Good Times Never Seemed So Good

Caroline
André Norton and Enid Cushing
New York: Tor, 1983
320 pages

Caroline was published in January 1983, eight months before Enid Cushing's death. Her passing was not recognized by the Montreal Gazette, her hometown's surviving English-language daily, though the family did publish an obituary in the 30 August 1983 edition.

It's no surprise that the Gazette gave Enid Cushing's death no notice; the paper paid little attention to her writing career. Not one of her murder mysteries – Murder’s No Picnic (1953), Murder Without Regret (1954), Blood on My Rug (1956), The Unexpected Corpse (1957), and The Girl Who Bought a Dream (1957) – was reviewed in its pages. The same holds true for the titles she penned in her late-in-life resurrection as a writer of historical romances: Maid-At-Arms (1981) and Caroline (1983).

My interest in Enid Cushing began with the discovery of her 'fifties Montreal mysteries, but I'm much more intrigued by her two romances. Both Maid-At-Arms and Caroline are collaborations with celebrated American science fiction writer Andre Norton (aka André Norton; née Alice Mary Norton). While I've not been able to discover how the two came to work together, I have learned that their friendship dates back to at least 1953, the year Murder's No Picnic was published.

Maid-At-Arms stands with Rosemary Aubert's Firebrand as my very favourite Canadian romance novel. Caroline is a close third. 

The back cover copy is a touch misleading:

Caroline Warwick is indeed young, beautiful, and a free spirit, but she never expresses a wish to study medicine. This is not to suggest that Caroline isn't curious; the earliest scene has her looking to set a kitten's broken leg by consulting medical texts. There are a great many such books in her parents' Montreal home. Caroline's father, one of the city's most respected physicians, lectures at McGill. Elder brother Perry is studying medicine at the university. And then there's Richard: "Richard Harvey (he was not a Warwick at all, although he had lived with them since his mother died when he was born and his father had gone west and died in the wilderness) who seemed to be the truly devoted doctor."

Richard began his education in Canada and furthered it in Scotland. His unanticipated return, pretty new wife in tow, is met with mixed reception in the family's St Gabriel Street home. Doctor Warwick, Mrs Warwick, Caroline, and Perry are happy, but not Priscilla. The fifth member and eldest daughter of the household, Pris had a thing for Richard. It doesn't help that his bride is Lady Amelia, niece of Lord Elgin, the newly installed Governor General of the Province of Canada.

But Pris is something a coquette – "flirting and playacting" is how Irish housemaid Molly puts it – and so she's over it soon enough, turning her attentions of Lord Elgin's aides-de-camp, including Lady Amelia's bounder of a brother Captain Carruthers and dark brute Major Vickers. Before the Governor General's arrival, Pris had time for handsome Corbie Hannacker, the most eligible bachelor in all the province, but she now ignores him, much to the distress of her younger sister. Caroline sees Hannacker as everything Pris should want in a man. Like Richard, he's good, kind, and wonderful, so much so that he continues to visit because he knows how much Caroline, seventeen going on eighteen, admires his horses.

Caroline is a much more conventional romance than the gender-bending Maid-At-Arms. Seasoned readers of the genre will recognize in the early pages that its heroine is destined for Corbie's arms. The question is just how this happy union – there is a wedding – will come to be.

 

Caroline is a well-written, well-crafted novel; the headache-inducing sentence in which Richard is introduced is an anomaly. Given Enid Cushing's awkward mystery novels, one might conclude that Norton's name deserved place of prominence, but I argue otherwise. Norton had no connection with Canada, never mind Montreal – and Caroline is very much a Montreal novel. The action takes place over little more than twelve months in the city's history. Beginning in January 1847 with Lord Elgin's arrival, it incorporates the Summer of Sorrow and the opening of the Montreal & Lachine Railroad, ending in the early months of 1948. Throughout it all, I kept an eye out for historical inaccuracies, yet spotted nothing. I doubt credit goes to Norton, just as I doubt Norton, a science fiction novelist from Cleveland, Ohio, came up with the idea of a historical romance set in mid-nineteenth-century Canada. It's unlikely Caroline will ever be reprinted, but if it is, let's give Enid Cushing equal billing.

