Stoughton.
"Tne Scamuer Puupenye."—By Baroness Orexy: Hodder & Stoughton Such highly respectable folk have frankly confessed that they are close students of the drama of murder trials, and ce much literature, also highly respectable, has accumulated.on the subject,' that Mr. Wakefield needs no-apology for bringing specially to the public notice a ease which certainly ranks with the most mysterious in the record of Sherlock Holmes or any other of the great detectives of fiction, Mr. Wakefield does not re-for to Mr, Marjoribanks' admirable ife of Sit Edward Marshall Hall, and possibly, therefore, he prepared this book before that biography was visned, Nevertheless, it is of importance to observe that Mr.' Marjoribanks records the Green Bicycle case as one of Marshall -Hall's most startling successes, and his account of the trial may be said to be a vivid picture of the events which Mr, Wakefield so prosaically, and yet 60 absorbingly, relates in order to present the public with a very pretty enigma, For the Green Bicycle Case. remains a mystery. Mr, Marjoribanks differs from Mr. Wakefield that he. refuses to. dismiss the solution put forward in the "Strand Magazine" as a ludicrous and exaggerated travesty. "But before that point is touched, let the crux of the problem be stated. The human appeal in this case is notable. It makes itself felt by anyone who has a spark of imagination and who possesses a grain of syn-by. Put briefly, the case was:
An ex officer, endeavouring to find employment as a schoolmaster, riding a green bicycle on an autumn evening, when the acckient of a puncture brings him in conversation with a young and pretty factory gil. He arranges to wait for the girl while she goes back to bhar house, and then cycles with her short way along a country road and says good-night, He does not find out her name. All the infor-motion obtained from her has been employed in a tyre factory, Two days learns that the girl has been found murdered not far from the spot where he left her and within, at most, half-an-hour of his parti with' her. He also learns that the Messrs. Hodder & Stoughton are to be congratulated on republishing ju new form several id nad new favourites, the two volumes mentioned forming part of the series. The "Omnibus" Volumes" chiefly contain four stories each by popular authors, there being ove 1,000 pages of reading between the covers, ina book that is actually—mot very much larger than many novels on sale, For travelling, these looks take up small packing space, and while away many hours: there is little chance of getting that blank feeling, when one has finished an edscrbing book and there is still an hour or two before the end of the journey: just' turn to. the next part, and go on with the "further adventures of the here.
In the "Police Van" we have "four complete police novels in one volume, as. reported by Edgar Wallace." Inthe first' consignment, Captain Featherstone. meets the "Green Archer" and solves the jsnystery of Garre Castle, after! thrilling adventures in subterranean passages, ending up with the storming of the castle by a daitalion of troops. Inspector Bourke and his solution of "The Forger" problem take up the second consignment, followed by Inspector Dick' Staines' adventures with "The Double" and ending with the solu: tion of the mystery of Lady's Stairs by Inspector Bradley of the "Flying 'Squad.'
Four of Baroness Orcay's stories of the famous "Scarlet Pimpernel" are published together in a volume bearing that name. Opening with the first of the now famous series, when Sir Percy Blakeney regains his wife's love trid counters the machinations of the French agent, Chauvelin, through Sir Percy's breath-taking adventures. in rescue ing aristes from the guillotine we read through to the last adventure in the book when Sir Percy has his subtle revenge on Chauvelin by saving the latter's own daughter front the sentence which her own' father would have had to pass on her. The stories in the volume jearlet_ Pimpernel," "I dorado" and Sir fact that she had spoken to a stranger riding a green bicycle was Amown, and everyone is searching for the owner of the bicycle. Th git] herself is known to have borne a character beyond reproach, she was engaged to be married shortly to a man of her own class, and all the evidence pointed to the fact that she was leading a life free from any form of embarrassment, What was the exoffieer to do? Living with an invalid mother, to whom he had been a source of no little anxiety, owing partly to his own personal deficiencies and partly to the fact that the war left him suffering from shell shock he wa: particularly anxious to avoid dis turbing publicity. What he should have done is obvious. Assuming that his story that he had nothing whatever to do with the murder was correct, he should have at once communicated with the police and told them of the events of the fatal evening. He did not do this. He attempted to conceal, and eventually to make away with, the green Dicyele—an attempt which was not very foolish from the practical point of view, because it was nearly Successful, only the accident of a slack tow rope resulting in its being fished up from the canal by a bargeman engaged on his lawful occasions, But let Mr. Wakefield tell the tale himself, The reader will at once perceive that it asks the very pertinent question: What would you do in like case?
In the event, the eloquence of Sir 'Edward Marshal Hall, and the absence of motive, resulted in the acquit tal of the' accused, and the crime remains wrapped in mystery. In the list of its curious features was the introduction of a blackbird a rook ora carrion crow, This bird was found dead a. few yards from the body of the murder-
For travellers, for book-shelves, and for all those who from time to time re-read old favourites, the "Omnibus Volume" series will be hard to beat—r.as. ed girl, and it was found gorged with biged, and tracks showed that it had made six journeys from the place where it fell to the dead body, before it died. The actual effect of this discovery on the case for the prosecution was merely to establish the fact that the girl had been dend for some few minutes before her body was found, and it thereby lessened the margin of time which permitted a third party to appear on the scene and disappear after the parting between the prisoner and the girl. But this bird has given rise to the ingenious theory, elaborated in the Strand Magazine, that the bullet found as the cause of the girl's death was accidentally discharged by some unknown loiterer desiring to take a casual shot at the bird. "It is a fantastic theory, admittedly, but, unlike Mr. Wak field, Sir Edward Marshall Hall's biographer does not dismiss it as impossible in such a mysterious ese, Among the famous trials of modern times there cannot be recalled one which supplies so little in the nature of motive or background for reconstructing the murder. The prosecution's theory was that the prisoner, as a shell shock case, had a sudden maniacal storm, and thus committed a purpposeless crime. But obviously the jury did not accept that theory. The case remains intensely, interesting and will probably**give scope for the ingenious acrobatics of detection experts for many years to come—E-H,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.