Haunted Horseplay

Haunted Horseplay

THE HAUNTED HOUSE--Hilaire Belloc, illustrations by G. K. Chesterton --Harpers ($2.50). Rackham, also known as Rackham Catchings, was a nice house for a murder. Part of it was built in the time of Queen Elizabeth. Various stucco wings added to its ugliness through the ages. Among other things, it contained "many a bad watercolour by ladies of the place, living and dead; a few portraits in the drawing-room, one of which, almost black, was reputed to be a Gainsborough." Rackham had come into the possession of Mrs. Hilda Maple, a widow with a business head. She filled it with bogus antiques, planned to sell it at a huge profit. But her nephew, John Maple, who considered himself the rightful heir of Rackham, resolved to buy it at a humble figure. One weekend, Hilda invited to Rackham, with the idea of hornswoggling them into buying the place, gouty Lord Mere de Beaurivage and Lord Hamilcar Hellup, a retired U. S. millionaire. Lord Hellup's daughter, Bo, and her lover, John Maple, were also on the scene with nefarious plans. Being something of a ventriloquist and wearing spooky robes, John Maple makes Rackham seem haunted. Gouty Lord Beaurivage is carried out in a fit of fright. Hilda agrees to sell Rackham to John Maple at his price, falls into the arms of Lord Hellup crying: "Hannibal! ... I mean, Hamilcar!" O happy ending! O lack of murder!

Author Belloc, Catholic historian-essayist, is not satirizing mystery stories; he is having a happy holiday. Only an Englishman can fill so many pages with a simple story and have so much fun doing it. The 25 illustrations by G. K. Chesterton suggest what Bud Fisher might have scribbled at the age of eight; are amusing.

Bonney Homily

THE BONNEY FAMILY--Ruth Suckow-- Knopf ($2.50). There are two old Bonneys, four little Bonneys--Warren, Sarah, Wilma & Wilfred. Mr. Bonney, a country clergyman, moves from the humble but well-beloved village of Morning Sun to a college town so that his children may have the advantage of college education. When this has had its effect, redheaded, eccentric Warren is a well-tamed professor; Sarah is a kind, sensible, placid young spinster; Wilma is married and faraway; Wilfred, who had especially liked rabbits or other animals, is dead in France. Wise Mrs. Bonney is dead too, and foolish, likable Mr. Bonney has inexplicably taken himself another wife. This humble, quiet homily, neither gay nor tragic, has a brown plainness of treatment to match its substance. It is a novel for those who do not mistake savagery for sincerity, rage or ribaldry for realism, who can bear with a certain lack of energy and emphasis when it is not replaced with drooling "poignance."

Stranded

HIGH GROUND -- Jonathan Brooks -- Bobbs Merrill ($2). Liberally educated in all the finer shades of political corruption, U. S. newsreaders have a ready sympathetic throb for the lone graft fighter. To Author Brooks such a figure looms so large that he ventures to draw the picture of an upstanding, small-city editor with solemn, biblical strokes. James Andrew Marvin, lonely Honest Man, is presented through the reverent chronicles of his five children (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Ruth). He emerges hard-hitting, high-minded, bad-tempered. Fighting heavily, with more goodwill than technique, he is defeated time and again by the subtler feints of a canny rival editor, a burly bartender, a cautious banker. His children, with the exception of the faithful Ruth, leave him stranded on his editorial high ground. The relentless climax of Marvin's failure gives dignity to a rather repetitious tale of puny struggles and mean treacheries.