Big Foot. By Edgar Wallace. (John Long, Ltd. • 7s.
6d.) and Terror Keep. By the same author. (Hodder and Stoughton, Ltd. 7s. 6d.)—As an expert in sensational fiction, Mr. Edgar Wallace holds a very high place, and both his output and freshness of invention are marvellous. Of these two stories, Big Foot is the better, save for those who demand to be tho- roughly " thrilled and nothing besides. Big Foot contains gathering threats of doom, a most mysterious murder in an out- of-the-way seashore bungalow, and (for a change) an ordinary and quite attractive old Police Superintendent, " Souper," to trace the crime home. No amateur detectives ; Souper des- pises them, and even rides the noisiest of motor-cycles in the pursuit of his quarry. A very effective pursuit, too ; and the reader is kept ingeniously off the true scent. There is a nice girl, who on the dust-cover shrinks from a dangling noose ; an incident which duly, and, we must say, most improbably. occurs just at the end. The climax certainly contains several improbabilities, but they do not interfere with the main plot. Lattimer, the " agent provocateur," is so red and odorous a herring that we did suspect him ; and anyhow, did he not go " alarmingly " far ? Souper thought so. But, after many snares, shots, attempted poisonings, and one other actual assassination, the handcuffs are clapped on the right wrists, and very unexpected wrists they are. Only the inoffensive public executioner, who is had down to _brighten tip the " farewell feast," is, poor fellow, left forgotten in the final hurly-burly : Souper owns up to that, and, though we are sure that a wedding takes place, nothing is said about it. Terror Keep re-introduces us to an old acquaintance of Mr. Wallace's admirers, the super-detective, J. G. Reeder. He is elderly, with side-whiskers, and these facts hardly recommend him to Margaret Belman, who goes as secretary to Larmes Keep, a beautiful boarding-house kept by eccentric Mr. Daver, The house had been, an old castle, and was built above a net- work of seaside caves. When we know that a noted criminal: John Flack, with a capacity for organizing gangs of des- peradoes, has just escaped from Broadmoor, we look forward to a duel of uncommon ferocity between him and Reeder, and we are not disappointed. As for the Keep—to tell the truth, after the first few chapters (admirable hors d'oeuvres) the fare gets a little over-spiced for all but the most hardened palates. Never were so many sliding panels, secret rooms, still more secretive villains, and hairbreadth escapes for Mr. Reeder, who, hot on the trail, goes to join Margaret in Terror Keep. By his intuitions and timely dodgings and two trunkfuls of handy resources, he wins through. Margaret barely does— the girl must have had a constitution of steel—and in the end, amid the din of revolvers, gunboat fusilades, and the entire collapse of the cliffs and the Keep, Mr. Reeder, now whisker- less, not only wins through, but wins Margaret. The wooing is quite prettily done. But is Flack dead ? His daughter thinks so—" with conviction."
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