Where There’s Smoke - Ed McBain

It's not unusual for a PI crime thriller to open with the discovery a dead body, but Where There’s Smoke is unusual in that it opens with the absence of a dead body. To be accurate, the corpse of Anthony Gibson has been taken from Abner Boone’s funeral parlour. Abner isn't keen on reporting the disappearance - it wouldn't be good for business - and he hope that if it's found quickly before the funeral, he can avoid telling the family of the loss. To that end he employs former police lieutenant, Benjamin Smoke to help him out.

Smoke is 48 but retired from police, unsatisfied that he has never had a really difficult case to solve, everything has been routine, he has never come across anything that resembles a perfect crime. This one however intrigues him enough to want to look into it a little bit further, and inevitably the more he finds out the more odd and complicated it looks. The deceased's son suspects that the road accident that killed Anthony is murder as Tony had run up some gambling debts. Smoke knows that dead men don't pay debts, so that doesn't make sense. His wife, strangely, is going on about her antiques business the day after his death. With Tony's background throwing up more interesting points, the more Smoke finds out the stranger the case seems to get.

Even more strangely, it doesn't look like Smoke is going to find out what it's all about or even pick up a paycheck, because the police find the body of Anthony Gibson the same day in an empty lot and return it to the funeral parlour without anyone in the family being any the wiser. Case closed. One other revelation however keeps Smoke pondering and baffled. Four other funeral homes were hit the same night. Someone was looking to kidnap this particular dead body, but returned it without any ransom demand. Why? Smoke might no longer have a client and may no longer be on the case, but you can be sure he hasn't heard the last of this one just yet.

There's a good reason why Smoke relentlessly pursues this investigation and it's the same reason the reader will motor through the short 150 pages of the novel. It turns up surprises, each lead even more bizarre than the next, from a woman who believes she is Cleopatra reincarnated pining for her dead brother Ptolemy the Twelfth, to body snatching and black masses. As with the opening investigation that led nowhere what is just as interesting are the people Smoke meets over the course of his investigation, connecting with people from all walks of life with fascinating backgrounds. Where There's Smoke is a classic old-school PI adventure with a 1970s twist, McBain revelling in the sexy and dangerous situations it throws up with some contemporary social observations along the way. 

Reading notes: Where There’s Smoke by Ed McBain was first published in 1975. I read a Pan Books paperback edition from 1980.