A classic "locked room" mystery from 1897: Squire Neville is found shot dead in his study on a sultry August afternoon. Witnesses swear that no-one could have entered or left by the door or window, but the case is clearly murder. The victim's nephews, John and Eric, agree to call in the celebrated "rule of thumb detective" Paul Beck to investigate...

Narrated/performed by Simon Stanhope, aka Bitesized Audio. If you enjoy this content and would like to help me keep creating, there are a few ways you can support me (and get access to exclusive content):

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Timestamps:
00:00:00 Introduction
00:01:20 Murder by Proxy
00:52:53 Credits, thanks and further listening

Matthias McDonnell Bodkin (1850–1933) was born in County Galway, Ireland, the second son of a doctor. Over the course of a long career he was a journalist, newspaper editor, barrister (QC during the reign of Victoria), county court Judge (for County Clare) and, for a brief period (1892–95), a Member of Parliament for North Roscommon, sitting in the House of Commons as an Irish Nationalist during Gladstone's fourth and final term as prime minister. Somehow alongside all this he managed to find time to write fiction, which he produced quite prolifically from the 1890s through to the late 1920s.

In this capacity he created two popular "rivals of Sherlock Holmes": Paul Beck, "the rule of thumb detective", who made his debut in 1897, and Dora Myrl, "the lady detective", whose adventures appeared in 1900. He subsequently had the ingenious idea of having them meet and work together, get married and produce a son (Paul Beck junior) who became a detective in his own right, appearing in stories from 1911 onwards. His other fictional output included a trilogy of historical novels set at the time of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, one of which ('Lord Edward Fitzgerald', 1896) was dedicated to William Gladstone, as well as several other novels, both contemporary and historical. He also published plays, works of history and some political journalism.

'Murder by Proxy' was one of the earliest stories to feature Paul Beck. It was the third adventure to be published and first appeared in Pearson’s Weekly, on 6 February 1897. It is probably Bodkin's best known short story and has been since appeared in a number of popular anthologies, including Hugh Greene's 'The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes volume 3' (1973).

Recording © Bitesized Audio 2023.