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knows that he and his cousin Elsie will each inherit half of
Crowther's fortune, so he does not see why he cannot have some of the money a bit earlier—"an advance on his legacy". At this point the first thoughts that it might be feasible to kill his uncle without being found out occur to Swinburn.
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just like any other company, but when he asks his uncle for a loan to be able to avoid bankruptcy he is appalled to find that the old man, obviously no longer able to understand trends in the world economy, is unwilling to grant him a substantial sum to overcome his financial difficulties. Swinburn
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are produced. Swinburn has inherited the works from his father and uncle. While the former has been dead for many years, Andrew
Crowther, his uncle, leads a retired life in the same town. At 65, his health has recently started to deteriorate. In particular, Crowther is suffering from indigestion.
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business was only an old wives' tale. He, Charles, wasn't tied up by these out-of-date considerations! What was politic was right. What was the greatest good of the greatest number? Why, that Andrew should die. What about all the men that were going to be thrown out of employment? What about the
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but I may as well tell you at once that under no circumstances would I marry a poor man. This is not entirely mercenary and selfish. I shouldn't be happy without the things I am accustomed to and my husband wouldn't be happy either. To marry where there would be shortage and privation would mean
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him. Again, Swinburn sees no other solution than to "take that desperate remedy" and kill the butler. This time he cannot be as subtle as when planning his uncle's death. He brutally slays
Weatherup with a piece of lead pipe and dumps his body in a nearby lake.
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is held, but
Swinburn feels quite safe when no one seems to implicate him in the case. However, some time later he is approached by Weatherup, Crowther's butler, who claims he has seen him exchange the bottles, and who starts
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or "howcatchem"), and the reader can watch the preparations for the crime and how the murderer tries to cover up his tracks. The final chapters of the novel are set in a
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clerks? What about poor old Gairns? What about Gairns's invalid wife? Andrew
Crowther's useless life could count for nothing against such a weight of human suffering.
426:. He does solve the case, and explains how he did it in the final chapters of the novel, but the emphasis of the book is on the thoughts and deeds of the criminal.
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One of the interesting aspects of the novel is the insight the reader gains into the workings of a criminal mind. In particular, Swinburn's rationalization along
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and during a private function at a hotel, where a résumé of the whole case is given in front of a small group of police detectives, solicitors, and barristers.
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His unrequited love for a young woman called Una Mellor helps him come to a quick decision. "It seems a beastly thing to say", she tells him,
480:(1961) follows on his way to self-destruction a young murderer who is also driven by the prospect of gaining a beautiful lady in the end.
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Crofts's
Detective-Inspector Joseph French, who appears in several of his novels, keeps in the background during the action of
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Charles
Swinburn is particularly proud of his perfect alibi. On the following morning he books a three-week cruise of the
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is about 35-year-old
Charles Swinburn, the owner of a factory in Cold Pickerby, Yorkshire, in which
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Avon (unnumbered #9), first paperback edition, 1941 and the first edition under the U.S. title
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After thinking the matter over again and again, Swinburn resolves to poison his uncle with
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misery for both of us. It would be simply foolish and I'm not going to do it.
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argumentative patterns must be mentioned in this context:
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448:in which a murder is committed on a flight from
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64:adding citations to reliable sources
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413:Then he told himself that all this
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334:Swinburn's business is hit by the
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542:Novels set in hotels
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532:Fiction set in 1933
512:1934 British novels
483:The protagonist of
477:This Sweet Sickness
465:Malice Aforethought
441:Death in the Clouds
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485:Simon Brett
407:utilitarian
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450:Le Bourget
120:March 2019
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446:whodunnit
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