The Decagon House Murders Read online

  “So I really don’t have to check up on ya even once?” the fisherman asked the six as they set foot on the dangerously creaking pier. “Don’ think phones work here.”

  Figure 1 Map of Tsunojima

  “It’s all right, grandpa,” Ellery answered. “We even have a doctor-in-training here,” he added, placing his hand on the shoulder of Poe, who was smoking a cigarette while seated on a big knapsack.

  The bearded Poe was a fourth-year student in the medical faculty.

  “Yes, Ellery’s right,” Agatha pitched in. “It’s not often we have a chance to visit an uninhabited island, and it would ruin the mood if someone kept coming to check up on us.”

  “You have a brave lil’ miss there too, I see.”

  The fisherman exposed his strong white teeth as he laughed and undid the rope that was tied to a post of the pier.

  “I’ll come pick ya up Tuesday next week at ten in the morning, then. Be careful.”

  “Thanks, we’ll be careful. Especially of ghosts.”

  At the top of the steep stone steps, the view suddenly widened. An overgrown grass lawn appeared to be the front garden of a small building with white walls and a blue roof, which stood there invitingly as if it had been waiting for the students.

  The blue double doors right in front of them were probably the front entrance. A few steps led up to the doorway.

  “So this is the Decagon House.”

  Ellery was the first to speak, but, having climbed the long stone staircase, he was out of breath. He dropped his camel-beige travelling bag on the ground and stood gazing up at the sky.

  “Agatha, your thoughts?”

  “Surprisingly lovely place,” said Agatha, putting her handkerchief to her light-skinned forehead, which was gleaming with perspiration.

  Leroux came up next, also out of breath. His arms were full of luggage, including Agatha’s.

  “Well… I was expecting… how to put it?… something more sinister.”

  “Can’t always have what you want,” replied Ellery. “Let’s go inside. Van should have arrived here before us, but I don’t see him.”

  No sooner had Ellery spoken than the blue window shutters immediately to the left of the front entrance opened, and a man looked out.

  “Hey, everyone.”

  And so Van Dine made his appearance, the seventh member of the group of students who were to sleep and eat on this island, and in this building, for one week. His name was, of course, taken from S.S. Van Dine, the literary father of the great detect­ive Philo Vance.

  “Wait a sec, I’ll come out,” Van said in his strange, husky voice, and closed the shutters. A few moments later he came scurrying out of the front entrance.

  “Sorry I didn’t meet you at the pier. I seem to be coming down with something. I’ve got a bit of a fever so I was resting for a while. I was listening for your boat coming, though.”

  Van had arrived earlier on the island to prepare everything.

  “Coming down with something? Nothing serious, I hope,” Leroux asked with a worried look, pushing up his glasses, which had slipped down his sweaty nose.

  “No, nothing serious… At least I hope not. Just a cold, I think.”

  A shudder went through Van’s slim body, as he laughed uneasily.

  Led by Van, the group entered the Decagon House.

  Going through the blue double doors, they entered a large entrance hall—although they soon realized that it was smaller than it first appeared, its irregular shape creating an optical illusion on first sight. Looking closely, they realized the wall facing them was shorter than the one behind. The entrance hall was shaped like a trapezoid, becoming smaller as they went forward, with another set of double doors on the far wall leading further into the building.

  Everyone except Van was puzzled by the strange layout of the room, which played with their sense of perspective, but once they had passed through the second set of doors and arrived in the main hall of the building, they began to understand. They were standing in a decagonal room, surrounded by ten walls, all of the same width.

  To grasp the structure of the so-called Decagon House, it is probably best to look at a simple floor plan. (See Figure 2.)

  Figure 2 Floor plan of the Decagon House

  The distinctive feature of the Decagon House is, as the name implies, that the outer walls form an equilateral decagon. Inside this outer decagon, ten separate blocks are set next to each other, surrounding the inner decagon that makes up the main hall. In other words, an equilateral inner decagon (the main hall) is surrounded by ten equal-sized trapezoidal rooms. The entrance hall they had just passed through was one such room.

  “Well? Bizarre, right?”

  Van, who had been leading the way, turned to the others.

  “Those double doors over there, opposite the entrance, lead to the kitchen. To the left of that are the toilet and bathroom. The remaining seven rooms are the guest rooms.”

  “A decagonal building and a decagonal hall.”

  As he looked around the interior, Ellery walked towards a big table in the centre of the room. He tapped on it with his fingers.

  “This is decagonal too. What a surprise. Could the murdered Nakamura Seiji have been suffering from monomania?”

  “Perhaps,” Leroux replied. “The burnt-down main mansion was called the Blue Mansion, and they say everything in there was painted blue: the floors, the ceilings and all the furniture.”

  The name of the individual who had moved to the island and built the Blue Mansion about twenty years ago was Nakamura Seiji. And the Decagon House, which was the annex of the main building was, of course, built by him too.

  “All the same,” said Agatha to no one in particular, “I wonder whether I’ll be able to tell all these rooms apart.”

