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"It was a fine, windy morning in Cambridge. Down King's Parade the wind came swirling along, sweeping the insecurely-propped bicycles on to the road and pavement, picking up sheaves of loose white papers and sending them dancing along. Those who had hats were holding them on, and those who wore gowns were holding them down. Young women with bundles of books under their arms and preoccupied expressions, hurrying tradesfolk, and gowned figures of all ages and sizes, filled the street. Among all this busy, familiar crowd one alien figure, watching it all with obvious interest, was making his leisurely way." - The Incredible Crime, p. 213
The Sum of It:
Prudence Pinsent does not have time for the romantic tales of life in British country-houses, nor the dramatic and bubble-headed ladies of detective fiction. On the first page of The Incredible Crime, she tosses a work of detective fiction on the floor in a huff about this very thing, setting up a different type of lady-led mystery story than those readers of the 1930's might have been used to.
Prudence is the charming, auburn-haired (#donttellHastings) daughter of the Master of Prince's College, Cambridge, where she spends her days doing the duties of the hostess of the college and hanging out with her pals, mostly the wives of professors and fellows. Though adored, she doesn't quite fit in with them, provoking one of her friends to say of her "I love her, but I should never be surprised if one day she kicked over the traces altogether" and a bit later in the conversation, another friend responds "I don't trust her conventionalism...she is too independent now to want a man, or to marry; but at bottom she is completely indifferent to public opinion, and if she wanted to flout it, she would do so without hesitation."
Perhaps a bit heavy-handed, but we certainly come quickly to understand that Prudence is unique, and that we might want to follow her adventures. To get away from the responsibilities and uprightness of her daily life, she regularly escapes to her cousin's country estate, Wellende Hall, on the Suffolk coast (home to some lovely descriptions of russet-toned landscapes). Lord Wellende is described as outdoorsy, athletic, maybe not handsome but attractive, and Austen-Leigh always arranges him in attractive settings, studying a book about veterinary science next to a huge fireplace or riding to hounds on a powerful horse. But does the straightforward and charming Lord Wellende have a secret in the tunnels beneath his family estate? And why is the author constantly bringing up links between him and a rather unusual nutty-professor style character back in Cambridge? Aside from alleged drug smuggling, that's where the mysteries lie.
The YOA Treatment:
A bit over a month since our trip, and do we miss England? MAYBE. Do we miss our walks through Cambridge, strolling along the river and past the magnificent campus? MAYBE. Do we wish we could have installed ourselves in some little cubbyhole there and never left? MAYBE. Needless to say, our nostalgia for the beautiful college town started even before we came home, and we couldn't wait to read The Incredible Crime: A Cambridge Mystery, one of the newest British Library Crime Classics releases.
We first discovered the book at the British Library's Bodies from the Library crime fiction conference while we were in London, a seriously fascinating deep dive into the Golden Age of detective fiction with some of the foremost experts on the topic. One of the coolest things about this book is that it was written by a the granddaughter of Jane Austen's nephew, Lois Austen-Leigh #bookroyalty. The first of four Golden Age crime fiction tales by Austen-Leigh, The Incredible Crime lavishes finely wrought detail on vivid descriptions of the town of Cambridge, college life, the classic English manor of Wellende Hall, and the quintessential Suffolk country village. The atmosphere evoked in each of these settings is crisp and clear, not overly flowery but so enveloping you can almost feel the breeze as Prudence speeds along amid the marshes in her cousin's motor-boat;
"The bright winter sun touched the shingle banks near the mouth and turned them into gold. A flock of very white gulls was circling overhead, and a single curlew was calling. Prudence drove fast. Arriving at the mouth, she saw a heap of shingle left bare and wet; and in another place a rougher tumble of water. She appeared to have forgotten what she had said to her cousin at breakfast, for without a moment's hesitation she left the shingle heap on the starboard, and headed straight out to sea."
or hear the crackle of a fire in the cozy hall at Prince's College:
"Men with brains and ability can be found all over the world, moreover there are always others coming up to fill their places, but such Jacobean rooms as this are not to be found all over the world, nor are they to be reproduced. The ceiling was finely moulded, and the walls panelled with oak, stained and darkened by the passing years. The dominant colour of the room was dark red or red-brown, the carpet was one or the other, the drawn curtains dark read, and two generous fires at each end of the room lit up the ruby tints of the decanters of port on the table and the splash of scarlet of a doctor's hood someone had thrown down on a chair."
Though the settings are deftly handled, and reason enough to give the book a read, the mystery is a bit clunky (someone is shipping DRUGS into the country! For SHAME! The coast guard is quite flustered. Just a bit trite, as crime hooks go, and some of the very 1930's attempts at descriptions of illicit drugs are chuckle-worthy). Until very near the end when some of our favorite characters seem to be in danger (and in fact ARE), the setting is really what keeps the reader invested in the book. In fact this is not a murder mystery until the end, and for the most part is something of a spy caper (-ish). There are certainly shades of Agatha in the book, particularly in the attitude and spunkiness of the main character, Prudence (interestingly reminiscent as a character of the plucky Tuppence Bereford, whose real name is Prudence -- we quite wondered if this was coincidence or homage). The dialogue is not quite as snappy as Tommy and Tuppence's repartee, and there are so many characters, many of whom are pre-middle-age British men, one can get a bit lost from time to time, but the scenes featuring Prudence are certainly the highlight. One thing we've always loved about Tuppence is the early feminism the character demonstrates, also present in Prudence Pinsent.
Man to Prudence: "I don't like talking secrets with a woman, it's damned risky, they nearly always blab, but there -- is there anywhere we can talk in private?"
Prudence's first impulse was to point out to him the unwisdom of belittling the trustworthiness of women in general, to the woman he apparently proposed to trust, but seeing how much in earnest he appeared, she refrained; besides which, she was really curious, and quite at sea as to what she was going to hear."
Like Tuppence, Prudence Pinsent is an independent lady, despite the concerns of everyone around her that she will remain a spinster (she's in her very early 30's) forever if she doesn't settle down. She seeks out adventure on her own, riding horses, speeding along in motor-boats, and climbing down terrifying vertical tunnels to see if she can uncover illegal activity -- IN PANTS. Also like some of Agatha's earlier works, there's a bit of a romance line in this tale that the modern reader might do without, though it takes some interesting twists and turns along the way and there's kind of a hilarious reverse-My-Fair-Lady scene. Though this book feels a bit less fresh than much of Agatha's work from the same era, it was a fun read and a truly lovely way to revisit some of the quaintest and most beautiful parts of jolly old England.
- E.
