Masson, Rene

New York. 1951. Knopf. 1st American Edition. Previous Owner’s Name Penned in Front, Otherwise Very Good in Slightly Worn Dustjacket. Translated from the French by Constantine FitzGibbon. 266 pages. hardcover. Jacket design by Karov. keywords: Literature France Crime Translated. FROM THE PUBLISHER - This is a tense, laconic story of the back alleys of Paris and their obsessed and implacable young criminals. It tells of a gang of street urchins led by a bitter girl whose brother has been sentenced to death for murder. The gang kidnaps a rich boy and holds him for ransom in a dark cellar. Cowering and abused, young Cric endures their insults and listens, with fright and fascination, to their hideous professional secrets. The boy's rescue depends upon an elderly private detective who, raking among his sorrowful memories, understands the motives of these terrible children - children nurtured on and the twisted wisdom of the streets. From his first meeting with Fleur, the gang leader, in a filthy cafE, the white-haired detective proceeds with weary, pitying patience. The trail leads through squalling, polyglot streets into a slum tenement whose hopeless inhabitants pose for pornographic photographs, hide stolen goods, wrap cheap caramels. There, in that ominous, dead-end world, an odd wry tenderness touches Fleur's heart and brings this face drama to its necessary end. A triumph of realistic fiction. inventory #43272