The Long-Shot Trial by William Deverell

(35. - 1218.) The Long-Shot Trial by William Deverell - Arthur Beauchamp’s efforts at savouring quiet days in his Gulf Island home with a cup of tea, the Goldberg Variations playing softly in the background and a good book in his hands, perhaps a literary thriller, are shattered when his wife Margaret, also known as his life companion, hands him the second edition of Wentworth Chance’s biography of the esteemed barrister.

Arthur is aghast that Chance’s calumnies of the first edition, clumsily addressed in the second edition, have actually been exacerbated by the inclusion of a chapter on the murder trial of R. v. Angelina Santos. The assertion in the book that during that time Arthur dallied with a pair of “women for hire” has aggravated Margaret. He decides to set the record straight or at least put his actions in context by writing his own memoir of the famous trial which took place 56 years earlier in 1966.

He heads to his spartan cabin near his home, places paper in his aged typewriter and writes of his stalwart defence of Miss (it is well before Ms.) Santos in Fort Thompson (Fort Tom), near the Yukon border in northeastern British Columbia. She is a 20 year old Filipina immigrant.

A domestic servant, she is charged with murder for shooting her employer, Frederick C. Trudd, with his rifle. She alleges he had raped her three days earlier. The local townspeople have raised $15,000 for the defence, a major fee in the 1960’s. The community despised Trudd.

Arthur’s section head, Alex Pappas, considers her doomed. Fueled by several double Scotches (he did not quit drinking until 1987) Arthur vows:

“If she goes down it won’t be because I didn’t fight for her”.

At the same time Pappas, with Arthur’s aid, is preparing for the murder trial of Vancouver’s richest man, Herb MacIntosh. 

Arthur, raised in one of Vancouver’s wealthiest neighbourhoods, by a pair of university professors, recognizes he is ill-equipped to understand life in the distant forests of northern British Columbia.

Arthur is dismayed by his client’s honesty:

But I would find it awkward relating to a client who, apparently, was incapable of telling lies. Most of my defendants hadn’t suffered that handicap.

She is a Catholic woman of great faith. She refers to her unborn child as a “beautiful miracle”.

She remembers little of the crucial moments before shooting Trudd. A prison doctor believes she has repressed these memories.

She is a woman without guile which disconcerts the young Arthur.

Unfortunately, the socially awkward inhibited Arthur does not conduct a detailed discussion with Angelina concerning the rape and its aftermath.

The case draws one of the province’s newest judges, Wilbur Kroop, a combative Federal prosecutor before ascending to the bench. Arthur and Justice Kroop have an intense mutual disdain.

Prosecuting will be an aggressive, though lazy, loudmouth from Vancouver, Ed Santorini. He will be assisted by a young lawyer, Clara Moncrief.

Heading north for the trial, Arthur’s flight is cancelled and he unwisely takes the bus. It is a 30 hour ride beset by breakdowns and belligerent adults and crying children.

Arthur spends the days before the trial in Fort Tom working to build a defence. 

He is beguiled by the comely Miss Moncrief. Will he venture into a relationship with a Crown?

His client believes God will stop the government from taking away her baby if she is convicted of murder.

Occasionally the plot drifts back to 2022 where Arthur’s memories of 1966 are aided by the mouse nibbled transcript of the trial his law firm unearthed from its archives.

Ridden with anxiety - few lawyers are any different before a trial - Arthur appears mentally unready for a capital murder trial but, when Order is called, he rises and becomes the experienced barrister of 5 years at the bar.

While Angelina had told Arthur only “God will decide her guilt or innocence” she does plead not guilty.

Shortly after the trial begins the Crown plays the recording of Angelina’s call to the RCMP:

“Please come. I think I shot Mr. Trudd and he’s dead.”

The reason for the title of the book is made clear through those two sentences.

The Crown case proceeds with Arthur engaged in skilful cross-examinations. It is a challenge to question those either experienced with testifying, police officers, or having expertise, doctors, but there are opportunities when they are arrogant or careless.

No one writes trial evidence better than Deverell. 

I found Arthur’s doubts and hesitations about calling a witness who might identify an alternative killer misguided. No defence lawyer can worry about the consequences to a legitimate alternative. His/her duty is to advocate for their client. If your client’s interests are secondary you must withdraw as counsel.

