The Norths Meet Murder by Frances & Richard Lockridge, 1940

 

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Burnt Offering by Richard & Frances Lockridge, 1955

 

photo: AbeBooks

Series: This is Captain Heimrich #9.

About the authors: Richard Orson Lockridge (1898 –1982) was an American writer of detective fiction. Richard Lockridge with his wife Frances (1896-1963) created one of the most famous American mystery series, Mr. and Mrs. North. (wikipedia).

Major characters:

• Susan Faye, widow, fabric designer
• Michael Faye, her son
• Orville Phipps, banker, town supervisor
• Asa Pervis, tow truck operator
• Cornelia Van Brunt, matriarch widow
• Henry Van Brunt III, her son
• Sam Jackson, lawyer
• Capt. Merton Heimrich, NY State Police
• Marian Alden, his niece
• John Alden, her husband
• Sgt. Charlie Forniss

Locale: [fictional] Van Brunt, Putnam County, New York

Synopsis: Marian Alden, niece of NY State Police Captain Merton Heimrich, and her husband John Alden are anxious to fit in to their town of Van Brunt; and attend the local town meeting. All the NIMBYs are there to oppose a zoning change to allow smaller lot sizes the resulting influx of low-brows; and there is tension among the residents. Town Supervisor (and banker and land developer) Orville Phipps is chairing the meeting.

The meeting is interrupted by a fire at the fire station. The building and two engines are destroyed. Early in the morning, Asa Purvis, on towing duty at the garage across the street, finds Phipps' Jeep parked in his station. Thinking Phipps is looking at the fire station mess, he takes a look himself, and finds Phipps' burned body in the rubble. Did he die in the fire?

Captain Heimrich thinks the death suspicious. Widow Susan Faye reports she had been given a ride by Phipps long after the fire was out, and autopsy shows Phipps was dead before his body was placed in the rubble. Heimrich is attracted* to Susan, but discovers a possible motive she will inherit from Phipps, who was her cousin. Then her son Michael Faye is abducted briefly - and returned with a warning to forget whatever Phipps had told her. Someone then takes a shot at Asa Purvis.

*Heimrich and Susan will marry in a later title.

Review:  Well, I got spolier-ed on this one. I knew right off who the killer was, as a later book (I forget which) mentioned this specific case and I.D'd the killer. Serves me right for not reading them in order. But that did not diminish my enjoyment of this one.

I have served on my town's zoning board, so I felt right at home in the opening chapter as we get a play-by-play of the town meeting, complete with annoying NIMBY's. Fortunately the meeting only lasted the first chapter. 

I found it interesting how the well-to-do town had a specific section (The Flats) which has the down-and-outs. In the Hudson Valley, no less! And the town made nice pretty street signs, but none for The Flats. It made for some uncomfortable reading as the well-to-do's look down their noses and try to keep them from infiltrating the rest of the town; and kept calling to mind similar incidents of which I am aware. It was the catalyst for murder, but does it ever really rise to that point?

I enjoyed reading about Susan Faye before she and Heimrich got married. I had not realized what a tough position she had been in financially.

 While you're here, you may also enjoy:  

• this review by Bev Hankins on My Reader's Block
• this review by Kate on Cross Examining Crime

A Client is Canceled by Richard & Frances Lockridge, 1951

 

About the authors: Richard Orson Lockridge (1898 –1982) was an American writer of detective fiction. Richard Lockridge with his wife Frances (1896-1963) created one of the most famous American mystery series, Mr. and Mrs. North. (wikipedia).

Major characters:

• Orson Otis, "Oh-Oh", our narrator
• Winifred Otis, "Pooh", his wife
• Paul J. Barlow, Pooh's uncle, VP of a cigarette company
• Pauline Barlow, his daughter
• Francis Eldredge, a cow farmer
• George Townsend, a neighbor, head of an ad agency
• Faye Townsend, his wife, a decorator
• Ann Dean
• Dwight Craig, Ann's ex
• Captain Heimrich

Locale: New York state

Synopsis: Oh-Oh (narrator) and Pooh are invited to a cocktail party at the home of their neighbors, George and Faye Townsend. They really don't want to go, but it's really hot and they have a nice pool. The party has a lot of tension. Wealthy Paul J. Barlow, VP of Blends cigarette company, had bought out Francis Eldredge's tobacco business, and Eldredge doesn't like the way he runs things. George Townsend has an ad agency, a contract with Barlow, and hints that he may pull of the contract. Ann Dean is surprised when her ex, Dwight Craig, shows up; and spends her time being snarky with him.  

