The Red House Mystery

The Red House Mystery is a “locked room” whodunnit by A. A. Milne published in 1922. It was Milne’s only mystery novel. The setting is an English country house where Mark Ablett has been entertaining a house party consisting of a widow and her marriageable daughter a retired major a wilful actress and Bill Beverley a young man about town. Mark’s long-lost brother Robert the black sheep of the family arrives from Australia and shortly thereafter is found dead shot through the head. Mark Ablett has disappeared so Tony Gillingham a stranger who has just arrived to call on his friend Bill decides to investigate. Gillingham plays Sherlock Holmes to his younger counterpart’s Doctor Watson; they progress almost playfully through the novel while the clues mount up and the theories abound.