‘The Case of the Busy Bees’ by Clifford Witting

Published by Galileo Publishers,
18 July 2024.
ISBN: 978-1-915530-45-5 (PB)
Originally published 1952.

Let me say straightaway that this is one of the most enjoyable Golden Age novels (it was first published in 1952) I have read in recent times. It has everything you could want within a constantly fascinating plot, including an abduction followed by two murders, attempted extortion, maps, drawings and a reproduction of a letter, and a cast of vivid and interesting characters. It is helped along in no small measure by Witting’s entertainingly breezy style.

A tomahawk of debated provenance is reported missing from Monk Jewel museum, an establishment run by the eccentric Mr Theophilus Mildwater. At the same time a notorious gang of violent thieves who call themselves The Busy Bees start operating in the area. Witting’s regular detective, DI Charlton, is investigating the activities of this gang, but when a violent murder is committed it appears that the Bees are linked to the theft.

So begins an investigation which rattles along merrily. As well as trying to identify abductors and murderers, Charlton and his colleagues are also desperate to discover the persona of Rex Apis (King Bee) who taunts them occasionally with written communications. We are regularly given tantalising glimpses of who is up to something without ever knowing quite what part they are playing in the various dodgy activities. A couple who are ostensibly on a holiday in their caravan and who run a cafe in London come under suspicion, and there are a number of characters who may not be what they seem. Who exactly, for instance, are Luther G. Ropemaker (of Cleveland, Ohio) and Otto Bijornson (currently of Kenya)? Is Mr Mildwater involved, and what about Rev. Glen? There is also the subplot of activities at Highman’s department store involving tensions between Jonathan Highman and his nephew Robin Galloway who stands to inherit the business. The latter’s relationship with a member of staff (herself the sister of a local criminal) leads to a dispute with his uncle. Galloway is also romantically linked to another local beauty.

Just as Inspector Charlton is about to solve the case he falls rather dramatically into a diabetic coma (we have been prepared for something along these lines through his increasingly failing health), and it is left to his colleagues to unmask the perpetrators. They identify the hives of The Busy Bees and the gang’s members (they are referred to only by numbers within the organization), and after a chase involving the caravan and an ambulance this intricate case is brought to a conclusion.

A thoroughly enjoyable novel, then, as I have already stated and, as the cliché goes, a real page-turner. It owes much to Witting’s entertaining style. Characters are well-drawn. As an example, there is the Chief Constable, Colonel Hollis, who is often more of a hindrance than a help, regularly telling his officers affably that he does not interfere whilst invariably doing so. Witting makes wry observations. ‘People shouldn’t have such names,’ someone observes when failing to remember a character called Elphinrick. ‘There ought to be a law against it.’ Colonel Hollis is not surprised when a criminal is unmasked whom he had come across in another context some years before: ‘Might have guessed he was no good. Called a table napkin a serviette – that sort of fellow.’ In a clear nod to Anthony Trollope, a letter from Rex Apis to a potential extortion victim is headed ‘Framley, Barchester, Barsetshire’.

You will not regret reading The Case of the Busy Bees. It is great fun.
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Reviewer: David Whittle

Clifford Witting (1907-1968) was born in Lewisham, England. He was educated at Eltham College, London, between 1916 and 1924. During World War II he served as a bombardier in the Royal Artillery, 1942-44, and as a Warrant Officer in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps, 1944-46. He married Ellen Marjorie Steward in 1934 and they had one daughter. Before becoming a full-time writer, he worked as a clerk in Lloyds bank from 1924 to 1942. He was Honorary Editor of The Old Elthamian magazine, London. from 1947 up to his death. His first novel Murder in Blue was published in 1937 and his series characters were Sergeant (later Inspector) Peter Bradford and Inspector Harry Charlton. Unusually, he didn’t join The Detection Club until 1958 by which time he had written 12 detective novels.

 

David Whittle is firstly a musician (he is an organist and was Director of Music at Leicester Grammar School for over 30 years) but has always enjoyed crime fiction. This led him to write a biography of the composer Bruce Montgomery who is better known to lovers of crime fiction as Edmund Crispin, about whom he gives talks now and then. He is currently convenor of the East Midlands Chapter of the Crime Writers’ Association.