The Nine Tailors
First edition
|
|
| Author | Dorothy L. Sayers |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Series | Lord Peter Wimsey |
| Genre | Mystery novel |
| Publisher | Gollancz |
|
Publication date
|
1934 |
| Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
| Preceded by | Murder Must Advertise |
| Followed by | Gaudy Night |
The Nine Tailors is a 1934 mystery novel by British writer Dorothy L. Sayers, her ninth featuring sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey.
Stranded in the Fenland village of Fenchurch St. Paul on New Year's Eve after a car accident, Wimsey helps ring a nine-hour peal of bells overnight after Will Thoday, one of the ringers, is stricken by Spanish Influenza. Lady Thorpe, wife of Sir Henry Thorpe, the local squire, dies next morning and Wimsey hears how the Thorpe family has been blighted for 20 years by the unsolved theft of emeralds from a house-guest by the butler, Deacon, and an accomplice, Cranton. Both men were imprisoned, but the jewels were never recovered.
At Easter, Sir Henry himself dies and his wife's grave is opened for his burial. A body is found hidden in the grave, mutilated beyond recognition. It is first thought to be the body of a tramp labourer calling himself "Driver" who had arrived and then vanished just after the New Year. Acting on a hunch, Lord Peter enquires at the Post Office for any uncollected letters addressed to "Driver". Bunter, Wimsey's valet, inveigles a postmistress into handing over a letter posted in France, which confirms a link with the body, which was wearing French underclothes. The letter is addressed not to "Driver" but to "Paul Taylor", a reference to "Tailor Paul", the tenor (largest) bell in the ring at Fenchurch St. Paul. When the writer of the letter is traced, the dead man is assumed to be Arthur Cobbleigh, a British soldier listed as missing in action in 1918, but who evidently deserted and stayed in France after the war. Cobbleigh appears to have known where the emeralds were hidden, and to have plotted to recover them, probably with "Driver". "Driver" is discovered to be an alias of Cranton, the accomplice in the original theft. Wimsey assumes the two men did recover the emeralds and Cranton then killed Cobbleigh for them, but cannot prove it.
An odd document found in the bell chamber by Hilary Thorpe, Sir Henry's daughter, proves to be a cipher, written on the same paper and with the same ink as the letter to "Paul Taylor" but in a different hand. When Wimsey decodes the cipher (which requires knowledge of change-ringing) it leads him to the emeralds, still untouched in their hiding place in the church.
...
Wikipedia