Trivia: This Montrealer has memories of a St Gabriel Street, location of the Warwick residence, but I couldn't quite place it. Investigation reveals that it is - unsurprisingly - in the oldest part of the city.

Adolphus Bourne, Map of the City of Montreal, 1843 (detail)

Three short blocks in length, it was once home to the Scotch Presbyterian Church. Its story was recorded by Rev Robert Campbell, "the last pastor," in A History of the Scotch Presbyterian Church, Saint Gabriel Street, Montreal (Montreal: Drysdale, 1887). Amongst the subscribers is a man named Charles Cushing. 

Object and Access: A decaying mass market paperback. The cover illustration is by New Brunswicker Norm Eastman, best known for men's magazine covers like this:

New Man, October 1968

I purchased my copy last year for US$5.79 from an Ohio bookseller. 

As far as I can tell, not one Canadian library holds a copy.

Related posts:

Bewitched, Bothered, but Not Bewildered

Montreal Most Strange (w/ mysterious directions)

A Curious Romance of Closeted, Corseted,

Petticoated Poet and His Twin Sister

Loving the Mayor of Toronto

The Ten Best Book Buys of 2021... and much more!

A better year than last, right? I got out more, raised pints in pubs, saw my daughter, and spent seven days touring Quebec City and the Eastern Townships. Hell, I even saw a movie in a theatre.

I also visited more bookstores, though a depressingly small number were worth the effort. Six of this year's ten best buys were purchased online. Ted Allan's pseudonymously published Quest for Pajaro (London: Heinemann, 1957) is my favourite. I'd known about about this science fiction romance since 1983, but in all the years that passed had never come across a copy.

No surprise, I suppose.

Quest for Pajaro was published in 1957 by Heinemann. There was no Canadian edition. Was anyone distributing Heinemann in Canada back then? If so, were they aware that "Edward Maxwell" was in fact Montrealer Ted Allan?

Doubt it.

I purchased Quest for Pajaro after having been invited to comment on Allan's work at this year's Toronto Jewish Film Festival. While not his best book, it is his most intriguing. There hadn't been many many Canadian science fiction romances before 1957 – still aren't. What's more, the novel's linchpin is an experimental jet known as the "Arrow."

Bruce Petty's gorgeous jacket illustration puts it over the top.

What follows is the rest of the ten best:

Willie the Squowse

Ted Allan
Toronto: McClelland &

   Stewart, 1977

The author's only children's book, this tale of a talented squowse (offspring of a squirrel and a mouse) proved one of the most enjoyable and life-affirming reads of the year. The fifty – fifty! – Quentin Blake illustrations brought further joy.

Whispering City
Horace Brown
Pickering, ON: Global

   Publishing, 1947

Horace Brown's adaptation of this film noir shot in Quebec City, for years I'd hoped to find a reasonably-priced copy. This year I did (US$89.95).

Can it be as good as The Penthouse Killings? Please tell me it's better than Murder in the Rough.

Blood on My Rug
E. Louise Cushing
New York: Arcadia, 1956

A mystery novel that begins with the discovery of a body in a Montreal bookstore, since I'd long been searching for this novel. Might it be a candidate for reissue as a Ricochet Book?

Nope.

Still, I'm still happy to have it in my collection.

Let Not Man Put Asunder
Basil King

New York: Grosset & Dunlap,

   [n.d]

Though it's been two years since I bought, never mind reviewed, a Basil King novel, I leapt at this one. Let Not Man Put Asunder is either the seventh or eighth King novel to be adapted by Hollywood. IMDb does not recognize, but I have this photoplay edition as evidence.

 

Toute la Vie
Claire Martin

Quebec: Éditions de L'instant

   même, 1999

I've admired Claire Martin since reading Dans un gant de fer in CEGEP. David Lobdell's translation of her Doux-Amer deserves a return to print. Imagine the thrill in finding three signed Martins during my recent visit to Quebec City. This is one.

