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John Wilkins, a respectable man from the Complaints Department, lives an apparently quiet suburban life – but suffers from blackouts. He has a frigid ‘refined’ wife, and an over-possessive mother. Then there is Sheila, the dream-girl who can’t say no.
A financier is found shot in the House of Commons. Suspecting foul play, Robert West, a parliamentary private secretary, takes on the role of amateur sleuth. Used to turning a blind eye to covert dealings, West must now uncover the shocking secret behind the man’s demise, amid distractions from the press and the dead man’s enigmatic daughter.
In an era of cancellations and delays, alibis reliant upon a timely train service no longer ring true, yet the railway detective has enjoyed a resurgence of popularity in the 21st century. Both train buffs and crime fans will delight in this selection of 15 railway-themed mysteries, featuring some of the most popular authors of their day alongside less familiar names.
A man is forbidden to uncover the secret of the tower in a fairy-tale castle by the Rhine. A headless corpse is found in a secret garden in Paris – belonging to the city’s chief of police. And a drowned man is fished from the sea off the Italian Riviera, leaving the carabinieri to wonder why his socialite friends at the Villa Almirante are so unconcerned by his death. These are three of the scenarios in this new collection of vintage crime stories compiled by Martin Edwards.
The cross-channel steamer Chichester stops half way to France. A yacht lies in her path, and the party that investigates find a trail of blood and two dead men aboard. Inspector French is called upon to help solve the mystery of the deserted Nymph.
Samuel Whitehead, landlord of the Rose and Crown, is a stranger in the lonely East Anglian village of High Eldersham. When the newcomer is stabbed to death in his pub, and Scotland Yard are called to the scene, it seems that the veil dividing High Eldersham from the outside world is about to be lifted. Detective Inspector Young forms a theory about the case so utterly impossible that merely entertaining the suspicion makes him doubt his own sanity. Surrounded by sinister forces beyond his understanding, and feeling the need of rational assistance, he calls on a brilliant amateur and ‘living encyclopedia’, Desmond Merrion. Soon Merrion falls for the charms of a young woman in the village, Mavis Owerton. But does Mavis know more about the secrets of the village than she is willing to admit?
A car hurtles down the driveway of a luxury villa in Switzerland. The driver is a young woman, Lucia Bernardi. Inside the house, police find the body of her lover on the bedroom floor. The dead man – Ahmed Fathir Arbil – was an Iraqi refugee, who has been tortured and killed. Lucia vanishes into hiding in the South of France. Piet Mass, a journalist for the World Reporter, sets out on Lucia’s trail, hoping for a scoop. Soon he must decide whether to publish his story -which will lead to Lucia’s exposure and almost certain death – or join her in executing a perilous scheme that could net them both a fortune.
Sir Wilfred Saxonby is travelling alone on the 5 o’clock train from Cannon Street, in a locked compartment. The train slows and stops inside a tunnel; and by the time it emerges again, Sir Wilfred has been shot dead, his heart pierced by a single bullet. Suicide seems to be the answer, even though no motive can be found. Inspector Arnold of Scotland Yard thinks again when he learns that a mysterious red light in the tunnel caused the train to slow down, and it soon becomes apparent that the dead man fell victim to a complex conspiracy.
In the peaceful seaside town of Broadgate, an impossible crime occurs. The operator of the cliff railway locks the empty carriage one evening; when he returns to work next morning, a dead body is locked inside – a man who has been stabbed in the back. Jimmy London, a newspaper reporter, is first on the scene. He is quick on the trail for clues – and agrees to pool his knowledge with Inspector Shelley of Scotland Yard, who is holidaying in the area. Mistrustful of the plodding local policeman, Inspector Beech, the two men launch their own investigation into this most baffling locked-room mystery.
When Professor Julius Arnell breathes his last in the hushed atmosphere of the British Museum Reading Room, it looks like death from natural causes. Who, after all, would have cause to murder a retired academic whose life was devoted to Elizabethan literature? Inspector Shelley’s suspicions are aroused when he finds a packet of poisoned sugared almonds in the dead man’s pocket; and a motive becomes clearer when he discovers Arnell’s connection to a Texan oil millionaire.Soon another man plunges hundreds of feet into a reservoir on a Yorkshire moor. What can be the connection between two deaths so different, and so widely separated?
When Arthur Simpson first spots Harper in the Athens airport, he recognizes him as a tourist unfamiliar with the city and in need of a private driver – the perfect mark for Simpson’s brand of entrepreneurship. But Harper proves to be more the spider than the fly when he catches Simpson rifling his wallet for traveller’s cheques.
The English country house is an iconic setting for some of the greatest crime fiction. This new collection gathers together stories written over a span of about 65 years, during which British society, and life in country houses, was transformed out of all recognition.
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