Mason, AEW -- No Other Tiger (1936)

B

Not a mystery story, although there are two murders in the present, and a couple more in the past.  As in They Wouldn’t Be Chessmen, the reader sees the events from both the hero and the villain’s perspective, and the emphasis is on suspense and adventure: will the bad man’s plot against the heroine and the wicked dancer succeed?  As always, Mason tells a story very well.  There are several excellent scenes (Strickland’s lonely vigil waiting for the tiger in Chapter III; Ransome’s accusation of Strickland; ***the discovery of Corinne’s body hanging from the chandelier***, which retrieves what may have been an anti-climax) and good characters, notably the Dickensian Mrs. Beagham, who trades in gossip from servants.  Cameo by Mr. Ricardo—who hardly covers himself in glory!

Note similarities to Allingham’s Tiger in the Smoke: a thriller in which the villain (a menacing figure of rage compared to tiger) and plot are known; escaped convicts searching for treasure / money; climax in France.

The end—Corinne’s death—anticipates Carr’s Lost Gallows: the wicked pay for their crimes, even extra-legally and at the hands of the villain.

·        Semiramis Hotel.

·        France—Provence.

·        Mazes: Ariadne; Clutter the man-beast; treasure hunt and clues; Strickland thinks of himself as in maze; recurring image of hedges and paths being blocked, or if character had turned left rather than right.

·        Mason believed in strong, natural women—in marriage, wife should be equal, a ‘mate’, not (as Ransome wants) a ‘debtor’, broken and moulded into what the man wants her to be.

Nick Fuller.