Rev.
Victor L. Whitechurch was an Anglican churchman, author and
creator of Thorpe Hazell, a vegetarian railway enthusiast, who's one
of the oddest "Rivals of Sherlock Holmes" appearing in a
short-lived series of nine short stories from 1905 to 1906 –
collected in Thrilling Stories of the Railway (1912).
Whitechurch started out as a turn-of-the-century mystery writer in
the Doylean tradition, but also got the participate in the early
Golden Age of the British detective story with novels like The
Crime at Diana's Pool (1927), Murder at the Pageant (1930)
and Murder at the College (1932). Not to mention being a
founding member of The
Detection Club and penning the first chapter ("Corpse Ahoy!")
for the round-robin mystery The Floating Admiral (1931).
The
first story is "Peter Crane's Cigars," originally published in
the July, 1905, issue of The Royal Magazine as "The
Ingenious Ruse of Mr. Crane," which briefly introduces Thorpe
Hazell. A book collector, railway enthusiast and amateur detective "whose knowledge of book editions and bindings was only equaled
by his grasp of railway details," but what made Thorpe Hazell
an odd duck at the time was another one of his eccentricities – "a
strong faddist on food and physical culture." A vegetarian to
the extreme who was constantly practicing strange, outlandish
physical exercises.
So
this first story presents a fairly minor problem as Hazell has to
deal with a tobacconist undercutting his competition by selling
quality cigars at bargain prices ("...only paid fivepence each
for them"). That brand can be "picked up very cheaply in
Holland or Belgium," but not resold at those low prices unless
they were smuggled into the country without paying the duties. Hazell
dons a disguise to tail Crane on his monthly excursion abroad, but
even the railway detective is baffled how Crane was smuggling the
cigars. So you can categorize this story as a borderline impossible
crime story and not something as banal or disappointing as the cigars
being smuggled pass customs inside the books Crane was lugging around
on his travels. Whitechurch came up with something more ambitious for
the core solution, but its dependence on (ROT13)
haxabja nppbzcyvprf detracts from the overall plot. Still a
fun, enjoyable introduction to the series.
"The
Tragedy on the London and Mid-Northern," originally published in
the August, 1905, issue of The Royal Magazine, begins with
Hazell perusing the morning newspaper when a headline, "SHOCKING
ACCIDENT ON THE RAILWAY," catches his eye and attention.
An unidentified man was found leaning out of one of the windows of an
express, on the London and Mid-Northern Railway, who had a wound on
the back of his head and an ear torn off. So the authorities assume
the man was looking out of the window and struck his head against one
of several bridges over the line, but Hazell would like to know more
about the incident. Between stretches and dumbbell exercises, Thorpe
Hazell becomes Thorpedyke Hazell and follows a trail of physical
evidence right to the murderer's doorstep. As noted before, these are
early, pre-Golden Age mysteries that reads like a blueprint of what's
coming, but often lacked fair play. So Hazell is as much as an oracle
as an detective. Still a fun story.
"The
Affair of the Corridor Express," first published in the September,
1905, issue of The Royal Magazine, is an interesting one. A
distressed Mr. F.W. Wingrave, a master at Shillington School, comes
to Thorpe Hazell asking him to help find a 10-year-old school boy,
Horace Carr-Mathers, who's the son of a millionaire and impossibly
vanished from a moving train – vanished right under the nose of the
school masters! So the London express was thoroughly searched, every
compartment, luggage rack and passenger, but Horace was nowhere to be
found. Hazell can see "a distinct plot" in Wingrave's
account and accepts the case. I think this is the first story with a
plot that has aged surprisingly well. Not only does it indulge in
some clueing and foreshadowing, but the visual image of how Horace
vanished from the train makes for a memorable visual image. That poor
kid! One of those rare detective stories that manages actually do
something with a kidnap plot.
"Sir
Gilbert Murrell's Picture," originally published in the October,
1905, issue of The Royal Magazine under the title "The Car
That Vanished" and anthologized in The
Realm of the Impossible (2027), is another early highlight of
the impossible crime story. A case that "found a prominent place
in Thorpe Hazell's notebook" and for good reason. Sir Gilbert
Murrell has three paintings on loan to an expedition, but they
inexplicable disappear in transit, on a goods train, along with its
entire waggon on a non-stop right. And to top it all off, the
vanished waggon with the paintings was in the middle of the train! I
don't know how feasible the disappearance-trick is or whether it can
be pulled-off on a first try, but the idea is ambitious, original and
light years ahead of its time when it comes to the impossible crime
story. A good and entertaining impossible crime caper.
"How
the Bank was Saved," published in the November, 1905, issue of The
Royal Magazine as "The Frustration of Kinch," begins with
admitting "Thorpe Hazell always looked upon the affair of the
Birmingham Bank from a distinctly humorous point of view" – "not worth calling a railway mystery or adventure." I
agree. This is a mild crime comedy in which Hazell helps a bank
thwart a plot to destroy their credibility over a personal grievance.
A plot involving a robbery aboard a train, but Hazell has a counter
plot. A fun, light, but forgettable, criminal farce.
