The novel begins as a mysterious sixtytwo-year-old delivery boy delivers six letters from a "Barney Northrup" to preselected clients in a scheme to attract them to a new luxury apartment building on the shore of Lake Michigan. Appealing to certain human weaknesses —the desire to have an elegant address at a reduced cost and to associate with the rich—Northrup wheedles his victims into taking the apartments. The building stands alone by the lake at the edge of town; its only neighbor is the Old Westing House, an empty mansion once occupied by the famous founder of Westing Paper Products. On Halloween night, Turtle Wexler, shin-kicking pest and future financier, is lured into the mansion as the result of a bet. Alone in the dark, Turtle finds a mysterious corpse. The following day the death of Sam Westing is announced and sixteen residents of the apartment...