M, KING'S BODYGUARD

In 1901, as the crowned heads of Europe arrive in London for Queen Victoria’s funeral, a Scotland Yard detective assigned to protect the new king, Edward VII, must outwit a foreign assassin whose target may in fact be Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany.

This lively and assured historical drama opens as the reign of “tiny, and shrewd” Queen Victoria is replaced by that of her libidinous son, Albert, aka Edward VII, whose bodyguard, William Melville, is the novel’s world-weary narrator. “A Catholic peasant promoted far above his station,” as he jokingly puts it, Melville has risen to Detective Chief Superintendent “through tenacity, low cunning and [his] own clumping fists.” Irish by birth and suspicious by nature, he knows that the imminent royal funeral procession, as it winds through London, will become, “for terrorists...one long shooting gallery, with every prize a jackpot.” European anarchists are Melville’s main suspects (“how I despised these fanatics”), and, sure enough, villainous zealots promptly materialize, leading Melville on a merry chase, though he quickly sniffs out the existence of a murderous plot far more labyrinthine than one prompted by pure ideology. “Politics is a stately dance with poisoned daggers,” he observes, as he begins to doubt even his German sidekick, Gustav Steinhauer, who is the kaiser’s master spy and therefore on the right side. Or is he? Both Melville and Steinhauer, along with many other characters, are based on historical personages, and their portraits—along with that of stinking, foggy London—are finely drawn. The narrative pace never flags, and even the obligatory scenes of shootouts, explosions, and hurtling locomotives are refreshingly vivid. The novel’s quieter moments are, however, its best, and none is better than its final twist. “Let’s just say I work with certain people who share your concerns about developments on the Continent,” an aristocratic stranger says, inviting Melville for a chat at his club. “We could use a man of your experience.” So the next installment has surely begun.

A briskly paced, richly atmospheric historical thriller.