2:47AM.

When she came out of the bathroom with Seulgi in tow the rest of them were all still sat around playing snakes and ladders. Even Jennie had joined them now. None of them seemed to notice Seulgi or Irene had been missing at all. Or that even Wendy had got up to leave and go talk to them. Or Yeri, for that matter. In fact nobody seemed to be paying attention to anything save for snakes and ladders.

‘Alright,’ Irene said. ‘Alright. I said alright!’

‘Yeah yeah,’ Yeri said, ‘we heard you the first time. Look, if you wanna play so much, all you have to say is, “Please can I join the game?” We can make space for you. But not if you’re rude. That’s not cool.’

‘I don’t want to play.’

‘Well, suit yourself. I was on a six-game winning streak, by the way.’

‘All luck,’ Wheein said, arms folded, drink on the table in front of her again.

‘Bull it’s luck.’

‘What else would you call it? Unless you can control the way the dice roll or something like that. Which, if you could, you wouldn’t be a student. You’d be in Vegas somewhere, at the roulette wheel. Although, knowing you, I doubt you’d have the patience for that.’

‘Okay, first of all, you don’t know me. Like…at all. And secondly, you just haven’t learnt the tricks of the game. The secrets, I should say.’

‘What are the secrets of the game, then?’

‘If I told you, they wouldn’t be secrets, would they?’

Wheein huffed.

‘Can I ask you a question?’

‘No.’

‘Does it hurt?’ Wheein.’

Wheein was silence.

‘Wheein. Hey, Wheein.’

‘What?’

‘Does it hurt?’

‘Does what hurt?’

‘Thinking that hard. I know you’ve never done it before.’

‘You went to all that effort just to insult me.’

‘Kinda, yeah. I mean, it wasn’t that much effort. Not as much effort as you put into thinking. See? Just did it again. Faint with the left, swing with the right.’

‘That’s—’

‘Shut up,’ Irene said. They turned to her. As if half of them couldn’t believe what she had said. And so Wheein said: ‘Excuse me?’

‘I said shut up.’

‘Oh, so now you’re being rude as well? Is it Everybody Be Rude to Wheein Hour? Did I miss the memo?’

‘I have something I need to share with everyone. Something very important that you all need to listen to.’

‘Listen,’ Yeri said, ‘I’m happy for you and all, but we don’t need to know.’

‘What?’

‘Can’t you just keep it to yourself? Or do you feel compelled to share it with everyone? Like those people who live vicariously through their Instagram likes and comments and , you know?’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘You and Seulgi.’

‘Oh,’ Wendy said, smiling, ‘are you back together? I’m so happy for you both.’

‘What?’ said Lisa. ‘Are you dating now?’

Irene sighed. ‘I wasn’t talking about that,’ she said. ‘That’s none of your business.’

‘What were you talking about, then?’

‘I know now who killed Mr Kim.’

‘So do we,’ Wheein said. ‘We’ve known for, like, three hours.’

‘No, I mean I know who actually killed him. And Mr Jae, too.’

‘Uh…yes. Are you okay? Have you been drinking?’

‘What? No. What I meant was—’

‘Look,’ Yeri said, ‘not to be rude or anything, because we talked about…you know…but please get on with it.’

‘I was getting on with it! Stop interrupting me, for Christ’s sake.’

‘Okay. Whatever you say. Keep going. But make it at least a little bit interesting, please. It’s got to be at least as entertaining as snakes and ladders, otherwise…what’s the point?’

Irene sighed again. Half of them seemed to still not be paying attention – Jennie fiddling with her piece on the board, Mr Jang yawning and looking about, Rosie picking her fingernails. She turned to Seulgi for reassurance and Seulgi offered her a tiny little smile. As if to say: Go on. Tell them.

‘Alright,’ she began.

‘Get on with it.’

‘I’ll cut straight to the chase, no ing around or dragging it out. We’ve got the wrong person.’

‘Oh, this should be good.’

‘You want me to give you the short version? Or the full version?’

‘Well,’ Lisa said, ‘if you’re about to seriously accuse someone here of murder, you should probably go ahead and give us the long version. Or you can just tell us who did it first and then go from there.’

‘Sooyoung.’

