Crime scene: 162 mystery solving puzzles to find out who the murderer is

Chapter 11 The Truth Behind Lies

The villa resort on the S plateau had its first heavy snow half a month earlier than usual, which was 30 centimeters thick.The heavy snow stopped at 6 o'clock on Saturday morning, but just after noon, the body of playwright Umeben was found in the log villa that was sealed by heavy snow.His chest and abdomen were cut several times with a kitchen knife, and he fell into a pool of blood.It was inferred that the time of death was around 9:[-] am that day, and the discoverer was Mrs. Umemoto who had just arrived from Tokyo.

The victim came here alone a few days ago to write a TV series, and a set of skis was poked behind the door.There were two ski tracks on the fresh snow in the morning, and the ski tracks lead to a red brick villa 40 meters away.It's been uphill to get to the villa.

In the red brick villa, there is a TV actress, Koike Mieko, who came here alone to recuperate.Interpol soon visited her.When asked about her relationship with the victim, she did not show any disgust, and gave the following answer: "Mei Ben came to my villa at noon on Friday. It snowed heavily soon, so she spent the night here. I got up this morning. Look, the heavy snow has stopped, we drank instant coffee together, and he went back to his villa around 8 o'clock. Because he said that his wife was coming at noon, he was afraid that his relationship with me would be exposed, so he left in a panic gone."

"Are the ski marks outside your door the ski marks he left when he went back?"

"Yes. My family has two sets of skis, and I lent one set to Meiben. Because he is not very good at skiing, he lifted his buttocks and slid back without stopping."

"Are you a good skater?"

"Generally I can still ski, but I started to catch a cold yesterday, and I haven't been out since the snow accumulated. The evidence is that there are no other traces around my villa except the traces of the skis that Umemoto came home." Mieko Koike emphasized that there is no snow on the snow. Leave your own footprints.Yes, just as she said, on the 30 cm thick snow, there were only traces of Umemoto’s skis from Mieko’s villa along the slope back to his own villa, without any other traces of skis and shoes.

Umeben’s ski marks did not slide down in one go, it seemed to stop several times in the middle, and the marks of the left and right skis were either wide apart or pressed together, which looked very messy.He was really bad at skiing.

When Meiben was killed in his villa, it was already 3 hours ago.After the snow stops, if the criminal escapes from the scene after committing the crime, of course he will leave footprints on the snow.But when the wife found her husband's body, there was no such footprint for some reason.In this case, Mieko Koike is still doubtful.So the police questioned her severely.

"The victim's wife said that you must have killed him and that you wanted to marry the victim, but the victim didn't have the courage to break up with his wife. You hate his hesitant attitude, so you killed him in a fit of anger?"

"That's Madam's nonsense. I haven't left my villa for a single step since the snow stopped. It's impossible to kill someone." Mei Jiangzi retorted calmly, but her crime was exposed after all.

[Answer] The key question is the pine tree outside her villa.Half of the snow on the pine tree fell to the ground, and the criminal police found out and exposed her ingenious tricks.So, what is that means?

It is a lie to say that Umemoto spent the night at Mieko Koike's villa last night.He had been at his cottage before it snowed.

On Saturday morning, after the snow stopped, Mieko skied to Meiben's villa.But at that time, a single ski was used.Moreover, a rope was tied to the pine tree in front of his villa, and he slid down while letting go of the rope.When they arrived at Meiben's villa, in order to prevent the rope from touching the snow, they tied the rope to the post at the back door.

When returning from committing the crime, he pulled the rope again, wrapped it around his body, and slowly climbed up the slope with a single ski to return to his villa.In this way, only two traces of skis remained on the snowy slope, pretending to be the traces of Umemoto himself skiing back from Mieko's villa.The two skis protruding from the back door of Meiben Villa were obtained by Mei Jiangzi the day before after hearing the weather forecast of heavy snowfall.

The ski marks are very irregular and unnatural, which is caused by pulling the rope back and forth with a ski.Also because the rope tied to the tree was pulled back and forth, the pine tree was shaken by the pull, so the snow on the branches and leaves fell to the ground.

(End of this chapter)