the illustrations (see "Innovations" section for more). She also has the gift of creating nuanced characters who seem like real people. It's a shame that she manages to undermine all her talent by ruining the suspense with all her heavy-handed foreshadowing. Only once did she make it work to her advantage when she discussed a bloody baseball bat before the bat became bloody. The passing remark (coming as the final sentence of a chapter as nearly all these HIBK remarks do) makes you think that Kit will be attacked yet again after being shot at once. In truth, however, the way the baseball bat gets bloodied has nothing to do with Kit and is one of the most horrific surprises in the book.

The cast of characters is large and as vivid as Judge Lynch says they are. We get all types of suspects from blustery and temperamental Alessandro Marioti, a failed opera singer, to Albert Putnam, nervous lovelorn singing student of Freda Bransen's. In an attempt to fill in the puzzle of Freda's life Barber finds it necessary to dig into her past and introduce nearly every person she ever encountered. As a result we get several bogey characters who serve no purpose whatsoever and who offer little insight into Freda other than superficial commentary. They exist only as the many examples of vain upper-crusters of Manhattan's elite. However, one supporting player from Freda's past appears to deliver the bombshell piece of evidence. She is a flighty, bubbly and garrulous ex-member of the Metropolitan Opera chorus. Freda has also worked there for a time as did the fiery Marioti. Daisy Jackson (aka Mrs. Elmer Schlummer) is a delight in her one big scene. What she has to say is key to understanding why Freda was killed and wraps up the bigger mystery of why the murder took place in Kit's studio.

The story is fascinating as an early example of a murder mystery that revolves around the identity of the victim and her past life. Kit and Sherry knew very little of their neighbor who lived across the hall. Freda Bransen was a lonely spinster who took in singing students as her sole source of income in her tiny studio apartment. But the day she stops by to deliver a letter for Kit mistakenly put in her mailbox changes her life and brings her past speeding into the present. Both Kit and Sherry slowly discover who Freda was, what she was escaping from, and how her past came to bring about her violent death. In one of the most poignant passages in the book Sherry sums it all up: "All at once, as I sat there listening to Daisy Jackeson's blithe and insensate jabberings, the horror attending [Freda's] dying seemed of no great importance. The real tragedy lay in what her life had been, not in the guise of its end. She had had so little, and that little she had not kept for long. A pitiful few years of happiness, perhaps, before her own dark destiny had caught up with her, never to let her again escape. It seemed to me suddenly unbearable that this should have been so."

Other interesting suspects include the dentist who lives upstairs, Peter Rollins, who seemed to be too interested in Freda's money; John Hunt, another of Barber's ne'er-do-well New Yorkers who at first seems like a superficial guy with no skills or ambition (he's a part time artist's model) but whose background in the military as a psychologist will play a significant factor in an intriguing subplot; and Ralph Whitley, a friend of Kit and Sherry's who stops by frequently to show off his very good caricature drawings but who is harboring a deep, dark secret.

INNOVATIONS: The Christopher Storm mysteries are unique in all of detective fiction because they include Kit's sketches (provided by artist Schabelitz) some of which have clues to help the reader solve the mystery. I believe these novels were the first of their type. Many detective novels, notably the The Baffle Book solve-it-yourself mysteries also published by The Crime Club, often included maps, floor plans and other sketches to help the reader visualize the crimes. No other detective novels from the Golden Age that I know of include a police artist whose sketches reveal his perceptions of the crime scene, the suspects and curious incidents that add to the mystery. As Sherry says of his method: "Kit has long since given up trying to explain that by drawing he sometimes sees things which would otherwise have gone unnoticed. That more than once, what looked perfectly correct to the eye proved completely out of drawing when sketched, thereby giving him a sure clue something was definitely wrong." Tony Shand has learned many times, she continues, the value of Kit's unusual technique in gathering evidence. This is why he often calls on Kit for help and a second eye. Obviously, he cannot avoid Kit's involvement since the crime took place in his own home and workplace. Even more significant is the fact that in this first novel drawing and painting are crucial to the plot. There are two very important sketches which actually reveal the identity of the killer and a work of art that Kit was working on provides one of the most noteworthy clues. The sketches are a mixture of full page portraits, drawings of the rooms, and idly drawn cartoons revealing Kit's thought processes. Most of the sketches include Kit's commentary along the perimeter of the art work. I've included several examples in the post.

