 Honestly, my dear Watson, it's elementary. Hello, detectives. Hello, detectives. Today, we're going to be solving a mystery. Not only are we solving a mystery, but we're going to be solving a mystery that even Agatha Christie can solve. Proro and his little green cells, where are you now? Where are you now? We're gonna be solving a mystery Miss Agatha Christie couldn't solve. That's why I'm Charlotte Kynes. Because I believe every British person is related to Charlotte. Picture the scene. It is the 18th of March, 1926. Miss Agatha Christie is at her home called Styles and she is trying to solve a murder mystery that has been published periodically in the Daily Mirror. Its readers are challenged to two questions. How did Cicely disappear? Who caused her disappearance and why? The first prize, let me tell you, is Agatha had her eye on the money. The first prize is the equivalent today of 15,000 pounds. Yes, please. If I solve this, where's my coin, Daily Mirror? I might write to them. But Miss Agatha didn't get it right. The mystery we're gonna be solving is the Winchingham Mystery by Anthony Berkeley. I'll let you have a look at the lovely cover. Lovely cover? What Australian detectives are? So yes, this was originally published in the newspaper as a periodical, a chapter would come out every day and the readers were challenged to solve it. But it is now a book. It's not a widely read book. So that's why I thought, not only because it's famous as being the book that Agatha Christie couldn't solve, she could not solve this mystery. I don't think many of you will have read this or will want to read it. So it doesn't matter. I'm gonna spoil the mystery for you. We're gonna solve it together. We're gonna basically read the book together. Miss Agatha, ever the graceful loser, described Anthony Berkeley Cox, who is the author as detection and crime at its wittiest. All his, why did I go a bit herky-pory there? Detection and crime at its wittiest. All his stories are amusing and intriguing and he is the master of the final twist, the surprise genouement. So that tells me already, we're getting a twist, eh? We're getting a twist at the end. So let's store that in our little gray cells. We're already getting the information that we need. Also, Anthony Berkeley himself, when talking about this book, says, I realized that it is not in the intricacy of the puzzle that is set, but in its very simplicity that success may be achieved. So we're looking, we're gonna be looking. We're gonna be looking for the answer that is staring us right in the eye, looking camp in the eye. So myself, Sherlock Holmes, I am Sherlock Holmes. How does Sherlock speak? Oh, oh, Sherlock, I'm Sherlock Holmes. We are gonna be solving this mystery together. Now I wanna try and solve it today. I wanna try and read the whole book and solve it today. It's about 10 a.m. and we're getting going. We're getting going. I will check in with you periodically with my thoughts. Let's begin solving the Wynchingham mystery. Welcome to the mystery wall. This is where we are gonna be solving our mystery. I have read the first 50-ish pages of the Wynchingham mystery. We have met our cast of characters. The mystery has just occurred. Let's go through what we know so far. Are you ready? So we start off with Steven Monroe. Steven Monroe is our protagonist, but that does not mean he can be trusted. I have read enough murder mysteries to know that does not absolve him of anything. We meet Steven and he talks about how he is ex-army and his uncle died. He got a lot of money. He decided, I'm gonna live for like six years really well off this money and then whatever happens after that happens. And we've got to that point and now he has to go work. So he previously existed in the land of the rich, but he poor now, sis. So he's going to work as a footman at this house. Enter the house. Wynchingham hall. Here we are, ladies and gentlemen. A lovely Tudor abode with red brick oak panelling. The owner of the mansion is Lady Susan Carey. She is described as fierce, cynical, overbearing, inexpressibly dignified little old lady with a body as fragile as her soul was fierce. She's basically a mean bitch. We also meet Millicent Carey, who is Lady Carey's niece who she adopted. Millicent is described as mild, inoffensive, well-meaning. She's just kind of kind and doesn't really stand up for herself, especially not to Lady Carey. These two, she's just very mean to her. And like Millicent's like, okay. We also meet Sisley. Now Sisley is an important character, so make sure you pay attention to her. So Sisley's kind of got the it-girl energy. She's kind of like a bad bitch. Every room she walks into she's like, ah. You know, I imagine like flowing hair. Like she's that girl. Lady Susan, from her perspective, she makes a point of disliking the girl at times. Her knowledgeable ability, her insufferable superiority, but she's always been a special favorite. She's that kind of girl who's like, no, she's a bad bitch, but you can't help but like her anyways. And last to enter the room is Miss Rivers, who I'm not entirely clear on who she is, but I think she's Lady Susan's companion. The description we get of Miss Rivers is that you always have to look twice around a room before realizing she's in it, which is kind of mean. But that does make me immediately suspicious because like that paints me as someone who can get away with doing anything under the nose of everything else, you know? She's putting all of the things in place for the mystery to eventually happen because no one looks at her, no one notices her. So like I'm immediately the detective, the detective instincts are flaring up. I do not trust Miss Rivers. And then finally we meet Martin, who is the butler. He's just a butler, like that's, he's just a butler. There's not anything particularly noticeable. I debated putting him even on