The inscrutable one is responsible for all the murders. Only
the merest accident, it seems, prevents him from disposing of the few
fortunate characters who survive to the concluding chapters of the
story. He narrowly misses the misunderstood wife (now a widow, thanks to
his kind offices), and his failure to bag the hero and _ingenue_
(together with a handful of subsidiary characters) is only a matter of
minutes. There is almost a false note about the last chapter, in which
the Oriental commits suicide before he has completed his grisly task;
but it was obviously impossible for anyone in the book to live happily
ever after so long as he remained alive. Just how Mr. HARRIS BURLAND and
the villainous figment of his lively imagination perform these deeds of
dastard-do is not for me to reveal. The publishers modestly claim that
in the school of WILKIE COLLINS this author has few rivals. As regards
complexity of plot the claim is scarcely substantiated by the volume
before me; but if bloodshed be the food of fiction Mr. BURLAND may slay
on, secure in his pre-eminence.
* * * * *
The _Rev.
Pages:
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66