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Read through chapter 12. I knew there was going to be a murder eventually! So, Mr. Coburn. If I followed Ch12 right, he was shot while in a taxi, from someone outside of the taxi. Getting a list of suspects is going to be tough. We should probably assume that the culprit has already been introduced. Can someone pull together a list of characters? Quinn2win fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Oct 2, 2013 |
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Aug 27, 2013 20:55
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It's probably a reaction to the standard tropes of a book written in 1922, but I can't help feeling that Madeleine has got to be less innocent than she seems. Maybe it's just hard to accept the only woman character as a distressed damsel that needs to be rescued by any old random man coming along and asking to marry her. There's nothing in the text to support her as being anything other than innocent, though. With the murder, and the introduction of the inspector, the book has gone in a different direction than I was expecting. We still seem to be entirely in the dark about what's actually going on, and how, though.
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Aug 27, 2013 21:39
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I've not been keeping up because I first want to finish the fourth Wheel of Time book, but it's so boring so far, so that's not going too fast either. When that's done, I'll dive back into this one.
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Aug 27, 2013 21:41
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ProfessorProf posted:Read through chapter 12. The way I read it, he was shot by the other passenger since the silencer/cloth was dropped inside the cab. The other passenger hides his face when boarding, shoots Coburn in transmit, talks at the body while getting out early, and escapes while the cab keeps going to the train station where the body is discovered. The description of the body also matches up with Coburn's first description, so there probably won't be a dramatic twist when Merrimen gets around to identifying it. The other passenger's description matches up reasonably well with Beamish's, but there's still at least two conspirators that have never been on camera. It feels to me like the main mystery is still figuring out what's the deal with the boats/numbers, since it seems pretty clear that Coburn was killed by one of the other conspirators (removing him from the plot before he can reveal the answer). Character descriptions (everyone with a name I think): Merrimen, a wine merchant - "He was a pleasant-looking man of about eight-and-twenty, clean shaven and with gray, honest eyes, dark hair slightly inclined to curl, and a square, well-cut jaw." Henri, a truck driver and conspirator - "He was a man of about thirty, good-looking, with thin, clear-cut features, an aquiline nose, and dark, clever-looking eyes." Madeline, ?a conspirator? - "She was of medium height, slender and graceful as a lily, and looked about three-and-twenty." ... "As she came closer, Merriman saw that her eyes, friendly, honest eyes, were a shade of golden brown, and that a hint of gold also gleamed in the brown of her hair. She was pretty, not classically beautiful, but very charming and attractive-looking." Coburn, a sawmill manager and conspirator - "He was tall and slender like his daughter, and walked with lithe, slightly feline movements. His face was oval, clear skinned, and with a pallid complexion made still paler by his dark hair and eyes and a tiny mustache, almost black and with waxed and pointed ends. He was good-looking as to features, but the face was weak and the expression a trifle shifty." Hillard, a customs inspector - "His thin, eager face, with its hooked nose, pale blue eyes and light, rather untidy-looking hair, formed a true index of his nimble, somewhat speculative mind." Beamish, a ship's captain and conspirator - "The newcomer was powerfully built and would have been tall, but for rather rounded shoulders and a stoop. He was clean shaven, with a heavy jaw and thin lips which were compressed into a narrow line." Bulla, a ship's engineer and conspirator - "a short, thick-set man named Bulla" Morton, a conspirator - ? Archer, a conspirator - ? Bensen, the manager at the landing in Ferriby and a conspirator - "He was a young fellow, slight in build, with an extremely alert and intelligent face, but a rather unpleasant expression. The sallowness of his complexion was emphasized by his almost jet black hair and dark eyes." Tom, the foreman at the landing in Ferriby - "He was older and looked like a foreman. His face was a contrast to that of the other. In it the expression was good—kindly, reliable, honest—but ability was not marked. He looked a decent, plodding, stupid man." Leatham, mine owner - "Charles Leatham was a man of about five-and-thirty, tall, broad, and of muscular build. He had a strong, clean-shaven face, a kindly though direct manner, and there was about him a SUGGESTION of decision and efficiency which inspired the confidence of those with whom he came in contact." Menzies, Leatham's employee - No description given Willis, a Scotland Yard detective - "George Willis was a tall, somewhat burly man of five-and-forty, with heavy, clean-shaven, expressionless features which would have made his face almost stupid, had it not been redeemed by a pair of the keenest of blue eyes." Newman, a doctor - "an exceedingly dapper and well-groomed little man with medico written all over him" the body, probably Coburn - "The face was long and oval, the hair and eyes dark, and there was a tiny black mustache with waxed ends." the other taxicab passenger, probably a murderer and conspirator - "the other was a big, tall gent", "He was a tall man, longer than what you [Willis] are, and broad too. A big man, I should call him." Henri and Beamish are also described as having a manner higher than their apparent station.
