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Mrs. Norris Mysteries #2
A Gentleman Called
As housekeeper to James Jarvis’s recently deceased father, a retired major general of the US Army, Mrs. Norris has raised Jimmie since boyhood. Now the Wall Street lawyer faces a challenging case. The son of one of the firm’s old blue-blood clients has been slapped with a paternity suit. But Teddy Adkins swears he never slept with the woman.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Norris is miffed when her gentleman friend Jasper Tully, the widowed chief investigator for the Manhattan DA’s office, cancels one dinner date after another because a real estate magnate has been found strangled in the bedroom of her Upper East Side apartment. Tully’s investigation turns up a trail of strangulations that extends all the way to the Midwest. As Mrs. Norris pursues her own unorthodox investigation, she uncovers a shocking link between the cases that threatens her very life.
A GENTLEMAN CALLED was a finalist for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award 1958. It is the second novel in Dorothy Salisbury Davis’s Mrs. Norris Mysteries, which also include Death of an Old Sinner, Old Sinners Never Die, and “Mrs. Norris Observes,” a short story in the collection Tales for a Stormy Night.
Meanwhile, Mrs. Norris is miffed when her gentleman friend Jasper Tully, the widowed chief investigator for the Manhattan DA’s office, cancels one dinner date after another because a real estate magnate has been found strangled in the bedroom of her Upper East Side apartment. Tully’s investigation turns up a trail of strangulations that extends all the way to the Midwest. As Mrs. Norris pursues her own unorthodox investigation, she uncovers a shocking link between the cases that threatens her very life.
A GENTLEMAN CALLED was a finalist for the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award 1958. It is the second novel in Dorothy Salisbury Davis’s Mrs. Norris Mysteries, which also include Death of an Old Sinner, Old Sinners Never Die, and “Mrs. Norris Observes,” a short story in the collection Tales for a Stormy Night.
- GenresMystery
Hardcover
First published December 1, 1958
31 people are currently reading
65 people want to read
About the author
Dorothy Salisbury Davis
63 books15 followersDorothy Salisbury Davis is a Grand Master of the Mystery Writers of America, and a recipient of lifetime achievement awards from Bouchercon and Malice Domestic. The author of seventeen crime novels, including the Mrs. Norris Mysteries and the Julie Hayes Mysteries; three historical novels; and numerous short stories; she has served as president of the Mystery Writers of America and is a founder of Sisters in Crime.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
November 23, 2014
I’m not sure what I think of A Gentleman Called. I can’t decide whether I feel disappointed or whether the unusual aspects of this second book in Dorothy Salisbury Davis’ Mrs. Norris mystery series makes up for the shortcomings.
I pretty much had the murderer pegged before the end of Chapter 5 — and you will, too. If that’s a deal-breaker for you in a mystery, then skip A Gentleman Called. However, there was a certain excitement in seeing two parallel investigations — one an official one by Jasper Tully, chief investigator for the District Attorney's Office, and another by attorney Jimmie Jarvis — grow closer and closer to each other until they intersect just before a very exciting climax that nearly spells the end for Annie Norris, the prim and clever housekeeper at the Jarvis household.
The novel begins with a paternity suit slapped onto the bland and mollycoddled scion of an old and wealthy Westport, Connecticut, family. Cherubic Teddy Adkins, who seems naïve even at 55, is accused by gold-digger Daisy Thayer, the clerk at a department store perfume counter, of fathering her son Alexander. Jimmie Jarvis, junior attorney at a prestigious firm, is sent to represent the family and find out the truth. Jarvis finds out more about the dysfunctional Adkins family than he ever wanted to know.
I loved most of the Julie Hayes novels, The Judas Cat, and the first novel in the Mrs. Norris series, Death of an Old Sinner. A Gentleman Called wasn’t up to that high standard, but it was good enough to pass the time while on a trip to Chicago. And, while not up to Davis’ previous high standard, I have to think that’s good enough.
I pretty much had the murderer pegged before the end of Chapter 5 — and you will, too. If that’s a deal-breaker for you in a mystery, then skip A Gentleman Called. However, there was a certain excitement in seeing two parallel investigations — one an official one by Jasper Tully, chief investigator for the District Attorney's Office, and another by attorney Jimmie Jarvis — grow closer and closer to each other until they intersect just before a very exciting climax that nearly spells the end for Annie Norris, the prim and clever housekeeper at the Jarvis household.
