Smallbone Deceased

Smallbone Deceased is a 1950 mystery novel by the English author Michael Gilbert, published in the United Kingdom by Hodder and Stoughton and in the United States by Harper & Brothers. A practising lawyer himself, Gilbert made the setting of the novel a London solicitor's office. It was Gilbert's fourth novel and, like his three earlier ones, features Chief Inspector Hazlerigg. The novel was well-received and has regularly appeared in "Top 100" crime lists. Some critics consider it to be Gilbert's best work. Plot Horniman, Birley and Craine are a respectable firm of solicitors, of Lincoln's Inn, London. After the firm’s senior partner Abel Horniman dies, a large deed box in his office is opened to reveal a corpse. It belongs to Marcus Smallbone, who had been a co-trustee with Mr Horniman of the valuable Ichabod Stokes Trust. Chief Inspector Hazlerigg investigates with the help of Henry Bohun, a newly-qualified solicitor and employee of the firm. Bohan has a condition (called in the novel 'parainsomnia') that means he needs less than two hours sleep a night, giving him a great deal of time to help with the investigations. Suspicion falls initially on the recently-deceased partner, the theory being that Smallbone had been killed to prevent him from publicly denouncing Abel Horniman’s misuse of the Trust funds. Miss Cornel, who had been Mr Horniman’s devoted secretary for over 20 years, helps his solicitor son Bob Horniman take over the Ichabod Stokes Trust work. But when Miss Chittering, one of the secretaries, is strangled, suspicion switches to Bob himself, who is clearly lying about where he was on the day in question. Bohun realises that Bob Horniman is in love with another of the secretaries, Anne Mildmay. The pair had had a romantic liaison in the office on the day Miss Chittering was killed, and he lied about it to protect her. The true killer was Miss Cornel who, in an act of misguided loyalty to her ex-employer, had dispatched Smallbone to avoid Abel Hornman’s fraud coming to light; and when it appeared that Miss Chittering had information that would have implicated her, had killed her as well.