The Case Of The Heavenly Twin

A review of The Case of the Heavenly Twin by Christopher Bush – 251111

A series that started out with The Plumley Inheritance way back in 1926 has now reached its fifty-eighth iteration and there are still five more novels to go before Christopher Bush finally put his pen down for good. Originally published in 1963 and reissued by Dean Street Press, The Case of the Heavenly Twin shows that while Bush prefers to stick to a winning formula, he is nonetheless prepared to make adjustments and to allow hints of his contemporary world peep through.

Long gone is Ludovic Travers’ old sparring partner, George Wharton, to be replaced by the more amenable but equally suspicious pairing of Jewle and Matthews and rather than relying upon the Yard to feed him cases in his role as a consultant, his main source of business is through his Broad Street Detective Agency’s relationship with John Hill of the United Assurance.

 As to vestiges of modernity, the concept of sitting down to watch television is mentioned several times, sometimes pejoratively as a sign of creeping Americanism, and a key to the resolution of the mystery lies in the form of a man posing as a television repairer. The instruments used in the fraud were traveller’s cheques, the currency of choice for travellers, especially after the Second World War in the days before credit cards.

But many things remain the same from the minor, such as the disdain for crooner, pop singers and rock and roll, to the more substantial obligatory scene with Tom Holger or his acolytes, a theatrical agent who gives the lowdown on some of thespians and musicians that come Travers’ way in return for an annual Christmas gift of a box of cigars. The main constant, though, is Bush’s plot device of taking three seemingly disparate threads and weaving them into a tight, complex, intriguing and sometimes baffling whole.

The first thread is supplied by John Hill who asks Travers to look into three frauds perpetrated on jewellers by an American or Canadian couple in the space of twenty four hours or so in Liverpool, Southampton and London, where expensive jewels have been purchased using realistically forged traveller’s cheques. The second and perhaps chunkier strand follows the death of Travers’ old friend and fellow clubman, Donald Mantler Senior, when Travers is instructed by the family solicitor, Horace Claden, to track sown the second of the Mantler grandsons, Kenneth. While the majority of the estate goes to Donald, the apple of his grandfather’s eye although the perspicacious Claden bridles at Travers’ suggestion that he is the heavenly twin, he has agreed to share some of the legacy with Kenneth.

The third strand concerns a jewellery heist at Denton House in the small Hampshire village of Denton Parva. An anonymous letter, the import of which is overlooked until the mystery moves to its conclusion, indicates that there were a couple of people acting suspiciously before the robbery but the robbery is pinned on Joey Banner aka Holy Joey or The Preacher due to his dalliance with the Salvation Army, something that ultimately proves to be his own salvation.

There are three murders along the way to spice things up although there is very much the sense that they are incidental to rather the main thrust of the mystery. Travers is far from the infallible sleuth, sometimes missing the import of something that is right in front of him, too easily beguiled by the wiles of a femme fatale, this time in the form of the chanteuse, Connie Riseman, and often fretting about the fine line he is walking between protecting the interests of hisclients and openly assisting the police.

The use of twins is a familiar plot device in detective fiction, one which, if not exactly playing fair with the armchair detective, offers plenty of opportunity for the author to muddy the waters which Bush takes with aplomb. Not one of his best, in my view, but it certainly beats spending several hours in front of the television.

The Wine Windows Of Florence

There is much to admire in Florence but one feature is barely noticed. Cut into the walls of some of the buildings are slots some eighteen centimetres wide and 35 centimetres tall, just large enough to hold a bottle of wine and that was their purpose. The buchette del vino, wine windows, owe the origin to the decision by the Medici dynasty after their return to power in 1532, to allow landowners to sell their wine directly to the public, thus cutting out the middle man but introducing the annoyance of having the hoi polloi cluttering up their magnificent courtyards.

The wine windows solved the problem, small arched openings carved out of the façade of the home, erecting a barrier between the proprietor and the consumer. Most would have a small door and a knocker which a client would use to place their order. Their bottle would be filled, the requisite money exchanged and the customer would be on their merry way without any human contact. In a time when contagious disease was rife, this was a safe way to sell wine, as the Florentine scholar, Francesco Rondinelli, noted in his report about disease contagion, Relazione del Contagio Stato in Firenze l’anno 1630 e 1633 (1634).   

No two wine windows were alike and some even had a plaque stating the opening hours and holidays of the buchetta. Orders for barrels of wine for home delivery could be placed via the windows and the sale of other produce, such as flasks of olive oil, cured legs of pork, flour, and vegetables, was transacted through them. Some charitable noblemen would use the windows as a way of getting rid of excess wine and produce while some windows were installed almost at floor level where the poor and needy could collect food or a jug of wine with a degree of anonymity.