The room fell quiet. Then Sooyoung laughed. She was sat on the left side of the middle sofa beside Wheein and she turned to them and looked at the severity with which Irene levelled this accusation at her and laughed again. ‘Wait,’ she said. ‘Wait a minute, I’m confused. Are you accusing me, or are you about to ask you a question?’

‘No. I’m saying you did it. You murdered Mr Kim.’

‘I’m sorry, I can’t tell if you’re joking right now or not.’

‘Do I look like I’m joking to you?’

‘This is honestly not the time for like this. I can’t be bothered playing games and stuff so please go and bug someone else.’

‘Rosie didn’t stab Mr Kim in the back. You did.’

‘Are you gonna explain?’ Yeri said. ‘Or do we have to listen to more of your cryptic riddles and sit here trying to decipher them while you stand like a statue acting all cool for your new girlfriend? Well, old-new girlfriend.’

‘You have as much motive as everyone else here,’ Irene said.

‘Me?’

‘No. Sooyoung. Well, also you, I suppose. But I’m talking about Sooyoung. She knew that the problem was twofold. First, Mr Kim was planning on buying out a majority share in H&H Enterprises and using that leverage to force you out of the company, just like he was doing with Wheein and Mr Jae at Front House. He had his fingers in a lot of pies, and he was planning on cleaning those pies out entirely. Replacing everyone, you included. We read about it in those documents in his safe, the ones we went over earlier. But unlike with Wheein and unlike with Mr Jae, you had no backup plan. Nowhere you could go. No one you could turn to. Mr Kim knew about your investment scams. He knew you were taking big money from stock investors and promising long-term return and then never delivering on those promises. Consider it like a pyramid scheme in all but name – you assure an investor that their money is going to see big returns, using a few vetted examples as evidence, you then take their money, either as a lump sum or in instalments, or hell, maybe even in stock options, and you just…never give it back to them. You say, “Whoops, sorry, that’s the nature of this business. Sometimes you lose, sometimes you win. Looks like you lost.” You remind them that you absolutely told them of the risks beforehand. It’s their fault, not yours. And then you suggest that if they want to see any returns at all, they keep paying. Again and again.

‘Except when has a pyramid scheme ever worked? And I don’t mean taking money from people – I mean keeping that money over the long term. Sooner or later, that house of cards comes tumbling down. And with Mr Kim knowing all about your little investment fraud schemes, yours was about to come down around you. That plus the fact he was going to push for your removal from H&H Enterprises had you all riled up. You knew you had to do something. That’s why, just like Wheein, you’ve been here in the past month or two for visits. Rosie and Jennie here said it themselves. You’ve even stayed here for a few nights.’

‘So what?’ Sooyoung said, no change in expression at all. ‘What are you actually implying here?’

‘I’m implying that it was you, not Rosie, that killed Mr Kim. And I think I can prove it, too.’

‘Think?’ Yeri said. ‘That’s it? You’re going on a “think?”’

‘Bear with me.’

Yeri sighed, as if she couldn’t be bothered to do just that. Irene studied them all again individually. There appeared to be very little concern or change of expression at all from anyone and so with some reluctance and with heart still pumping like caged electric in her chest Irene continued.

‘So, we know you’ve got motive. But motive’s not enough. Everyone here has motive.’

‘What’s my motive?’ Jisoo said.

A pause. Then: ‘Alright, almost everyone here has motive. Including you, Sooyoung, as we’ve just gone over. But let’s start with the obvious – you’ve been here in the past month, you’ve been talking to Mr Kim a lot, you’ve stayed at this house for days on end. We’ve established these as facts, yes?’

‘Yes,’ Sooyoung said reluctantly.

‘Including eyewitness accounts from the maids. But that’s okay. You’re not the only one to do that either. What that does do, however, is give a reason for you knowing about Mr Kim’s medication, including his naloxone, which you never denied earlier, by the way. You just said that maybe you’d heard about it from him, maybe not. I’m willing to bet you had absolutely had. You knew he was going to fire you and you knew he had an idea about your investment scams and you knew also how much trouble this could cause the company if it was ever leaked to the public. If anyone ever found out. Which meant you also knew that Mr Kim would’ve had no choice but to turn you in, for the sake of himself and his future investments in H&H. Imagine the headlines if it had been uncovered and he hadn’t fired you? Or taken any action at all. How would that have looked for him? Not good. A businessman as wily as Mr Kim couldn’t have ever accepted that as a possible outcome, an outcome more all the more likely to occur thanks to a certain someone writing a lengthy, in-depth, behind-the-scenes journalism article on Mr Kim and his multitude of business adventures. Right?’

