Suspects—Nine (1939) by E.R. Punshon

Last month, I compiled a little best-of list, "The Hit List: Top 10 Favorite Reprints from Dean Street Press," which shined a spotlight on, in my opinion, the best Dean Street Press reprints discussed on this blog and, what has been discussed, comprises only a small fraction of their total output – having reprinted hundreds of vintage mysteries over the past decade. So they went over and above to fill that gawping hole the Rue Morgue Press left behind, but the flood of reprints and additional translations has made it difficult to keep track of everything. I decided to take a break from Christopher Bush and Brian Flynn to return to the first majora Golden Age mystery writer to be resurrected by Dean Street Press, "kindly Mr. Punshon."

E.R. Punshon's Suspects—Nine (1939) is his twelfth detective novel starring Bobby Owen who during this period, in this series, holds the rank of detective-sergeant and "wistfully looking for promotion." Similar to Bush's Ludovic Travers, Punshon allowed Bobby Owen to evolve over time from a young constable (Information Received, 1933) to a Commander of Scotland Yard (Six Were Present, 1956). Just like Flynn, Punshon tried his hands at different styles of detective fiction from magical criminal fantasies (Diabolic Candelabra, 1942) to more sordid, down to earth crimes (The Conqueror Inn, 1943). Suspects—Nine brings a bit of both to the table as Owen is now engaged to the proprietress of "Olive, Hats," Olive Farrar, who Punshon introduced as a love interest in Dictator's Way (1938). Giving a series detective-character a love interest was somewhat of a revolutionary idea when Dorothy L. Sayers made Lord Peter Wimsey fall in love with Harriet Vane in Strong Poison (1930) and married them in Busman's Honeymoon (1937). Margery Allingham (Sweet Danger, 1933) and Ngaio Marsh (Artists in Crime, 1938) followed suit.

So marrying off your inveterate bachelor detective is commonly associated with the Queens of Crime and Punshon seems to have written Suspects—Nine as an homage to their witty, character-driven "manners mystery" – full of social and political satire. The kind of sophisticated, well characterized mystery novel Moray Dalton could have written. 

Suspects-Nine sees Bobby Owen comically getting dragged into a petty case of a misappropriated hat when Olive Farrar's chic West End shop is caught in the middle of a feud in London's high society. Lady Alice Belchamber, "formidable and well-known explorer and traveller," who had "bullied and browbeaten her way through the most remote districts of the darkest continents." There were stories of Lady Alice that "she once had cowed with her riding whip a tribe of armed and furious reputed cannibals," while in her flat hung "a formidable knife with which she admitted having slain the Arab, who, armed with it, had penetrated her tent somewhere in the wilds of the near East." Lady Alice hates Flora Tamar who "enjoyed the deserved reputation of being one of the most beautiful women in London." Flora Tamar is married to Michael Tamar, chairman and managing director of the important Internal Combustion Engine Co., but nonetheless is known to sink her hooks in every pair of trousers that comes near her. They saw Flora Tamar pinched Lady Alice's best boy years ago and the "vindictive old bean" has never forgiven her.

The problem begins when Lady Alice learns "Olive, Hats" had designed and created a hat for Flora Tamar to wear at the forthcoming Royal garden party at Buckingham Palace. Lady Alice convinced the sales woman, Vicky, to show her the hat, tried it on and liked it ("...I said it wasn't for sale, and she shouted that every hat in a hat shop was for sale..."). She simply walked out and mailed them a cheque for £26 5s ("Consolidating the position, that's called"). Olive fully expects to lose Flora as a client and Bobby offers to act as a mediator, but Lady Alice naturally refuses and Flora expects a free new hat. Bobby came away from both meetings with an easy feeling of impending catastrophe and dark, unknown forces moving behind the petty incident of the misappropriated hat.

Bobby had been told Lady Alice somehow seems to keep tabs on Flora Tamar and he learns how when spotting a sleazy private detective, named William Martin, in the entrance hall of Lady Alice's apartment building. Martin has an unsavory, violent reputation who had "narrowly escaped arrest in connection with the case of a woman found strangled and dead in an empty house," but an alibi, though the police believed it false, saved his neck – currently works for one of London's slightly less disreputable private inquiry agencies. Bobby judges Lady Alice to be a formidable enemy and reflects "that Flora Tamar might do well to be upon her guard." But not all is well at the Tamar household as he finds out when accidentally crashing a house party and notices the undercurrent of hostility. But there's more. Michael Tamar takes Bobby aside and confides in him he has received an extortion note, of sorts, saying "there's plotting against you." If he wants to know more, he has to leave a hundred one pound notes in a tin under a stone on Weeton Hill. And that's the place where not long after a body is discovered.

The victim is identified as Munday, butler to Michael and Flora Tamar, who had been shot in the face several times and a knife wound that was inflicted about half an hour after death! A detail that lends "to the murder a strange element of the wholly inexplicable." Bobby has to comb through to the nine titular suspects to find the person who had motive and opportunity to shoot and stab a dead butler on that hillside.

