The Light at Gull Point
- A case in 10 chapters
- Free to play
- Large print
- Read in order
How the case begins
Gull Point light has had one keeper for twenty-six years. Elias Snow trims the lamp, keeps the logbook in a copperplate hand, rows his dory to town on Saturdays, and has not taken a holiday since the year his son drowned with the Marguerite, nine years back, on the shoal his own light watches. The town calls him steady. The town calls everything it cannot look at directly steady. On the night of the equinox storm the light burns all night, faithful as ever. In the morning the relief man finds the lamp still lit, the logbook open mid-sentence, the dory on its davits, one oilskin gone from its peg, and no keeper. No body on the rocks, no boat missing, no note. The town begins, quietly, to tell its oldest story: about the wrecker families, about lights that lied on purpose, about the sea taking back its debts. And the pension board's man, due in a fortnight to inspect the station's records, finds himself asking a smaller, harder question: what was the last sentence in the log about to say?
Each chapter is a short scene and a puzzle, and every puzzle leaves you one clue. Keep all nine. The finale needs them. Your clues keep themselves on this device.
- 1The Relief Man
- 2Mid-Sentence
- 3The Empty Peg
- 4The Boathouse
- 5The Bar
- 6The Chosen Night
- 7The Fortnight
- 8The Marguerite
- 9The Neighbor's Oath
- 10Low Waterbring your clues
The people of the case
- Elias Snow. Keeper of Gull Point light, twenty-six years. His son went down with the Marguerite nine years ago, in sight of the lamp. He has not missed a night since.
- Widow Marsh. Keeps the store at the landing, and once, long ago, kept other things. The only person Elias speaks to on Saturdays beyond the weather.
- Constable Pratt. The town's one policeman. Would rather face a smuggler than a mystery, and says so.
- Dr. Levasseur. The pension board's inspector, due in a fortnight. Polite, thorough, and carrying a file with nine-year-old questions in it.
- Abel Snow. Elias's nephew and the relief man, who found the empty lamp room. Wants the keeper's post, and is ashamed of how much.
- Ginny Tolan. Postmistress. Sorts every letter to and from Gull Point, and remembers, professionally, all the envelopes she is not supposed to.
Prefer pen and paper?
The whole case as one large-print booklet: every chapter and its puzzle, a clue ledger to fill in, and the ending sealed on the last page.