It took me awhile, though I was ahead of Arthur, to figure out there would be a mighty twist because of the pregnancy.

Arthur’s quick wit and willingness to tread over legal boundaries makes the trial entertaining. There are consequences.

In the end, Arthur faces the greatest challenge of defence lawyers. Should Angelina testify?

I was shaking my head at Arthur’s hubris at the end of the trial. If found guilty of murder the sentence was bound to be that Angelina was to hang though Arthur certainly knew that the Federal Cabinet had commuted all death sentences as a matter of policy since 1963. With hanging no longer the punishment Angelina would have been sentenced to life imprisonment.

His address to the jury is mesmerizing though it would have faced valid objections over raising facts not in evidence.

The Long-Shot Trial is another excellent Deverell mystery. The trial is riveting. The stretching of trial proprieties was present but not over done. Deverell is a master craftsman of legal mysteries. Arthur Beauchamp is a barrister nonpariel.  

****

Deverell, William - (2011) - A Trial of Passion; (2011) - Snow Job; (2012) - I'll See You in My Dreams; (2012) - "D" is for William Deverell; (2014) - Kill All the Lawyers and The Lawyers of Kill All the Lawyers; (2015) - Sing a Worried Song and Truth is Stranger Than Fiction - Sing a Worried Song; (2018) - Whipped and A Fictional Porcupine Plain; (2021) - Stung and A Fictional Defence of Necessity

If the Dead Rise Not by Philip Kerr

(34. - 1217.) - If the Dead Rise Not by Philip Kerr - In 1934 Bernie Gunther has gone from being a police detective to a house detective at the Adlon Hotel because of the Nazi takeover. He expresses his opinion of the National Socialists as he watches a military parade:

“ … the traffic jam of Nazi flags and banners the soldiers were carrying - an entire haberdasher’s store of red and black and white curtain material."

A confrontation after the parade with an arrogant police officer, August Krichbaum, ends with Gunther delivering a powerful punch to Krichbaum’s stomach. When Krichbaum dies Gunther has to live with the uncomfortable knowledge he is a witness away from being arrested.

Gunther learns of impending measures against Jews from a former police colleague Otto Trettin, now a member of the Gestapo. Germans with four Jewish grandparents will bear the brunt of the new laws. Trettin recommends full Jews leave the country now. He tells Gunther, who has one Jewish grandparent, that he is a “crossbreed” (second-grade mixed race) and should find a way to make his Jewish grandparent disappear. He provides the name of a man who can change history. Gunther undergoes “an Aryan transfusion” in which Gunther’s Jewish grandmother will become his great-grandmother.

At the hotel Gunther is occupied by issues arising from hotel guests entertaining visits by “joy ladies”.

Mrs. Hedda Adlon’s dear friend, the beautiful and wealthy and Jewish Mrs. Noreen Charalambides, from New York wants to write an article of her own for the Herald Tribune on German Jews.

Hitler wants to burnish the Third Reich’s public image by hosting the 1936 Olympics. His desire is aided by American IOC President, Avery Brundage, absurdly concluding Jews are not being discriminated against in Germany.

Irritated by her righteousness Gunther points out to Mrs. Charalambides that Blacks are lynched and discriminated against in the U.S.

Gunther, enthralled by Mrs. Charalambides, offers but token resistance to becoming her personal investigator and protector.

They look into the past of a Jewish German boxer found floating in the Spree River as the focus for her story.

Gunther’s sarcasm peaks as he amuses Mrs. Charalambides.

He is deflated when Mrs. Charalambides calls him a cynic even though she is right.

He is inflated when Mrs. Charalambides says she wants to kiss him.

Love is an ill-fated word in crime noir.

They learn of the corruption around the vast new Olympic Stadium project. The 1936 Games are 2 years away and the Stadium is a hole in the ground. Workers are in such demand that even Jews, though secretly, are hired to work upon the Stadium.

The German Organizing Committee is composed of dedicated high ranking Nazis intent on pleasing the Fuhrer and enjoying the economic opportunities of the Games.