First and obviously, he has to consider Munday's employers, the Tamars and two of Flora's suspected lovers, Holland Kent and Julius "Judy" Patterson. Secondly, Michael Tamar's nephew and heir in lieu of children, Roger Renfield. Thirdly, the vengeful Lady Alice along with her potentially dangerous private investigator and her lovely niece, Ernestine “Ernie” Maddox. She has been involved with Judy who lives by his wits ("cards and all that") and a regular the Cut and Come Again. A London nightclub that has figured in more than one Bobby Owen novel. Finally, there's the possibility of an unknown person, or simply "X," which would bring the whole investigation back where it begun. Bobby tackles the problem through good, solid police work ("it's just plodding, sir") and the so-called "mainly conversation" approach with one of the chapters even being titled "More Conversation," but complexity of the plot and detailed characterization never makes it a drag to read. And the many intricacies and possibilities never muddy or clutter the story.

In that regard, Suspects—Nine is a reminder of what I initially admired so much about Punshon's detective fiction. A skill to erect and navigate complicated, maze-like plots and manipulate, intertwined plot-strands like a master puppeteer. Suspects—Nine is a good example how effortlessly Punshon moved around a plot with many different moving parts and large, clearly defined cast of characters running mostly on emotions without getting all tangled up in a mess. Only thing you can really say against Suspects—Nine is that Punshon has done it even better in other novels (There's a Reason for Everything, 1945), but nothing that should take away from this excellent, Golden Age mystery.

I disagree with Nick Fuller's review in which he states that "the means Bobby Owen uses to reach that solution – police routine rather than psychological introspection – is disappointing in a book with so many detailed characters and tortuous emotions." Bobby Owen notes towards the end that, somehow, the murder of the apparently inconspicuous, unimportant Munday sprang from this "welter of passion, intrigue and claim, of counter claim and counter passion, intrigue and counter intrigue." A lot of what happens in this story is driven by all kinds of emotions, seldom rationally, which is why the murder appeared to be so incomprehensible. So figuring out the solution with calm, commonsense thinking and good, old-fashioned police routine worked better than as when Bobby had given away his best Hercule Poirot imitation. It felt really satisfying when from Bobby's memorandum (fact list) the truth emerged "so long and so strangely overlooked." A solution revealing Suspects—Nine not only as very well executed, vintage whodunit with a clever take on the general lack of alibis among the suspects, but showing it was also somewhat of masterclass in diverting suspicion. A great, long overdue return to this series and comes highly recommended to everyone who enjoys these sophisticated, character-driven 1930s mystery novels.

The Hit List: Top 10 Favorite Reprints from Dean Street Press

If you're a casual mystery reader who looked at our little niche corner on the internet, you might get the impression that the prevailing belief is that locked room mysteries and impossible crime fiction is the pinnacle of the genre – a final form if you will. That's not true. It's only a small faction of the fandom riding their favorite hobby horse into the ground. I'm perhaps more guilty of riding that hobby horse to pieces than most, but I love a good, old-fashioned or classically-styled detective story and a body in a hermetically sealed room is not a necessity. Even though you don't always get impression from this blog. So let's put the spot light on some classic, non-impossible Golden Age mysteries.

In 2015, Dean Street Press began what seemed, at the time, to be the Herculean task of filling the immense, gaping hole that the still sorely missed Rue Morgue Press left behind. But they have tackled that task head on in an almost industrial way. Not content with simply reprinting one or two titles from a specific writer, DSP turned them out in badges of five or ten at a time. Sometimes even more than that. So in less than a decade, DSP has republished nearly five-hundred Golden Age mystery novels that include the complete works of once obscure or long out-of-print writers like Christopher Bush, E.R. Punshon and Patricia Wentworth. They're currently working on the doing the same for Brian Flynn with Glyn Carr possibly being next in line to go through a round of reprints. But what are some of the best titles DSP brought back from obscurity?

I wanted to do one of these publisher-themed five-to-tries or top 10 lists and initially planned doing a top 10 favorite translations from Locked Room International, but the intention of this post is to take a break from those damned locked room puzzles. So that left me only with Dean Street Press as enough of their reprints have been discussed on this blog to compile a top 10 best favorite reprints. That was easier said than done and had to give my favorite writers a handicap by limiting the list to one entry per author. So no desperate attempts to convince you Christopher Bush's Cut Throat (1932) is not shit, if only you tried to make it through to the end without getting despondent. It appears to have worked. 

 

Top 10 Favorite Reprints from Dean Street Press (in chronological order):

 

The Mystery of the Peacock's Eye (1928) by Brian Flynn 

The ongoing run of Brian Flynn reprints has left me spoiled for choice, but decided to go with the obvious suspect and the 2019 Reprint of the Year Award winner. A case with Flynn's typical Doylean touches as Bathurst investigates a murder involving Royal blackmail and a magnificent, blue-shaded titular emerald. While that might sound like a typical, dated 1920s mystery novel, Flynn provided a solution shining with all the brilliance of the coming decade that makes The Mystery of the Peacock's Eye a classic of the '20s. 

