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Police at the Funeral (1931)

by Margery Allingham

Other authors: See the other authors section.

Series: Albert Campion (4)

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
8762024,296 (3.67)53
From the Golden Age mystery author comes "a richly detailed and entertaining romp, with a fascinating resolution and an unconventional and winning sleuth" (Chicago Tribune). Albert Campion heads to Cambridge as a favor to a friend, whose fiancée is employed by the elderly Faraday family, to investigate the disappearance of her uncle Andrew. What the self-proclaimed "Deputy-Adventurer" finds is foul play of the most heinous kind: murder. Andrew is found floating in a river, bound and shot in the head. Needless to say, in a household of unlikable characters-presided over by an authoritarian widow-he's not sorely missed. But fear has pervaded the dour family, bringing up decades of suppressed hatreds, petty jealousies, and nasty impulses-all of which lead to a second shocking killing. As the number of Faradays dwindle, so should the number of suspects. But Campion discovers that in a family this dysfunctional, it's hard to stop what hatred has set in motion. Praise for Margery Allingham "Margery Allingham stands out like a shining light." -Agatha Christie "The best of mystery writers." -The New Yorker "Allingham was a rare and precious talent." -The Washington Post "Margery Allingham deserves to be rediscovered." -P. D. James, New York Times-bestselling author "Don't start reading these books unless you are confident that you can handle addiction." -The Independent From the Golden Age mystery author comes "a richly detailed and entertaining romp, with a fascinating resolution and an unconventional and winning sleuth" (Chicago Tribune). Albert Campion heads to Cambridge as a favor to a friend, whose fiancée is employed by the elderly Faraday family, to investigate the disappearance of her uncle Andrew. What the self-proclaimed "Deputy-Adventurer" finds is foul play of the most heinous kind: murder. Andrew is found floating in a river, bound and shot in the head. Needless to say, in a household of unlikable characters-presided over by an authoritarian widow-he's not sorely missed. But fear has pervaded the dour family, bringing up decades of suppressed hatreds, petty jealousies, and nasty impulses-all of which lead to a second shocking killing. As the number of Faradays dwindle, so should the number of suspects. But Campion discovers that in a family this dysfunctional, it's hard to stop what hatred has set in motion. Praise for Margery Allingham "Margery Allingham stands out like a shining light." -Agatha Christie "The best of mystery writers." -The New Yorker "Allingham was a rare and precious talent." -The Washington Post "Margery Allingham deserves to be rediscovered." -P. D. James, New York Times-bestselling author "Don't start reading these books unless you are confident that you can handle addiction." -The Independent… (more)
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» See also 53 mentions

Showing 1-5 of 20 (next | show all)
Summary: A request to find a missing uncle turns into a multiple murder investigation in an unhappy Cambridge manor.

Campion has a meeting with the fiancee of an old friend in a secluded location called the Sanctuary when he encounters Inspector Stanislaus Oakes. Oakes is trying to elude someone who is following him. The young woman, Joyce Blount, has seen and knows him but won’t say who it is. Turns out she has a reason. Her uncle, Andrew Faraday, is missing. Her fiance, Marcus Featherstone, a friend of Campion, is Andrew’s solicitor. They want someone with Campion’s skills to help find him.

Campion arrives at Socrates Close, the family manor, to learn that Andrew has been found by two students–dead. Floating in the river, legs and hands bound, his head blown off with a bullet between the eyes. Inspector Oakes joins the investigation.

It turns out Andrew was a black sheep, a gambler, erratic and disliked by the family, including his brother William, his sister Julia, and Great Aunt Caroline, a formidable old woman who heads the household. Then, there is the man who had followed Oates, Cousin George Faraday, whereabouts unknown. Great Aunt Caroline immediately takes a liking to Campion and hires him to investigate the death.

Death soon becomes deaths. Aunt Julia dies the next morning after her morning tea. It’s poison. Suspicion, at least for Andrew’s death, falls on William. He was the last with Andrew, walking home from church with him, parting when Andrew went the long way home. But William also was late getting back and can’t account for the time due to amnesia, which he claims he has seen a doctor for. But his service revolver is missing, as is some as well as some cord from a window pull.

More bizarre things happen. William is wounded and faints from what looks like a knife wound. He recovers but Campion suspects more poison, just not enough. A huge barefoot footprint appears in a bed outside the house and a giant “B†appears on a window. Then George appears, has a conference with Caroline, and takes over the house. He has something on her, connected with Andrew’s death. The next morning, he’s dead–cyanide poisoning.

