The Unfinished Clue

The Unfinished Clue (1934) Georgette Heyer

Sir Arthur Billingham-Smith and his wife Fay are throwing a house party. Except that the general didn’t want to have the party, doesn’t want to see his son and the woman he wants to marry, and is pretty much a complete bastard.

He dislikes his son almost as much as he dislike’s Fay’s sister.

‘H’m! I suppose this is a specimen of the modern frankness we hear so much about!’ remarked Sir Arthur belligerently. ‘Personally, I should have thought that common politeness –’

‘You wouldn’t,’ interrupted Dinah, quite unperturbed. ‘You told me last time I came that you’d ceased to expect ordinary courtesy from me.’

Dinah is probably the best character in the book.

‘Would you like me to make love to you, darling?’ inquired Francis.

‘Do just as you like; I needn’t listen,’ replied Dinah.

‘It seems to be the order of the day,’ he said softly. ‘You don’t like me a bit, do you, my sweet?’

‘No, not much.’

So, to summarize: Arthur is awful, Fay is weak, the son–Geoffrey–is unable to stand up for himself, and the rest of the members of the house party are pretty much contemptible.

The mystery is ok. Although the murder doesn’t happen until chapter five, you know precisely who is going to die, and of course everyone has good reason to kill him. I also guess pretty quickly who had killed him, although I wasn’t positive which of two characters was that person.

However, I did enjoy the historical aspects of the story–in that is a contemporary that is now 80-some years old and an historical, which I always find fascinating. The rest of it? Meh.

Publisher : Poisoned Pen Press
Rating: 6/10

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