Last year, I revisited one of Agatha Christie's lesser-known, sometimes unjustly overlooked detective novels, Peril at End House (1932), because the plot turns on a craftily camouflaged motive rather than a well-hidden murderer or a cleverly contrived alibi – making it a whydunit. Nick Fuller pointed out in the comments "by that light, Lord Edgware Dies—another where the murderer stands out—might then be a howdunit." That just handed me an excuse to toss Lord Edgware Dies (1933) on the reread pile.
Lord Edgware Dies, alternatively published as Thirteen at Dinner, begins with Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings at a London theater where they spot a very famous face in the audience, Lady Edgware – better known to the world as Miss Jane Wilkinson. A young American actress currently enjoying success in London who had married the wealthy, slightly eccentric Lord Edgware three years previously. A choice she has come to regret. Jane Wilkinson intends to marry the Duke of Merton, but her husband refuses a divorce and "stands in the way of these romantic dreams." So she approaches Poirot asking him to try and pursued her husband to give her a divorce or she'll have to bump him off herself. She repeats several times before a number of witnesses she's considering to kill her husband. One of them remarks she's quite capable of committing murder, but "she hasn't any brains" as "her idea of a murder would be to drive up in a taxi, sail in under her own name and shoot."
Poirot wouldn't normally touch a divorce case, but now he has become intrigued and welcomes the opportunity to study Lord Edgware at close quarters. However, Lord Edgware informs Poirot he had agreed to a divorce months ago. He wrote and told her so, but the letter mailed to her Hollywood address never arrived ("extremely curious"). Poirot has the feeling there's still something to the affair which now appears to have taken care of itself.
Inspector Japp, of Scotland Yard, arrives at Poirot's doorstep the following morning with the news Lord Edgware was killed at his house in Regent Gate. Stabbed with surgical precision in the neck and murderer appears to be his wife. Jane Wilkinson went to the house in a taxi, announced herself at the door as Lady Edgware and sailed pass the butler to see her husband. Ten minutes later, the butler heard the front door close shut and the maid discovered the body the following morning. But her motive no longer holds up. More importantly, she can present an alibi as incontestable as the constitution of her homeland. So they have look elsewhere for suspects, but those pesky alibis, bodies and complications are found around every corner. Sort of...
Lord Edgware Dies is a howdunit, not a whodunit, in which the murderer's identity becomes apparent long before the final chapter rolls around. Apparent to everyone except the characters. This time, it's not just Hastings who's as dense as a lead-lined brick wall and it really is the story's only real problem. So let's get that out of the way first, before moving on the positives.
The plot that's setup is better suited for an inverted mystery, however, the inverted mystery doesn't really fit Hercule Poirot and the only way to make it work is to dumb him down a bit to the point where Poirot is as baffled by the whole thing as Hastings – until he overhears a chance remark in a crowd. It has been remarked that the credibility problem here lies with the alibi-trick, but thought it more unbelievable Poirot (SPOILER/ROT13) qvqa'g guvax vg fhfcvpvbhf gung gur bar crefba va Ybaqba jub pna qb n cvgpu-cresrpg vzvgngvba bs gur zheqrere qvrq gur fnzr qnl nf Ybeq Rqtjner sebz na nccnerag bireqbfr, abe gung gur vzcrefbangvba pbhyq unir orra qbar ba gur nyvov raq bs gur zheqre. Something that could to the story's advantage had it been inverted, cat-and-mouse style mystery/battle-of-wits between detective and murderer. How the story's structured and presented, you have to go along with it and ignore the obvious.
