The House by the River

A. P. Herbert built this 1920 novel around a single terrible act and the slow rot that follows it. Stephen Byrne, a charming poet living beside the Thames at Hammerton Chase, kills his young maid in a moment of panic and persuades his loyal, unassuming neighbor John Egerton to help him hide the body. What begins as concealment turns into something crueler, as Byrne lets suspicion settle on the friend who saved him. Herbert, better known for his light comic writing, shows a darker gift here for guilt, cowardice, and the way an ordinary man talks himself into monstrous choices. Fritz Lang filmed it in 1950. You can read it free as a PDF and EPUB.