The Evil Shepherd (1922)

THE EVIL SHEPHERD (1922)

Oppenheim loved to turn the tables on the reader. Endings (while not quite those of the staged denouements favoured by Agatha Christie) that reveal something radically new about the character(s) and the situations are a commonplace.
Here Oppenheim presents us with more of a challenge.
The typical young Englishman, a successful barrister, Francis Ledsam has successfully defended his client, Oliver Hilditch, of a charge of murder. After the trial Ledsam is approached by a beautiful young woman Margaret, the wife of the accused, who convinces Ledsam that her husband was not only guilty but is responsible for many other outrages.
Hilditch invites Ledsam to his home where, with Margaret in attendance, he confesses that he was guilty and demonstrates how he killed the man.

Ledsam is so shaken by this that he decides that he can no longer defend those whom he believes to be guilty; it makes him party to crime, it is immoral. (Hardly a Rumpole of the Bailey stance.)
Later that night Hilditch is killed. An accident says his wife, or suicide.
Discussing his new-found desire to rid London of evil with a friend at a restaurant, they are interrupted by a stranger whom they later discover is Sir Timothy Brast the father of Margaret.
Brast is a contemptuous cynic who regards the notion of "good" as so-much piety and nonsense.
Ledsam is led into a strange relationship with Brast whom he initially loathes because of his attraction for Margaret.
Ambiguities, dangers and mysteries multiply. Motives, appearances and easy assumptions are questioned.
Themes: Adventure, romance, good & evil.
Summary: another corker with a touch of moral philosophising. 8/10