In Spite of Myself: A Memoir
Christopher Plummer
Toronto: Random House,

   2009

I regret many things in leaving our St Marys home, not the least of which involves selling thirteen-hundred books, In Spite of Myself amongst them.

I'm slowly been buying them back. This signed copy was found at the Kemptville Youth Centre Book Fair.

Beautiful Joe

Marshall Saunders
Toronto: Standard

   Publishing, 1897

I own many copies of Beautiful Joe, but this is by far the most... um, beautiful. At one dollar, it was the least expensive book I purchased this year.

The Countess of Aberdeen provides an introduction!

Menaud, maître-draveur

Félix-Antoine Savard
Ottawa: Éditions Fides, 1967

Another Quebec City find, I came upon this inscribed, slip-cased edition on the very same day I made my pilgrimage to the author's home.

I vow to read it in the New Year.

Poldrate Street
Garnett Weston
New York: Messner, 1944

This old novel proved to be 2021's most unpleasant, stomach-turning read. Voyeurism, adultery, greed, murder, and something approaching necrophilia figure.

Good fun from a Toronto boy who made a killing in Hollywood before retiring to Vancouver island.

Two generous souls donated books to the Dusty Bookcase this year.

Lee Goldberg noted my interest in the novels of former Vancouver newspaperman Tom Ardies (Their Man in the White House, Kosygan is Coming) and was kind enough to send me newly published copies of This Briefcase is Going to Explode, Pandemic, Balboa Firefly, and Manila Time (the latter two written under Ardies' Jack Trolley nom de plume). 

Lee is in the process of reissuing Ardies' entire bibliography through Brash Books.

More power to him! 

Fraser Sutherland died this earlier this year. I was honoured to have been asked to provide an obituary for the Globe & Mail. One of the greatest challenges in its writing concerned family, specifically the name of a sibling, an older brother, who had died at a young age. Our newspaper of record is insistent on such things. It seemed not one of Fraser's friends could quite remember... and then one came through, which led me to this uncommon chapbook:

Published in 1976 by Northern Journey Press, Within the Wound is dedicated to that brother, Hugh Sutherland (1941-1965). I shared this discovery with Fraser's good friend, Adrian King-Edwards of Montreal's Word Bookstore, who in turn presented me with this copy.

RIP, Fraser. You are much missed.

Related posts:

Love is a Long Shot on the Nose

He and His Arrow

Little Willie, Willie Won't Go Home
Horace Brown: From Penthouse to Pavement
Horace  Brown: Saturday Matinee
No Whack on the Side of the Head
Montreal Most Strange (w/ mysterious directions)

Claire Martin at the Beginning of the Quiet Revolution

Packing Up the Dusty Bookcases

Blue Plaque Special: Quebec City Edition

The Dead of a Dead End Street

A Russian is Coming! A Russian is Coming!
Have Bomb - Will Travel

Montreal Most Strange (w/ mysterious directions)

Blood on My Rug
E. Louise Cushing
New York: Arcadia, 1956

223 pages

Miss Talmadge visits her St Catherine Street bookstore on a Sunday afternoon. This being Montreal, the decade being the 1950s, her business is closed for the day, but she's looking for something to read... because, I guess, the bookseller doesn't have much of a home library. Her choice is Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Gift from the Sea. Miss Talmadge is about to leave when she remembers that there's a letter that must be answered, and so she enters her back office, where she finds a man lying "messily dead" on her treasured rose Khalabar rug.

Miss Talmadge  phones the Homicide Bureau, stirring a napping telephone operator, who in turn sets bored policemen into action. A siren is heard, a car draws up, and Detective Inspector Richard MacKay emerges. Miss Talmadge finds reassurance in the "laughter lines at the corner of his eyes and quirk at one side of his mouth."

Within fifteen minutes, Inspector MacKay has learned the victim's name (George Albert Smithins) and hometown (Red Deer, Alberta). He shares both with Miss Talmadge, whom he's already determined had nothing whatsoever to do with the murdered man. 

