The Yellow Claw.

FIRST EDITION. Half title, 31pp cata. (6/5/14); inner hinges starting but sound, the odd spot. Orig. black cloth, lettered in yellow; extremities sl. rubbed, a few small marks, sl. cocked. Contemp. ink signature of C.S. Baker on leading f.e.p., ink stamp 'presentation copy' over imprint on title. A nice copy. Not in Glover & Greene. Hubin p.353. Parisian investigator and master of disguise Gaston Max goes up against master criminal Mr. King in a rather melodramatic tale involving mysterious redheads in expensive furs, opium dens, London socialites, a futurist studio, and Scotland Yard. Arthur Henry 'Sarsfield' Ward, 1883-1959, was a prolific novelist best remembered now for his fictional villain Dr. Fu Manchu; thanks to the Fu Manchu series, he was one of the most financially successful authors of the early twentieth century. He claimed to be a member of the secret society the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, which counted influential authors like Algernon Blackwood and Arthur Machen among its ranks, but that seems unlikely as the order was dissolved in 1903 when Ward was only twenty.…