I have, in my limited exposure to his work, come to quite enjoy the thrillerish tendencies of Horatio Edgar Wallace. You don’t come to him for solid plotting, intelligent detection, or subtle clewing, but there’s a brand of creativity he brings to his wild schemes that is difficult to find elsewhere.

Having thoroughly enjoyed The Crimson Circle (1922), I sought other Wallace tales featuring impossible crimes and, guided by Adey, had a good time with The Clue of the Twisted Candle (1918) despite not having any idea come the end how the apparently-impossible sealing of a barred door was achieved (clear technical writing is not Wallace’s forte). And so I came to The Clue of the New Pin (1923) with reasonable hopes that, at the very least, it would be entertaining in the same vein and…well, let’s look at that.

In true Wallace style, the plot meanders in the opening stages as if he is trying to work out what the eventual thrust of the narrative will be. If there’s any canonical perspective on how much drafting Wallace did — by which I mean, if he ever wrote a draft with a higher number than 1 at the end — I’d be interested to hear of it. These House of Stratus editions say on the back cover that “he wrote more than 170 books” and, well, you don’t put out that sort of volume if you’re worrying about the mirroring of the themes in chapters 6 though 12 and whether the reader recognises their relevance to the plot developments in the final third.

So for a little while here, neither Wallace nor I really knew what was going on, but it eventually settles into a pattern that draws in all the threads: miserly millionaire Jesse Trasmere, his nephew and heir presumptive Rex Lander, his journalist friend Tab Holland, and the actress Ursula Ardfern all drawn into an orbit that will culminate with Trasmere’s death by shooting in the locked basement room where he hoards his wealth. The only fly in the ointment is that Trasmere was shot in the back and would have died instantly, but the only key to the room is found on the table in the room. Since there’s no aperture large enough to admit the bullet from outside, and only an eight-of-an-inch space at the bottom of the door, howdunnit?

One distinctly gets the impression that Wallace did not redraft this if only because the first third is so much fun, jumping from Tab’s various journalistic sorties…

A Polish gentleman concerned in certain frauds on insurance companies had been arrested, escaped again, and having barricaded himself in his house, was keeping the police at bay with the aid of boiling water and a large axe…

At midnight [Tab] joined a little group of police officers that stood at safe range from the besieged house, whose demented occupant had found a shot-gun. Tab was with them until the door of the house was stormed and the defender borne down and clubbed to a state of placidity.

…to the sort of broad middle class criticism that these books so squarely aimed at the horrified, delighted middle classes seemed to revel in:

Mr. John Stott had discovered to his gratification that the association of his name with the Trasmere case had enhanced, rather than detracted from his social standing. It is true that the newspapers, having long ceased to take the slightest interest in the murder, seemed oblivious to the part he had played, or the startling discovery which he had to his credit, but a more important circle of public opinion, that circle which met daily at Toby’s and discussed an expensive lunch and such matters of public interest as deserved attention, had applauded Mr. Stott’s decision to place in the hands of the police authorities the information which, up to that moment, had been confined to some twenty commercial gentlemen, their wives, their wives’ families, their servants, the servants of their wives’ families, the families of the servants, to say nothing of personal friends of all and each, their servants and attachments.

Wallace is clearly having a blast, with the various relationships shared by various people coming under scrutiny, the vanishing of two suspicious types, and Tab Holland always on the scene, leaning at times into his friendship with the newly-minted Rex Lander to justify his excessive interest in proceedings.

Interestingly, too, there’s a thread of this that addresses the racial abuse suffered by Chinese people in England at the time which simultaneously admits the existence of such xenophobia without comment…

The Chinaman pursued his course to the unsavoury end of Reed Street; children who saw him screamed derisively; a frowsy old woman standing in a doorway yelled a crude witticism, but Yeh Ling passed on unmoved.

…leans into it for thriller purposes…

Mr. Stott had an idea that he ought to telephone for the police, but refrained. In the case of ordinary burglars, he would not have hesitated. But these were Chinese, notoriously clannish and vengeful. He had read stories, in which Chinaman had inflicted diabolical injuries upon men who had betrayed them.

…and then owns that anyone who sees these immigrants as less than noble and honourable people is a bloody idiot:

“We Chinese are peculiar people. If Mr. Lander came to me on his return from Italy and said — ‘Yeh Ling, this property is my uncle’s in which you have only a small share’, I would reply, ‘that is true’, and if the agreement which we two men had not signed was not discovered, I should make no effort at law to preserve my rights.”

And he meant it. Tab knew as he spoke, that he was telling the truth. He could only marvel that such an exalted code of honour could be held by a man who subconsciously, he regarded as of an inferior race and of an inferior civilisation.

Ronald Knox, you feel, would be suitably appalled, and I understand why.

The second third, then — and this is a long book by Wallace’s standards, based on the six or so I’ve read — mixes the brew somewhat, painting relationships in new and interesting colours, but in a way that leaves very little for the denouement. Indeed, it’s actually the placement of (there’s no other word for it) a clue which tipped me to the mastermind behind the various murders, and I didn’t see how Wallace could spin this skein out for much longer…and then he does, by writing perhaps the longest denouement in the history of fiction.

Oh, my goodness, it goes on and on and on.

It really does feel as if Wallace had his fun, dug himself out of the various holes his impromptu spinning of unexpected developments got him into…and then realised that he still had a book to finish. Where The Crimson Circle seemed to revel in joyous developments that topped each other by becoming more and more outlandish and fun, and where Four Square Jane (1929) playfully throws more and more kindling on the fire of speculative delight, here Wallace just seems to run out of puff, has a Big Monologue where our villain reveals themself for no reason, and then explains away the two locked room murders in a way that — goddamn it, Edgar — I once again do not understand.

All told, I wonder if I accidentally peaked early with Wallace in reading The Crimson Circle first, because I’m yet to experience a second book of his (out, yes, of the 169+ others, so odds are against me…) which conjures up quite the same competencies in the concentrations that I like. I’m mulling over one of The Daffodil Mystery (1920), The Face in the Night (1924), The Forger (1927), and The Clue of the Silver Key (1930) as my next read of his, and if you, dear reader, have any suggestions to direct me to one of these or elsewhere please do make them below. With limited funds and limited time, I don’t intend to read even a sizeable proportion of Wallace’s output — his more Adventure-y books don’t sound like my jam at all — but when he’s on form like the opening section here he’s honestly so enjoyable that I wonder if anyone else was ever this good at that sort of thing.

So, yes, a curate’s egg, but one whose stronger elements make me very keen to experience similar elsewhere. And, no, it’s not a secret passage, may heaven be praised.