Edward Phillips Oppenheim was an extremely prolific and popular author of “romance thrillers” in the first decades of the 20th century. Until the website Past Offences issued a direct challenge to its mystery fans to find, investigate, and critique fiction first published in the year 1907, I had no real reason to try one of the many Oppenheim texts available through Project Gutenberg and consider his contribution to the shaping of the detective genre.
The Avenger is an enjoyable mix of elements popular in literature at the time, including international intrigue, mysterious murders, and headstrong damsels who still need some help from the men who fall in love with them to avoid scandal and social ruin. If the prose and dialogue are a little formal and genteel, they are also admirably accessible when contrasted with other fiction of the time. To my delight, I found Oppenheim’s storytelling engaging and his narrative pacing and structure worthy of a contemporary Hollywood screenwriter, which surely goes a long way to explain his popularity with readers.
The Avenger is an enjoyable mix of elements popular in literature at the time, including international intrigue, mysterious murders, and headstrong damsels who still need some help from the men who fall in love with them to avoid scandal and social ruin. If the prose and dialogue are a little formal and genteel, they are also admirably accessible when contrasted with other fiction of the time. To my delight, I found Oppenheim’s storytelling engaging and his narrative pacing and structure worthy of a contemporary Hollywood screenwriter, which surely goes a long way to explain his popularity with readers.
The story begins immediately, with protagonist Herbert Wrayson entering his flat to discover a young woman determinedly searching in drawers and cabinets for something. The woman, we soon learn, has mistaken Wrayson’s rooms for those of his neighbor Morris Barnes, an adventurer who has returned from Africa. While the indignant burglar remains tight-lipped about her intentions, a distraction allows her to slip away… and Barnes is soon found strangled in the carriage of a Hansom cab that was waiting outside the apartment house.
Wrayson receives another jolt when a chance photograph reveals that the mysterious woman is Louise, daughter of his good club friend Colonel Fitzmaurice. Also at the club is a curious soul named Stephen Heneage, “a man of a different and more secretive type.” This sedentary acquaintance takes an interest in the case, even advising Wrayson at one point to leave the country or risk danger in London. Heeding this advice, Wrayson crosses the channel to France, where he meets The Baroness, whose companion is Louise. While The Baroness is thrilled with the company of the Englishman, Louise is much less enthused, and Herbert Wrayson has the double challenge of learning Louise’s involvement with the cab murder while also engaging in gentlemanly romantic pursuit.
The abrasive Sydney Barnes soon appears, hoping to discover the source of his dead brother’s substantial income in England, as he knows that Morris left Africa virtually penniless. Sydney tries to get an answer from solicitor Bentham, but the lawyer is not talking, and is soon found stabbed outside his office. Once again, Wrayson must determine Louise’s involvement and decide whether her life is also in jeopardy. Heneage continues to act cryptically, a ghost from the past resurfaces, and ultimately all is made known and reputations saved from ruin.
Wrayson receives another jolt when a chance photograph reveals that the mysterious woman is Louise, daughter of his good club friend Colonel Fitzmaurice. Also at the club is a curious soul named Stephen Heneage, “a man of a different and more secretive type.” This sedentary acquaintance takes an interest in the case, even advising Wrayson at one point to leave the country or risk danger in London. Heeding this advice, Wrayson crosses the channel to France, where he meets The Baroness, whose companion is Louise. While The Baroness is thrilled with the company of the Englishman, Louise is much less enthused, and Herbert Wrayson has the double challenge of learning Louise’s involvement with the cab murder while also engaging in gentlemanly romantic pursuit.
The abrasive Sydney Barnes soon appears, hoping to discover the source of his dead brother’s substantial income in England, as he knows that Morris left Africa virtually penniless. Sydney tries to get an answer from solicitor Bentham, but the lawyer is not talking, and is soon found stabbed outside his office. Once again, Wrayson must determine Louise’s involvement and decide whether her life is also in jeopardy. Heneage continues to act cryptically, a ghost from the past resurfaces, and ultimately all is made known and reputations saved from ruin.
For me, it is the assured plot and pacing that make The Avenger a success. (The book was released in England in 1907 as The Conspirators, with the American edition offered the following year carrying The Avenger title. The second title is the stronger one, as the actions of the murderer are largely inspired by a need to right wrongs through a type of vigilante justice.) While it certainly exploits a Victorian love of melodrama that includes a villain with power over the innocent and chaste lovers with harrowing societal obstacles placed in their way, the formula is smartly (and even economically) employed. Each of the crimes and curious behaviors has a clear and satisfying rationale to support it, and Oppenheim manages a couple of revelations – including the identity of the murderer and the true reason for the wedge between Wrayson and Louise – that are unexpected yet strong.
The character of club member and intermittent commentator Stephen Heneage was perhaps more intriguing to me than Oppenheim had intended him to be. In one sense, Heneage is one of the plot’s few dead-ends: he is introduced by the author as being either a brilliant yet eccentric armchair detective or a man using this cover to gather information for hidden purposes. I had expected Heneage to solve the mystery and provide the solution to the reader or else to be revealed to be a conspirator flying under false colors. Oppenheim uses him for neither purpose, which felt like an opportunity missed and an odd element to keep in the book. (To be fair, Heneage’s change in moods, from fact-gathering and curious to admonitory and alarmed to anxious and dyspeptic, actually function as a clue to the mysteries, but he remains a passive secondary character who wants to become an active primary one.)
While it was an enjoyable reading experience, The Avenger ultimately – perhaps necessarily – rang a little hollow for me. As popular literature of another era, it lacks a larger thematic idea or purpose beyond upholding the social morality that its plotline explores. It also carries a symmetric neatness that feels a little too pat, a bit too diagrammed, which arguably is a weak case to make by a fan of classic detective fiction. But just as my favorite mystery stories and authors use the genre to provide something more in the way of character, theme, or structure, I hold the same hope regardless of the era or format I dip into. Oppenheim here delivers first-rate crime melodrama, which is cause for recognition if not complete devotion to explore his entire oeuvre of more than 150 books, short story collections, and plays. That said, I’m glad I read one engaging title from E. Phillips Oppenheim, and would not mind doing so again.
While it was an enjoyable reading experience, The Avenger ultimately – perhaps necessarily – rang a little hollow for me. As popular literature of another era, it lacks a larger thematic idea or purpose beyond upholding the social morality that its plotline explores. It also carries a symmetric neatness that feels a little too pat, a bit too diagrammed, which arguably is a weak case to make by a fan of classic detective fiction. But just as my favorite mystery stories and authors use the genre to provide something more in the way of character, theme, or structure, I hold the same hope regardless of the era or format I dip into. Oppenheim here delivers first-rate crime melodrama, which is cause for recognition if not complete devotion to explore his entire oeuvre of more than 150 books, short story collections, and plays. That said, I’m glad I read one engaging title from E. Phillips Oppenheim, and would not mind doing so again.
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