tags: classics, crime, mystery, noir, thriller
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Born out of a brutal childhood, Raven is an assassin for hire whose latest hit—a government minister—is one calculated to ignite a war. When the most wanted man in England is paid off in marked bills, he also becomes the easiest to track—and police detective Jimmy Mather has the lead. But Raven’s got an advantage. Crossing paths with a sympathetic dancer named Anne Crowder, the emotionally scarred Raven has found someone in the wreckage of his life he can trust, maybe his only hope for salvation. Or at least, escape—because Anne is also Mather’s fiancée. Now the fate of two men will depend on her. And either way, it’s betrayal.
This is the first time I read A Gun For Sale. It is a very good story told seamlessly. The author was obviously sympathetic to the assassin. Raven, the assassin, was an ugly looking guy - small bodied and with a harelip which made it hard for him to elude the police. The assassination was not the reason he was being sought by the police. It was the stolen bills that he was paid for the job of killing a Czech government minister in order to start a war. Raven wanted revenge for the duplicity of the man who hired him.
He encountered Anne on a train and tried to steal her ticket because he cannot use the marked money for anything, not even for food. He was able to keep Anne as his hostage of sorts, intending to kill her but Anne was smart. The way she got away from him was pure genius. They met for the second time when he found her in an apartment bound and gagged by the man Raven was trying to find. Small world but this happened in the same town of Nottwich where the assassin, the man who hired him, and the police are all in. The short story has a happy ending for Anne and her police detective fiance. Not so for the 2 bad men.
Recommended for readers who don't mind reading books written in the 1930s.
I read Graham Green's Brighton Rock many many years ago and also a few short stories, some made into movies. The Third Man and The Fallen Idol are terrific. I have yet to see Brighton Rock movie adaptation which is already on my Kanopy watch list. Or maybe I have seen it already.