The novel begins with a paternity suit slapped onto the bland and mollycoddled scion of an old and wealthy Westport, Connecticut, family. Cherubic Teddy Adkins, who seems naïve even at 55, is accused by gold-digger Daisy Thayer, the clerk at a department store perfume counter, of fathering her son Alexander. Jimmie Jarvis, junior attorney at a prestigious firm, is sent to represent the family and find out the truth. Jarvis finds out more about the dysfunctional Adkins family than he ever wanted to know.
I loved most of the Julie Hayes novels, The Judas Cat, and the first novel in the Mrs. Norris series, Death of an Old Sinner. A Gentleman Called wasn’t up to that high standard, but it was good enough to pass the time while on a trip to Chicago. And, while not up to Davis’ previous high standard, I have to think that’s good enough.
May 19, 2017
1958, #2 Mrs Norris, housekeeper to James Jarvis, Lawyer, and Inspector Tully NYC PD; nominated for Edgar Best Novel 1959. Someone is murdering little-old-ladies-with-money as well as playing games; nice Mrs. Norris finds herself on both sides of the case. Cosy police procedural - four stars.
When Inspector Tully gets handed a Bluebeard/serial killer sort of case He’s quite happy - it’s a thorny problem and he loves those. But he also loves the calm-speaking, quick-witted Mrs. Norris, and regrets not being able to see her much over the ensuing month. But Mrs. Norris has “other interests” to keep her busy: a peculiarly entertaining, winsome older gentleman client of her employer who seems to turn up at the apartment quite (and increasingly) frequently. And she does a spot of genteel detection for her boss as well.
She’s a clever, kind woman and loathe to suspect the cherubic, super-joyful Mr. Adkins of any double-dealing or “womanizing” but, alas, it appears he’s mixed up in a nasty paternity suit. As the story unfolds, Mrs. Norris’s experiences with Mr. Adkins, Lawyer Jarvis’s development of the case, and Inspector Tully’s serial killer case all start to blend together.
Not a true had-I-but-known thriller, for all the clues are quite visible all along the way, and there’s little ambiguity in the suspicions raised and just where the story is going. Plus a goodly portion of the story follows the police as they work the serial killer case. Ms. Davis is a very sure-footed plotter, with suble touches here’n’there, a nicely calibrated sense of humor (dry), a decent enough pace (switching easily and clearly amiong the three viewpoints) and some truly remarkable - and excellently portrayed - characters.
Overall this is a comfortable, entertaining read and yet not too predictable. Ms. Davis's touch is smooth and sure, and her way with words is quite precise and beautifully evocative - the characters seem to live upon the page still, even after sixty years.
Ms. Davis, although not now as well-remembered as some of her contemporaries (Eberhart, Christie, Millar, Marsh, Allingham etc) was very popular during her career, winning one Edgar Award and being nominated five more times, and also was a Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America. She wrote two mystery series: three books in the Mrs. Norris series in the 1950s, and four books in the Julie Hayes (wannabe reporter) in the late 1970s. She also wrote over a dozen other crime novels and numerous short stories. She was one of the Founders of Sisters In Crime.
When Inspector Tully gets handed a Bluebeard/serial killer sort of case He’s quite happy - it’s a thorny problem and he loves those. But he also loves the calm-speaking, quick-witted Mrs. Norris, and regrets not being able to see her much over the ensuing month. But Mrs. Norris has “other interests” to keep her busy: a peculiarly entertaining, winsome older gentleman client of her employer who seems to turn up at the apartment quite (and increasingly) frequently. And she does a spot of genteel detection for her boss as well.
She’s a clever, kind woman and loathe to suspect the cherubic, super-joyful Mr. Adkins of any double-dealing or “womanizing” but, alas, it appears he’s mixed up in a nasty paternity suit. As the story unfolds, Mrs. Norris’s experiences with Mr. Adkins, Lawyer Jarvis’s development of the case, and Inspector Tully’s serial killer case all start to blend together.
Not a true had-I-but-known thriller, for all the clues are quite visible all along the way, and there’s little ambiguity in the suspicions raised and just where the story is going. Plus a goodly portion of the story follows the police as they work the serial killer case. Ms. Davis is a very sure-footed plotter, with suble touches here’n’there, a nicely calibrated sense of humor (dry), a decent enough pace (switching easily and clearly amiong the three viewpoints) and some truly remarkable - and excellently portrayed - characters.
Overall this is a comfortable, entertaining read and yet not too predictable. Ms. Davis's touch is smooth and sure, and her way with words is quite precise and beautifully evocative - the characters seem to live upon the page still, even after sixty years.
