MIDNIGHT AT MALLYNCOURT
By
A turn-of-the-century gothic in which Jenny Randall -- a gently reared actress who speaks in dotted swiss -- agrees to impersonate a ""wife"" for handsome Edward (""His eyes were Filled with lust he didn't have to simulate""), who is vying for elderly Lord Mallyn's dying bequest against burly cousin Lyman. Jenny chirps, befriends Lyman's pale little daughter who is hated by her mother, the beautiful Vanessa; and is about to succumb to Edward, when two murders (one Vanessa's) take place. Jenny, as she's about to be strangled, learns all. Fair plotting but Jenny's a dreadful bore.