 

The Night of Fear (1931) by Moray Dalton 

This pick is perhaps a little out of season to bring up now, on the tail-end of March, but The Night of Fear is one of the earliest and best country house mysteries at Christmas from this era – in addition to being Dalton's most accomplished detective novel. A well-spun drama that begins during a Christmas party concluding with a game of hide-and-seek in the dark and the discovery of a body, which the police try to pin on the blind Hugh Darrow. But how to prove his innocence? A must read for the December holidays.

 

Murder at Monk's Barn (1931) by Cecil Waye 

“Cecil Waye” was the third, previously unsuspected penname of John Street, better known as “John Rhode” and “Miles Burton,” who wrote four once extremely obscure novels under that name. Three of the four are so-called metropolitan thrillers, but Murder at Monk's Barn is, plot-wise, in the traditional style of his Rhode and Burton mysteries. Where the book differs is the tone and characters. The detectives are a brother-and-sister team, Christopher and Vivienne Perrin, who were a hold over of the 1920s Young Adventures like Tommy and Tuppence Beresford. So while the mysterious shooting of an electrical engineer comes with all plot-technical expertise and ingenuity expected from Street, Murder at Monk's Barn is no humdrum affair as the two Bright Young Things livened up the whole story. 

 

The Case of Naomi Clynes (1934) by Basil Thomson 

A predecessor of the contemporary police procedural and ultimately a very simple, uncomplicated and straightforwardly told story of a crime, which nonetheless succeeded in creating complex and intricate plot-patterns. A plot that excelled with simplistic beauty. More importantly, I remember The Case of Naomi Clynes as a surprisingly warm, human crime story with some decidedly original touches to the ending.

 

The Case of the Missing Minutes (1937) by Christopher Bush 

It has been observed that Christopher Bush was to the unbreakable alibi what John Dickson Carr was to the impossible crime, which makes The Case of the Missing Minutes his version of The Three Coffins (1935). Regardless of what the book title suggests, The Case of the Missing Minutes is not some dry time table or math puzzle. It can actually be counted among Bush's best written, most well-rounded and certainly bleakest of his earlier detective novels with a meticulously put together plot that runs like a Swiss timepiece. 

 

Murder on Paradise Island (1937) by Robin Forsythe 

Some of you probably expected a title from Forsythe's short-lived Algernon Vereker series, like The Pleasure Cruise Mystery (1933) or The Spirit Murder Mystery (1936), which took an interesting approach to plotting a detective story – spinning a great deal of complexity out the circumstances in which the bodies were found. Murder on Paradise Island is a standalone mystery and has a much lighter touch to the plot, but the backdrop and circumstances the characters find themselves makes it his most memorable contribution to the genre. A cross between Anthony Berkeley's Mr. Pidgeon's Island (1934) and a Robinsonade as a group of survivors of a ship disaster get washed up on the pearly beaches of a desert island in the middle of the Pacific. 

 

Bleeding Hooks (1940) by Harriet Rutland 

Arguably, the best and most deserving title to have been reprinted by DSP as well as my personal favorite of the lot. A pure, Golden Age whodunit set in a Welsh fishing village with an inn catering to fly fishing holidaymakers, but the Fisherman's Rest becomes the scene of murder when the vulgar Mrs. Mumby is found dead with a salmon fly deeply embedded in her hand. The doctor concludes she died of combination of poor health and shock from the wound, but the detective-on-holiday, Mr. Winkley, suspects foul play. There's a neat little twist in the tail. John Norris called the book “something of a little masterpiece.” I agree! 

 

There's a Reason for Everything (1945) by E.R. Punshon 

The return of E.R. Punshon's Bobby Owen series to print also posed a difficulty in picking a favorite, because Punshon allowed his Bobby Owen to age and evolve as a character. And tended to try something different every now and then. So there are differing periods in the series that feel distinct from one another, but decided to go with strongest, most intricately-plotted detective novels. A complex detective story concerning a murdered paranormal investigator in a haunted house, vanishing bloodstains and a long-lost masterpiece by Vermeer. A great demonstration of Punshon's ability to erect and navigate labyrinthine-like plot without getting tied-up in all the numerous, intertwined plot-threads. 

 

The Threefold Cord (1947) by Francis Vivian 

So far, The Threefold Cord still stands as the best written, most ingeniously plotted of Francis Vivian's detective novels I've read to date. Inspector Knollis is dispatched to the village of Bowland to investigate wholesale pet murder at the home of a local and unpopular furniture magnate, Fred Manchester. Someone twisted the necks of the two family pets, a budgerigar and cat, before placing a silken cord loosely around their broken necks – which proved to be a prelude to a gruesome ax murder. Vivian expertly tied the present-day murder to the story of a public hangman who died under mysterious circumstances before the war. Every piece of the puzzle fitted beautifully together to form an inevitable conclusion.

