Double or Quits

Bertha Cool and Donald Lam are taking time off between cases and doing a little fishing. One of the fishermen on the boat learns the two are private investigators. He approaches them with his problem and Cool and Lam wind up with a new case.

It seems Dr. Devarest (new client) had put his wife’s jewels in his wall safe after an evening of entertaining guests. The next afternoon, when he opened it for her, they found the safe had been robbed. Devarest wants Cool and Lam to find out who did it and get the jewels back…no questions asked. Devarest’s first choice of suspects is his wife’s secretary, who had disappeared the next morning.

What would be a fairly simple case becomes complicated. A nephew who is a ladies’ man, a niece who show more is sexy and very interested in the mystery and Donald Lam, are added to the mix. Then there is the fact that Demarest’s wife has her own secret affair going with a close friend of Demarest.

Add in a killer who is out to stop the investigation, even if it takes another murder making two for the case, blackmail, a confidence game, a rich divorcee, a lonely widow and the poisoned Scotch. Talk about complications!

Written in 1941, it’s a fast moving case with no-nonsense PIs who are out to solve it and collect their fees. Great read!
2024-04-05 show less

This early book in the series is the one where Donald goes from employee of B Cool to partner in Cool and Lam. It starts as an apparently simple case of stolen jewelry but dead bodies quickly start popping up in unexpected places. The book includes a couple of delicious scenes with Bertha and Elsie (both together, and separately), and as always in these books I enjoyed the pre-WWII Los Angeles setting.

Having said that, it isn't among my favorites in the series. The plot feels a bit random, and none of the supporting cast turns out to be even remotely sympathetic. And the scene were Donald beats up an insurance adjuster felt completely gratuitous. I guess there has to be at least an occasional case sans a sweet young thing in need of show more brainy rescuer. show less

GGardner's Lam and Cool mystery series is not as well known as his Perry Mason series. They are a mismatched Odd Couple pairing of private eyes. Bertha Cool is an overweight ovebearing penny pincher with zero in people skills. Donald Lam is the brains of the outfit and eventually solves their cases. While these mysteries are not filled with chase scenes or all out battles, they are generally witty, clever, and worth reading. Double or Quits involves a safecracker, missing jewels, a bicycle-riding tennis playing woman, q tricky garage door, and murder. However, its not quite the smooth read the other books in the series are and somewhere along the line, the reader gets left behind on one of the twists and turns.

This is my first experience with the work of Erle Stanley Gardner, supposedly the king of American mystery fiction, and I am a bit disappointed with it. The plot is loose and there are quite a few side characters with schemes of their own. The process of detection doesn't feel convincing enough. And the bad print quality of this edition doesn't help the cause.
I have bought another book from this series, and I do hope it turns out to be better than this one...

Wonderful cover design, man in silhouette, necklace, car, red container, spooky.