Book: White Mischief by James Fox

The Murder of Lord Erroll ~ A True Story of Aristocracy, Alcohol and Adultery

There was a place called Happy Valley in Kenya in the first half of the 20th century to which certain rich folk from England came, settled on farms and lived their hedonistic expat lives. This book tells the story of a few dozen of them, although I suspect that many, many others also lived there and led exemplary lives. I hope so, as the men and women in White Mischief are pretty horrid. The book is a gossipy look at their messy, self-centered, pleasure-seeking way of life. 

White Mischief is an inspired title. It's the story of the murder, in January of 1941, of Jossyln Hay, Earl of Erroll and High Constable of Scotland, who was shot to death and of Sir Jock Delves Broughton, the prime suspect, who was acquitted. 

The author and his now-deceased fellow journalist, Cyril Connolly, have that peculiar British infatuation with titles and money and royalty. They had co-authored an article on the murder in the late 1960s, and Mr. Fox continued his interest in the case after Connolly's death. He wrote White Mischief in 1982. It was referenced in Alexandra Fuller's latest book, Cocktails Under the Tree of Forgiveness, which is why I read it. 

"Broughton was thirty-one when his father died in 1914. Along with Valentine, Viscount Castlerosse, he was considered the best-looing officer in the Irish Guards. Having for years found it difficult to pay his bills at the officers' mess, he now had a princely income along with the house and the acres." 

"Broughton was born into the protected, leisured world of racing and into the big league of landowning families. His father was the 10th Baronet, owned three houses: Doddington Park in Cheshire, Broughton Hall in Staffordshire and 6 Hill Street, in Mayfair, London...With the houses came some 34,000 acres: a vast estate mostly of prime Cheshire farmland which would now be worth something over 70 million pounds." 

And on, and on...

But the book is interesting for the glimpse into that time in Kenya (and Africa in general) when the Europeans could live with native black servants doing the work. It was the world of memsahib; it was the Kenya of Out of Africa, some of whose characters appear in this book. 

The author is a decent writer and does a good job of reporting. He has success hunting down and speaking with several people who had been close to the events 40 years earlier, so there is also the element of suspense throughout the book. Will we know for certain who killed Josslyn Hay?