Wallace, Edgar - Red Aces (1929)

Red Aces is the fourth and last of Edgar Wallace's JG Reeder books, featuring the diffident sleuth with the furled umbrella in three novelette-length adventures:

• Red Aces - a man is killed in a remote house, and suspicion is cast on a young bank clerk who appears to have embezzled his money. Two playing cards - the Aces of Hearts and Diamonds - are displayed above a window in the victim's house. Reeder pays a visit to a gambling den, orders barley water, and sorts out the case in quick time.

• Kennedy the Con Man - Kennedy is the sole survivor of the crooks behind the Pizarro Scheme - a treasure-hunting confidence trick. When the victims of the Pizarro Scheme start disappearing from their flats and hotel rooms, is Kennedy behind it? Reeder is inveigled into the case by his assertive secretary, Miss Gillette, whose boyfriend has been robbed and whose friend's fiancee is a suspect. Reeder manages to solve the case, outsmart Kennedy and dispose of the intrusive Miss Gillette.

• The Case of Joe Attymar - It might be a coffin, for Joe Attymar is supposed to be dead, and Reeder's chicken-fancying young friend Johnny Southers is the main suspect. Reeder puts up with gas, concussion and bomb attacks in his efforts to ferret out the truth, and matches wits with one of the smartest quick-change artists in the business.

This is vintage Wallace, with no great depths but a good deal of humour and plenty of engaging goings-on along Wallace's beloved Thames.

Red Aces should shortly be available as a free download from Gutenberg Australia.

Jon Jermey.