CROOKS, COPS AND SPIES

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31984, 10 May 1969, Page 4

CROOKS, COPS AND SPIES

Dead at First Hand. By Jonathan Ross. CasselL 184 pp.

The story began wben a man called Connor, chauffeur to. a London underworld character named! Roy Tosher, turned the ignition key in his boss’s car and smeared- the car and himself oyer five Counties. Chief Inspector' Regers, whom readers will have met before in the same author’s ‘The Blood Running Cold” and “Diminished by Death” and will have liked as a hardworking and efficient policeman subject to human hopes, ambitions and weaknesses, came to the conclusion 1 that Connor’s death was incidental and not germane to the main intention which was the elimination of Tosher—an eventuality much desired by many people, Including Chief Inspector Rbgers. Dr Bridget Hunter, a young police pathologist and friend of Rogers, became strongly attracted physically by Tosher and he told her a sad story of police persecution and of quixotic taking the blame for bis brother's misdeeds. Truth and Tosher, however, are only distant acquaintances and that but seldom. All this complicated the investigation, and there was a tricky situation for the Chief Inspector when Tosher was killed in his own apartment and Bridget was there at the time. A young private detective from Los Angeles, following Connor in order to find' some $lOO,OOO stolen by him and his friend, gave considerable aid to the' police, particularly against Purvis and Pringle, unpleasant strong-arm men in Tosher’s employ. An abortive attack on the Chief Inspector’s wife caused a friend of hers to become severely injured, and then the police moved in with fists and feet flying. The characters are clearly drawn and the action is rousingly fast in this excellent third story by a very competent author.

The Black Garden. By Christine Arnothy. (Translated from the French by Robert Baldick). Hamish Hamilton. 202 pp. Yves Barray, a middle-aged scholar working for the Commission for the Preservation of Ancient Monuments, went to Deauville to spend a few days at hie childhood home, soon ; >tb b* demolished to ' make way foF civic development in the area. He was accosted by a'.droung woman who accused him of belonging to an organisation Which for years Had been following and persecuting her. Although no wolf, Yves offered her shelter in his house and found out that she was a German girl whose father had been a notorious torturing doctor at Dachau. The allied soldiers, searching for her father, had dragged her as a childuff 13 into Dachau to sitow h*r her [ father'* victims in the hope that she -would teen -betray his hiding place. Ws experience left a terrible scar op Sigrid’s - mind. Her father, ! now m Central America; was i using her to blackmail former /Nazis living as respectable . members of the community. I The organisation which for i years had been following her i consisted of Israelis deter- ; mined to find her father and

to bring him to justice. Another group were friends of her father wishing to kill her because she knew too much about them. Yves fell in love with Slgrid, but she had fallen in love with a young Jew who had been given the job of getting to know her in order to further the organ!sation’s plans. She and Yves part and she sets out for South America, still followed by her trackers. Yves’s marriage, never a stronglycemented one, breaks up and he quickly deteriorates mentally. The story is told sympathetically. There is little action and the only vividly drawn character is Slgrid herself, However, Mke so many good French writers, Christine Arnothy does make her people live for days afterwards in a reader’s imaginings. Shoot IL By Paul Tyner. Heinemann. 213 pp. This is the horrid story of a horrid young man, Herby Rueker, a police patrolman, aged twenty-three, armed of course with a revolver, who after stopping a Negro suspected of theft and, thinking

that the alley in which they were standing was quite deserted, wantonly and mail* ciously shot the Negro through the head. The crime; however, was not unobserved, for a .Negro shoe-shine boy, resting high up oh a, fire escape, saw what happened. Pending a full investigation, custody of any kind. Footloose, and not in any particular financial difficulty, he wanders round his former precinct, frequenting the local pool rooms. A knowledge of the rules of pool would be a help to the reader. The widow df the murdered man begins an action for damages against Rucker claiming three milllop dollars. Her. lawyer keeps the shoe-shine boy under protection and coaches him in the evidence he is to give, and the story moves forward to the time when Rucker will be offiffially called to account In the meantime, he shows that he is an amoral, lascivious, foul-

mouthed, selfish young swine without any human feelings of remorse or pity. His male and female associates are brilliantly sketched by the author and their reactions to Rucker are interesting in what they reveal about themselves and the society in which they live and move. The book is brilliantly written but cannot be recommended as a Sunday-school prize or as a birthday present for the majority of grandmothers.

The Fourth Grave. By John Boland. Cassell. 186 pp.

Joe Marden, a young car salesman in London, was approached by George Dorpmous, a tough but somewhat seedy South African, with the story that George had known Joe’s father who had been massacred along with other white people in the part of Africa where they had made their homes. Furthermore, George knew that Mr Marden had bought diamonds shortly before he was killed and had given him a clue to their hiding place which he was to hand on to young Joe. The clue had some semblance of meaning for Joe—enough for him to get leave from his

job and to join George in an expedition to find the hiding place on his father’s former farm. That part of the country, however, was completely

forbidden to white men and wag rigorously patrolled. On the way, George, by no means Bns-ja •> heJt> them trail, and they d & Wjr ruins of fte tarn, the tempo of the action is greatly increased. Attacks by the local soldiers and capture of Dorpmous is followed by counterattack and rescue. Pursuit deads to a pitched battle in a ratine and rescue by helicopter utdler trying circumstances. With Bly Knives I Know Fm K BJtUSX M» pp. Axis Milyutin, by nationality a Turk, trained in Russia as a circus performer specialising in knife throwing, was in Athens with a group of entertainers. He was persu-

aded to visit Baalbeck, and in a ruined temple there he found his identical twin brother, Azim, who had just been shot Azim, a brilliant linguist was a Russian spy, and it suited Azim's employers that Israeli spies shouldjmagine that he- bad befen killed. This they, would have thought if they had discovered -the body of Aziz, but someone had been careless and Azttn, himself had been shot instead. Killing a member of the family of such a ode as Aziz starts off a vendetta, and Aziz took umbrage at what had occurred, and also at what might have occurred. He set out to avenge his brother, and started with the man who had shot his brother. Thon he went on to find the man who had ordered the killing. This took him on a vividly adventurous journey through Lebanon to Antakya, and Ankara. On his way he is tracked by Russian spies, agents, and Israeli commandos, all of whom offer him violence at one time or another, but individually give him aid against their rivals. He has a horrid time, lightened by his association with an English girl, who turns out to be rather more than a simple tourist In the end he wins through with the aid of his knives. The chase and the wild Middle Eastern scenery are both described with attractive skill.