In a recent post Peter Walker recommended *Dead Letters*
which:
"introduces Lt. Eamon Wearie, an FBI trained US Postal
Inspector, and
thus this gives a new take on the 'cop' theme'."
Not commenting on the quality of the book, which I haven't
read yet,
but plan to based on Peter's comment, I should point out that
the US
Postal Inpsection Service is not organized along military
lines like
municipal police forces. Hence, no real Postal Inspector
would ever
attain the title of "Lieutenant." He'd be an "Inspector" a
"Senior
Inspector" a "Chief Inspector," etc. The US Postal Police, on
the
other hand, a uniformed force separate from but closely
related to
the Inspection Service, does have military style ranks.
This is not the first time the activities of the Postal
Inpsectors
have been grist for police procedural mills. Back in the
'50s, Doris
Miles Disney wrote a trilogy of novels about Postal Inpsector
David
Madden for Doubleday Crime Club which were very
well-received. Also
in the '50s, a tight little *noir* film with Alan Ladd as a
tough
Postal Inspector was entitled *Appointment With Danger*. It
also
featured Jack Webb and Harry Morgan as gangsters who were
partnered
up rather than as cop-partners. The script was by Richard L.
Breen,
who also wrote both of Webb's feature-length *Dragnet* films.
(Best
line: "Do you even know what love is?" askes Ladd's
exasperated
superior. "Sure," Ladd replies cooly. "It's something that
goes on
between a man and a .45 that won't jam.")
More recently, retired Texas policewoman Anne Wingate, under
her
"Martha Webb" pseudonym, wrote a neat little novel about a
small-town
Texas policewoman teamed with a Postal Inspector in a book
*may* have
been called *Darling Corey's Dead*. (Another book with the
words
*Darling Corey* in it came out almost simultaneously, and
I;ve always
gotten them confused; the other one was called, I think,
*Wake Up,
Darling Corey*). - Jim Doherty
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