Blood on My Rug is the third of E. Louise Cushing's five murder mysteries. Having read the first and second, I knew to expect little by way of intrigue. Mackay, who is so sharp in his first quarter-hour on the case, turns a sluggish dullard. Accompanied by Miss Talmadge, he interviews four of the five young women who work in her bookstore. The fifth, Ellen Pope, left Montreal on the evening of the murder. It's most unlike her, but MacKay doesn't follow up. Why should he? After all, two days later a telegram arrives to say that she's in Lachute caring for sister who has taken ill. 

As in Cushing's previous mysteries, the most suspicious character – indeed, the only suspicious character – will be found to have committed the crime. Though presented as a hero, MacKay errs repeatedly in dismissing evidence pointing to the murderer as "the long arm of coincidence."

St Catherine Street, 1956

It all  makes for a frustrating read, which is not to suggest that it isn't fascinating. What makes Blood on My Rug a real page-turner is its depiction of Montreal as an exclusively English city. There are no francophones. There are no French street names. There are no French newspapers. Every business has an English name. Cushing's Montreal is also one in which the discovery of a dead body might cause distress, but recovery is quick. Here's Miss Talmadge and her maid on the morning after the murder:

Miss Talmadge wakened early Monday morning, which was most unusual for her. She lay looking at the morning sun which glimmered coldly on her white curtains and decided to get up. After all, it was hardly fair to let the burden of any excitement that there might be at the store that morning fall on the girls.

     She stretched out a lazy arm and rang for Daisy, thereby startling that damsel greatly.

     "Did you ring?" she asked uncertainly.

     Miss Talmadge grinned at her. "I did," she said cheerily. "I think I'll go down to the store early, Daisy. Will you shut the window and bring me my breakfast, please?"

The missing Miss Pope's body will be found stuffed in a trunk at neighbouring Brown's Luggage Shop, but none of her co-workers are particularly disturbed. The luggage store closes for the day and police investigate, but business at the bookstore continues as if nothing has happened.

Trust me, Montrealers aren't so cold.

I spoil little in revealing that the solution to the murder comes courtesy of a note the victim hid in the copy of Gift from the Sea Miss Talmadge took home that bloody Sunday. The discovery drew my interest as I'd earlier found this within the pages my copy of Blood on My Rug:

A note found inside a book in which a note is hidden in a book. Whatever can it mean?

The directions continue on the reverse. I'll happily scan the back and send it on to anyone who requests on the understanding that if it leads to treasure we split it 50-50.

If it leads to a body, you're on your own.

Favourite sentence: 

"I know it's not very pleasant for you," he said pleasantly.

Dedication:

Irene Love Archibald, who was dead eleven years when Blood on My Rug was published, wrote under many names. As "Margaret Currie," she had a long-running column in the Montreal Star, at which her husband was editor. She left us with one book: Margaret Currie: Her Book (Toronto: Hunter Rose, 1924).

Trivia: Miss Talmadge tells Inspector Mackay that on the evening of the murder she was at the "Capital Theatre," which I take to be a reference to the Capitol Theatre, also on St Catherine Street. It was torn down in 1973. MacKay doesn't ask the name if the movie. I've read enough mystery novels to recognize his laziness. 

Object: A squat book bound in light green cloth. I'd been looking for a copy for about a decade. The one I purchased was first listed last month on eBay with a US$99.95 opening bid.

There were no takers.

The seller relisted at US$9.95.

I was the lone bidder.

An ex-library copy, it's in far better shape than might be expected. Sadly, the catalogue card has been removed. What attracted most was the dust jacket, which features a pitch for The Sting of Death by Perry D. Westbrook and these "RECENT ARCADIA MYSTERIES":

Run from the Sheep - Eline Capit
The Crime, the Place, and the Girl - D. Stapleton

A Few Drops of Murder - Isabel Capeto

Access: As far as I can tell, the only publicly available copy in this country is held by Library and Archives Canada. The book is more accessible south of the border. According to WorldCat, the Library of Congress, seven American universities, and two American public libraries have copies. What intrigues is that those two public libraries serve Kiowa, Kansas (pop 1026) and Mandan, North Dakota (pop 18,331).

No copies are currently listed for sale online.