Silence.

‘Right?’

‘Oh, ,’ Wendy said. ‘Uh, yeah. Right, boss. Sorry, I got sidetracked for a minute.’

‘So you admit that it’s possible you could have found something like that, had you gone snooping?’

‘Oh, yeah, of course it was possible. Probably even likely, I’d say.’

‘Exactly. And Mr Kim knew this as well, which means so did you, Sooyoung. You panicked. You understood that should everything go ahead as planned, you would be out of a job, out of the company, and, once your fraud was revealed to the world via Wendy’s investigations here, probably in a jail cell. And that was something you just couldn’t live with. Understandable, I suppose…all the way up until you began plotting to kill him.’

‘This is so ing stupid,’ Sooyoung said. ‘Are we actually listening to this nonsense? Anyone?’

‘Not really,’ said Yeri. ‘But it beats another game of snakes and ladders, so whatever. Please, continue.’

‘Thanks,’ Irene said dryly. ‘Anyway, where was I? You began plotting to kill Mr Kim, knowing that with him out the picture there was no chance of any rival investor buying up a majority of H&H’s shares, which meant your job was safe, your career was safe, and more importantly, your legal livelihood was safe. But you’re smart, much smarter than you let on. You knew about the dinner coming up because he told you about it, what with you being here so often recently, and you knew others would be here too. The maids, of course, and presumably Wheein, with her being in and out as well? Right?’

‘I saw her a couple times,’ Wheein said.

‘There you go. And then others too. You knew it would be a perfect opportunity for something like this. So you hatch a plan. You sit all night concocting it, going over every little detail, making it all perfect.’

‘Jesus,’ Yeri muttered. ‘You make her sound like some sort of super criminal. Like a Batman villain or something.’

Irene ignored her and continued. ‘Your plan is pretty straightforward, isn’t it? You sneak into his office, switch around his medicine vials, and wait for him to overdose on morphine, because you know how easy that would be to shift blame onto someone else. One of the maids, perhaps. Or the cook. Or even Wheein. Yeah, you start thinking Wheein would be the best scapegoat. She has motive, she has no alibi, and she’s been here even more than you have. It’s a pretty solid plan. It isn’t until all the guests have arrived that it starts to slowly unravel.

‘See, your original plan was to simply find a way into Mr Kim’s study – where you knew he kept his medicine – and switch them around. And that’s exactly what you did. At five minutes past five in the evening, the storm knocked out the main generator, and with it, the lights. Seulgi and I were upstairs at that time talking to Yeri, and when we came down about ten minutes later you were down here as well with Wendy.’

‘I’d just met her down here, boss,’ said Wendy. ‘She came from upstairs.’

‘Thought so. She came from upstairs because she’d spent those three minutes of darkness in Mr Kim’s study, swapping the vials around. Am I right?’

‘No,’ Sooyoung said. ‘You’re completely – and I mean completely – not right. In fact, you’re the exact opposite of right.’

‘Maybe. Maybe not. I can’t exactly prove where you were, because we were in total darkness, and that’s the beauty of it – you never expected that either. Nobody did. The generator going out was a total of luck for you, and for Mr Jae, and for Rosie too. A hiccup in your otherwise perfect plan, but a hiccup you used to your advantage.’

‘Wait wait wait,’ Lisa said. ‘Slow down just a second. Mr Jae? Rosie? I’m confused. If Sooyoung is the killer, then—’

‘I’m getting to that part.’

‘She’s got a point,’ Yeri said. ‘I mean, Rosie here admitted to switching the vials. Unless you were lying.’

‘No,’ said Rosie. ‘I wish I was, but I wasn’t.’

‘So you switched the vials around.’

‘Yes.’

‘Then what the are you talking about, Irene?’

‘Let me finish,’ Irene said. She took the vials from Seulgi and held them up. ‘This vial here is empty. This one here in my right hand is almost full. Now, if Rosie had switched the vials around like she said she did, this one here in my right hand – the one that’s still almost full – would be Heparin. But it’s not.’

