Published in 1928, this was written by R. Austin Freeman (1862-1943).

I'd never heard of this author, but as his name came up twice in quick succession, I couldn't resist seeking him out, and giving him a try.

Firstly, he was one of those listed in The Five Red Herrings (the culprit in that, you may remember, "was a student of detective literature", and Dorothy L. Sayers treats to quite an extensive reading list).

And, secondly, T.S. Eliot's review of S.S. Van Dine's The Canary Murder Case qualifies his otherwise unreserved praise with this comment: "We would say that Mr. Van Dine has not yet written anything to equal the best work of either Mr. Freeman or Mr. Crofts."

As a Thief in the Night is later than the novels referred to in these sources, but I thought it would be a good place to start.



Our narrator is Rupert Mayfield, a lawyer. And one of the few bones I would pick with the book is that we don't really discover the exact nature of his relationship to the Kensington household at the centre of the case until many chapters have gone by. I'm sure this was deliberate, but I found it a little frustrating to be kept guessing.

Anyway, Mayfield is a friend of the Monkhouse family, with its various hangers-on, and is aware that Harold Monkhouse, is a sickly man. But because he's always laid up with something or other, no-one really notices that he has deteriorated of late. Except, that is, for his brother, Amos. He hasn't seen Harold for a while, so he is shocked by his state, and strongly registers his concern and anger -- the latter being directed largely at Monkhouse's wife, Barbara, who (in Amos's opinion) is away too much for the "trumpery reason" of supporting women's emancipation (or, as he describes it, "amusing herself with her platform fooleries").

A second medical opinion is requested, and tests are ordered, but nothing really substantial emerges. And then Harold dies... Given his state of health, this is not entirely surprising, but there are enough oddities about the case to necessitate an inquest.

It is at this point that Mayfield calls on the assistance of Dr Thorndyke, "a medical barrister", who is qualified not only in law but also in medicine. He is described in the book as "probably the greatest criminal lawyer of our time", and "the leading authority on poisons and on crimes connected with them".

The inquest reveals that Harold Monkhouse died from the effects of arsenic poisoning, and the administration of this substance had been going on for some time. So the hunt for the killer starts. More I will not say... But I will register that I got two-thirds of the solution right. If you think of a Colonel-Mustard-in-the-library-with-the-candlestick scenario, then I guessed the first two components. Just didn't get the murder weapon...

It's a well written story, nicely combining procedure, suspense, and atmosphere.



The Thorndyke character is undeniably the book's major strength. His expertise is fed by Freeman's own: The author qualified as a doctor; entered the Colonial Service; was posted to the Gold Coast; but was invalided home with blackwater fever. Unable to set up a practice, he found work as a locum, but also started to collaborate (using the pseudonym Clifford Ashdown) with the medical officer at Holloway Prison (John James Pitcairn) on a series of short stories.

It was in 1906 that Freeman started writing under his own steam (and under his own name). Dr John Evelyn Thorndyke made his first appearance in 1907, and is "regarded by many people as the first real fictional forensic scientist... It is claimed that Freeman tried out all the experiments that he describes in the Thorndyke novels."

While wholly scientific, Thorndyke is also eclectic in his evidence-gathering. At one point in the book, he says: "My rule is, when I am gravelled for lack of evidence, to collect, indiscriminately, all the information that I can obtain that is in the remotest way connected with the problem that I am dealing with." These two facets -- science and an interest in human beings -- are reflected in his character, too. The narrator says he was "as impersonal as Fate when he was occupied in actual research and yet showing at times unexpected gleams of warm human feeling and the most sympathetic understanding".



Freeman soon established himself as a successful crime writer: "[He] even won the approbation of Raymond Chandler, one of the harshest critics of Golden Age Detective Fiction. In a letter to Publisher Hamish Hamilton Chandler wrote of Freeman: 'He has no equal in his genre, and he is a much better writer than you might think... because in spite of the immense leisure of his writing, he accomplishes an even suspense which is quite unexpected... There is even a gaslight charm about his Victorian love affairs and those wonderful walks across London.'"

Yes, he does write very atmospherically about London. The fog, the alleys round the Inns of Court, Highgate Cemetery...

Another aspect of the story's interest derives from Mayfield's relationships: Firstly, with the three main women characters (one of them dead for many years); and secondly, with Thorndyke. Mayfield is aware of the peculiarity (and the inconsistency) of the latter: "I was, in fact, his employer. And yet, in a certain subtle sense, I was his antagonist. For I held certain beliefs which I, half-unconsciously, looked to him to confirm. But apparently he did not share those beliefs." Though urged to divulge all information, Mayfield sometimes feels reluctant to do so. So that's an interesting tension.

Our narrator, alas, does not wholly escape the attitudes of his age: "It is an appalling reflection, in these days of lady professors and women legislators, that to masculine eyes a woman never looks so dignified, so worshipful, so entirely desirable, as when she is occupied in the traditional activities that millenniums of human experience have associated with her sex." Oh, dear... At least he's good enough to acknowledge his prejudice...

Freeman also wrote on social and political matters, but his very right-wing ideas (anti-immigrant, pro-eugenics...) make this aspect of his work a much less attractive proposition). But, yes, I will certainly go back for more of the detective fiction.