 

The Heel of Achilles (1950) by E. and M.A. Radford 

Edwin and Mona Radford, a mystery writing husband-and-wife team, who specialized in forensic detective stories in the tradition of R. Austin Freeman's Dr. John Thorndyke series occasionally peppered with challenges to the reader (e.g. Murder Isn't Cricket, 1946). Their often tightly-plotted detective stories somehow were all but forgotten until DSP reprinted half a dozen of them in 2019 and 2020. The Heel of Achilles is an inverted mystery with the first-half following the murderer as he executes, what he thinks, is the perfect crime. The second-half brings their detective, Dr. Manson, to the scene who begins to laboriously poke holes into the killer's supposedly watertight plot. A cold, impersonal examination of a crime that meshed very well with the intimate and personal opening half depicting the murderer and his crime. A genuine classic of the inverted mystery.

Music Tells All (1948) by E.R. Punshon

I promised in my previous review to return to the detective story's shining era and initially it was going to be a toss-up between two options, Christopher Bush or Brian Flynn, but there's another name from Dean Street Press' stable of resurrected writers who has been criminally neglected on this blog – namely "kindly Mr. Punshon." There's one of his detective stories that I had set aside for a very specific reason. 

E.R. Punshon's Music Tells All (1948) is the twenty-fourth Bobby Owen mystery and a very rare instance of two series-characters crossing paths. Crossovers always have been one of a guilty pleasure of mine. 

Curt Evans wrote in his introduction that Dorothy L. Sayers "affectionately dubbed" Punshon's first series-detectives, Inspector Carter and Sergeant Bell, "that blest pair of sirens." Carter and Bell debuted in The Unexpected Legacy (1929) and appeared together in five novels, published between 1929 and 1932, in which Sergeant Bell did all "the hard work of actually collecting facts and deducing solutions" – while the publicity-seeking Inspector Carter "received all credit and promotions." As if Punshon had reconceptualized the Sherlock Holmes series with "Holmes as a preening fraud and Watson as a wise drudge." I expected DSP would complete their Punshon run with his "earlier, critically-lauded" Carter and Bell series, but the last Bobby Owen novel (Six Were Present, 1956) was reprinted in 2017. But, as of this writing, the Carter and Bell series is still out-of-print.

So I really should have gone with either Suspects – Nine (1939) or So Many Doors (1949), but the lure of a genuine and extremely rare crossover was too great a pull. Even without having encountered Sergeant (now Superintendent) Bell while he was still working alongside Inspector Carter. A decision that I'll no doubt come to regret when my review is followed by the surprise announcement that the Carter and Bell series will be reissued in 2022. Anyway... 

Music Tells All opened a new chapter in the series as Bobby and Olive Owen returned from Wychshire, a rural county where Bobby acted in various capacities and eventually became the Acting Chief Constable (It Might Lead Anywhere, 1946), which provided a sometimes dreamy and magical backdrop for nine novels. Such as Ten Star Clues (1941), Diabolic Candelabra (1942) and There's a Reason for Everything (1945). Now they're back in London and the post-war malaise is putting its stamp on British society.

These were the dark days of food-and petrol rationing, clothes coupons, societal upheavals, poaching and crime waves – not to mention a severe housing shortage. So, upon their return to London, the Owens find themselves living in a hotel room without hot water, because "the hotel's stock of coal had run out." Everything was in short supply. Olive couldn't believe her eyes when she notices an ad in the newspaper that a charming cottage to be let near the village of Much Middles. Only twenty miles from London. Bobby is very skeptical and believes the place is either unaffordable, haunted or merely a practical joke, but they receive an invitation to view the cottage. And they end up getting "the cottage on a three-year lease at a rent of a hundred a year." More of a heist than a bargain during those days, but the Owens find they have a strange lot as neighbors.

Mr. Fielding is their landlord and a semi-retired city speculator who's a chubby, good-tempered with an almost childlike trustfulness beaming from his candid eyes and exuding general air of a happy, which is "strangely unlike those supposed to mark the professional speculator he was describing himself to be." Bobby briefly glimpsed another personality underneath his friendly exterior. A brief, unguarded moment when Fielding went from "beaming like a happy child upon a friendly world" to "an Ishmael whose hand was against every man as every man's hand was against him." Fielding has a curious, double-edged attraction with the Owens next door neighbor, Miss Bellamy, who has an otherworldly aura about and plays "passionate, possessive strains" on her grand piano. The music "flowing passionately" from Miss Bellamy's cottage has a strange, appealing effect on everyone who hears it and the vicar, Mr. Gayton, believes there's a pagan element to her music. There are also a brother-and-sister, George and Rhoda Rogers, who share a cottage and they're as curious a pair as everyone else in the neighborhood. George Rogers is a self-professed scholar, "engaged on a most interesting inquiry" to prove that the Old School Tie "an unconscious symbolism of the infantile desire to return to the safety and comfort of the maternal womb," as well as being an outspoken pacifistic and conscientious objector during the war, but reportedly got his ass handed to him in a scrap with Fred Biggs – who's Mr. Fielding's battle-scarred chauffeur. Rhoda served in the Middle East as part of the A.T.S. and received a recommendation when opened fire with a tommy gun on two Egyptian spies in the pay of the Nazis, which prevented important secret documents falling into the wrong hands. Well, you can't pick your neighbors.