here, but I don't know, we've spent a fair amount of time getting to know him already. Martin's job is basically to train Steven up to be a fit man. And like, listen, Steven's not great at it. He's used to being within this group of people. You know, he's used to mixing with these kinds of people. And then he's like, I'm actually gonna serve you now. Mm, don't know how to do that. Sisley is described as looking ill. And when Lady Susan leaves the room, she begs Millicent for 50 pounds. And Millicent is like, bitch, not bitch, because Millicent's nice. So she's like, I've already lent you a hundred. And Sisley's like, yeah, I need a lot of 50. And Millicent's like, are you gambling again? And Sisley's like, yeah. So Miss Sisley has a gambling addiction and Millicent has been funding it. Sisley's sleeved to go somewhere else. Steven takes her down to the station and he's gonna pick up other guests as well. And when he gets there, he finds out one of those guests is Pauline, his ex. How juicy, isn't this amazing? Pauline sees him, she's angry. She's like, get out my way, bitch, get out my way. At the start in the first chapter, before he left his house to become a fit man, he actually had a picture of Pauline and a frame that he ripped up. So yeah, listen, yikes, there's a lot of, there's a lot of unspent feelings there. But Pauline is with her rich as fiance. He's like the richest man in London and she's there with him. Oops, the drama. Julius Hammerstein, he hasn't given me much energy yet. He's just like a big business guy who likes to talk about business, essentially. But then we meet a fun character, Frederick, who is Lady Susan's nephew. He knows Steven, they went to school together. He's like, why are you here doing this? And he tells everyone else his story, like the fact that Steven has no money and thus has to work as a fit man. Then the rest of the party guests arrive. We have Henry, Henry Kentus Bear, who's described as an exquisite creature and basically his only job or interest in life is dressing well. So I chose Harry Styles. He doesn't strike me as someone we need to suspect. He's a fairly like, you know, he's not really one of the main girlies, if you get what I mean. He's just there to like give, he's got like languid, lazy energy to him. He's just there to give like comedic relief. There's also Colonel Ufcom, whose main trait is that he's old. The only stuff he ever says is like, well, back in my day, back when I was young, not really getting suspect energy from him either. We also have John Starcross, who is a world famous explorer and no dinner party these days was complete without John Starcross. So very exciting. He's interesting because he could have some kind of like, he's got a lot of survival tactics. He may know how to pull tricks and stunts. So that's interesting. And then our final two characters, we have Annette Agnew, who is just described as very pretty, very natural, very direct and very modern. So that's that. And finally we have Miss Baby Columpton. I don't actually know what her real name is, but everyone calls her baby. She's described as like fluffy. Every time they see her, she's like a fluffy woman. A fluffy woman walked in. I don't really know what it means. Very innocent. She's got a childlike face. She seems very sweet. She is the last one to join us at the party. So that is our cast of characters. Now I feel like it's been made hard for me about the fact that there's quite a lot of them. This is where it gets interesting. After the dinner, Frederick says, listen, I'm obsessed with witchcraft. I'm so into voguing right now. He says like, I've got a current obsession with witchcraft. I want us to perform a spell to make someone disappear. Okay. Miss Columpton likes the idea of doing the spell. She's excited by it. The net is like, that's boring. I don't wanna do that. And Star Cross gets uneasy. He's like, I think this could be dangerous. I've seen some wild shit in my travels. I don't think we should mess about with this. So he's not for it. Now, Cicely left earlier in the day, if you recall, Steven took her to the train station. When there, he realized that she was supposed to go to Folkestone to go on this yacht thing. She got a ticket to Brighton instead. And then she turns up just now in the evening, saying, oh, it was canceled. I had to come back. We don't really know what's going on. She didn't go to Folkestone. She went to Brighton. She says her suitcases went to Folkestone. So that is definitely mysterious, but she has returned to the party. Lady Susan asks Steven to go and get Miss Rivers for her to join them in the drawing room. Miss Rivers is not in her room and nobody knows where they are, which is a bit suspicious because the mystery is about to happen. Frederick picks Steven to read out the spell, which I feel like absolves him of what's about to happen to some extent, because people would hear his voice moving around the room if he was getting up to shenanigans. Also, he is the protagonist, but I feel like we can't completely absolve him yet, but I feel like it reduces the risk of his guilt. Sicily is picked to be the one who goes under the disappearing spell. Annette is not into it. She wants someone to pay bridge with her and no one's turning up, so she pretends to go sleep. Miss Columpton is a bit suspicious to me. She's described as sitting in the corner seat, patting her skirt vigorously, which like, I don't understand what's going on there. Miss Rivers enters the room when it's dark. Oh, that's another thing. The lights went out. The electricity has gone out, so they're using candles and they blow all the candles out when they're gonna do the sales. Miss Rivers walks in when it's already dark. She enters the room and the spell starts. Now, it quickly gets out of hand. There's loud raps being heard from above and they're like, what the hell? Everyone's