The Double by Edgar Wallace

"It is impossible not to be thrilled by Edgar Wallace." Dubbed the Master of Thrillers, this 1928 mystery takes its leisurely time but really delivers in the end.

Detective Inspector Dick Staines visits Brighton with his good friend Lord Tommy Weald and meets Walter Derrick, an amusing fellow and Tommy's neighbor on Lowndes Square. They are all taken with a lovely nurse wheeling an invalid about; Mary Dane has a voice rich with laughter, her eyes clear and gray as a spring sky.

Dick returns to stay at Tommy's London townhouse, discovering strange events at Derrick's empty home next door. The staff tell of strange noises and see ghosts on the stairs. Derrick's father built the home with secret stairways and hidden tunnels. He had a famous collection of fingerprints, and it is rumored he stashed all his wealth at home. Dick discovers staff trussed in the kitchen before he is knocked out by a girl in an evening dress—Mary Dane! Telling his friends the news, he finds Mary was with Tommy the whole time. Tommy is in love with Mary, even giving her a ring, but when she is with Dick, she claims he is her true love. Is there a double, or are they one and the same? A dead man is found in Derrick's home, and the walls broken open—and after each event, a fingerprints is found matching that at a deadly shooting in Slough nine years ago, the killer never caught.

You may speculate how Mary can be in London while remaining with her patient, and how Dick and Mary can join forces at the same time Tommy is romancing her, but you will not guess the real twist of what is being searched for and why. The serial nature and language belies the age of this thriller, but the bones are there. Wallace delivers a great twist.

With over 50 million copies sold, Wallace wrote up to ten books a year by dictating into a wax cylinder dictaphone, producing over 170 books which continue to be reprinted.

The 1963 British film claiming to be Edgar Wallace's The Double was a different story about a man suffering from homicidal hallucinations.

1928 / Hardcover / 320 pages

My other reviews for Edgar Wallace:

The Lone House Mystery

Four Square Jane