The Lost Gallows (1931)
Blurb:
My review:
It says much for Carr's style that
he is able to make this story of a Jack Ketch who kidnaps his victims
in order to hang them on his private gallows to avenge a private wrong
not only entertaining but convincing. The duel between the
suavely witty Bencolin and Sir John Landervorne; the superb use of the
London fog and what Dr. Pilgrim saw; and the lost street, "the
prettiest fancy in the whole realm of nightmare," are integrated to
form a logical whole. Carr's style has greatly improved since It Walks by Night (a book he
himself later came to regard as rubbish--c.f. Haycraft). Even
though lurid in parts, the prose is generally excellent, and gives the
impression of moving through a nightmare, at once theatrical and
melodramatic, but also horribly real.
The only serious flaw is that Jack Ketch is far too easily
spotted. Note also a very strange but effective ending.