Patrick Malahide, An Appreciation

Image source: Amazon.com

Back in March, Fearless Admin wrote about a Guardian article announcing that a “new” Inspector Alleyn novel, Money in the Morgue (I keep wanting to type Murder in the Morgue), was shortly to be released.  The book is based on notes and a partial draft left by Dame Ngaio Marsh and was completed by mystery author Stella Duffy.  Recently, I was able to get the book from the library and I eagerly read it, wanting to see how much of Marsh’s original voice and flavour would be retained, and if Alleyn would be recognizable as Alleyn.  Oh, and I was also very curious if I could imagine Mr. Malahide’s Alleyn dealing with the events of the book.  😉

The book plays a bit fast and loose with timing, as Marsh’s novels usually do.  World War II is on and we’re dropped into the action at a military hospital on Mount Seager, New Zealand.  The hospital is small and isolated – it can only be reached by a single road and a somewhat unreliable bridge over a raging river – and it’s populated with a diverse cast of characters.  The patients are a combination of convalescing soldiers and civilians under the care of the no-nonsense Matron and her nursing staff.  There’s the rather starchy Sister Comfort (who is anything but), good-time-girl-with-a-heart-of-gold Rosamund Farquharson, steady and reliable Sarah Warne, the good-looking but troubled Dr. Luke Hughes, the rather obsequious Father O’Sullivan, the dying, elderly Mr. Brown and his sullen grandson Sydney, obnoxious payroll officer Mr. Glossop, helpful Sergeant Bix, and Privates Sanders and Pawcett and Sergeant Brayling.  As might be expected with a Marsh novel, each of them have their own tangled personal relationships and secrets that they’re reluctant to share with the others.

The Mysterious Patient in the Private Room

The mysterious patient in the private room

There’s also a mysterious, unseen patient in the private room of the military convalescent ward.  No one knows much about him, except that he’s rumoured to be a writer who’s been covering the war and had a breakdown as a result.  We find out soon enough that it’s actually Alleyn, pretending to be an invalid as a cover story.  He’s on some top secret business in New Zealand and has been asked to look into some strange radio signals that seem to coincide with the appearance of a Japanese submarine off the New Zealand coast.  His wife Agatha Troy is back in England but never far from his thoughts, though he finds himself inexplicably stricken with writer’s block whenever he tries to write to her.  He has a much easier time writing to Inspector Br’er Fox, although he can’t tell him much about exactly what he’s doing.
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