Rupert Heath, publisher of Dean Street Press’s line of reprinted vintage mystery fiction, recently sent me an email flyer outlining what’s in store for us from them this March. I asked if I could reprint it here, and he has most graciously agreed:

   We are delighted to be adding new Golden Age mysteries to our range of publications on 2 March 2020. This time we are featuring authors Moray Dalton, E. & M. A. Radford, Henrietta Clandon and Roy Horniman, including the classic black crime-comedy Kind Hearts and Coronets.

   Further to our successes last year, we are publishing five further titles from Moray Dalton: The Belfry Murder, The Belgrave Manor Crime, The Condamine Case, The Case of Alan Copeland, and The Art School Murders.

   We have three more titles from E. & M.A. Radford, the married Golden Age crime-writing couple: The Heel of Achilles, Death of a Frightened Editor, and Death and the Professor.

   A new author for DSP, we are very pleased to add four classic Golden Age mysteries from Henrietta Clandon: Good by Stealth, Inquest, Power on the Scent, and This Delicate Murder.

   And finally we are excited to bring out a new edition of Kind Hearts and Coronets (aka Israel Rank) by Roy Horniman – the basis for the famous Ealing Comedy, and every bit as fresh, funny and relevant as when it was first published in 1907.

   All best wishes

       Rupert Heath

           Publisher

THE GREAT DETECTIVE. “Train of Events.” Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 02 January 1980 (Season 2, Episode 1). (11th overall of 30 [or is it 35] episodes.) Cast: Douglas Campbell (Inspector Cameron), James Duggan (Sergeant Striker), Sandy Webster (Dr. Chisholm), Sean McCann (McCarthy, the conductor), Maurska Stankova (Klara Elek, the widow), John Grima (Vilmos Elek, the dead man), Richard Farrell (Conley), Patrick Brymer (the cabbie). Producer: Peter Wildeblood. Writer: Larry Gaynor. Director: Rudi Dorn.

   Ordinarily a ride on the Sudbury to Toronto night train is an unexciting affair, but not this evening. Aboard is Provincial Inspector Alistair Cameron, his assignment being to keep tabs on a gold bullion shipment worth $200,000; there has been much anarchist activity of late, and Cameron is there to make sure they don’t get a chance to subsidize their revolution with other people’s money. An unwelcome addition to the passenger load, at least as far as the Inspector is concerned, is Sergeant Striker, who has been assigned to Cameron as his “bodyguard” in case things get out of hand with the anarchists.

   Everything goes well until the train stops for water; then bullets start to fly from the siding, punching holes in windows and woodwork alike — and, it would seem, one unfortunate man in the passenger car. After everything calms down, with the anarchists breaking off the attack, the Inspector insists on inspecting the gold, which is under armed guard in a specially modified combination car near the engine; satisfied that the bullion is intact, Cameron permits the train to proceed non-stop to Toronto, where it arrives with the early morning sun — but without the railway car, the guards, and the gold! Needless to say, the bank intends to have the Inspector’s guts for garters for this …

   And it’s here that the story turns into an impossible crime, and a well-done one at that. Conundrums abound: How did an entire car disappear from a moving train? When the passenger killed during the ambush is autopsied, how can it be that he was shot from no farther than six inches? And what bearing did his profession have on the robbery? In searching the train, now a crime scene, why can’t Striker find any signs whatsoever of bullet damage?

   And what’s the significance of that forlorn lady’s wig found stuffed under a seat? What about those two rather hefty women who bumped into the Inspector when he left the train? After there’s a gas explosion in a shack in the railyard, why, according to the coroner, did the victims perish the way they did instead of being killed in the blast? What about that piece of plywood Cameron and Striker find not far from an over-river railway bridge? And, finally, how did the widow of the man killed in the ambush get to be such a good shot? (Actually that last one is never asked or answered in the show; we were just wondering.)

   “Train of Events” is a model of how to do an impossible crime story on episodic TV: it’s the right length, not too long and not too short (roughly an hour, unlike the usual overly-padded Banacek episode); every element and scene contributes to forwarding the plot; and the characters and tone are lightly tongue-in-cheek without being a distraction. We especially appreciate how the director took great pains to reconstruct the events, nicely adding to the Great Detective’s Big Reveal of the crime.

   IMDb tells us that this series was “based on the first government appointed provincial detective Alistair Cameron, set during the late Victorian Era. He is assisted by his friend Dr. Chisholm, a pathologist. He relocates from Scotland to Canada for his job, takes in a house keeper, and becomes guardian of his niece. He also has a sergeant who assists on his cases.”