Both Oates and Campion keep searching for who could be responsible for all these deaths. Then the answer comes in an overnight fight between Campion and the barefoot stalker…

It’s fascinating to see the tie between Great Aunt Caroline and Campion. It seems to come down to discretion toward an old, if not particularly attractive family. Likewise with William under a cloud of suspicion. Under Campion’s eccentricity, there is a certain decency. But will it mislead him and endanger his own life in a house where everyone under the roof seems to be coming to an early death? ( )
  BobonBooks | Dec 21, 2023 |
a certain particularly horrible racial slur is used like 30% of the way through as part of describing a magic trick. was kind of shocked to see it, although i guess a certain agatha christie novel was published with it in the title for decades afterwards so i probably shouldn't be as surprised but still. disgusting

ok so after finishing it, very cleverly written, lots of red herrings and an incredibly unlikely but still convincing resolution. dangles something at you near the start which is frustrating but it's ok. but. BUT. in the ending while wrapping up things a solution to one minor thing is HORRIBLY racist. like disgustingly so. my mouth was agape reading it. it's hideous. a character was blackmailing the matriarch by threatening to reveal he's mixed race - he was the kid of a brother or something and his mother was mixed race (described using innuendo i.e "bad type of person") and they had a first child who had black skin and this was the biggest scandal possible so OBVIOUSLY they got packed off and just ugh it'd disgusting incredibly disappointing horrible end. ( )
  tombomp | Oct 31, 2023 |
One of the earlier novels in the Campion series. Campion is brought into a situation by a friend, who has a fiancee living at a rather ominous house in Cambridgeshire. Ominous, in the sense that there's a lot of poisonous (literally?) personalities about coming into conflict. And some of those personalities start dying. A bit of police not picking up on things (or the Detective choosing not to be obvious), but the writing carries this story, and keeps your interest, and the solution is logical. Above average for Golden Age stuff. ( )
  EricCostello | Mar 4, 2022 |
Police At the Funeral by Margery Allingham is the fourth book in series that features the man of mystery Albert Campion. Neither a detective nor a spy, he seems to have his fingers in many pies and, it also seems he is a member of a very highly placed family, maybe even one of royalty. In this outing he is called upon to assist an old friend who is concerned for his fiancée who lives with many members of her family at a large house called Socrates Close in Cambridge.

Great Aunt Caroline rules the roost at Socrates Close, her word is law and the rest of the relatives that live there despise each other and chaff under the rules but as Great Aunt Caroline holds the purse strings, they obey. When suddenly one of the uncles and then one of the aunts are murdered, both terror and mystery are unleashed.

Another fun outing that has Albert Campion solving an intricate mystery. With lots of running around in the night, and strange cryptic symbols appearing on the windows, the author knows exactly how to elevate the tension and keep the reader turning the pages. With it’s witty writing, dry humor and plenty of red herrings strewn about, Police At The Funeral was an engaging puzzler. ( )
  DeltaQueen50 | Jun 17, 2016 |
After three books, for the first time, Allingham takes Campion out of the thriller genre and into a much more traditional manor house murder mystery. And while she doesn't leave the solution as apparent as, say, Agatha Christie might, most of the major clues are on open display to the reader, and there is every possibility they will be able to guess at the solution before it is revealed. Allingham shows her skill at misdirection to the point where the solution, when it comes, feels almost obvious. How could you miss that? But you do. It's very clever.

Part of Allingham's misdirection is, as always, her presentation of tremendously vivid characters. This time, there's a whole houseful, lorded over by the tiny but dominating personality of eighty-six-year-old Caroline Faraday, who keeps a raven's watchful eye on her flighty and selfish family. We are reminded again and again that all emotion seems to have been driven from her personality in her attempt to keep control, and it is to this end that she enlists Campion as her personal eyes and ears during the investigation. The intellectual dance they keep up through the novel is almost beguiling: one, masked in stoicism, the other, masked as a fool. Their interactions lead to a delightful and surprising resolution.

Police at the Funeral comes at the end of an intense writing period for Allingham, which may explain the lackluster title; after this, she took a longer-than-usual break before the next in the series. Perhaps she even contemplated ending it here. Had that been the case, it doubtless would have ended Mr. Campion's adventures on a very high note; this is a strong, assured piece of work, very engaging and well on-par with more famous mysteries of the period. Like Mr. Campion himself, it deserves better recognition. ( )
  saroz | Dec 22, 2015 |
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» Add other authors (4 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Allingham, Margeryprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Hofschuster, Friedrich A.Translatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Marber, RomekCover designersecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Matthews, FrancisNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Rutten-Kooistra, T.W.Translatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
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Epigraph
Dedication
To My Seven Paternal Uncles
First words
When one man is following another, however discreet may be the pursuer or the pursued, the act does not often pass unnoticed in the streets of London.
Quotations
"This person was shipped off to the colonies many years ago. He returned with ... a wife. They had a child ... by some horrible machination of heredity the stain in the woman's blood had come out. ... The child was a blackamoor. ... George bears our name and he is always threatenng to reveal his half-caste blood ... --a touch of the tarbrush! It is unthinkable!" ... Mr Campion understood what it was that she considered worse than murder. ... He felt very honoured by her confidence.
As they entered, a wire-haired fox terrier of irreproachable breeding, rose from the
hearth-rug and came to meet them with leisurely dignity. Marcus effected an introduction hastily.

