Evening star., 1934-08-08
NEW BOOKS
AT RANDOM
MGgwsf Cermond.

OUT WENT THE TAPER. BY r. C.
Ashby. New York; The Macmillan
Co.
PlaS Conan, an old barraoklike,
unattractive house in the vale OF
Cwm wyddfa. and but half n mile
from the ruins Of st. Hoel Monastery.
is the background for this vivid tale
of ancient ghosts and modern crime.
The ugly, thirty-room. bleak Welsh
mansion had been unoccupied for sew
eral years. and would have remained
empty had not the Spring food OF
1881 driven the Reverend Ambrose Cory
and his family from their home and
compelled the churchwardenS TO ar
range a temporary shelter for the
rectory family elsewhere. Plas Conan
was selected and the family moved IN
Traditional ghost stores. believed
for generations by the natives of the
village, had their origin in historic
deeds OF horror committed in st.
Hoels, and the influence OF It's
haunted ruins ranged from the noun
tain Of Byrn Margiad, at the head
of the vale, to the village. Indeed the
rector himself would not have been
surprised had he seen the striding
form Of great Lewellyn or the ghosts
of English warriors sweeping over the
heights as he gazed from his window
into the mists of early morning.
The monastery had been sacked by
one of Edwards barons in the con-
quest of Wales in l27T. when the King
OF England swept down over the noun
tainS of the Snowden range and pill
LACED and burned and murdered
throughout the land. Edward himself
had slaughtered the bards OF Snowden,
and IL was Gilbert the Red who had
descended on the monastery one night
with his drunken troops and alter
smashing up the holy edif1ce had
ordered its ffty-four monks and lay
brothers to be built up alive into the
walls of the wine vault before he rode
away to meet Llewellyn in battle. No
bell had rung from st. Hoels since that
night of horror. But occasionally some
superstitious native had coupled a tale
Of mysterious loss or the seeing Of an
apparition with an avowal OF having
heard the bell.
Into this atmosphere Of superstition
and history appears Tai Winyatt oil
Kansas. q college mate of Nigel Cory,
invited to spend the Summer vacation
at the rectory. A young man from
that section Of the United States,
whose ancestors were pioneers OF the
Western frontier, is not likely TO take
much stock in ghosts. but Tai becomes
keenly interested in the st. Hoel ruins
and is determined TO explore them
despite the advice of his host to keep
away from the monastery. He had
seen a circular indentation in a nag
stone of the cloister, ehoked with dirt
and mold, but he knew it had once
held q ring, and his inherited 5est for
adventure will not permit him to leave
Own Wyddfa without knowing what
hes hidden under that stone.
In the dead Of night he steals from
his room in PIas Conan, armed with
a fashlght and poker, and sets out
to explore the ruins. He spends hours
in terrifying chambers of horror,
emerging finally in a state of ex-
haustion, from which he falls asleep
in an open field. He is awakened from
his slumber by a ghost, who talks with
him a while and vanishes. Other
people in the village have encountered
the same ghost In places much nearer
their homes than st. Hoel.
Another ghost inhabits Plas Conan,
ffa
material equipment and sending cold
chills down the spines Of those who
are dwelling temporarily under its
roof. Two more murders are COM
mitted before the mystery of those
earlier victims whose spirits haunt
the rectory and the monastery neigh
borhood is solved.
Besides the rector, who Is a student
Of psychic phenomena; his placid wife,
his practical son and his sensible
daughter, those who are living at Plas
Conan include Tai Winyatt, spinster
sister of Mrs. Cory's, and DR.. Gabor,
German scientist, who believes in
ghosts and who has a strange and un-
happy past. Others who participate
In the story are Mrs. Powys, a me-
dtum; Swami Stenhalls, Mick Web
ster and Tony Cleeve, strangers in the
neighborhood, and Mr.. Collins, the
owner Of Plas Conan.
The author of this new mystery will
be remembered for his outstanding
achievement In He Arrived at Dusk, I"
the story of a ghost who stalked the
moors in remote section of Scotland,
This second tale Of ghosts and mur-
ders is even better. Mr.. Ashby is q
craftsman Of first rank and q creator
of ghosts to whom even the confirmed
unbeliever is not only willing but
anxious to be introduced.
THE STRANGLED WITNESS. BY
Leslie Ford. New York: Farrar
81 Rinehalt, Inc.
There is something singular about
the consistency with which authors
who select the Nations Capital as the
location of novels of either romance
or mystery fail to create an at
mosphere Of reality. In the latter
field there is one exception. Natalie
Lincoln is the only writer whose skill
is equal to the task of presenting a
tale OF crime against a convincing
Washington background.
Except for the weakness of back
ground, however, "The Strangled Wit
ness" is a well-constructed and enter
tanning story. Its principals are en-
meshed in the complex activities of
the lobbying profession which thrives
nightly on Capitol Hill. On the eve
OF q vote in the Senate on a proposal
to remove from private ownership the
vast utilities corporations of the coun-
try, 1t becomes known that Senator
Greer, powerful influence in the
Upper House, is to make a radio
speech renouncing his allegiance to the
private owners in favor of the New Deal
proposal. But when the speech goes
out into the ether it informs the Ma
ton that he will support the cor
porations. Late that night the Sen
ator is found dead in his own living
room, murdered by the wielder of
pistol.
A beautiful widow, believed to be