So, while Olive begins working on the cottage, Bobby returns to Scotland Yard and now holds the temporary, undefined position of "temporary-acting-junior-under-deputy-assistant-commissioner." A result of the war having depleted the ranks of the C.I.D. and a meeting is planned to reorganize the department, but until then, they have to begin to stem the tide of a growing wave of crime with the primary focus on an epidemic of smash and grab raids. This assignment places Bobby smack dab in the middle of a very cheeky and daringly-staged crime.

One of the smash and grab gangs somehow managed to coincide a jewel robbery with a Scotland Yard test from a suitable place from which to send out a test alarm of a smash and grab raid. A motor cyclist put a phone booth and the wireless in Bobby's car out of action with a spanner, which leads to a high speed chase with the mysterious cyclist seemingly inviting Bobby to pursue him. A merry-go-round leading straight to Much Middles where the motor cyclist performed a "vanishing act" near the cottage of one of his new neighbors. And he thought he recognized Fred Biggs in the motor cyclist's mannerisms. But he has "a complete alibi." Why did this smash and grab raid practically lead back to Bobby's own doorstep? Was there a reason behind their incredible luck in getting the cottage during a housing crisis?

A problem that takes on a whole new complexion with the discovery of murder victim, shot to death, inside a disused, half demolished air raid shelter at the bacl of Fielding's house – a dispatch case is found underneath the body. A dispatch case crammed with jewelry, but not the smash and grab loot. All of it's "dud stuff" barely worth a fiver.

Bobby is placed in a difficult position and is more than a little relief that the murder is the official responsibility of the self-effacing, mildly cynical Superintendent Bell. And, while Bell the general routine of the murder investigation, Bobby probes the people involved to see how, or where, the smash and grab raiders overlap with his next door neighbors or that mysterious, haunting music. A task not made easier with suspects and witnesses who are either missing, lying or unwilling to cooperate with a second murder complicating the case even further. This second murder provides the story with its best idea and a great answer to that "perennial difficulty in murder," which concerns how to dispose or hide a dead body. Unfortunately, the idea is not used to its full potential here, because Music Tells All is not exactly a conventional, Golden Age detective story.

Punshon was born in 1872 and in his late twenties at the dawn of the twentieth century, when the modern world began to take shape, but remarkably, his detective novels were hardly updated relics from the past. They were very much of their time and sometimes even (far) ahead of their days, but there were also some very clear clues and hints that Punshon belonged to a previous generation. Punshon had an old-fashioned, melodramatic streak, but never the corny, over-the-top kind like can be found in Anthony Wynne's mystery novels – who truly arrived on the scene two or three decades too late. Punshon could be genuinely dark and brooding, unashamedly indulge in the macabre and the imaginative or produced something that was years or decades ahead of its time (see the very modern The Conquerors Inn, 1943). More than once, Punshon gave me the impression the classic ghost-and horror genre lost a great name when he decided to write crime-and detective fiction (see the ending of The Dark Garden, 1941) So you can never be quite sure which direction one of his mysteries is going to take or in what way it's going to end. 

Music Tells All is not a detective story in which Punshon pulls out a string of clues and red herrings from his sleeve with a murderer tied to it at the end. Music Tells All is a tragedy of characters posing as an early police procedural (of sorts) with the strains of haunting music and crossover element making everything curiously reminiscent of one of Gladys Mitchell's criminal flight of fancies. Yes, the solution is, for better or worse, somewhat Mitchell-like in nature. So you can file this one under "acquired taste." Sorry, Jim!

Nonetheless, I very much enjoyed my time with Music Tells All and a return to Punshon was long overdue, but readers who are new to him are advised to begin at an earlier point in the series. Such as Bobby Owen's debut as a fresh-faced constable in Information Received (1932), Death Comes to Cambers (1935) or the previously mentioned There's a Reason for Everything. I'll probably return to Bobby and Punshon before the end of the month.

Death of a Beauty Queen (1935) by E.R. Punshon

Last month, I reviewed Brought to Light (1954) by E.R. Punshon, a late entry in the series, which saw Bobby Owen at the tail-end of his career when he had reached the rank of Deputy Commander of the Metropolitan Police. The story was excellent, full of zest and vitality, but ended my post with commenting that I preferred the early period novels when Owen was a young, fresh-faced policeman moving through the ranks – traveling the British countryside on his motorcycle. So I decided to return to one of the earlier novels when Owen was still working under the guidance of Superintendent Mitchell of Scotland Yard.

Death of a Beauty Queen (1935) is the fifth novel in the Bobby Owen series and begins with a beauty contest in the Brush Hill Central Cinema, organized by Mr. Sargent, who's the manager of the cinema.

Before I go on, a brief aside on the setting of the story: last year, I wondered in my review of John Russell Fearn's One Remained Seated (1946) how many detective novels or short stories had a cinema as setting, because it looks as if they are few and far between – only P.R. Shore's The Death Film (1932) and Fearn's Pattern of Murder (2006) came to mind. Now we can add Punshon's Death of a Beauty Queen to the list. Even if the cinema was only used here as the stage for a beauty contest.

The dead-on favorite to win the contest is Miss Caroline Mears, "a veritable goddess of old Grecian dream," whose only flaw are her hard, blue eyes, but her overall beauty silenced the dense crowd for a minute before bursting into applause. Before she can be announced as the winner, Mears is found fatally wounded in her private dressing room and is rushed to the hospital. Where she died upon arrival.