Ms. Davis, although not now as well-remembered as some of her contemporaries (Eberhart, Christie, Millar, Marsh, Allingham etc) was very popular during her career, winning one Edgar Award and being nominated five more times, and also was a Grand Master of Mystery Writers of America. She wrote two mystery series: three books in the Mrs. Norris series in the 1950s, and four books in the Julie Hayes (wannabe reporter) in the late 1970s. She also wrote over a dozen other crime novels and numerous short stories. She was one of the Founders of Sisters In Crime.
December 3, 2017
Finished this in one sitting! What a deliciously wicked read. This is so like Lady-Killer by Anthony Gilbert and I remember enjoying that one as well. Characterization was wonderful, last few pages where the two investigations started to converge was really suspenseful, and that famous last words. And those delightful exchanges. I mean, who could resist conversations like this? "It did occur to me to wonder what you would do with that menage when you came into your inheritance?" "I shall put a match to the house in the dead of the night, set up an alarum, and watch them run out out in their nightclothes. It will be interesting to see how they go about living when there is nothing left for them to eat but one another." and this "He reminds me of Harpo Marx," Jimmie said, "scalped." "I think that's disgusting, sir." "So do I!" roared Jimmie, and watched her thump out of the room.
January 5, 2025
Went to the lovely Lost Books in Montrose with my niece and picked up a bunch of old paperbacks from the spinning rack, just like the ones I'd read ravenously off my parents' bookshelves when I was young. I started with a little pocket mystery by Dorothy Salisbury Davis, touted on the cover as being "By the winner of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine Award...'Superlative'" and also only 40 cents when published (and a bargain at $4 67 years later). Despite the story being silly and pretty gross and really no mystery at all, the writing is charmingly old-fashioned, sly, and entertaining. And it's fun to read about New York City landmarks described nearly seventy years ago, to get lost in norms and language and depictions written as current, but in a time before I was born. I mean, I know I could do that with Shakespeare and everything before and imbetween, too, but there's something so cool about reading of Tavern on the Green in the mid-1950s when our family was there for NYE in 2024. Anyway, glad I picked it up.
June 29, 2024
"After some fifty-odd years of blameless living, Georgianna Adkins' boy, Teddy, is in a mess, socked with a paternity suit by a salesgirl.
"It is not a case that Jimmie Jarvis' law firm would ordinarily touch. But old bluebloods stick together, so to Jimmie himself falls the unappealing defense of Teddy -- whose resemblance to a beaming, middle-aged cherub makes the whole thing seem absurd.
"In truth, Teddy is quite a puzzle, as Jimmie's housekeeper realizes when Teddy comes calling, curiously often. If her friend Jasper Tully, chief investigator for the D.A., were around, she would mention it. But Jasper is tied up with a sensational murder case involving a series of brutal strangulations ..."
~~back cover
I'd not read anything by Dorothy Salisbury Davis before, and I quite enjoyed this book. Not quite enough to hunt up others, but it was a nice, pleasant read, with such an obvious clue that even I realized who the murderer was.
"It is not a case that Jimmie Jarvis' law firm would ordinarily touch. But old bluebloods stick together, so to Jimmie himself falls the unappealing defense of Teddy -- whose resemblance to a beaming, middle-aged cherub makes the whole thing seem absurd.
"In truth, Teddy is quite a puzzle, as Jimmie's housekeeper realizes when Teddy comes calling, curiously often. If her friend Jasper Tully, chief investigator for the D.A., were around, she would mention it. But Jasper is tied up with a sensational murder case involving a series of brutal strangulations ..."
~~back cover
I'd not read anything by Dorothy Salisbury Davis before, and I quite enjoyed this book. Not quite enough to hunt up others, but it was a nice, pleasant read, with such an obvious clue that even I realized who the murderer was.
Read
April 23, 2024Three of Davis' most endearing and enduring characters return to delight and thrill mystery and suspense fans. This time, Jimmie Jarvis finds himself involved in a threatened paternity suit against a dapper little man named Teddy Adkins, whose wealthy family are old clients of Jarvis' law firm. At the same time, Jasper Tally is embroiled in the investigation into the strangulation of a woman -- crime which appears tied to several other unsolved mysteries. At the center of the two storm fronts, Mrs. Norris, the redoubtable housekeeper, must fend off the attentions of the dapper client and an unseen, sinister threat to her life.
Didn't read.
