YMMV / The Pale Blue Eye

• Magnificent Bastard: Augustus Landor is the true killer of West Point Military Academy cadets Leroy Fry and Randolph Ballinger, who raped his daughter Mattie two years ago, which drove her to suicide. Recognising Fry as one of the rapists through his dog tags, Landor lured Fry out of his barracks with a forged note and hanged him to death with a rope. When Landor found himself contracted by West Point to investigate Fry's death, he took advantage of his position to cover up his crime and find Fry's conspirators, soliciting the assistance of Cadet Edgar Allan Poe. Learning that Fry had his heart carved out of him, Landor frames his murder on black magic occultists. Decoding Fry's journal, Landor discerns Ballinger's culpability in Mattie's rape and kills him. Although this frightens the third rapist, Cadet Julius Stoddard, into deserting the academy and fleeing for his life, Landor takes consolation in the fact that he had brought justice to two of his daughter's rapists and that Stoddard will spend the rest of his life afraid of Landor's retribution. Discovering that the family of West Point chief physician Dr Marquis have been conducting black magic rituals to treat his daughter Lea's seizures, Landor saves Poe from being sacrificed by the Marquises and lets Lea and her brother Artemus die in a fire, pinning Fry and Ballinger's murders on the siblings. While Poe manages to deduce that Landor was the true killer, he burns the evidence. Having grown fond of Poe, Landor apologises for manipulating him and laments that should Mattie should have met him, believing that they would have loved each other.