"The Moonstone" by Wilkie Collins

 Not the first time I have read this Victorian classic, often hailed as the first detective novel, but I am re-reading it for the book club at the Grove Theatre in Eastbourne. This means that I am reading having already known whodunnit and how; this in turn means that I can spot the hints dropped in the plot which make the solution of the mystery possible. It's a clever plot. Below, I analyse the plot and this section contains a spoiler alert.

Sergeant Cuff, the detective, was probably based on the real-life Inspector Whicher, an early detective employed by the London Metropolitan Police, whose investigation into a murder at Road Hill House for which Constance Kent was subsequently found guilty also involved a nightdress. Sergeant Cuff's retirement to a cottage where he grows roses preceded the retirement of Hercule Poirot (who grows Vegetable Marrows) in Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, a brilliant novel which also shares a narrative device with The Moonstone. The relationship between the clever, but sometimes enigmatic, detective and the slow-witted butler who narrates much of The Moonstone is clearly the model for Sherlock Holmes and his narrator Watson, and for Poirot and Captain Hastings. The character of Gooseberry, the nimble-witted street urchin, in The Moonstone is clearly a model for the Baker Street Irregulars in the Sherlock Holmes books. And of course the local policeman is incompetent! Thus, this book pioneers many of the tropes of detective fiction.

It is told from multiple perspectives. One of the narrators is unreliable: I can't think of any novel previous to the Moonstone which uses this device. The first section is narrated by the steward, Mr Betteredge. He is a fussy old man with an amusing (and rather unPC) view on life; this narrative allows Collins to add humour, both laughing with Mr B and laughing at him: "On hearing those dreadful words, my daughter Penelope said she didn't know what prevented her heart from flying straight out of her. I thought privately that it might have been her stays." (Ch 3) The second section is narrated by Miss Clack, a poor relation of the family, whose genteel poverty have led her to become a proselytising Christian, forever handing out unwanted tracts and advice; Collins skilfully pokes fun at her naivete. Other narrators include a principal protagonist, a medical assistant, and a solicitor. 

Collins employs subtle humour in his characterisations of the steward, Miss Clack and Mrs Merridew; these comic characters are far more skilfully drawn than the crude but compelling caricatures of Dickens.

Pacing: Warning: this section contains spoilers

• The crucial clues are clustered at the 13% and 14% mark: these are the painting of the door, Miss Rachel's character, and Mr Franklin sleeping badly.
• The diamond is stolen at 19%
• The Great detective arrives at 23%
• Rosanna dies at 34%
• Sergeant Cuff is dismissed at 38%
• We discover who took the Moonstone from Rachel's room at 65%
• The opium addiction theory is advanced at 80%

This means that most of the action occurs in the first half of the book and the second half is a sometimes long-winded explanation of who and, more importantly, how. A full third of the book occurs after the thief has been unmasked. This has, to modern eyes, the feeling that the narration isn't quite balanced.

The Moonstone as a commentary on social class

Collins shows a lot of class consciousness in this novel. 

• One of the main characters is a servant girl (an ex-thief whose mother was a prostitute) who dares to fall in love with the young gentleman of the house. Of course the object of her love is ignorant of the fact and of course she comes to a bad end (and you could argue from this, and from the conventional ending, that Collins believed that any disruption of the social hierarchy would lead to misery) but this character does enable Collins to make the point that "Suppose you put Miss Rachel into a servant's dress, and took her ornaments off -? ... young ladies may behave in a manner which would cost a servant her place." (2.3.4) 
• The bulk of the narration is undertaken by the family steward. He is an old man who has spent all his life in service and understands his place in the social hierarchy. Again, you could argue that Collins believes that 'knowing your place' is essential for social stability. Nevertheless, this loyal family retainer understands the unfairness of the system which is revealed through the use of gentle irony:
• "People in high life have all the luxuries to themselves - among others, the luxury of indulging their feelings. People in low life have no such privilege. Necessity, which spares our betters, has no pity on us. We learn to put our feelings back into ourselves, and to jog on with out duties." (1.20) 
• "Gentlefolks in general have a very awkward rock ahead in life - the rock ahead of their own idleness.  ... the secret of it is, that you have nothing to do with your poor empty head, and nothing to do with your poor idle hands. And so it ends with your spoiling canvas with paints, and making a smell in the house; or in keeping tadpoles in a glass box full of dirty water, and turning everybody's stomach in the house; or in chipping off bits of stone here, there, and everywhere, and dropping grit into all the victuals of the house; or in staining your fingers in the pursuit of photography, and doing justice without mercy on everybody's face in the house. It often falls heavy enough, no doubt, on people who are really obliged to get their living, to be forced to work for the clothes that cover them, the roof that shelters them, and the food that keeps them going. But compare the hardest day's work you ever did with the idleness that splits flowers and pokes its way into spiders' stomachs, and thank your stars that your head has got something it must think of, and your hands something that they must do." (1.8)
• There is also a disabled girl who acts as a sort of Greek chorus to the story of Franklin and Rosanna and who prophesies that "the day is not far off when the poor will rise against the rich." (1.23)

Selected quotes:

• "I have myself (in spite of the Bishops and the clergy) an unfeigned respect for the Church." (1.5)
• "Everything the Miss Ablewhite's said began with a large O; everything they did was done with a bang; and they giggled and screamed, in season and out of season, on the smallest provocation. Bouncers, that's what I call them." (1.9)
• "We had our breakfasts - whatever happens in a house, robbery or murder, it doesn't matter, you must have your breakfast." (1.11)
• "The ugly women have a bad time of it in this world." (1.14)
• "In my line of life, if we were quick at taking offence, we shouldn't be worth salt to our porridge." (1.16)
• "Through the driving rain we went back - to meet the trouble and the terror that were waiting for us back at the house." (1.19)
• "I have only been blindfolded; I have only been strangled; I have only been thrown flat on my back, on a very thin carpet, covering a particularly hard floor." (2.1.2) A nice example of dramatic irony used to highlight the sanctimonious Pharisaical hypocrisy of one of the major characters.
• "You have contracted two very bad habits ... You have learnt to talk nonsense seriously, and you have got into a way of telling fibs for the pleasure of telling them." (2.1.2)
• "I am not ignorant that old Mr Ablewhite has the reputation generally (especially among his inferiors) of being a remarkably good-natured man. According to my observation of him, he deserves his reputation as long as he has his own way, and not a moment longer." (2.1.8) A great observation of a minor character which chimes with the theme of 'not everyone is who they seem to be'.
• "He had what I may venture to describe as the unsought self-possession, which is a sure sign of good breeding, not in England only, but everywhere else in the civilized world." (2.3.9) I think it is described as the arrogance of entitlement nowadays
• "That terrible time in the early morning - from two o'clock to five - when the vital energies even of the healthiest of us are at their lowest. It is then that Death gathers in his human harvest most abundantly." (2.3.9)
• "The bees were humming among a few flowers placed in pots outside the window; the birds were singing in the garden, and the faint intermittent jingle of a tuneless piano in some neighbouring house, forced itself now and again, on the ear." (2.3.10) A perfect example of the pathetic fallacy suggesting not all is perfect in this rural idyll.
• "I used to attend scientific experiments when I was a girl at school. They invariably ended in an explosion." (2.4)
• "It is only in books that the officers of the detective force are superior to the weakness of making a mistake." (2.5.1)

July 2022; 472 pages

Nominated by Robert McCrum as 19th in the Guardian's 100 best novels of all time.

This review was written by the author of Bally and Bro, Motherdarling  and The Kids of God

Peter Ackroyd has written a biography of Wilkie Collins.