Notes on the Settings and Characters of “Give Me Back Myself” by L. P. Davies (1971)

Time Setting:
'Give Me Back Myself' begins on Friday the 23rd of April, most likely in 1971. - p 96

Place Setting:
The Chatfield Memorial Hospital, just outside Oxford, where Stephen Dusack spent some 4 weeks after being injured in a train crash.

In the Warwickshire Cotswolds:
Studdold: Estate Agents, Dicken and Smith, had been on the corner of Mill Street and Redditch Road. Studdold Railway Station. - p 2

Buckley House (pp 28, 35, 54), on the edge of the small Cotswold village of Braite-on-Hay, about 6 miles from Studdold. The old high brick wall, at least 12 feet high, surrounding the grounds (p 27) was topped both by glass and by 3 feet high iron bars, supporting strands of barbed wire. The remotely-controlled security gates in this wall had usually been kept shut. - pp 28 - 29, 42

At Braite-on-Hay:
The Drake public house. - p 45
Old Mr. Kenny's house.

In Devonshire:
Torre St. Marie, a (p 155) village, on the edge of Dartmoor, about 25 miles west of Exeter. - pp 157 - 158, 163
Ashdene, a small house in Elm Down, about 3 miles away from Torre.

Characters:
English-born Stephen Dusack, 32 years, who had lived in South Africa since the age of 5, returned to live in England a week ago, thus very few people in England have met him. He has only just started work as a clerk in the Studdold office of Estate Agents Dicken and Smith, and taken up lodgings in a Wyvern Terrace house. When he goes back to Studdold, after getting out of hospital, both businesses have vanished from their buildings. - pp 46 - 50
Douglas Catfield, Stephen's only friend in England.

At the hospital: Doctor Lattimer and Mr. Glossop.

At Buckley House: Howard Downey, secretary to the unmarried real-estate speculator, David Orme, who had lived for well over 20 years (p43) at Buckley House. He was the son of the late Seymour Orne, a former Birmingham factory owner. - pp 108 - 109
Frank Purley, the armed (p 83) bodyguard, and his father Tom Purley, the gardener-cum-handyman, live in the gate lodge of Buckley House.
Craddock, the chauffeur and his wife Mrs. Craddock, the Buckley House housekeeper.

Detective Inspector Sanderson of the Birmingham C. I. D.

Harry Benson, the previous Buckley House chauffeur and Mrs. Benson, the former housekeeper, now running a betting shop and living in Wyvern Terrace at Studdold. - pp 183 - 184

At Braite-on-Hay: Mr. Ambrose Kenny, an elderly, retired accountant (pp 40, 139 - 141, 162), and his Birmingham-based interior decorator (pp 62, 94) daughter, Miss Francine Kenny.

Harrison and Redfern.

Quotes:
"Dusack, which sounds vaguely Polish but which is apparently English in origin." - p 62

"I think I'm more scared about losing myself than I am of being killed." - p 94

Two seemingly unconnected people from very different walks of life had seen fit to lie brazenly to him. ...on the face of it neither stood to gain anything. Kenny was possibly right, there might be people who lie just for the pleasure of watching their victims' discomfiture. But to encounter two of that breed in such a short space of time was too much of a coincidence. So there had to be a reason, and the only one he could think of that made sense was that they had both been bribed, paid to lie. - p 61

"I've never heard tell of anything like this before. Not in real life, anyway. It's as if someone were trying to wipe away your past. First where you used to lodge, then where you worked, then your friend over here, then your friend out in South Africa." - p 74

"One man can't transfer a lifetime of memories and impressions to another man, a complete stranger, in the course of a short conversation on a train. It's impossible." - pp 81 - 82

"...it's that big mouth of his. If he's not interfering in other people's affairs, he's sounding off about things that are best not sounded off about. At least, not to someone you don't know." - p 139

Plot Teasers:
What did the clerk, Stephen Dusak, have to do with the wealthy David Orme?
The idea of an elaborate conspiracy is surely ridiculous.
Who assaulted Stephen Dusack (p 127) and why?
What is Frank Purley's motive for advising Stephen Dusack to get right away from Buckley House?
How was the crash (p 4) of the 2.30 train to London, with its 50 casualties (p 44) central to the plot?
Who was Martin Rietti, and why have there been at least 3 attempts to break into Buckley House?
How do Douglas Catfield, Jarty Jervis, and Hammond come into this business?

Comment:
The close similarity of the names Catfield and Chatfield is the sort of coincidence that happens in real life but should be avoided in fiction.

(Page references are to the 1971 Doubleday edition.) ( )