The Sanatorium

A sanatorium in the High Tatras · winter 1926 · everyone kept their distance – even the murderer · Difficulty: Chief 9 · 16×16

In the winter of 1926 the lung sanatorium in the High Tatras lived by one iron rule of its chief physician, Vincenz: against infection, nobody ever came close enough to touch another person – not even corner to corner. On the evening of the first heavy snow he took his drops from the medicine cabinet as always, and was found dead in his office beside the desk, poisoned by his own medicine. Fifteen people were in the house that evening: six patients, six members of staff and three visitors. The murderer kept the distance rule like everybody else – and yet was alone with Vincenz in the Chief Physician’s Office. Read every statement, find everyone’s square and unmask the poisoner.

Rules

No two people were on touching squares, not even corner to corner.
Every row and every column holds exactly one person. As soon as you place someone, cross out their whole row and column.
“Beside” = directly left, right, above or below, and in the same area. Squares with objects (the oven, the sinks, the tables, the barrel, the kettle, the shelves, the counter, the microscope, the alembic, the X-ray apparatus, the cabinets, the desk, the potted plants, the medicine trolley, the lamps, the altar, the candelabra, the piano, the bookcases, the globe, the gramophone, the shower, the water jet, the wardrobes, the parasols, the telescope, the pillars, the oxygen tank, the fir trees, the fountain, the statue, the sundial, the hedges, the flower patches) cannot be occupied; the seats – the chairs, the armchairs, the benches, the deckchairs and the loungers – and the beds and the massage table can: whoever is on a seat was sitting, whoever is on a bed or on the massage table was lying. A corner of an area is a square of that area that borders the outside (another area or the edge of the board) on one horizontal and one vertical side.
“A flower patch was somewhere in her row” = a flower patch is on one of the squares of her row, in any area; the same goes for columns.
Directions refer to rows and columns, not to the same line: “exactly one row north of him was a woman” = the person in the row directly above his is a woman, in any column.
“Beside the same kind of thing” = beside objects of the same type; they need not be the same piece.
The murderer was alone with the victim: nobody else was in that area.

Statements

Adrienne (opera singer): A flower patch was somewhere in her row.
Béla (retired hussar captain): Exactly one row north of him was a woman. He was in the Park.
Christl (typist from Vienna): A bed was somewhere in her column. She and Vincenz were beside the same kind of thing.
Dušan (young poet): A bed was somewhere in his area.
Emilie (schoolteacher): She was in the Dining Room. She was with Karla.
František (watchmaker): He was in a corner of his area. A bench was somewhere in his area.
Grete (head nurse): A bed was somewhere in her row. She was not beside a bed.
Hans (bath attendant): The alembic was somewhere in his column. There was no other man in his area.
Irena (laboratory assistant): A cabinet was somewhere in her area.
Jaroslav (X-ray technician): He was alone in his area. The altar was somewhere in his row.
Karla (pharmacist): There was exactly one other person in her area. Somebody in her area was sitting in a chair.
Ludvík (cook): The water jet was somewhere in his column. There was exactly one other person in his area.
Miloš (timber merchant): A cabinet was somewhere in his area. There was exactly one other person in his area.
Naděžda (journalist): A chair was somewhere in her column. She was the only woman beside a lounger.
Orsolya (painter): She was sitting on an armchair or a lounger. Somebody in her area was sitting on a lounger.
Vincenz (the chief physician): The victim. He was found in the Chief Physician’s Office, beside the desk – alone with the murderer.

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