Story Skeleton—And Then There Were None

Story structure relates to the psychological appeal of narrative, that which engages readers and builds in them a sense of anticipation—a desire to know what happens next. Our ongoing exploration now delves into mysteries, illustrating yet again the universality of story structure, albeit from a different angle.

 

By Michelle Barker

Challenge Achieved

Agatha Christie is a legend in the mystery world. In The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, Mma Ramotswe invokes her work on numerous occasions as proof that women can be detectives. Christie was a master at her craft, and no book demonstrates this better than And Then There Were None. The novel was published in 1939 during what is known as the Golden Age of Detective Fiction (i.e. before noir came into fashion), and Christie wrote it as a challenge. In the author’s note that precedes the novel, she explains that she wanted to craft something that was “clear, straightforward, baffling, and yet had a perfectly reasonable explanation.” Could she come up with a story in which ten people died “without it becoming ridiculous or the murderer being obvious”?

Challenge achieved. But she also claimed it was the hardest of all her novels to write.

If you haven’t read the book yet, STOP READING THIS SKELETON RIGHT NOW because I’m about to spoil it for you, and you don’t want it to be spoiled. This is an edge-of-your-seat read, best experienced when you have no idea of the resolution. Go read the book, then come back and we’ll talk.

The Hidden Protagonist

In And Then There Were None, Christie subverts several tropes in the mystery genre. She disguises the central plot so completely that we don’t realize who the protagonist is until the final pages.

In traditional narrative terms, the protagonist is the character whose actions and decisions drive the story. In this case, that person is the murderer—someone whose identity is withheld, whose point of view is obscured, and whose plan only becomes visible in retrospect. In this novel, the protagonist is both secret and morally reprehensible.

But aren’t we supposed to identify in some way with the protagonist? Not necessarily. A villain protagonist is a central character who pursues their goal through harmful, immoral, or violent means. Unlike an antagonist, who exists in opposition to the hero’s goal, a villain protagonist is the engine of the story. They act. They plan. They create the world of the narrative, even if from the shadows. Think Tom Ripley in Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley, or Patrick Bateman in Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho.

What sets Christie’s killer apart is not just their moral position, but also their absence. We can’t evaluate their actions in terms of causality until the book is over. We don’t follow their plan as it unfolds. We can’t—because we don’t know who they are.  

Instead, we follow a collection of victims. We care, to varying degrees, about each of the guests on Soldier Island. We care—but each of them is morally problematic. This is not a case of an ensemble protagonist, nor are these collaborators working toward a common goal. Each guest on Soldier Island has a secret, but none of them drives the story. There’s no hero. There’s only the villain, executing a perfect plan—and leaving us to pick through the rubble at the end.

The Reader as Detective

Christie also subverts the trope of using a brilliant sleuth to guide us through the mystery. One of the guests, a retired detective named Blore, is hopelessly off the mark when it comes to figuring out what’s going on. The real detective, in effect, is us. But we’re not gathering clues or interviewing witnesses. Christie gives us access to each character’s thoughts, but that access is curated. Someone is lying. This is an omniscient narrative that doesn’t quite play fair.

Eight strangers arrive on Soldier Island, having each received a different invitation from a mysterious Mr. or Mrs. Owen. They’re greeted by a recently hired couple: a housekeeper and a butler. The host is absent, so there are ten people in total on the island. It is isolated, accessible only by boat—weather permitting. And hanging in every guest’s bedroom is a framed copy of a nursery rhyme:

Ten little soldier boys went out to dine…

Everyone is eager to meet Mr. U.N. Owen, but the news is he won’t be arriving until the next day. After the initial dinner, a gramophone recording accuses each guest of a murder they’re alleged to have committed at some point in their past, including the butler and housekeeper.

It becomes apparent that the invitations to this island are bogus. The name of the island’s owner, U.N. Owen, is itself an indication of that. U.N. Owen = Unknown. Whoever is in charge of this game has done their research, but most of the guests either make excuses about the accusations against them or feign ignorance.

The verdict: they must get off the island ASAP.

Only one problem: there won’t be any boat until the morning.

Well, two problems, because this is when the guests start dying. And with every death, another soldier figurine vanishes from the dining room table.

Anthony Marston

One choked his little self and then there were Nine.

Marston is the first to go. A young and handsome hotshot, described as a god, he is accused of accidentally killing two children with his car. He raises a glass, drinks, and drops dead. The doctor discovers cyanide in his drink, but no poison is found anywhere else. The assumption is suicide—though nothing about Marston suggests he might have killed himself. The guests go to bed uneasy.

