A review by robinwalter
Cut Throat by Christopher Bush

challenging lighthearted mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.25

Yet another mentally challenging mystery from Christopher Bush. The excellent introduction from Curtis Evans mentioned a fiendishly difficult alibi that needed to be broken, so I paid extra special attention and tried to read as carefully as I could. Of course,  I still came up short. 

One reason for this was the language Bush used.  For example, at one point a character thought to himself: 

What precisely, for instance, was that combine that Travers had hinted at and Bland had laughed off? 

I did not recall any mention of a "combine" so I went back and looked for the passage. It turned out that in the original passage, the phrase used was “liaison”. That  made a lot more sense to me, because “combine” as a noun in any context is not that common today, and as a noun meaning “liaison” in a romantic or sexual sense even less so. 

Later on in the story language tripped me up again, this time the fault was all my own,  mistaking the word “vessel” for “vein” which confused me no end until several helpful Golden Age mystery experts on twitter put me straight. 

Once again, then, I was stumped. Nevertheless, that is not a problem with stories like this because once again, this was not a fair play mystery. I doubt anyone would have come up with the solution that Ludovic Travers demonstrated at the very end. So despite the fact that this slowed me to a crawl and confirmed that as a detective I make Clouseau look like Poirot, I thoroughly enjoyed the story, particularly because of the humour. 

In the very first Ludovic Travers story. There was quite a bit of whimsical humour and it returned in this story, particularly in regard to Ludovic Travers himself. Chapter 10, entitled “Travers and Delilah” was particularly amusing, Travers’ discomfiture at his situation bringing several chuckles. Seeing Travers so humanised was delightful, as when he was dreading an unpleasant task and was then  given an unexpected reprieve by Wharton, his Scotland Yard liaison: 

Travers stared at him. It was as if the condemned cell had opened and the warder had remarked: “What about a nice little eighteen holes this afternoon?” 

Tthe collaboration between Travers and Whartonwas again a highlight. The collaboration was not all one-sided either, as this exchange shows: Wharton says 

 “Let’s compare notes. Tell me everything you noticed.”

Then, after the conversation had finished, this: 

 quarter of an hour later, Wharton was on the way back to town. Travers was realizing two things. Wharton hadn’t divulged one single thing that he himself had noticed in those two visits of the evening—and he hadn’t given any reason whatever for hurrying back to town. 

It’s this “combine” of peers that marks these stories as special for me. Wharton gives as good as he gets, and both contribute to the mystery’s resolution, in this case both even making the same wrong “whodunnit” conclusion to which all the evidence seemed to point. 

There are some passages that reflect the views common in the era and  which did not sit well with me, but happily not many of them. There were also a few Biblical references thrown in again, including one to Akeldama that had me wondering about the personal ethics of the parson who thought that reference fitted his situation. 

Two challenging Travers tales in a row has left me mentally drained, but they were both great fun. Bush uses language with great care, and relieved of the burden of trying to keep up with the mystery, I’ll enjoy future Travers stories for the language and the laughs.