Manor of Death

Art by Chris Brock - 2022

The clock struck midnight. Its bell echoed through the sizable manor and off its wood paneled walls before carrying itself into the parlor.

A horrible event had transpired here.

The dinner party was a disaster. The jell-o salad was hardly touched. The bread was stale. The tea was served cold, as was most of the small talk. To top it all off, Brevin Veralittle was found dead in the coat closet with a mutilated nose and gashes across his wrinkled face.

So rude of him. A little warning next time, please.

Gathered in the parlor are all the guests who remained at the party while Brevin was murdered. They were all suspects. They were all dangerous. They were all scum. After all, most of them had chosen to pair Cabernet Sauvignon with the imported caviar. How uncivilized.

The impatient patient and hypochondriac Isaac Alda Dime paced the parlor’s velvet carpet with more violence than the headache he’s swore he’s had for months.

“Well,” Mr. Dime scoffed. “I suppose we’ll just be ignoring the elephant in the room?”

Al Bedalot, poker prodigy who flirted through the guest list even though he was only bluffing to keep his full house a secret, cleared his throat.

“The details aren’t exactly concrete,” he remarked. “Just like my marriage.”

“Pretty sure it's ceramic,” the idiotic, idiosyncratic Dr. Ima Hack stared at the small elephant statue positioned on the end table.

Mrs. Veralittle let out an obnoxious sob more melodramatic than a deceitful distant cousin in a saucy Spanish soap opera.

“He meant my dear husband’s death, you bumbling imbecile!”

“Ah,” the talkative, European butler, Gooden Shwartz spoke up between sobs, “I was wondering when that would be… how you say…?”

“Addressed?” mailman Finnish Sentins said, who had conveniently been delivering a letter around the time of the death.

“Yes. I believe this is about the time where questions start,” Dick Tate, professor of literature and public speaking at the most prestigious university in town, took out his journal. “What have we concluded is the manner of death?”

“Apparently the one I was invited too,” Dr. Hack muttered.

“A pocket watch on the head,” Mr. Shrwartz said. “How… ah, how you say…?”

“Brutal. Blood everywhere,” Mr. Sentins already helped himself to some hor devours, pickled beet juice spilling down his shirt.

“A rather untimely death,” Mrs. Veralittle sobbed.

“Well then,” Mr. Dime grumbled. “Who here uses a pocket watch?”

“Don’t look at me,” Mr. Bedalot said. “I don’t need a pocket watch dictating my life. I’ve got nothing and no one to hold me down.”

“I think it was this mail boy person!” Mr. Shwartz exclaimed. “He’s so… so…”

“Innocent? I’d agree,” Mr. Sentins said.

“What about Dr. Hack? She’s known for her long walks alone. You might’ve taken a long walk past the coat closet!” Mrs. Veralittle said.

“How dare you accuse me of murder!” Dr. Hack gasped. “I took a walk to your master bedroom. In fact, I’m wearing a necklace from there right now!”

“How did you know I was accusing you of murder?” Mrs. Veralittle replied with a smug look.

“Everyone! Hold your horses!” Mr. Dime yelled.

“I don’t have horses anymore, I sold them to a guy in Mexico!” Dr. Hack cried.

“It’s an expression!”

“I think you’re expression yourself too loudly then!” Dr. Hack crossed her arms.

Mr. Dime sighed, “I’m getting a second headache.”

“What I think Mr. Dime is trying to say,” Mr. Bedalot said. “Some of us could be a little less dramatic when someone is found in the closet. For example, my wife.”

“There must be a red herring here…” Professor Tate interrupted.

“I ate it with the asparagus already,” Dr. Hack replied. “But fish can’t kill people, Professor. How stupid of you.”

Mr. Shwartz let out a dramatic sigh, “I need some fresh… fresh… how you say…?

“Excuses?” Mr. Sentins asked.

“Ugh!” the butler stormed out.

“For all we know, Dr. Hack killed my poor husband with her sheer stupidity! She’s a liability!” Mrs. Veralittle said.

“I have none of this ‘lie ability’ whatsoever. I am a terrible liar!” Dr. Hack yelled.

“And the only thing that’s sheer here is Mrs. Veralittle’s top,” Mr. Bedalot said.

“Al!” Mrs. Veralittle cried.

“I wasn’t complaining, Karen.”

“Wait!” Professor Tate exclaimed. “I have it solved!”

He began furiously scribbling in his journal.

“Solved? What do you mean?” Mrs. Veralittle asked.

Mr. Shwartz walked back in, a book in hand.

“Look what I found in the library,” he wiped tears from his eyes and threw his book on the end table. “Blood and cartilage all over the page. What sort of… sort of… how do you say…?”

“...monster would murder an individual, maim them, and hide their mutilated facial features in reading material, ignoring all moral, social, and state imposed laws known to man?” Mr. Sentins answered.

“Yes!” Mr. Shwartz exclaimed.

“That husband of yours always had his nose in a book, huh?” Mr. Bedalot muttered. “You deserve someone better.”

Mrs. Veralittle went royally flushed.

“There we go!” Professor Tate looked up from his journal. “I found the key piece to this puzzle! It’s all in the names!”