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Aug 30, 2013 02:29
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Hobnob posted:
Yeah, but on the other hand, a damsel in distress being secretly (or even obviously to anyone, but the dumbass of a main character) evil is one of the worst (well, at least my least favorite) tropes popularized by hard-boiled fiction. But for 1922 it would still be somewhat unexpected twist. Damsel in distress is the kind of trope that works well with providing "a motivation" for "a character" (usually "Watson" type, because "Holmes" shouldn't be distracted with such matters) without diverting readers' attention too much from stuff that actually matters: solving a mystery. rvm fucked around with this message at 19:49 on Aug 30, 2013 |
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Aug 30, 2013 19:40
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I'm reluctant to suspect Madeleine, just because the "She's obviously too nice to not be evil" line of thought burned us pretty bad back in Murder is Easy. I don't know how well that would've gone over with a 20s audience.
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Aug 30, 2013 19:47
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My guess at the limitations of a 1920's innocent young women character is that they can't commit crimes for profit, but emotional motives are fair game. So Madeline couldn't shoot someone to rob them, but she could shoot them to stop them from exposing her father's crimes or to get revenge for something.
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Aug 31, 2013 00:52
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I wonder Madeleine is now? So Coburn went to the syndicate meeting on the Thursday. It must have been held in England, (maybe in Hull owing to the train ticket). He survives the meeting, and a couple of days later he and Madeleine check out of their hotel, and only then does the murder occur. No real surprise that it took the syndicate a few days to make their plans. But where could Madeleine be now? I also really want someone to go to France and follow Henri and his mysterious trucks. Even the characters keep bringing up the idea but haven't followed through. I'm sure it would blow the case wide open. They should also find out what was in the shed, and whether those 'aspirin' pills shown to Merriman were actually aspirin.
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Sep 4, 2013 11:24
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We still going?
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Sep 9, 2013 05:13
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I'm still in.. If Autumncomet doesn't reappear shall we just keep going?
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Sep 9, 2013 08:46
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If he doesn't show up by tomorrow, I'll start reading ahead and pick the next stopping point myself.
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Sep 9, 2013 13:31
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My confusion is as follows: If I remember things correctly, their observations confirmed that no special selection or processing is happening to the pit props after unloading, making it impossible for the pit props to be loaded with something. By invoking their friend the mine owner, they also confirmed the boat doesn't stop to filter out part of the pit props after it left, which means some of the pit props also can't somehow have extra value themselves (like say of being of a more valuable exotic wood or whatever). This seems to leave only the possibility that the pit props are a total red herring. I'd want to go back and reread the earlier sections to see if some of those eliminations could be flawed. I'm not sure if I remember correctly by now, but their observation also eliminated the possibility that something else is being loaded or unloaded for the boat, right? Could the crew members carry something on them? But then why all the pit prop complication? And what's the relation to those license plates again?
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Sep 9, 2013 17:35
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I think we've been on this segment long enough to do away with spoiler tags for it. It's been a while since I read the segment, but would it be possible for the filtering to happen on the boat during transit somehow?
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Sep 9, 2013 17:47
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If they would filter on the boat, they still have to get the valuables off of it somehow.
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Sep 9, 2013 18:17
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The fuel oil tank filling might be worth another look. If what they're smuggling is brandy (or some other liquid), it would be the obvious way to get it off the boat - perhaps a fake fuel tank. But I think that passage in the book explicitly says they examined it and nothing was suspicious. Could they be throwing the (doctored) props overboard somewhere at sea and collecting them later? Though we haven't an inkling of another boat or anything.
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Sep 9, 2013 21:52
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I thought Zola was following but I guess not.  Read up to the end of chapter 15. There's a reveal in the next chapter regarding the nature of the smuggling so lock in any theories you have!
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Sep 10, 2013 09:28
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ProfessorProf posted:I think we've been on this segment long enough to do away with spoiler tags for it. Autumncomet posted:I thought Zola was following but I guess not. For what it's worth, keeping things spoilered allows you to see how far to read without spoiling the book if you're catching up due to absence or whatever. I don't see much against keeping the spoiler tags in myself, don't know about the rest of you?
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Sep 10, 2013 17:49
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Autumncomet posted:I thought Zola was following but I guess not. Zola was busy with a flu-like illness.  I'm going to try to catch up tonight.
