Sexton Blake: Schemes and Scandals (The Teed Files #7)

Synopsis:
“Our duty is to go forward into this valley of the shadow of death with courage and faith—we have to uphold the honour of England by demeanour and deed… We are standing for justice, for law against arbitrary violence.” The Daily Mail, August 1914

By December 1914, the Great War had been rumbling on for four months. In August, Germany had been victorious at the Battle of Liège and began its march to-wards France. The Germans were again victorious at the Battles of Mons and of the Frontiers. In September, however, the French and British forces triumphed at the First Battle of the Marne. This was followed by the First Battle of the Aisne and then the ‘Race to the Sea’ which culminated in the First Battle of Ypres. It was from Ypres in West Flanders, Belgium, that the bloody four-year long stalemate of trench warfare on the Western Front of World War I would begin.

The anthology begins with A Soldier—And a Man, a double-length Christmas tale in which Blake teams up with Mademoiselle Yvonne to solve a high-society murder. It is followed by The German Colony, a pre-war tale in which Blake travels to Papua New Guinea to foil a gun-smuggling operation. In the third tale, The Mystery of the Banana Plantation, Blake visits Costa Rica and matches wits with Dr. Huxton Rymer. In the fourth tale, The Conniston Diamonds, the Council of Eleven returns and attempts to steal a highly valued diamond necklace. In the last tale, The Army Contract Scandal, Yvonne, Blake and Tinker attempt to bring a pair of unscrupulous war profiteers to justice.

This is the seventh of fourteen anthologies that collects George Hamilton Teed’s most popular works from 1913 to 1917. Each edition includes all of the original illustrations! Enjoy!