With One Stone by Frances & Richard Lockridge (1961)

 

Major characters:

• James Bedlow, wealthy newspaper publisher
• Ann Bedlow, his second (and trophy) wife
• Dinah, James' daughter (by his first marriage)
• Mary Parsons, James' other daughter (by his first marriage)
• Russel Parsons, Mary's husband, a public relations man
• Norman Curtis, editor at Bedlow's newspaper
• Robert Lynch, Ann's brother
• Jason Sarles, gardener
• Harry Simpkins, butler
• Captain Merton Heimrich
• Sergeant Forniss

Locale: (fictional) Van Brunt, upstate New York

Synopsis: Captain Merton Heimrich is returning from Florida with his bride Susan Faye Heimrich, when they read of a death near their home in New York state.

It was the custom of the wealthy Bedlow family to gather for cocktails at 6 PM. The family consists of wealthy newspaper publisher James Bedlow, his second wife Ann Bedlow, and his two daughters Dinah Bedlow and Mary Parsons. Trophy wife Ann is much younger than James, about the age of his daughters.

Ann goes for a pre-cocktail walk on the estate but does not return. James goes to look for her, and finds her near death in the bottom of their empty pool. He and gardener Jason Sarles bring her to the house, but to no avail, she dies from a serious head wound.

Authorities arrive and find a bloody rock nearby, apparently a murder weapon. They also find someone had apparently been staying in their closed-up guest house near the pool. Not long after questioning the household, James Bedlow himself is found dead in his home office, apparently a suicide. But something isn't quite right - who shoots themselves by holding the gun far away?

With two murders in hand, the investigation turns to motive, and the sequence of inheritance. Robert Lynch, a penniless artist, is Ann's half-brother, and is hoping to be in on the proceeds of the estate. He heads to Van Brunt - but meets up with a rock and the empty swimming pool as well.

Review:

It is a cunning murderer who plots getting an inheritance by making sure A dies, then B dies; but not the other way around; and a plot element common in Erle Stanley Gardner's Perry Mason series. 

We have a small cast of characters in the mansion. Picking out the murderer gets a bit easier as it goes along, since three of the cast get murdered along the way. I had it narrowed down to two, and it was indeed one of them. 

It is always fun to have a mix of the gentry in their mansion, especially when they begin suspecting each other. This 1961 story also shows how alcohol was a common part of everyday life, and everyone is always fixing drinks whenever the action slows; and the 6PM cocktail cart was a requisite part of lubricating the household.

The story is told in third person, and reveals the thoughts of many of the cast. Some of these are obscure and sometimes I was not sure who was "thinking" or what they meant. But that does not detract from the enjoyment. The Heimrich series always fits well like a comfortable old sweater.

Also see this review by Bev Hankins on My Reader's Block.