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Excellent murder mystery. On September 9, 1905, the NY Times Saturday Review of Books described this book as follows: “That painstakingly ingenious person, Fergus Hume, has devised another of his hide-and-seek, jack-o’-lantern murder mysteries. It begins with a queer and rich old woman found stabbed to death in her chair and not a clue to the murderer. Then so many clues turn up that even the story-book detective is bewildered. Then nearly everybody turns out to be somebody else under an alias, and all the clues lead nowhere…”
A murdered aunt ends your engagement; your fiancee asks you to stop the detective.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A servant's new post turns uneasy after a visitor's perfume appears to provoke a frightening reaction.
Susan Grant's interview for a parlor-maid post turns Rose Cottage into a quiet test of suspicion. Miss Loach studies her closely, while Susan takes in both the room and the woman who may become her mistress.
Servant gossip, a hidden family name, and a sudden murder set up a patient, talk-driven mystery.
A busy kitchen becomes the first room of danger as Susan Grant recalls her father's poisoning, the family name her mother made the children hide, and the fear that he may have known too much. Around her, Mrs.
A family death turns drawing-room tension into a pointed threat against Juliet's future.
A death inside a family anxious about status pulls money, marriage, and buried resentments into close quarters. Peter Octagon, retired from legal stationery and comfortably placed, would rather live quietly, while Mrs.
A barred house, a ringing bell, and a marriage held hostage by an unsolved murder.
Mrs. Octagon's strange remark turns a family conversation into a neat locked-house puzzle. Juliet and her stepfather Peter test her suspicions of Mr. Hale and Mr.
Selina's murder revives Lord Caranby's old engagement and makes Juliet's broken match look like a clue.
Selina Loach's violent death hangs over a broken engagement, turning Mrs. Octagon's sudden refusal of Juliet's marriage into more than family interference.
Victorian dread, read with grave restraint.
The Secret Passage, Chapter 1, follows Susan Grant’s interview with Miss Loach at Rose Cottage and the abrupt shift from rejection to hiring after the mention of Señora Gredos and Sunday card-playing.
Susan Maxwell tells Mrs.
Fergus Hume’s Chapter 3 of The Secret Passage moves from the “Shrine of the Muses” in Kensington to the news that Selina Loach has been found “stabbed to the heart.” Peter Octagon, Mrs.
Basil Saxon says Aunt Selina was "stabbed to the heart," yet no weapon and no exit can be found.
Lord Caranby ties Mrs. Octagon's anger to a 20-year-old love story, Selina Loach, and Amelia Saul.
Cuthbert Mallow questions his mother in Devonshire about Lord Cairnby, Selina Loach, and the long-ago death of Miss Saul.
Miles Jennings visits his old Eton schoolfellow Cuthbert Mallow as both a detective and a friend investigating Miss Loach's death.
Juliet inherits six thousand a year but still refuses Cuthbert Mallow's immediate marriage proposal.
A detective and his companion pursue a clever fugitive who escaped through a secret entrance, revealing her true identity and a planned refuge.
A detective recovers after a shootout and learns the fate of the criminals in a classic murder mystery.
In this chapter, Cuthbert arrives to find Juliet distraught after Marikito's vitriol attack, and learns that Marikito has been killed by a motor-car.
A chapter from a classic murder mystery novel where a character seals a confession and discusses whether to reveal the truth about a death.