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An exciting, quick-moving mystery set in 19th century England that upends many preconceived ideas.

Synopsis

A VICIOUS KILLER

Join East India Company Agent Andrew Green and Bow Street Runner Scarlett Pembridge as they hunt down a brutal murderer in 1840's London. The opening chapter of the Green & Scarlett series arrives with MASKING THE TRUTH, a shocking tale of murder, corruption and revenge.

A SPY AT HOME

The Opium War has just broken out, and Agent Green is no longer required in China. Reassigned to a post inside of London's burgeoning Metropolitan Police force, Green finds that many of the injustices he helped to create have now landed on his home city's doorstep.

When the Met's lead detective throws Agent Green in at the deep end, his investigation into the city's opium smugglers will put him at odds with the one and only Scarlett Pembridge, Bow Street Runner and London's top bounty hunter.

A TANGLED WEB

Can a conflicted Police Constable and a determined Bow Street Runner set aside their differences to catch a killer and dismantle a shadowy drug ring? How far will Agent Green be willing to go to prevent interference in Company business? Can Scarlett resolve questions of humanity and justice when she discovers the killers shocking motive?

Masking the Truth: A Scarlet and Green Thriller

By Max Parker


Mix in opium, deadly work conditions, a corrupt company, an emerging police force in London, and one woman who does not even consider the roles existing for her in the 19th century, and you have a recipe for excitement. In Max Parker’s Masking the Truth, that recipe creates a delicious blend of mystery and adventure.


The story revolves around Scarlett Pembridge, a member of the independent policing agency, the Bow Street Runners, and Andrew Green, a veteran in the legal opium trade who works for the East India Company. Pembridge has a reputation for bringing in a lot of criminals, usually dead, and Green has returned from several years in China to serve as a consultant with the emerging Scotland Yard.


They find their paths crossing as they seek out the Matchstick Mangler, a vicious killer who tortures victims and leaves their eyes pried open with matchsticks. The question is if this ties in with a mysterious illness some workers at the matchstick factory suffer from, or with opium disappearing into a London that is struggling with an increase in the damage that opium brings to its users.


Although Green works with the police, he is actually employed by the East India Company, a once reputable force in England but one that Green is starting to question. When he realizes that Scarlett’s father, who runs the Bow Street Runners, used to be an East India agent, the questions only get deeper. 


When Scarlett and Green cross paths, it rarely goes well. While not opposed to violence, Green prefers a more subtle approach than Scarlett, who often ends up in a fight. Most of her opponents usually underestimate her because of her gender, but her tall height and training from her father give her an advantage.  Still, both Green and Scarlett have their blindspots and they are not superheroes, making them realistic and approachable protagonists.


As Green’s work with police and the opium trade crosses paths with Scarlett’s search for the Matchstick Mangler, they find the need to work together. No good reviewer ever reveals the ending of a mystery, so suffice it to say that Parker leads us to a surprising and exciting end of the story.


Fans of fast-moving mysteries with a dose of fighting and dying will enjoy this novel. Parker has created two strong characters whom we hope to see in future adventures.  



Reviewed by

I'm a long-time reader and reviewer who has no pretension about being an author someday. My undergraduate work was in Philosophy, Religion, and English. My Master's degree is in Professional Writing (English). I've taught first-year English with college students and write three different blogs.

Synopsis

A VICIOUS KILLER

Join East India Company Agent Andrew Green and Bow Street Runner Scarlett Pembridge as they hunt down a brutal murderer in 1840's London. The opening chapter of the Green & Scarlett series arrives with MASKING THE TRUTH, a shocking tale of murder, corruption and revenge.

A SPY AT HOME

The Opium War has just broken out, and Agent Green is no longer required in China. Reassigned to a post inside of London's burgeoning Metropolitan Police force, Green finds that many of the injustices he helped to create have now landed on his home city's doorstep.

When the Met's lead detective throws Agent Green in at the deep end, his investigation into the city's opium smugglers will put him at odds with the one and only Scarlett Pembridge, Bow Street Runner and London's top bounty hunter.

A TANGLED WEB

Can a conflicted Police Constable and a determined Bow Street Runner set aside their differences to catch a killer and dismantle a shadowy drug ring? How far will Agent Green be willing to go to prevent interference in Company business? Can Scarlett resolve questions of humanity and justice when she discovers the killers shocking motive?

CHAPTER ONE

She almost had him, and she would rot in hell before she let him get away again.

The looks Scarlett got when she came back empty-handed last time had stung. Of course, they had blamed her womanhood, like no man had ever let a bounty get away. Hypocritical bastards.

In three years as a Bow Street Runner, Scarlett had brought in more bounties than anyone else. More than one of them had been killed in the field trying to catch up with her. Did they recognise that? Of course not. They resented her. Being the boss's daughter didn't help, they assumed that she got special treatment even when she did not. But being a woman compounded things, and any tiny mistake was always held against her. So, Scarlett always tried to make sure that mistakes did not happen, or if they did, that she corrected them quickly. And the prey she was hunting right now was just that; a mistake that needed correction.

The house was about a twenty-minute ride from the city centre, a small estate on the northern outskirts. It wasn't huge but it was large enough to sustain enough of a sheep farm that this prick didn't have to work himself. A two-storey farmhouse loomed at the end of a muddy driveway, with a smaller building adjacent where the slaves would have been housed, back when it was legal. Given that they had only started finding this deviant's victims within the last year, she couldn't help but wonder whether he had been as cruel to his slaves. They weren't here anymore, fleeing as soon as they had their freedom. And that said a lot.