getting a bit uncomfortable. Lady Susan asks, can you speak? And a booming voice from up above says, yes. Then it starts going crazy. There's loads of raps. There's a bang, a crash by the fireplace. There's a scream. The lights come back up and Cicely is missing. She's missing. We don't know where she is. Here we have a map of where everyone was when the seance took place. Cicely is here in the center of the room. Julius and Pauline are sitting on this sofa together. Steven is here reading it out. Now, interestingly, during the spell, he does walk over to Pauline and hold her hand. So he should know that she hasn't really had anything to do with it because they are holding each other's hand. Henry is by the window seat here. Freddie is over here by the door and the statue that he has just covered up. Miss Rivers is seated here on this sofa. John Starcross is by the French windows. Lady Susan and the Colonel are in these chairs. Millicent is playing on the piano, which again absolves her of much guilt because she's playing the piano continuously. Annette is lying on this sofa and pretending to sleep and Miss Collinpton is curled up in this corner seat, again, patting her skirt vigorously. And also, Steven says, just before the lights went up, he got a distinct pungent smell of chloroform. So that suggests that Cicely was perhaps drugged, but then who was the scream from? In terms of who I am suspecting, obviously the whole Millicent lending her 150 pounds, which is like thousands and thousands of pounds in today's money. And her knowing that Cicely has a gambling addiction immediately gives me warning signals. Also, earlier in the book, Freddie mentions to Steven how he's gonna get barely anything in Lady Susan's will. Even though he's related to her and he thinks Cicely, because she's befriended the woman, is gonna get all her jewels, which he says is a small fortune. So he stands to gain from killing or removing Cicely from the picture because he'll get more money in the will. So he's a big suspicion for me. Also, the fact that he came up with the idea to do the spell and he chose Cicely kind of, like other women, people saying pick a net and he was like, no, she's grumpy. And so it wasn't until Cicely proposed herself that he chose Cicely. However, a flaw in this plan is, Cicely was not supposed to be there. She wasn't supposed to be at the party, so she was supposed to be somewhere else. Even when the spell was proposed, she wasn't there. So that is a big flaw in the plan. So that's where we stand at this point in the first 50 pages. Cicely has disappeared, but I feel like we've done a good job of meeting our cast of characters and I'm gonna go endeavor to find out what happens next. Interesting, interesting. So the next chapter opens up with the lights coming back on, Cicely's gone and we immediately notice only two people that have moved are Henry and Baby. They're the only two that have moved from their original position and we heard footsteps while the lights were out. My initial thought from this is that we have two or more people working together, but I don't know if that's too obvious and I don't know if it's too obvious to suspect Henry and Baby straight away just cause they've moved. I mean, you could move cause you're scared and wanna like run away if you think her noise is near you, but Henry, they're searching the room for Cicely and Henry won't move off the piano. Freddie proposes maybe there's something in the piano, maybe she's hired in the piano and he's like, no, there's no room in the piano for her to hide, plus I tried the lid when I came and sat on it. Okay, girls. So he is suspicious, suspicious. My immediate suspicion is that Henry is hiding something in the piano, but he has something to do with Cicely, evidence, chloroform, something he doesn't want the rest to see, he's hiding it. I'm suspicious, I'm putting a star on there. I don't trust this man. A big note is made of Miss Rivers. In this, when they're all searching around, Steven is like, I don't know why she insists on wearing those thick glasses and like her wearing her hair pulled back so tight. My immediate thought is, are there skies, are there skies? I'm gonna say now, she's not mentioned again in the whole rest of the section I just read. So I don't know if we should really suspect her, but I'm just a bit suspicious. The only people that think something is wrong and it's not just Cicely playing a prank are John Star Cross, the explorer, he's like, I've seen shit in my day, this ain't good, and Millicent is fairly worried. And also, Steven and Pauline are becoming increasingly worried. They don't find anything, they go to sleep, and they wake up again in the night to screams in the drawing room again and a thick smell of chloroform again in there. Now, Henry is in there when Steven gets into the room. The windows are wide open, Henry said he was just the first in the scene, like my story. Never trust Harry Styles. The order they get there in is Henry, Steven, Star Cross, and then Freddie, all coming to investigate the noise. Steven and Pauline meet up in the night, they agree to work together on this to try and figure out what's happening because of course they will hold each other's hand during the whole debacle, so they feel like they can trust each other. Julius busts in and threatens to basically kill Steven if he keeps getting it on with his fiance. And then something very exciting happens, we get our next piece of evidence. A phone call from Cicely to Lady Susan saying it's all her fault, she's been banished to another realm, and she's been dematerialized, she's blaming Lady Susan, and they have to hold another seance tonight to get her back. Millicent's immediate reaction is shocked when finding out it's actually Cicely on the phone. Whenever a character reacts like that, it makes me think she thought she