Evening star., 1950-01-01

Lacks the Usual
Fast Getaway
THE PARASITES
BY Daphne Du Maurier. (Dou-
bleday G. Co.,; S3.)
Reviewed by
MARY McGRORY.
Give Daphne Du Maurier a plot
she can ride and off she goes.
laundering down the high road
at midnight, her readers in hot
pursuit. On the secret stairway, in
the ghost-ridden passage, no one
is surer-footed. But she is far
more at home in the company of
desperate generals and haunted
brides than she is with the ever
so-brittle sophisticates of her cur
rent attempt at drawing room
comedy. Dash, not depth, is her
strong suit, and although she bus
ties about good deal from May
fair to Paris. THE Parasites, u
which is essentially a character
study. never really goes very far
or moves very fast.
Two Noel Cowardish ne'er-do-
wells and an Elsie Dinsmore-type
spinster comprise the trio whom
she follows here from nursery to
full-grown immaturity. Utterly
irresponsible, they feed on each
other and the people unwise
enough to enter their orbit. But
since Miss Du Maurier has them
told off at some length in the
opening chapter. any suspense,
usually such a factor in her
cracking chronicles, is notably
absent.
A Complete Relationship.
Her central characters, the fab
ulous Delaneys, bear a complex
relationship to one another. Maria
is the daughter of a singer and
a soubrette; Mall is the son OF
dancer and a pianist; Celia is
the legitimate offspring of the
singer and the dancer, who travel
across Europe. enjoying triumph
after triumph, while their undis-
ciplined children romp backstage
and terrorize hotel staffs.
Their emotional lives are also
involved. Maria is seduced when
scarcely in her teens. and after
and during many love affairs
marries county squire. Mail
skips school to elope to Paris with
an old family friend who serves
in the dual capacity of mistress
and governess. Celia has no love
life at all. Maria and Mall, who
entertain what the jacket circum-
specify calls "a strange affinity
for each other, eventually become
lovers.
| After their rococo childhood,
with the help of the family name
and minimum of effort, Maria
and Mall become famous. Celia,
who, we are told, might have been
a fine artist, makes a career of
running errands for other people
and never quite has the courage
to exercise her talent.
Disastrous Week End.
Apparently lowering between a
desire to laugh at her characters
and deplore them, Miss Du
Maurier does much better on
the few occasions when she
decides they are pretty ridicu-
lous after all. BY far the best
passage in the book is a broadly
comic review of a disastrous
country week end. But elsewhere,
especially when she uses the edi-
torial I'VE" as her vantage-point
she is needlessly solemn, and the
Delaneys. desperately gay from
the cradle. become a bit tiresome.
What makes THE Parasites"
finally unrewarding. however, is
the lack of any contrasting char
acters to point up their futility.
Maria's husband is a stiff slice of
the roast beef of old England.
Malls mistress is a blowsy, cheer
full sort who doesn't seem to care
much one way or the other. And
since Miss Du Maurier, except in
the delicious instance mentioned
above, eschews satire. the Delaneys
do not make particularly strik-
ing family portrait.
r. 81