Related posts:

Bewitched, Bothered, but not Bewildered

No Picnic

A Curious Romance about a Closeted, Corseted, Petticoated Poet and His Masculine Twin Sister

Maid-At-Arms
Enid Cushing [and Andre Norton]
New York: Fawcett, 1981
221 pages

Twins Lady Jennifer and Lord Jonathan Welland are alike in body, but not in mind. Jenny's chief interests are guns, horses, and war. As a little girl she would sneak out of bed to eavesdrop on her grumpy guardian, the Duke of Burghley, as he regaled dinner guests about his fight against Napoleon in the Peninsular War. Jonnie never joined her; his interests lay in poetry, the pianoforte, and petticoats. Throughout their young lives, the twins would secretly trade identities. Jenny, as Jonnie, joined the men on a fox chase, while "a skirted and beruffled Jonathan toyed with tea and cakes and exchanged titters with delicately nurtured maidens at the Manor."

The one person not taken in by their masquerade was Lord Rufus Randall; Jonnie aside, he knows Jenny better than anyone alive. Randall first met Jenny when she was a newly orphaned girl of eight – he was eighteen – and they've been jolly good friends ever since. Twelve years have passed, and the first of this novel's twenty-four chapters finds Lady Jennifer in a nostalgic mood:

"Rufus, do you remember the time Sir Peter Davies over at the Lodge had that party three years ago? They all played those forfeit for a kiss games – or maybe you don't remember, because you stayed off in the trophy room with Sir Peter – anyway, Jonathan was the belle of the party and was always being caught on purpose. You must have heard about it"
     "I also recollect that the Jonathan of the evening also made quite a name for himself as well," Lord Rufus said dryly. "Fine pair up to no good – that was the two of you."
     "We used to have fun," Jennifer nodded at the memories of mischief successfully carried through. "Nobody could ever tell the difference."
     "The only noticeable difference was that fair Jonathan displayed a fine sense of more maidenly conduct than his sister appears interested in showing," Lord Rufus pointed out.
     "I should have been a boy," Jennifer sighed, not for the first time.

Jenny gives expression to her desire in midnight rides through the English countryside dressed in male drag: riding boots, black breeches, dark shirt and black jacket. She never forgets to carry a gun.

Does Jenny's twin think he should have been a girl? Jonnie doesn't say, but the Duke of Burghley has long been concerned about interests he associates with women. Fearing his ward is getting to be a "damned sissy," he hunts him down in London. "Gad, do you know where I found this brother of yours, my dear?" the Duke says to Jennie. "At Lady Ashbury's salon, listening to a fop reading poetry. Poetry! And he was ready to spout off verses, too. Imagine that for your brother! I tell you, at that point I had enough. I told him to come with me. I'm not going to have my ward behaving like a pampered pimp, reeling around in ladies' salons and boudoirs, listening to poetry."

The Duke decides to make a man of Jonnie through military service. He purchases a commission in the Rifle Brigade, and makes certain that the newly-minted Captain Jonathan Welland will be posted far from Lady Ashbury's London salon.

Where exactly?

Jonnie tells Jenny:

"Halifax," he said gloomily.
     "Halifax? Where's Halifax? she repeated blankly. "What on earth are you going to do there?"
     He made a sweeping, oddly feminine gesture. "Place's in Canada – I'm for garrison duty."

Jenny manages to convince their guardian – she calls him "Guardie" – to let her accompany her brother; it helps that Lord Bradbury, the Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia, happens to be one of the Duke's old war pals. The very next week, the twins board the Cambria, bound from Liverpool to Halifax. Sadly, predictably, they're not two days out when delicate Jonnie collapses in Jennie's bunk from mal de mer. There he remains for the remainder of the voyage "rolled in one of her dressing gowns." Meanwhile, hardy Jennie dons Jonnie's military uniform – "fortunate, she considered, that padded fronts to an officer's uniform had become a recent military style" – so as to pass as her brother and be allowed on deck in rough weather.