   Wikipedia also tells us that The Great Detective was based on the exploits of John Wilson Murray (1840-1906), who was “Ontario’s first full-time criminal detective with the title Detective for the Government of Ontario. He held the position until his death and solved hundreds of crimes.”

   The big three performers in “Train of Events” are Douglas Campbell (1922-2009) as Inspector Alistair Cameron (25 episodes), Sandy Webster (1923-2017) as Dr. Chisholm (20 episodes), and James Duggan (died in 2013) as Sergeant Striker (9 episodes). Early in his career, Douglas Campbell was a stage sensation, scoring big with Shakespeare in the ’50s (being naturally portly and blustery, he made the perfect Falstaff); he once described himself as a “William Morris socialist,” whatever that means.

   Among a lot of other actors doing one-shots on The Great Detective who have achieved notice elsewhere: Geraint Wyn Davies, John Neville, Megan Follows, Maury Chaykin, Sharon Acker, Nick Mancuso, Len Cariou, Henry Beckman, Alan Scarfe, and James Bradford (who played Inspector Regan in three episodes of the show).

   The CBC seems to have developed amnesia about The Great Detective series; we can’t find anything about it on their website.

      —

NOTE: This episode, which was obviously taped off an A&E broadcast (hence the low quality), is available on YouTube, but the individual who posted it there is not allowing it to be embedded on other sites. You can watch it here, at least for now.

ART OF CRIME (L’art du crime). “Une Beauté faite au Naturel: Parties 1 & 2.” France 2 / Gaumont Television / France Télévisions. 17 November 2017. Nicolas Gob (Antoine Verlay), Eléonore Bernheim (Florence Chassagne), Philippe Duclos (Pierre Chassagne). Guest Cast: Miou-Miou, Stéphan Wojtowicz, Louis-Do de Lencquesaing, Venantino Venantini (Leonard de Vinci). Dircetor: Charlotte Brändström.

   A man who had been stealing a painting from an old French mansion at night is found stabbed to death, his outstretched pointing to a marker stone with name of Leonard de Vinci engraved upon it. Question: Is it possible that an unknown painting by the Italian master is hidden behind the otherwise worthless painting?

   Tackling the case on behalf of the police are two mismatched (of course) detectives, one a street smart cop, Antoine Verlay, now assigned to the department handling crimes of art fraud and theft, and an art historian and authenticator, Florence Chassagne.

   They do not get along especially well, but working on the theory that opposites attract, you just know, deep down inside, they will find working together more than the chore it is in this, their very first case together.

   Art of the Crime was on for three seasons. Even though I didn’t follow all of the details about the world of art, forgeries, I found the story line fascinating. The amount of money that’s at stake is certainly grounds for many more stories like this one. The color photography is absolutely splendid, especially the scenes in the underground areas of he mansion, where Verlay and Chassagne find themselves temporarily trapped.

   And thanks to the latter’s vivid imagination, Leonardo da Vinci himself makes an appearance. What’s not to like?

CHARLES ALVERSON, who died several days ago (January 19th), had a relatively minor career in the world of crime fiction, but his two books about San Francisco-based PI Joe Goodey struck me as being very done, both solidly in the Raymond Chandler tradition. After reading the two of them, I was constantly on the lookout for the third, but alas, it never turned out to be.

   Quoting from his first book (*), here’s the first paragraph:

   And from the second:

   According to Wikipedia, after deciding perhaps that mystery writing wasn’t going to pay the bills, Alverson Alverson was managing editor of the British environmentalist magazine Vole, financed by Terry Jones of Monty Python, and was co-screenwriter of Terry Gilliam’s film Jabberwocky, and was co-developer of the story and co-writer (uncredited) of the first draft of the screenplay that became Brazil (1985).

(*) This quote and the one following are included in Dick Lochte’s long essay on Joe Goodey you can find on the Thrilling Detective website.

        The Joe Goodey series —

Goodey’s Last Stand. Houghton Mifflin, 1975

Not Sleeping, Just Dead. Houghton Mifflin, 1977

    Plus one crime-related standalone novel:

Fighting Back. Bobbs Merrill, 1973

   Noted TV journalist and news anchor JIM LEHRER died today at the age of 85. Of his many other accomplishments, which will most assuredly be included in the many obituaries appearing now online and again in tomorrow’s newspapers, he also wrote a good many works of crime fiction, most of which I seem to have missed knowing about for all these years.

