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Death and the Dancing Footman
by
Ngaio Marsh
detective mystery, vintage mystery in a Kindle edition that was published by Felony & Mayhem Press on December 15, 2012 and has 356 pages.
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Other books by this author which I have reviewed include Dead Water, Killer Dolphin, A Man Lay Dead, Enter a Murderer, The Nursing Home Murder, Death in Ecstasy, Vintage Murder, Artists in Crime, Death in a White Tie, Overture to Death, Death at the Bar, Surfeit of Lampreys, Died in the Wool, Swing, Brother, Swing, Night at the Vulcan, Colour Scheme, Spinsters in Jeopardy, Scales of Justice, The Death of a Fool, Singing in the Shroud, False Scent, Clutch of Constables, Hand in Glove, When in Rome, Tied Up In Tinsel
Eleventh in the Inspector Roderick Alleyn vintage detective mystery series and revolving around a Scotland Yard detective. The year is 1940 and blackout rules are in effect. The story is set in Dorset. The focus is on an antagonistic weekend house party. This story was first published in 1941.
My Take
I do love it when a series brings us back into a previous story’s characters. A way of catching up with life. In this case, Agatha Troy is painting the Reverend Walter Copeland from Overture to Death, 8.
Marsh uses a third person global subjective point-of-view from the perspectives of a number of characters, so we know their thoughts, emotions, and experiences.
Royal reveals his game to Mandrake who does not approve. Poor guy, Royal wants to be creative but it isn’t in him. It’s one reason he likes Mandrake. Royal does explain his theory of “each individual ha[ving] as many exterior realities as the number of encounters he makes”, and it’s another fascination.
It’s fascinating to read of plastic surgery in the 1910s and so sad to know Sandra Compline felt the need for it. There is some hinting? that William’s tendency to say the first thing that comes into his head is due to the trauma of seeing the result of his mother’s “plastic” surgery. Marsh notes that Nicholas is just like his father, all ego and selfishness, and, as we discover, a coward who wants his cake and wants to eat it as well.
I love that William likes to paint, although his mother pooh-poohs it.
I have no time for Madame Lisse. She’s so self-absorbed in herself and her career! Cold to her husband and anyone else in her life. And karma grabs her quickly, lol. Dr Hart certainly has his problems what with so many people getting hurt (or dying) and no one trusting him.
I keep being confused about “beauty specialist”. Marsh makes Madame Lisse and Lady Hersey sound like they’re owner/operators, but the term sounds like the ladies are doing work on the individual clients.
There’s action but mostly chat as the guests complain about each other and wonder who is attempting to kill whom. It is interesting that they wonder what a play about Jonathan would be like, how each would react to a particular event.
Yep, this is such a fun party that some guests keep trying to leave the party in the middle of a blizzard.
There’s conflict amongst them, mostly the lover interactions although there are business issues from the past and today, but also the enmity between Lady Hersey Amblington and Madame Lisse who operate rival beauty salons. Lisse is poaching most of Lady Hersey’s upper-class clientele!
It cracks me up that Jonathan is so interested in live flowers while Mandrake prefers dead flowers, even as he considers his next play.
There is a very weird red herring in this, and i don’t see what Marsh was trying to accomplish, well, except to confuse the reader.
That exciting drive to Winton St Giles through all the snow makes me grateful for snow tires. It’s the drive back that gives Alleyn the opportunity to notice courtship notes.
It does end on a curious note, and I’ll be curious to read on and see if we see more of Jonathan.
The Story
Jonathan Royal is bored and sets up a house party to play psychiatrist with guests who feel antagonism for the others. His intentions are good . . . and he thinks Mandrake will get some grand ideas to write about.
The Characters
Chief Detective-Inspector Roderick Alleyn is with CID at Scotland Yard. He’s married to Agatha Troy, a famous painter, who is doing a portrait of Walter Copeland at Winton St Giles.
Scotland Yard
Dr Curtis is the police surgeon. Detective Inspector “Brer” Fox, a.k.a. Foxkin, is Alleyn’s partner and has a great way with female domestics; Detective-Sergeant (DS) Thompson is the photographic expert; and, DS Bailey is the fingerprint expert.
Highfold Manor is . . .
. . . the country home of Jonathan “Jo” Royal in Penfelton near Cloudyfold. He has some unusual, for his time and sex, interests such as flower-arranging, ensuring their appropriateness for his guests and their rooms, and the arrangement of his house. Jonathan is also a justice of the peace. Caper is his butler. Mrs Pouting is the housekeeper. James and Thomas Bewling are Jonathan’s head shepherd and his brother. Miss Fancy Bewling is the Bewlings’ old aunt. Another Thomas is a footman. An ancestor, Hubert St John Worthington Royal, has a part to play. Elsie is a second housemaid.
The guests for Royal’s house party include the disabled Aubrey Mandrake, who is a poetic dramatist, his real name is Stanley Footling of which he is most embarrassed; the Complines; Dr Francis Hart, formerly Doktor Franz Hartz, newly emigrated from Vienna, is a plastic surgeon; the gorgeous Madame Elise Lisse, a.k.a. the Pirate, of the Studio Lisse, who is a beauty specialist and an early refugee from Austria; Miss Chloris Wynne, who was engaged to Nicholas and is now engaged to William, has enlisted as a W.R.E.N.; and, Lady Hersey Amblington is Jonathan’s distant cousin, who loves to knit and is another beauty specialist.
The Complines include Sandra, the mother who had a botched plastic surgery, a.k.a. Mrs Nicholas; William, who is home on leave and the oldest son, devoted to his mother and despised by her; and, Nicholas, who is the spoiled younger son who has a comfy situation out of the war. Deacon is Mrs Compline’s maid.
Walter Copeland, is the rector of Winton St Giles. Dinah is his daughter, who intends to follow up with her acting, and is engaged to Henry Jerningham, the son of the local squire. Pen Cuckoo, the Jerningham estate, is currently shut after events two years ago in Overture to Death.
Great Chipping
Blandish is still the police superintendent. Lord Hesterdon is the chief constable. Mr Tassy is the chemist.
Mrs Ainsley is a former client of Lady Hersey’s. Jane is Lady Hersey’s second-in-command at the salon.
The Cover and Title
The cover is a grayish purple with the centralized gradient in the upper half serving as a background for the title with its gradient of white to pale purple. The stretched banner across the center is in a pale gray with the author’s name in its art deco font in deep purple, white, and hatch marks. The bottom third is classic with its rays of one-sided scalloped rays in white with the spaces between with their own gradients of deep purple to the lighter. There are five individually posed figurines in assorted colors — one figurine is lying down, broken. They stand on a light wooden surface with the pale purple arched banner providing background for the series info in white.
The title is about timing when Death and the Dancing Footman frolic at the same time.
