From that inauspicious start, Philip Marlowe finds out about blackmail, an eight-year-old murder, and three much more recent murders. By the time the novel is done, he has just come back from a drive to Wichita, Kansas, to bring a young woman home to her parents, and he tells local police detectives what he knows about the murders.
I am planning a three-part series for July 2021 on my blog that will include Chandler’s novel and the two film adaptations: Time to Kill and The Brasher Doubloon. Both films are available for free on the Internet Archive website. Click on the film title in the following list to find each film at the archive:
◊ Time to Kill (1942)—the film was rewritten to feature the series character Michael Shayne played by Lloyd Nolan. I think the quality of the original film has something to do with the poor quality of the digital transfer.
◊ The Brasher Doubloon (1947)—this version is in English with Spanish subtitles.
What does the “high window” in the novel’s title have to do with the Brasher doubloon? Not too much, not directly anyway, is what Marlowe discovers eventually. It has more to do with Merle Davis, Mrs. Murdock’s personal secretary. She is the one who is rescued at the end of the novel. But the people involved in the coin’s disappearance are connected directly to an incident involving a high window eight years earlier.
Philip Marlowe eventually finds Linda Conquest, Mrs. Murdock’s missing daughter-in-law, working as a singer in a nightclub. She warns Marlowe about the connection between Vannier, a blackmailer, and Mrs. Murdock. Marlowe takes note, but he doesn’t dwell on the warning—and Chandler doesn’t dwell on it in his narrative. I think this point in Marlowe’s investigation, one of many, demonstrates how Chandler’s writing might be characterized as impossible to follow: Readers have to take note, too, or they will miss all the right clues. Here is part of the conversation between Linda Conquest and Marlowe about Mrs. Murdock, Vannier, and Mrs. Murdock’s secretary Merle Davis:
She [Linda Conquest] picked a shred of tobacco off her lip. “You notice what she’s [Mrs. Elizabeth Bright Murdock] doing to that girl?”
“Merle? I noticed she bullied her.”
“It isn’t just that. She has her cutting out dolls. The girl had a shock of some kind and the old brute has used the effect of it do dominate the girl completely. In company she yells at her but in private she’s apt to be stroking her hair and whispering in her ear. And the kid sort of shivers.”
“I didn’t quite get all that,” I said.
“The kid’s in love with Leslie, but she doesn’t know it. Emotionally she’s about ten years old. Something funny is going to happen in that family one of these days. I’m glad I won’t be there.”
I said, “You’re a smart girl, Linda. And you’re tough and you’re wise. I suppose when you married him you thought you could get your hands on plenty.”
She curled her lip. “I thought it would at least be a vacation It wasn’t even that. That’s a smart ruthless woman, Marlowe. Whatever she’s got you doing, it’s not what she says. She’s up to something. Watch your step.” (pages 152–153)
Later, in the same conversation between Linda Conquest and Marlowe, Linda repeats her point about the connection between Vannier, Mrs. Murdock, and Merle Davis:
“Vannier hasn’t anything to do with my [Marlowe’s] job anyway. He has no connection with the Murdocks.”
[Linda Conquest] lifted a corner of her lip at me and said: “No? Let me tell you something. No reason why I should. I’m just a great big open-hearted kid. Vannier knows Elizabeth Bright Murdock and well. He never came to the house but once while I was there, but he called on the phone plenty of times. I caught some of the calls. He always asked for Merle.”
“Well—that’s funny,” I said. “Merle, huh?” (pages 153–154)
Merle Davis is the one whose fate was determined eight years earlier by the events involving a high window. None of this is connected yet in the narrative, but Philip Marlowe connects the details later, after collecting all the clues for future reference. The High Window has the kind of plot that is almost—almost—difficult to follow, which is a trademark of its author. Following Chandler’s writing takes a great deal of attention to detail. Nothing slips by the detective Philip Marlowe, and nothing should slip past the reader either.
One of Philip Marlowe’s conversations with Mrs. Murdock’s son Leslie Murdock in his mother’s house shows Chandler poking a little fun at his famous detective and thus at his chosen profession as a writer of detective novels:
He [Leslie Murdock] came forward into the room and sat down in one of the I-dare-you-to-sit-in-me chairs and leaned forward to cup his chin in his left hand and look at the floor.
“All right,” he said wearily. “Get on with it. I have a feeling you are going to be very brilliant. Remorseless flow of logic and intuition and all that rot. Just like a detective in a book.”
“Sure. Taking the evidence piece by piece, putting it all together in a neat pattern, sneaking in an odd bit I had on my hip here and there, analyzing the motives and characters and making them out to be quite different from what anybody—or I myself for that matter—thought them to be up to this golden moment—and finally making a sort of world-weary pounce on the least promising suspect.”
He lifted his eyes and almost smiled. “Who thereupon turns as pale as paper, froths at the mouth, and pulls a gun out of his right ear.” (page 241)
The joke is really on the readers because Chandler could be talking about his own writing and “sneaking in an odd bit [he] had on [his] hip here and there.” Except that Chandler doesn’t sneak in “odd bits”; he lays out the details as Philip Marlowe conducts his investigation, and it’s up to the reader to pay attention to everything, much like a detective would.
I found The High Window to be tightly written; I didn’t find anything vague or incomplete about the plot. As I mentioned, Raymond Chandler’s plots are sometimes criticized for being difficult if not impossible to follow, which is a characterization I disagree with, and it certainly cannot be leveled at The High Window. I have also read The Little Sister by Chandler, and that novel seemed to have some loose ends—nothing that affected the plot or the ability to understand the story, but I noticed them just the same.
Click here for my article about The Little Sister.
I’m a big fan of Raymond Chandler’s writing, but The High Window does have some language that modern-day readers might find offensive. For example, Detective Lieutenant Jesse Breeze refers to another character, Pietro Palermo, as a wop more than once, which struck me as unnecessary. Was Chandler using the term to portray something about the detective’s character? Or was the term used so widely in the 1940s that Chandler wouldn’t have even given it much thought? Probably the latter, but it’s hard to be sure today.
Some of Chandler’s language doesn’t age too well, and I have given only one example here. But if you can accept that negative and focus on the story that Chandler tells, the novel is still a rewarding read.
The High Window, by Raymond Chandler • New York, NY: Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, 1992 • Originally published in 1942
List of main characters:
Philip Marlowe • Mrs. Elizabeth Bright Murdock • Jasper Murdock, deceased husband • Merle Davis, Mrs. Murdock’s personal secretary • Leslie Murdock, son • Linda Conquest, daughter-in-law, married to Leslie • Elisha Morningstar • Lois Magic • Lou Vannier • Alex Morny, nightclub owner • Eddie Prue, bodyguard at Morny’s nightclub • George Anson Phillips • Detective Lieutenant Jesse Breeze • Lieutenant Spangler
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