"Yes, yes, murder is never very pleasant, is it?"- Midsomer Murders (Garden of Death, 2000)
Over the past fifteen years, a whole
flock of once obscure and long-forgotten mystery writers found their way back into
print, which introduced a score of names to my list of favorite crime-fiction
authors – such as Clyde
B. Clason, Stuart
Palmer and Kelley
Roos. A recent addition to that list is E.R.
Punshon.
Punshon has nearly fifty novels to his
name and thirty-five of them are detective novels about his series character,
Bobby Owen, who walked on the scene as a young police constable (Information Received,
1933) and retired as a Commander of Scotland Yard (Six Were Present,
1956). However, one should not assume Punshon was merely an early pioneer of
our modern-day police procedural. Punshon had a fertile imagination and
possessed the ornamental writing-style of the early twentieth century, which
some condemned as wasted verbiage, but I love how he was able to bring a room
to life by pointing out a candlelit duel had once been fought in it – c.f. Ten
Star Clues (1941).
I can appreciate a well conceived sense
of time and place as much as a clever and solidly constructed plot, which is
another one of Punshon's talent as a mystery novelist. Punshon justly received
praise for his labyrinthine-like plots and ability to manipulate multiple
plot-threads, like a practiced puppeteer, without his yarns becoming a tangled
mess. A veritable artisan of webwork plotting!
So this resulted in over thirty well
written, atmospheric and often excellently plotted detective novels that helped "kindly Mr. Punshon," as Anthony
Gilbert called him, secure a spot on my list of favorite mystery novelists.
A lot of these talents are reflected in the subject of this blog-post.
The Dark Garden (1941) is the sixteenth entry in the Bobby Owen series and one of
the earlier books from the Wychshire period, which began (unofficially) in Murder
Abroad (1939) and comprises of nine novels in total – constituting his
body of wartime crime-fiction. Officially, Owen simply has to double "the
parts of head of the not very extensive Wychshire C.I.D." with "that of
private secretary to the chief constable," but Colonel Glynne always seemed
to be sidelined in these novels. In this case, the chief constable is "recovering
from a severe attack of pleurisy." So this leaves Owen in charge of all the
big investigations, which occur often enough in this countryside district that
it makes you suspect Wychshire County borders Midsomer County. Anyhow...
The story begins with a visit to the
office of Bobby Owen by a local farmer, Mr. Osman Ford, who is a grim, dour man
with angry eyes and a dark expression. Ford has enthusiastic plans to expand
his farm, called Roman Ends, but these plans require funds and there's a sum of
five-thousand pounds available, but the money belongs to his wife – which is
held in trust on her behalf by a solicitors firm. Mr. Nathaniel Anderson is one
of the senior partners in the firm and refuses to discuss the matter with Ford,
because the money belongs to his wife, which angered the short-tempered farmer
and he's convinced the money has been embezzled. However, Owen advices him to
consult a lawyer, but this only angered Ford even more.
Not long after this confrontation, Owen
hears that Ford has been airing threats against the lawyer and this is
potentially a problem, because there have been persisted rumors that Ford has
killed before – a young rival to his wife affection was found dead in an icy
canal. Officially, there was "not an atom of proof" for murder and the
affair was dismissed as an unfortunate accident, but there was still "lots
of talk and gossip."
So Owen decided to give an unofficial
warning to the farmer and determined to visit Anderson for further information,
but what he finds there resembles a psychiatrist’s waiting room rather than a
solicitor's office. Everyone who works there seems to be either obsessed or
suffer from some sort of neurosis.
Anderson lives separate from his
estranged wife, but has a relationship with one of the office secretaries, Miss
Anne Earle, who was a foundling and only recently she was contacted by a
long-lost aunt, Mrs. Augusta Jordan. However, Miss Earle's background as an
orphan left their marks on her character and these markings drive most of her
actions. She also has a much younger admirer among the office employees: a fair-haired,
long-legged youth named Billy Dwight. The young man probably saw his employer
as an elderly seducer and probably was the person who seen fleeing from Miss
Earle's cottage (after being shot at). Arthur Castles is an office clerk, but
also the son and grandson of the founders of the office, which the family lost
after financial problem and Anderson made sure the boy got an education and a
position in the office – which resulted in conflicted feelings within him. On
the one hand, Castles is grateful for the opportunities given to him by
Anderson, but he always wondered what part he played in the downfall of his
father. Finally, there's the second senior partner, George Blythe, who shuns
woman and is very passionate about his charity work for Hopewell House, which
provides a home for homeless boys who might otherwise have drifted into
mischief.
So there you have a glimpse of the
intricate web of character-relationships and potential motives, which Owen have
to give serious consideration after Anderson goes missing and turns up again
halfway through the book – floating in a canal with a bullet hole in his back!
At one point, Owen visits the sickbed of
Colonel Glynne to give his report and remarks that whole case "seems to have
its roots in the past," because his investigation is littered with references
to past happenings: a baby left on a doorstep a quarter of a century ago and bankruptcy
from the same period. A wife leaving her husband several years ago. A drowning
of a young man who would have been middle-aged today, etc. But there are also
several tangible clues: such as an expensive, fur-lined glove that was dumped
in the canal and the sum of five-thousand pounds that turns up in several
accounts.
All of this can be read as a slow,
meticulous crescendo that builds towards a memorable chase scene in the titular
garden, in which someone takes shots at Owen with a gun that has a silencer. So
he only hears soft pops as bullets whiz past his head. Evidently, Punshon also
knew how to write suspense and this becomes even more apparent with the final dénouement
over a freshly dug grave. Arguably one of the greatest denouncements of a
murderer in all of detective-fiction. A fantastic and atmospheric scene that's
only marred by the murderer's identity, which was a bit obvious and anti-climactic,
but very forgivable in this instance – since I found the story as whole very
good, interesting and somewhat unusual.
It's another example that Golden Age
mysteries were not primarily about restoring order. Sure, the case can be
shelved as solved, but the final tally is as dark as it depressing. There
really are no winners in this book.
So The Dark Garden is not as great
as some of Punshon's best work, such as Death
Comes to Cambers (1935), Diabolic
Candelabra (1942) and There's
a Reason for Everything (1945), but still an excellent showcase of his
talents as a mystery novelist.
On a final, unrelated note: JJ published
the short story collection, Ye
Olde Book of Locked Room Conundrums (2016), I conceptualized in this blog-post
and the book is a free-of-charge. My next blog-post will (most likely) be about
this locked room collection.
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