Deed Without a Name

DOROTHY BOWERS (1902-1948) was a champion of "fair play" mysteries in which all the clues are cunningly displayed within the story.  The daughter of a bakery owner, she attended Oxford university, and later became a History teacher, supplementing her income by compiling crossword puzzles.  A member of the Detection Club, Bowers wrote five crime thrillers before her early death from tuberculosis.

“Curiosity is the test of detective stories. If it is continually whetted all faults can be forgiven. If it is not, then all graces of style and character tend to remove the novel into another class. Comparatively few of the goods that bear the label are “detective” through and through; the boys’ book of adventure, the nursemaids’ novelette, the tale of mystery and terror, the drawing-room melodrama, the tough school’s callisthenics and all other types of popular fiction mongrelize the strain.There is almost a thrill of discovery in recognizing the pure breed and this is what Miss Bowers gives us in “A Deed Without A Name.” She begins quietly and unpromisingly with a young man of Chelsea whose tales of poisoned chocolates, a push in the back on a railway platform and a narrow escape from being run down in the street suggest a persecution complex or self-dramatization that he will grow out of. Of course, he would climb a wall and let himself in by a back-door rather than enter his home in the usual way. And then the crimes begin. Miss Bowers’ story is exciting because it steers clear of familiar ways. There is no Fuss over detectives’ personal appearance or idiosyncrasies and though she cannot overcome the prevailing passion for apt quotations she keeps them for chapter headings instead of dialogue. Her business is strictly the unravelling of a murder mystery. Plodding police methods are unassisted by “hunches”, amateur or professional. The task is tackled like washing-day by constable, sergeant and inspector, acting on information received from a prying housemaid. Whether you spot the guilty party or not make little difference. The very nature of the crime has an interest that forbids the skipping of odd chapters. Miss Bowers brings a fresh box of tricks on the stage just when the audience was becoming jaded. Her illusions may amount to the old business of vanishing live ‘uns and producing dead ‘uns, but they seem new. She ranks with the best.”

• IntroductionI  Riddle-Me-ReeII  A Visit and a VisitorIII Ding Dong BellIV QuestV Rope's EndVI Witches' SabbathVII Curious Behaviour of a Young ManVIII A Word of Mr. VickIX At the Sign of the JuniperX - Of AccidentsXI - Of IncidentsXII Salt is DoubtfulXIII Pardoe is UnsuccessfulXIV The Most Unlikely PersonXV At Mulberry FountainXVI The Most Likely PersonXVII At the CinemaXVIII GasXIX Vacant PossessionXX Last Word of Mr. VickXXI A Bump on the HeadXXII Leaves from a DiaryXXIII The Bird