Everyone was somewhere.
Only one of them was with the body.

How it works

Three steps, and no guessing at any of them

1. 1

   Read what they told the inspector

   Each guest says where they were — or, more often, where somebody else was not. Every statement is true.

2. 2

   Place everyone on the plan

   One guest per row, one per column, never two in the same square. The statements rule out the rest.

3. 3

   Look at the room with the body

   When the plan is full, exactly one guest is standing in it. You have not guessed. You have proved it.

The house party

Fourteen people. The same fourteen, every time.

You will get to know them over fifty cases — who is likely to be in the cellar at midnight, who never goes near the library. Four of them are found dead across the volume. The other ten have some explaining to do.

Mr ColeThe butler Thirty-one years at Halmerton, and he has outlasted two cooks, three gardeners and one baronet's temper. He answers precisely what he is asked and not one syllable beyond it. The household repeats, as a joke, that Cole has never been surprised by anything. It is not entirely a joke. Mrs ThorneThe housekeeper Every key in the house hangs at her waist and she counts them twice a day, morning and night, aloud. She keeps a ledger of what the household consumes and, in a second column nobody has asked to see, of who consumes it. Miss AshbyThe governess She arrived from Norfolk with two references. One was from a family the agency could not afterwards trace. She reads later than the house allows and has an unhelpful habit of remembering exactly what was said, and by whom, and in what order. Dr HallamThe physician He attends the family and half the village, and it is he who signs the certificates when a Halmerton dies. Some in the parish find this convenient. Others find it unfortunate. He has not said which of the two he finds it himself. Lady FenwickThe widow She has buried two husbands and speaks warmly of neither. Through the lorgnette she misses nothing at thirty feet, and has never once been persuaded that a thing she saw was better left unmentioned. She dines at Halmerton more often than she is invited. Colonel PrewittThe colonel Thirty years in India, of which he will tell you twenty-nine at considerable length. He keeps regimental hours: up at six, port at nine, and no account whatever of the hours in between. Ask him about the year he does not mention and he will offer you a drink. Mr RookThe solicitor He carries the Halmerton will in a locked case and the Halmerton debts in his head, and would rather lose the case. He arrives without warning, stays exactly as long as the business requires, and has never been heard to say goodbye. Miss PryceThe companion She is paid to read aloud to Lady Halmerton in the afternoons and to be invisible for the rest of the day. She is considerably better at the second duty than the family has ever noticed, which is precisely the difficulty. Reverend BellThe rector He christened three of this family and has buried rather more. He hears more confessions than his church strictly provides for, and keeps every one of them, which makes him the most trusted and the most dangerous man at the table. Mr DunnThe gamekeeper He knows every acre of the estate, every gate that does not lock, and every window that was never meant to open. He comes up to the house when he is sent for. The trouble, as Mrs Thorne observes, is the other times. Sir Walter HalmertonThe master He built the west wing with money that no ledger in the house accounts for. In a single year he altered his will twice and told three people three different versions of what it now says. All three are still under his roof. Lady HalmertonHis wife She runs the house to the minute and the family to the shilling. Nobody has ever heard her raise her voice, a fact the household finds considerably more alarming than if she had. She writes a great many letters and posts them herself. Mr Hugo HalmertonThe son He owes money in three counties and is charming about it in all three. He returns to Halmerton when his creditors draw close and departs when they lose interest, and he is never at any point embarrassed by the arrangement. Miss Rosalind HalmertonThe daughter She reads the newspapers her mother disapproves of and asks, at dinner, the questions the family has quietly agreed not to ask. She has been told twice this year that she is too clever by half. She took it as encouragement.

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One of the fourteen at Halmerton House