Mysteries

Still stalling on Bacon, I read two mysteries last week. One was another recommendation, this time in the Wall Street Journal, The Lodger by Hillaire Belloc's sister, Marie Belloc Lowndes. It is not a proper mystery, in that the criminal is both deranged and known to the reader from the start, and should probably be called a work of psychological suspense. The twisting of mind and morals suffered by the strict, self-reliant woman of the house as she tends to her mad lodger catches the reader and twines his hopes with hers, so that when she convinces herself for a moment that he is innocent, her relief is the reader's. It is a remarkable performance, and another confirmation that if a good writer recommends a minor novel, you should certainly give it a try.

I also read The Lighthouse, another of the books I picked up at Half Price Books a couple of weeks ago. Dalgiesh is becoming a little too superhuman in his command of himself and everyone he meets. Not only does he always know exactly what to say and, far more important to his very British author, what not to say, in order to achieve the greatest possible effect on everyone else, but he even manages to solve the case from his sickbed as he suffers through SARS. As though to compensate, James has increased the intensity of his self-criticism and the torment of his highly intellectual romance, to such a degree that a man of his intelligence would surely realize he was being ridiculous.

As a mystery, though, The Lighthouse belongs to that pleasant, old-fashioned genre, the locked-room mystery. In this case the locked room is a remote island, a variation that escapes the artificiality of a door locked from the inside. For that matter, it might not even be possible to have a locked room in any meaningful sense now. Bedrooms and studies do not have chimneys, gas fixtures, bell-pulls, keyholes, French doors, or old, thick walls that could hold a secret passage. Forensic science finishes off whatever sneaky alternatives are left, with the possible exception of killing by radio, or of course by time machine. The island is also a secret preserve for the wealthy and powerful, so it takes the place of the now-implausible manor house. The result is a comfortable mystery that, whatever its faults, is no weaker than several of Sayers' mysteries.

Update: I just found that the WSJ had P.D. James give her recommendations, so I have several more books in the queue now. The only one I know is Murder Must Advertise, which James is entirely correct to choose; of Sayers' dozen novels, it is unquestionably the purest entertainment.