Mrs. Rogers

Nine little soldier boys sat up very late;
One overslept himself and then there were Eight.

The next morning, the housekeeper is found dead in her bed and another figurine is gone. Armstrong had given her something to help her sleep, which makes him the prime suspect. Emily Brent considers the death as divine retribution for the murder that Rogers and her husband are accused of: killing their former employer out of neglect, to gain an inheritance.

The pattern is clear. The guests are being killed off one by one in the ways described by the rhyme. They determine that it must be their host, Mr. Owen. He must be hiding on the island somewhere. They know what they must do: find Mr. Owen and stop him from picking people off like pigeons.

General Macarthur

Eight little soldier boys travelling in Devon;
One said he’d stay there and then there were Seven.

The general, an elderly man, begins talking openly about accepting the inevitable end. Accused of sending his wife’s lover to his death during World War One, he goes to sit by the water and is later found bludgeoned.

“We know now exactly where we are,” Justice Wargrave declares. There’s no possibility anymore of believing that an outsider is committing these crimes. “It is perfectly clear. Mr. Owen is one of us…”

Mr. Rogers

Seven little soldier boys chopping up sticks;
One chopped himself in halves and then there were Six.

The next morning the butler is found dead, killed with an axe while chopping firewood, The weather has turned; the circle closes: No one is coming to rescue them until the storm clears.

Emily Brent

Six little soldier boys playing with a hive;
A bumble bee stung one and then there were Five.

An older religious woman, Brent is accused of causing her former maid’s suicide but refuses to accept any responsibility for the woman’s drowning. She is injected with poison from a hypodermic needle and is found dead in the dining room with a bee buzzing outside the window. The needle that the doctor usually carries is missing from his bag.

The group decides to lock up all potential weapons (including drugs), but now a revolver is also missing. Every room and person is searched. They do not find the revolver, but they do find the needle outside the window—along with another soldier.

Justice Wargrave

Five little soldier boys going in for law;
One got in Chancery and then there were Four.

Wargrave, a retired judge, is alleged to have sent an accused murderer to his death by influencing the jury to find him guilty. He is found dead in a staged scene, wrapped in a red curtain for judge’s robes with grey yarn on his head for a wig, bearing a red mark on his forehead. Whoever killed him used the missing revolver that one of the guests, Philip Lombard, had brought.

Dr. Armstrong

Four little soldier boys going out to sea;
A red herring swallowed one and then there were Three.

Armstrong vanishes. A medical doctor and reformed alcoholic, he is accused of killing one of his patients by operating on him while drunk. Another figurine is missing, but no one can find Armstrong’s body. Vera suggests the disappearance is a red herring—an intentional mislead.

William Henry Blore

Three little soldier boys walking in the Zoo;
A big bear hugged one and then there were Two.

Blore, the former detective, is accused of killing a man by testifying against him to get a promotion, even though he knew the man was innocent. He goes up to the house alone and is crushed by a heavy marble clock shaped like a bear. In the meantime, Vera and Lombard find Armstrong’s body washed up on the shore. Which means they are the last two alive.

Philip Lombard

Two little soldier boys sitting in the sun;
One got frizzled up and then there was One.

Lombard is a mercenary soldier and the one character on the island in possession of a weapon. He readily admits to the crime he’s accused of: leaving twenty-one African men to die in the bush so that he and a friend could survive.

Vera and Lombard are together when Blore dies—eliminating him from suspicion—but panic and mistrust override logic. Convinced Lombard’s the killer, Vera grabs the revolver from his pocket and shoots him.

Vera Claythorne

One little soldier boy left all alone;
He went and hanged himself and then there were None.

Vera Claythorne is accused of killing a boy in her charge by allowing him to swim in dangerous conditions, which she did in the hopes that her lover would inherit the estate and marry her. Instead, he abandoned her, and she became haunted by the boy she let drown. When she returns to her room, a noose is waiting. She hangs herself.

And then there were none.

Mystery… Unsolved

Normally the solution to the mystery would come before the climax. The detective finds the crucial clue, has the aha moment, and nabs the criminal. But Christie subverts this plot point as well. In an epilogue, detectives uncover the involvement of another man, Isaac Morris, who arranged the sale of the island and provisioned it. But they can’t question him because he’s dead too—and he died the night the guests arrived on the island.

The detectives conclude that the murderer had to be one of the guests, but that theory doesn’t account for one thing: the chair beneath Vera’s body was not kicked over. It had been put away. And yet by the time Vera committed suicide, all the other guests were already supposedly dead.

