Reprint of the Year: The Desert Moon Mystery

  For the last several years, Kate at Cross Examining Crime has been rounding up the vintage mystery bloggers and having us perpetuate her brilliant brainstorm (one of many that she has had). In the wake of various publishing houses recognizing the virtues of Golden Age (and more recent) vintage crime novels through reprint editions of both well-known and more obscure titles, Kate thought those of us who love those vintage mysteries would like the chance to feature the year's reprints and make a pitch for our favorites to be voted Reprint of the Year. We loved the idea so much that we keep coming back for more.

My first choice for the 2024 ROY Awards Ceremony is The Desert Moon Mystery (1927) by Kay Cleaver Strahan. I first read this in 2013 thanks to John over at Pretty Sinister Books.  He not only brought it to my attention by featuring it on his blog, but also very generously loaned his copy to me.  I had long wanted to read a book by Strahan and I hadn't managed to track down one of her novels for my very own--so borrowing  from a good friend was the next best thing. Since 2013, I did find a vintage copy of my very own and the reprint by Coachwhip this year gives me the perfect chance to revisit it and give it a plug in the ROY nominations.

The scene of the crime in Strahan's novel is the Desert Moon Ranch--home to the wealthy Sam Stanley, his housekeeper Mary Magin, his adopted son and daughter, John and Martha, Martha's caregiver Mrs. Ricker, and hangers-on Chadwick Caufield and Hubert Hand.  Sam just seems to collect folks for his ranch like some people take in stray cats.  The story is told by Mary Magin and the action begins when the twin daughters of Sam's ex-wife show up looking for a place of "rest and relaxation."  

Except they're not really getting any of that....Mrs. Magin notices that the girls, Danielle and Gabrielle, are constantly busy searching everything from the attic to the outlying buildings.  They're certainly up to something, but what?  Before Mrs. Magin can discover what the object of this scavenger hunt is, Gabrielle is found strangled on the attic steps and this first shocking death is followed by the suicide of Chad Caufield.  Caufield believed himself in love with Gabrielle--a vain, mean-spirited girl who wouldn't even give him the time of day.  Has he killed himself out of desperation because the girl he loves is dead...or out of remorse because he killed her after being rejected one too many times?

Sam Stanley firmly believes Caulfield to be innocent and is determined to get to the bottom of things. Mrs. Magin is also taking notes and keeping an eye on everyone.  It doesn't help that the girls' father, a ne'er do well who has just been released from prison shows up.  Stanley gathers everyone together for a session of coerced confessions, but before that little task can be completed Martha is dead.  Grief-stricken and out of options, he decides to hire Lynn MacDonald, a private detective of great repute, who also happens to be a woman.  There will be one more death and a great many clues to be gathered before Miss MacDonald--with the help of Mrs. Magin--can track down the culprit.

As John mentions in his review, this mystery uses one of the moth-eaten tricks of detective fiction, but the story is so well-told and has enough interesting features that the modern reader really doesn't mind. I actually enjoyed reading one of the early instances of the trick.  Lynn MacDonald is a nice take on the female Holmes, keeping facts and observations to herself until Mary can prove to her that she has quite the keen eye for observation herself.  The two make a very good team at the end.

It was also quite interesting to read a vintage mystery with a very country house set-up that takes place in a very western atmosphere.  There's a down-home feel to the story that runs under the build-up of suspense and confusion--made the most real to us through Mary's difficulties in arranging what she knows and what she's heard from various characters. 

First line: I knew that evening in April, when Sam got home from Rattail and came stamping snow into my kitchen, his good old red, white, and blue face stretched long instead of wide in its usual grin, that he had brought bad news with him: a slump in the cattle market; moonshine liquor discovered again, down in the outfit's quarters; a delayed shipment of groceries from Salt Lake.

I see no more credit in keeping on loving a person who has proved unworthy of being loved, than I see in hating a person who has turned out to be blameless or in continuing to do any other unreasonable thing. (Narrator--Mary Magin; p. 5)

"John," he [Sam Stanley] finally said, "is old enough to take care of himself."
With that he turned and wen out of my kitchen, not giving me a chance to say that, though I had lived through fifty-six years, I had never yet seen a man at the age he mentioned. (p. 8)

 

I continue this story in my own way, stating that if any more atmosphere is in it, it got there by mistake. My plan is to turn it out so that, from now on, not more than a page of it can be skipped at one time and the rest of it make sense. (p. 46)

Last line: But I know that it is induced by a mixture of long years of right living, and clean thinking, and sanity, and courage; so I am expecting it to clear away the shadows from the Desert Moon and leave it, riding high as it used to ride, high and proud, a brave, shining thing in our valley.

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Deaths = 5 (one natural; two strangled; one shot; one poisoned)