On seeing the gigantic pit where the Stadium is to be built Gunther is overcome as the area reminds him of No Man’s Land in WW I. Memories of a continuing nightmare in which he is sinking in the mud of a shell crater overwhelm him - “... I had to drop down on my haunches and take several deep breaths in an effort to pull myself together.”  

I thought of an English lady I knew well who had been an air raid warden in London during the Blitz in WW II. Forty years later she could not be in a room where balloons were popping.

Kerr is so skilled at creating vivid scenes. 

As Gunther is being suddenly released from a stint in police custody outside Berlin he is taken through a room with a falling axe:

Constructed of dark polished oak and dull-colored steel, the mahine was about eight feet in height - just a bit taller than an executioner wearing his customary top hat.

I shivered along with Gunther contemplating the guillotine before him.

Upon stepping outside he lifts his face up to falling rain:

The rain felt even better than it looked, and I rubbed it across my chin and hair the same way I’d washed my face with it in the trenches. Rain: it was something clean and free and fell from the sky and wasn’t going to kill you.

Gunther is a bulldog. He cannot give up the investigation no matter the risk.

Following up information takes Gunther to Wurzberg and the limestone industry. More dangers await him in Potsdam and Berlin.

Abruptly over three-quarters of the way into the book Gunther is in Havana in 1954. He has changed his name to Carlos Hausner. In Havana he has unexpected reunions. Gunther has mixed emotions about the reunions. Trying to live a quiet life without drawing attention is impossible for Gunther. 

The shifts in power and the hard experiences of life before, during and after the war create new dynamics in the relationships. As in Argentina, Gunther is no longer at the mercy of thugs, Nazi and non-Nazi.

Gunther is asked by a group of businessmen, members of the American Mafia including Meyer Lansky, to find a killer. Equally wanting answers are members of the Cuban elite. Gunther will be well paid and have unlimited authority. He is given even more power than he had in Argentina. It is irresistible for Gunther that he is asked to exercise rather than restrain his detective instincts. His obsession to find killers is indulged and he is assured that the methods he undertakes are not limited by traditional police policies.

In the least likely description possible for Gunther he is described as a Knight of heaven. He responds that his “armor’s very dirty”.

Despite his professed indifference to “doing good” he places himself in yet another dangerous situation to help. In his soul Gunther is a knight errant who cannot turn away from helping no matter the risk.

Gunther’s sarcastic wit permeates the book. He cannot carry on a conversation without a biting comment or two or more.

Kerr is gradually filling in the gaps of Gunther’s pre-war life in Nazi Germany but not in a linear way. Over the 6 books I have read in the series, readers have learned about his life before the Nazis took over, during their reign from 1933 to the start of WW II, what he did during the war, the immediate aftermath of the war and his escape to Argentina. While I have set out the time frames chronologically the books weave in and out of the eras of his life.

Bernie will never have a routine life, though I found Kerr went overboard on the number of Gunther’s narrow escapes from death in If the Dead Rise Not I will keep reading to find out what dramas befall him in the next books in the series.

****

Kerr, Philip – (2004) - Dark Matter; (2016) - March Violets; (2016) - The Pale Criminal; (2016) - A German Requiem; (2016) - Berlin Police and the Holocaust - Part I and Part II;  (2016) - Comparing Serial Killers in Three Totalitarian States; (2023) - The One From the Other; (2023) - A Quiet Flame; Paperback

The Puzzle Box by Lisa Adair

(31. - 1214.) - The Puzzle Box by Lisa Adair - In August of 1985 Amy Young, 16 years old, is living with her aunt, Jeannie Young, in the fictional small town of Glenmere in northern Saskatchewan. Between them they work four jobs to sort of make ends meet. They hope there might be some money from the estate of Dorothy Young, Amy’s grandmother, but the lawyer has been waiting months for documents and has not even read the will to the family. 

Amy is a cashier for $4.25 per hour at Family Grocer’s. Her aunt works as a part-time receptionist during the day for the town doctor and as a waitress at Frankie’s Diner in the evening. The Diner uniform is “an orange striped shirt, black dress pants, and a blue apron with matching orange ruffles”. Amy occasionally busses tables and washes dishes at the Diner.