Yeri laughed. ‘What is this?’ she said. ‘Chemistry school?’

‘Seulgi mentioned it earlier.’

‘Mentioned what?’

‘Said she went to hospital last year for a morphine drip. Said it looked like transparent honey being pumped into her.’

Yeri was silent. Then: ‘I’m lost.’

‘Morphine has a slightly higher viscosity than other intravenous fluids, such as Heparin. This vial here, the one that’s nearly full, is morphine, not Heparin.’

‘But Rosie literally just said she switched the vials.’

‘Yeah.’

‘Well?’

‘I did,’ Rosie said. ‘I mean, I switched the vials, but I didn’t take the naloxone. I forgot about it. What? Do you want me to lie now? Are you trying to get me to pretend I didn’t do it?’

‘Maybe you should’ve just said that in the beginning, apparently.’

‘I guess so.’

‘No,’ Irene said, ‘you’re not listening. Yes, Rosie switched the vials, but the morphine is still here. Which means—’

‘Somebody else must’ve switched the vials as well,’ Jisoo said.

‘Bingo. The vials were switched twice, by accident, by two separate people. We’re talking one killer, multiple killees.’

‘Killees?’ Yeri said.

‘I forgot the term.’

‘Why not just say attempted killers?’

‘Yeah, that works, I suppose. So, the lights go out at five oh five. Sooyoung, having planned already to swap the vials around at some point in the evening, takes the initiative and uses this brief episode of darkness to sneak into Mr Kim’s study and switch the contents of the vials, and in the process she grabs the vial of naloxone, the anti-opioid he would’ve used to stop himself from OD’ing. And boom – just like that, Mr Kim would return to his study, inject the switched medicines, and die of a morphine overdose. And presumably your fingerprints wouldn’t be on the vials either, but we’ll get to that part in a little while. Anyway, back to the timeline – the lights come back on at five oh eight, and your part of the plan is done. Now you come downstairs, you sit and chat, have something to drink, maybe grab a couple canapes, which are delicious, by the way – if nobody’s tried them yet I suggest you do so.

‘But anyway, that happens. Then, roughly five to ten minutes later, Mr Kim shows Seulgi and I to the kitchen. Then, on his way up to his office, Mr Jae distracts him by asking him to show Mr Jae to his private collection of Qing pottery again. Just once more, you know, to be sure. That’s the cue that Rosie needs to slip into his study undetected and switch the vials around. Which you did. Correct?’

‘Yeah,’ Rosie said reluctantly. ‘I already admitted to that.’

‘Okay,’ Yeri said, ‘let me get this straight. Sooyoung switches the vials, then Rosie switches them back, so my granduncle actually takes…the correct dosage of each?’

Irene nodded. ‘Exactly. So what we have here is a case of double trouble.’

‘Double trouble,’ Lisa said. ‘Really now.’

‘Well, what else would you call it? Both of them tried to kill him and neither succeeded.’

‘Well…they did.’

‘What?’

‘I mean…he’s dead.’

‘I was getting to that bit. So, both of them switch the medicines around and wait, knowing that IV drugs take hold so quickly that Mr Kim should be dead within minutes at most. But then, ten minutes before dinner is scheduled to begin and half an hour after Rosie has switched the vials, he comes out of his study and stands on the balcony up there and tells us to get ready to eat. So, naturally, you both freak out. I mean, what else is there to do? He’s supposed to be dead, but he’s not. That’s when two people here decide that he has to die. And properly this time.’

‘Sooyoung and Rosie,’ said Lisa.

Rosie turned to her. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I already told you I didn’t stab him. I just switched his medicines around.’

‘Why are you admitting that anyway? I mean, that’s pretty stupid of you.’

‘What’s the point lying? You found out earlier anyway.’

Lisa made a face that said: You have a point there.

‘She’s right,’ Irene continued.

‘Who’s right?’

‘Rosie. It wasn’t her that tried to stab Mr Kim.’

‘Who the was it then?’

‘Mr Jae. And Sooyoung, of course. But Mr Jae as well.’

Yeri groaned. ‘Are you gonna tell us what happened or not? Just give us your list of events, man. Let’s get this over with.’

‘Okay,’ Irene said. ‘Just before dinner, at roughly five fifty-six, or maybe a minute after, the power goes out again. This time it’s out for about six or seven minutes, and this time it isn’t because of the storm. It’s because someone cut the lines. Phones, too. Groundskeeper Jang here confirmed that himself.’

