I've spent some time i the past few weeks talking with friends about one of the great "crime queens" of the Golden Age, Margery Allingham. One of the reasons why I enjoy so many of her books is that - when you read one for the first time - you can never be quite sure what kind of book you're reading, as Allingham wrote crime fiction ranging from "pure" detective stories to thrillers to "psychological" dramas, and she tackled all the genres extremely well. Her detective, Albert Campion, who appears in most of her books, is a delight to know. I realize that I haven't featured very many of Allingham's books on the Classic Mysteries podcast, and I hope to work some of the novels which I haven't reviewed here yet into our schedule as we go along. For today, I'd like to share with you an engaging combination of traditional puzzle-plot mystery and thriller called More Work for the Undertaker, which I reviewed here about eight years ago. Here's the text of that review, edited somewhat, mostly to update with information about the book's availability.
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Interesting people, the Palinode family. Eccentric, to be sure – what’s a good British family in a mystery without some eccentricities? Very poor, too – in fact, they were reduced to living as boarders in the house they used to own. But they still were interesting and engaging people. So why has someone been poisoning them? Unless Albert Campion can come up with an answer, there’s likely to be More Work for the Undertaker – the title of Margery Allingham’s book which we’ll be discussing today.
Margery Allingham is still regarded today as one of the so-called “crime queens” of Britain’s Golden Age of Detection. More Work for the Undertaker originally appeared in 1949, putting it just after that Golden Age, but it remains one of Allingham’s most interesting and enjoyable books.
At the heart of the book is the Palinode family, five elderly siblings and a young niece who have come down in the world. They used to own their house, in the days when their father, a professor, and his wife, a poetess, used to host literary gatherings. The house has been taken over now by an elderly variety actress, Renee Roper, who has allowed the Palinodes to stay on as more-or-less paying boarders.
When two of the Palinodes die suddenly, of course, Renee is horrified, particularly when poison is suspected. She ultimately persuades an old acquaintance – Allingham’s detective, Albert Campion – to move into the house as a boarder, the better to investigate. This comes as a huge relief to the police as well, who have been unable to make sense out of the case.
What Campion quickly discovers is that there is something very peculiar going on in the neighborhood of the Palinode’s house – a quiet little street called Apron Street. The police do not understand it, but quite a number of London’s professional gangsters and thieves appear to have developed a powerful fear of something in the neighborhood, expressed as a warning not to go up Apron Street. And it will only be by uncovering that mystery that Campion will be able to solve the riddle of why someone should want to kill members of the seemingly harmless Palinode family.
There are murderous attacks and a strange suicide, not to mention the occasional poisoning. But while there is a great deal of action in this book, it is the characters who make it one of Allingham’s best. Not only Campion himself, and his friend, Renee Roper, and the fascinating Palinodes. Campion’s valet-and-factotum-and-general aide, named Magersfontein Lugg, also plays a central role here. And there is a local undertaker with the unfortunate name of James Bowels, who seems to have stepped out of the pages of a Dickens novel. There’s a local doctor, henpecked by his wife, and the local druggist, who plays another key part here. Police detective inspector Charlie Luke – who will appear in many of the later Campion books – makes his first appearance here. In addition, there is a coffin which rather unnervingly appears and disappears at odd times. And there is a final, fantastic chase – up Apron Street, if you will – with police pursuing a horse-drawn coffin brake, a cart designed to carry a coffin. All of this is told with quiet humor – but with a serious undercurrent, a sense of something not quite right and very dangerous.
It is all fantastic, to be sure, but Allingham, as always, carries it off with aplomb. I find her writing here has the ability to take my breath away; she catches moments and pins them in a few words that make unforgettable portraits.
Let me give you a few examples:
Here’s Charlie Luke, describing the street to Campion:
The district’s gone down like a drunk in thirty years, and the Palinodes with it.
Here’s Campion, in the midst of a very peculiar conversation with one of the elderly Palinodes:
He felt that, intellectually speaking, he was having a conversation with someone at the other end of a circular tunnel, and was in fact standing directly back to back with her. On the other hand, of course, it was possible that he had become Alice in Wonderland.
And how about this description, again of an older woman:
She laughed at him and another few years slid off her age.
Or this one:
She was very small and the rags of attractiveness hung round her like dead petals.
I realize that these are all out of context and probably don’t mean much on first hearing. What matters is that they are quite typical of the kind of fine writing and really amazing descriptions you’ll find on nearly every page of More Work for the Undertaker. It’s a wonderful story, and the secret of Apron Street is quite likely to elude you until the final explanation is given. Campion, Luke and Lugg are all at their finest here, and Allingham’s other characters will charm you, horrify you, sometimes both. She’s a fine writer, and More Work for the Undertaker is Allingham at her best. [Updated: Agora Books has re-released paperback and e-book versions, and there's also an audio version readily available.]
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You can listen to the complete original podcast version of the review by clicking here.
Next: The Man in the Brown Suit, by Agatha Christie.
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