We are only privy to the solution thanks to a written confession placed in a bottle, discovered by a fisherman, and signed by…

Justice Wargrave: The Villain Protagonist

Wargrave’s letter is a nod to the usual trope in mysteries where the detective reveals the solution to what seemed like an unsolvable crime. Wargrave outlines exactly how he killed everyone—including himself at the end with the revolver to make it look like someone else did it.

Looking back from this revelation, we can now see the plot points that were previously obscured.

Stasis Motivation: Justice and Murder

Wargrave begins by describing his lifelong obsession with justice. He had a reputation as a “hanging judge,” and he admits to taking satisfaction in sentencing people to death—so long as they were truly guilty. Alongside it was something darker: a desire to kill. But never without justification. The two impulses—justice and murder—remained separate until he learned he was dying.

Inciting Incident: A Terminal Diagnosis

Once Wargrave is diagnosed with a terminal illness, everything clicks into place. He will kill. But he’ll do it with purpose. He will find people who’ve gotten away with murder and make them answer for it. No court. Just his verdict and his design. Justice, stripped of mercy.

Rising Action: Island Acquisition and Guest Selection

Wargrave finds his ten victims—people whose crimes were either technically legal, unprovable, or hidden by silence. He enlists Isaac Morris, a corrupt fixer with his own guilty past, to buy the island and set things in motion. Morris becomes the first to die, poisoned the night the guests arrive.

Wargrave stages everything: the invitations, the guest list, the figurines, the rhyme, the gramophone recording. Every detail is calibrated to maximize psychological pressure. Fear is a tool and he knows how to use it.

Point of No Return: The First Death

Anthony Marston dies after drinking cyanide. It looks like a suicide, even though on a character level it doesn’t make sense that the god in his fancy car would kill himself. Wargrave uses this moment to establish his authority. He gathers the group and pushes them to explain their past, though most of them don’t accept responsibility for their crimes.

Mrs. Rogers is next, eased out of life with a sleeping draught. The guests try to stay rational. They search the island. But Wargrave is already playing on both their fear and their assumptions.

Macarthur walks straight into death—already resigned to it. Mr. Rogers follows, then Emily Brent. The remaining five guests are breaking down psychologically. They stick together wherever they go, as if that will keep them safe.

Midpoint: The Faked Death

Wargrave convinces Dr. Armstrong to help him fake his own murder. They hang a strand of seaweed in Vera Claythorne’s room, giving her a terrible shock, but it’s a distraction. All the men, save Wargrave, run upstairs at the sound of her shriek. Meanwhile, Wargrave wraps himself in a curtain, uses some of Emily Brent’s gray wool for a wig, applies a red mark to his forehead, and plays dead.

This is ostensibly a trap to flush out the killer—but it’s actually a trap for Armstrong. Wargrave tells him he’s the only person with enough medical knowledge to verify the death, so he’s the only one who can make the ruse convincing. But now that everyone thinks Wargrave is dead, he’s free to move around unseen. No one will suspect a dead man.

Rising Action Continued: The Final Killings

With Armstrong's trust secured, Wargrave lures him to the cliffside and pushes him over. And voilà: there’s the red herring. That leaves Blore, Lombard, and Vera. Wargrave kills Blore with the heavy bear-shaped clock, then relies on fear to do the rest.

Spotting something on the beach, Vera and Lombard go down to investigate. It’s Armstrong. They’re the only two guests left, which means one of them must be the killer. Even though, based on Blore’s death—which happened while they were together—this couldn’t be true. But their suspicion undoes them.

Vera sneaks the revolver out of Lombard’s pocket and shoots him. Now she’s alone. The last soldier.

Climax: Vera’s Suicide

Wargrave stages her room: a noose, a chair, an open invitation to finish what the rhyme demands. He doesn’t need to be there. Overcome with guilt about her part in the child’s drowning and convinced that the man she once loved is somehow present, she sees the setup and hangs herself.

Wargrave returns the chair neatly to its place—a final detail to confound the investigators.

Resolution: The Bottle and the Shot

He writes out the full confession, seals it in a bottle, and throws it into the sea. Then he jimmies a revolver with an elastic band so that he can pull the trigger at a distance. The gun springs clear, making it look like he was murdered like everyone else.

Ten guilty people. Ten deaths. One impossible crime. Justice has been served.

