One advantage to this “review a week” schedule I’ve been keeping is that it’s forced me to track down authors I’m interested in but wouldn’t take the time to read. Baroness Emma Orczy is one such writer. Although she’s most famous for her series about the Scarlet Pimpernel—a dashing hero who saves aristocrats during the French Revolution—us mystery fans know her through her mystery fiction. There’s Lady Molly of Scotland Yard. Or lawyer Skin o’ My Tooth. Or the subject of today’s review, The Old Man in the Corner.
The Old Man in the Corner has a slightly confusing publication history. Orczy wrote a series of stories in The Royal Magazine, that are collected in The Old Man in the Corner. And yet this collection was actually the second collection of stories, the first being The Case of Miss Elliot. So technically, I'm reading these stories in the wrong order! And, just to further frustrate, the first set of stories were originally in first person before being rewritten into third person…but the second collection (which came first mind you) kept the first-person narrator. How all of this came about, I do not know. So set all of that aside, take a seat at the A.B.C Teashop, and listen to an old man tell his stories.
The titular man is a wheezing, giggling weirdo who’s constantly messing with a piece of string. He’s also a fan of crime and a regular presence at inquests for the latest shocking murder or theft. Of course, the old man is a fair bit sharper than all in attendance and is able to deduce the truth simply through newspapers and inquests. So, we have what might be the first instance of the armchair detective character, who doesn’t stoop so low as to investigate, but instead merely sits and listens to the facts. Well, he does do some investigation, but that’s usually to confirm things he’s already deduced. His other interesting quality is what he does with his deductions: Zilch, bupkis, not a single finger lifted.
You see, the old man is possessed of a cheerful amorality. It’s not that he isn’t moved by the plight of victims or their families, nor does he have any real stake in criminals getting off. He’s just off the opinion that if a criminal is smart enough to outwit the police, then more power to them. “Crime interests me only when it resembles a clever game of chess, with many intricate moves which all tend to one solution, the checkmating of the antagonist—the detective force of the country.” It’s this aspect that elevates this collection into something more interesting.
For the most part, the stories are pretty simple and formulaic. The first chapter has the description of the crime, the second the inquest of an innocent person, the third the Old Man’s explanation. Polly Burton, our viewpoint character, barely does anything. In the first few stories she really doesn’t do anything, and even when she does talk in the later ones, she’s pretty quickly bulldozed by the Old Man. But even so, these stories are pretty solid overall, and the Old Man is a fascinating character to watch in action, as it were. There’s also some loose continuity, with a couple of recurring characters and some references to past cases.
We begin with “The Fenchurch Street Mystery.” The mystery is the disappearance and later murder of Willam Kershaw. He was attempting a blackmail scheme on Smethurst, the millionaire, over a murder that the latter committed twenty years ago. When Kershaw’s body is found in an alley, the millionaire himself is called to the dock. It’s a clever little mystery, even if today’s readers might see through it sooner than readers of the time (and I have to wonder if it would all go as smoothly as the killer planned).
The Old Man returns in “The Robbery at Phillimore Terrace.” A suspicious tramp is tailed into the titular terrace when he is suddenly fallen upon by the servant of the house of Knopf, the diamond merchant. The house has just been robbed, but there’s no trace of the jewels on the tramp. Complicating matters is that it turns out that Knopf’s neighbor has also been robbed of his jewels. The police are force to release the tramp, but they tail him back to the terrace…where he vanishes into thin air! Yes, we have a (minor) impossible crime here! The central idea is pretty good. I didn’t appreciate it at first, but I enjoyed it more after thinking about it. But I wouldn’t read this story solely for the impossible crime.
“The York Mystery” sees the Old Man recounting the murder of bookie Charles Lavender, a bookmaker who had Lord Arthur Skelmerton over a barrel with horse racing debts. So when he’s found stabbed on the grounds of Lord Skelmerton’s house with Lord Skelmerton’s knife, after threatening to come collect that night, it’s no surprise who finds himself facing the threat of the noose. But if he’s not responsible, then who is? Well, once you eliminate him, there’s only one suspect left. But the cluing pointing to this person is pretty good.
“The Mysterious Death on the Underground Railway” is only a two-chapter affair. “Will you be good enough,” he said suddenly, “to give me a description of the man who sat next to you just now, while you were having your cup of coffee and scone,” the Old Man taunts Polly. Obviously, she cannot, and this failure to tell one London man from another forms the basis for the shocking poisoning murder of a young woman on the Underground, allegedly at the hands of a possible lover. While the means of poisoning the victim is a cliché, the rest of the story is pretty good, with a good clue pointing at the culprit.