Two women dead in as many weeks. She'd almost caught him red handed last time, but the bugger had slipped out the back while she was waylaid by the brothel owner. It was the latest of a string of young female victims, each found beaten and strangled. It wasn’t exactly high profile due to the nature of the victim’s work, but the brutality of it had caused Scarlett to take a personal interest. As terrifying as Hogg’s crimes were, her father hadn’t seemed too concerned about her going after him. Men like that were weak, poorly socialised, and above all cowardly. She’d gone after him alone on purpose, reasoning that he would not see her as a threat until it was too late.

Unfortunately, things had not gone to plan. Scarlett gritted her teeth at the memory of allowing the madam to waylay her for so long, a silly argument about jurisdiction and whether she had any right to come in and kick down doors. They argued, and all the while Hogg was in the back room throttling one of the madam’s girls. She barely seemed to care when she found out too, which only made it worse. One of the patrolmen had joked that he’d have just given the madam ‘five across the eyes,’ and while Scarlett had done so, it was only after another girl was dead. Scum, the lot of them.

She saw movement behind the curtains of the house, and so she made her way over to the barn at the side of the property, to make sure there was no one else there waiting to back the sick bastard up.

The door creaked loudly, and Scarlett tripped on the raised doorjamb when she stepped through. Stealth was not her strong suit. But she was tall, and could carry herself in a scuffle. Most of the time though, it was more efficient to resolve things at a distance, so she made sure to have her Colt at the ready in these situations. The English guns were pretty, but the percussion caps on the Colt revolvers got the shot off a bit faster, and that split second could really matter. They also didn't send sparks flying back into your face and hair. Scarlett was proud that she'd been able to convince her father that all of the Horse Patrol should have a Colt Paterson. The boys sure thanked her for that one, even if her father had winced at both the expense and the blow to his nationalistic pride that importing such weapons from across the Atlantic had caused.

Inside the barn the only light was the dim afternoon glow that flowed in through the windows, casting deep shadows and illuminating motes of dust in the air. Luckily, it was empty save for a few sacks of grain, a few hay bales, and a very dusty shelf with nothing on it but three seemingly antique cans of beef. A damp mustiness indicated that mould had probably taken the grain for itself, and it felt as if the air was sticking to the back of Scarlett’s throat, causing her to breathe through her nose. There were three sets of bunks, but all were bare of mattresses and linens, confirming her suspicions that the slaves were long gone. Probably left this maniac to his devices the moment the abolition law passed. She made her way back outside and checked behind the house. Sheep stood about munching grass, a few of them raising their heads and looking at her with dull eyes. She stood for a moment, carefully surveying the terrain which stretched out into a hillside. There was nothing to see except livestock, grass, and the occasional tree, for miles. The house then.

“What's a lady doing visiting at this hour hmm?”

She rounded back on the voice, and cocked the hammer of her Colt, pointing it at the man and startling him.

“Whoa whoa whoa,” he cried, heading back through the rear door into the house, “no need for that, lass.”

“I'm Scarlett Pembridge of the Bow Street Runners. I have a warrant for the arrest of Brian Hogg. It’s over, put your hands up.”

“I haven't done anything wrong!” he shouted, stepping sideways and back into the house.” If she were a bit closer, she might have been able to take a shot at him, but he was a little too far away and if she missed him she would have a very scared and probably armed man hiding in that house.

She yelled, “I am coming in, and if you've done nothing wrong then you will come quietly.”

Scarlett went in the rear door where he had passed through, and as she did so a rifle came clubbing down over her arms, forcing her forearms down and sending her pistol to the floor. She dove forward in a roll, and scrambled to get at her gun. When she couldn't reach it, she instead grappled with the man, grasping the barrel of the rifle and pushing it upward. It went off, the closeness of the black powder explosion making her head hurt and her ears ring.

Still grasping the hot rifle barrel, she punched at his face once, twice, three times. He rocked back and she wrenched the rifle from him and threw it aside. The man got up and started swinging fists at her, which she deftly slipped, bobbing her head to the side, and down. This was what she was good at, but her father made sure she knew every fight was a risk. She was solidly built and knew how to use her size, but a man her height was almost always stronger. What you had to do was deliver as much violence as possible in as little time as possible, end things before they started. Fighting like a girl, he called it. It was funny, but true, as most men had a way about their fighting that allowed their opponent fair chances. The world wasn't fair and neither was Scarlett. She drove an elbow forward into his sternum, pushed him over, and hopped backward to the door where her gun was. She picked it up and trained it on him as he pulled himself to his feet.

“Stop there.”

He didn't move, but she could see something in his eyes. A wildness. She opened her mouth to speak but then he twitched, so instead she pulled the trigger and put a lead ball into his chest.

You didn't become the top bounty hunter in the Runners by taking chances.

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About the author

Max Parker is a writer based in Sydney, Australia. He is the author of historical crime thrillers such as the Green & Scarlett series. If you enjoy Max's work, make sure you head to his author page and sign up to the newsletter. view profile

Published on January 22, 2021

Published by Green and Scarlett Publishing

60000 words

Contains mild explicit content ⚠️

Worked with a Reedsy professional 🏆

Genre:Historical Fiction

Reviewed by