THE TRAGEDY or XBarnaby RossViking ($2).
During its seven-year life the Viking Press has never published a detective story. This criminal negligence the editors are enabled to expiate by the discovery of an "almost perfect mystery." The Tragedy of X strikes a happy balance: not perfect enough to render its readers completely insomniac, it has points enough to make them lose at least a minimum desired amount of sleep.
Dissipated Broker Harley Longstreet, to celebrate his engagement to Cherry Browne, gives a party at a New York Hotel. Longstreet's business-partner John De Witt, his...