On page 103 of The White Hen (Mills and Boon) we read that the Duke laughed softly. "'It is just like a romance,' he sighed happily;" which was precisely where, without intending it, the Duke placed his ducal finger upon the weak spot in the whole business. Because if ever a story was "like a romance," and like nothing else on earth, and filled with characters each and all pledged to preserve its unreality at all costs, here is that tale. The plot, of which there is a generous allowance, turns chiefly upon the problem, when is a white hen less a hen than a jewel casket? Answer, when she has swallowed, and is erroneously thought to have retained, a famous diamond, upon which an impoverished but noble (see above) French family had depended for the dot that should enable their daughter to wed a plutocratic but otherwise detestable suitor. I take it you will hardly need telling that this is the moment chosen by Romance, under the expert guidance of Miss Phyllis Campbell, to bring along an even more wealthy young American, mistaken (of course) for his own chauffeur and working such havoc upon the heart of the heroine that, when the latter accidentally recovered the diamond from its feathered cache, she very sensibly decided to say nothing about it. Whereupon, because the other characters, especially an unpleasant Duchess, were unaware that, as the shop announcements say, "Poultry was Down Again," much profitable confusion resulted, though nothing to impugn the justice of the ducal verdict quoted above. So that, if your taste jumps with that of his Grace, you also can "sigh happily;" otherwise you will perhaps omit the adverb—and select a story less exclusively romantic.
There is a spirit of Yorkshire and a spirit, I suppose, characteristic of Suburbia, and on the outskirts of certain large manufacturing towns there must exist a formidable blending of these two. To express the double flavour of this essence requires, I should say, a subtler and more elaborate method than Mr. W. Riley has attempted to use in A Yorkshire Suburb (Jenkins). He has imagined for the purpose of these sketches an architect, Murgatroyd, who in planning most of the houses in the locality has attempted to express in brick and stone the characters of their several occupants. This is a device which becomes rather monotonous as the book proceeds, besides imposing a series of strains which neither architecture nor credulity can easily bear. Since these are rather superior suburbanites, dialect is for the most part absent, and it is hard to feel that they are very different people from those who live about the borders of Manchester or London; a character like Mrs. Flitch, for instance, who is angelic to behold but a spiteful gossip at heart, is, alas! to be found anywhere. And where the dialect does crop out it does not seem to be dependent on suburban soil for its raciness. I don't doubt the accuracy of Mr. Riley's Yorkshiremanship, but I do think he has under-estimated the difficulty of localising the peculiar genius of villadom.
Though billed by her publisher as a merciless analyst, Mrs. Mordaunt is really (if you want to fling this kind of title about) an eclectic synthetist or synthetic symbolist. Her wicked people are prodigiously wicked, wickedness personified, in fact; her good folk are noble-hearted without stint or measure. I don't personally think that anybody could be quite so completely and gratuitously evil as good-looking Charles Hoyland in The Little Soul (Hutchinson); or, being so, could possibly be recommended, still less engaged, as tutor to a sensitive youth; or, being so engaged, tolerated for two days. He certainly could not hold down his job long enough to corrupt his pupil, Anthony Clayton, by exchanging souls with him under the nose of mad but perceptive Mrs. Clayton and sane sister Diana. This conspicuously chaste Diana is an attractive person, and so is the recklessly charitable Dr. McCabe, her appropriate mate, who first had to fly the country through helping a chorus-girl out of a difficulty and then (more or less) won the War by revolutionising bacteriology or something like that. However, Mrs. Mordaunt interests because she is so palpably interested herself.
The scenes of Lure of Contraband (Jarrolds) are laid in the Devonshire of some hundred years ago. It is, as its title suggests, a tale of smuggling, and it contains an account of a hand-to-hand fight between the hero and the villain which I advise all members of the National Sporting Club to read. They may be shocked by the tactics of the villain, but at the same time they will see what a bout of fisticuffs meant in those days. Mr. J. Weare Giffard is a master of atmosphere, and I, at any rate, lived happily in his Appledore, and imagined myself drinking prime (and cheap) French brandy in the Beaver Inn; while Lieutenant Perkins, who commanded the "preventive men," sat in his tall-backed chair by the fireplace and kept his eyes and ears open to detect anything that was suspicious. But he was not foolish enough to ask many questions about the French brandy. An excellent yarn, simply and straight-forwardly told.