View of Dartmouth and Halifax (c 1850)
L. Crepy

The twins' arrival in Halifax poses a problem in that Jonnie, under guise of Lady Jennifer, remains deathly ill. So as not to arouse suspicion amongst the other passengers, he disembarks in whalebone corset, petticoats, bell-skirted dress, and bonnet, and is whisked away to the Colonial Hotel. Once there, however, he declines to take up his commission. Jennie is annoyed, but at the same time all too willing to take his place as a captain in the Rifle Brigade:

"I'll make a deal with you, Jonathan, and you'll abide by it. Your place for my place; my skirts for your trousers."
     Jonathan fiddled with the arm of his chair. "Jennifer, I don't think..." he began hesitantly, but his sister cut in.
     "You're quite right, Jonnie, you don't think. You make a choice, now. Either you promise to stay in my skirts, most of the time anyway, or you get into this uniform right away. Which will it be? One or the other Jonnie. There's no other choice. You're a Welland, and I don't propose to have to blush for the name."
     "Oh, all right," Jonathan was goaded by beyond his endurance. "I'll be Lady Jennifer and you can go on playing soldier."

What could go wrong? I expected plenty, particularly after Lady Bradbury, wife of the Lieutenant-Governor, insists "Lady Jennifer" reside at Government House.

Government House from the S.W. (1819)
John Elliott Woolford

Surprisingly, things go quite well for the twins. Jenny proves to be an excellent soldier, and is quite popular with the men under her command, and Jonnie has no difficulty in passing as a woman while staying with Lord and Lady Bradbury and their two daughters. This is not to suggest Jonnie is altogether happy; he complains about corsets, but his chief source of frustration lies in not being able to live the life he'd enjoyed in England. "You've always liked the female's role better than the man's," observes Jenny. "Oh yes, I've heard stories of your London exploits – don't worry."

This depiction of Jonnie as someone who has never "flirted with the girls" changes abruptly with the arrival of Lord and Lady Bradbury's English niece, Miss Matilda Markham, at Government House. Jonnie is immediately smitten by her feminine, yet dominant ways, and longs to end his masquerade so that he may court her.

Why the change in Jonnie? I suggest this note appended to the novel's page at Andre-Norton-Books.com may provide an explanation "Andre Norton's name is Not On This Book – however she did complete the story for Enid Cushing when Enid became ill."

Of course, being a romance novel, Maid-At-Arms is more Jenny's story than Jonnie's. She may be the less interesting character, but this is not to suggest that she isn't loved. Remember Rufus Randall? You know, the English Lord who befriended Jenny when she was a girl of eight? Well, Rufus isn't fooled by stories of Lord Jonathan's success in soldiering coming across the pond, and so he sets out for Halifax. I'm sure I spoil nothing in reporting that Rufus rescues Jennie from a situation that she can't handle. In fact, he saves her life.

And then church bells ring.

Jonnie does not serve as maid-of-honour.

About the author(s): Maid-At-Arms marks the beginning of what I've described as Enid Cushing's second act. Her first consisted of five mystery novels, stretching from Murder's No Picnic (1953) to The Girl Who Bought a Dream (1957). What accounts from the twenty-eight-year silence that followed is a real life mystery, as is how she came to collaborate with Andre Norton.

The contract signed by Cushing and Norton can be found here, courtesy of Andre-Norton-Books.com.

In 1983, the year of Cushing's death, she published one last novel. This time, Norton's co-authorship was acknowledged on the cover:

Bloomer: You knew there'd be one. Coming in the very first chapter, it provides a good example of the novel's poor writing and editing:

"Tell me, Jenny, did your guardian ever become aware of the numerous occasions on which you, er, diddled him. I believe such was the term you used – in the past?"

Object: A typical 'eighties mass market paperback, complete with five pages of adverts for other Fawcett titles. Bil Keane's Daddy's Little Helpers – "More laughs from the Family Circus Crew" – appears under the header "GREAT ADVENTURES IN READING."

As far as I've been able to determine, there was no second printing.

Access: WorldCat suggests that not one Canadian library holds Maid-At-Arms. The good news is that used copies are plentiful and cheap. Do not be taken in by the Massachusetts bookseller who describes the book as "Very rare," and claims it is by Norton "Writing As Enid Cushing." He's out to make an easy fifty bucks, but is not so bad as the New Hampshire bookseller who asks US$85.97, adding a further US$24.99 for shipping.

