Chapter 6 of 17 · 2'34"
The butler explains that he was once Mr. Boddy's servant and that his own wife was blackmailed by the same man. Revenge, not justice, drives the story he tells: "The suicide of my wife preyed on my mind and created a sense of injustice in me." When he finishes, the guests realize the killer is still in the room.
❝ Monologue · 4 lines The butler explains his wife
In four flat sentences he moves from his wife's death to Boddy's hatred, and the calm is what lands.
One of Us Did It
After Mr. Boddy's murder, Wadsworth admits he was once Boddy's butler. Boddy had blackmailed his wife as well, and she killed herself; her death "preyed on my mind." He explains that he gathered all the victims to confront Boddy face to face and then hand him to the police — only for the group to realize one of them is the killer.
Wadsworth has been running the room all night, and now he finally explains himself — but the confession rearranges the whole night's meaning. He was Boddy's butler and, more importantly, a fellow victim: Boddy blackmailed his wife too, and drove her to suicide. "We had no money. And the price of his silence was that we work for him for nothing. We were slaves." So he staged the evening as a trap, hoping to confront Boddy and "turn him over to the police." Yet the guests immediately spot the hole in his plan: if everyone had a motive, the killer is still among them. His grief may be real, but so is his vanity about the game he built.
A1–C2 is the CEFR scale. Cards above the level you pick fade, and playback will not auto-pause on them.
“We had no money. And the price of his silence was that we work for him for nothing. We were slaves.”
Three plain sentences turn extortion into a bargain and end on the word that costs the most.
Neutral
“The suicide of my wife preyed on my mind and created a sense of injustice in me.”
Grief and anger are described as slow processes, which makes the revenge feel inevitable.
Formal
“Well, one of us did. We all had the opportunity. We all had a motive.”
The parallel sentences put every single person inside the frame without naming anyone.
Neutral
“What could be more American than that?”
A dry question that welds patriotism to profit and lets the irony land on its own.
Neutral
When my wife decided to end her life. She, too, was being blackmailed by this odious man who now lies dead before us. He hated my wife for the same reason that he hated all of you. He believed that you were all thoroughly un-American.
Up next · 07defence mechanismThe scene: Mr. Boddy's Body DisappearsHe wanted to confront Boddy with his blackmail in front of the victims and then hand him to the police — a plan to free them all and settle his own debt.
Boddy blackmailed her too. She refused to name her friends, had no money to pay, was forced into unpaid work for Boddy, and eventually killed herself.
It is only half true. His wife was Boddy's victim, and he lost her to suicide — but he also ran the scheme and knew far more than he let on.
The group cannot tell. They conclude that whoever did it is one of them, since everyone had both the opportunity and a motive.
It is old slang for being executed in the electric chair. The line jokes that if the group is blamed, they will all be sentenced to death.