Mr Jang nodded.

‘So it was Sooyoung?’ Jennie asked.

‘No, it wasn’t. It couldn’t have been Sooyoung, because Sooyoung went to the bathroom a minute before the lights went out. I know because I saw her enter the bathroom and close the door, and I didn’t see her leave until after the lights had already come back on. Which confirms that somebody else cut the power, because it’s on the first floor, away from any potential window entrances. It was Mr Jae.’

‘Right,’ Yeri said. ‘So, the guy that did this is dead? I was right about the whole suicide stew thing? Brilliant.’

‘No. You see, when you’re in this job as long as I’ve been, you start noticing things other people don’t. Little things. The way people react, the way they talk about stuff, the things they try and make people aware of. Things that draw your attention away. I can’t help but watch them.’

‘Sounds creepy.’

‘You know what I mean. And people have been doing and saying things all day that grabbed my attention. First it was Rosie accidentally letting slip about needing to provide for her family and then it was her and Mr Jae mixing up their stories about when Mr Jae last stayed here. Then it was Mr Kim and his riddles. But there were a couple other things as well, things that I thought were, well, just things until I started mulling them over.’

‘For god’s sake, just get on with it.’

Irene obliged. ‘It was Sooyoung,’ she said bluntly.

‘What?’ Sooyoung said. ‘How—’

‘She knew she had to do something, and fast. Dinner was only minutes away. So she did something nobody else here thought of doing, something incredibly smart. She gave herself an alibi, and just to make sure it was foolproof she gave it in front of the only person in this house alert enough to pay attention to it – me. She told me she was going to the bathroom, that bathroom over there on the left behind us, and I watched her walk into it and close the door behind her. Then, she put her plan into motion. First, she grabs the things she laid out ahead of time – I don’t know exactly what they were, but I’m presuming a pair of gloves and a raincoat, just to be sure. Things she brought with her three weeks ago, when she stayed in the guest bedroom upstairs. Like a coat, for example.’

‘What?’ Lisa said. ‘How do you—’

‘Rosie told me.’

‘I did?’ Rosie asked.

‘When we were questioning you in the dining hall. Presumably you mentioned it as an off-hand comment when I asked whether Sooyoung had been here before, but like I said, I pick up on these things. So, you go to the bathroom, you put on the raincoat you’d stashed there beforehand, you put on a pair of gloves presumably as well, to hide fingerprints, and then, in the pouring rain, you climb out the window.’

‘She climbs out the window?’ Yeri said. ‘What, like Hitman or something?’

Irene nodded. ‘She climbs out the bathroom window, yes. Outside there’s a path that runs the length of the house, from the front, all down the side, all behind the conservatory, and then around the other side too. So, she climbs out.’

‘And then what? Goes around to my granduncle’s side of the house?’

‘No. Well…yes, but first she climbs through the kitchen window, making sure nobody’s there to spot her. And luckily for her, nobody is. Jennie and Rosie are still upstairs at this time, just before the power goes out, and Jisoo is, unfortunately, asleep on the job. So, Sooyoung grabs a knife out of the kitchen drawer, climbs back out through the window, and walks around the side of the house, past the conservatory, and right around to outside your granduncle’s study. Then, with all the care in the world, she climbs.’

‘Climbs what?’

‘There’s trellising all put up on the right side of the house. Leads all the way up to the second floor. Sooyoung knows this because, like Mr Jang said earlier, it was his job to show all the guests around the garden, on Mr Kim’s wishes. At first I thought it couldn’t be her, or Wheein, because they’d have to have pretty intimate knowledge of the house to know something like that. But Mr Jang’s clarification here changed that. So, she climbs. Except, she’s not careful enough. She slips, and a piece of the trellising breaks off. That’s the piece Seulgi and I found when we were outside. After you all locked us in the boiler room.’

Nobody made a sound.

‘So, she slips, but manages to climb up. This is around about the time Mr Jae cuts the power, much to Sooyoung’s luck. Mr Kim is still sat at his desk at this time, presumably already numbed from his daily morphine dose. Then all Sooyoung has to do is climb in through his window, sink the knife into his back, and climb out again.’

