Thu 4 Nov 2021
A 1001 Midnights Review: FREEMAN WILLS CROFTS – The Cask.
Posted by Steve under 1001 Midnights , Reviews[9] Comments
by George Kelley & Marcia Muller
FREEMAN WILLS CROFTS – The Cask. Collins, UK, hardcover, 1920, 2019. Seltzer, US, hardcover, 1926. Penguin, paperback, 1946. Dover Publications, trade paperback, 1977, 2019.
Freeman Wills Crofts’ first novel, The Cask, is considered by many critics, including Anthony Boucher, to be one of the best and most important books in the mystery genre. The prime virtue of this and all the Crofts novels is their tight, logical plotting, in which every detail fits solidly and smoothly.
His detectives work meticulously to piece the clues together, often in order to demolish a supposedly unshakable alibi; and because they are so logical, the endings are always exceptionally satisfying. Early in his career, Crofts experimented with a number of sleuths, but in his fifth novel, Inspector French’s Greatest Case (1925), he introduced Inspector Joseph French, who was to appear in most of his subsequent books, Like Crofts’ previous heroes, French is a bit of a plodder who slowly and carefully works his way step by step through the process of deduction to a natural conclusion.
In The Cask, the plot turns on alibis. When four casks fall to the deck of a ship during unloading, two of them leak wine, one is undamaged, and the last leaks sawdust.This last cask is examined more closely, and gold coins and the fingers of a human hand are found. But before the cask can be completely opened, it vanishes.
Inspector Burnley of Scotland Yard is assigned to this bizarre case. Using the few clues available to him, he is able to locate the missing cask. And when it is opened, Burnley finds the body of a young woman who has been brutally strangled. There are no clues to the victim’s identity, so Burnley goes to Paris, where the cask was assembled.
What follows is a detailed, complex investigation, involving timetables, a performance of Berlioz’s Les Troyens, and a group of suspects with a multitude of motives.
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Reprinted with permission from 1001 Midnights, edited by Bill Pronzini & Marcia Muller and published by The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box, 2007. Copyright © 1986, 2007 by the Pronzini-Muller Family Trust.
November 4th, 2021 at 7:59 pm
Like Freeman, Crofts had a rare ability to take the potential dullness of things like railway timetables and make them riveting reading. I’m not sure how to describe exactly what he manages to do, but it is a kind of magic where what should be dull and and plodding actually build up suspense and the readers involvement in the case as if we were alongside French every step.
I admit I have read and enjoyed many Crofts titles far more than I expected and not merely because they were classics of the fair play genre.
Like Freeman he makes dullness a virtue and pays off quite often in the finale where he lets his hair down a bit.
November 4th, 2021 at 8:48 pm
I read one of Crofts books early on, but before I could read another, I read somewhere that they were very dull, humdrum perhaps, and I never read another. Kind of dumb of me, I’m thinking now.
November 4th, 2021 at 11:15 pm
Have read this one and quite enjoyed it though the last part is quite a drag.
November 5th, 2021 at 8:23 am
Crofts’ best novels, IMHO:
The Cask (1920)
The Sea Mystery (1928)
The Box Office Murders (1929)
Sir John Magill’s Last Journey (1930)
Mystery in the Channel (1931)
Sudden Death (1932)
The Hog’s Back Mystery (1933)
Mystery on Southampton Water (1934)
The Loss of the “Jane Vosper” (1936)
Death of a Train (1947)
November 5th, 2021 at 1:12 pm
Like Steve, I read one and was unimpressed so didn’t try another. Maybe I should give it another go.
November 6th, 2021 at 6:03 pm
Crofts was really influential.
All those British mysteries starring Scotland Yard Inspectors derive from him.
He was big in Japan.
And you can see his influence on the early Simenon.
All of the books I picked out as Crofts’ best are genuine detective stories. That is, they have mysteries investigated and solved by detectives.
Both the mystery plots and solutions are usually substantial, in these 10 novels.
Crofts’ books often have a Background. THE CASK show the shipping business in 1912, in detail.
Other Crofts novels show trains and boats and many kinds of business and workers, It’s a window into British work life of the era. Mainly middle class and working class.
November 6th, 2021 at 10:21 pm
I read it after reading the review. What a ride. I had figured out who the criminal was almost immediately, but his alibi was rock solid or so it seemed.
There is no sparkle in the prose, a bare recital of events which should make it dull. It isn’t. It reads like a film or TV script; you can almost see the camera angles and changing locations.
Thanks for this review.
November 7th, 2021 at 6:20 am
I have read all of the novels of Crofts and have pretty much enjoyed them all, though some have weaknesses. My short selection of favourites would include The Groote Park Murder, Inspector French And The Starvel Tragedy, Sudden Death, The 12.30 from Croydon (an ‘inverted’ mystery) and Golden Ashes.
November 9th, 2021 at 4:16 pm
Very tempted to sample some of these for research purposes. Victorian and Edwardian rail and steamships fascinate me.
In that vein, I listened to a wonderful Joe Conrad sea yarn this week: “the Brute”. Dan O’Herlihy stars.
https://archive.org/details/OTRR_Escape_Singles/Escape_48-04-11_-036-_The_Brute.mp3