   The first series of note are the light-hearted adventures of One-Eyed Mack, Oklahoma’s lieutenant governor, who solves mysteries in his spare time. Lehrer also wrote two books about Charles Avenue Henderson, a former CIA agent who wants nothing more to do but retire in peace and quiet, , but who finds that actually doing so is not as easy as he thought.

      The One-Eyed Mack series —

Kick the Can. Putnam 1988

Crown Oklahoma. Putnam 1989
The Sooner Spy. Putnam 1990
Lost and Found. Putnam 1991
Fine Lines. Random House 1994
Mack to the Rescue. University of Oklahoma Press, 2008.

    The Charlie Henderson series —

Blue Hearts. Random House 1993. ISBN 0-679-42216-1.

Purple Dots. Random House, 1998.

      Crime-related standalone novels include —

The Special Prisoner. Random House, 2000.
The Franklin Affair. Random House, 2003.
Top Down: A Novel of the Kennedy Assassination. Random Houose, 2013.

   W. GLENN DUNCAN passed away on May 7th of last year. He was the author of six books about a PI named Rafferty (no first name known). Rafferty, whose home base was Dallas TX, was definitely in the Spenser tradition, but with a Gold Medal sensibility. if that makes sense. (All of his books were paperback originals published by Fawcett Gold Medal. )

   Rafferty is also known for the set of Rules he lives by, and many of them are quoted throughout his adventures. (See below.)

        The Rafferty series —

Rafferty’s Rules (1987). Film: Cinepix, 1992, as Snake Eater III: His Law.
Last Seen Alive (1987)
Poor Dead Cricket (1988)
Wrong Place, Wrong Time (1989)

Cannon’s Mouth (1990)
Fatal Sisters (1990)

   — By W. Glenn Duncan, Jr.

False Gods (2018)

        Rafferty’s Rules, as compiled by Kevin Burton Smith

2) Be lucky. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

3) If you’re going to be stupid, see rule number two. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

3) When all else fails, sit on your duff and await good news…

5) If a client can afford it, he — or she — pays top dollar.

6) Don’t forget the money.

7) Anxious clients who smile too much are usually trouble.

8) The client has to say out loud what he wants me to do. (Rafferty’s Rules)

8) When in doubt, raise hell and see who complains about the noise. (Last Seen Alive)

9) Dull won’t balance the checkbook.

11) Don’t worry about what’s right, worry about what’s possible.

11) To feel really dumb, be a smart ass once too often. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

12) Selling people is antisocial.

13) Get the money up front.

16) When you can’t tell the bad guys from the good guys, it’s time to get the hell out. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

17) Never take a client at face value.

18) Ribs should be eaten naked.

19) When you can’t tell the bad guys from the good guys, it’s time to get the hell out. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

20) Any hunch so strong that it hurts just has to be right. (Cannon’s Mouth)

21) Grow up and grow old.

22) Don’t skulk. You can get away with anything if you act like you’re supposed to be doing it.

23) You show me a man who always “fights fair” and I’ll show you a man who loses too often.

27) In one way or another, every client lies. (Even Rafferty isn’t sure if this is #27 or not.)

28) Hot coffee and nudity don’t mix. If you spill, it hurts.

33) Always obey your friend, the police man.

34) Sometimes good luck accomplishes more than hard work. (Rafferty’s Rules)

34) When in doubt, dodge. (Wrong Place, Wrong Time)

34) Clients always hold back something back. (Last Seen Alive)

35) If a client appears to be telling you everything, see rule #34. (Last Seen Alive)

39) Smiting the wicked sounds biblical, but mostly it’s good clean fun.

41) When someone mentions how good something “could” be, they’re really telling me how lousy that something is.

47) Wear steel-toed boots when kicking people on their bony parts.

CORNELL WOOLRICH “Crime on St. Catherine Street.” Novelette. First published in Argosy 25 January 1936; reprinted as “All It Takes Is Brains” in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine, December 1966. Woolrich’s original title: “Murder on St. Catherine Street.”

   Woolrich was the kind of writer that could start with the screwiest kind of idea, get his protagonist to go along with it, and make the reader swallow it down whole, enjoying the whole rest of the story without hesitation and with no holds barred.

   Case in point. On a drunken whim, a man named Hewitt, one of Manhattan’s idle rich, agrees to a wager that he can go to a strange town — Montreal, say — with only six bits in his pocket, and manage to survive for a whole week without knowing a single soul. Which he manages to do, of course, and in fact he comes out ahead by several thousand dollars, not including the money he wins on the bet.