‘Oh, cool,’ Yeri said. ‘That’s “all” she had to do, is it? Who is she, Tenzin Norgay?’

‘What?’

‘Tenzin Norgay. You know…Nepali climber and mountaineer, famous for scaling Everest? No? C’mon. I mean, classics I can sort of understand, but this is, like, modern history. You know what? Never mind. Keep going.’

‘Right,’ Irene said. She cleared . ‘Sooyoung climbs through the window, stabs Mr Kim, and climbs back out again, all while the lights are out. Except we’re forgetting who cut the power and why. You were spotted, weren’t you?’

‘What?’ Sooyoung said. She laughed.

‘Mr Jae had the same idea as you. That’s why he cut the power. And right as you were climbing out the window, he entered Mr Kim’s study and spotted you leaving out through the window. You’d done his job for him. And then, knowing you were in trouble, you freaked. You knew you had to shift the blame, and who better to do that to than the only other people in this house that both, A, had motive and B, had been staying here recently, even more than you had? Yeri and Wheein. But you knew Yeri would be too obvious, too easy to explain away. The estranged grandniece who never spoke fondly of her granduncle, who maybe had been left a great sum in his inheritance? Too easy to sniff out. So, instead, under the cover of darkness, you snuck into Wheein’s room, planted the naloxone in her drawer, and crept out again. Maybe nobody would find it, or maybe they’d blame Mr Jae or Rosie instead, but that didn’t matter to you. It was about creating as many potential breadcrumb trails away from yourself as possible.’

‘This is ing absurd. Do you get off on making up these ridiculous stories to pass the time or something?’

‘See, when I think about it, it explains so much. All the things I’ve seen over the past ten hours or so. It all fits neatly into place. Seventy twenty-seven.’

‘What?’

‘I remember checking my phone when I came downstairs at seven twenty-seven and seeing you and Mr Jae talking over there by the kitchen. I thought nothing of it at the time, but now it all makes sense – he was blackmailing you, wasn’t he? Making you aware that he knew what you’d done and that if you tried pinning the blame on him, he’d reveal it to all of us. And that would be the end for you. So, you had to act first. You brought a backup plan with you, just in case switching the medicines didn’t work, and just in case you couldn’t get access to his study. Didn’t you? Cyanide.’

Yeri broke out into laughter. ‘The plot thickens,’ she said. ‘Cyanide? Really?’

‘There’s a reason Sooyoung mentioned it earlier, when we were talking about Rosie potentially having poisoned the stew. Sooyoung said potassium cyanide and sodium cyanide would be easy to come by for a maid.’

‘She was deflecting,’ Wendy said.

‘Exactly. Creating a smokescreen. Diverting attention. She did the same thing just after I arrived as well, at about five thirty or so, when she asked if anyone knew where the bathroom was, as if to make her look like she had no idea where anything in this house was located, despite having slept here multiple times before. Diversionary tactics 101. So, she used cyanide – presumably in liquid or powder form – to poison the stew, and she did that when she went to the bathroom for a second time, at around 8:45 PM. I remember coming back downstairs and asking where Sooyoung and Yeri were and I remember you, Jennie, telling me that Sooyoung was in the bathroom. But just like before, she used that opportunity to her advantage. A minute or two was all she needed. And then with Mr Jae out of the way, all she had to worry about doing was disposing of the tools she’d used to carry out this plan of hers, knowing she already had a solid alibi in the form of me vouching for her being in the bathroom the whole time the original murder went down. I presume she’s still in the process of disposing of these tools, but we can check easily enough.’

‘Check how?’ Lisa asked.

‘You see, like I said, all these little things kept building up. There was this niggling feeling in the back of my head that something wasn’t right all along. When the power went out just before dinner I was sat here, and when the lights came back on the first person I saw was Sooyoung, coming out of the bathroom. I asked if she was okay, because she was walking awkwardly and the bottom of her dress was wet, and she told me that the faucet in the bathroom was broken. You said, I believe, word for word, “This house is falling apart.” Clever. But Seulgi mentioned earlier that she filled up her glass of water in the bathroom, so I knew it couldn’t have been broken, and I used the bathroom about an hour ago and the faucet worked just fine. Your dress wasn’t wet from that, was it? It was wet because you’d been outside, after climbing through the window, in this weather. And even the raincoat could only keep the top half of you dry. There’s even a streak of mud in the sink that you forgot to wash up, that I’m guessing is from where you washed the bottoms of your heels, to avoid suspicion that you’d been outdoors. And you were walking funny because—’

‘The trellising,’ Wendy said, a light in her eyes. As if she were suddenly putting it all together as well.

