The Angel of Terror

A 1922 thriller from one of the era’s most productive crime writers, this novel centers on Jean Briggerland, whose delicate beauty hides a gift for arranging fatal ‘accidents.’ It opens on the murder trial of James Meredith, whom Jean’s testimony helped condemn, while his own account blames her father for the killing and her for the frame-up. Unconvinced of her innocence, Meredith’s solicitor Jack Glover works to shield Lydia Beale, a struggling artist married into the Meredith fortune that Jean stands to inherit should Lydia die. Scheme follows scheme against the young wife, among them a grimly memorable attempt to infect her with smallpox. Wallace moves the action from London to the French Riviera and, as was his habit, reveals each plot in advance, so the suspense lies in watching the net tighten rather than in guessing the culprit.