Mr. Campion’s Abdication

“There’s no such thing as the Abdication Treasure, so there’s nothing to find and Campion had better make sure he doesn’t find it!” That cryptic warning, conveyed to Albert Campion through a close friend, drives the plot of Ripley’s enjoyable third novel featuring Margery Allingham’s gentleman sleuth (after 2016’s Mr. Campion’s Fault). In 1970, the production of a dramatized documentary about the abdication of Edward VIII is a family affair: Albert’s son, Rupert, and his daughter-in-law, Perdita, have been cast as Edward and Wallis Simpson, and he himself is serving as the film’s technical adviser. The movie is being shot at Heronhoe Hall, the Suffolk manor house where Edward and Mrs. Simpson held weekend trysts in 1936. Legend has it that, after marrying Mrs. Simpson in 1937, Edward sent an expensive present to the then-owner of Heronhoe. A representative of the crown is worried that Albert is using the movie as pretext to look for this item, but in fact someone else is after the treasure. Ripley makes the most of a clever mystery plot that’s not centered on a murder. (Nov.)