Amy had been living with her grandmother at the family farm because her mother died when she was 6. She does not know her father. Her grandmother had collapsed in town and died a few months earlier. Aunt Jeannie is her only relative and that is by marriage. It is Uncle John, Aunt Jeannie’s unlamented and long gone ex, who was her grandmother’s son.

Every dollar is hard earned and extra food from the diner is appreciated.

While not discussed in the book the mid-1980’s were a hard time for rural Saskatchewan. Grain prices were down and farms were struggling to survive. I remember dealing with too many clients in deep financial trouble.

Grandma Dorothy had told Amy that a puzzle box at the farm was “something really special. She said that, if I could open it, I would have everything I ever wanted”. It is a wooden box with little panels.

A shifty stranger is in town trying not to draw attention to himself. 

Break-ins are occurring and modest items pilfered.

The meeting with the lawyer and the distribution of the estate were not plausible to me as a lawyer. There are multiple legal issues with the will and the marital status of Aunt Jeannie and Uncle John. Had it been said the will was a holograph will instead of a will prepared by a lawyer there would have more credibility.

Thankfully Amy reports matters to the police. She would not have been a credible investigator. More authors should give the police a meaningful role.

Later proceedings in Court and the actions of a criminal defence lawyer were so wrong I was gritting my teeth in exasperation.

A small issue but a matter that shows the extent of an author’s research, for authors depicting Canadian court proceedings there are no gavels in Canadian courts.

The plot stretched my suspension of disbelief. Partly because I am a lawyer and partly because the plot has both a mysterious stranger who is pretending to be a local and another mysterious stranger.

What kept me reading were the small town characters and their interactions. The residents of Glenmere are believable. The convrsations are real. Their personalities fit rural Saskatchewan.

Amy is a nice young woman. The losses in her life have shaken her but she is doing her best to move ahead.

I expect it was a coincidence that in consecutive years I have read mysteries set in small town Saskatchewan written by women and featuring a sleuth who is a teenage girl dealing with profound family loss. Last year it was A Snake in the Raspberry Patch by Joanne Jackson which won a Crime Writers of Canada Award of Excellence.

Adair has significant work to do on her plotting of a mystery and her research. She is skilled at creating a premise and characters.

Anthony Bidulka at the Melfort Library

 

Last Wednesday was a wonderful evening at the Melfort Public Library as Anthony Bidulka came for an event to celebrate the publication of his new book, From Sweetgrass Bridge. It is the second in his Merry Bell trilogy.

Joining Anthony was his husband, Herb McFaull.

I have been on the Library Board since 1979 and was the host for introducing Anthony, conducting an interview after he made an address and asking some questions of those in attendance.

The library staff and other members of the Board made the setting memorable with Rider memorabilia including cereal boxes from the year two of the Riders headlined Co-op brand cereals. I had forgotten about Fantuz Flakes and Darian's Darios.

Anthony spoke eloquently of his reasons for writing which focused on writing on under-represented groups and settings.

He guaranteed that Merry, a transgender woman, and her sidekick Roger, a cross-dressing man, are the only Western Canadian sleuthing duo with those backgrounds.

He reminded us of the never ending challenge for prairie writers to gain national recognition, especially in Toronto, the media centre of Canada. 

He told us that he limits himself to writing 4-5 book blurbs for other authors in a year.

On book buying he tends to buy e-books from different sources, including Amazon. Because of the amount of travelling that he and Herb do each year it is easier to have e-books.

I asked him about how he edits his writing. I said I like to use a red pen. He says he does editing on his computer. 

Anthony further spoke about the importance of an editor in the book writing process and the interaction between writer and editor.

We learned that Anthony and Herb have travelled to over 100 countries.

My surprise for the evening was learning from Anthony's niece that, when she was a girl, long before he started his professional writing career, he would create and illustrate stories for her with the pages folded so that they had to be unfolded in a specific order.

The most unique aspect to the evening was the library staff arranging for the Golden Grain Bakery to create cookies with a copy of the book cover, From Sweetgrass Bridge, upon the cookies.

Anthony showed he had done some research on me with a neat zinger. He looked up my review of his first book, Amuse Bouche, and noted that I had said:

   Bidulka is Saskatchewan's second best mystery writer.      Gail Bowen remains the best.

