Freeman, R Austin - When Rogues Fall Out (1932) aka Dr. Thorndyke's Discovery

This is very close in form to the inverted detective story. We see most of the events leading up to the first crime, and know who the criminal is. We do not see such events from the criminal's point of view in the second murder. But so much is known about this crime immediately by the police, that is almost as if we have seen the events leading up to it. The reader can guess, in both cases, most of the facts of the murders. The pleasure of the tale is seeing Thorndyke unravel the crimes. Freeman leaves a few surprises up his sleeve, which give pleasure to the reader; these surprises prevent the tale from being a pure, 100% inverted detective story. Still, it is very close to the inverted form. The lack of mystery in the tale is unexpectedly compensated for by the clarity with which the reader can follow all the events of the case. Both crimes are full of interesting detail. The tale is lacking in the brilliance of [Mr. Pottermack's Oversight], but it is a good read.

Material in the book looks forward and backward to other Freeman novels. It resembles The Penrose Mystery (1936) to come, in that the opening sections deal with a collector with a private museum in his house. An accident in the country followed by a hospital stay plays a role in both books. These events are as lucid and straightforward in When Rogues Fall Out as they are baffling and filled with mystery in The Penrose Mystery. It is as if Freeman had taken some of the events of the earlier novel, and filled them with mysterious twists. Both of these books are noteworthy among Freeman's later fiction, in having little in common with the material of his early trilogy of novels. Polton and his skill with mechanics plays a major role in both books. The country churchyard in Discovery and the barrow in Penrose play parallel roles.

Both When Rogues Fall Out and Mr Pottermack's Oversight are very episodic in their construction. Each is a mosaic made up of many small sections, which are very diverse in their material. When Rogues Fall Out also recalls Mr Pottermack's Oversight in its concern with optical devices and photography. Some of the optical techniques employed in the earlier novel are put to new applications here as well. One of the devices Freeman has invented here anticipates modern security surveillance equipment. So Freeman was a pioneer here, as he was in his tales advocating police laboratories. Both When Rogues Fall Out and Mr Pottermack's Oversight are sunny, cheerful books. Despite their various crimes, they both radiate optimism and good nature. Perhaps because the reader understands all the events in these inverted stories, there is a lack of a sense of sinister, dark mysteries that oppress several later Thorndyke novels. Mr Pottermack, despite being a criminal, is a very sympathetic character. And only a small fraction of When Rogues Fall Out is from the murderer's point of view. Instead, more often we see two other cheap but completely non-murderous crooks, each of which has their comic angle. Indeed, the British title of the book seems well-chosen: When Rogues Fall Out. One wonders whether this is Freeman's original title; Dr. Thorndyke does not actually make any key discoveries in this book, and the dignified American title Dr. Thorndyke's Discovery seems arbitrary.

Much of Mr. Pottermack's Oversight takes place outside, and is a culmination of Freeman's interest in landscape architecture. By contrast, When Rogues Fall Out is more of an indoors book, and shows the Golden Age interest in extravagant architecture. We see the victim's home, and a railway tunnel, as well as a country cottage and an auction house. There is a slight ambiguity in some of these settings between indoors and outdoors. The railway tunnel, while a massive human construction, is entered from outdoors, and the space underneath it partakes of some features of the outside. The scenes at the victim's house include the churchyard next door, also an outdoors if man made region. Both much of the house and the tunnel are underground regions; the book has a chthonic feel. The clock interior early in the book also maintains the imagery of hidden chambers and tunnels.

One can make some criticisms of this novel. It seems unlikely that Scotland Yard would have been unable to identify the killer's fingerprints. And Thorndyke's easy deductions of the real tangled state of affairs seem too easy, and set up by the author. On the plus side is Freeman's wonderful narrative flow, in which each detail is logically explained.

Mike Grost

Didbury Toke collects and deals in antiques and works of art. Alas, he's also a fence and not always scrupulous in his dealings with non experts. It is this latter trait that leads him to rook Thomas Hobson and his wife, buying a beautiful l692 walnut and marquetry long case clock for 2 pounds. After restoration the clock sells for about ten ten times that, but not before Toke discovers diamond jewelry hidden in its base, a treasure trove he keeps before putting the clock on the market.

Hobson's attempt to get the clock back ultimately leads to a flourishing criminal partnership between his representative, Arthur Hughes, and Toke. The former supplies stolen jewelry and other goods, the latter disposes of them. Inevitably cracks appear in the relationship, and then Toke disappears while on the continent.

The second part opens with the murder in Kent of a certain police officer known to readers of the Thorndyke stories. The deceased had gone there to dentify one Frederick Smith, and the body, robbed of official documents, is found in the Greenhithe railway tunnel. Naturally the police, Thorndyke, and Jervis are keen to catch the perpetrator.

In passing we learn Dr Jervis is married to a lady he met during one of Thorndyke's previous cases, and once this is known, the alert reader will begin to put two and two together as to how a swizz was worked, but no matter, it's still interesting to follow Thorndyke's careful investigation of a case that ultimately involves strange noises in the sealed wing of a country house and links back to the disappearance of the owner, the two-faced Toke.

My verdict: Readers who have read the previous case mentioned, particularly if they are also familiar with a certain novel by John Meade Falkner, will be a few steps ahead of Thorndyke as he unravels the inter-connected crimes, but even so it's a pretty good outing. The usual explanations of scientific doings -- and the way in which two of Polton's particularly useful inventions work -- hold interest to the end, where justice is finally done.

Etext

Mary R

 A three-sectioned novel, the first section of which is an entertaining account of the titular falling-out among three rogues that leads to murder. This part is told in the inverted style. The second section deals with the investigation by Thorndyke and his associates of another murder, one that not suprisingly turns out to be related to the murder detailed in second one. The third section returns to the matter of the first murder. Really a simple enough tale, without the Byzantine plotting of many Golden Age tales, but well-told, even if the conversation of the characters reads more like 1912 than 1932.  Not like straw-chewing at all. Thorndyke is brilliant but bland, far removed in personality from Conan Doyle's Holmes or even Rhode's Dr. Priestley. Most memorable characters: Freeman's wrinkled assistant Polton, who has a tool for every occasion, the ruthless murderer and the cleverly-named Didbury Toke.

Curt