THINGS I LEARNED: The deluded and vain Marioti exclaims to the police: "I shall be a great tenor. As great even as Melchior." Not being too much of a opera fan I was clueless who he meant. Are you as curious as I was? Probably not, but I'll tell you anyway. Lauritz Melchior was a Danish American opera singer who was the leading Heldentenor at the Metropolitan Opera for three decades, from the late 1920 through the early 1950s. He specialized in Wagner and made the previously lesser-thought-of German composer one of the better regarded musicians in opera companies. Thanks to Melchior's fantastic singing, a voice remarkable for carrying over the orchestra, Wagner's work became mainstay of opera repertoire in the US.

When Ralph Whitley first appears in Kit's studio carrying a portfolio and talking of his pictures Sherry thinks he is "just another Thornton or Model Guild chap, with the inevitable photos." Once again I was clueless. She is referring to Walter Thornton Modelling Agency, at the time of the story one of the "Big Three" in model agents in New York. Thornton, like many of the characters in this book, started out as an artist's model and then gained connections to the more lucrative fashion photography side of modelling. He opened his agency located in the Chrysler Building in 1929 and it lasted until 1955. Some of his clients included a bevy of gorgeous soon-to-be movies stars like Susan Hayward, Lizabeth Scott, Lauren Bacall and Grace Kelly.

THE AUTHORS: Although a newsletter published by the Doubleday Crime Club claimed that Barber and Schabelitz were married this does not appear to be true. Willetta Ann Barber (1911-1977) married Matthew Smith, an actor and writer, in 1948 and there is no record of her marrying any other person. She was the step-daughter of shipping magnate Edward J. Barber, son of Irish immigrant James Barber who founded Barber Steamship Lines of which Edward became president in 1917. [Small Worldism: In 1942, the Barbers lived in my hometown of Ridgefield, CT on a thrillingly hilly street where I regularly rode my bicycle while growing up!] Supposedly Willetta was one of Schabelitz' models according to that same newsletter article. But I have no way of knowing whether that's true or not. You can see a photo of her posing on one of her stepfather's passenger ships here. Just scroll down to the entry on Willetta Ann Scott.

DJ illustration by Schabelitz
A Song of Sixpence by Frederic Arnold Kummer

Rudolph Frederick Schabelitz (1884-1959) began his career as a portrait painter and exhibited at a few galleries when he was only 22. Quickly he became better known for his book and magazine illustrations. He was one of several well regarded book illustrators who showed their work at The Society of Illustrators' exhibit in 1919. His work is found in numerous novels of the early 20th century, illustrations for magazine stories, and commercial advertising art. One of the more unusual aspects of his career was when his highly prized fashion drawings were offered by The Woodruff Art Service on a subscription basis to department and clothing stores via a trade magazine called The Haberdasher. He even contributed the interior artwork to two issues of the Shadow pulp: May 1946 (The Curse of Thoth) and June 1946 (Alibi Trail). Schabelitz was married in 1910 and I found no record of a divorce making the tale of his marriage to Barber even more suspicious.

EASY TO FIND? Some of the Kit Storm mysteries were reprinted in paperback, but not his debut in print. Published only in the US by Doubleday Crime Club and later reprinted by Doubleday owned Sun Dial Press, Murder Draws a Line is relatively scarce. I found only eight copies of both first edition and reprints for sale using the usual online book search services. Only two of those come with dust jackets. Prices range from $29 for a reading copy to $100 for a VG/VG copy with DJ. There are an additional six copies held at various US academic libraries as well as The Library of Congress. It's a possibility your local library may have a copy.

Christopher Storm Detective Novels
Murder Draws a Line (1940)
Pencil Points to Murder (1941)
Drawn Conclusion (1942)
Murder Enters the Picture (1942)
The Noose is Drawn (1945)
Drawback to Murder (1946)
The Deed is Drawn (1949)