W. Bolingbroke Johnson, The Widening Stain

W. Bolingbroke Johnson, The Widening Stain
Copyright © 1942 Morris Bishop
Reprinted 2020 by The Mysterious Press

The author's name is a nom de plume for Morris Bishop, wo was (according to the introduction by Nicholas Basbanes) an academic whose research spread across a number of fields; he was also highly regarded as a teacher and as a writer of limericks.  Otto Penz;er's Mysterious Press re-published The Widening Stain in 2020 as a part of the series "Otto Penzler Presents American Mystery Classics.  Unfortunately, calling something a classic does not make it classic.

The principal character is Gilda Gorham, who is the Chief Cataloguer of the library of an unnamed (but presumptively Ivy-League-ish university.  The cast is composed mostly of faculty members, but also includes the head of the library, the custodian (who is rather sinister), and a buffoonish police lieutenant.  Two of the professors die, one (an assistant professor of French Literature, who is herself French) possibly accidentally, the other clearly murder.  In the end, Gorham provides an explanation of both deaths, and all ends well.

The setting is reasonably well-handled and the participants generally well developed (although Professor Casti’s (Romance Languages, and Italian) vocal tics seemed to me to be more American than not.  Another of the faculty, Professor Parry, is notable mostly for his ability to compose limericks. In my opinion, the limericks were the most interesting part of the book.  I will say that the dynamics of the campus seems well-suited to the 1940s setting, and are, for those of this generation’s readers who are academics, provide an interesting commentary on how things have changed.[1]

My problems with the book are two:
First, there was a lot of padding—scenes, conversations, and so on—that did nothing to advance the story.  Second, and vastly more important, when we get to the end, Gorham proposes a solution to the two deaths, identifying one of the more senior faculty as the culprit.  Her explanation seems (to me, anyway) ad hoc, with little in the way of supporting evidence.  The guilty party promptly has a meltdown, and all ends well for Gorham and for the other faculty.

The book has its charms, but the mystery is not, really, one of them.  I would definitely not consider this to be a classic.

[1] As one example:  One of the faculty s said to routinely wear his Phi Beta Kappa key on a watch chain over his vest.  Counting my undergraduate and graduate school years and my teaching career, I almost never saw a member of the faculty wearing a vest (I certainly never did; the only significant stretch of time that I even wore a suit and tie was my two years as a business school dean).  And I never saw anyone visibly wearing a Phi Beta Kappa key (I have two, which might sound strange.  One is mine, the other is my paternal grandfather’s.)