was dead, like she thought it would be impossible, or she's just very innocent and very mudmilling and kind, but also like innocent mudmilling, I don't think so. Now, Steven has a meeting with little Julius's chauffeur, and he tells him, he ain't got much money, he ain't got much money. And if I were you, if I had savings with him, I'd get him out, and between you and me, if he don't get no more money in a week or so, he's going to prison, prison, honey, prison. So immediately, Steven's like, I can't let my girl Pauline get caught up in this. Like I'm going to need to find a way to stop this. Is he on some money bid to get money out of Lady Susan so he doesn't go to prison? I don't know. Steven and Pauline go for a walk to chat. They hear Freddie and Miss Clumpton getting on basically, having naughty times in the woods. Even though she tried to proposition Steven earlier, I shouldn't tell you about that. There's a lot of stuff going on, I don't tell you about it, because there's a lot of stuff happening. She tried to like get Steven, and he was like, no, no. And she was like, fine. So she turns to Freddie instead. Then on their way back from the walk, Millicent runs up to Pauline and Steven, saying a letter has fallen from the ceiling in the drawing room. Like how is that even possible? We've had a lot of stuff going on with the ceiling, with like wraps coming from the ceiling, a voice from the ceiling. And now we have a letter falling from the ceiling. In Cecily's handwriting, again with this whole spiel that there has to be another seance tonight. Otherwise, her soul is eternally doomed. Steven kind of gets the sack. Lady Susan sacks him so he can just become a member of the party and like enjoy times with everyone. Basically says, I was friends with your mom. You can live here forever until you find your feet again. The colonel thinks it's mass hypnotism. Okay, my guy. Like, everyone's just like, shot, shot. Shot and he's like, you know, you can't discount it. And then Pauline and Steven find out from Millicent again a secret, the only members of the Kerry family who live in the house are supposed to know, so Freddie wouldn't know, that there is a secret priest hole in the drawing room off to the side of the fireplace. The fireplace is here. I think it's here on off of this window scene. And Pauline and Steven are like, guess we better go investigate it. And there they find a handkerchief with Cecily's expensive, uncommon scent on it. Basically no one else can afford this scent. She imports it from France. I also forgot to tell you that at the start when they're searching for Cecily in the room, they find a scarf hanging basically from the ceiling. It's hanging from like a corner of the top of one of the painting. So her scarf somehow gone to the ceiling. But yeah, they find a handkerchief in the priest hole which they think means Cecily must have been there. Maybe went to hide in there during the seance and it's got her distinctive smell on it, Pauline can tell. And then this is where it gets juicy everyone. Are we ready? This is where, oh how the tables have turned. Henry and Martin, I bet you forgot about him, Martin. Come into the room basically talking about how Henry's gonna let Martin in on a project they're working on. Talking about how the other party has been trying to get the information we want. Martin asks, will the young lady continue to play her part? Talking about how once this is done, Martin will get a quarter of the money they're gonna get from it, which insinuates it's Henry Martin maybe Cecily hiding on purpose and someone else. And Martin says, there's a man in the house we can frame on who's served a term of imprisonment under another name and I can use that to blackmail him. Oh my God, like I don't even know where to go with this information. What am I supposed to do? Be a detective, I don't know, I just have red string. Now Henry and Martin are connected by a very suspicious thread. In terms of my suspicions right now, if I had to guess right now, Henry number one. I don't trust this man. I mean, surely now we know he's involved in some way with whatever's going on. He's just been so dodgy. Like every time there's been a piece of information, like the windows being open when they went into the room the second time after the chloroform strong smell, he like kept trying to like give an alternative explanation other than the most suspicious one that we think happened. But I don't yet know what he has to gain. He doesn't have a job, right? One of the first introductions we got to him was how Stephen's like, I don't know how he affords to dress the way he does and live the way that he does when he doesn't really have a job. He just like lives off his friends. So I'm thinking, is there a link between him and maybe a gambling debt that Sissy has? Cause I haven't forgotten about that. She's begging medicine for 50 pounds here, 50 pounds there. Like her life depends on it. So I'm like, is she paying off a gambling debt? He runs some kind of like underground gambling business and now they're getting Martin in on the action. I don't know. Who would be his accomplice? I'm very suspicious of Miss Rivers. I feel like there's something to the disguise there, but I feel like she's been with Lady Susan for a long time. So that's a long time to keep the disguise up. Pauline, I think we can trust. Stephen and Pauline, I think are now supposed to be our detectives of the story, because we can kind of trust, but I wouldn't rule that out. I like John Starcross. He seems like a voice of reason. We can't forget also, we've got a man here who has served prison time under a different name that they want to frame. Maybe John Starcross? I feel like it could be him. In terms of who the other person on this plot is, Julius needs money. He needs money, but I don't feel like he's been socializing with a lot of