Superintended Mitchell and Sergeant Bobby Owen quickly come to the conclusion that there were several people in the "regular pandemonium" backstage with a potential motive for murder. Mears played a dirty trick on one of the contestants, Lilian Ellis, which effectively ruined any chance she might have had. Ellis had been promised a job as permanent mannequin at the Brush Hill Bon Marche, if she met with any success, but Mears spoiled those plans. And she was known to have a temper. Mr. Sargeant has been flanked the whole evening by Paul Irwin, an influential member of the borough council and a hard-line Puritan, who's only son, Leslie, is sweet on Mears and wants to marry her – much against his wishes. They discover Leslie in Mears' dressing room and he flees. Shortly after the murder, a man arrives at the cinema, named Claude Maddox, introducing himself to Mitchell and Owen as the fiance of Mears.

And then there are such complications as to what happened to the victim's handbag, who was the "tough looking bloke" looking for one Carrie Quin and why was the murder weapon traced back to the door-keeper, Wood.

So the premise is fairly standard affair: a body surrounded by a small circle of suspects supplied with motives and opportunity. Unfortunately, this is the only problem and the story lacked the labyrinth of plot-threads characteristic of Punshon's work, which made this one of his unusual slender detective stories – much like It Might Lead Anywhere (1946). It didn't help that the murderer was incredibly easy to spot.

Nevertheless, it was, always a well written story and the last half sprung a pleasant surprise on me when it introduced two, (quasi) impossible situations. Firstly, a suspect escapes from the police, in bare feet and pajamas, but, unlikely as it may seem, this person appears to have vanished into thin air. Successfully eluding the posse of constables. This much amuses the British press and the world-wide community who reported and speculated wildly on the matter. Several prominent Nazis in Germany expressed their believe that "the Jews were at the bottom of the whole thing," while French newspapers dispatched special correspondents "to report on this strange manifestation of 'l'hysterie Anglaise.'" A fun little side distraction in the story.

A second, full-blown locked room mystery is introduced in the last three chapters of the book when a murder is committed in a cottage under police observation, back and front, but the only other person on the premise was a maid – who obviously is not the murder. The locked room trick also explains the unlikely escape of the bare-footed suspect, but these closely linked impossibilities are slightly marred by the fact that the ancient solution was cribbed from Conan Doyle. And not clued at all. So, while I appreciate to find two impossible crimes in a book not listed in Locked Room Murders (1991), I could have done without them. You see, I picked Punshon to smear out my locked room reading and have a bit of variation. What does Punshon do? He springs not one, but two, on me. I should have gone with The Dusky Hour (1937) or Suspects – Nine (1939). Oh, well.

All in all, Death of a Beauty Queen is a mixed bag of tricks. It was good to see Owen back at the side of Mitchell and him playing a secondary role suddenly reminded me of those written by Christopher Bush, in which Ludovic Travers plays the shadow of Superintend George Wharton. The book was as well written and characterized as any of Punshon's best detective novels, but the plot was unable to sustain itself pass its strong opening. On a whole, not too bad, but Punshon has written better.

Well, I was planning to take a short break from the locked room mystery and spread them out a bit, but now that Punshon has ruined that, I'm going to return to Fearn for my next read. Hey, I have to moral compass of a heroin addict when it comes to impossible crime fiction. Why wouldn't I use kindly Mr. Punshon as an excuse to indulge in my locked room vice. I would sell your children's soul to the devil to get back the lost manuscripts of Hake Talbot and Joseph Commings. :)

Brought to Light (1954) by E.R. Punshon

Brought to Light (1954) is the thirty-second detective novel in the estimable Bobby Owen series, published when E.R. Punshon was an octogenarian and had only two years left to live, but the characters, plot and story-telling still bristled with the vitality and inventiveness of the early novels – barely any wear or tear. I think Nick Fuller described the story perfectly when he called it the work of a man half Punshon's age.

Punshon not only retained his vitality as a story-teller, but also remembered how to design a maze-like plot out of numerous, intertwined plot-threads and manipulated those strands like a nimble-fingered puppeteer. This is what makes even late-period Punshon a treat to read.

Reprinted by Dean Street Press

Brought to Light brings Bobby Owen, Deputy Commander of the Metropolitan Police, to the pleasant country town of Penton, "once upon a time the capitol of the Kingdom of Mercia," where he had been given a course of three lectures to the West Mercian Police. The West Mercian Chief Constable, Major Rowley, had offered modest prizes to his men for the three best essays on these lectures and Owen was tasked with picking the winners, but his attention is drawn away to the lingering residue of a tragic, long-buried love story in a nearby village – involving grave robbing, lost poems and murder.

Hillings-under-Moor is "a scattered, lonely sort of place" laying on "the fringe of the Great Mercian Moor." The only claim to fame this tiny village has is a lonely grave in the churchyard.

