Duplicate Death (by Georgette Heyer)

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I’m glad I decided to re-read Georgette Heyer’s crime fiction novels. I’ve just finished ‘Duplicate Death’, which I first read in 2008. All I could remember was that a nasty murder took place during a Bridge party. I had forgotten all the characters - and, checking back, it appears that I didn’t particularly like it last time, though I didn’t dislike it either.

This time I was prepared for a large cast of characters, and kept a note of them as they started to appear. The first chapter involves a nice family scene; Jim Kane and his wife have just received letters from their children who are away at boarding school, and Mrs Kane also receives a letter from her mother-in-law. She tells her husband that his half-brother Timothy Harte is embroiled with an adventuress, and she would really like Jim to see if he can investigate..

The names sounded vaguely familiar, but it wasn’t until rather later in the book when I realised that these three people were main characters in Heyer’s novel ‘They found him dead’, which I re-read just five months ago. Timothy was fourteen in that book, a fan of gangsters, and determined to help - or hinder - the police in an investigation. In this book, he’s ten years older, and works as a barrister. He recognises Chief Inspector Hemingway who was Sergeant Hemingway in the earlier book. 

The main action takes place in the home of Mrs Haddington, a society widow with a stunningly beautiful daughter, Cynthia. Nobody is entirely sure how she entered high society. Although this was written as a contemporary novel, first published in 1951, it’s apparent that the rules were almost as rigid as they were in the Regency era where Heyer set most of her novels. It’s suspected that her friend Lady Nest Poulton launched her, but they don’t actually seem to like each other much…

Mrs Haddington is hosting a duplicate Bridge party. She has three guests to dinner in advance, including Timothy Harte, who is in love with Mrs Haddington’s secretary Beulah. Then large numbers of visitors arrive; there are almost fifty people in the house, with eleven Bridge tables set up in two locations. I was writing down all the names as they were introduced, but it turns out that most of them are not really relevant to the story. Those that are become more memorable.

Mrs Haddington is rather cold, and not very likeable, but she’s a good hostess and while she’s quite ruthless, she adores her daughter. So much so that she’s indulged and spoiled her. Cynthia is not very bright, cares little for social rules, and wants to marry someone whom her mother doesn’t particularly like. 

Then the tragedy happens, and Chief Inspector Hemingway of Scotland Yard is called in, along with Inspector Grant. The two have quite a good rapport; Inspector Grant is Scottish and comes out with occasional words or phrases in gaelic. However some of his speech patterns are (in my opinion) more Welsh than Scottish. It’s not a huge deal; he doesn’t have much imagination but he is good at his job. 

With some of Heyer’s crime novels it’s obvious early in the book who the perpetrator is. It wasn’t obvious to me at all what had happened in this one. Despite the house being full, there are only really seven possible suspects, and the interviews and checking up are done well. Hemingway is very intuitive, and has a deceptively friendly manner that tends to put people at their ease, as he asks quite pointed questions. 

And just as he thinks he may have worked out both motivation and means for the crime, someone else is killed, using the same unpleasant technique. It throws Scotland Yard into some confusion, and further investigations take place.

I don’t think I could have worked out ‘whodunnit’ as there were some unsavoury parts of the story that didn’t get revealed until later in the book. But it was very well done, and I appreciated all the parts involving Hemingway, as well as those where Timothy takes part. The romantic thread is very low-key but runs satisfactorily alongside the main plot adding a bit of human interest.

Overall, I liked this book this time, very much, despite the gruesome subject matter - and Heyer manages to avoid writing unnecessarily gory scenes, concentrating instead on the potential suspects.

Recommended if you like this genre of mid-century crime fiction. Available in Kindle form as well as paperback, and sometimes available second-hand. 

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