Twenty years after that review I will amend my assessment to say Anthony Bidulka and Gail Bowen are Saskatchewan's best mystery writers.

Anthony is an engaging guy. I encourage all readers to go see him if you are near one of his book launches or author events.

(The photos are from the Melfort Public Library Facebook page. Please go take a look for further photos from the evening.

All present last Wednesday will not forget their evening with Anthony.

Fall From Grace by L.R. Wright

(32. - 1215.) - Fall From Grace by L.R. Wright (1991) - In the summer of 1990 Steven Grayson returns to Sechelt on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia after 10 years of self-imposed exile in Vancouver. Wright sent a chill through me when she writes of his mother, Velma:

She looked again with eagerness toward the future, and did not know that the murder of her son awaited her there.

Shortly thereafter she tells the reader who will kill Steven.

Wright, as she did in The Suspect, despite eliminating the issues of who will be the victim and who will be the killer early in the book though not on the first page this time, creates suspense over the “why” of the murder and whether the murderer be caught.

Ten years earlier Steven had been a member of the graduating high school class. He is often irritating, taking photos constantly. Schoolmates include Warren, Annabelle Kettleman, Wanda and Bobby. Bobby is the bad boy. He returned to school after a four year absence to graduate at 22.

By 1990 life has settled down for those living in Sechelt. Warren and Wanda are now married. Annabelle is married to the disagreeable Herman Ferguson. 

Steven and Bobby are single and in Vancouver. 

Bobby comes home, with intentions of finding a job, before Steven. 

Staff Sergeant Karl Alberg of the RCMP detachment is barely enduring the summer heat in his non-air conditioned office. He escapes the office and its paperwork when he can to deal with complaints.

His lover, Cassandra Mitchell, is the town librarian. Their relationship, I described as “halting” in my review of The Suspect, has strengthened though they still have issues.. 

Wright can create a memorable image in a sentence. When Steven does not respond to a question from Velma:

She saw in his eyes that he had no intention of telling her.

Alberg and Mitchell sail to an island beach at Buccaneer Bay that Alberg loves. As they arrive a body is being carried to the beach. It is Steven who has fallen from a cliff overlooking the beach. Alberg determines where he fell from and starts to investigate.

Wright’s Alberg is compassionate as well as “detached, dispassionate, concentrated” in the carrying out his duties.

Alberg interviews the young man, Joe, who found Steven at the base of the cliff, broken but not dead. Steven asks Joe to help him die:

“So I put my hand on the back of his neck and in a minute he was dead.”

Alberg gave his shoulder a hard squeeze, and let go …..

“You did good,” said Alberg to Joe.

The scene at the hospital where Velma is called to identify Steven has a heartbreaking intensity. She denies it is Steven. Alberg puts his arm around her shoulder, sits her down and rocks her saying Steven “was very handsome” and she “must have been very proud of him” until she accepts the body is Steven.

Wright sees deeply into the hearts of her characters. 

Alberg works his way backwards into Steven’s life searching for anyone on the Sunshine Coast who had a grievance with Steven. It is hard going for he was gone for 10 years.

Knowing who Alberg should find keeps the pages turning as I wanted to know if Alberg can find and arrest the killer. Based on The Suspect it is not certain.

Neither knowing a motive nor the name of a suspect Alberg gathers information with significat details that the reader knows are important for the investigation but not to Alberg. 

About to turn 50 Alberg meditates on his stage of life. He thinks about retirement.

Bobby decides it is time to leave again, real soon. He asks his Aunt Hetty for $5,000 to get a car. They love each other. 

Ferguson casually beats Anabelle. She does not protest. He writes “Whore of Babylon” on their house. With the children she washes off the words.

While Anabelle’s three children - Rose-Iris, Camilla and Arnold - are pre-teens they help with cleaning and cooking and worry about their mother. They see the bruises. 

And then the story comes together. 

Wright had a remarkable talent to make you care about the victim, the murderer, the police and all the other characters in her books. None are all perfect. None are all evil. They are the people around you. One of them is a killer.