Janet Merton was the lover of a celebrated poet, Stephen Asprey, who placed his love-letters and unpublished poems in her coffin when she passed away, because one day, he wanted the world to know what it owed the woman who had rekindled his Muse. So the grave began to attract coach parties, American tourists and passing motorists, who often "try to chip off bits of the tombstone for what they call souvenirs," but there has also been much talk about opening the grave to retrieve the letters and poems. A proponent of opening the grave is Edward Pyle, of the Morning Daily, who has a lot of back-room pull and even got a question asked about it in Parliament – prompting the Home Secretary to promise a request for opening the grave would receive "favourable consideration." However, Pyle faces stiff opposition.

The grave is a freehold of the Merton family and is now in name of Miss Christabel Merton, a niece of Janet Merton, who says she will never agree to its opening.

The Duke of Blegborough also has his personal reasons why he would prefer the Merton grave to remain undisturbed. His wife had died from taking an overdose of sleeping pills and, locally, there were whispers the Duchess was poisoned by the Duke, because he believed she had cheated on him with the famous poet, Asprey. The Duke is afraid that the love-letters mentions his late wife and fan the flames.

However, if you think this is the whole premise of Brought to Light, you're sorely mistaken and need to read more Punshon. This is only the beginning.

Several years ago, the previous rector, Mr. Thorne, left the rectory one night for an evening stroll and has never been seen or heard of since. There were gossip that Thorn was heavily in debt or got himself involved with a woman who had disappeared around the same time, but other simply assumed he has lost his way on the lonely, desolate moor when he was caught in one of the moor mists that can come up out of nowhere – simply walked circles until he died from cold and exposure. The present curate-in-charge, Mr. Day-Bell, wants Owen to take charge of the Thorn case in the hope that it will smother the rumormongers. Mr. Day-Bell also worries the Merton grave might be opened without permission.

The widow of the poet, Mrs. Asprey, lives nearby the churchyard in "an old, half-ruined house" and is "a formidable old lady." She had chased Pyle from her home with a revolver and she has been making the victory sign above the grave of Janet Merton. There's a Samuel Chrines, a "petty scribbler," who claims to be the love child of Asprey and Pyle has brought a hard-bitten, unsavory character, named Item Sims, with him from London.

Reprinted by Ramble House

So, there you have, as I remember them, all of the plot pieces and, towards the halfway mark of the story, a burned-out caravan with a body inside is found on the Great Mercian Moor.

Deputy Commander Owen takes charge of the investigation and calmly, but competently, traces down the murder weapon and talks to everyone involved with grave, which actually reminded me of Ngaio Marsh. However, Brought to Light is not guilty of, what Brad of Aw, Sweet Mystery calls, "dragging-the-marsh." The characters he talks to are interesting or unusual. Such as John Hagen, church sexton and a passionate, self-taught classical scholar, who only lives for his books. Combine this with a pleasantly tangled plot, rich writing and an equally rich backdrop brimming with ancient history – which has always been one of Punshon's strong points. Death Comes to Cambers (1935) and Ten Star Clues (1941) are good examples of Punshon's sense of time-and place.

I mentioned in my opening that there was barely any wear and tear, but the keyword there is barely and there a little bit of wear in these very late-period Bobby Owen stories that should not go unmentioned. At this late hour, Punshon evidently had become less adept at hiding the murderer from his readers. I spotted the murderer here even sooner than the one in Punshon's swan song, Six Were Present (1956), but hardly something to complain about in this case. Brought to Light is an impressive and imaginative piece of detective-fiction from a 82-year-old man. So I can forgive Punshon here for having failed to pull the wool over my eyes.

However, I do prefer early-period Bobby Owen to the high-ranking, battle-tested Commander of the Metropolitan Police. Owen was at his best when he was young, fresh-faced policeman, slowly climbing the ranks, while traveling the countryside on his motor cycle to go from one murder to the other. Or the period when he was working for the Wychshire County Police (e.g. Diabolic Candelabra, 1942). But that is a personal preference. Not a complaint. 

 

So, all in all, Brought to Light turned out to be a worthy addition to this excellent series. It was perhaps not entirely flawless, but Punshon had barely lost a step in nearly half a century of writing, beginning with The Mystery of Lady Isobel (1907), which is a welcome change from the dramatic decline in quality that usually befalls prolific writers towards the end of their careers – which unfortunately happened to my favorite mystery writer, John Dickson Carr. So it was nice to see that one of my other favorites had remained (nearly) at the top of his game towards the end.

The Golden Dagger (1951) by E.R. Punshon

The Golden Dagger (1951) is E.R. Punshon's twenty-ninth title about his longtime series detective, Bobby Owen, who started out as a police constable (Information Received, 1933) and climbed to the rank of Commander, which is a position he held during the last period of the series – beginning with So Many Doors (1949) and ending with the wonderfully introspective Six Were Present (1956). This story is part of that last stretch in the series and sees Owen doing more, as a Commander of Police, than his rank would probably allow him to do outside of the printed page.

Reprinted by Dean Street Press

The story opens with Commander Bobby Owen sitting in his office, "almost as busy indeed as bored," as he sifts through the daily accumulation of paperwork and reports on his desk. A dull routine of bureaucratic procedure disrupted by the arrival of Detective Constable Ford.