Wine windows continued to be in operation until the early 20^th century and millions of litres of wine must have been dispensed through them in their four centuries of use. Most were either plastered over or converted into mail boxes, housing for door bells or intercom systems, but, according to Buchette del Vino, a cultural association in Florence, there are some 158 extant in the historical centre of Florence, a number which increases to around 180 in the Metropolitan city as a whole.

Established as a means of controlling contagious diseases, wine windows have experienced a renaissance, partly as a result of Covid 19 which particularly ravaged parts of Italy and partly because of Stanley Tucci’s TV series, Searching for Italy, in which the actor was seen sampling wine from an opening in the wall of Babae Restaurant, one of the first to resurrect the custom in 2020 as a way of preventing the spread of disease. Now about ten or so have been put back into commission, serving glasses of Tuscan wine, food, espresso, and gelato. Restored buchette di vino can be found at Cantina de’ Pucci, Osteria Belle Donn, DiVin Boccone, Gastronomia Duomo, and other sites.

Curiously, London had its own variation of the wine window, following the passing of the Gin Act of 1736, designed to curb the consumption of gin. Captain Dudley Bradstreet is said to have hung a sign of an old tomcat outside his London establishment. Beneath the cat’s paw was a slot into which a coin could be placed. This would be a sign for Bradstreet to pour a measure of gin through a lead pipe directly into his customer’s mouth. Not quite as hygienic as the wine window, though!

Post Mortem

A review of Post Mortem by Guy Cullingford

One of my undoubted finds of 2025 is Guy Cullingford, the ghost name, you might say, that Constance Taylor used for her series of a dozen crime fiction novels of which Post Mortem, originally published in 1953, is the third. It is a fascinating book laced with wit and humour, which takes the genre by the scruff of the neck and gives it a couple of sharp and sardonic twists and offers the reader an astonishing new perspective on what is a fairly tried and tested and, dare I say it, mundane set of plot devices.

The victim is the writer, Gilbert Worth, who is a fairly unpleasant character. He has successfully estranged himself from the other family members who live in the house with him and, for good measure, also the staff and in particular the gardener, Williams. Gilbert and his wife have grown steadily apart, continuing to live together for the sake of appearances, he finding consolation in the form of his femme fatale of a secretary who cannot spell, Rosina (Rosie) Peck and she has led on the next door neighbour, Major Toby Kent, into thinking that there is more to their friendship than the need for a friendly face.

Sylvia has also been deeply offended by the portrayal of the subject of Worth’s best selling work, Margueritte, which she sees as a thinly veiled character assassination of her which it is, although the author has deluded himself into believing that she is blissfully unaware of the fact. Juliet, their daughter, is appalled by the treatment of her mother by her father. Julian, the eldest son, has had his ambitions to be an author constantly thwarted by Gilbert and Robert, who wants to be a priest, is also under constant pressure to make his way in the world with a steady job. Both the sons accelerate their interest in Rosie before their father’s corpse has had time to cool down.

Prior to the crisis point there have been two strange incidents. Gilbert’s writing room is in a turret accessible by steep winding stairs. One evening, finding that the light bulb had blown he gingerly made his way down only for his foot to slip on a marble and he took a fall, although was not seriously hurt. Then, blessed with a sensitive sense of smell, he detects there is something wrong with his usual drink of milk and gives it to the kitchen cat which is duly found dead from poisoning the next morning.

The moment of crisis comes early on in the book when Gilbert is found in the downstairs study with half of his head blown off and a gun in his hand. The door to the French windows was open. Despite there being no suicide note and Gilbert being considered of a generally sound mind, albeit of an abrasive character and with an artistic temperament, the death is passed off as suicide.

Worth’s professional advisors, Carus Leach, the solicitor who is characterized throughout as a sea lion, and his publisher, Harry Stein, have misgivings but there is really only one person interested in the pursuit of the truth. With enough characters with sufficient motivation to commit a crime which would give them release from the purgatory in which they are existing there is plenty of material to sift. It would be wrong, though, to characterize the novel as a piece of detective fiction, more an exploration from an unusual vantage point a life lived, the wrong turnings made and the lessons to be learned, a sort of search for redemption.

To say more would give the game away as the book’s structure is wholly dependent on a particular plotting device. Suffice to say that its title is well chosen!

Gin Update (3)

Rosemullion Navy Gin

Founded in 2018 by Andy and Liz Bradbury, the Rosemullion Distillery is to be found in Mawnan in the south west of Cornwall, near Falmouth, and began launching its Dry Gin a year later. Now the range includes a Summer Gin, a Harvest Gin, a coastal Seafarer’s Gin, and a Navy Gin, as well as rums.   

The duo ferment their own base spirit for their gins and rums and their product is made in batches of between 100 and 200 bottles using their copper pot still. They use Cornish rainwater in both the fermentation and distillation processes and, naturally, use the abundant natural botanicals of this beautiful part of Cornwall to give their spirits that local twist.

