Golden Age of Detective Fiction

Famous author Dale Sanborn is summering in Wellfleet after publishing his latest novel, Reverence when he is murdered in his cottage. The clues: a blow to the head, an empty sardine tin, and the blanket covering the body point the yokel policeman (and grocer) Sullivan to Bill Porter. Porter, the director of a wealthy local family, had been seen quarreling with Sanborn after Sanborn had run over Porter’s beloved pet dog. Porter had also bought twelve tins of the same brand of sardines found in Sanborn’s cottage and had borrowed a hammer from Sanborn’s neighbor Prudence Whitsby on the day of the murder, ostensibly to hang a nail. Still, with the hammer now missing, it looks like the most probable murder weapon to Sullivan. Convinced of Porter’s guilt, Sullivan arrests Porter and puts him in the pillory because Wellfleet has no jail.

After Porter’s arrest, Asey Mayo, Porter’s mechanic, but ostensibly their jack of all trades man, takes it upon himself to clear Porter’s name before he is moved to a real jail and charges are brought against him. Asey Mayo, having worked for the Porter family for three generations, is fiercely loyal to the family. Asey Mayo, a spare, flannel-wearing rambler, is well-known for his folksy wisdom, penetrating intelligence, and masterful ability to fix what’s broken.

Asey Mayo, rough around the edges and with overly direct manners, enlists Prudence Whitsby’s help to conduct interviews. She’s well-liked, genteel, and knows everyone in town- she’s also connected to several of the vacationers visiting Wellfleet during the scorching summer heatwave. Prudence and her niece Betsey, who is romantically linked to Porter, are immediately suspected by Sullivan of helping Porter cover up his murder. Asey Mayo quickly starts creating a timeline exonerating them.

As Asey Mayo and Prudence start investigating the complicated and often cruel history of Dale Sanborn, they are confronted with many people who would not mourn his death. Broken engagements, political riots, an estranged family, and ruined marriages are littered in Sanborn’s wake. It’s up to Asey Mayo and Prudence to confront Sanborn’s many enemies and track down which one actually murdered him before the weekend is over and Bill Porter is sent to jail.

The Review

I loved The Cape Cod Mystery. It’s a breezy read, filled with witty characters and intrigue. Asey Mayo is the breakout star of the book with his folksy speech and wisdom of a man who is well-traveled and acquainted with the breadth of human nature. He suffers no fools and is adept at breaking down lies. Motivated by loyalty to the Porter family, he’s not afraid to use his considerable connections and the wealth of the Porter family to grease the wheels in his small town of Wellfleet.

Living in a small town myself, I found Taylor’s portrayal of small-town life: with squabbling love affairs, walls of silence, protection of the well-known, and suspicion of outside authority, to be pretty accurate. Sanborn is begrudgingly tolerated within Wellfleet, but no one will open their mouth to persecute a well-born son of the town to help solve his murder, and this closing of the ranks is reflected in The Cape Cod Mystery.

Interestingly, most of the clues in solving Dale Sanborn’s murder are seeded in his murky past. He has a painful history with nearly all of the vacationers in Wellfleet, and most are genuinely tragic. Leaving his mother to starve to death, breaking up a marriage by sowing suspicion, and driving a young woman to suicide are all in Dale Sanborn’s wake and add a touch of melancholy and weightiness to a relatively light writing style. I think Atwood balances her easy-to-read prose well with these complex subjects, which really shines at the book’s ending. Dale Sanborn is a man who destroys lives and, even after death, manages to snuff out one more, handled so carefully and ends the book’s mystery on a bittersweet note.

The mystery is pretty straight forward, with suspects and their past encounters slowly revealed throughout the book. These revelations make the book fly by, and I felt no desire for many murders. The Cape Cod Mystery is basically a postmortem of Dale Sandborn’s life and the convergence of all the people he wronged, all coming together as if by fate to give him a reckoning.

I liked Asey Mayo’s steady and loyal countenance. I am interested to see how his investigative methods evolve when he is not investigating people he knows as intimately as the people in Wellfleet and is not so personally devoted to the accused. Much of his deductions come from what he considers accurate based on previous encounters with the individuals. He tells the story or people much like them- he even pulls a Miss Marple and tells the entire ensemble of suspects how he solved the crime based on the actions of a similar murderer he witnessed while working as a sailor.

The Cape Cod Mystery was a delight to read, and I am currently on the hunt for Asey Mayo’s subsequent adventures. I also highly recommend the American Mystery Classics reissue of this 1931 mystery; it has an informative and short introduction by Otto Penzler and great discussion questions included at the end for book clubs.

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