An anonymous phone message was received from a call-box in Lower High Hill, reporting a murder at a place called Cobblers, which is the home of Lord Rone, who possesses one of "the finest art collections in the world" and lately has been filling the pages of the Daily Trumpeter – who insist on labeling him an "Export Dictator." A followup report brought to Owen's desk informs him that a constable has found fancy-handled, ornamental dagger in the call-box with bloodstains on the blade. The handle of the dagger was in the shape of "a nude woman in ivory and gold," a 16th century piece of metal work by Benvenuto Cellini, which has "a smile of evil, secret joy." Obviously, a fine piece of art like that could have only come from the collection of Lord Rone.

As noted above, The Golden Dagger was published during the twilight years of the series, when Punshon was 79 or 80, but the intricacies of the multi-layered, maze-like plot showcase the same vitality that can be found in his earlier novels. One of the puzzling, intricate problems of the plot is the apparent lack of a murder victim.

Nobody appears to have actually died in Lower High Hill, let alone murdered with an ornamental dagger, but there are two men with (tangential) ties to Cobblers who have gone missing.

The first of these two men is a writer of popular romantic "slush," calling himself "Tudor King," but he shuns the public and publicity like a leper, which only enlarged his popularity as a novelist and this vexed his secretary/housekeeper, Charlotte Cato – an "extremely realistic novelist of former days" who never achieved the commercial success of her current employer. Sour grapes, spiked with envy, can be a motive for murder. The second person missing from the scene is Baldwin Jones, who had been brought to Cobblers by the brash, outspoken daughter of Lord Rone, Miss Maureen Carton, but she send him packing with a black eye when he tried to kiss her.

However, one of Maureen's admirers, Jack Longton, insists it was him who gave Jones a shiner and this lead is further complicated by the fact that Jones turns out to be a petty, two-bit blackmailer. And there are more people who could be involved in this possible murder case. Most of them are staying at Cobblers as either guests or employees of Lord Rone.

Richard Moyse is hoping to the secure the vacant position of personal secretary and Lord Rone suggested he stayed a day, or two, with him so that he can consider him for the post and Moyse conveniently saved Lord Rone – when a man snatched his dispatch case and threw him in front of car. Moyse not only stopped the car, but was able to retrieve the stolen dispatch case. The second person is a young art critic, Norman Oxendale, who asked permission to stay at Cobblers to inspect the famous pictures and miniatures. Or is there an ulterior motive for his visit? After all, there had been previous attempt at theft and someone had succeeded in taking the Cellini dagger from the Long Gallery.

Finally, there's one of "the best-known historians and archaeologists in the country," Sir William Watson, who doubles as a doormat for his wife, Lady Watson, who likes male lap-dogs and lately she had her eyes Oxendale – after Jones had disappeared from the stage. Add to all of that "a very illusive kind of clue," namely a journeying black Homburg hat, burned letters and a body found in a haunted forest and you got yourself a late, but fairly typical, Punshon-style detective novel.

As you would expect from Punshon, even at this stage in his life, he works, pulls and manipulates the strings of all these plot-threads with the nimble fingers of a practiced puppeteer. However, it must be said that the plot-complexity here comes mainly from pulling all of the plot-threads together, because, taken by themselves, they tended to be rather simple. You can especially see this weakness in the murder that's at the heart of the plot, which turned out to be as simple as it was sordid, but the numerous plot-threads that were tied around it completely obfuscated the simplistic solution – which was also done by the meddling behavior of one particular character.

This helped obscure the fact that the murderer's identity was weakly clued, which Owen's admitted at the end when he said that the clues, while present, were very small. So small that the case, officially, ended with a verdict of murder against "person or persons unknown." We know who the murderer's identity and motive, but Owen lacked the conclusive evidence to file the case away as solved.

Nevertheless, while arguably not the best or strongest entry in the Bobby Owen series, The Golden Dagger is still a pleasantly busy, fairly clever detective novel that will please loyal, long-time readers of Punshon.

So the plot, while not perfect, was far from a crushing disappointment, but there was another aspect of the story that depressed me and relates to the depiction of the bleak, depressing state of post-World War II Britain – which strongly reminded me of Cyril Hare's When the Wind Blows (1949) and Leo Bruce's Cold Blood (1952).

There several references to taxes, like a super tax, which is supposed to leave nobody with more than six thousand pounds a year and this made it very difficult, if not impossible, to maintain a large, fully staffed estate. It's even mentioned that, by then, the attire of an old-fashioned housemaid "considered rather worse than the wearing of handcuffs and leg-irons." Or how, years after the war ended, rationing is still going on and the reader is treated to a brief scene in which Owen eats his share of "the week's bacon ration." These references, littered throughout the story, gives the book a slight hint of gloom and doom, because you realize that an era had definitively ended. An era in which our beloved mystery writers and detective characters had thrived.

I suppose that's something that will always cast a gloomy, depressing pall over these British mysteries from the 1950s. Anyway, I'll try to picking uplifting for my next read. Probably Case Closed. A series that has never failed to lift my spirits. So stay tuned!