第88話: ストーム中のスノーストームでリチャードがステファン・ヴァン・クロヴェンのヴィラで殺人事件を捜査する

88

Stefan Van Croven, a famous horror novelist, requests Richard, believing his wife is having an affair. At Van Croven's villa, Richard meets his student Jonathan Tradonio, his wife Daiselle, magazine editor Foster Drake, and a researcher named Shamus O'Halliwell. Richard encounters Stefan himself eerily dressed as a vampire and is offered to stay the night because of a snowstorm. Stefan excuses himself to his study and asks Jonathan to bring him wine and a movie to watch. At midnight, everyone checks on Stefan but find him tied to a wooden cross with a stake impaled through his heart; a movie projector lightens his corpse up and the stake used in the murder had been stolen. Richard is forced to examine the body due to authorities being of no help with the snowstorm in progress. Everyone had a motive to see Stefan dead and Daiselle confesses to her affair with Shamus, putting the two at the top of the suspect list. As Richard prepares to close the case, he and Conan are horrified to discover no footprints in the snow on top of the connecting corridor; with the victim's study door locked, access to Stefan is impossible. (Source: Wikipedia)