Dorothy Sayers’s second Wimsey novel, Clouds of Witness, was another lunchtime read. I liked this a lot better this reading, probably because this time I noticed the theme:
Truly enough the ’47 port was a dead thing; the merest ghost of its old flame and flavor hung about it. Lord Peter held his glass poised for a moment.
“It is like the taste of a passion that has passed its noon and turned to weariness,” he said, with sudden gravity. “The only thing to do is to recognize bravely that it is dead, and put it away.” With a determined movement, he flung the remainder of the wine into the fire.
This is very much a book about the need to clear away old, bad passions and romances, and the unfortunate consequences of failing to do so. (I think, by the way, that this might be one way to read the odd ways a couple of the plot threads wrap up: rewards to the characters.) In a way, the opening is a clue, as Peter vacations in Corsica and “stud[ies] the vendetta in its natural habit,” and then fetches up in Paris, which I tend to think of as representing elegantly decadent passion and romance. Of course, the first page made me snarf for a different reason, but that’s not relevant right now.
This is a better mystery than Whose Body?, with its complications and obfuscations very much proceeding from its theme. I know some people, including Pam [spoilers at the end] and Truepenny [spoilers throughout], have complained about the opening and closing set-pieces, but I confess to a certain fondness for them; no surprise there, I suppose, as I am a trial lawyer, and you just don’t get lines like “My lords, the barometer is falling” these days (or in this country). It’s not a perfect plot by any means; besides the odd wrappings-up, Sayers appears to have completely forgotten the existence of one (1) broken bone and one (1) child, neither of which is really justifiable. But I’m inclined to give this a bit of pass, just because I appreciate the way this book moves the characters and sets the stage for later books.
(I’m reconsidering leaving my The Lord Peter Wimsey Companion at home, by the way. It’s a gorgeous volume, very well done, but it’s just not the same looking up references after the fact. On the other hand, I hate to bring it into work; it weighs a ton, it’s too nice to leave in the bottom drawer of my battered filing cabinet, and dragging it out during quick lunches at my desk seems inexpressably geeky. Decisions, decisions . . . )