Few people would do what Ned Balfour does in George Sims’ The Last Best Friend. After Balfour’s friend, Sam Weiss, falls out a window and dies, Ned drops his sunny holiday in Corsica and heads back to London to find out why. It doesn’t make sense that Weiss would commit suicide. Plus, there is the telegram he sent Balfour about a “terrible decision” he had to make. The best clue that Weiss didn’t kill himself comes later in the book, when Balfour is beaten up. Every mystery reader knows that that the detective is definitely asking the right questions when someone beats them up.
Balfour, at first, is the kind of man I don’t like much. He’s a cheater and still has a lot of maturing to do even though he’s well into middle age. But the more time I spent with Balfour, the more I started to admire his loyalty to his friend, Weiss. The police are treating Weiss’ death as an accident or, more probably to their way of thinking, as a suicide. The inspector in charge of the case asks Balfour a few interesting questions, but doesn’t seem to be pursuing the few leads the police have. Balfour takes those leads and runs—well, moseys in a good suit while also taking in the occasional auction and drinking good wine.
To be honest, I didn’t think there was much to the case until a few more clues surfaced linking Weiss and a few other members of their antiques, manuscript, and art dealing circle with art looted at the end of World War II. Balfour is an unlikely detective but he seems to have a knack for asking the right questions. He’s also got the right kind of stubbornness to keep going in spite of all the close calls with various thugs and villains.
The Last Best Friend was originally published in the 1960s and is now being rereleased by Poisoned Pen Press. Between Poisoned Pen and the British Library, there’s been a little renaissance of mid-century mysteries that I’ve been very much enjoying. The only problem is that these rereleases have made me start to wonder how many books are languishing, waiting to be read again. So many books, so little time.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley for review consideration. It will be released 7 November 2017.