Didn't read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 8, 2025
This is not a whodunit. The reader figures out early on who the killer is; the rest of the book deals with two separate investigations, one into the killer himself (who is not then recognized as a murderer) and another into the identity of the killer. Eventually, of course, they come together, but not before Mrs. Norris is led deep into danger. It’s well done for that kind of thing, but it’s not my favorite sub-genre. And I was disappointed that Davis couldn’t resist offering a psychological explanation for the killer’s conduct—in the last sentence of the book!
February 15, 2022
Davis is certainly a much easier read than her contemporaries, but I'd rather fight my way through difficult prose than hang out with her main characters.
August 28, 2014
Dorothy Salisbury Davis was considered as one of the Grand Dames of crime fiction, but she didn't start out as a writer, working first in advertising and as a librarian. She published her first novel in 1949, The Judas Cat, and since authored 20 novels and received seven Edgar Award nominations. She's been a big influence on the crime fiction community, serving as Myster Writers of America grandmaster in 1985 and on the initial steering committee for the formation of Sisters in Crime (along with Charlotte MacLeod, Kate Mattes, Betty Francis, Sara Paretsky, Nancy Pickard and Susan Dunlap).
By her own account, Davis is an "odd fit" in crime fiction, unhappy with her perceived inability to create a memorable series character and uncomfortable with violence and murder. But she's very happy creating villains, and often commented that villains are much more fun to write about than heroes. Her themes trend more toward psychology than out-and-out detection and religious tensions are often found in her work, not surprising considering her own background (as a Roman Catholic who left the church).
A Gentleman Called from 1958 was nominated for an Edgar in 1959 and included in The Essential Mystery Lists by Roger Sobin. It features characters who were to be featured in three books, including attorney Jimmie Jarvis and his housekeeper, Mrs. Norris, and the District Attorney's chief investigator, Jasper Tally.
The story starts off revolving around middle-aged bachelor Theodore Adkins, who is slapped with a paternity suit. Adkins is also from a wealthy family who are old clients of Jarvis' law firm, which prompts Jarvis to take the case. At the same time, Jasper Tally is involved in an investigation into the strangulation of wealthy Arabella Sperling and the theft of her diamond pin. Eventuallly, the two plots converge around several other unsolved murders involving matrimony-minded women, which threatens to ensnare Mrs. Norris and put her own life in danger.
Salisbury is adept at characterization and using dialogue to flesh out her characters. The psychological underpinnings of A Gentleman Called are as important, or really more so, than the whodunnit aspect, but it's entertaining to follow her characters through their interactions or, as Kirkus noted, enjoy the "Insidious indirection which gives the novel a crafty glint."
By her own account, Davis is an "odd fit" in crime fiction, unhappy with her perceived inability to create a memorable series character and uncomfortable with violence and murder. But she's very happy creating villains, and often commented that villains are much more fun to write about than heroes. Her themes trend more toward psychology than out-and-out detection and religious tensions are often found in her work, not surprising considering her own background (as a Roman Catholic who left the church).
A Gentleman Called from 1958 was nominated for an Edgar in 1959 and included in The Essential Mystery Lists by Roger Sobin. It features characters who were to be featured in three books, including attorney Jimmie Jarvis and his housekeeper, Mrs. Norris, and the District Attorney's chief investigator, Jasper Tally.
The story starts off revolving around middle-aged bachelor Theodore Adkins, who is slapped with a paternity suit. Adkins is also from a wealthy family who are old clients of Jarvis' law firm, which prompts Jarvis to take the case. At the same time, Jasper Tally is involved in an investigation into the strangulation of wealthy Arabella Sperling and the theft of her diamond pin. Eventuallly, the two plots converge around several other unsolved murders involving matrimony-minded women, which threatens to ensnare Mrs. Norris and put her own life in danger.
Salisbury is adept at characterization and using dialogue to flesh out her characters. The psychological underpinnings of A Gentleman Called are as important, or really more so, than the whodunnit aspect, but it's entertaining to follow her characters through their interactions or, as Kirkus noted, enjoy the "Insidious indirection which gives the novel a crafty glint."
June 5, 2019
I'm not sure whether I liked this book or not - it certainly was suspenseful, but it contained a plot element that I do not usually enjoy (can't reveal because of spoilers). This was my first "Mrs Norris" mystery, and it happens I got two of them at the same time, so will read the other, and see if this element will be a constant.
August 12, 2012
Unbearably predictable.
September 23, 2014
Pretty dated, but well written.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews