Death of a Ghost, by Marjorie Allingham
Marjorie Allingham is considered one of the “Queens of Crime,” a celebrated author from the golden age of detective fiction (1920s-1950s). The British Crime Writers’ Association sponsors an annual short story contest named after her. The CWA says submissions should fit her genre definition: “The Mystery remains box-shaped, at once a prison and a refuge. Its four walls are, roughly, a Crime, a Mystery, an Enquiry and a Conclusion with an Element of Satisfaction in it.” Marjorie Allingham is famous for stories in “the locked room” tradition. The murder seems physically impossible at first blush, but the reader can theoretically solve it, based on the clues presented. Ultimately, the solution is surprising, because it must address a deliberately bizarre set of crime scene circumstances.
There are informal rules within this sub-genre. It’s simply not cricket to pull an outrageously improbable solution from the back of a patterned sundress. Multiple secret passages, fanciful poisons, and Tom-Swift-like inventions are considered gauche.
But DEATH OF A GHOST breaks Marjorie Allingham’s own rules because it is extremely UNfair: The criminal relies on dumb luck to successfully commit two murders, and the circumstance are only baffling because the murderer is batshit crazy.
“Insanity” seems like a sleazy way for a writer to solve logistical problems. If some aspect of the scenario is absurd or illogical it doesn’t really matter because the criminal is mad, and his actions and motivation can’t be expected to make sense. It seems especially seedy for one of the “queens of crime.”
But that’s why I like this book.
The murderer, Max Fustian, is an art agent who is perpetrating a scam. He represents the estate of John Lafcadio and, according to a provision in the great artist’s will, offers up one new painting per year in a posthumous art-show-and-sale. Before he died, Lafcadio promised twelve paintings for those shows, but only provided eight. So Fustian commissions four copies and passes one off to a frothing crowd of eager art buyers. Fustian murders the two people who know about his fraud: the forger, Tommy Dacre, and a female friend, Claire Potter, who witnessed the fabrication.
Fustian stabbed Dacre with a pair of bejeweled scissors when the gallery lights suddenly turn off; the utilities are hooked up to an old-fashioned coin-fed utility meter. The opportunity is impossible to anticipate, so the murder must have been a quick improvisation. Of course, Linda Lafcadio is suspected because she was a spurned lover, and woman are prone to hysteria.
Fustian’s insanity is interesting in and of itself.
He has a split personality where one fragment is willing to look foolish to deflect guilt, but another fragment is full of braggadocio, and taunts the famous amateur sleuth, Albert Campion. The confident Fustian is hilarious. Even though the snooty art world treats him like a grasping little upstart, confident-Fustian considers himself a celebrity who is universally revered. A painter, Dee Birch, confronts him about an unflattering article he wrote about her: “Fustian, did you write this disgusting piece of effete snobbery?” Before she has a chance to properly berate him, Max says “My dear Miss Birch . . . of course I would be delighted.” He grabs the magazine and autographs his byline photo, hands it to her, then walks away. It would be funny as a calculated insult, but confident-Fustian honestly believes Dee Birch wants his autograph, he doesn’t register her obvious anger and condescension. He even believes people gathered at the Cellini Society’s cocktail party expressly to honor him. “I can’t drink a sherry these days without getting a crowd around me.”
The buffoonish Fustian confesses to murdering Tommy Dacre early in the novel, knowing his story will implode under scrutiny. It's a false bit of chivalry, supposedly meant to protect Linda Lafcadio, but his version of events doesn't match the autopsy facts.
Albert Campion realizes there is something suspicious about the clumsy confession, but he’s powerless to decode the motivations of a person who is genuinely crazy.
I doubt it was an intentional bit of criticism, but the entirety of Allingham’s ultra-conventional British society seems mentally ill.
Her detective, Albert Campion, frequently slips into a depression that seems pathological. Even after Fustian is arrested while attempting a third murder, Campion feels defeated, and moans to police inspector Oates: “He’s beaten us again, Stanislaus, don’t you see it?” Lafcadio’s desire to tease an artistic rival with his posthumous art sales is irrational to begin with, as is the hero worship surrounding the dead painter. Donna Beatrice, the great painter’s old “muse,” delights in the violence that has visited the Lafcadio clan, and thinks it’s a product of negatively colored auras clinging to the persons involved.
But those examples are theatrical, superficial derangement. The real craziness in this society is the separation of characters into two distinct classes.
The novel has a simplistic “Us and Them” division of humanity, where some people are cultured and some are vulgar. The cultured people may be eccentric, pompous, and ridiculous but they are still part of the privileged club. A few members, like the artist John Lafcadio, are geniuses, but most belong because they have the capacity to appreciate genius.
Vulgar people can be immensely talented, but their need to earn a living atrophies their sensibilities. They are bitter, small-minded and resentful, and it’s impossible for readers to sympathize with them, even though that should be a natural affiliation. Claire Potter is a clever artist and teacher but she is poor, and dependent on Belle Lafcadio’s charity. Immediately after she is murdered, Donna Beatrice delivers the ultimate backhanded compliment: “she was so practical.” And Max Fustian, for all his showmanship and success as a critic and agent, is still treated like one of the help.
The patronizing attitude seems to be a factor in Fustian’s insanity. Like all vulgar people, he wants to crash the privileged gates but can’t because he just doesn’t look the part. He tries to mimic the eccentricity of aristocratic fashion by wearing colorful vests but can’t quite pull it off.
All the privileged characters in this book have affectations. Belle Lafcadio wears a Breton bonnet, and Albert Campion carries a decorative cane. One old gentleman has “his gaiters padded,” and Donna Beatrice always looks like she is in “fancy dress.” Those ridiculous mannerisms aren’t indicators of madness, however, because the people are members of the elite. They do whatever they want, without worrying about what others think.
