The Blue Sequin

Tonight the Archive opens on a detective it has never opened before — and one who changed crime fiction more than almost anyone who came after Sherlock Holmes. Dr. John Thorndyke, created by R. Austin Freeman in 1909: a medical man and a barrister, and the first true forensic scientist in detective fiction. Every laboratory scene in every crime story written since owes him something. A young woman is found murdered in a railway carriage on the line down to Woldhurst. The compartment was locked. The train did not stop. A man is already under arrest, and the case against him looks complete — motive, opportunity, and a weapon of a most peculiar kind. His solicitors send a telegram asking Thorndyke to direct the defence, and they want him on the eight twenty-five from Charing Cross. What Thorndyke brings to the scene is not intuition. It is a research case, a microscope, and a refusal to accept the obvious explanation while a simpler one remains untested. And unlike almost every detective of his era, he is not hunting a criminal. He is standing between an innocent man and a conviction that everybody else finds perfectly satisfactory. FOR LISTENERS This is a complete, unabridged reading of The Blue Sequin by R. Austin Freeman, collected in John Thorndyke's Cases (1909) and now in the public domain. Every word is the author's own. Part of The Midnight Archive: three nights of classics every week, alongside four original Nocturnal Tales mysteries. Holmes astonishes you. Thorndyke shows you the evidence and lets you follow. Which do you actually prefer in a detective story — the leap you could never have made, or the reasoning you could have made yourself? SUPPORT & LISTENING OPTIONS CREDITS Narrated and produced by Nocturnal Tales. Story by R. Austin Freeman (public domain). TAGS / KEYWORDS r austin freeman audiobook, dr thorndyke audiobook, the blue sequin, john thorndyke's cases, first forensic detective, railway carriage murder, locked compartment mystery, edwardian detective story, scientific detective fiction, public domain audiobook, unabridged classic mystery HASHTAGS