Search results for ""Author Curtis Evans""

When wealthy elderly Simon Ewing is found murdered in his flat, it appears to be a robbery gone wrong. Two rings were taken from the dead man's hands, but his hidden jewelery strongbox remained untouched, except for one missing diamond solitaire. An unknown man was spotted exiting the building; there is evidence that he had searched the upper floors before attacking Ewing when the old man was briefly left unattended. But how could an outsider have known when to strike? And why take only one ring from a treasure trove? Superintendent Woods is called in, and through patient careful detection begins slowly to disentangle the clues, as suspicion shifts from one character to the next. This classic detective novel from the 1930s is now republished for the first time.

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‘When a man has three separate notices by three different women inserted in the local paper, and he’s my own namesake besides, I feel I owe him something.’ Sequential death notices appear for Robert Raynald: one by his mother, one by his estranged wife, one by his daughter. This odd approach draws the attention of Superintendent Mallett and his friend Dr. Fitzbrown. The inquest had decided that Raynald shot himself whilst temporarily insane, but his daughter Geraldine is not convinced and presents enough evidence to arouse the investigator within Mallett. Raynald's story is presented in flashbacks, as Mallett and Fitzbrown build a picture of his life through the people who knew him best. Requiem for Robert combines the excitement of a detective story with a haunting reading of character.

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'Mr Gabb, your son did not commit suicide. He was murdered.' Simon Gabb has everything - or so it seems: a beautiful house, a big estate, a flourishing business and two sons, both endowed with evident capacity for carrying on the family firm. The moody Giles is brilliant and inventive; the married Basil is dependable and efficient. And yet something is manifestly wrong. A secret invention, on which his business was engaged for the government, becomes known to those who had no right to know it. But how and where did the leak occur? It is a conundrum which creates suspicion and dissension within the family and engulfs everyone who dine with them one Saturday night. Giles has become friendly with young Arden and Billy Laforte, who were the previous owners of Herons' Hall until their father's death left them penniless, and who now rent one of the lodges on the property. When Giles brings the Lafortes to the Hall for the first visit to their old home in three years, the Gabbs hardly know what to expect. Yet the Lafortes seem completely at ease, so when a fierce storm develops, Mrs Gabb insistes they stay the night. The next morning, Gabb's elder son, Giles, is found dead in a motorboat on the lake, his body propped up by a shotgun. But it is soon apparent that the gun was not the cause of death, nor did he die in the boat; a skilled marksman shot him from a distance. Superintendent Mallett is assigned the case and must deal with the smouldering emotions the flare up between everyone present that evening.

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Charles was in a vile temper and Anne was catching the full benefit of it. Charles Courtley is a difficult man. Prone to violent outbursts and a bully to his wife and daughters, he has uprooted the family from London to an old manor house in remote East Anglia. Spoilt by his growing wealth and increasingly intolerant of any dissent, Charles enjoys controlling everyone around him. His family, his employees and even the locals - banned from using the traditional footpaths on his forested estate - have multiple reasons to bear a grudge. When Charles is shot dead in a woodland clearing, evidence from an unreliable witness points to Courtley’s secretary, but he has a cast iron alibi and the resulting trial ends in an acquital. A year later, a seemingly innocent death and an odd cenotaph leads Chief Inspector Simon Sturt to reconsider the case. Dorothy Erskine Muir (1889–1977) was one of seventeen children of John Sheepshanks, Bishop of Norwich. She attended Oxford, worked as an academic tutor, and began writing professionally to supplement the family income after the unexpected death of her husband in 1932. Muir published historical biographies and local histories, as well as three accomplished detective novels: In Muffled Night (1933), Five to Five (1934) and In Memory of Charles (1941).

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