Vulgar people are instantly identifiable because they try too hard to mimic that aristocratic carelessness.
Even Stanislau Oates notices Fustian’s gaffs. “Only yesterday, he went to a party in a scarlet tartan waistcoat. What could be madder than that?”
Well, stabbing someone with bejeweled scissors comes to mind.
There are informal rules within this sub-genre. It’s simply not cricket to pull an outrageously improbable solution from the back of a patterned sundress. Multiple secret passages, fanciful poisons, and Tom-Swift-like inventions are considered gauche.
But DEATH OF A GHOST breaks Marjorie Allingham’s own rules because it is extremely UNfair: The criminal relies on dumb luck to successfully commit two murders, and the circumstance are only baffling because the murderer is batshit crazy.
“Insanity” seems like a sleazy way for a writer to solve logistical problems. If some aspect of the scenario is absurd or illogical it doesn’t really matter because the criminal is mad, and his actions and motivation can’t be expected to make sense. It seems especially seedy for one of the “queens of crime.”
But that’s why I like this book.
The murderer, Max Fustian, is an art agent who is perpetrating a scam. He represents the estate of John Lafcadio and, according to a provision in the great artist’s will, offers up one new painting per year in a posthumous art-show-and-sale. Before he died, Lafcadio promised twelve paintings for those shows, but only provided eight. So Fustian commissions four copies and passes one off to a frothing crowd of eager art buyers. Fustian murders the two people who know about his fraud: the forger, Tommy Dacre, and a female friend, Claire Potter, who witnessed the fabrication.
Fustian stabbed Dacre with a pair of bejeweled scissors when the gallery lights suddenly turn off; the utilities are hooked up to an old-fashioned coin-fed utility meter. The opportunity is impossible to anticipate, so the murder must have been a quick improvisation. Of course, Linda Lafcadio is suspected because she was a spurned lover, and woman are prone to hysteria.
Fustian’s insanity is interesting in and of itself.
He has a split personality where one fragment is willing to look foolish to deflect guilt, but another fragment is full of braggadocio, and taunts the famous amateur sleuth, Albert Campion. The confident Fustian is hilarious. Even though the snooty art world treats him like a grasping little upstart, confident-Fustian considers himself a celebrity who is universally revered. A painter, Dee Birch, confronts him about an unflattering article he wrote about her: “Fustian, did you write this disgusting piece of effete snobbery?” Before she has a chance to properly berate him, Max says “My dear Miss Birch . . . of course I would be delighted.” He grabs the magazine and autographs his byline photo, hands it to her, then walks away. It would be funny as a calculated insult, but confident-Fustian honestly believes Dee Birch wants his autograph, he doesn’t register her obvious anger and condescension. He even believes people gathered at the Cellini Society’s cocktail party expressly to honor him. “I can’t drink a sherry these days without getting a crowd around me.”
The buffoonish Fustian confesses to murdering Tommy Dacre early in the novel, knowing his story will implode under scrutiny. It's a false bit of chivalry, supposedly meant to protect Linda Lafcadio, but his version of events doesn't match the autopsy facts.
Albert Campion realizes there is something suspicious about the clumsy confession, but he’s powerless to decode the motivations of a person who is genuinely crazy.
I doubt it was an intentional bit of criticism, but the entirety of Allingham’s ultra-conventional British society seems mentally ill.
Her detective, Albert Campion, frequently slips into a depression that seems pathological. Even after Fustian is arrested while attempting a third murder, Campion feels defeated, and moans to police inspector Oates: “He’s beaten us again, Stanislaus, don’t you see it?” Lafcadio’s desire to tease an artistic rival with his posthumous art sales is irrational to begin with, as is the hero worship surrounding the dead painter. Donna Beatrice, the great painter’s old “muse,” delights in the violence that has visited the Lafcadio clan, and thinks it’s a product of negatively colored auras clinging to the persons involved.
But those examples are theatrical, superficial derangement. The real craziness in this society is the separation of characters into two distinct classes.
The novel has a simplistic “Us and Them” division of humanity, where some people are cultured and some are vulgar. The cultured people may be eccentric, pompous, and ridiculous but they are still part of the privileged club. A few members, like the artist John Lafcadio, are geniuses, but most belong because they have the capacity to appreciate genius.
Vulgar people can be immensely talented, but their need to earn a living atrophies their sensibilities. They are bitter, small-minded and resentful, and it’s impossible for readers to sympathize with them, even though that should be a natural affiliation. Claire Potter is a clever artist and teacher but she is poor, and dependent on Belle Lafcadio’s charity. Immediately after she is murdered, Donna Beatrice delivers the ultimate backhanded compliment: “she was so practical.” And Max Fustian, for all his showmanship and success as a critic and agent, is still treated like one of the help.
The patronizing attitude seems to be a factor in Fustian’s insanity. Like all vulgar people, he wants to crash the privileged gates but can’t because he just doesn’t look the part. He tries to mimic the eccentricity of aristocratic fashion by wearing colorful vests but can’t quite pull it off.
All the privileged characters in this book have affectations. Belle Lafcadio wears a Breton bonnet, and Albert Campion carries a decorative cane. One old gentleman has “his gaiters padded,” and Donna Beatrice always looks like she is in “fancy dress.” Those ridiculous mannerisms aren’t indicators of madness, however, because the people are members of the elite. They do whatever they want, without worrying about what others think.
Vulgar people are instantly identifiable because they try too hard to mimic that aristocratic carelessness.
Even Stanislau Oates notices Fustian’s gaffs. “Only yesterday, he went to a party in a scarlet tartan waistcoat. What could be madder than that?”
Well, stabbing someone with bejeweled scissors comes to mind.
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