MR CAMPION'S MOSAIC

Albert Campion’s speech commemorating the life of (fictional) mystery writer Evadne Childe, who died seven years ago in 1965, rapidly immerses him in multiple puzzles that have outlived her.

Though the only film based on any of Childe’s golden-age detective stories, The Moving Mosaic, bombed in 1952, the BBC is working on a new TV version. But the road to remaking it is strewn with difficulties. Location scout Don Chapman has come down with food poisoning, and actor Peyton Spruce, who starred in the 1952 film, has been struck by a car. Would Campion, already recruited as a last-minute speaker in place of Spruce, please look into the apparent coincidence? Of course he would, along with his longtime bagman, Magersfontein Lugg, his old friend Cmdr. Charles Luke of Scotland Yard, and his actor son, Rupert Campion, who wonders if there might be a part in the new telefilm for him. Instead of imposing order, Campion’s inquiries reveal, maybe even provoke, more chaos, from the invasion of the film shoot at a Roman ruin by The Prophetics, spiritualists looking for some sign of Childe’s ghost, to the theft of an ancient mosaic floor to the murder of entertainment attorney Tania Smith, whose marital career links otherwise wildly divergent plotlines. With so many performers on and offscreen jostling for attention, it’s a mercy that Campion, who insists, “I really do not mind staying out of the limelight,” is so self-effacing. As is the whodunit: blink and you’ll miss the deft unmasking of the guilty party.

One of Campion’s most waggish adventures, just as you’d expect when he meets all those divas.