 ****

Wright, L.R. - (2012) - The Suspect; (2012) - "W" is for L.R. Wright

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby

(27. - 1210) - All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby - Titus Crown was surprised when he, a Black man, was elected Sheriff of Charon County in Virginia. The racism of the South is always present. The Sons of the Confederacy are planning a parade in support of a Confederate statue to Ol’ Rebel Joe.

Crown is obsessed with order. His clothes are arranged by colour alphabetically and he is distressed if any of the items on his precisely arranged office desk are moved:

After his mother died when he was thirteen, he became possessed by a desire to give his life structure …. Structure became his religion. Discipline was his crucifix against chaos.

However, the world is filled with chaos in ways both small and great. His girlfriend disorders his clothing to loosen him up. A young Black man, Latrell Macdonald, goes to the local high school where he shoots the white Jeff Spearman, the popular Geography teacher. Latrell is killed as he rushes at the police outside the school.

Titus is a graduate of the University of Virginia and Columbia University and a former FBI agent. As a child he enjoyed reading Greek mythology.

Pastor Jamal Addison is concerned over Latrell being shot by white deputies. The Black community is split over Titus becoming Sheriff: 

To a lot of Black folks, including Jamal, he was now Blue instead of Black.

I was as shaken, as disgusted, as devastated as the police were by the child pornography found on the phone and computer of Spearman. There are videos of Spearman and an unknown man, the Last Wolf, brutalizing and killing children. Spearman and the Last Wolf wear grotesque wolf masks. Latrell is with them. The community has a hard time believing Spearman was a monster and serial killer.

Cosby sums up the wicked:

“Terrible people can do good things sometimes. But they like doing the terrible things more.”

While Cosby does not focus on the torture of the victims there are graphic descriptions. 

Of the 14,000 residents of Charon County who could be the Last Wolf? Who could be so depraved yet give no outward sign? Titus says:

“It’s someone we thought we knew.”

Titus has his own secret from a confrontation in Indiana when he was in the FBI. The psychic scars reach far into his soul. He has told no one in Charon County.

The Charon County of Titus is full of troubled, difficult, nasty people. There are but a few good people in the book.

Gillian “Gilby” Hayes is at least 80 years young and the owner of a restaurant serving “down-home, unadulterated, nurtionally dubious Southern cuisine”. Titus likes her. She makes everyone feel at home.

Titus is a hard man who has rejected faith because his mother died despite his teenage prayers. He cannot believe in a God who does not prevent evil. He has lost hope. As Titus cannot forgive, especially himself, the burdens he bears are heavy.

He is a sensitive man with a conscience. Hard and sensitive are an awkward combination for a Sheriff.

I do admire Cosby for including Christians in the book. Most contemporary crime fiction ignores religious life. I regret he does not find any good in the churches of Charon County.

He visits the Holy Rock of the Redeemer Church whose pastor, Elias Hillington, keeps “a collection of snakes”. A neighbour said they have “hooting-and-hollering services” and then bring out the snakes. Hillington preaches fire and brimstone and “railed” against “the liberal agenda”. He vigorously states none of his congregation could have abused the dead children.

Titus’s old girlfriend, Kellie Stoner, comes from Indiana. She is making true crime podcasts. She is beautiful and profane and magnetic. His current girlfriend is loving, beautiful and running a flower shop.

The Last Wolf, certain of his superiority, toys with Titus.. Titus is convinced he is daring the police to catch him.

The Last Wolf calls Titus. He uses a digital voice modulator.

Danger escalates and the tension is fierce. The Last Wolf nails a lamb with its throat cut to the door of the home of Titus and his father.

Titus sends out a message of his own to the Last Wolf.

The Last Wolf and Titus close in upon the other.

Not only the Last Wolf is spiralling. 

Titus knows the cost to a lawman who turns avenger.  

His girlfriend, Darlene, ends their relationship. She says he has tried to love her but…. She concludes:

“Find someone that makes you smile.” 

The writing is wonderful. The descriptions are skilfully done. The characters are well developed. The emotions are real. Yet I am not sure I will read another Cosby book. The darkness is so deep and the lightness so sparse. There are shades of black in noir. All the Sinners Bleed is the blackest of black.

****

Cosby, S.A. - (2022) - Razorblade Tears and Who is S.A. Cosby?