The Cat Wears a Noose

Rachel Murdock Mystery #4

by Dolores Hitchens, Rhys Bowen (Introduction), D.B. Olsen (Pseudonym)

A drunken man is shot dead on his doorstep in this classic mystery starring the “observant [and] appealing” seventy-year-old sleuth ( Publishers Weekly ). Walking home wearily from an evening spent poring over the books of the Parchly Heights Methodist Ladies’ Aid searching for a fifty-eight-cent error, Miss Jennifer Murdock becomes witness to a terrible A man, stumbling drunk, arrives home―and just as he fumbles with his keys, gunfire erupts and kills him on the spot.

Jennifer is determined not to tell her sister, Rachel, anything about it. After all, Rachel considers herself a sleuth, or as Jennifer views it, a busybody who pokes her nose in places it doesn’t belong. What she doesn’t know is Rachel has just had a visit from a member of that same household, a meek eighteen-year-old taken in after she was orphaned and treated like a servant. Young Shirley has been alarmed by a series of nasty pranks―and now she’s heartbroken, and even more frightened, after finding her pet bird dead. There’s something awful going on in the house on Chestnut Street, and neither her prim and proper sister nor Det. Lt. Stephen Mayhew can stop Rachel from finding out what it is.…

The Cat Wears a Noose was previously published under the pseudonym D.B. Olsen.

Genres: Mystery, Mystery Thriller, Crime, 20th Century

264 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1944

About the author

Julia Clara Catharine Dolores Birk Olsen Hitchens, better known as Dolores Hitchens, was an American mystery novelist who wrote prolifically from 1938 until her death. She also wrote under the pseudonyms D.B. Olsen, Dolan Birkley and Noel Burke.

Hitchens collaborated on five railroad mysteries with her second husband, Bert Hitchens, a railroad detective, and also branched out into other genres in her writing, including Western stories. Many of her mystery novels centered around a spinster character named Rachel Murdock.

Hitchens wrote Fool's Gold, the 1958 novel adapted by Jean-Luc Godard for his film Bande à part (Band of Outsiders, 1964).

Reviews

[Alan (the Lone Librarian) Teder · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Cat Goes Black
Review of the Mysterious Press/Open Media Kindle edition (December 6, 2022) of the Doubleday hardcover original (1944).

She tested the claws and found them sharp. "You're going to have to take care of yourself," she told Samantha. "Keep an eye out for whoever tries to take this bottle."
She tied the bottle to the string by its cap which contained the dropper, and then she looped the string about Samantha's throat and made a firm knot.

Ok, to get the elephant in the room immediately out of the way, there is no hanging of the cat in this book and there is no noose ever tied around its neck. The latest cover designers for this and the new 2024 edition (see below) obviously did not read the book, but went with their assumptions. What actually happens is that Miss Rachel at one point ties a ribbon around the neck of Samantha the cat with a clue dangling from it. It is meant to provoke a reaction from a suspect. So it is a metaphorical "noose" i.e. a trap, to ensnare the culprit. The cover design on the original 1944 edition did a better job in trying to portray this, even if it does look a bit ridiculous.

Cover design of the original 1944 Doubleday edition when the book was published under the D.B. Olsen pseudonym. Image sourced from Goodreads.

Otherwise this was a fairly standard entry in the series where the parameters have now been clearly defined. 70-year-old Miss Rachel (who hasn't aged since book #1) is intrigued by some imminent or actual crime situation and insinuates herself into the investigation over the objections of her sister Jennifer and especially those of police detective Mayhew. She always manages to bring along Samantha the cat who becomes her unwitting assistant in solving the crime.

The stories are improbable of course, but I do enjoy the idea of a senior amateur female sleuth outwitting the authorities and the culprits. And let's face it, it is adorable that she has a constant feline companion.

Note: In the early books Samantha the cat was described as being of a marmalade colour. This apparently didn't suit the marketing and design staff for the book series, where a black cat constantly appeared in the titles and the book covers. In The Cat Wears a Noose the cat is suddenly described as being black.🐈‍⬛

Trivia and Links
This edition of The Cat Wears a Noose was from Otto Penzler's Mysterious Press but the latest 2024 edition is part of the Otto Penzler American Mystery Classics series (2018-ongoing).

There is an American Mystery Classics related Goodreads Listopia here with 57 books listed as of early April 2024. There are currently 71 titles listed at the Mysterious Press online bookshop. The official website for the series at Penzler Publishers seems to show only the most recent and upcoming titles.

[Fran Irwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

3 1/2 stars

[Maria Vela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Light mystery read but not quite at the same level of a miss marple mystery.

