MAKING MYSTERIES

It is curious that most people feel they must apologize for a love of mystery stories. They feel somehow that a good detective story is not "literary", that it is a sort of Sunday supplement intruded into a cultured society of books. And yet these same people say that it is proper to read Lewis Carroll because he is a relaxation for the mind. Why this should be considered a proper answer is another mystery, for it takes a good deal of thinking to understand. "Through the Looking Glass", but a detective story writer does all the reader's thinking for him.

Detective stories are really the only form of literature which strikes a common chord in the hearts of all readers. They are read by the intelligentsia, the middle classes, and the great unwashed. Under the circumstances, it is strange that there are so few good mystery stories. Sir Conan Doyle has deserted Sherlock Holmes for spiritualism. Cyril McNeile puts out a good "Bull-Dog Drummond" story every now and then, but not often enough. There are quite a few books put out with such appetizing titles as "The Red House Mystery", but they are not mysterious. The production of one of the most delightful and fascinating kinds of literature seems to be at a standstill, and a mystified public would like to know why.

In this connection the comment of an English reviewer is interesting. He wants to know why no book has ever been written to which it is proved that the man to whom all the evidence, circumstantial, testimonial and otherwise, points, really committed the crime.