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Sep 10, 2013 18:13
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My smuggling guess: Some small items are being smuggled in the fuel oil. The book's brought up the refueling repeatedly when it didn't have to (for example, it never brings up how fresh food and water gets loaded on the ship). The objects get wrapped in some oilproof container, pushed through the tubes, sit hidden at the bottom of the oil tank when the ship crosses the border, and are either hand carried or pumped back ashore on arrival. e: and after reading the chapters, still possible 
Foxfire_ fucked around with this message at 02:08 on Sep 11, 2013 |
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Sep 11, 2013 01:29
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Apparently I've been totally forgetting to update the OP for chapters since we started this book! Whoops. I find myself fixating on the language used by our conspirators to describe their cargo. Archer tells Benson to "bring the usual up tonight", and in the second call, Benson says he "brought up two hundred and fifty" and "got seven hundred unexpectedly planted." They also use "blank cargoes" to describe the safe shipments, which leads me to strongly suspect that, whatever is up, it is indeed somehow hidden within the cargo of props. What kind of smuggling items would appear in these kinds of quantities? They seem small for counterfeit bills, and large for gallons of brandy, and either way that word 'planted' seems strange. What's really being smuggled here? As for Willis's trap failing, possibilities: The conspirators slipped past the perimeter and made the exchange. I'm inclined to toss this idea out, unless there was an explicit weakness in Willis's net that I didn't catch. The conspirators made the exchange elsewhere. Do we have any guarantee that either Archer or Benson was at the same place that Willis was staking out? The conspirators did not make the exchange. Esoteric, but I don't think it's impossible. Would require them to be aware that they were being monitored, allowing them to deliberately feed false intel to Willis. Nothing definite, but it's getting quite interesting. With five chapters to go, it's probably about time to start talking about our next book. Unless someone else has something to run, I'll nominate The Moving Finger. Quinn2win fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Oct 2, 2013 |
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Sep 11, 2013 20:25
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Maybe a hidden pipe between the depot and the distillery? I mean if it is brandy (and the fact that it's ending up at a distillery seems to point to that) then you'd only need a pipe to transport it. Perhaps, from the map we had previously, a small pipe running along the railway line?
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Sep 12, 2013 04:13
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Yes, I like the pipe/refuelling idea. It seems the only possible way, if the cargo isn't being brought off by passengers or crew and isn't in the pit props.
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Sep 15, 2013 09:58
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Relevant question: Did ships in 1922 use liquid fuel?
Quinn2win fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Oct 2, 2013 |
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Sep 15, 2013 14:28
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The thread's slowed down so catch up and post any theories about the smuggling you want to lock in.
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Sep 20, 2013 06:47
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ProfessorProf posted:Relevant question: Did ships in 1922 use liquid fuel? The Girondin is described as having Diesel engines earlier in the book.
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Sep 25, 2013 08:42
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At least we know that the rectifier earlier in the book wasn't a coincidence: the manager is the murderer. The book's characters are also still pushing forward both brandy smuggling and false money as possible explanations. 1) The UK end point has a distillery/rectifier as the only thing nearby, and we know the managers there are heavily involved. 2) Whatever is being smuggled is being "planted" in small quantities. The manager in the rectifier is very good at this. 3) Having another boat could substantially improve their profit. 4) "Blank" cargo can be used if they suspect they're under surveillance. The license plates may be used to signal the need for this. 5) Whatever is being smuggled can be transported essentially undetected to the rectifier. An underground pipeline does sound very reasonable, after all they had to dig to put the phone line. It was remarked earlier that even though a rectifier isn't watched as heavily as a distillery, they're still kept under an eye, and Hilliard didn't believe it was feasible because of that. Either he's naive or the processing that the rectifier does is something not straightforward. Passage of note: "rectifiers, because they don't themselves produce spirit, but merely refine what other firms have produced, are not so strictly looked after" You can distill wood alcohol (ethanol) from wood, but that's not drinkable and I don't see how that would allow them to make such profits. I went back and indeed the fueling of the boat is described several times, including the apparatus...and the barrel they observed from. They're also described as having inspected the fueling apparatus closely but not having seen anything particular. I reread the first chapter and there's something of note: when he sees the lorry of which the plates are changed, it does *not* contain wood or pitprops, but "a single heavy casting". So here's my theory: they're not smuggling brandy but alcohol. The planting refers to getting rid of the excess alcohol they have compared to their intake in the rectifier. They might even just put the ethanol in the diesel tanks: the relative density and boiling points are different so they should stay separated during the trip. (While checking this, I was alerted that ethanol-diesel mixtures are very much a thing that can actually power engines, but I'm not sure an engineer from the 1920s would have known this!) The rectifier can do the separation again. The props are a red herring to hide the true purpose of the boat trips. They already established earlier that the props couldn't' really be liquid containers because they aren't taken back, and the conspirators didn't balk when they suddenly had to give props to their mine-owner friend.
