I recently watched some British murder mystery show called P.D. James: Original Sin, and in this
story, murders are taking place at a publishing house located in a reproduction
Venetian palazzo called “Innocent House”. (Oh, the irony!) But I think it might
have been more fun had the author made it be some frilly Louis XIV-style gilded
palace, and called it “Gilt House”. That might have been somewhat more
appropriate for such a story. And then, with the house so-named, they could
populate it with a copious assortment of liars, thieves, murderers, adulterers,
blackmailers, drug dealers, extortionists, book & art forgers, etc.: Then anybody really could have done it! And the solution could be that everyone
is guilty of at least one of the murders, and they’re all for different
reasons, but they each tried to make it look like it was the same killer, just
so they might all get away with it. And the last person alive is guilty of the
murder of the second-to-last person there, but not of any of the other murders.
So everyone killed everybody else, until there was only one left, who is guilty
of one murder only, which as it turns out, is actually self-defense, but the
way the murderers planned it all, it makes them look guilty, so they kill the
investigating detective and run away. (Maybe they can use this for the comedy
version, with Inspector Dog Leash. Actually, for all I know, someone may have
already used this silly idea.)
