Customer Reviews

Three Plots for Asey Mayo

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Three novellas quench the reader's desire for more Asey Mayo mysteries.

In "The Headacre Plot," Asey is called to Headacre House, home of Colonel Tiberius Head. A man named David Arlington claims that his wife Lora was invited to the place and has subsequently disappeared. Asey senses that something is wrong with the man's story, and justifiably so: when they get to the estate, they find that Ty Head is dead, shot in the middle of the forehead. Who could have engineered such a deed? In addition to David and Lora (who quickly turns up), there's Ty's brother Jules, current president of the family company; Jules' daughter Penny, an independent and quite rude young woman; her boyfriend Fritz, who is not a welcome addition to the family; and Charles Sewall, a houseguest who happens to be the family company treasurer. As usual, Doc Cummings helps Asey get down to the bottom of the murder ... but not before a second victim is found. Note: the 1930s term "Fifth Column" is used here in casual speech. It refers to people who give aid and support to an enemy while living within their own country. Those possibilities were presumed to be very real on Cape Cod during WWII. And even though a Fifth Columnist turns out not to be responsible for these particular crimes, that doesn't mean his/her involvement wasn't considered as a true option.

Mistaken identity is the key component in "The Wander Bird Plot." Asey Mayo is repairing Nora Latimer's speedboat when the two of them spy a young woman parking a car with a trailer on Nora's private property. But when they land and confront Cordelia Alcott for her transgression of trepass, it turns out that the car and trailer don't belong to her after all. Neither does the dead man lying inside. Where is the Alcott trailer? And where is Cordy's Uncle Wilbur, who was left sleeping inside it? Who is the victim, and who would have had a reason to biff him? Did neighborhood busybody Lizzie Chatfield see anything helpful through her binoculars? Is that young artist Jere Warren somehow involved? What is his relationship with Nora? This is the most fun and intriguing episode in the book.

The most bizarre story of the three is "The Swan Boat Plot," which takes place entirely in Boston. Asey is supposed to pick up his cousin-in-law Jennie at the train station in the early morning hours and drive her back home to Cape Cod. But when he gets there, she's nowhere to be seen. He wanders over to the Public Garden, knowing her fondness for riding in the swan boats. He finds her suitcase and other items, seemingly dropped in a rush -- as well as the dead body of photographer Rudi Brandt. It looks as if the man had been using early daylight to get images of a scantily-clad model and similarly-attired dummy riding in the boats. (Yes, even today, that scenario seems far-fetched.) Thus must Asey do his best to track down Jennie and get a handle on what has happened. But he's not as well known in Boston as he is on the Cape; and soon enough, he and Jennie are dodging the cops, who think they were involved in the crime. If you thought Asey did a lot of running around during his investigations on the Cape, you should try to follow his movements up and down these city streets. Even on the printed page, it's exhausting work. It all comes down to money and love, as such tragedies often do. And as always, Asey nails the killer, even though this time he had to "trust to luck and ingenuity."

These novellas make for some light entertainment for avid mystery readers. They're obviously not as detailed and rich as are the other novels in the series. But they'll do, in a pinch.

This volume consists of three separate novellas of about 100 pages each. The first, "The Headacre Plot: is the weakest of the three although there are two murders committed with a unique weapon but because the story is told quickly the characters are not very defined.

The second, "The Wander Bird Plot" is my favorite of the three. The wander bird is an early version of a travel trailer in which a young woman is travelling around the Cape with her Uncle Wilber, a man who lost all his money in the stock crash, but he won the trailer in a cereal contest. There are the usual colorful characters, the very wealthy widow, Nora Latimer, who has a young man protege each summer and Mrs. Lizzie Chatfield, an annual tourist, who loves to survey the views from her inn with her binoculars. There's one murder with the ever popular blunt instrument, an arson to destroy evidence, and a second attempted murder, as well as a romance. Asey takes charge, of course, and sorts it all out.

The third story, "The Swan Boat Plot", is unique in that it takes place in Boston, rather than on the Cape -- the only Mayo story as far as I can remember, that isn't set on the Cape.

Asey is picking Jenny up in Boston at 5:30 am as she returns from a family funeral in Chicago, but Jenny has mis-calculated the time difference and arrives early. She goes into the Public Garden to feed the ducks and look at the Swan boats and witnesses the shooting of a photographer. He's working early before the park gets crowded. Jenny thinks his glamorous model has shot him and runs after her. Asey follows a trial of Jenny's possessions, suitcase, pocketbook, hat, etc. The model has a rich, jealous fiance, who objects to her possing. There's the former model, now secretary to the photographer, who's in love with the model's brother, and a retired judge who used to have a summer place on the Cape and gave it up. This story has many red herrings, two victims and complex situations, so it is not as relaxing a read as the earlier two. I think it may have been written later because when Asey wraps it up, he has to return to the Porter factory which is starting to construct big tanks. None-the-less, you can't beat three good stories for the price of one.

I love all of P.A.T's cape cod seriece os books and this one is just as great, to me, as all of the others