Dix petits nègres

Ten strangers, each bearing a secret weight of guilt, find themselves drawn by cryptic invitations to Soldier Island, a remote rock off the coast of Devon. They arrive under various pretexts: some believe they are visiting old friends, others have been hired for a weekend, and still others anticipate a relaxed holiday. Met by the island's newly hired servants, Mr. and Mrs. Rogers, they soon realize their mysterious host, a Mr. U.N. Owen, is conspicuously absent. In each of their elegant rooms, a framed copy of the nursery rhyme "Ten Little Soldier Boys" hangs on the wall, and upon the dining table, ten small soldier figurines stand sentinel.

As the guests gather for their first dinner, an unsettling calm is shattered by a disembodied voice emanating from a gramophone record. The voice booms through the room, accusing each person present - from the retired Judge Wargrave to the young, reckless Anthony Marston, the pious Emily Brent, the former governess Vera Claythorne, and the mercenary Philip Lombard - of having committed murder, crimes for which they were never brought to justice. Mrs. Rogers, the housekeeper, faints from shock, and the chilling realization dawns: they have been lured here by an unknown entity, U.N. Owen, a name that chillingly sounds like "Unknown."

The accusations hang heavy in the air, and before the night is through, the first line of the nursery rhyme finds its grim fulfillment. Anthony Marston, who had callously caused the deaths of two children in a reckless driving incident, chokes on his drink, his face turning purple, and collapses, dead from cyanide poisoning. The first soldier figurine disappears from the dining table. The following morning, Mrs. Rogers, frail and nervous, is found dead in her bed, having "overslept herself" after a lethal dose of chloral hydrate. Panic begins to ripple through the remaining eight.

General Macarthur, haunted by the memory of sending his wife's lover to his death, is the next to perish, found with his head bashed in, mirroring the rhyme's verse about a soldier boy who "said he'd stay there." The guests, now convinced that a murderer is among them, search the small, isolated island, but find no one else. The storm that descends upon the island further seals their fate, cutting them off completely from the mainland and any hope of escape. Mr. Rogers, the butler, is then found, struck down by an axe while chopping wood, and Emily Brent dies of a cyanide injection, stung by a bee, as the rhyme foretold.

The dwindling number of survivors - Judge Wargrave, Vera Claythorne, Philip Lombard, Dr. Armstrong, and William Blore - are gripped by intense paranoia, each suspecting the other. Judge Wargrave, with his keen legal mind, attempts to maintain order, but distrust has taken root. He is soon found with a gunshot wound to the head, seemingly the victim of a final, theatrical act. Dr. Armstrong, a nervous physician who once operated while drunk, disappears into the stormy night.

The remaining three, Blore, Lombard, and Vera, huddle together, fear a palpable presence. Blore, a former corrupt police inspector, is crushed by a marble bear-shaped clock. Vera and Lombard, now the sole survivors, are locked in a deadly dance of suspicion. They discover Dr. Armstrong's body, washed up on the shore, drowned. Believing Lombard to be the killer, Vera manages to steal his revolver and shoots him, leaving her as the last one standing.

Returning to the house in a state of shock and relief, Vera finds a noose hanging in her room, a chair meticulously placed beneath it. Overwhelmed by her guilt and the insidious suggestion, she steps onto the chair and hangs herself, fulfilling the final, chilling line of the rhyme: "He went out and hanged himself and then there were none." The police, arriving later, find ten dead bodies and an impenetrable mystery.

However, the truth eventually surfaces in a confession found in a bottle, cast adrift at sea. It is the meticulous account of Justice Wargrave, who, driven by a twisted sense of justice and a lifelong desire to commit a perfect, unpunishable murder, orchestrated the entire macabre scheme. He details how he lured his victims, all of whom had escaped legal retribution for their crimes, to the isolated island, systematically eliminating them according to the nursery rhyme. He even faked his own death with Dr. Armstrong's unwitting help, only to murder the doctor later, and finally, after all others were dead, rigged his own revolver to ensure his suicide appeared to be another murder, leaving a truly insoluble puzzle for the authorities.