[Kristi · Rating 3 out of 5]

This Rachel Murdock mystery was written in 1944 at the height of WWII. Rachel Murdock at age 70 does remind me of the tenacious Miss Marple, but the writing is not quite the quality of Dame Agatha. It was an enjoyable read and the fact that I am owned by a cat made her companion Samantha, who definitely has a mind of her own, a fun addition. At 75 I am always looking for new mystery authors and now will add Ms. Hitchens to my list. Kristi & Abby Tabby ****************** Quite independent of the novel, the Introduction by Rhys Bowen made me quite cranky. As she states we both grew up reading the great mystery authors of the first half of the 20th century - Agatha, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, Josephine Tey, and Margery Allingham. We both also tried the "hard boiled detective novels of the likes of Mickey Spillane and found them wanting. Ms. Bowen, however, wrote off American mystery authors. I did not and enjoyed Ed Mc Bain's 87th Precinct books, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe, and Frances and Richard Lockridge who wrote the wonderful Mr. and Mrs. North series. She likes her mysteries "cozier and character driven". She obviously never read the authors I did. Ms. Bowen was amazed that she found St. Mary Mead transported to America and Los Angeles yet. Yet she complains that Rachel does not behave like Miss Marple. She takes risks that Miss Marple never would have taken". Jane was always content to observe from the sidelines. Miss Rachel comes accross as having a sense of justice, but little compassion. Although I adored Miss Marple, she was not exactly warm and fuzzy - best described as dispassionate and a dedicated gossip. Ms. Murdock takes on this case because she feels compassion for a young girl and her dead bird. According to Ms. Bowen "Miss Marple... would not have been so cavalier about her pets." I don't remember Miss Marple having either a cat or a dog - perhaps I have forgotten. Rachel is present when her cat is presented wearing a clue hanging around her neck, so the cat was not in danger. I am not certain why Ms. Bowen agreed to write this preface as she does not seem to like Rachel or for that matter AMERICA at all!! I am surprised that she now lives in California and Arizona since our country is / was so selfish. Remember the book was written in 1944. "No, this could not have take place in England where people were close to STARVING and everything was rationed!!!!!" I know that the U.S. did not have to endure the Blitz where Nazi planes killed 42,000. England was never occupied by Nazi invaders, however, except for the Channel Islands, while the Japanese invaded the Aleutians which caused a campaign that lasted more than a year. Rationing was present in the U.S. while through the lend lease program ( read free because as a "neutral nation" when the program started we could not legally "sell" to combatants ) Lend-Lease, enacted March 11, 1941), was a policy under which the United States supplied the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, France, Republic of China, and other Allied nations of the Second World War with food, oil, and materiel between 1941 and September, 1945. The aid was given free of charge on the basis that such help was essential for the defense of the United States. A total of $50.1 billion (equivalent to $672 billion in 2023 ) worth of supplies was shipped, or 17% of the total war expenditures of the U.S. In all, $31.4 billion went to the United Kingdom. Imagine the world without the food from American farms and war materiel from our factories. Again Ms. Bowen seems to never have gotten over WWII and to detest America and its authors. This was the most bizarre introducion to a book ( which is usually a positive review ) that I have ever read.

[Darius Ostrowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my fifth book by Dolores Hitchens and the third that features Rachel Murdock, the old lady who enjoys inserting herself into mysteries, and her cat Samantha (who never is put in a noose). Usually her sister Jennifer is the one that avoids anything to do with murder, this time however she witnesses a man being shot on the front porch of his house. She does her best to avoid telling Rachel, unaware that a young woman from that very house has visited her sister and asked her to investigate some nasty pranks that have resulted in her pet bird being killed.

Rachel and Samantha are soon on the case, with Rachel getting hired as a cook as she investigates the strange going-ons, much to the chagrin of Detective Stephen Mayhew. Orphans, an inheritance, and much more is going on behind the scenes as Rachel tries to find the murderer before she becomes the next victim.

Another nice entry from Ms. Hitchens from the mid-1940’s, although the war doesn’t really play into this one.

[Carissa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another enjoyable entry in the Rachel Murdock mystery series! Like many books of this era, this is also an interesting look at life during WWII, with opportunities for better-paying work opening up for women and consequent shortages of domestic labor. Miss Rachel is an engaging character, as always, with more than a passing resemblance to Miss Marple. There was one aspect of the mystery I found far-fetched. The murderer was said to have such a phobia of animals that she fainted when confronted with a cat, and later was dissuaded from murdering Miss Rachel because of the presence of a cat. Yet we are supposed to believe that she brought a Great Dane upstairs to look at the body of his murdered mistress?

