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First published: 1926
Pages: 147

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About this book

Before he created Horatio Hornblower, C. S. Forester wrote this tight, unsettling crime novel, published in 1926. William Marble is a struggling London bank clerk buried in debt when a wealthy young nephew arrives from abroad, carrying a small fortune. Marble poisons him and hides the body in the back garden, and from that moment the money he killed for becomes a torment rather than a rescue. He cannot spend it without drawing suspicion, cannot bear to leave the house that hides his crime, and slowly comes apart under the strain. Forester studies guilt and self-destruction with cold precision, and a bitter stroke of irony waits at the end. A free PDF and EPUB edition is available here.

About the author

C. S. Forester

C. S. Forester (1899-1966) was a British novelist best known for the Horatio Hornblower series of naval adventures and for The African Queen. Beyond his sea stories he wrote crime fiction and screenplays, with a lasting interest in characters pushed to moral extremes under pressure.

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