Murder After Christmas by Rupert Latimer

Christmas as it was meant to be celebrated: with a pitch black comedy about the murder of an old rich guy

“It’s always struck me, Culley, that if ever a man was born to be murdered, that man was Sir Willoughby Keene-Cotton.”

Note: this is a mostly spoiler-free post. Light spoilers regarding plot but not whodunnit!

It is a running joke in my family that if my mother were to die suddenly in her sleep, we can safely assume my father helped her along. We are all in agreement on the best place to dispose of a body (in the back yard, next to the family dog - RIP). Does this make us morbid and macabre, or do all happy families cheerfully plot each other’s demise while sipping cocoa around the fire?

Guys, there is only one version of this book cover, and this is it

Perhaps our murderous plotting is why I felt a certain affinity for the Redpaths, the family at the center of Rupert Latimer’s 1944 novel Murder After Christmas. They - husband and wife Frank and Rhoda, aunt Paulina, son John and his paramour Margery - fantasize endlessly about killing off rich old Uncle Willie, the former step-father of Rhoda and current houseguest over the Christmas holiday. Their musings aren’t based on any particular animosity, he’s just very rich and kind of a pain in the ass.

So when he is found dead in the snow the morning after Boxing Day, still in his Father Christmas costume from the party the night before, they aren’t exactly heartbroken (he was so old, after all). The investigation that follows - it was murder, of course - continues in the same vein of dark comedy. In the preface to the British Library Classics reissue of Rupert Latimer’s Murder After Christmas, Martin Edwards, who worked to uncover this forgotten gem of a Christmas story, writes, “As the plot continues to thicken, the storyline pursues an increasingly eccentric course, but the lighthearted tone is maintained throughout.”

Eccentric is an understatement. There is the madcap farce of the Redpaths being questioned by Superintendent Culley downstairs while “bodies” (sandbags dressed in clothes) are thrown from various upstairs windows (to test where the body would land had Uncle Willie fallen/been pushed) in an echo of Frank’s earlier daydream of doing away with Uncle Willie by betting him he couldn’t jump out the attic window.

It is during this round of questioning that the Redpaths realize Uncle Willie was likely murdered. It is a revelation that is immediately undercut by Latimer’s endlessly quotable prose: “In the silence you could have heard a body drop, and did.”

The Redpaths appear to have no motive for murdering Uncle Willie, a point they lament at length prior to his passing:

“Anyway—I forgot—we don’t want to murder him now, do we?”

“Not for his money,”acknowledged Frank wistfully. “His wife gets it all.”

The murder plot, such as it is, hinges on this fact. Uncle Willie is married to a woman he never sees, who is on her deathbed in another town. She will inherit his money if she outlives him (something her family is depending upon); if the reverse occurs, no one is quite certain who will wind up with Uncle Willie’s enormous wealth. His wife dies on Christmas Day, a fact only Aunt Paulina is aware of, having intercepted a telegram on Boxing Day and deciding it wasn’t worth ruining the party over. What follows is a quest for motive as well as opportunity, for it turns out Uncle Willie has been poisoned.

This element of the plot has echoes of Dorothy Sayers’s 1928 mystery The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club, where the question of who died first, General Fentiman or his sister, determines who will inherit. Timing plays a crucial role here as well, with a fun twist that adds an element of surprise to the topsy-turvy plot.

As befitting a Christmas tale, the stakes are pretty low - two elderly people die - and the consequences are appropriately low-key, if not entirely satisfying. Even the war, ever present in the background, is treated with a certain worldly nonchalance that feels very modern for a book written in the midst of blackouts, rationing and evacuees, all of which are featured heavily in the story. John, frustrated with the zaniness of his family, says:

“But it seems to me that living under the Nazi regime will be a picnic after spending Christmas in this house. I can’t think what I’m saying, let alone say what I’m thinking. And, like the poor Germans, you must all be very frightened or guilty about something or you wouldn’t be so touchy.”

The novel is endlessly quotable - my notes are mostly just lines lifted directly from the book - and the characterizations are sharp. Take this exchange, between the Chief Constable and Superintendent Culley:

“Perhaps you’d like to nose about a bit and let me know how it strikes you.”

“From what particular angle, sir?”

“All possible angles, beginning with the obvious one.”

“Money?”

“That, of course. Sir Willoughby’s death is going to make a difference to a number of people. Scandalously wealthy man. No one quite knows how rich he was. But a villa in Italy, a castle in Spain, another in Scotland, house in London—all for one old man! Could have been murdered from anti-capitalistic motives alone.”

For once I will keep this post spoiler-free, partially to preserve the zany thrill of the story, partly because the denouement, done in the classic style (drawing room, suspects gathered, lawyer impatiently waiting to read the will) is altogether too complicated to outline succinctly.

So try it out for yourself this Christmas. It’s the perfect book to escape with when your own holiday guests become to much. You may find yourself sympathizing with Frank, who gives voice to the sentiments of many of us when faced with the prospect of another houseguest, exclaiming in exasperation, “I absolutely refuse… to be nice to any more people!”

Further reading: Crimereads published a version of Martin Edwards’s introduction to the novel here. None of Latimer’s other books are in print. Perhaps if everyone rushes out to buy a copy of Murder After Christmas, the good people at British Library Crime Classics will issue more.