A review of The Box Office Murders by Freeman Wills Crofts – 231202

The fifth in Freeman Wills Crofts’ Inspector French series, The Box Office Murders, also known as The Purple Sickle Murders, was originally published in 1929. As Crofts’ stories go, this is quite an accessible book and relatively uncomplicated, perhaps reflecting the fact that this is the last book he wrote while working as a railway engineer and had not the spare time to concoct dastardly mind-twisting plots.

Thurza Darke approaches Inspector French with concerns about the death of her friend, Eileen Tucker. Both worked in box offices in London cinemas and both had been lured into a get rich quick betting syndicate by a woman they met on a train. After some initial successes, both begin wracking up debts and fall into the clutches of a Gang who force to act on their behalf. Any resistance or suspicion that they are acting as informants means a death sentence. One of the gang members has a distinctive purple sickle tattoo.

Intrigued, and recognising another murder that falls into the same pattern, a box office operator, French decides to investigate, using Darke as one of his principal informants. Predictably, Darke’s involvement leads to her own death and French is genuinely moved when he sees her body. Vowing to avenge these senseless deaths, he redoubles his efforts to bring the gang to justice. Thanks to a suggestion from his wife, he finds another box office operator, Molly Moran, to help. However, her role in the investigation piques her curiosity and despite the Inspector’s warnings to be careful, puts herself into unnecessary danger. It is rare for there to be much emotional engagement in a Crofts’ novel, but there is genuine sympathy for the plight and fate of these naïve women.

From a structural perspective, there is little mystery as we know the identities of the gang members and the murders, two of which have occurred before the book begins, are of little individual interest, save to emphasise the brutality of the gang and suggest that they are involved in much more than luring gullible and vulnerable young women into gambling debts. What interests Crofts/French is the scheme that the gang are operating, essentially one involving the counterfeiting of half-crown coins, some of which are passed off into circulation through the dispensing of change at cinema box offices.

The mechanics of how the coins are produced and then put through a process to give them the appearance of wear are described in detail. Even the officials from the Royal Mint are duped by the results. It is clear to see that the possibilities opened up by a gang using this process were what interested Wills in developing this story and while there might be a little too much technical detail for some, the particulars of the counterfeiting need to be understood to explain why such an elaborate scheme was developed to put them into circulation. The profit for the gang was in the fact that the face value o the coinage was considerably higher than the cost of manufacture.

Much of the book is solid police procedural and Crofts is pedantically obsessed by detail. French does not just take a train from A to B but will take a specifically timed train calling at. A chase through the streets of London involves the naming of every street down which he travels, allowing the reader to follow the progress using an A to Z. Initially, these stylistic features can be irksome but after a while I put it down to just how it is.

The denouement is exciting as French tries both to rescue Molly and apprehend the gang, whose escape is delayed by the need to move their bespoke machinery. On the whole, I enjoyed the book, particularly as Crofts exhibited an emotional range that I had not seen before.