Oh-Oh and Pooh head out after putting in an appearance, and drinking a lot of the cocktails. They stop on the way home for more drinks, and decide to return to the Townsends to use their pool (in a remote area of the property), which is OK as they have a standing invitation to do so. As they swim, they find Barlow's body - shot. Captain Heimrich and the rest of the police arrive. Oh-Oh mentions that oh, by the way, he has a gun at home which is similar to the one used in the shooting, and when he gets home he finds it is missing.

Things get worse. The Otis' head over to Francis Eldredge's farm, and wind up getting shot at, and finding him dead. No gun, so it wasn't him doing the shooting. Now the Otis' have been the first to discover two bodies. And the are named for a $50k inheritance in Barlow's will!

Review: Oh,  the 1950's cocktail scene. Have drinks after work, drinks at the cocktail party, and drinks on the way home. Everyone smoking at the same time. Too much. One beer is my limit.

Capt. Heimrich has an annoying manner of repeating everything he says, which got a bit old.

Readers who are younger than I should have some technical knowledge in order to understand this book, which I share here:

• Cars did not always have backup lights
• Cars used to have manual chokes which had to be set properly in order to start the engine
• Rural telephones used to be shared on party lines. Wikipedia describes them: Party lines provided no privacy in communication. They were frequently used as a source of entertainment and gossip. Sort of the internet of their day.

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

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. 

Death on the Aisle by Frances and Richard Lockridge (1942)

 

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About the authors: Richard Orson Lockridge (1898 –1982) was an American writer of detective fiction. Richard Lockridge with his wife Frances (1896-1963) created one of the most famous American mystery series, Mr. and Mrs. North. (wikipedia).

Major characters (see the convenient program!)

and...

• Pam and Jerry North, amateur detectives
• Lt. Bill Weigand
• Dorian Hunt, his fiancée
• Detective Sergeant Aloysius Mullins
• Edward Evans, theatre custodian

Locale: a theatre on New York City's Broadway

Synopsis: Police Lt. Bill Weigand is on the verge of finding a minister to marry him and his fiancée, Dorian Hunt, when he gets a call to a homicide at the West 45th St. Theatre in New York City.

He arrives to find Pam and Jerry North in attendance at a rehearsal for the play "Two in the Bush". During the rehearsal, Dr. Carney Bolton is found stabbed to death in the audience sears. Bolton had been a theatre enthusiast and had been backing this production. The weapon - an ice pick - is still in him. Weigand locks down the theatre and interviews the cast and staff. One cannnot be found - custodian Edward Evans. After a search, Evans is located unconscious in a storeroom, having been pushed down the stairs.

Weigand stresses to the cast/staff that one of them must be the killer, and anyone with any knowledge of the crime is in danger themselves. No one admits to anything, but his assertion comes true when actress Ellen Grady does not show up for the next rehearsal. Weigand and Pam respond to her apartment, to find her drowned in her bathtub.

Review: I enjoyed this one as Bill Weigand plods through the investigation, ever slowly going forward in a good procedural manner. A detailed analysis of who-was-where every minute and checks into background relationships gradually narrows down the suspects. There are only a handful of possibilities for the killer - but the motive remains elusive until Weigand makes a phone call and asks one medical question of the doctor. The reader is not privy to the question or the answer, and this has the one footnote in the book - in which the author explains that the subject of the question, although not revealed, concerns a 'fact in evidence', and that the particulars have been laid before the reader previously in this Ellery Queen-like fair play disclaimer. This is, in fact, the turning point of the book.

The Norths have only a small presence in the book, and their involvement stems from being present at the rehearsal when the murder occurred. Pam accompanies Weigand to Ellen Grady's apartment, and looks at the scene with a 'woman's eye' to note some aspects which elude the police's notice.

I learned that the term 'actor' is preferred by both male and female thespians - and that the term 'actress' is a faux pas. I thought this was a recent thing, but this was written in 1942!

If you like death-in-the-theatre-audience, also try The Roman Hat Mystery by Ellery Queen.

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