ine. Harriet is in a state of personal tension because she a successful career woman must decide whether to marry the rich, aristocratic, witty, extraordinarily intelligent Lord Peter Wimsey (Sayers's detective hero). She has been putting him off for five years, fearful of losing her identity to such an extraordinary man, yet drawn to him for his extraordinary qualities. As she tells Miss de Vine,
"I have been facing one fact for some time," said Harriet,
staring out with unseeing eyes into the quad, "and that is,
that if I once gave way to Peter, I should go up like
"That," said Miss de Vine drily, "is moderately obvious.
How often has he used that weapon against you?"
"Never," said Harriet, remembering the moments when he
might have used it. "Never." (Sayers 447)
What woman would not marry a man who had never used it, as indeed Harriet, having worked through her ambivalence, does do on the last page of the novel. It is the peculiar quality of Lord Peter's heroism that h
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