   It all begins with him picking up a girl as he starts the first night of his stay, or rather, as it turns out, she thinks she’s picking him up. But when she quarrels with his boy friend and accomplice in crime, a man known only as Louie, she ends up dead and Hewitt ends up on run from the law, with only a salt shaker in his pocket that he can use to pretend he has a gun.

   Coincidences always played large roles in any story that Cornell Woolrich wrote, and this one is no exception. But this is no tale of gloom and doom. In spite of all the odds against him, Hewitt maintains an upbeat attitude throughout, making this a lot of fun to read.

KING OF GAMBLERS. Paramount Pictures, 1937. Claire Trevor, Lloyd Nolan, Akim Tamiroff, Larry Crabbe. Helen Burgess, Barlowe Borland. Based on an unknown story by Tiffany Thayer. Director: Robert Florey.

   You’d have to call this a gangster movie, but most of the overt gangster-like violence takes place in the first eight minutes, as bomb goes off in a barber shop whose owner is balking at stocking the latest model slot machines. Two young children are killed, and gambler, suave night club owner, and mob boss Steve Kalkas (Akim Tamiroff) is beginning to feel the heat.

   To which he has an immediate answer. He’s a hands-on sort of mob boss, and there is a reason he always keeps a gun in his office desk drawer.

   But no. What the movie really is is a three-way romance between Kalkos, a night club singer named Dixie Moore (Claire Trevor), and a newspaper reporter by the name of Jim Adams (Lloyd Nolan). Dixie is blissfully unaware of Kalkos’s true attentions to her, but Adams is not quite so slow in catching on.

   It’s too bad that Lloyd Nolan’s character is out of town for much of the middle part of the book, or their love affair might have been consummated a lot sooner, as well as Kalkos’s final fate.

   I’m in line second to none when it comes to watching a movie with either Claire Trevor or Lloyd Nolan in it, but in my opinion, Akim Tamiroff walks off with the high acting honors in his one. He’s both unctuously outgoing when he wants to be, but that’s on the outside. Inside, whenever he needs to be, he can also be as viciously cruel as any other crime boss in town.

   This seems to be a movie that’s until recently has been hard to find. [See Comment #1.] Luckily someone did, and someone, that person or someone else, has put it up on YouTube. Enjoy this one while you can.

PS.   Larry Crabbe is also in this one, without the Buster, and boy, in a tuxedo and sporting a nifty mustache, does he make a great right hand man for Mr. Tamiroff. Who would have thought?

RAYMOND CHANDLER “English Summer.” Written in 1957; first printed in The Notebooks of Raymond Chandler, edited by Frank MacShane (Ecco Press, hardcover, 1976).

   A story that went unpublished in Chandler’s lifetime, and it’s easy to see why. But an excellent work nonetheless, and one of his best in the short story medium — which is saying a lot.

   According to Chandler’s notes (recorded in Raymond Chandler Speaking) he saw “English Summer” as a break-out work, one that would re-define his writing for the future. Hence, the first few pages read like he’s trying to change his accustomed style, and the result is a little constrained and sort of self-consciously Hemingwayesque.

   Fortunately, Chandler can’t keep up the strain of not writing like Chandler for long, and we are soon back into the familiar and uniformly excellent prose of a great writer at his best and when we get into the story proper….

   Yeah. This is a creepy one. The narrator, John Paringdon, is hopelessly in love with Millicent Crandall, who is married to an abusive and neglectful drunk. He is in fact a guest at their country cottage, the sort of situation that should lead to a weekend of brittle dialogue, but Chandler observes the unities here. At break of day Paringdon goes for a walk and meets the bewitching Lady Lakenham. By sunset he will be in love with no one.

   This being Chandler, there’s murder involved, done casually as dust swept under a casket. There’s also cold-blooded seduction committed by Lady Lakenham, in a castle hacked to pieces by her husband.

   We even get the sort of cross-country flight from the authorities one finds in the chase novels of John Buchan. But that’s not what “English Summer” is about.

   “English Summer” is about the death of Love. And it comes from a writer who once observed that in a mystery, the crime is (or should be) less important than its effect upon the characters — brilliantly realized here in a few pages that will haunt me for a long time.

   English singer-songwriter Sandy Denny (1947-1978) was a member of the folk-rock group Fairport Convention when this song was recorded. I do not believe it was released until after her death.