‘Foon,’ he said. ‘Written “Featherstonehaughâ€.’

Somewhat to his host’s embarrassment Mr Campion shook hands with the dog, who seemed to appreciate the courtesy, for he followed them back to the hearth-rug, waiting for them to be seated before he took up his position on the rug again, where he sat during the rest of the proceedings with the same air of conscious breeding which characterized his master.
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Wikipedia in English (1)

From the Golden Age mystery author comes "a richly detailed and entertaining romp, with a fascinating resolution and an unconventional and winning sleuth" (Chicago Tribune). Albert Campion heads to Cambridge as a favor to a friend, whose fiancée is employed by the elderly Faraday family, to investigate the disappearance of her uncle Andrew. What the self-proclaimed "Deputy-Adventurer" finds is foul play of the most heinous kind: murder. Andrew is found floating in a river, bound and shot in the head. Needless to say, in a household of unlikable characters-presided over by an authoritarian widow-he's not sorely missed. But fear has pervaded the dour family, bringing up decades of suppressed hatreds, petty jealousies, and nasty impulses-all of which lead to a second shocking killing. As the number of Faradays dwindle, so should the number of suspects. But Campion discovers that in a family this dysfunctional, it's hard to stop what hatred has set in motion. Praise for Margery Allingham "Margery Allingham stands out like a shining light." -Agatha Christie "The best of mystery writers." -The New Yorker "Allingham was a rare and precious talent." -The Washington Post "Margery Allingham deserves to be rediscovered." -P. D. James, New York Times-bestselling author "Don't start reading these books unless you are confident that you can handle addiction." -The Independent From the Golden Age mystery author comes "a richly detailed and entertaining romp, with a fascinating resolution and an unconventional and winning sleuth" (Chicago Tribune). Albert Campion heads to Cambridge as a favor to a friend, whose fiancée is employed by the elderly Faraday family, to investigate the disappearance of her uncle Andrew. What the self-proclaimed "Deputy-Adventurer" finds is foul play of the most heinous kind: murder. Andrew is found floating in a river, bound and shot in the head. Needless to say, in a household of unlikable characters-presided over by an authoritarian widow-he's not sorely missed. But fear has pervaded the dour family, bringing up decades of suppressed hatreds, petty jealousies, and nasty impulses-all of which lead to a second shocking killing. As the number of Faradays dwindle, so should the number of suspects. But Campion discovers that in a family this dysfunctional, it's hard to stop what hatred has set in motion. Praise for Margery Allingham "Margery Allingham stands out like a shining light." -Agatha Christie "The best of mystery writers." -The New Yorker "Allingham was a rare and precious talent." -The Washington Post "Margery Allingham deserves to be rediscovered." -P. D. James, New York Times-bestselling author "Don't start reading these books unless you are confident that you can handle addiction." -The Independent

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Book description
The imperious Great Aunt Caroline Faraday runs her old Cambridge residence like a Victorian fiefdom, unconcerned with the fact that it's 1931. Furniture and meals are heavy and elaborate, both motorcars and morning tea are forbidden on account of vulgarity. The Faraday children--now well into middle age--chafe at the restrictions, but with no money of their own, they respond primarily by quarreling amongst themselves. The illustrious Faraday family endless squabbling is tedious, but the tense tranquility is punctured when Nephew Andrew vanished without trace one Sunday morning after church, only to be found dead in a secluded stream. Matters are complicated further by the murder of Julia, his petulant and whining sister, poisoned by her morning cup of tea. Though neither will be much missed, decency demands that Caroline Faraday hire the nearly respectable Albert Campion to investigate away from the bustle of Piccadilly,their untimely ends. Mr. Campion must untangle a web of family resentments, little does he expect to be greeted by a band of eccentric relatives all at daggers with each other. He must unravel a chillingly ingenious plot, strewn with red herrings to get to the real secret of the Faradays. Unfortunately, what Mr. Campion discovers will force the modern world relentlessly into Mrs. Faraday's stuffy Victorian parlor.
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