Original mysteryNo. 2502 hr 18 minHercule Poirot
London in the fog, and a block of mansion flats in Battersea where a man has been found dead in his own bath. The dead man is an architect. He was seen alive the previous evening, the door was locked from within, and the water was long cold by the time anybody thought to look. It would be an accident, and a great many people would much prefer it to be an accident. Except that on the same afternoon a financier of considerable importance walked out of his offices in the City and has not been seen since. Two men. One dead in a bathtub in Battersea, one vanished from Threadneedle Street. Nobody at Scotland Yard believes for a moment that the two things are connected. The Belgian Detective is quite certain that they are, and cannot at first say why. What follows takes Arthur onto a rooftop above Queen Caroline Mansions, into a hospital ward, across a trading floor in the City and down to a house in Salisbury — and finally to a graveyard at first light, where a coffin is lifted out of the ground to settle a question that has been waiting thirty years to be asked. The Bathtub Enigma is an original Golden Age-style mystery about patience, professional standing, and how much can be arranged by a man everybody has been trained to believe. FOR LISTENERS This is an original mystery written by Nocturnal Tales, inspired by the spirit of the great Golden Age crime writers. The plot, characters and text are entirely our own creation, and all characters and events are fictional. This story first appeared in the second volume of our collected mysteries; we have revised it and recorded it as a full audiobook. No affiliation, endorsement, or official connection is implied. The locked door was never the problem. Everyone in this case was looking at the wrong body. How early did you stop believing in the accident? CHAPTERS 00:00 - Introduction 02:18 - Chapter One - The Architect's Alarm 16:07 - Chapter Two - The Missing Financier 28:51 - Chapter Three - Clues from Above 42:17 - Chapter Four - Threads of Deception 57:49 - Chapter Five - Stocks and Suspicions 1:13:15 - Chapter Six - A Gathering of Minds 1:27:56 - Chapter Seven - Shadows of the Past 1:43:39 - Chapter Eight - The Surgeon's Shadow 1:56:29 - Chapter Nine - The Exhumation 2:15:17 - Closing SUPPORT & LISTENING OPTIONS CREDITS TAGS / KEYWORDS golden age mystery audiobook, locked room mystery, 1930s london mystery, battersea mystery audiobook, missing financier mystery, exhumation mystery story, belgian detective audiobook, arthur mystery audiobook, long full length audiobook, classic detective story audiobook, original golden age whodunit, vintage detective fiction HASHTAGS
Free to listen, in full, with no account and no password. Your place is remembered in this browser, so you can stop and come back.
Every story on Nocturnal Tales is free, and stays free. Listeners who choose to give are the reason there is a new one tomorrow.
This is our work and what we live on: two of us, writing and producing a story every night. Giving here goes straight to us, rather than through a platform that can change its mind overnight. Why donations are important.
or
Give with PayPalPayPal opens in a new page. Monthly support is easiest to manage through the card option.
No story is ever locked. Payment is handled securely by Stripe — we never see your card details. You can change or cancel your support at any time, from this page, with no explanation needed.
Tell us what you made of this one. No account and no password — just a name.
Lady Molly of Scotland Yard
The newspaper-reading public called it the Somersetshire Outrage, and to this day, as far as the public is concerned, it was never properly explained at all. A young shop assistant named Jane Turner is found in her lodgings at Weston, tied to a chair with a rope, a shawl over her head, half-slipping to the floor.
by Baroness Orczy
46 minNo. 249
Hercule Poirot
New Orleans, the spring of nineteen thirty-three. There are certain cities which, even before one has committed a crime in them, seem already to know the secret. Arthur and the Belgian Detective have come for a rest.
1 hr 14 minNo. 248
Max Carrados
It begins with Max Carrados greeting his friend Carlyle at the door and remarking that he has a mystery about him somewhere. He can hear it in the man's step. The mystery is a railway disaster.
by Ernest Bramah
1 hr 7 minNo. 247
A. J. Raffles
Two cases tonight from the gentleman thief who has drawn more requests than anybody else in the Archive. WILFUL MURDER is the darkest thing in the whole collection. Bunny warns us at the outset that most of their robberies will not bear telling at length.
by E. W. Hornung
1 hr 13 minNo. 246