"How
the Bishop Kept His Appointment," originally appearing in the
January, 1906, issue of The Royal Magazine, is a mild,
humorous adventure story in which Hazell helps a bishop get to his
important speaking engagement after their train derailed. So not much
to say about this one except that it has one or two good moments.
"The
Adventure of the Pilot Engine," first published in the February,
1906, issue of The Royal Magazine, takes place at "a
juncture when European politics were considered by diplomatists to be
in a very delicate state" when Count von Neglein arrived in the
country – scheduled to have "an interview with the English
Prime Minister" ("...in presence of the King"). A
small group of spies, headed by a man named Dubourg, plot to prevent
this meeting from ever happening and the plot he has hatched makes
this the most technically complicated stories in the series. A
complicated and fiendish scheme involving a particular stretch of
railway with quadruple tracks and switch boxes. There's even a map of
that stretch of railway line. Refreshingly, Dubourg admits "there
are several weak spots in the plan" and "must trust to
luck." Nobody could have planned on a certain railway detective
playing deus ex machine to spoil their carefully laid out and
executed plot. So not too bad for a vintage spy thriller.
Note
for the curious: one of the characters involved in the plot is a
Russian spy, named Koravitch, who's probably the same character from
Whitechurch's The
Adventures of Captain Ivan Koravitch (1925). That could mean
Whitechurch could have written the first, or one of the first,
crossovers in the detective genre. Something deserving of being
footnoted.
"The
Stolen Necklace," originally published in the March, 1906, issue of
The Royal Magazine, concludes this short-lived series on an
underwhelming note. A short story from the late 1800s or early 1900s
about stolen or misplaced diamond necklaces, strings of pearls and
gold rings tend to feel like filler stories – because rarely
something really is clever is done with it. This story is no
exception. Hazell helps a woman retrieve a diamond necklace she lost
on a train, but turn out to have been stolen. An OK story by itself
(and for the time), but forgettable and very weak to end this series
on. At least Hazell was satisfied with his ending ("...glad to
think that the last of my little investigations of railway mysteries
has cleared a good man of suspicion...").
Hold
on! There are six more, non-Thorpe Hazell thrilling stories of the
railway in this collection beginning with another locked room murder
aboard a train.
"The
Mystery of the Boat Express," published in the February, 1912,
issue of The Royal Magazine, begins with a passenger of the
Great Southern Boat Train paying the guard a half-crown to lock his
compartment ("...I do not wish to be disturbed"). When the
train arrived at its destination, the guard unlocks the compartment
and discovers the passenger has been shot through the head. So it
appears to be a case of suicide, but the evidence screams murder. How
can a man alone inside a locked compartment, on a moving train, have
been shot? The solution to that conundrum makes "The Mystery of the
Boat Express" another footnote worthy title. I think the locked
room aficionados has seen a variation, or two, on this trick before,
but this story predates them all by more than twenty years. Other
than that, very much a short story of its time.
"How
the Express was Saved," originally published August, 1911, issue of
The Royal Magazine, runs along similar lines as some of the
previous stories. It revolves around a group of disgruntled railway
strikers who were told by their employer to hit the road. So they
hatch a plot to derail the train, on which their General Manager is
traveling, pitching it straight into the river. In my opinion, the
best written of Whitechurch's railway thrillers complimented by a
beautiful map of the scene where the train is to be derailed.
I
have very little to say about the last four, fairly minor short
stories from The Royal Magazine. "A Case of Signalling" (1911) has a maid and her railway worker boyfriend spoil a burglary. "Winning the Race" (1911) is another affair of international
intrigue and concerns trying to get one train to arrive before the
other. "The Strikers" (1911) is much the same as "How the
Express was Saved," but not as good. Finally, "The Ruse That
Succeeded" (1911), in which the Russian spy Koravitch has to be
smuggled out of Britain. I guess this story comes from The
Adventures of Ivan Koravitch.
So,
all in all, Whitechurch's Thrilling Stories of the Railway is
an interesting, but mixed, collection of short stories. The best of
these stories are "The Affair of the Corridor Express," "Sir
Gilbert Murrell's Picture," "The Mystery of the Boat Express" and "How the Express was Saved" followed at some distance by "The
Tragedy on the London and Mid-Northern" and "The Adventure of the
Pilot Engine." You have to judge these stories by the standards (or
lack of standards) of the pre-Golden Age period when the detective
story of the 1930s and '40s slowly started to take its form. That's
perhaps the biggest strength of Thrilling Stories of the Railway
is showing this transition from one period to the other. Like the
best from this period, they read like a blueprint or premonition of
the coming Golden Age (e.g. Isabel Ostrander's The
Clue in the Air, 1917). Whitechurch's railway mysteries belong
to that category with its technical, more ambitious and complicated
plots, impossible crimes, diagrams and floor plans. Whitechurch was
not the first to include floor plans and diagrams, but they were
still far from a staple of the detective genre. So definitely enjoyed
this collection and its historical window into the development of the
detective story. Recommended not only to vintage crime fans, but fans
of vintage fiction in general.
