Dr. Edmund Bickleigh is both self-deprecatingly funny and unabashedly murderous. He kills his very unpleasant wife in a complicated plot. First he secretly gives her a patent medicine that causes headaches. Then he gives her increasing doses of morphine for the headaches. When he pretends concern at her growing addiction and stops the morphine, she begins stealing it from him. He makes sure others are aware of her habit and then kills her with an overdose. Bickleigh is an engaging character, and while we may not be sympathetic, we are curious about him and interested in his dealings with a domineering wife and two mistresses. Because he is clever and imaginative, he seems to have a chance of getting away with murder, and the only suspense in the book surrounds Bickleigh’s arrest and trial.
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