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Sep 25, 2013 12:11
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Should we keep going with the book? The thread is all quiet but I want to know what happens.
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Sep 30, 2013 02:48
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If no one has any other theories then read to the end of chapter 17.
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Sep 30, 2013 04:05
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Well that was an information-dense chunk. I still don't have a very good sense of the shape of the tunnel or of what still remains to be figured out. I'll probably have to go over it again at some point... Quinn2win fucked around with this message at 19:18 on Oct 25, 2013 |
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Oct 2, 2013 15:36
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Bleh. So the smuggling is done via a big hundred gallon tank on the ship that noone noticed while searching it. And it's loaded/unloaded on both ends by hidden underground pump rooms. Hopefully there's something more interesting going on with the number plates.
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Oct 9, 2013 00:16
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Well that explains that I guess. I hope the numberplate thing is solved next - I think that perhaps if they'd looked at that first, the whole thing would come clear. Still hoping for a last minute twist though.
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Oct 13, 2013 04:54
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Well the one mystery I figured out was fully explained before the end of the chapter :-/ The remaining mystery is how they get the brandy in in France. They can hardly have the lorries just carrying it over from the producer, given that they have signage saying they're from the Pit Prop Syndicate. That would raise exactly the sort of questions they want to avoid. I'm guessing they're stored at some intermediary that (for example) also sells fuel, and that they have two lorries with the same numbering (one fake) do the pickups. I'm a bit disappointed that the mystery we spent much time on (how are the goods transported) is handwaved away by a storage unit that all the protagonists totally missed even when specifically inspecting the boat for it, and guessing the real mystery would have required us a few chapters back to say something to the effect of: "There is an invisible tunnel containing unhearable railroad cars and an unhearable pump with a tube that's also unhearable going to an invisible hole in the warf.", without as much as a hint in that direction. At some point the protagonist is actually listening in on the boat, though I guess you could claim they didn't necessarily had to do a transfer at that time (but I'm not sure).
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Oct 16, 2013 12:17
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It's been quite a while, so read up to the end of chapter 19, which has some of the best-worst lines in the entire book. 
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Oct 25, 2013 04:34
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So if I followed this segment, right, the purpose of the number switching is so that the French officials would think they had inspected every lorry for illicit materials, when they were actually only inspecting the same safe few with different numbers on them? It looks like the only real mysteries left are how they're going to catch the crooks, and why they keep capitalizing SUGGESTION. So, since we're approaching the end: Does this thread still have enough steam in it for another book after this one?
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Oct 25, 2013 19:20
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ProfessorProf posted:So, since we're approaching the end: Does this thread still have enough steam in it for another book after this one? I know I do! I couldn't do this book because of some real life stuff eating my time, but I'm totally ready for another book now that I have free time.
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Oct 25, 2013 19:24
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Should we go ahead and lurch on towards the ending?
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Oct 30, 2013 21:34
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Sure, let's do it. I'm definitely in for another book too, after this one.
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Nov 2, 2013 08:54
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Onwards to the end.  Read this after you've read the last chapter. I feel like this book had a lot of potential and it was kind of fun going "maybe that's it, no no, maybe it's this, hey I was right all along!" but the characters just didn't do it for me. Also not a fan of the romance. And as mentioned a few posts up, the brandy thing was a little too hand-wavy. I'll be looking forward to Sherringford or whoever doing the next book!
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Nov 2, 2013 09:18
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Finished - not a bad ending. The last minute attempt at a twist kept it somewhat interesting but could have felt a bit more dramatic. It was also a bit annoying that Hilliard, Merriman, and Madeleine hardly featured in the final resolution - more realistic, yes, but I didn't really get much of a feel for the Inspector's character in his section. I'm pleased that the number plate mystery had a satisfying explanation. And it seems like the author still had a few extra SUGGESTIONS saved up, because there were a lot in that last section. A good mystery though, looking forward to the next one.
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Nov 3, 2013 05:09
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Well that's that. Did we actually solve anything, or was this round a total wash? I'll leave this to Sherringford if he has anything he wants to run, but I'll run something if he doesn't.
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Nov 4, 2013 17:45
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