You do not need much of an imagination to visualize a group of hearty Cornish seafarers making merry with their Navy Gin. With an ABV of 57% it pays homage to the local shoreline by adding seaside botanicals and seaweed to the mix and turning the dial up to eleven. Oily juniper rubs shoulders with liquorice and anise, lemon zest gives a lift to the party, while slightly saline vegetal notes and a healthy dose of cracked black pepper contribute to a memorable, refreshing, and warming finish.

The bottle is in their familiar solid chunk of pear=shaped clear glass, a thing of beaut to look at and very tactile to boot. This fan of Navy Gin thinks it is the best of their range.

Malfy Gin con Arancia

While Malfy’s Gin con Limone was a hit with me, their con Arancia was a tad disappointing. Made with Sicilian Blood oranges, which are unique to Sicily and so-called because of their red flesh and deep red juice, the spirit retains the distinctive, almost vibrant redness in its colour, enhanced by the masceration of their skins. There is always a trade-off and to use blood oranges for their startling colour is to lose the sweetness one ordinarily associates with an orange for a slightly more bitter taste. Perhaps this is what caused me to make a double-take.

Unlike some of the other offerings from Malfy where the named fruit is undoubtedly the star of the show and need little assistance from anything else, with the con Arancia there is vanilla and grapefruit in the mix. At least the juniper is given room to shine and act as a foil to the sweeter notes of the orange.

It is certainly refreshing and makes for a colourful display as a gin and tonic, but, for me, it was one of their less successful efforts.

Until the next time, cheers!

Gin Update (2)

Slingsby London Dry Gin

The North Yorkshire town of Harrogate is best known for amongst other things its water and tea. It was in 1571 that William Slingsby discovered the unique properties of the natural spring water from the Tewit Well, turning Harrogate into a spa town which attracted visitors keen to sample the waters. Betty and Taylors, founded in 1886 by Charles Taylor and his brother, is one of the nation’s pre-eminent purveyors of tea and coffee and owns the must-go-to attraction that is Betty’s Tea Room in Harrogate

Launched in August 2015 Slingsby London Dry Gin seeks to harness these fine Harrogate traditions by using water drawn from the Harrogate aquifer and including Taylors’ green and jasmine tea amongst the botanicals. In fact, the spirit uses 24 botanicals, of which 17 are sourced from Rudding Park Hall’s kitchen gardens in Harrogate. These include primrose, Severn sea rosemary, Silver posie thyme, citrus thyme, garden thyme, rhubarb, sage, lovage, chervil, nettle, and sweet cicely. Along with the two teas these are complemented by seven more traditional botanicals, Madagascar juniper, angelica, cassia, orris root, coriander, liquorice, and grapefruit.

Unsurprisingly, with all that going on, it is quite a pungent, punchy spirit with an ABV of 42% and with citric notes and the piney juniper coming through loud and clear, with a slight dryness provided by the tea and a sharpness from the rhubarb. There is a lot going on and it leaves the palate with an aftertaste that is a mélange of zest, pine, pepper and a vaguely floral tint which gives a sweetish finish.  

The bottle is another impressive one, a squat piece of blue glass with dimples in the sides to facilitate holding, broad rounded shoulders, and a short neck leading to a wooden neck and artificial stopper. Yorkshire in a bottle, you might say, but there surely comes a time that in order to stand out on a gin shelf you should deliberately aim not to stand out. The red foil around the neck shows that they are proud to be official suppliers to the British and Irish Lions.

Eden Mill Golf Gin

Egg chasing is not my sport nor is spoiling a long walk by trying to put a small ball into a tiny hole but the home of golf, St Andrew’s, has inspired what local distillers, Eden Mill, claim to be the only gin in existence to be distilled with botanicals foraged from one of the most iconic golf courses in the world. I have no reason to doubt that this is the case.

The course provides gorse, heather, and lavender, while the sea, visible from the course, is represented by the subtle saltiness of Scottish kombu seaweed which offsets the otherwise potentially overpowering floral notes. With an ABV of 42% it makes for a refreshing, flavoursome drink, ideal for sipping in the 19^th hole.

Golf has made its mark on the tall, cylindrical bottle made of clear glass which features as its design the dimples found on a golf ball. The small illustration which features at the front of the bottle is worth some study. It features the Swilcan Bridge which stands on the 18^th fairway of the Old Course, built over 700 years ago to allow shepherds to move their livestock across the burn. The sheep pays homage to the old legend that the bunkers were hollowed out by sheep seeking refuge from the winds that sweep across the course.

Towards the bottom of the illustration is a room key with the number 269, a reference to the room that Tiger Woods stays in at the Old Course Hotel, acknowledging the 269 strokes he took to win his first Open championship in 2000. The illustration is ringed by representations of some of the botanicals used in distilling the spirit, including seaweed, heather, and lemon, topped off with a golf flag, inevitably, and the three peaks of the distillery in a shimmering a golden hue.

Until the next time, cheers!