Bruce, Leo - Case for Sergeant Beef (1947)

Review by Nick Fuller

4/5

More substantial than Bruce’s earlier books, for a sense of unreality hung about Case with Ropes and Rings (ingenious though it was), and the much-touted Furious Old Women was rather dull. The plot concerns Wellington Chickle’s attempts to plan and commit a perfect murder. While the murderer’s diary is not new (and was re-used in Crack of Doom), it is well-handled, and the way in which Chickle’s plot (which he fondly believes is ingenious) is seen through by every character in sight is most amusing. The characters are all eccentric, and the plot very neat; Bruce manages to put some new ideas in the inverted tale.

Case For Sergeant Beef is Leo Bruce's version of the inverted detective story. The reader is shown quite early, the journal of Mr. Wellington Chicle, who is a retired watchmaker with delusions of grandeur. He wants to be remembered as an exceptional man, one who is remembered in the same breath as Crippen and Landru, nay long after they are obscurities he shall be known as "the coolest and most brilliant murderer of the century". He has a cunning plan. He shall find a quiet spot and murder the first person who comes along. Since he has no motive he will never be suspected let alone caught.

We then move on to the actual events which show that Mr. Chicle is perhaps less of a genius than he imagined. Before he even commits a crime he has aroused suspicion by being spotted lurking in the woods and he later compounds his problems by trying to make the crime more complicated than his original plan. And in fact almost everyone else in the book thinks Mr. Chicle is up to something.

But Chicle is not the only possibility. The murder victim, the brother of Beef's client, is not a very pleasant man. He has been sponging off his sister, whose gun was involved and there are suspicions of shady connections to a certain Mr. Flipp, a bookmaker who became a widower in circunstances that drew the attention of the police. And why is Mrs. Pluck, Chicle's housekeeper so determined to conceal her activities on the night of the murder. We watch as Beef wonders why Chicle has lied about enjoying shooting and why a pair of unusual shoes from a local jumble sale are of such importance that Chicle, when caught with them tells obvious lies. We watch as Beef gets the local scout troop to find the site of another shot that has been fired. And then another body is found.

Filled with his usual humour, shrewdness, and thirst, Beef displays once more his ability to solve the case by resorting to sound common sense and good British ale. I would rate this as an excellent example of a classic British mystery and another triumph for Sgt. Beef.

Ron Smyth