The Complete Dr. Thorndyke - Volume IV by R Austin Freeman

The Complete Dr. Thorndyke - Volume IV by R Austin Freeman

Volume IV contains the fourth, fifth, and sixth Thorndyke novels, published in 1914, 1922, and 1923, respectively. Covering different periods in the doctor's career, each of these shows Thorndyke's skills at their finest.

• A Silent Witness - When a young doctor finds a body that almost immediately vanishes, he's drawn into a dangerous plot which endangers his own life, and eventually leads the murderer to strike at Thorndyke's own door.
• Helen Vardon's Confession - In this unusual adventure, Helen Vardon tells her own story, in which her future is nearly stolen from her, and she is set on a path leading to her ultimate destruction - unless Dr. Thorndyke can save her.
• The Cat's Eye - An inheritance with ties to the Jacobite Rising of 1745 sets in motion a series of events that threatens not only Thorndyke's friends, but his own life as well.

Richard Austin Freeman was born in London in 1862 and died in 1943. He went to Middlesex Hospital to study medicine before joining the Colonial Service. He was sent to a position in Accra, Ghana, on Africa's Gold Coast. He suffered blackwater sickness while in Africa, forcing him to return to Britain. He decided to try his hand at writing fiction after failing to find a permanent medical employment.

Using the pen name Clifford Ashdown, he wrote his first works in partnership with Dr. John James Pitcairn, the medical officer of Holloway Prison. The Red Thumb Mark, the first Doctor Thorndyke novel, was released in 1907. During World War I, he was a Captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps. He continued to write until his death in 1939, when he was 77 years old and wrote parts of Polton Explains in a bomb shelter.