Good heavens, after this second reading of Christianna Brand’s Suddenly at His Residence, a.k.a. The Crooked Wreath (1946) do I have plenty of Thoughts.  Indeed, I have so many Thoughts that I’m deliberately writing about it on a Thursday so that my self-imposed 1,000 word limit stops me going on for about four times that length, to the enjoyment of no-one. So: Sir Richard March, tiring of the attitudes of his grandchildren, threatens to rewrite his will, retires to the lodge in the grounds of Swanswater Manor for this express purpose…and is discovered dead the following morning. Having been visited by various people throughout the previous evening, who actually poisoned him?

The first thing I took away from this is just how phenomenally well-written it is, with Brand evincing more than her usual skill when limning the March family and their relationships — aided, no doubt, by a placement of adjectives which lift the whole thing on almost every page. Even little moments of nothing are somehow made more joyous and complete by the perfect descriptor thrown in so casually that it almost hurts to read:

That evening they sat on the terrace looking down to the river and away from the lodges, tenderly nursing their sunburn and all very silent after the rather hysterical unease of the day. … Bella fed biscuits to her dog, a small white whiskery animal called Bobbin which sat up with a rocklike steadiness, holding its mouth wide open to receive the fragments which, from a really astonishing distance, she threw to it.

She also prevents the frivolousness of the younger generation which irritates Sir Richard so much from being such an issue for the reader, with fabulous writing about grief, casual asides about the horror of the wartime experience, and reflections upon what is meant by the word “England” brushing up against the reality of the war which continues to rage. And yet, the March family come with plenty of flaws: none of then bother to learn the name of the ‘woman who does’ for them at the Manor, calling variously a “hag” and “The Turtle”, and the following diatribe from gardener’s wife Mr. Brough, following the accusation of her husband, is another piece of pitch perfect condemnation:

“Let the servants suffer! Don’t dream of punishing the rich or suspecting the rich, or saying a word that might hurt the precious feelings of the rich — not if you can find a servant to suffer in their place!”

There are also the difficulties within the family itself — Philip is having an affair with his cousin Claire, and has to negotiate leaving his wife Ellen and their young baby — and the way this feeds into the behaviour and attitude of the March grandchildren as things fall out becomes increasingly interesting, as does the love that lawyer Stephen Garde harbours for eldest grandchild, and presumed heir, Peta. And the moment when Sir Richard’s second wife Bella resoundingly refutes the idea that she would commit murder in order to acquire Swanswater for herself remains one of the great stand-up-and-cheer moments of classic detective fiction.

Indeed, there’s so much going on here that you could write a whole review before you even got to the criminous plot, and the expert way Brand waves false and true solutions at you from the very early stages (you’re actually told before the halfway point how the apparently impossible murder of Sir Richard was achieved…). And so while the criminal aspect does sort of take a back seat at times, we do at least have the terrier-like presence of Inspector Cockrill on the scene to worry away at the suspects in the most shamefaced manner imaginable.

And while, miserably, the family eased their tortured nerves, in accusation and argument, wrangling unceasingly among themselves, siding now with one and now with another, irritable, dejected, over-excited, ashamed, Inspector Cockrill prowled, ever watchful, through the house and grounds. Now and again he put a sharp question; now and again he stood unblushingly outside a door to listen; now and again he appeared among a group of them, stirring up with a sort of mischievous joy those easily ignited fires…

I can fault this only in that we’re never told how Cockrill comes to realise the answer of Sir Richard’s death, which is a very slight disappointment on the back of the sheer perfection of an ending which manages to take an impossible situation for the family and the crime alike and turn it into the most consummately fitting dénouement perhaps ever put on the page.

This was the second book by Brand I ever read, and I had good impressions of it from all those years ago, but revisiting it with a better appreciation of her oeuvre, and of the genre in general, makes me realise how magnificently special Suddenly at His Residence is. Brand would be out-sold and out-reputationed by many of her peers, but the excellent work done by the British Library in negotiating rights and picking such strong titles to reprint will hopefully give her the reappraisal she is due. My thanks to them for all the work that has gone into these, and for the review copy that has enabled me to find so much to celebrate in this book in particular. Hopefully more are on the way…a second reading of Tour de Force (1955) feels about due, hein?

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See also

Martin @ Window Through Time: The purist would argue that there are more holes in the plot than in a colander and while that is true and there is an element of impossibility to the explanation of the way both impossible murders were committed, Brand manages to divert the reader’s attention with a tour de force of some not inconsiderable brio and humour. 

Nick @ The Grandest Game in the World: Brand usually turned out creditable work; she does not here.  She populates the clichéd country house with a large family whose vocabulary is liberally peppered with ‘Dear’ or ‘Darling!,’ a condiment this reader finds offensive to his palate.  The patriarch is murdered on the eve of changing his will—a thoroughly clichéd situation… What irritates most is the twee and over-sentimental tone, always very arch, except when it degenerates into simply blatant melodrama.