Programming note: Join me tomorrow, Saturday, for a rather sporty edition of my weekend music show, Mark Steyn on the Town, on Serenade Radio. It airs at 5pm UK time - which is 6pm Western Europe/12 noon North American Eastern. You can listen from anywhere in the world by clicking the button at top right here.
~Ahead of that, welcome to Part Fifteen of Bulldog Drummond, Sapper's tale of sinister coup-plotters on the loose in the English Home Counties after the Great War. Kathlyn Miller, a Texas member of The Mark Steyn Club, writes:
Hi Mark,
First, if I was reading this book I would not be able to put it down until it was finished, so grateful you are reading it. Second, I am believing this is the first book in a series and surmise Hugh lives for more adventures. I listen to this while in the sauna so I imagine I am sweating for Mr. Drummond! Thank you!
Thank you, Kathlyn. As you'll hear, in our latest installment, Drummond also has cause to sweat, so maybe you're sweating for each other - although he's undoubtedly the type that thinks ladies merely "glow".
And you're right that "this is the first book in a series", which lasted all the way to the end of the Swingin' Sixties, not an era he was quite so comfortable in, especially girl-wise. (Final caper: Some Girls Do. Crikey.)
Nicola Timmerman, a Steyn Clubber from Francophone Ontario, is also enjoying it - although mainly on linguistic grounds:
I say Old Bean, this is quite the ripping tale!
That's not lingo you hear a lot in your neck of Ontario, Nicola - although you certainly did when the late Jacques Parizeau was out and about.
So welcome to tonight's episode, which resumes where we left off - in a house where the lights have gone out, and our hero has to ascend the staircase in the dark:
At last he reached the fourth step, and gave a final adjustment to his semi-conscious burden. He felt that the hall below was full of men, and suddenly Peterson's voice came to him out of the darkness.
"That is four, Captain Drummond. What about the fifth step?"
"A very good-looking one as far as I remember," answered Hugh. "I'm just going to get on to it."
"That should prove entertaining," remarked Peterson. "I'm just going to switch on the current."
Members of The Mark Steyn Club can hear me read Part Fifteen of Bulldog Drummond simply by clicking here and logging-in. Earlier episodes can be found here.
In this eighth year of The Mark Steyn Club, if you've a friend who's a fan of classic literature and you want to give him or her a present with a difference, we hope you'll consider a one-year gift membership in The Mark Steyn Club. The lucky recipient will enjoy full access to our back catalogue of audio adventures and video poems - Conrad and Conan Doyle, Orwell and Orczy, Kipling and Kafka, and all the rest - which should keep you going until the next variant blows in from Wuhan, or at least until the cancel crowd has had all the books banned. For more details, see here.
Through the hellish plot twists of 2024, our nightly audio adventure goes on, so do join me right back here tomorrow for Bulldog Drummond Part Sixteen, a few hours after the latest Serenade Radio edition of Mark Steyn on the Town.
