Kyu Nin No Niseseija No Misshitsu / Original Title: Nine Times Nine (Kisotengai No Hondana)

[Machine Translation] Cult researcher Wolf Harrigan, who is preparing to denounce the cult "Children of Light" led by Ahaswel, a legendary "Wandering Jew," enlists the help of Matt Duncan, a young aspiring writer he met by chance, and the two attend a cult meeting at the Temple of Light. At the meeting, Ahasueru, a guru wearing yellow robes, chants the curse of "Nine Times Nine" with his followers and predicts Wolfe's death. The next day, while playing a game of croquet with the Harrigans, Matt looks into Wolfe's study and sees a figure in yellow monk's robes hunched over Wolfe's desk. The window is locked, and he tries to enter the study through the mansion's door, but it is also locked, so he cannot get in. When he goes outside again and looks in through the window, he finds Wolff lying on the floor, shot in the face, and the person in the yellow robe who was supposed to be there has vanished.... Faced with this inexplicable locked-room murder mystery, Duncan and Lieutenant Marshall, who hates detective novels, consulted the "Locked Room Lectures" by John Dickson Carr, the "master of the locked room school," and deduced and examined the case, but to their surprise, they could not find any "locked room" murders in any of the categories of the "Locked Room Lectures. However, it turns out that the case does not fit into any of the categories in the "Locked Room Lectures". In the face of the puzzled investigators, Ursula, a nun who knows how the difficult case came to be, quietly prays to get to the bottom of it.... Will the prayers of the unique nun detective be answered and the truth behind the godforsaken locked room crime be revealed? This urban legendary locked room mystery, dedicated to John Dickson Carr and selected as one of the top ten locked room mysteries of all time by Edward D. Hock, has been brought back to life after half a century in this new translation!

伝説の「さまよえるユダヤ人」を名乗るアハスヴェルが主宰する教団「光の子ら」を糾弾すべく準備を進めていたカルト宗教の研究者ウルフ・ハリガンは、ひょんなことから知り合った作家志望の青年マット・ダンカンの協力を得、二人は「光の寺院」で開かれる教団の集会に参加する。その集会の場で、全身に黄色い僧衣をまとった教祖アハスヴェルは、信者たちとともに「ナイン・タイムズ・ナイン」の呪いを唱え、ウルフの死を予言する。その翌日、ハリガン家の家族とクロッケー場でゲームに興じていたマットがふとウルフのいる書斎を見ると、ウルフの机に身をかがめている黄色い僧衣を着た人物の姿が目に入る。窓は施錠されており、邸内の扉から書斎に入ろうとするものの、やはり鍵がかかっていて中に入れない。再び外に出て窓から中をのぞくと、ウルフは顔面を撃たれて床に倒れており、存在したはずの黄色い衣の人物は消え失せていた...。この不可解な密室殺人の謎に直面したダンカンは、探偵小説嫌いのマーシャル警部補と共に「密室派の巨匠」ジョン・ディクスン・カーの“密室講義”を参照しながら推理・検討をするのだが、なんと“密室講義”のどの分類にも当て嵌まらないことが判明する。困惑する捜査陣を前に、難事件の経緯を知った尼僧アーシュラは、真相究明のために静かに祈りを捧げるのだった...。果たして異色の尼僧探偵の祈りが通じ、神をも畏れぬ密室犯罪の真相が看破されるのだろうか!?ジョン・ディクスン・カーに捧げられ、エドワード・D・ホックが主催する歴代密室ミステリ・ベストテンにも選出された、都市伝説的密室ミステリが新訳によって半世紀の時を経てここに甦る!