Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Vol. 120, No. 3 & 4. Whole No. 733 & 734, September/October 2002

The heirs are there quite early to hear the lawyer read the will.

They are gathered in the mansion up on top of Uncle’s Hill.

It is a scary, very windy, rainy, dark, and stormy night.

(I must tell you of the weather even though the term is trite.)

There is the butler and a banker and a guy that blows a flute,

And a hooker and an actress — all are there to get the loot.

“Being of sound mind,” reads the lawyer... The room goes black ere more is said.

A shot, a scream, the lights come on. The actress lies there dead.

There is lots of finger-pointing about who has pulled the trigger.

But inwardly the heirs rejoice since now the pot is bigger.

A shot is heard amid the screams. The dark comes one more time.

A flashlight shows the flute guy dead, but no light has shown the crime.

As the lights come back they look around to see who isn’t hit,

And realize with great relief it’s now a three-way split.

They all back up against the wall. Once more the lights all fail.

The hooker and the banker die and lay slumped across the rail.

The lawyer looks around to see the butler standing there,

And orders him at gunpoint into a heavy wooden chair.

“I stole the money,” the lawyer said. “Till the old man died, I hid it.

But now with all the heirs gone, I’ll just say the butler did it.”