Ruthven Campbell Todd (1914–1978) was a Scottish poet, artist, and novelist. (Ruthven is pronounced ‘riven’.) During World War II he wrote about a dozen detective novels. He used a pseudonym at the advice of Cecil Day Lewis, who also had a pen name for his Nicholas Blake stories. Todd’s alias wasn’t particularly original, as he simply rearranged his own name into R. T. Campbell. In addition to his full-length crime fiction, he wrote a couple of short stories that can be found in mystery anthologies. Unfortunately only eight of the twelve full-length works were published. The other four manuscripts were lost when his publisher went out of business. The Dover reprints have a wonderful introduction by Todd’s biographer Peter Main.
Todd’s first mystery was Unholy Dying (John Westhouse Ltd., 1945; Dover Publications, 2019) released in the late years of the war, although it seems to have been written earlier. It introduces amateur detective Dr. John Stubbs, a botanist who brings his journalist nephew Andrew Blake with him to an international geneticists’ convention. Blake is the narrator of the story. Stubbs looks and acts like a boisterous walrus, however most of the attendees seem to hold him in high regard. They don’t feel the same about Dr. Ian Porter, one of the other scientists there. Porter has antagonized his colleagues past and present by stealing their work and now is trying to steal a girlfriend as well.
Dr. Porter immediately annoys Blake and they engage in a public shoving match at an evening social function the same day they meet. The next day Porter is found dead of cyanide poisoning in one of the convention exhibit areas. The police do not lose much time in arresting Blake for murder. Stubbs is enraged at the short-sightedness of the detective in charge and immediately sets out to find an alternate suspect.
Stubbs is a large, loud man who plays the buffoon while shrewdly observing his surroundings. The scenes where Stubbs drives his cherished Bentley are comedic. Blake’s articles about the various convention presentations gives the reader a perspective on the state of genetics research in the 1940s. After Blake is arrested and finds himself in jail, the tone of the book becomes more somber, understandably. And after the second murder, Stubbs becomes determined to find the killer.
Despite Todd’s disdain for the mystery, seeing it only as a route to quick cash, he adheres to the conventions of the genre. He provides a detective who is superior in intellect to the police, a sidekick to record the action, a fumbling police detective, a number of red herrings, and a dramatic reveal of the culprit, who turns out to be quite a surprise.
A compact story with a suitably devious plot, some droll descriptive bits, and a likeably unconventional detective.