Marilyn's Mystery Reads

Posts Tagged ‘ancient document’

In the last decade of the 19th century, enquiry agents were relatively unknown.  That was the English name for private detectives, and even today it sounds more genteel than “private eyes.”  But whether they were called enquiry agents or private investigators, their jobs were the same:  finding missing persons, acting as bodyguards, thwarting blackmailers.  But whenever the team of Barker and Llewelyn takes a case, it always becomes more dangerous or more obscure than the usual ones.

The novel opens with a man who believes he has been followed from Germany to London because of the precious package he has been given.  Skillful as he is, ultimately he cannot evade his pursuers, and he is stabbed in the middle of a busy London street mere steps away from his destination.  Moments from death, he enjoys the expressions on his attackers’ faces when they open the suitcase he’s been carrying and discovers that it’s filled, not with the priceless item they thought was inside, but with socks, socks, socks.

A small package is delivered to the office of enquiry agents Cyrus Barker and Thomas Lllewelyn, and when Barker opens it he finds a small key with the letter Q stamped on it.  Although Llewelyn is in the dark as to what it is or what it means, Barker appears to understand; the two of them leave their office, walk a few blocks, and enter a building that also has a Q on it.

They are led to the office of the Prime Minister who reluctantly informs them of the death of an agent in His Majesty’s Foreign Office, a man who had been trusted with something of incredible value.  To mislead the killers and the government that hired them, Cyrus and Thomas are asked to bring a satchel to France that will then be delivered by others to The Vatican. 

When Cyrus professes to be incredulous as to why they were picked for this job when the Prime Minister could have chosen envoys from any branch of the royal government, he is told “you would not be an agency our government would naturally choose….Your methods are considered unorthodox, haphazard, and impulsive.  Most of your cases end in bloodshed.”

Despite this statement, or perhaps because of it, Barker agrees to take the parcel and its unknown contents across the channel.  The two men leave the Prime Minister’s office and bring the parcel directly to Barker’s bank.  But, of course, that is only the beginning of the adventure.

This the eleventh novel in the Barker and Llewelyn series and has moved from the 1880s to the early 1890s.  The characters have moved with the times, Thomas having started out as an apprentice to Barker but is now is his partner.  However, Thomas is still a “junior” partner, as the vastly more experienced Barker continues to make most of the decisions.  But change is definitely in the wind.

And while Cyrus Barker remains a bachelor, the younger Thomas Llewelyn is a newlywed whose wife is a beautiful widow; she has been pushed out of the tight Orthodox Jewish community in Londaon for her marriage to Thomas, a gentile.

You can read more about Will Thomas at this website.

Check out the complete Marilyn’s Mystery Reads at her website.  In addition to book review posts, there are sections featuring Golden Oldies, Past Masters and Mistresses, and an About Marilyn column that features her opinions about everything to do with mystery novels.