[Laurie J. · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first I’d read, but not the first in the series, so there’s backstory I’ve missed. However, it’s a great cozy mystery written in 1944 with a 70yo woman sleuth (a la Miss Marple) but one who gets involved to work out the mystery, not sit back and observe and figure it out that way.

There’s changes in POV character without signaling which was abrupt or confusing, a few times wondering whose head we were in. Characters are drawn a bit one dimensionally and cliched (poor, orphaned, drunk/alcoholic) but that is indicative of the thinking of the time too.

I will go back to the beginning to listen to more from this author. My library has two others.

[Jeanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really more of a 4.2, but I'm going with five stars. This is another classic mystery, written in the 1940s and strikes me as both cozy and a bit of noir. I can see this as one of those wonderful b/w movies of that era. There's grit, romance, some violence, and a little old lady who's in the middle of it all and not a bit dithery. I am so glad these are being reprinted. I have to say that the introductions by modern authors tend to fall short of the mark for me. The series needs to be read in the context of the time it was written. I am definitely reading more of these.

[Cami Pease · Rating 2 out of 5]

I should have quit around 40 pages in, but it’s a short book and I can rarely bring myself to stop in the middle even when it’s deserved. There was a decent mystery underneath it all, but the writing is so clumsy and the trappings of the mystery so poorly laid out that it didn’t really matter.

[Mari · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of problems & mysteries to solve here. And of course money was the root of the nastiness.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

I absolutely loved it! I love all the characters! This is a must read series! I can’t wait for the next book!

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book, deserved a better introduction.

[Cherie Waggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I felt the story was a bit slow.

[Katie Giordano · Rating 2 out of 5]

Could not stand to DNF a book that’s only 200 pages but it was so hard to follow. Wanted to dnf multiple times!

[Philip E. Kramer · Rating 3 out of 5]

rather predictable

I’ve read better…. The cat only had a minor part in it, and didn’t wear a noose, by the way

[Sydney McCormack · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was like fine??? Want to read more murder mystery’s!

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Didn't know following a 70 yo sticking her nose into murder investigations and solving crimes would be this funny to read

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty solid entry in this series, with a bizarro deus ex machina bit where her cat inadvertently saves our sleuth's life. Hitchens is excellent as a social novelist focused on the brutalities of domestic life--as in all of her novels, especially so in the previous entry in the series published by American Mystery Classics, the home is a place of cruelty, jealousy, rage, resentment. The seething anger hidden not very well behind manners powers the murders here, the solution of which fits with, psychologically, what analysts suggest about how each sex murders people and why. (Oddly, the intro, which is usually quite enthusiastic, here essentially says, eh, many British people have done this better. I suppose there the proprieties of the class system, especially in its incarnation in the 30s and 40s, made the disparities between wanting and having that much more painful.) And yes, the characters here are fairly one-dimensional, and the werewolf bit is both silly and lackadaisically explained; Lieutenant Mayhew, Rachel Murdock's partner/foil, is repeatedly described here as bearlike, in a way that feels lazy rather than concerted. Rachel herself is an excellent character, a sharp-witted and sometimes tart voice of conscience. Hitchens's domestic twist on midcentury California noir (oddly, although the novel came out during WWII, there's barely any reference to it) benefits from her sharp eye for the fashion and housekeeping details, particularly, by which you could discern that someone was struggling viciously, even murderously, to grasp middle-class rectitude. (Although the temptation is to classify these as cozies, there's something dark and ominous, and I'd argue more edgy, due to their location inside the family, to them.) Chandler's famous passage about how the Santa Ana winds make "meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks" gestures at household crime, but his mysteries never revolve around anything that homely. It's Hitchens who truly grasps what that rage might mean, and how it might manifest in and wreck, an actual family's lives.

[Kidlitter · Rating 4 out of 5]

These are such pleasantly predictable mysteries, with the suburban setting, the sisters at domestic war, the cat playing a role in the proceedings. But Hitchens definitely knew her mid-twentieth century California noir. Her families are bitterly dysfunctional, class and sex permeate the conflicts, and the violence is brutal in a setting that features the smells of jasmine and jacaranda and citrus fruits fall on the sidewalk. Miss Rachel is as brilliant as ever, if a Superwoman in her physical abilities for a 70 year old woman. But I'll take her shrewd observations, brilliant deductions and cheeky defiance of law and order in the face of the stultifying 50s bearing down on independent women of her sort.

[Ron Kastner · Rating 3 out of 5]

One nasty person after another; why did the detective even bother to help? Murder unconvincng.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

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