Days 207 and 208

Writing exercise – A locked room mystery

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Don’t you just love a mystery?

I don’t, but not one that is impossible to solve. 

Impossible?

I was told that nothing is impossible, and there is always a logical answer to every problem.

I was also told there will always be people who will maintain that the impossible is because of the unexplainable, and we had to look more closely at things that were not of this world.

Those people, the logical people, call crackpots or charlatans. 

There is the unexplainable, but in the end, when we look at all of the facts surrounding a situation, we always find an answer.

But…

We do have unsolvable crimes committed by real people who got away with it.  We do not like to think there is such a thing as the perfect crime.  It is preferable to believe the criminal was very lucky

The crime I was called to, on a dark day and in a sinister house, had all the hallmarks of a perfect crime:  a dead body in a locked room that had only one exit, the door, locked from the inside.

At least, that was the first report I was given by my partner Detective Sargeant Wilson, newly promoted to the detective branch, enthusiastic, and it came out in an explosion of words.

At least she had arrived properly and hadn’t blundered around the crime scene like my last partner had when he first started.

Downstairs in the living room, occupying six of the seven lounge chairs set around the fire, warming those within a range of about twenty feet. Beyond that, there was a chill in the air, not all from the cold.

Outside, a shard of bright light was followed by a crack of rolling thunder, after which the rain became torrential.  I half expected the roof to be leaking.

I was introduced to the six, each including the victim part of a group who paid a small fortune to stay the night in a “genuine” haunted house.  The group were all from the same family: the grandfather, Anton Giles; the father, William Giles; his third wife, Lucy; William’s eldest son, David; his eldest daughter, Winnie; Oliver, and Bertie.

The family get-together was the grandfather’s idea.  William Giles’ current wife was younger than all his children, and the animosity from those children could be felt in the room.  It was obvious the grandfather had a reason, and looking around at the group, finding out what that was would be the same as extracting teeth.

It was also clear, from the venue’s management, of which the manager and two assistants were present, that the murder, mock or otherwise, was not part of the “entertainment.”

An inspection of the room, opened with a spare key by the manager when a preliminary search for Anton had failed to locate him, showed the other key was in the room; then the door was locked from the inside, the victim had been shot at point-blank range by someone he knew because there were no defensive wounds.  The gun was next to the key, and Anton’s watch and wallet were missing, suggesting robbery with violence.

There were no secret doorways or entrances to the room other than the normal door.  The cupboard, full of clothes, didn’t have a secret back.  There was no trapdoor under the carpet, and there was no vent in the walls or roof big enough to take an escapee.

There were no guests or staff on the site or in the house; the caterers had left after dinner, and would not be back until morning, if the rain stopped, because my car was the last to get over the causeway.  If it rained much more, we would be lucky to leave in the morning.  I arrived alone, and my partner arrived a half hour earlier with three constables, one each at the exits.

No one was leaving.

One of the six, or one of the three staff members, could be the murderer.

When I came into the room,  Wilson was standing by the fire, notebook at the ready. The six were seated by the fire, the three staff in the background.  It was a large room, and it took a few seconds to reach the fireplace and get a first look at the family, as Wilson introduced them.

When that was done, I was about to speak when William Giles’ eldest son, David, said, pointing at his father’s latest wife, Lucy, “She did it.”

William glared at the son and said, “Don’t start this again.  It’s clear you don’t like her, but she is not a murderer.  You obviously, on the other hand, must have after he wrote you out of the will.”

“I did nothing of the sort.  And we have only your word on that; he never said he had changed his will.  Unless, of course, you have a newer will, but it would have to be a fake.  He said he was not leaving anything to a paedophile.”

A clear reference to the father marrying a young girl.  She didn’t look very old, but a quick ID check Wilson had called for would soon sort that out.  Appearances were always deceptive.

“Let’s not forget how mortgaged to the hilt you are, Davey.  Hopeless with money, always asking Gramps to bail you out.  I heard home tell you there was no more in that well.  No wonder you killed him.  You got your own version of the will?”

All this talk of a will.  Sometimes, it was useful to let the suspects banter.

But then, time for a question.  “Was this gathering for another reason, other than bonding?”

Oliver snorted.  “Bonding.  Every time we get together, it’s a surprise one of us isn’t murdered, and now it’s happened.  Greed, that’s what this family thrives on.  We were here for an important announcement, and I’m guessing Anton was going to tell us if he was leaving us anything.  Worth billions, he was.  If you are looking for a motive detective, there it is.”

Whilst Wilson hadn’t contaminated the crime scene, the rest of the family had, once the door had been opened, and everyone would have fingerprints all over the room, and Winnie had fainted on seeing the body.  It was, Wilson said, a dog’s breakfast.

It was a family accurate assessment.  And worse, we could not get forensics in until the flooding subsided.

I noticed that Wilson collected all paperwork from the grandfather’s room, locked with the key in his pocket, odd because of the other missing items, and then after a quick search of the other rooms, but no will or anything to do with inheritances was found.

Equally odd, even though Wilson at the time was unaware of what she was looking for.  Clearly, the old man had brought something with him, and the murderer may have taken it.

A call to the old man’s lawyer was next on the list.  A change in the will would make things interesting.

“I did not kill Anton.  He didn’t like me, true, but none of you do either, and none of you are dead if that’s your criterion.  The rest of you children, well, I’d be disgusted to call you my own.”

It sounded weird to hear from a girl younger than all of them, sounding more mature than her years.  It’s probably not.  They all looked and sounded like they had a privileged upbringing.

I had wealthy parents and a boarding school education, but my parents made me work, starting at the bottom and earning my keep and respect the hard way.  There was no free ride for any of us in our family.  Whatever bias I might have had was left at the door.

“If this were a gathering to discuss inheritance, where are your grandfather’s papers?  They were not in his room and were not stored in a house safety deposit box with other valuables, as management requested.”

I looked at each of the six faces, and the only one that didn’t bear intense scrutiny was Lucy.  It might be that she had a guilty conscience or just that she squirmed under intense observation.

Or it was an indicator.

Wilson just returned and motioned for me to join her outside.

She handed me a carefully folded document that had ‘Last Will and Testament of Anton Giles’ dated two days before.  I unfolded the pages and went to the last.  It was unsigned.

A quick scan showed it was short and to the point.  None of the family was going to inherit.  Bottom line, there was nothing to inherit, the total sum up for grabs, a little more than ten thousand pounds.

“Where did you find it?”

“In Lucy’s underwear drawer.”

I sighed.  “We’re not going to get one grain of truth out of any of them.  How long between the murder and your arrival?”

“About three hours.”

“Long enough for all of them to search the house, his room, find out the truth, kill him, and get their stories straight.”

“Even the house staff?”

“All of them.”

“Do you think it was Lucy?”

“Because of this?”  I held up the will.  “No.  I bet there are about twenty of them hidden around this place, and not one is the real will.  The old man was playing with them, failing to realise how it would affect one of them.  One of them may have the real will.”

“How will we know?”

Uf or when the next person dies.”

I might not have come to that conclusion if we had not found the fake will.  This was more than a family bonding. This was a weekend deliberately designed to torment his child and grandchildren before delivering the bad news.

I should not have answered the Superintendent’s call. 

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©  Charles Heath  2025