1928 mystery/thriller. Charles Moray was jilted by Margaret Langton on
the eve of their wedding; he threw himself into exploration, and has
just returned to London. Meanwhile, a silly young woman is called back
from her finishing school after the death of her father…
My goodness this is fine period stuff. There are two beautiful
heroines, London traffic is used in an attempted murder, everyone
spends every evening at dinner and/or a show, not one but two people
thought to be dead turn out to be alive after all; and one of those
heroines is so remarkably stupid that, as she writes to a friend:
Don’t tell anyone, but I answered an advertisement, and I got an
answer, and I’m going to someone who wants a nice-looking girl for a
secretary. I was afraid I might be too young, but he wrote and said
he liked them young and wanted to know what colour my hair was and a
lot of things like that. So I sent him the little snap-shot
Mademoiselle took last term, and he said he was sure I should suit
him, and I’m going there tomorrow.
I mean, it's sheerest pulp nonsense, with a criminal conspiracy bound
by mutual blackmail, and a secret cellar, and if you don't spot who
the villain is you really aren't trying. But it's great fun.
And so it's in a spirit of appreciation of accidental humour that I
mention that one minor character is called Lesbia, and in borrowing
heroine #1 for an extended lunch break from the hat shop where she
works comes back from talking to the boss and announces "I’ve made
love to her very successfully."
Also there's Miss Silver, a private investigator who might be
considered to have sprung from similar stock to Miss Marple (who had
appeared in a short story the previous year but wouldn't make it to a
novel until 1930)… but she's more straightforward about what she does,
working as a very superior private investigator, and her role here is
mostly to know everything and give the protagonists good advice ("go
to the police"), which they generally ignore.
(All right, it would be better if there were airships.)
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