The Strange Case of Harriet Hall – Moray Dalton (1936)

Review e-book kindly sent by the publisher.

There’s nothing quite like spending the weekend with a good old murder mystery that becomes increasingly hard to put down. Dean Street Press – publisher of those lovely Furrowed Middlebrow titles – also publish a number of Golden age mysteries. One of their most recent titles to be released is The Strange Case of Harriet Hall by Moray Dalton. The kindle edition is already available (here in the UK at least – with the paperback released at the beginning of March).

Moray Dalton I have since discovered was the pseudonym of Katherine Mary Dalton Renoir. She published twenty-nine mystery novels between 1924 and 1951 and The Strange Case of Harriet Hall was one of her fifteen Inspector Hugh Collier novels. It seems that Dean Street are currently re-issuing five of her novels. I shall probably want to read them all.

In his introduction to this edition Curtis Evans calls The Strange Case of Harriet Hall ‘one of the finest detective novels from the Golden Age of mystery.’ That is quite a claim – whether it deserves such an accolade I shall leave to others to decide – but it really is very good – with a couple of big surprises (I guessed one of them- but that didn’t spoil it).

Amy Steer is a young woman living alone and quite friendless in London, constantly doing the round of employment agencies – and coming away with nothing. Her landlady wants her out – and she has no money left. Glancing through the advertisements in a national newspaper in some desperation Amy comes across a personal ad – someone enquiring for relatives of Julius Horace Steer – who could discover something to their advantage. Amy recognises the name of her father who died when she was two. She answers the advert immediately and a few days later finds herself meeting Mrs Harriet Hall in the station first-class ladies waiting room.

“As she turned away a tall woman came quickly through the swing doors, and after a swift appraising look round, moved towards her. She was well dressed in black with a long silk coat with a collar of fox furs, and her hard handsome face was heavily made up.

‘You are Amy Steer? My dear child – come and sit down.”

Mrs Hall tells Amy she is her father’s sister – and that the advert had been in the paper everyday for a fortnight. She tells Amy she lives quietly in the country – supported by the kindness of friends.  Having fallen out with her nephew Mrs Hall wants to reconnect with her brother’s child – and asks Amy to go and live with her in Larnwood. She gives Amy £100 to buy clothes she says she will need for meeting new people.

Things seem to be looking up for Amy – and despite the suddenness of the whole thing, Amy is excited to have money and the ability to buy new clothes. A few days later with her trunk full of new clothes she is on the train for Larnwood. During her journey she strikes up a friendly conversation with a young man sharing her compartment Tony Dene – he is going to the same station as Amy and offers her a lift at the other end. Only just before the train gets in Tony learns that Amy is the niece of Harriet Hall and his whole demeanour changes. When the train pulls in young Mr Dene rushes off – leaving poor Amy to walk the five miles to her aunt’s isolated cottage.

When Amy arrives, the cottage is deserted – but the door open and the kitchen stove is warm. Thinking Mrs Hall must have just slipped out – Amy settles down to wait – but her aunt never appears. The next day – it is Tony -whose family live in the Dower house a short walk away – who makes a very grim discovery in the well at the bottom of the garden.

Mrs Hall might not have been to everyone’s liking, even poor Amy had tried not to think of her as a little vulgar with her costume jewellery and bright make up – but why would anyone kill her? Just why had the apparently respectable, likeable Dene family at the Dower house been in such thrall to Mrs Hall? Mrs Dene seems nervous whenever her old friend Harriet is mentioned, Tony and younger sister Mollie clearly hated the woman they considered grasping and impossible – their elder sister the rather brittle Lavvy, the beauty and their mother’s favourite, hated her too, though is mostly concerned with her society engagement. Lavvy’s a selfish snob, desperately clinging to her brilliant engagement, terrified his awful mother will whisk him away as the scandal of a murder hits the press.

“We’ve managed to head off the Press men so far. But that won’t last. We can’t escape publicity, and the reading public enjoys murders.”

The local police get the investigation underway and seems hardly anyone has an alibi. It isn’t long, however, before Inspector Hugh Collier of Scotland Yard has been called in. Collier is a man of calm, good sense, empathetic and fair. I really liked Collier – he was such a nice, gentle man, sensible and kind. Dalton’s characters are all excellent actually, she slowly reveals the characters of the Dene family – and we soon see perhaps not everyone is telling the truth.

Some big surprises and another death – soon have everyone talking, the press is very excited – and all the circumstantial evidence seem to be pointing in one direction. However, Collier is not a man to rush into things.

I loved this excellent Golden Age mystery – a couple of unexpected revelations make this a memorable mystery – and one that will make you want to read more by this writer soon.