But has it? Christie doesn’t allow an easy answer to this question. Many of the original crimes fall into a grey zone in terms of personal responsibility. Combine this with complex characters who feel varying degrees of remorse and a man who administers justice with brutality rather than mercy, and you have a novel that provokes discussion.

Creating the Closed-Circle Mystery

In The Murders in the Rue Morgue, Edgar Allan Poe created a locked-room mystery which involves a crime happening under seemingly impossible conditions—in Poe’s case, a room locked from the inside with no way for the killer to escape.

What Agatha Christie has done in this novel is referred to as a closed-circle mystery: the crimes occur among a limited, isolated group of people, with no one else coming or going—one of whom must be the murderer. This creates huge psychological pressure because everyone is a suspect. In this group of seasoned murderers, that’s particularly true. Being trapped together changes them, makes them paranoid, fearful and nervous. That’s what the murderer counts on.

These are not easy to write. As in all mysteries, if the reader figures it out too quickly, they won’t read on. But if you make it unsolvable, it will feel like a bit of a cheat. Finding that small strip of land between guessable and surprising is a challenge.

Also, in order for this subgenre to work, the circle really must be closed. Once the story starts, the setting must be truly isolated so that no one new can enter the circle. The characters must each have a plausible motive for being the murderer, as well as some opportunity to commit the crime. Planning is key. Some authors suggest working backwards from the end so that you know which key clues reveal the answer—in other words, you know how to misdirect the reader: what to bury, what to lean on, what to hide in plain sight.

Was This a Fair Fight?

Some readers feel the ending of And Then There Were None is so unguessable that Christie cheated a little. “Inevitable but unexpected” is the gold standard for a twist. The reader should be able to go back and pinpoint what they missed on the first read.

But it’s impossible to know that Wargrave faked his own death and then hid to commit the rest of the murders while everyone believed he was already dead. The description of his so-called death is vague enough to slide past us. We’re tricked like everyone else in the house.

Christie makes the unusual decision to allow us access into every character’s head, though it’s definitely the right choice for this novel. Giving us insight into each of these characters’ thoughts compounds the mystery. She wields POV like a weapon, cutting from one character’s thoughts to the next at exactly the right moment to create suspicion. Each of them struggles with varying amounts of guilt. Each brings a secret to the island—some more than one.

But Christie doesn’t give us an honest look into Justice Wargrave’s thoughts. POV implies an implicit bond of trust between author and reader. If we’re being given access to a character’s thoughts, we assume this also includes their intentions. Should we have guessed that the murderer is a judge because the whole book is about justice? Feels like a stretch.

In his confession, Wargrave claims there were three clues:

1. He himself wasn’t really guilty of murder, since the man he sentenced to death was in fact guilty of his crime.
2. The line in the rhyme about the red herring should have led others to the conclusion that Armstrong had been tricked.
3. The bullet in Wargrave’s forehead left a red mark like the brand of Cain, the first murderer in the Bible.

Could these be more obscure?

In the end, though, it’s such a brilliant book that no one cares if the fight was a little rigged.

In Conclusion

I’m always interested in successful authors’ early attempts at publication and their (often rocky) road to success. Writers, take heart: Agatha Christie’s first novel was rejected by six publishers. Through a neighbor, she was put in touch with a literary agent who… nope, didn’t want it either. But he suggested she write a second book. A fan of detective novels, she decided to write one featuring the now infamous Hercule Poirot. It was rejected by two publishers but finally picked up on the condition that she rewrite the resolution. And so a career was launched. She became the best-selling fiction writer of all time, being outsold only by Shakespeare and the Bible. And Then There Were None has sold over 100 million copies, making it the best-selling crime novel ever.

Fun facts: Agatha Christie knew how to surf. She learned about poison from her time volunteering at hospital dispensaries during both world wars. And after her first marriage broke down, she disappeared for eleven days. As in: vanished into thin air. Numerous theories have been posited as to what happened and why, but it seems to me the most obvious one is that she simply wanted to create her own mystery and see if anyone could solve it.

So far, no one has.

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Michelle Barker is an award-winning author and poet. She is the co-author of two craft books: Immersion and Emotion: The Two Pillars of Storytelling and Story Skeleton: The Classics. Her fiction, non-fiction, and poetry have appeared in literary reviews worldwide. She has published three YA novels (one fantasy and two historical fiction), a historical picture book, and a chapbook of poetry. Michelle holds a BA in English literature (UBC) and an MFA in creative writing (UBC). Many of the writers she’s worked with have gone on to win publishing contracts and honours for their work. Michelle lives and writes in Vancouver, Canada.