Fiction
Pled Piper. By Nevil Shute. (Heinemann. 8s. 6d.) Uneasy Freehold. By Dorothy Macardle: (Peter Davies. Ss. 6d.) MEMORY, like a ghost, haunts thc present and the future: the haunting and the haunted play their large parts in the novels listed here. Miss Royde Smith tells how the American wife of an English seafaring man goes to live in a curious old house that her husband has recently inherited. Dollie Laisterdyke is lonely and forlorn in her new home, situated in one of the most beautiful of England's cathedral cities. The igolating effects of the war make her plight hopeless; she cannot be consoled by the birds, exotic creatures, sent by her husband. "But they're not company," though they do need care and attention. They live in the top story of the odd little house, where an aviary has been made for them. Driven more and more upon her own resources, Mrs. Laisterdyke indulges in a series of romantic day- dreams. She collects stories from which she attempts to contrive a scenario for her favourite film star. It would be ungracious and difficult to attempt a complete summary of this book, with its separate themes so skilfully woven into a whole. England at war: the excellent minor characters, Mrs. Bonnyrotter, the char, and Miss Montgomery all emerge clearly ; while the heroine remains little Mrs. Laisterdyke whom no one knows, till the war, which has played its inexorable part in her life, destroys her. Miss Royde Smith writes with a delicate fancy ; she has elegance and sensibility. Her book is not for every reader, but those delighting in the fantastic and unusual will find much of it charming and stimulating. Miss Godden, too, relies on implication and suggestion in her dramatic study of human relationships. The setting is Bengal,
and here the ghost is of a dog, treasured possession of her central
character, the child of an unhappy marriage. The, method of soliloquy so successfully used by Virginia Woolf in The Waves is at times employed with good effect: "I see the bazaar," said Emily as she lay "it is interesting and exciting. The first shop you come to is ;he shop where they make kites ; you can buy twelve kites for three annas in colours of pink and green and white and red and a wicker spool to fly them with and a pound of thread. The thread is glassed, 'and—only don't tell Mother—
we fly them with Shah off our roof and challenge other kites, and
cross strings with them and cut them adrift, and then we can put .another bob on our kites' tail." Emily fights a dangerous worldly adversary in the shape of a dishonest,mother half aware of the perils and isolation that lie ahead. She is drawn with sympathy and imagination. The Indian characters are equally well done; but Emily's parents are a few shades too -exotic and artificial, which lessens the effect of the novel as a whole. The film producer can still learn many things from the -novelist. What could have persuaded Miss Godden to finish her book like a. film, with those last few neat, tidy, but quite superfluous, shots, after the end was reached?
Memories of earlier better days took an elderly Englishman back to France in the tragic spring of 1940. His son was already dead, killed in the present war. The visit was hardly a success, for when things began to look really dangerous he fert he ought to be in England again. While he is making preparations for his return he is asked to bring home the two young children of an English couple living in Switzerland, where invasion is expected. The three of them set out on the long and trying journey, and before they have gone very far, the little girl, youngest of the -party, is taken ill and they are forced to halt for some days. When travelling is resumed, -he is already saddled with a third child, daughter of a Frenchman working in London. Presently a fourth and then a fifth child join the little band. Their adventures are many and terrible, but after a rest in Chartres they are shepherded by a resolute young Frenchwoman, who succeeds in getting them to the coast. Here the party is swollen by the addition of a young Polish boy. Then the Gestapo get hold of them, but a little German girl, whose relations are anxious for her to go to America, solves that problem. Mr. Shute handles his material with a great deal of tidy competence; but are the English really so unimaginative as he seems to think?
Miss Macardle attacks her theme, the haunting of a charming Devonshire house, with a great deal of confidence and energy. Roderick Fitzgerald, a young literary man, who shares the place with his sister, tells the story. The atmosphere is slowly but surely created. There is the local gossip, the vaguely disturbing • impressions created by the guardian of the late owner of the house, in which anxiety and reluctance seem equally mixed. For ,a time nothing happens, but the quiet period is followed by a series of rather mysterious incidents. There are two ghosts ; one benevolent, the other malign, both of whom played important parts in the infant life of the previous owner, a young and lovely girl. As the hauntings become more horrible, the Fitzgeralds begin to think of leaving. The minor characters are all pleasantly drawn, they all play essential parts in the whole ; but readers of the contemporary detective novel will find the general technique very familiar. It would be a pity to spoil the book by giving away too many of its details and angles. Miss Macardle writes with sympathy and understanding of her ghosts, making them hardly less real than the flesh and blood characters whose lives are so affected by these revenants. Her methods prove au thorough and complete, we feel in the end she has told us rather more than we really need have known! Joing HAMMON.
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