I purchased my copy for one American penny.

Well worth it, I think.

Related posts:

Montreal's Murderous Murder Mystery Writer
(and the transvestite brother he passed off as his wife)

Bewitched, Bothered, but not Bewildered

Soldiering On with Edith Percival

No Picnic

No Picnic

Murder's No Picnic

E.L. Cushing

London: Wright & Brown, 1956

188 pages

My latest Dusty Bookcase review, of E.L. Cushing's Murder's No Picnic, is now available gratis at the Canadian Notes & Queries website:

A House Full of Orphans

I wish I could say I liked the novel. I didn't. Given its cover, I was at the very least expecting a fun read. It wasn't. Regular readers may remember my enjoyment of Murder Without Regret. Now that was fun!

I don't know that I'll read anything more by Cushing. Her books aren't at all common and tend to be quite expensive. My warped copy of Murder's No Picnic was purchased earlier this year £16.00 from an English bookseller located somewhere in Devon. With shipping added, the thing set me back well over fifty dollars. The true first edition was published in 1953 by New York's Arcadia House. There has never been a Canadian edition. I don't expect we'll ever see one.

Not a Ricochet Books candidate.

Related post:
Bewitched, Bothered, but Not Bewildered

Bewitched, Bothered, but Not Bewildered

Murder without Regret
E. Louise Cushing
[New York]: Arcadia House, 1954

There are two ways to approach this novel: the first is as a murder mystery, the second is as an account of four pivotal days in the life of a repressed, frustrated and somewhat unpleasant lesbian. Both lead to intertwining paths, but the latter is much more interesting.

Murder without Regret was Enid Louise Cushing's second novel, and is one of several to feature Inspector MacKay of the Montreal Police Service. He'll be the one who solves the crimes, but the roles of protagonist and narrator fall to twenty-something Barbara Hiller. Babs opens the novel by driving through the gates of the Randall mansion on Peel Street. It's been some time since her last visit. She'd once been close to Julie Randall, heiress presumptive of the Randall fortune. The two had "gone around together" for years, but then Julie met Joyce Prescott and Babs was replaced. What Babs refers to as a "bewitchment" came to an abrupt end: "It hurt at first, but I got over it."

So, here we have Babs in her car, steeling herself in anticipation of Julie, whom she hasn't seen in years. Babs is at Randall House because Julie asked her – now, that phone call was unexpected – saying something about the reading of her grandfather's will. It seems that tonight's the night the fortune becomes hers. Just a formality, really, but Julie wants Babs present.

After all that build-up, the meeting between the two comes as an anticlimax. Julie sends Babs upstairs to her bedroom, but it's just to freshen up. Once there, Babs notices a girl slumped over the vanity, places her hand on a cooling left breast, and determines that she's dead.

Who's the dead girl? Why, Joyce Prescott, of course.

Enter Lieutenant Brandy Fernley, Royal Canadian Navy. He'd met Babs once during those years she and Julie had been close. She's forgotten all about him, but not he her: "Funny, I remember you so well… Your red hair, and the way your eyes always followed Julie." Brandy has returned for a reason, though Joyce's dead body serves as a spanner in the works:

"I was going to announce my engagement to Brandy," Julie sniffed.
     "Your engagement?" I said somewhat flatly. For some unaccountable reason, I had a funny letdown feeling. 

Who killed Joyce? Who cares. By this point I wasn't so much interested in the solution to the crime as I was in getting a read on Babs. News of a second murder victim, former acquaintance Paul Hadrill, doesn't distract much, though his name brings further insight. Babs is quick to make clear that they'd "never gone around": "It was true that we'd driven a lot together – he and Julie in the back seat and me alone in front." Babs later reveals that she'd taken in the action through the rearview mirror.

