I'm still on my "queens of crime" trail, and have finally reached Ngaio Marsh (1895-1982). She has an interesting life story. Born and educated in New Zealand, she divided her time between her home country and the UK, and her talent among multiple artistic pursuits (she painted and directed theatre productions, as well as writing novels). Impressive though this versatility might appear to us, her mixed career was regarded at the time as something of a liability. Carole Acheson quotes from her autobiography: "Intellectual New Zealand friends tactfully avoid all mention of my published work and if they like me, do so, I cannot but feel, in spite of it."

Colour Scheme was published in 1943, and I listened to an audio version. The narrator did a fine job with the posh Brits, but not only struggled a bit with the New Zealand accents (understandable, as they are very tricky to get right), but also consistently mispronounced words like pakeha and marae, which I found a bit distracting.

Nevertheless, I enjoyed the book. It's a highly unusual story, and Marsh herself regarded it as her best.


Orakei Karako, 2001

We find ourselves at Wai-ata-tapu thermal springs, in New Zealand's North Island (and the setting brought back plenty of memories of various expeditions to such areas). The curative enterprise that has been established around the natural hot water and mud pools is run by Colonel Edward Claire, with wife Agnes and daughter Barbara (there's also a son, Simon, but he's dead set on getting himself into the services, so seems to spend most of his time learning Morse code and other such skills, and scandalizing his family with his talent for New Zealand turns of speech). The Claires are ex-India colonials, and a constant source of annoyance to the irascible Dr James Ackrington, Mrs Claire's brother.

At the springs for therapeutic reasons is Geoffrey Gaunt, a temperamental and somewhat arrogant actor, plus his entourage of two (chief among them Dikon Bell, who often ends up being the novel's voice of reason). Roaming around in the background we have the unlikeable, opportunistic, and coarse Maurice Questing, to whom Colonel Claire seems to have some financial obligation, and the prone-to-inebriation Herbert Smith, a workman. Rolling up later, for the sake of his lumbago, is Septimus Falls.

These characters, at each other's throats for most of the book, provide an often Fawlty-Towers-like atmosphere. Indeed, Acheson remarks that Colour Scheme "is essentially a comedy of manners in which the murder/detective element serves only to provide a structure and a climax". At the root of much of the conflict are rival concepts of class, origin, and identity, much of which draws from Marsh's own experience of divided loyalties.



But there's a serious accusation afoot as well -- that of aiding the enemy. It's 1943, remember. Not only was fear of a Japanese invasion rife, but German raiders were also out and about on New Zealand's waters, laying mines, and attacking Allied shipping (in the second half of 1940, they succeeded in sinking four ships off New Zealand, causing the deaths of more than 50 people). So, when a ship is torpedoed in our story, it's not at all an unrealistic proposition.

We don't hear much else about wartime conditions. We see those living at the springs observing blackout regulations, as required. They would also have been subject to petrol and food rationing. (Also unmentioned, because it was all hushed up, was the April 1943 "Battle of Manners Street". This violent altercation between US and NZ servicemen, in which at least two people died, has been described as "the ugliest riot in New Zealand's history". No results of the inquiries into this or similar incidents were ever published, and because of wartime censorship, they weren't covered in the local newspapers at the time.) Marsh herself joined NZ's Red Cross Transport Unit during the war.

Near the springs, meanwhile, there's a Maori village, whose legends, tapu areas, and concealed treasures provide another plot element.



Questing is such a nasty character, with so many enemies, that it's unsurprising that he's the one who ends up dead (in a boiling mud pool, rather horribly...) What is more unusual is that this doesn't happen until a large proportion of the story has gone by (the audio-book takes 9 hours and 44 minutes to read, and there are only 4.25 hours left when the terrible scream of the doomed man is heard...). Also odd -- to me -- was the apparent absence of a crack sleuth. We have Detective Sergeant Webley, who is very competent in the business of witnesses and evidence, but does little detecting. So we end up with this complicated round-the-table meeting, where the various protagonists outline their various alibis, and try to pick holes in each other's stories, but the police are conspicuous by their absence.

This being the first Ngaio Marsh I have read, I picked up no clues (if such there were) as to the identity of one of the resort party, who turns out right at the end to be none other than the redoubtable Roderick Alleyn, working under an alias (he has been sent to New Zealand to look for spies)...

It's the 12th Roderick Alleyn book, by the way, and there were 32 altogether. According to Carol Westron, he "is very much a Golden Age detective hero: handsome, well-born (his brother is a baronet) and highly intelligent, he is also unfailingly courteous to those of a lower class or less wealthy than he is." But in Colour Scheme, you don't get much insight into all this.



Anyway, we end up with the various aspects of accrued guilt -- assisting the enemy, committing murder, and stealing Maori artefacts -- pinned on the various culprits, and justice done. It also looks as though Dikon and Barbara may get together (and, heaven knows, they deserve each other).

I was unsure what to make of the treatment of Maori. On the one hand, some of the characterizations verge on the stereotypical (Huia, Eru...), and words like "primitive" and "savage" and "primordial" crop up uncomfortably often... On the other hand, it is very respectful (especially by the sad standards of the age). Maori culture is presented seriously, and the characters of kaumatua such as former MP Rua Te Kahu and matriarch Mrs Te Papa are accorded dignity and admiration. Ackrington expands on how the pakeha have ruined the Maori, in a way that is somewhat patronizing but not entirely devoid of insight. (Colonel and Mrs Claire make their own contributions of the patronizing element, minus the critique, but as the colonial Claires are generally presented as fossils, their views are clearly not legitimated.) Generally, Maori are portrayed as putting up with the pakeha rather better than is the case the other way round.

Acheson explains how Marsh's own internal/external view of New Zealand gave her a different perspective on the situation of its indigenous people: "It was clear to her that the Maoris were suffering from being caught between two cultures: their own, of which they had to reject whatever the white missionaries and settlers found objectionable; and European culture, which they were expected to assimilate quickly in exchange... [All Marsh's New Zealand fiction portrays] her love for the land and her sympathy for the Maori people, particularly for their difficulties in adapting to an alien culture." Indeed, this view is articulated by Rua, who says: "Our people stand between two worlds. In a century we had to swallow the progress of nineteen hundred years. Do you wonder that we suffer a little from evolutionary dyspepsia?"

I'm not sure quite where this view would have stood on the spectrum of understanding in its day, but even 80 years later, it's an advance on some of the views emanating from various parts of the world.

All in all, then, an interesting story, and I'd definitely be up for checking out more.