Ten Little Indians

And Then There Were None is a mystery novel from Agatha Christie that involves ten people who are all murdered according to the poem “Ten Little Indians”. There are ten guests on the island; they include: Thomas Rogers, Ethel Rogers, Doctor Edward James Armstrong, General John Macarthur, Phillip Lombard, Anthony Marston, Vera Claythorne, Judge Justice Wargrave, and Emily Brent. Each of these characters have a motive for killing. A motive is a reason for doing something. In the novel And Then There Were None, Anthony has the least motive to kill while Vera has a strong motive to murder.

At dinner the first death occurs, which is Anthony Marston. During dinner U.N Owen requested that Mr. Rogers to play a phonograph for the guest. When it went off it started listing what crimes each of the guests committed. Mr. Rogers claimed that he had no idea what was on it. No one trusts anyone. The first death was Anthony Marston who was poisoned with potassium cyanide in his whiskey. “Ten little Indian boys went out to dine; one choked his little self and then there were nine.” The motive for the killer killing Anthony Marston was because Anthony was selfish and ran over two college kids in his sports car giving no regards to the children he killed. Even though this was an accident, Anthony believed that this was the students fault for getting in the way; Anthony believed he was the unlucky one because he got his license revoked for a year. Out of the entire guest the reader is lead to believe that Anthony was the least guilty out of all of them.

In contrast Vera Claythorne had the strongest motive to kill. Vera was the most mentally unstable of all the guests. For example she said "If I were doing away with myself I'd take an overdose of veronal-something like that-not cyanide!" This proves Vera mental unstabability. Vera’s crime was that she murdered a child named Cyril, the father was Hugo who she had loved but Cyril prevented them from getting married. When Vera killed Hugo’s child he no longer loved her. The ironic part is that Vera takes care of children for a living, so when she was able to kill a child like it was nothing just so she could be with Hugo proves that she has the strongest motive.

Each character is killed off until there are none. The character believed they were safe in their house, but the reader knows that the most dangerous place because they are trapped in the house with the killer. Each death relates to a line in the poem, and also with each death comes another figure getting broke.