  The entrance and the portal to the kitchen opposite both had double doors, and both were decorated with figured glass set in a frame of plain wood. When the doors were closed there was no way to tell them apart. The four walls to each side of each set of double doors had doors leading to the other rooms. These plain wooden doors were also difficult to tell apart. There were no furnishings in the main hall that could serve as a guide, so Agatha’s worries were quite natural. “You’re right there. I myself got confused about the rooms several times this morning.”

  Van cast a wry smile. His eyelids looked puffy, perhaps because of the fever he had mentioned.

  “How about making some nameplates and hanging them on the doors? Orczy, did you bring your sketchbook?”

  Orczy looked up anxiously as her name was called.

  She was a small woman. Mindful of her rather plump figure, she was always wearing dark clothes, but that only made her look out of fashion. She was the complete opposite of the brilliant Agatha and was always looking away with timid eyes. But she was very skilful at her hobby: traditional painting.

  “Yes. I have it with me. Shall I take it out now?”

  “No, later is OK. Take a look at your rooms for now. They’re all the same, so you don’t have to fight over them. I’m already using this room though.” Van pointed to one of the doors. “I was given the keys, so I’ve left them in the keyholes.”

  “OK, gotcha,” Ellery answered brightly.

  “Great, you get settled in then we’ll go and explore the island.”

  3

  The rooms were quickly divvied up.

  Counting from the front entrance, Van, Orczy and Poe occupied the rooms on the left and Ellery, Agatha, Carr and Leroux those on the right.

  After the six had disappeared into their rooms with their luggage, Van leant back against the door of his own room, took out a Seven Stars cigarette from his ivory down jacket, put it in his mouth and stared keenly into the dimly lit decagonal hall.


  The walls were made of white plaster. The floor was covered with oversized blue tiles and, unlike most Japanese homes, you could walk inside with your shoes on. The ceiling rose diagonally upwards from the ten walls and in the centre was a decagonal skylight, from which light kissed the exposed rafters before falling on the white decagonal table. Ten chairs with blue cloth covering their whitewood framework surrounded the table. Those were the only decorations in the room, save for the round lamp hanging from the rafters like a pendulum.

  There was no electricity. Natural light from the skylight was the only source of illumination, which is why, even during the day, a mysterious atmosphere permeated the hall.

  After a while Poe, dressed in faded jeans and a light-blue shirt, stepped languidly out of his room.

  “Oh, you’re fast. Wait, I’ll make some coffee now.”

  Holding his half-smoked cigarette between his fingers, Van walked to the kitchen. He was currently a third-year student in the science faculty, which meant he was one year younger than Poe, who was a fourth-year medical student.

  “Thanks. Must have been a hassle bringing the big stuff like the blankets.”

  “Not at all. I had some people help me.”

  Agatha also appeared from her door, busy tying her long hair back with a scarf.

  “These are pretty good rooms, Van. I’d expected something much worse… Coffee? I’ll make it.”

  Cheerfully Agatha walked into the kitchen, where she saw a glass jar with a black label on the counter.

  “Instant coffee?”

  She picked the jar up with a look of displeasure and shook it.

  “Don’t be picky,” replied Van. “You’re not at a resort hotel, you’re on an uninhabited island.”

  Agatha pouted her rose-coloured lips.

  “And the food?”

  “In the fridge. But it isn’t working, as the electricity and phone lines all went down in the fire. Hope that’s OK.”

  “Oh, well, it’ll probably keep. There’s water, I hope?”

  “Yes, I’ve already connected the water line. I also hooked up the propane-gas tank I brought, so you can also use the gas heater and the boiler. I don’t recommend it, but you could even use the bath.”

  “Good job. Hmm, there are still some pans and tableware left, I see. Or did you bring those with you too?”

  “No, they were here already. Three kitchen knives, too. There’s a lot of mould on this cutting board, though.”

  Timidly, Orczy joined them.

  “Orczy, you come and help too,” Agatha said briskly. “Luckily there’s a lot here, but we’ll need to clean everything first.”

  Agatha shrugged and took off her black leather jacket. She turned to Van and Poe, who were stood behind Orczy, peeking into the kitchen.

  “If you aren’t going to help us, then please leave. Go and explore the island or something. You won’t get any coffee before we’re finished.”

  Putting her hands to her hips, she glared at the two of them. Van grinned sheepishly and retreated, together with Poe.

  “And don’t forget the nameplates,” Agatha called after them. “I won’t have you coming into our rooms when we’re undressing!”

  By now, Ellery and Leroux had also emerged from their rooms into the hall.

  “Thrown out by the Queen, I see,” said Ellery with a laugh.

  “Indeed,” replied Van.

  “So now I suggest we follow Her Majesty’s orders and take a look at the island!”

  “That’s probably the best… Wait, where’s Carr? Still in his room?”

  “He’s gone out. On his own,” said Leroux, and he glanced towards the entrance.

  “Already?” asked Poe.

  “He likes to play hard to get,” Ellery said archly.