“Really?” Dr. Hack asked. “Shakespere? Now?”

“Each of our names is actually wordplay meant to clue us in as to who each of us is!” Dr. Tate continued.

“How meta!” Mr. Dime said.

“Meta is my middle name!” Professor Tate chuckled. “Seriously, it is. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. You see, Dr. Ima Hack is not in fact a doctor but is instead a cocaine dealing, brain-fried, druggy pretending to be a doctor! You’re a hack!”

“But I’m only doing it to pay my way through medical school!”

“And Mr. Isacc Alda Dime is just as harmless as he claims to be!” Professor Tate continued. “He really is sick all the time!”

“My doctor was right!” Mr. Dime cheered.

“I was?” Dr. Hack asked.

“What about you then?” Mr. Dime said. “Your theory must work with yourself as well!”

“Ah yes,” Professor Tate said. “My name, Dick Tate, is a clear play on the word ‘dictate’! Oh, how clever. Well, less clever now that I’ve explained it. And, of course, my first name must be a reference to my massive--”

“Ego?” Mr. Sentins finished.

“Oh, I didn’t forget about you, mailman Finnish Sentins. It’s pretty obvious,” Professor Tate said. “You’re a Russian spy who is currently leading an attack on America’s postal system, attempting to tear it down from inside the belly of the bureaucratic beast. You just happened to be passing by this manor on your way to meet with your other comrades enjoying vodka at a bar down the street weren’t you? Your politics and hands are as red as the beet stain on your shirt!”

The room went quiet. Mr. Sentins shook his head.

“Well,” Professor Tate said. “Thought there might be an expectation of subversion. I’m sorry. That was my--”

“Bad?”

“Was going to say fault but… Oh!” Professor Tate paused. “Of course! The lack of a subversion is a subversion itself! Oh, that devilishly handsome author of our lives is so clever! So very clever!”

Mr. Dime cleared his throat, “Are you going to reveal the murderer?”

“Yes yes,” Professor Tate straightened himself. “The butler over here, Mr. Gooden Shwartz also works as a pool boy around here and, well, I can attest to the fact that he looks pretty great in shorts.”

“Oh, you flatter me, Mr. Professor person.”

“And I’m sure Mr. Veralittle would say the same thing!” Professor Tate said.

Mr. Shwartz gasped, “You wouldn’t dare?”

“Oh, I would!” Professor Tate said. “You and Mr. Veralittle were having a little affair, weren’t you?”

“I’m sorry! I can’t help it!” Mr. Shwartz sobbed. “I just look so good in shorts!”

“So it was him!” Mrs. Veralittle cried. “Send him to the cops!”

“Now now, Mrs. Veralittle,” Professor Tate said. “I haven’t gotten to you and Mr. Bedalot quite yet. Because, you see, Al Bedalot certainly bet a lot tonight when he hoped to win your heart tonight despite both of your marriages.”

“Yup,” Mr. Bedalot shrugged. “I say go big or go home. Except hers are bigger here than my wife’s at home.”

“Uncalled for,” Professor Tate said, “but you’re far from the worst person here tonight. Mrs. Veralittle, you almost made my theory as useless as Dr. Hacks’ medical license, until good old Al over here helped me fit in the last piece of the puzzle.

“You see, he called you Karen, which indicates that your full name is Karen Veralittle. You were never in distress tonight. You were never upset that your husband is dead.

“You wanted him dead, and you did it--with the very pocket watch Mr. Shwartz gifted him for his seventy-fifth birthday. You even knew Mr. Shwartz would go to the library to find comfort in the books he and your husband used to share, sending him a message with your husband’s most handsome feature: his nose. All out of revenge for his wretched affair.”

The butler nodded in agreement.

“He did have a perfectly symmetrical nose…” he whimpered.

“So, Karen Veralittle, it seems you are caring very little about your husband, Brevin Veralittle, who is now breathing very little!”

The room went quiet. Mr. Sentins coughed.

“Ok, that last name looked better on paper, but we got you! You’re the murderer!” Professor Tate declared.

Mrs. Veralittle smiled, “So what if I am? He’s still a lying cheater! He still made our whole relationship out to be some sort of… some sort of…”

“Lie?” Mr. Sentins said.

“Sure!”

“Well you didn’t let him leave the closet!” Mr. Shwartz cried.

“That’s where I killed him, Gooden!”

“Exactly!” Mr. Swartz fled the room crying.

“Another case solved!” Professor Tate closed his journal with a snap.

That’s where we leave the Manor of Death, now in the care of the butler, Gooden Shwartz and devoid of any more Veralittle dramatics. Mr. Bedalot returns home to his wife and seven children, Mr. Dime goes to the doctor to see if he has a tumor, Dr. Hack goes off to experiment with shrooms and coke, and Professor Tate gets to leave to his quiet house, ready to bury himself in a good book by the fire while Mr. Shwartz wonders if they should bury or cremate his lover.

All of them remain oblivious to the real threat creeping around at night, sending each of their letters and bills to his comrades overseas, a beet stain still burning through his mailman’s uniform…