the other guests to try and get information. My like top guest would be Miss Rivers or maybe baby or a net. We haven't heard much about her. I mean, at this point, I'm just, you know, suspecting everyone. Do we now think that Henry definitely has something to do with everything going on or is it a red herring? I'm not sure. But I definitely think Cicely is involved to some extent because of the letter in her handwriting. Millicent verified that. And ladies and gentlemen, it was definitely her on the phone, not someone faking her voice. So in order for that to happen, she's either being blackmailed maybe with the gambling addiction or she's in on it to try and pay that off. I feel like. So yeah, Henry is my enemy number one at the moment. I just realized Florence Pugh is probably not happy I've cast her in another film with Harry Styles after the way his acting seems to have gone in. Don't worry about it. Henry I'm suspicious of. Julius I just don't like and he needs money. Miss Rivers we have not spoken much about but I'm very suspicious of and Millicent I feel like knows a lot about the stuff of the house that could be used. And she lent Cicely 150 pounds so she has a motive. I don't know what Henry's motive is yet other than he doesn't have a job and this is kind of how he makes his money. I don't know. Curious sir and curious sir. So much to talk about many big developments. As you'll remember, we have the phone call and the letter saying we have to hold another seance. That doesn't happen. The people for the seance, Henry, Freddie, they're the ones who want the seance. However, Pauline doesn't mean later that Millicent was a little bit on the slide. They'll be like, you know, not in front of the group but just telling Pauline, you know, I think we should have the seance. I think it could work. I think you could do something. Millicent, what do you have to say for yourself? I've just got to say this mystery is really fun. Like I know we're not reviewing the book necessarily but I'm having the best time. This is a five-star for me so far. It's a locked room closed circle mystery. Like I mean, it's really funny as well. I'm loving the writing. I love this cast of characters. Like they all bring something different to the table. I'm just really enjoying it. So I'm definitely gonna read more from this author in the future. Steven notices, hey, Lady Susan was wearing her pearls at dinner when she was on the night before. And this isn't a very big piece of information but it struck me because I have detective skills, you know, major detective instincts as interesting. So keep it in your mind. Steven and Pauline, our besties are like, listen, they're like in love, you know, they're besties. They decide to hide in a drawing room to see if anyone's gonna come in and go to the secret passage. Someone does, Steven follows him up and gets attacked and the person escapes or even can see him. With my detective instincts that would not have been a problem. But something that does come out of this is Pauline's going around some of the corridors afterwards goes, little smell, little smell. And she realizes Cicely is still in the house. She's still in the house. And then the next morning, Lady Susan's jewelry is stolen, her pearls that she was wearing and all the rest of her jewelry is stolen. Now this, we have to think about, does not benefit Cicely who if she's in on all this, what's the point? Cause she stands to inherit that. Someone is gonna steal the jewelry if they didn't stand to benefit from inheriting it like Frederick or Julius who needs the money. And then, when he couldn't get any worse, we have a death. We have a death. Guess who dies? Guess who dies? Mr. Martin, everyone. I meant to print out a cross to go across his face. Well, let's just, you know, fold the corner of his face over, Martin's dead. Now, is it a murder or is it accidental? At first everyone is saying it's accidental because he was crushed under a falling branch, a big falling branch. Stephen tiptoes out there to investigate, finds, oh yeah, in fact, it was soared off. The branch was soared off. It's foul play, ladies and gentlemen, foul play. Martin was murdered. So we wanna think, this is now not longer just Cicely going missing. This is murder. Who stands to benefit? Maybe Henry, I'm giving him another star. I don't care. It was like, actually I've made a mistake. This guy's a fucking idiot. I should not be involving him in my plans. Get rid. Or it could be the person that he was talking about blackmailing who went to prison under different names, who I think is John Star-Cross. That's my bet because why the fuck is he here otherwise? Hang on, I haven't written here. Murdered. Now interestingly, Millicent, she's been very nervy this whole time, right? She's like, girl, I'm a ball of nerves. When Stephen mentions he's gonna take the path earlier in the morning that Martin eventually dies on, she's like, oh really? Are you sure you wanna take that path? Are you sure you wanna do that? Because maybe she knows something's a fit. So Millicent is a little bit suspicious to that. It could just be someone being like, why the fuck are you walking instead of taking a car which I'm offering to you? Or it could be her being like, I don't want you to die. We find out a very important piece of information. Stephen doesn't know this. The character doesn't know this, but we do. Which means it strikes me as important. Cicely, remember the yacht trip that she was supposed to go on? She was supposed to go to Folkestone to go on? We receive a fax and it says we're confused. She was never invited. They left on the yacht trip a week ago. The people who were saying invited her. They barely even know her. She was never supposed to go on the yacht. Which brings the question, why did she leave and come back? Was it to go do something? Which the team, the people who