Edgar Wallace

The Secret House Edgar Wallace

What if the head honcho of one of the country's most lurid gossip rags was suspected of running a very lucrative sideline in extortion of the wealthy and powerful? That's exactly what appears to be the case in The Secret House, a satisfyingly complex tale of treachery, titillation and good, solid detective work. Scandalous periodical "The Gossip's Corner" is run by a supposed blackmailer whose identity has baffled the police -- until T. B. Smith, a singlularly acute Assistant Commisioner, gradually tracks the man to the Secret House. A man stood irresolutely before the imposing portals of Cainbury House, a large office building let out to numerous small tenants, and harbouring, as the indicator on the tiled wall of the vestibule testified, some thirty different professions. The man was evidently poor, for his clothes were shabby and his boots were down at heel. He was as evidently a foreigner. His clean-shaven eagle face was sallow, his eyes were dark, his eyebrows black and straight.