The Ace of Clubs Murder (1939) by Ralph Trevor

James Reginald Wilmot is an obscure, long-forgotten British author who wrote romance novels as "Frances Stuart" and, under the alias of "Ralph Trevor," prolifically churned out science-fiction, spy thrillers and detective novels during the 1930 and '40s – some of which have recently been brought back into print by Ramble House and Black Heath Editions. Not much else is known about him, or his work, on the web and only potential source of information is tucked away behind a paywall.

So I picked The Ace of Clubs Murder (1939) based solely on its intriguing sounding story-title, synopsis and the original cover art, which gave me the impression of Ellery-in-Wonderland kind of detective story (e.g. There Was an Old Woman, 1943) set in England.

The story turned out to be more along the lines of Ngaio Marsh, but was surprised to discover that this little-known author produced a very well-written and characterized detective novel. There was a lot of promise in the plot, but, in my opinion, it became less impressive as the story crawled towards the ending and the solution fell flat – which can be blamed on Trevor holding his cards too close to his chest. Almost like he was afraid to give too much away, but I'll come back to that later on in this post.

The Ace of Clubs Murder is set in a colony of retirees, Firtholm, situated on the outskirts of the town of Mexbridge and has been erected by Joshua Benton, a builder of homes, who holds some unusually progressive ideas about housing. Benton is appalled by the old-world housing of England, rows of drab, nearly windowless houses, crammed in streets scarcely wide enough for "the wind to blow decently between them." Populated by "thin, undersized, depressed people with no ambition." Benton eagerly looks forward to "the next war," because if Britain was to be bombed to blazes from the air, the government would have to rehouse millions of people – moving them into "hygienic tenements or houses" specially built for them. This was his motivation for building Firtholm.

So when Marcus Poland comes to Benton with a proposal to built a social center, or club house, in Flirtholm the builder immediately agrees. Three months later, Poland is installed as the manager and social organizer of The Ace of Clubs.

Most of the residents of the Firtholm take a liking to Poland. Colonel Ratchett thinks of him as honest, hardworking man and Miss Susan Welsh, a spinster, is quite taken in by him, but there are also people who cast a suspicious eye on the newcomer. Miss Welsh's niece, Miss Doreen Fenning, is wary of the relationship between her aunt and Poland, while her boyfriend, Ronald Manning, caught Poland eyeing Doreen in a way of which he strongly disapproved – resulting in a confrontation between the two. However, they're not the only ones who are suspicious of his motives. Mrs. Ratchett wonders why a man of Poland's capability choose to settle down among them when he could easily be managing one of the big clubs in the West End. Then there's the enigma of the retirement colony, Vivienne Carter, who appears to know Poland and she's even blackmailed by him. So there you have as good a setup as any for a detective story and the situation comes to a head when Poland suggests a charity event to raise money for the Mexbridge Cottage Hospital.

Poland proposed to run a collection in the town and neighborhood in fancy dress. So the members of The Ace of Clubs worm themselves in fancy looking costumes, clowns, funny policemen, Pierrot's, chefs and nursemaids, while Poland is dressed in a white suit with "an enormous Ace of Clubs back and front" to "resemble a playing card." Very much like the living playing cards from Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865). Oh, they're all wearing masks.

The charity collection turned out to be a howling success, but the ends in tragedy when, later that night, Poland's body is found by a police constable in a deserted spot known as Tylers' Field.

I told you the story read like a mystery novel by Marsh! The first half of The Ace of Clubs Murder is a lively written story with a cast of interesting characters, but the police investigation, conducted by Detective-Inspector Curtis Burke of Scotland Yard, tended to drag a bit – a problem exacerbated by Trevor showing either too much or too little. You see, the body had been found earlier that evening by two different people: Doreen had been there first and fled the scene in a panic, but Ronald had been aware of this and, suspecting the obvious, decided to muddle the waters by providing her with an alibi. A fancy dress alibi. Ronald dons a spare costume that's identical to Poland's and pretend to be him the rest of the evening.

However, this alibi immediately arouses suspicion, because it doesn't tally with the time of death. The medical evidence clearly showed that Poland must have been lying dead on Tylers' Field at the same time people saw him dancing at The Ace of Clubs. Unfortunately, the reader already knows the solution to this problem and, as a result, Burke's investigation becomes a bit of a drag. And it eliminated two names from the list of suspects.

The second problem is exactly the opposite of showing the reader too much. Namely showing too little and too late.

There are some pretty blatant clues, which pretty much give away the motive and murderer, but they're not given to the reader until very late in the final quarter of the story and this caused me to misidentify the murderer – whom I had eyes suspiciously from early on in the story. A line from the same, final quarter of the story appeared to confirm my initial suspicion, as one of the characters mentioned that Poland had met "some people in [redacted] who had big ideas about starting some kind of business in London," which also gave me a hint of a motive. And this person was definitely capable of strangling the strong, powerfully built Poland with his bare hands. Unfortunately, the solution turned out to be a bit more hackneyed than that. Oh, well.

So, a long story short, Trevor was without a doubt a far better writer than plotter, but mystery readers who prefer story-telling and characterization over plotting will find an enjoyable and rewarding read in The Ace of Clubs Murder. Despite its short comings in the plotting department, I found this to be a interesting title from the trail of obscurity.

Anyway, for my next post, I'll be taking a look at a (locked room) mystery novel JJ, of The Invisible Event, brought to my attention. I mention this here to give him an opportunity to guess which one and, if you want to know why, read our comments on this post. Good luck, JJ! :)