“Two-Way Murder” by E.C.R. Lorac

E.C.R. Lorac (1894-1958) is relatively unknown today, but she was one of the lights of the Golden Age of Mystery in Great Britain and a member of the Detection Club, which included such mystery writers as Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, and G.K. Chesterton (Chesterton was the first president). Her real name was Edith Caroline Rivett (and thus the E.C.R.), and she was one prolific writer. She published some 49 mystery novels under the Lorac pen name (most of them Chief Inspector Macdonald mysteries) and 23 under the pen name of Carol Carnac. 

One of her last manuscripts, completed in the 1950s but never published for reasons unknown, was Two-Way Murder. That is, until now. The British Library’s British Crime Classics has published the work, and it’s the first time the series has issued a not-previously-published book.

 

It’s a dark, foggy night near coastal southern England. Two friends, Nicholas Brent and Ian Macbane, are motoring their way to the annual Hunt Ball in the town of Fordings. The dancing isn’t the only attraction; attending will be Dilys Maine, a local beauty whom half the county is in love with. Dilys has a very strict father, who happens to have traveled to London on business, so she’s able to sneak out and attend the ball.

 

E.C.R. Lorac

Brent gives Dilys a ride home; she needs to be home before her father returns early the next day. But about a mile before their reach the Maine manor home, they come across what looks like a large bag in the roadway. Except it’s not a bag, but a body. Nick sends Dilys to walk on foot the rest of the way; they’re trying to keep her father from finding out about the dance, as he certainly will if she’s called to give evidence at the presumed inquest. Nick walks back to the farm of Michael Reeves to use the phone. Michael, a potential suitor for Dilys, is apparently still at the dance. Nick gets inside through a window, calls the police, and then is interrupted in the dark and knocked unconscious.

 

The local police and C.I.D. are soon on the case, as is just about everyone else – the Maines’ housekeeper, Macbane, Reeves, and the rest of the local population. Everyone, it seems, has something to hide, including the identity of the victim and the disappearance 18 months previously of Michael Reeves’ sister. 

 

It’s a complex story, dependent upon multiple roadways running roughly parallel to each other. It’s packed in a tightly written narrative, and it requires close reading. Lorac leaves clues, but the solution will still come as something of a surprise. 

 

Related:

 

My review of Fire in the Thatch by E.C. R. Lorac.

 

My review of Bats in the Belfry by E.C.R. Lorac.