Who killed Paul? As with Joyce, MacKay is on the case. Babs is somewhat helpful – much less than she likes to think – but everyone else moves on. Joyce hasn't been dead twenty-four hours before Julie invites Babs to Malcolm's, an upscale downtown restaurant. Babs, who had anticipated an intimate luncheon, is irritated to discover her old friend surrounded by women she doesn't know: "Even before I'd a chance to declare my neutrality, I was ignored with the successful rudeness cultivated by and perfected by female cats who have decided after one glance that the latest arrival is not One of Them." Babs' own feline glances linger:

Kitty Buckley was a languid, black-haired would-be beauty, with mascara that thick. I gulped when I saw her dress. It was black and very smart, but it dropped down to here in the front. I was fascinated, and practically had to tear my eyes away to take in Kathleen Haines, beside her.

Cushing's Montrealers are either catty, cold or insensitive. Even "nice Inspector MacKay" (see review below) can't help but joke with Babs at the inquest into Joyce's death. Still, the detective is dedicated, solving her murder within a matter of days. Nothing is spoiled in revealing that the killer turns out to be Julie; she's the lone character the reader might have cause to suspect.

You'd be wrong to suppose that her arrest would upset Brandy Fernley. Julie's fiancé reveals that their engagement was meant as a joke played on assembled friends. It doesn't speak well for the mystery writer that what follows comes as the novel's greatest surprise:

"So you see, even last Tuesday night I had no idea of marrying Julie.
     "Oh," I said flatly. He had seemed to expect some noise from me.
     "Yes, I decided then and there I'd like to marry you. The party Thursday night rather clinched it. How does that appeal to you?
     "Quite a lot," I admitted honestly.

There's no talk of love, no embrace, no kiss; the two don't so much as touch. And so, navy man Brandy trades an engagement of convenience for a marriage of convenience, and Babs prepares union to a man who likes nothing more than being at sea in the company of other men.

That's it, really, though an awkward page is tacked to the end in which Babs learns that she, not Julie, will be inheriting the vast Randall estate.

All in all, a strange book… and I do like strange books. I'll be reading more E. Louise Cushing. One of her mysteries is about a Montreal bookseller who finds a body in her shop.

The title is Blood on My Rug.

Favourite passage:

"You always have been longer in stores than you intended to be," she said calmly. "I think you like to talk to the salesgirls. Anyway, I didn't mind at all; it seems perfectly natural for me to wait for you."
     I grinned. She'd hit the nail on the head; it seemed perfectly natural for me. I did like chatting to salesgirls, as she well knew…

Trivia I: Montrealers, particularly residents of NDG, will enjoy the local flavour. Paul's murder takes place at 4312 Melrose Avenue, which is currently the site of a Jean Coutu parking lot. His killer walks over from Wilson using the alleyway that runs just north of Sherbrooke. One minor character works in Simpson's – disguised as "Mason's" – and is shot just up the street on Mansfield.

Yes, shot. See, I haven't given everything away.

Trivia II: The only Montreal novel I've encountered to feature not a single French-speaking character. "Madame Cecile of the French Salon in one of the large stores" receives fleeting mention.

The critics rave: "Montreal gal's poisoning sets off chain reaction; nice Inspector MacKay takes over. Badly organized, plus other structural faults but holds interest. Fifty-fifty." – Saturday Review, 1 January 1955.

Object: A compact, cheaply produced hardcover in maroon cloth with black type. Depicting the scene of the crime, the uncredited dust jacket illustration is best viewed from afar; up close it looks nothing if not bizarre. That piece of furniture is awfully high for a vanity, is it not? The keys are the size of children's teethers and those coins look like pieces of eight. I'm not bothering with the levitating purse.

The rear cover and flap features ads for other obscure Arcadia mysteries by Fred Orpet (Murder's No Accident), R.A. Braun (Murder Four Miles High), Maude M. Thomas (Wait Long, Wait Still) and Harry Walker (né Hillary Waugh; The Case of the Missing Gardener).

Access: An uncommon title, Murder without Regret appears to have enjoyed one lone printing. Just three copies are currently listed for sale online. The cheapest, Very Good in Very Good dust jacket, is going for US$25. The one you'll want, sold by a Dartmouth bookseller, is inscribed by the author. Price: C$95.

Not a single Canadian library has a copy.