were like scamming needed to do before the events of the night or did something genuinely go wrong and she came back? Stephen goes to visit Pauline's dad to warn him off of the engagement with Julius. Now this whole another section, there's like a whole chapter on this. I don't understand money. I'm a detective, not an economist. You can't pay me to understand money, okay? Understand human motivation. Yes, but. Basically, the only short of it is Pauline's dad, used to be rich, got into loads of debt. He put loads of money in these investments which he got told had halved. Julius says, I'll do the good thing and I'll buy them off of you and I'll sort it out. Her dad is like, oh my God, I love you. Stephen says, mm, something smells fishy here. Rings up some contacts, finds out actually those shares in a couple days, like 10 days, are gonna be actually quadrupled the value that you put in and like saves the day. And he's like, oh my God, like the dad's like, I love you, marry my daughter, I think. He tells Pauline, Pauline rips off her engagement ring. Julius flees. He flees the house with the jewelry. Now, then we have a confession. We have a confession. Get all the microphones on me please. Annette, Annette, Miss Zendaya up here. I've been saying pretty and quiet this whole time. Hands out. Cecily hid behind her. She knew what was going on. She knew, she knows, she knows. Cecily came and hid behind her on the sofa, like under the sofa. She helped to hide. She went and did some of the taps, the sounds we heard. She did the scream that we heard, but she says someone else was doing the larger sounds. She flung Cecily's scarf up to the top. She was doing all that, right? But there's a change. They wait until everyone has left the room. She's called upstairs to talk to someone, I can't remember who. She comes back down, I think baby. She comes back down, Cecily has gone. She's missing. So she doesn't know what has happened after that. It seems like the seance was originally a joke, at least on Ceci's part, or she saw the chance of the seance happening, saw it as a chance to play a joke, essentially. That suggests to me, she's not part of whatever plan is going on and is now being blackmailed. Remember, the letter, 100% her handwriting. The phone faint, but her. So, I think she's being blackmailed. I don't think she's involved, but I think they've got shit on her, with the whole going to Brighton, gambling addiction. I haven't forgot about that. It's right at the start, I haven't forgot about it. For me, for this to be a fair play mystery, it would have to be someone we're spending a lot of time with, who's behind this. Henry's one of them, Julius. Frederick, we've kind of mentioned, but a lot of the others we haven't spent a whole ton of time with. I'm still really, really suspicious of Miss Rithas. There was a section in the drill we weren't missing that she was very short with Stephen when he was trying to find out what was going on, but I mean, it's like nothing major. I haven't got any concrete opinions yet, but I'm gonna read one more section of 50 pages, which I think won't get us to the reveal. I think we'll stop before the reveal, and I'll make my final guess, and then we'll see if I'm right. Bearing in mind, no one solved this at the time. Not even, I could say like no one. I'm just gonna connect Annette to the scarf so that I remember that's like a bit of a red herring, cause she just threw that up there. Oh, and the chloroform. The chloroform was her as well. I'm feeling most suspicious towards Miss Rithas though, I have to say. Henry feels too obvious. He's been like the villain, the pantomime villain the entire time, or maybe Millicent. These two are who I'm suspecting the most right now. What other mysteries have we got? Jewelry, I think is Julius, stealing the jewelry for money, and man who used to be in prison, I think is John Starcross. They're my guesses so far, but I don't have motives for Miss Rithas and Millicent. I do feel Millicent actually with the 150 pound, but is that, I mean, I don't know. We shall see. Let's read one more section and then I'll submit my guess. Honestly guys, being a detective is tiring work. I'm exhausted. It's like half 10. I'm ready for that. So I have read up to chapter 21. I have my theories, but first of all, I just wanna say I'm pretty sure I was right. I'm pretty sure John is the guy who used to be in prison. It's just been floated by Stephen that that is what happened, like this is just the second. I just wanna say I was fucking right. I was right. I'm pretty sure that's what it's gonna tend to be. So like tick, tick, tick for Megan, tick, tick, tick, tick. Not much has happened. We haven't really got any evidence this round. We find out that the whole thing that Henry was getting Martin to sign up for was him and baby. We're looking through Julius' money to see if he was actually bankrupt because if he was, they were gonna buy Pauline's dad's shares because they knew what was going on. Or at least that's the story they're giving, but honestly, I believe it. I feel like that evil has been vanquished. So it turns out that Freddie and Annette have an alibi for when the tree fell so they couldn't have killed Martin. The handkerchief, well, Millicent tells Pauline and Stephen that the handkerchief that they found is actually hers. And she loved the scent so much that she went and bought it as well. Pauline doesn't believe her. She's calling bullshit. I've never mentioned this, right? Because I didn't think it was important. I didn't think this character would be important. But basically, Stephen's old butler, who he had to fire when he had to get a job, is now working as a gardener on the grounds. And it turns out that the escape into the old priest hole also exits onto Millicent's room and that's how the guy who attacked Stephen escaped. She says it was the