Safe Custody


Safe Custody is a 1932 novel by the English author Dornford Yates, first serialised in The Saturday Evening Post.

Plot

The protagonists travel to the Castle of Hohenems in Carinthia, and attempt to gain possession of the carved jewels of the Borgias, walled up within the dungeons.

Background

The author, living in France at the time, seems to have been homesick, as the dedication reads "To the finest city in the world incomparable LONDON TOWN".

Critical reception

Mercer’s autobiographer AJ Smithers, writing in 1982, suggested that "his public ought to have become disenchanted by now with such well-worn stuff, but it cannot be denied that Safe Custody came as fresh as any of the others". It sold well, as usual.
The original dustjacket included the following quotes -