Madeline Payne, the Detective’s Daughter
“That is the strangest part of the affair, Lucian; she had money. Where it came from, I never could guess, nor would she ever give me any information on the subject. It was a legacy—that was all I was to know, it seemed.
“I remember,” she continued, musingly, “how very much astonished I was to receive, from my stepfather, a lecture on this head. He took the ground that my childish curiosity was unpardonably rude and angrily forbade me to ask further questions. And I am sure that since that one instance of wonderful regard for the feelings of Aunt Hagar, he has not deigned to consider the comfort and happiness of any, save and always himself.”
As the girl’s voice took on a tone of scornful sarcasm; as her cheeks flushed and her eyes flashed while memory recalled the many instances of unfeeling cruelty and neglect, that had brought tears to her childish eyes and pain to her lonely heart—the eyes of Lucian Davlin became bright with admiration, and something more; something that might have caused her honest eyes to wonder and question, if she had but intercepted the glance. But her thoughts had taken a backward turn. Without looking up, perceiving by his silence that he had no desire to interrupt her, she proceeded, half addressing herself:
“I used to ask him about my mother, and was always informed that he ‘didn’t care to converse of dead folks.’ Finally, he assured me that he was ‘tired of seeing my sickly, ugly face,’ and that, as I would have to look after myself when he was dead and gone, I must be educated. Therefore, I was sent to the dreary Convent school at M——. And there I studied hard, looking forward to the time when, having learned all they could teach me, I might breathe again outside the four stone walls; for, by my step-papa’s commands, I was not permitted to roam outside the sisters’ domains until my studies should reach an end. Then they brought me back, and my polite step-papa called me an ‘educated idiot;’ and my good old Hagar cried over me, and I made friends with the birds, and the trees. Ever since, always avoiding my worthy ancestor-in-law, I have been wondering what it would be like to be happy among true friends, in a bright spot somewhere, far away from this place, where I never have been happy for a day at a time, even as a child.”
“Never, little girl?” The eyes were very reproachful, and the man’s hand was held out entreatingly. “Never, darling?”
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Lawrence L. Lynch
Emily “Emma” Medora Murdock Lynch Van Deventer (January 16, 1853 – May 3, 1914) was an American mystery novelist who wrote under the name Lawrence L. Lynch.
Emily Medora Murdock was born on January 16, 1853, in Oswego, Illinois, the daughter of Charles L. Murdock, a lawyer, and justice of the peace, and Emily A. (Holland) Murdock. She married Lawrence L. Lynch in 1877 and Dr. Abraham Van Deventer in 1887.
She took the name of her first husband as her pseudonym for nearly two dozen detective novels popular in the US and England. Most of her novels were set in Chicago, and Against Odds (1894) was set at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. Some of her heroes were traditionally male characters, such as Francis Ferrars, a Scotland Yard investigator who becomes a private detective in America. She was also noted for her independent female characters, such as the private detective Madeline Payne and Leonore Arymn, who strikes a woman batterer with a large mallet in Shadowed by Three. Emma Murdock Van Deventer died on 3 May 1914 in Oswego.
Bibliography
- Shadowed by Three aka A Woman’s Crime (1879)
- The Diamond Coterie (1884)
- Madeline Payne, the Detective’s Daughter (1884)
- Dangerous Ground; or, The Rival Detectives (1885)
- Out of a Labyrinth (1885)
- A Mountain Mystery: or, The Outlaws of the Rockies (1886)
- The Lost Witness; or, The Mystery of Leah Paget Laird (1890)
- Moina; or, Against the Mighty (1891)
- A Slender Clue; or, The Mystery of Mardi Gras (1891)
- A Dead Man’s Step (1893)
- Against Odds: A Romance of The Midway Plaisance (1894)
- No Proof (1895)
- The Last Stroke. A Detective Story (1896)
- The Unseen Hand (1898)
- High Stakes (1899)
- Under Fate’s Wheel (1901)
- The Woman Who Dared (1902)
- The Danger Line (1903)
- A Woman’s Tragedy; or, The Detective’s Task (1904)
- The Doverfields’ Diamonds (1906)
- Man and Master (1908)
- A Sealed Verdict (1910)
- A Blind Lead (1912)