The Nine Tailors

[sawyl]

And so to what is probably the best of Dorothy L Sayers' straight up mysteries, The Nine Tailors. Set in a fenland village, it feature a mysterious murder, a partially solved theft, and a series of explanations of the art of campanology.

After crashing his car on a snow New Year's Eve, Wimsey finds himself stuck in the village of Fenchurch St Paul. Swept up by the Rector's enthusiasm for his huge church and its particularly fine ring of bells, Wimsey ends up taking part in a nine hour peal of 15,840 changes to mark the new year. After picking up some of the village gossip, including the story of the theft of a valuable emerald necklace that all but ruined the local squire, Wimsey and Bunter take their leave and return to London.

In spring, Wimsey is surprised by a letter from the Reverend Venebles imploring him to return to Fenchurch St Paul. The badly disfigured body of a man has been found in the grave of Lady Thorpe, who died on New Year's Day, just prior to Wimsey's departure. Connecting the corpse with an itinerant motor mechanic he met on his way out of the village and wondering whether the man might be the sole surviving member of pair who stole the Wilbraham Emeralds, Wimsey rushes down to attend the inquest.

As the mystery unfolds, Wimsey and Superintendent Blundle find themselves increasing baffled by the case's peculiarities: the unfathomable cause of death; the decision of a London jewel thief to wear darned French underclothes; a cryptic piece of prose found in the bell tower; and the possibility that someone has been addressing letters to the church bells. Through a combination of luck and steady police work, each of the clues is broken in turn, but the central mystery is left untouched. Which makes the final serendipitous breakthrough, when it eventually arrives, all the more satisfying.

The book features a particularly strong cast of characters and one of Sayers' most memorable settings, with the Reverend Venebles central to both successes. Kindly and absent minded on most things, the Rector is clearly deeply passionate about his church, its architecture and its excellent ring, and it is his love for his parish that makes the place feel so completely real. Even his enthusiasm for campanology is such that makes what might otherwise be a dull series of mathematical progressions come alive and made me begin to realise why bell ringing might be considered an enjoyable pastime.

Mrs Venebles, too, is quite wonderful. As grounded as her husband is vague, she's obviously the person who keeps the parish affairs organised and who prevents the Rector's enthusiasms from running away with him. She's also shrewd enough to see through Wimsey and Bunter, realising that while his Lordship might be a pussycat, Bunter is much more formidable prospect. Indeed, the scene she shares with Bunter, furious that the housemaid has dusted the fingerprints off a potential piece of evidence, is one Bunter's best and most revealing moments:

'I am sorry I expressed myself with so much acerbity,' he said, 'and I take blame to myself for not removing the key from the cupboard door. But you will understand my feelings, madam, when I think of his lordship innocently waking to a new day, if I may say so, and not knowing of the blow which is in store for him. It goes to my heart, if you will pardon my mentioning the organ in such a connection. There, madam, is his morning tea, only waiting for my hand to put the boiling water to it, and I feel, madam, as though it were the hand of a murderer which no perfumes of Arabia — supposing such to be suitable to my situation — could sweeten. He has rung twice,' added Bunter, in desperate tones, 'and he will know by the delay that something of a calamitous nature has occurred—'

The supporting cast — especially puritanical old Hezekiah Lavender and sharp, clever, teenage Hilary Thorpe — are well drawn, but they're completely dominated by the characters of the eight occupants of the belfry: Gaude, Saboath, John, Jericho, Jubilee, Dimity, Batty Thomas and Tailor Paul. The bells are a persistent and brooding presence, jealous, in the rector's words, of the presence of evil. And in the key moments in the book where the action actually takes place in the bell chamber itself, each of the characters is either rewarded or punished according to the judgement of the bells — all very gothic.