‘Presumably you sprained your ankle when you slipped and broke off a piece of the trellising. It had nothing to do the faucet at all. And your inhaler as well.’

‘What?’ Sooyoung said. ‘Are you going to say I made up my asthma now, too?’

‘Yes. Well, actually…maybe not. I don’t know. Maybe you do really have asthma. But what I do know is that you haven’t used that inhaler once all day.’

‘Because I haven’t needed to. Jesus, are you that ignorant about how asthma works?’

‘I might be ignorant,’ Irene said, ‘but I’m also willing to bet that inhaler hasn’t been used because the little thing inside it isn’t for your lungs, is it? I’m willing to bet I know what it is, though.’

‘This is so stupid. And I mean so, so—’

‘I’m not finished,’ Irene said. Her tone was such that everybody in the room was silent and attentive. ‘The naloxone,’ she continued. ‘At first we thought it was Wheein, because we found it in her drawer. Then we thought it was Rosie setting her up. But something was off to me, something I haven’t really been able to put my finger on until now. It was something that Rosie mentioned earlier, another off-the-cuff comment that meant nothing at the time and one that Rosie probably didn’t even realise she’d said, but it stuck with me. Wheein always likes her things neat and tidy. Always cleans everything up herself. Is that right?’

‘Yeah,’ Wheein said. ‘Why? What are you trying to get at?’

‘It was something I noticed earlier. I’ve been noticing it all night. Not to sound like I’ve been staring at you in a creepy way or anything.’

‘Oh, yeah, no chance of that.’

‘The way after every drink you set the glass down at a perfect ninety-degree angle. The same with the bottles too. And in your room, when we went and searched through your drawers, you put everything back perfectly. Literally inch perfect. You were more concerned with making sure your clothes were folded properly than with the fact we all thought you were a murderer. I even tested it myself earlier, when I poured a glass of whiskey and put the bottle back deliberately crooked on the table to see if you would do anything about it. And you did. You set it straight, just like I thought you would. I’ve seen that before. Used to know someone just like that. It’s because you’ve got OCD, isn’t it?’

Wheein was quiet for a long time. Then she shrugged, an air of nonchalance to her. ‘It’s just a mild form of OCD,’ she said. ‘Very mild. Means nothing. I just like things neat.’

‘Like, or need?’

‘Need, I guess. It’s like this psychological impulse to have everything neat and tidy. But hey, that’s what OCD is. I mean, it doesn’t affect me too badly. Like I said, it’s mild. I count myself lucky that it’s not much worse. I know of people that have literally scrubbed the skin from their hands because they’re convinced they’re dirty and they just can’t help themselves. Thankfully I’m not that bad at all. I just have to have everything neat.’

‘Everything?’

‘Yeah. Why? What are you—’

‘Rosie knew this as well.’

‘What?’

‘Didn’t you, Rosie?’

Rosie looked about. As if searching for support somewhere. ‘I mean, I didn’t know she had OCD,’ she said. ‘I just thought she was a clean-freak.’

‘Exactly. You knew she preferred everything neat and straight. At a perfect angle, as you said yourself, word for word when we questioned you. Said she doesn’t like people in her room either. She does it all herself. You knew because she’d been here so much recently that you picked up on her habits.’

‘Yeah.’

‘But when we found the vial of naloxone in Wheein’s drawer, it had just been thrown in there. No care at all. Nothing neat about it. Now, all of you tell me – whether she was in a rush or not, do you think someone with OCD would, or could, leave something like that? Without being sorted and tidied away? Well?’

‘I dunno,’ Yeri said. ‘I’m not a psychologist. Or a doctor. Should’ve been, though, with all the bull I’ve had to put up with tonight.’

‘Oh, boo-hoo,’ Jennie said.

‘What’s this? Genie gaining a backbone all of a sudden? Say it ain’t so.’

‘It’s Jennie. And look on the bright side – at least you’re not dead.’

‘Not yet, no. Keep blabbing and I might be heading that way, though.’

