Section outline

    • A man is shot in the back on an empty, snow-covered street with no footprints nearby, and another is killed in a locked room with no apparent way for the killer to escape. As Dr. Fell investigates, he delivers the famous “locked room lecture,” a brilliant dissection of the locked-room mystery genre itself. With atmospheric tension, clever misdirection, and intricate plotting, The Three Coffins is a masterpiece of Golden Age detective fiction.