Book cover: "The Footsteps at the Lock"

Here's a reissue of an old detective novel on this surreal day in Arizona.¹

• Title: The Footsteps at the Lock 
• Author: Ronald Arbuthnott Knox (1888-1957). He was an Anglican priest in the Church of England, who later resigned from that post to convert to Catholicism — an event that created a lot of buzz. On the side, he wrote detective novels, as one does.
• Cover design: Paul E. Kennedy
• Publisher: Dover Publications, New York
• Publication note on copyright page: "This Dover edition, first published in 1983, is an unabridged republication of the work as originally published by Methuen &  Co. Ltd., London, 1928. (The map that originally appeared on the endpapers has been placed after the dedication.)" That map appears at the bottom of this post, too.
• Series: This is one of five novels by Knox that feature insurance investigator Miles Bredon.
• Dedication: To David in memory of the Uncas
• Pages: 248
• Format: Paperback
• Price: $6.95
• Back cover excerpt: "Monsignor Knox is well known in mystery circles as one of the fathers of Holmesian scholarship. This lighthearted narrative reveals him as not only a scholar of the mystery genre but an able practitioner as well."
• First sentence: "It is an undeniable but mystifying fact of natural ethics that a man has the right to dispose of his own property at death."
• Random excerpt from middle #1: "One very old gentleman had to be convinced, with great difficulty, that iw as the hare, not the hounds, which worked by electricity; he was positive of the contrary — it was notorious."²
• Random excerpt from middle #2: "You do not shock the refined ears of a lady who dates from the Crimea by describing too faithfully the habits of a young ne'er-do-weel."
• Random excerpt from middle #3: "Millington Bridge is not among those one-way-traffic concerns in which our thrifty forefathers delighted; there is room to pass a lorry on it; but, by a kind of false analogy, it was a sharp angle over each of its jutting piers in which the pedestrian may take refuge from the dangers and the mud-splashings of the road."
• Rating on Goodreads: 3.66 stars (out of 5)
• Goodreads review excerpt: In 2012, Abbey wrote: "Layers within layers, puzzles tied to other puzzles, abound in this finely crafted, albeit slow and extremely old-fashioned tale. ... I’d always wanted to see what Knox’s writing was like, and now I have. While I enjoyed this one I won’t go far out of my way to read more of his books, as the excellent initial premise, the convoluted plotting and good pacing eventually became overwhelmed by the formulaic nature of the 'thrills'."
• Rating on Amazon: 4 stars (out of 5)
• Amazon review excerpt: In 2015, Bracton wrote: "Close attention to the map at the beginning of the book is helpful (I made a rough schematic to keep next to me as I read). Of course, the real entertainment value of the story is in the puzzle and seeing how Bredon and Leyland sort it out. And the writing is beyond superb. Not only are there evocative descriptions of the upper Thames and surrounding countryside, but there are marvelous turns of phrase: in referring to a character's addiction to morphine, a doctor says 'When I saw him, he'd obviously more or less reached the line of perpetual snow.' But it's not all plot and clever writing; there's a very insightful (but not intrusive) discussion between two of the characters on a question of ethics. This is simply a very good book, and when you've read it, you'll be looking for Father Knox's other mystery novels."

Footnotes 

1. Taking place today in the Phoenix metroplex, mere miles apart: (a) the president and most of the U.S. presidential line of succession are attending a memorial service at State Farm Stadium in Glendale; (b) Ashar is working as a volunteer at the Gathering of the Ghouls fan convention at Rawhide Event Center in Chandler; and (c) and the Phillies are playing the Diamondbacks at Chase Field in Phoenix. 

2. According to Wikipedia, the transition from using live hares to mechanical lures in British greyhound racing occurred in 1926, which was two years before this book was first published.