‘Alright,’ Irene said. ‘Focus, please. Now, back to where we were – I’d go so far as to say that probably isn’t something that’s going to happen. And not only did Wheein know this, but Rosie did too. Do you think either of them would have been that careless? I don’t think so, not with something this important. I think the more likely answer is that whoever put that vial of naloxone in Wheein’s drawer was somebody that had no idea about her OCD tendencies at all. Which instantly rules out Wheein herself and the maids. Which leaves a very short list of people, and when you take out all the people with alibis and those who are A, not dead, and B, have motive, you’re left with only one person. You.’

Sooyoung laughed again. Irene couldn’t quite tell if it was anxiety or amusement or both but it was loud. ‘Me?’ she said. ‘Seriously?’

‘It all adds up. Every part of it. I’ll tell you something else that caught my eye as well. When I was in the bathroom earlier I noticed one of the screws to hold the air vent in place was slightly out of place, at the wrong angle. As if somebody had recently fiddled with it. How much money do you want to bet that there’s something in that vent that somebody has tampered with recently?’

‘This is so stupid,’ Sooyoung said again. ‘Wait. Wait a minute. You don’t believe her, do you? Tell me none of you actually believe her about this? Are you hearing how complicated this sounds?’

‘Sounds okay to me,’ Wendy said, arms folded.

‘Well, knowing the way you write, that isn’t surprising. But you’re telling me you think I managed to: plan this weeks in advance, have intricate knowledge of Mr Kim’s medical history and daily medicinal upkeep, plotted it out to the exact day, date, and time, created a fake alibi for myself just in case, climbed out a bathroom window in the pouring rain, climbed in through the kitchen window and stole a knife without either of the maids here seeing or hearing me, climbed up a ing ladder of green trellising like I’m Lara Croft or something, broke into an old man’s study room without him noticing, stabbed him in the back, poisoned another man, hid the accessories somewhere, broke into Wheein’s bedroom, planted the naloxone in her drawer, got out again, got back in through the bathroom window, put my things away, and came back out without being spotted or causing a scene? Oh, and apparently I did all of that last part in six minutes or less. C’mon, really?’

‘Green,’ Seulgi said.

‘What?’

‘How do you know the trellising is green?’

‘The penny drops,’ Yeri said with a laugh.

Sooyoung was silent. Whether it was guilt on her face or pure dumb astonishment at this turn of events Irene couldn’t tell.

‘Tell you what,’ Wheein said, ‘if this whole thing is true, and is just as crazy as Miss Solve-It-All here says it is, why don’t we go and check it out?’

‘Check what out?’ Lisa asked.

‘She mentioned the screw in the bathroom vent looking out of place, right? Anyone got a coin?’

‘A coin?’

‘To open the vent with, genius. Unless you know where Mr Kim leaves his handy collection of screwdrivers lying around.’

‘That’s a great idea,’ Irene said.

She led them over to the bathroom on the left of the room. The first thing she did when they were crowded around the doorway was test the faucet to see if it worked properly still and it did. She pointed to the vent on the wall to the right. The screw on the bottom left at an odd angle, only half tightened. Wheein passed her a single coin and she held it between her thumb and forefinger and slowly began unfastening all four screws until the vent grate came right off with ease. They watched her. She dropped the toilet lid and climbed atop it and leant over so her head was partially in the vent. Then she pulled out a black raincoat and a pair of black latex gloves and held them up for the others to see. The front of the raincoat had a faint orangey stain of blood right by the zipper.

‘God damn,’ Yeri said. ‘I’ll be a monkey’s uncle. How the did you figure that out?’

‘Oh, you know. Just a few tricks of the trade here and there.’

‘That’s honestly seriously impressive,’ Lisa said. ‘For the first time tonight I’m actually quite amazed.’

‘Thanks. But— hey, wait. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine.’

‘What?’ Yeri said.

‘There are eleven of us left alive.’

‘Okay. So? You sound like a TV gameshow host or something.’

‘Eleven of us alive. I’m here. There are nine of you standing in the doorway. That makes ten.’

‘Yeah, great work, Euclid. Ten here, and Sooyoung out in the main hall makes eleven. So what?’

‘So who, exactly, is watching Sooyoung?’

‘Oh,’ Yeri said. ‘Oh, .’