gardener. Stephen calls bullshit on that. So they're both saying that Millicent's lying and why would she lie? Why would she pretend that the handkerchief is hers? She wanted to see like Sisley's knot in the vicinity. A ransom letter is sent out and it's saying, put it on the tree. The tree we used to kill the guy, put it on the tree. Stephen and Pauline like stake it out to see who goes past the area that could lead to the tree. When they get to the tree, the letter is gone. Now, I think Miss Rivers delivered the letter to the tree. She was supposed to pin it to the tree. My initial assumption, and I wrote it down in capitals, is was the letter ever there, right? I didn't believe that she ever put the letter there. But in the last few pages, Stephen has basically asserted that it's Miss Rivers that she never put the letter there, that she was in disguise as Sisley and then they switch places. Again, I wrote down disguise, talking about the glasses and the hair pulled back and I was like, hang on. The fact that he's coming to this conclusion this early means it's not true. So before that, if I had stopped a chapter earlier, because I don't know when they got up to in the newspaper when they were supposed to solve it. Do you know what I mean? I would probably have guessed Miss Rivers, but the fact that Stephen has just guessed her, I don't think it's correct. But part of me does still think that it's like there's something going on there with the disguise. I don't trust it. And then we've just got to the point where it seems like Star Cross is the convict, ex-convict that I said he is. Now, we get to the point where I have to make my final guess. Right, this is a big moment and I'm very tired. Let's eliminate people. Annette has too many alibis when stuff is going on, I think. Henry and baby, I think, are caught up in the stuff with Julius. Don't think it's them. Don't think it's gonna be Star Cross. Think his reveal is that he's gonna be the ex-convict. The Colonel just hasn't given me anything. He hasn't given me anything. Like to think he would be him. Thought it would be Miss Rivers. Don't think it's gonna be her anymore. Don't think it's Julius. So that leaves me with Millicent and Freddie. That leaves me with Millicent and Freddie. And I think it might be them. I think this is my final assertion, right? Write it down. Miss Agatha, I'm coming for you. Get it, get the records to show. I think it was Millicent and Freddie. We think back to that quote from the writer himself saying it's simple. It's basically in plain sight. I realize that it is not in the intricacy of the puzzle that it's set, but in its very simplicity that success may be achieved. I think they too have the most simple reasoning, right? By the way, I don't think she's in it. I think she's been blackmailed, kidnapped, something of the sort, right? Frederick is the one who set up the séance. He's the one who set up this whole situation happening in the first place. He stands again from Cecily being driven out the wheel. He's stolen maybe, I don't know, Julius might have stolen the jewels, but maybe Frederick stole them so Cecily has no inheritance. Millicent is jealous of Cecily by the fact that Susan prefers her to Millicent her own niece. She barely shows Millicent any affection, but she loves Cecily and is gonna give her the jewels. I'm starting to think it might be correct. It's the most simple explanation. It's the most basic reasoning. It's the most stuff you look path because we spent this whole book looking at the stuff with Julius, the stuff with Henry and baby. When I think they're red herrings, I think the core of the story is Frederick and Millicent. What do we have to say, everyone? What do we have to say? I think it's them. Millicent's lying. She's lent Cecily 150 pound, which in today's money is like 10 grand. She's lent her like 10 grand. She knows, like she's been whispering a lot to Pauline, like saying, oh, we should hold the second séance. Oh, Ceci's falling into trouble with bad people, with gambling and stuff. Like she's behind the scenes, she's been laying a lot of suspicions. So I think it's them too. I think it's them too. I think it's the niece and the nephew. Now the flaws are Millicent. The piano sound keep playing throughout because she have rigged it in the piano to keep playing the sound throughout. But would Cecily have trusted Millicent and Frederick because she knows them better than other people? The jewelry though was put in the safe and then stolen with a key. Perhaps Millicent would know where the keys are because she lives there. Okay, I'm going with Millicent and Frederick. It didn't solve it. Didn't solve it. I'm going to solve this. Let's discuss, because I actually did solve a few things. I wasn't completely dumb. I solved a few things. It was confirmed at the start of the chapter section I just read, Star Cross was the girl, he went to jail. I got that at least. Listen, the detective powers ain't all dead. Listen, I can infer a few things. Then there's this addition of this like anonymous man on the ground who like, Steven is like, well, we found our suspect. Turns out he is Cecily's fiance. And they were going to elope together. That's why she told everyone she was going on this like imaginary yacht trip. She was actually going to Brighton to meet him. She gets there. She gets cold feet. She comes back and he's here to like try and win her back. And then everyone's like, yeah, she's missing. He's like, now Bridger, who I told you about before was Steven's bestie not on the board. He was my best guy. I was never gonna be a suspect. He is like, I went looking around and I found an old ice house and it's locked. Cecily's in there bitch. So they go in there and they find Cecily bound and gagged. Selena, you can finally have the question mark taken off your face, your back. So Cecily returns, but she doesn't