As those of you who have read my posts about Marsh’s other books, her detective, Alleyn, sometimes comes off stiff and stuffy, lecturing people and showing off his polysyllabic vocabulary and convoluted sentence structure. I had thought this was a function of experience, that she loosened up, the more books she had written. This book proves me wrong. It’s only #8 in the series, Alleyn is not yet even married, although he has met his future wife, Agatha Troy, but he is at his less awkward in this book.

The story is simple. It takes place in a small country village, ruled by a aristocratic family (now sadly low on funds). The scion of this family is a middle-aged widower, easily bowled over by his manipulative cousin, Eleanor, who came to live in his home three years previously. Prior to her arrival, another middle-aged “spinster of the parish”, the wealthy Iris Campanula, had a clear field for dominating all of the parish clubs and associations, and for practicing her designs on the local pastor, a remarkably handsome man with the soul of a gentle parish priest. The cast is rounded out by the daughter of the pastor and the son of the leading family (both in their early twenties and, of course, in love), the local doctor (who has inherited a family home but no wealth to keep it up, given that his wife suffers from spinal paralysis), and the black widow who has moved in recently and set her sites on the doctor, although any man will do in a pinch.

Ngaio Marsh, who had briefly briefly been in the theatre, often includes the theatre in books, set in London’s West End, in theatres in New Zealand, amongst opera stars in New Zealand, and so on. In this case, the main characters decide to put on a small show in aid of replacing the elderly piano in the village hall. Against the combined wills of Iris Campanula and Eleanor, the rest of the group decide on a modern farce. The two fathers, emotionally blackmailed by the two women, forbid their progeny from seeing each others. At the same time, the ladies spread gossip about the doctor and the mysterious lady, and threaten to tell the doctor’s wife what he’s up to.

The evening of the big show arrives and Eleanor, who had fought tooth and nail to demonstrate her virtuosity at the piano is forced, by injury to her finger, to give way to friend and competitor. As the house lights dim and the stage lights come up, Iris sits down, arranges her music, hits her opening chords, and is blown away by a bobby-trapped pistol hidden within the piano.

Who did it? And who did they mean to kill? Iris or Eleanor?

Inspector Alleyn to the rescue! He sweeps down with Fox, Thompson, and Bailey, takes the whole thing apart and puts it back together again, undercovering the how and then the why and the who. Utterly cool throughout the whole thing, he smoothly lifts clues right off the hands of the suspects, adding bits ad pieces of statements together one by one, until it all makes sense.

This is quintessential British golden age small town cozy mystery, very similar to a book I wrote about earlier this year, Hand in Glove about another cozy group of neighbors whose friendship went bad.

If you like golden age mysteries, this is one to try.