And so we come to the third book in the Dorothy Dixon Air Mystery Stories. After an introductory story in which Dorothy earns her wings and captures some thieves (Dorothy Dixon Wins Her Wings) and a follow-up tale in which she foils the plans of some smugglers (Dorothy Dixon and the Mystery Plane), I had hopes that we would have yet another challenging adventure that Dorothy (and, yes, Bill Bolton returns once again - poor girl cannot seem to have her a story without him!) would have to weather - and when I say weather, I mean it (see below)! Author Dorothy Wayne (better known as Lt. Noel Sainsbury, Jr.) seems to rely on a number of the same tropes as this third book in the series features many similar scenes that we saw in the first two books - although, Dorothy does finally shine as the quick-thinking sleuth and strong leader we all knew she could be if given the chance!
Dorothy Dixon Solves the Conway Case opens with our young aviatrix doing what she loves most - flying her plane, Will-O-The-Wisp (or "Wispy," for short) with her best friend, Betty, along for the ride. The only problem is, they are flying in the middle of a rough storm, and good ol' Wispy is running extremely low on gas. Thus, Dorothy is forced to find a place for an emergency landing in the torrential downpour while flying over a dark area of forest! Leave it to Sainsbury to put Dorothy in dire danger from the very first page - this type of situation definitely catches the reader's attention from the get-go. Of course, Dorothy, being the hero of the story, manages to set the plane down safely, and she and Betty make their way through the storm and find a secluded house (gee, it seems like each of these mysteries involves a secluded house in some form) where they think they will get shelter. But, alas, fate has other plans - instead of a welcome party, the girls peer in the window to find a young man tied to a chair, while two other men are questioning him harshly about something (hmmmm, this also seems to be a recurring theme in this series - someone being held captive in the secluded house). And so, the mystery begins!
Sainsbury spends in inordinate amount of time on Dorothy and Bill's tramp through the woods, as they try to escape the men with guns who are after them (mistakenly believing Bill is actually George Conway!), and chapters are spent on their running in the rain through the wooded forest and up a dangerously steep cliffside (that, conveniently, Terry had previously hiked and found a secret way to climb up the side of it). He eventually gets the duo to a cabin in the protected woodland area, which is inhabited by an old man named Abe Lincoln River "known to the world at large as Ol' Man River, but to his friends he's Uncle Abe" (p. 160). He takes an instant liking to Dorothy and Bill and helps them out of a number of tight situations through the rest of the book.
What the reader must realize is that Uncle Abe (or Ol' Man River, if you prefer) is a character that is a product of the time when this book was written. From the moment his is introduced as "an ancient, white haired negro" (p. 152), to the dialect he is given by Sainsbury (i.e., "Lordy, Lordy, you chillen is sho' 'nuf half drown'. But we's gwine ter fix date sho' nuf in a jiffy" [p. 154]), it is clear he is an over-the-top stereotype of how African-Americans were portrayed in the early part of the twentieth century, particularly in literature. The references to Uncle Abe as "the old darky" (p. 156) and even the self-proclaimed "ol' niggeh" (p. 161) must be read in the context of the time, with an understanding that such terms, while not appropriate today by any means, were not considered in same way back in 1933 when this book was published. Uncle Abe is a lovable character in the story, and he has no problem standing up to the white landowners who try to bully him into revealing Dorothy and Bill's whereabouts. In fact, without Uncle Abe, the two heroes would never have been able to sneak their way into the great house on the hill, rescue their friends, and reveal the crooks for who they are!
Sainsbury once again keeps his story real by integrating non-fictional locations into the book, such as references to "Route 124," a road "from Poundridge Village that runs to South Salem..." (p. 96). Some quick research reveals that New York State Route 124 (called "Salem Road") is a nearly 5-mile road that connects Pound Ridge to South Salem, running through a forested area, just as it is described in the book. And since the previous books have made it clear the Dixons and Boltons live in New York, around the tip of Long Island, then this area would not be far-fetched at all as a place where Dorothy is forced to land while flying. There is also an interesting reference to "Bull" Durham (p. 78), but not the one from the real world. In the story, Bull Durham is Terry's cousin, Ed Durham, who played football for the Lawrenceville university team; in the real world, however, Bull Durham was a baseball player who played for various teams in the first decade of the twentieth century. While not a direct reference, it was probably a subtle homage to the sports hero.
Something else I found interesting is the author's use of the Bible in the story. At one point, Uncle Abe is telling Dorothy and Bill how he came to be there in that cabin in the forest, and he says, "De Good Book say, 'Him what has, gits, and him what ain't got nuffin' gits dat nuffin' tak'n away'..." (p. 165). This is a paraphrased version of Matthew 13:12, which says, "For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath." This statement was made by Jesus to his disciples, just after telling the parable of the sower and the seeds. Commentaries on the matter indicate the verse is referring to spiritual awareness: a man who has a desire to learn more about God and to do His will shall see his knowledge and understanding increased, but those who refuse to listen and believe will have what little understanding they may have had taken away. Sainsbury takes the verse to refer to Uncle Abe and the comfort he lost with his previous master in the South to the lonely, impoverished existence he now lives.
While the adventure and danger are kept at a high level throughout the story, the mystery itself is somewhat subdued and not a major portion of the story; in fact, its solution is done "off-screen," so to speak, and we learn of how Dorothy uncovered the whereabouts of the missing patents owned by George's father from the crook's cook, who helped Dorothy, Bill, and Uncle Abe when they snuck into the great house in order to rescue their friends. I found that to be somewhat of a let down, as I would have loved to have seen (or, rather, read) Dorothy's making the big find in the presence of George Conway and all of her friends. I supposed Sainsbury may have been running out of room, so he had to wrap up this adventure so as to not exceed whatever page count or word count restrictions he had for the book.
Before I end this post, there is one scene at the end that had me scratching my head. After everything is wrapped up, Dorothy and Bill take a test run in her plane in order to test one of Conway's patents - and after spending more than 100 hours straight in the air without refueling once, the plane comes in for a perfect landing. What is unexplainable is that when the mechanics open the door, they find "side by side, grimy, worn, unkempt, were Dorothy Dixon and Bill Bolton, sleeping like children!" (p. 247). How in the world did they land the plane if they were both fast asleep? I did a search to see if there were automatic pilots in the 1930s that could have landed a plane, but it seems the first successful, fully automatic landing did not occur until 1937, some four years after this book. Thus, we are left with one mystery that will never be solved...
RATING: 8 faded blue flannel shirts with matching overalls out of 10 for a mystery that has very little flying and lots of running, sneaking around, and climbing!
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