really know who had her. There was a man and a woman she says and she never saw their faces. She had masks put on her. She hid in a closet after everyone else left the room. She was waiting for her net and she comes out of the closet and someone puts a chloroform bag overhead. She screams. That's when we heard the second scream later in the night. That was actually legit. And she's been locked up in the ice house ever since. Forced to do the letter and the telephone at like we thought. Then Steven gets thinking. He gets thinking, thinking, thinking. And he solves it. He solves it, he solves it. And honestly, I'm actually about detective. I haven't even told you about the vast amount of things that actually led to him finding out what had happened, because I didn't think they were necessary. Didn't even tell me about this development. Oh my God. I just thought it was irrelevant. Remember, Steven was the footman and then ladies and gentlemen was like, girl, you're free. Like just come be with the girlies. They hired a parlor maid to replace him. Turns out that parlor maid was kind of behind it all and she was helping Martin. He's dead. It was all Martin. He's dead. I didn't think of the parlor maid because she wasn't there for half the book. She wasn't there. But essentially it boils down to, the parlor maid is Martin's sister. He hired her. When Martin died, the parlor maid was the one doing the ransom notes because she was like, I'm getting something out of this shit. If I came here to do this, he killed himself with the tree. It was supposed to kill Steven, which I feel like we knew that the trap was supposed to kill Steven. But he like misjudged it. Killed himself, not a very good villain. And it turns out, right? I will take a little bit of credit. I was a little bit correct. I was a little bit correct because also kind of in on all of this was Millicent. It was Millicent. She and Martin were married. Honestly, check out the window. I just, she had never been shown affection before. They were married. Let's actually, let's get this red string out. Come on now. He was with her because of what she stood to inherit from Lady Susan. He wanted the money, honey. And the plot, right? The reason that he kidnapped Cicely was not necessarily for like a ransom. That wasn't his initial intention. But what he did intend to happen was that Lady Susan would be so distraught by Cicely going missing, she'd have a heart attack and die. Which feels like a lot of guesswork. And he kept doing things like the telephone to make her more nervous. He hoped she'd have a heart attack and die. That's Millicent would inherit everything and he'd inherit it too, essentially. He was playing our girly Millicent. That's why Millicent lied, if you remember, about Bridger coming into her room with the guy who assaulted Steven on the staircase. It was actually Martin and she was protecting him. Millicent also stole the jewels, but she did it, you know, out of innocence. They said out of innocence. She was duped. She was hypnotized into marriage. Okay, okay. So Millicent was involved and I feel like I should take a little bit of credit for that because I got that. I knew we shouldn't trust her. I knew we shouldn't trust her, but Martin and the part of the maid. Honestly, what am I supposed to do? I'm giving the book five stars, by the way. I really loved the book. I'm gonna read more from this author in the future. He was really funny. I loved the cast of characters that we had. I had a lot of fun. Perhaps part of the five stars, I had so much fun doing this, but like, I'm not sure about the part of the maid. I'm not sure it makes it a fully fair play mystery in the sense that she was not there for the vast majority of the book until Steven got, you know, the sack and so he could be one of the girlies. You know, I really feel like everyone that was involved in the end should have been on this board. The fact that this nameless, she did have a name. She had no name. The fact that this nameless part of the maid was like part of the brains behind everything, I'm not sure I'm happy with. Like that doesn't feel fair. That doesn't feel fair, you know? Martin, yes. Okay, and Millicent, yes. And the link between them, yeah. But like, it should have been someone else. It should have been someone else should have been Martin's sister. So I'm not exactly happy with that, but there we have it. We can now at least recreate the famous meme from, is it always sunny in Philadelphia? Hang on, I wanna get it up so I can like really, really embody it. Okay, you ready? Listen, I had a lot of fun doing this video. I've gotta say, I've gotta say, I had a lot of fun doing it, you know, doing all of my plans. I had a lot of fun. Let me know down below who you would have suspected. If you had done this, who would you most suspect? Also, let me know if you'd like me to do this again. Do you think I should do it with some Agatha Christie's or do you think I should do it with some books that like you guys are less likely to wanna read because it doesn't matter if I spoil them? I feel like it's kind of safer doing it with books that not many people are gonna be interested in reading like old, other old classic crime, but that isn't Agatha Christie because then it doesn't matter if I spoil it like I do in this video. But yeah, then we know. If you got into the end, comment a magnifying glass emoji. And yeah, I feel like it wasn't the worst. I got close. I got a minnowson and I knew there'd be a guy and I couldn't think of Freddie. I just discounted Martin because he was dead and cause stuff continued on. But I suppose it all made sense in the end. And I, listen, you can't discount someone cause they're dead. You can't discount someone cause they're dead. So I hope you enjoyed the video. Thank you guys so much for watching and I'll see you very soon in another one. Bye.