To Kill a Cat

Published in 1970

From the dust jacket:
"Intricate, gripping crossword puzzle of a plot, excellent writing and a most unusual policeman. More of Superintendent Wycliffe please, Mr Burley": that was how the Newcastle Journal greeted the first Wycliffe story, Three-toed Pussy. Now Mr Burley has obliged with a return appearance for Superintendent Wycliffe, in an even more complex and enthralling puzzle. Wycliffe is officially on holiday, at a West Country resort, when he hears that a girl has been murdered in a sleazy local hotel: and what better way is there of spending a holiday, he feels, than in solving a murder. He is quickly assembling what might be called the primary clues: news of visitors to the hotel on the night of the murder—the man in the pin­stripe suit seen by the maid Kathy; the man on the fire-escape seen by a neighbour; the tart in the next bed­room, and what she overheard; and the clues in the bedroom itself.

The girl has been strangled, and her head has been savagely battered after death: two separate assailants?

Wycliffe's puzzle gathers many pieces, and many possible ways of fitting them together before he sees how the very different parts of the girl's life link up. The solution is reached by a really masterly sequence of deductions.

From the back cover (Corgi 1994 reprint): The girl was slim and young, with auburn hair splayed out on the pillow. Wycliffe almost believed her asleep rather than dead - until he saw her face.

Although death was by strangulation, someone had smashed her face in after she was dead. She lay in a sordid room in a seedy hotel down by the docks, but her luggage, her clothes, and her make­up all indicated she was more expensive and classier than her surroundings.

Superintendent Wycliffe was officially on holiday, but the case fascinated him and he had to find out who she was, why she was lying naked in a shabby hotel room, why she had a thousand pounds hidden under some clothing, and above all, why she had been 'murdered' twice.

As he began to investigate, he found there was too much of everything about the case - too many suspects, too many motives, and too many lies.

Appearance: “Inspector Fehling coughed. He had not previously met the chief superintendent, who was a comparative newcomer to the area. His first impression was unfavourable and the inspector set great store by his first impressions. Wycliffe did not even look like a policeman, it was difficult to believe that he was tall enough and he seemed almost frail. A teacher, some kind of academic, perhaps a parson, but never a policeman.”

Entomologist: “Wycliffe watched it all with interest and approval. He never tired of watching people about their business and their pleasure.”

Method of Working: “Wycliffe stood for a while, apparently lost in thought. Actually, though ideas chased each other through his mind they could hardly be said to have any pattern of rational consecutive thought.”

“It was when he made an effort to think in a disciplined way about anything that he was most conscious of his shortcomings. And this reflection brought him back to the case. Not only did he find sus­tained logical thought difficult but he was always short of written data. He had the official reports but these were so full as to be almost useless. Any other detective would have a sheaf of private notes, but he rarely wrote anything down and if he did he either lost it or threw it away. Notes were repugnant to him. Even now he ought to be sitting at a desk with a notepad in front of him, jotting down his ideas, transposing and relating facts like a jig-saw.”

Wycliffe’s No.2: Chief Inspector James Gill. “It was one of Wycliffe’s consolations that he didn’t have to spell everything out for Gill; they had evolved a kind of conversational shorthand which, despite differences of temperament, they could use because their logical processes were similar.”   

Local officer: “Inspector Fehling was a very large policeman, but he prided himself on the precision and economy of his movements. A gorilla, but a very refined gorilla.”

Pathologist: "Dr Franks, the pathologist, a chubby man, always in a hurry, bustled out."

Previous title Next title