"In a few minutes, this famous mystery writer will be dead. Who killed him? Was it his mistress? The sore loser? The distinguished publisher? The ambitious ex-wife? The underpaid research assistant? The loyal secretary? Or was it someone else? Match wits with Ellery Queen and see if you can guess who done it!"
This episode contains examples of:
- Citizenship Marriage: A major plot point. Magda is an illegal alien; Edgar Manning knew about this and held it over her, which is what provides her potential motive for his murder. When Magda reveals that Cliff Waddell had proposed marriage to her, Ellery realizes that Cliff also knew Magda was in the country illegally, and used this knowledge to frame her for Manning's murder.
- Disability Alibi: Cliff Waddell's war injuries, making it impossible for him to raise his arms past a certain point, seem to eliminate him as a suspect.
- Disconnected by Death: Edgar Manning is on the phone with Ellery when he is murdered.
- Improvised Weapon: Subverted. It appears that Edgar Manning was killed with the award trophy he received earlier that night. However, the murder was actually the result of a kick to the head with a built up shoe. The killer then smeared blood on the trophy to make it appear to be the murder weapon.
- Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: Nick McVey's characters tend to behave this way.