  A row of high pine trees grew to the north of the Decagon House. There was a break in the line and the branches of the black pines on either side had connected to form an arch, which the four passed through to reach the ruins of the Blue Mansion.

  All that remained on the site were the foundations, together with a few dirty stone blocks. The desolate front garden had been covered by a thick layer of black ash, and the sight of the surrounding trees, scorched in the fire and rotting where they stood, was striking.

  “Completely burnt down. Must have been a tremendous fire,” said Ellery, letting out a sigh as he surveyed the dismal scene.

  “There’s really nothing left,” added Van.

  “So, Van, is this your first visit too?” Ellery asked.

  Van nodded.

  “My uncle told me a lot about the island, but today is the first time I’ve been here. I had to carry all the luggage this morning and then what with my fever I didn’t think it’d be wise to explore the island on my own.”

  “That was sensible. But there’s really nothing but ashes and bricks here.”

  “I guess a corpse would have made you happy, Ellery?” Leroux grinned.

  “Lay off. That’s something more up your street, isn’t it?”

  A little path opened into a pine grove to the west. It led straight to the cliffs. On the other side of the wide azure sea they could just make out the black shadow that was J— Cape.

  “Great weather today. The sea’s almost tranquil, you could say.”

  Ellery faced the water and stretched. Wrapping his hands in the hem of his yellow sweatshirt, Leroux also turned his small body towards the sea.

  “You’re right, Ellery,” agreed Leroux. “It’s almost unbelievable that only six months ago, at this very place, such a horrific incident occurred…”

  “Horrific… That’s the word. A mysterious quadruple murder, right here in Nakamura Seiji’s home, the Blue Mansion.”

  “I’m quite used to quintuple, even decuple murders in books, but this one was real and happened relatively close by, too. Somehow the fact that Nakamura is such an ordinary family name made the whole incident seem even stranger. I was really shocked when I saw it on the news,” said Leroux with a shudder.

  “I seem to recall it happened in the early morning of the 20th of September? A fire broke out and the building burned down completely. Four bodies were discovered in the ruins: that of Nakamura Seiji, his wife Kazue and the bodies of the servant couple who lived there.”

  Ellery went on, his voice calm and detached.

  “A significant quantity of a sleeping drug was found in all four bodies, but the police also discovered that they had not all died of the same cause. The two servants had been tied up with rope in their own rooms and their heads had been smashed in with an axe. The head of the household, Seiji, had been doused with kerosene and burnt to death. His wife Kazue, who was found in the same room, was found to have been strangled to death with a rope-like object. What’s more, her left hand had been cut off at the wrist using a sharp instrument. The hand was not recovered from the ruins of the fire. I think those were the main points of the case, Leroux?”

  “I think there was also a gardener who disappeared.”

  “Ah, you’re right. The police couldn’t find the gardener, who was supposed to have arrived on the island some days earlier to work there. He seemed to have disappeared completely.”

  “Yes.”

  “There are two views on that. One is that the gardener was the murderer and that’s why he disappeared. The other view is that someone else was the murderer, and there’s another explanation for his disappearance. For example, the gardener might have been fleeing from the murderer and accidentally fallen off the cliffs and been swept away by the current.”

  “The police seemed to have gone with the ‘gardener equals murderer’ theory. I don’t know what results further investigations uncovered, though. What do you think about the case, Ellery?”

  “Well.” Ellery
brushed away a lock of hair that had been displaced by the wind blowing from the sea. “Regrettably, we have too little data. All we know is the information we were given in the few days the media were all over the case.”

  “Not like you to be so unsure of yourself.”

  “Well, so should anyone be. It’s easy to come up with a fairly reasonable hypothesis, but there’s too little data to prove any one theory and declare QED. In this particular case, the police investigation was also rather poorly handled. But then again, this is all that was left of the crime scene. And there were no other survivors on the island. It’s quite natural that the police would consider the missing gardener the criminal.”

  “True.”

  “So the truth is hidden beneath these ashes.”

  Ellery turned and walked back to the remaining stone blocks and picked up a piece of wood. Crouching, he looked at what lay beneath it.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Leroux, puzzled.

  “Wouldn’t it be interesting if I’d just found the wife’s hand here?” Ellery said with a straight face. “Or maybe we’ll find the skeleton of the gardener beneath the floor of the Decagon House.”

  “You’re crazy,” cut in Poe, who had been listening to their conversation in silence. He stroked his beard, looking worried. “You have a rather peculiar sense of humour, don’t you, Ellery?”

  “I agree,” chimed in Leroux. “It’s as you all said on the boat: if something happened on this island tomorrow, it would be just like the ‘chalet in the snowstorm’ Ellery loves so much. How happy he’d be if there were a series of murders like in And Then There Were None.”

  “And he’d be the first to get himself killed.”

  Poe spoke very little, but sometimes came out with some harsh words.

  Leroux and Van looked at each other and laughed.

  “A series of murders on a remote island. That sounds just the thing,” Ellery said with good grace. “Precisely what’s in order. And then I’ll take on the role of the detective. So? Anybody want to challenge me, Ellery Queen?”