Having now reread Peril at End House and Lord Edgware Dies, they clearly represent a period in Christie's career when the training wheels were coming off. Christie not only knew then what she could do with the detective story, as she showed in her graduation project known as Murder on the Orient Express, but had now the confidence to wield them. One of her most admirable and endearing qualities is on full display here. A talented or even merely a good, competent mystery writer can lie through their teeth without uttering a single untrue word. Very few of her contemporaries could match her when it comes to simultaneously rubbing the truth in your face and pulling the wool over your eyes. To quote Poirot "facts that are concealed acquire a suspicious importance," while "facts that are frankly revealed tend to be regarded as less important than they really are." Lord Edgware Dies is not the best nor most successfully executed example of this talent, she did it with all the bravado and brazenness that would distinguish her best-known, most celebrated 1930s mysteries – a decade she punctuated with the publication of And Then There Were None (1939). After Lord Edgware Dies, Christie became the Agatha Christie we remember today. There's something else worth pointing out.
Last year, I compiled "The Hit List: Top 10 Beneficiaries of the Reprint Renaissance" and seriously considered including Christie as a surprise entry or honorable mention. Not because she was in dire of reprints or had a reputation that needed a public overhaul, but because Christie wasn't an isolated phenomena. She took inspiration as much from her contemporaries as the other way round. Just compare The A.B.C. Murders (1936) to Anthony Berkeley's The Silk Stocking Murders (1928) or Sad Cypress (1940) to Dorothy L. Sayers' Strong Poison (1930). So having more of her contemporaries back in print gives more depth to her own work. For example, I kept thinking of Christopher Bush as Lord Edgware Dies is exactly the kind of detective novels he always tried to write with varying degrees of success. It has everything you often find in his work. A cast of characters filled with theatrical people. A handful of alibis with one of them potentially being fabricated, channel crossing alibi between France and alibi. A closely-linked pair of murders in the story's opening stages. So imagine Bush quite enjoyed and perhaps took inspiration from it.
I'm pretty sure Leo Bruce took inspiration from Lord Edgware Dies for M. Amer Picon ("Papa Picon") from Case for Three Detectives (1936). One of my favorite lines from that book comes when Sgt. Beef is complaining about the three titular amateur sleuths "with their stepsons, and their bells, and their where-did-the-screams-come-from" ("why they try to make it complicated"). Bruce was echoing Hasting's explaining to Japp how Poirot "always been fond of having things difficult" and "a straightforward case is never good enough for him," which is why Hastings believes Poirot always tries to make a case more difficult – especially when the solution comes out too easily. Sounds like Papa Picon.
So, in summation, Lord Edgware Dies is certainly not one of Christie's triumphs when it comes to plotting and you shouldn't think too deeply about the alibi-trick, but it's bravado and confidence in the shaky, less than perfect plot makes up for a lot. A mixed bag, to be sure, but an enjoyable and not wholly unimportant one. With the next novel, Christie really took off to become the embodiment of the Golden Age detective novel.
I am trying to remember the Rex Stout/Nero Wolfe mystery where he uses the impersonation alibi, the actress capable of doing the impersonation being found dead right after. I can't remember the title. As I recall, the impersonation is done over the telephone directly to Wolfe. I have long wondered if Stout took inspiration from Christie for this one. Although he did publish a few before WWII, don't remember the dates for sure.
ReplyDeleteThank you for a good review.
I've only read halfway through the Nero Wolfe series and don't recall such a story.
DeleteYou say the plot would be better-suited for an inverted mystery. In fact, there is an inverted mystery that uses this very premise. The episode "Sayonara, DJ" of the Japanese Columbo-inspured Furuhata Ninzaburou uses a Lord Edgware Dies-esque gambit as part of the setup. Though admittedly this set-up is relatively arbitrarily to how the crime is solved.
ReplyDeleteIgnore me. I confused this for Peril at the End House. I get the two titles mixed up in my head sometimes. Sorry.
DeleteWell then, not much I can do with these comments, is there? :)
Delete"So imagine Bush quite enjoyed and perhaps took inspiration from it." The reverse, if anything, I warrant. Bush's Perfect Murder Case used the same idea before Christie - although Christie does it more elegantly.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the mention, by the way!