Closed Circuit. By William Haggard. (Cassell , I Is. 6d.) Political
intrigue and polite blackmail In classier parts of London between British diplo- matists and those of small South American re- public. Reasonable fascimile, in clipped and elegant prose, of what life is like at FO and Embassy parties -until it all falls to implausible pieces in the middle. Counsellors in Her Majesty s Foreign Service may get asked over dinner in smart London restaurants to murder the husbands of the ladies they are dining with, but it's hard to believe, and harder still to believe that they just say, 'Yes, dear,' between the soup and the fish. After this, there are knifings in the Park, masked pistoleers in taxi-cabs that are not what they seem, and everybody drinking everybody else's poisoned champagne at posh do's in Belgrave Square. Oh, pooh.
CHRISTOPHER PYS1
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