The story begins as Dickory Dock (a girl, around 15, first year art student, quite observant, a native New Yorker) is looking for a job, She sees an ad for an artist's assistant and goes to 12 Cobble Lane, for an interview. She meets Garson, (middle aged, mysterious, portrait painter, talkative) the artist and Dickory proves to be observant enough for the job. Dickory gets acquainted with Garson and then starts work. The next day a police officer who knows Garson drops by, and wants Garson to solve some of his cases. Garson paints portraits of the guilty with the information given in the cases. Some of the cases in this book are: The Case of The Horrible Hairdresser (a hairdresser who used a tonic that took three women's hair off), The Case of the Face on the Five-Dollar Bill (a counterfeiting case), The case of the Full-Sized Midget (a storekeeper who stole his own merchandise.) When Dickory and Garson are solving cases they call themselves Inspector Noserag (GARSON backwards - almost) and Sergeant Kod. (DOCK backwards - almost)
Later Dickory is caught in one of Garson's tenants rooms and is gagged and badly hurt. A person involved in one of the cases helps Dickory by killing the evil men. He leaves, and Garson says he killed his tenants. There is a rumor before that Garson killed his brother, But in fact, that is one of his pen names. He had different ones for different aspects of his personality. One is good and one is evil. Dickory saves Garson by looking at the evil paintings that Garson told him never to look at, finding evidence to free Garson. The antagonists are the tenants, and the protagonists are Dickory and Garson. The good side wins in the good vs. evil conflict in this book.
Dickory Dock is my favorite character in the story. She is bright and skilled and is very agile. She learns a lot in the book. She learns how to see through peoples disguises, and about the good/evil conflict of the people in the world. 5he matures well in this book, and starts her way to adulthood.
The theme of this story is that there is more in life and people than meets the eye. Everyone is trying to disguise their personalities in this book in real life. There are some interesting plot twists in the book. Dickory learns how to see through these personality "disguises" and learns more about the theme. This can relate to anyone who is embarrassed about themselves and tries to hide it. This covers almost everybody in the world.
I liked this story for its sense of reality and the fact that everyone is in disguise. It has an interesting and somewhat complex plot. I recommend this book to all ages and people who like mysteries.
by David Cole