The Lost Luggage Porter

James Harrison Stringer, now working as a detective for the North Eastern Company Railroad in York, England, has been fired from the job he's loved--being "on the footplate" of a locomotive. He had wrecked a locomotive and its shed because someone else failed to warm up the brakes. Though he still has a chance to work at the terminal and watch the various lines as they operate, the 23-year-old Stringer still sees the railroads as a world in which the power, movement, and downright excitement of being in a locomotive cab will never die. When a hotel porter at the Station Hotel in York is found with his throat cut, and soon afterward the Cameron brothers, "Brilliantine" and "Crackpot," whom Stringer has encountered in a snooker parlor, are shot to death near the York goods yard, the seemingly quiet life off the footplate suddenly ratchets up. Stringer goes undercover to trace the "bad lads" and those masterminds putting them up to crime. Wearing an old suit and a pair of spectacles from which he has removed the lenses, Stringer believes that no one will recognize him from his former jobs on the railroad. (Oddly, he also believes that a pair of glasses with no lenses will fool everyone into thinking they are real.) He insinuates himself into a gang run by Valentine Sampson and Miles Hopkins, and each night returns home to his loving wife Lydia, who types up his reports for Weatherill. Lydia, a suffragist, pregnant with their first baby, due in a month, does not look forward to motherhood. Stringer's discovery that the gang plans to rob a safe containing the wages of railroad men who have been out on strike leads to additional complications when the use of acetylene torches creates emergencies. Martin creates a broad panorama of York life in 1906, concentrating on life in the railways as they dominate the life of the community. The 23-year-old Stringer, while not fully realized, is still a character with whom the reader will develop sympathy. The slang of the railroad and of the period may be disconcerting for readers initially, but as the story develops, the unfamiliar language becomes less of a problem and adds significantly to the atmosphere. Filled with local color, Lost Luggage Porter provides a fascinating glimpse of life in 1906 as the railroads become the link to the future. The story creates an indelible portrait of ordinary existence and its values--a must for any railroad buff! n Mary Whipple

The beauty of this series lies in the writing, and, as I am not usually a fan of mysteries, the strongly drawn characters and descriptions of early 20th century England warrant my continuing interest in it. Jim is now officially a member of the railway detectives, and the book takes on a picaresque turn as he is lead through the streets of York and then on to Paris. I can only find fault with one thing, and that is the rather sketchily drawn character of Jim's wife. She occupies only a brief part of the book, that is true, but in a book with so many good characters, it is odd that she comes off merely as an afterthought. Still, I'm eagerly looking forward to the next Andrew Martin book later this year.