Next up is another short one: “The Liverpool Mystery.” There’s no murder here, merely the scamming of a clerk out of some banknotes for a purchase of jewelry.“A title—a foreign title, I mean—is always very useful for purposes of swindles and frauds,” muses the Old Man this time around. The solution is obvious, but scam stories almost always have a certain charm to them, and I suspect the Baroness was jabbing at some of the prejudices of her countrymen.
“The Edinburgh Mystery” (I’ll give you three guesses where this is set) involves the failed marriage of David Graham, a sweet but physically deformed young man. His godmother, determined to see him married, announces that she’s setting aside a deed of gift to her godson’s future wife. Within the week, he’s engaged to a doctor’s daughter. Sadly, this marriage is doomed to end in tragedy, as the fiancée finds herself in the dock on charges of robbery and murder of the godmother. Once again, the culprit stands out, but mystery itself is pretty solid, with a simple but clever dodge at the heart of it.
Like before, you get three guesses what “The Theft at the English Provident Bank” is about. Got it? Good. The bank is robbed in the night and the manager is found inconsolable (that old Victorian dodge, brain fever) in front of it in the morning. The night guard claims he saw the manager’s wife speak to the manager in the dark, but she flatly denies it. This one feels like a letdown, with a solution that probably should have occurred to the police.
However, we follow that up with “The Dublin Mystery,” my favorite of the collection. The mystery starts with the death of Millionaire Brooke (presumably not his actual name) of natural causes. What’s not natural is the death of his solicitor, who is strangled to death on his way home. Further excitement comes when Brooke Sr’s will leaves most of his estate to his wild younger son, while the dutiful older receives almost nothing. Allegations of fraud and murder follow. This one is fun because of the cluing. It’s the kind of subtle bit that you just brush over without really thinking about what it means that Christie and Carr would later use to good effect.
The titular unparalleled outrage of “An Unparalleled Outrage” is the robbery and kidnapping of Francis Morton, who is found in an apartment on the verge of death. Morton alleges that he was meant to deliver money to his wife’s first husband, who she assumed was dead. Instead, he was robbed and left to die. The renter, one Edward Skinner, stands accused in court…but Morton clears him. The Old Man points to the obvious solution, the main stand-out being just how completely the culprit gets away with everything.
“The Regent’s Park Murder” is another highlight. The inhabitants of Park Square West are awoken at three in the morning by cries of “Police” and “Murder,” followed by gunshots. The body of Aaron Cohen is found shortly thereafter, though he’s been strangled to death. The police suspect the killer killed the man then shot at him to make sure he was dead, missing in the process. They turn their attention to John Ashley, a minor noble who had a bad run at a gambling den against Cohen, and who owns the gun found at the scene. Obviously, a case this clear can’t help but collapse, but then who committed the crime? The Old Man’s solution is clever and surprising, making this one of the gems of the collection.
“The de Genneville Peerage” is another legal dispute over inheritance. Like in “The Dublin Mystery,” we have a dutiful older son dealing with a more careless younger. This young man is sweet-talked by a lawyer into arguing that he’s entitled to the inheritance on the basis of an old will centuries old. His case is derailed by the minor issue of his brutal murder in his hotel bedroom. Might his older brother have been so threatened by the lawsuit that he took a dramatic risk? The hotel porter seems convinced that he went to the hotel the night of the crime. And what about the lawyer who started all this mess, who disappeared the same night? I figured out the central idea but applied it the wrong way round. This is on par with the other stories in the collection.
We end with “The Mysterious Death in Percy Street.” The death is that of the caretaker for a series of studios, who is found dead in her bedroom, the windows wide open on a winter night. For some reason the story acts like there was any ambiguity about what happened, with some characters in story thinking that it’s possible it was suicide for some reason. No, of course not. An admirer is briefly suspected but cleared, leaving the Old Man to explain the simple truth behind the crime. But this time, it’s Polly who gets the last laugh on the Old Man, with one of the more surprising solutions from this time period. It’s a good reveal that casts some of the earlier stories in a more unsettling light.
All in all, The Old Man in the Corner is a good collection. It’s of great historical value to the genre, and is worth reading on that basis. But even if you’re just looking for good Victorian mysteries, you could do a lot worse than this. These aren’t as sophisticated as what would come later, but are good for what they are, and if you engage with them on their level, they may just surprise you. And the Old Man is a fascinating detective to spend time with. Recommended
Other Reviews: The Invisible Event.
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