7 h 6 minAudiobook11 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
A killing breaks the calm of Washington society, and a coded message asks you to look beneath its polite surface.
In The Thirteenth Letter, Natalie Sumner Lincoln brings murder into the drawing rooms, offices, and official circles of Washington, D.C. A circle of people has secrets to keep, and a killing gives those secrets new weight. As you follow the clues, each suspect offers another reason to question what respectable appearances might conceal.
At the heart of the mystery is a cipher: a puzzle in writing that invites you to think alongside the investigator. Conversation, observation, and slow discovery carry the story forward. The pleasure is in weighing what you learn, testing your suspicions, and trying to reach the answer before the mystery reveals it.
What you’ll discover
- Secrets behind polite manners Look beneath respectable appearances as a crime brings private troubles into the open.
- A message in cipher Work through a coded puzzle that gives you another way into the mystery.
- Washington beyond its offices Enter a world of officials, diplomats, and families linked by long social ties.
- Clues worth lingering over Follow conversations and observations at a steady pace that leaves room for thought.
- The pleasure of suspicion Weigh the suspects and test your guesses before the answer comes into view.
Who will love it
Readers who love a closed circle of suspects, a country house cut off by snow, and a secret code solved step by step, with a touch of romance and old Washington society.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A wedding at midnight in the snow
- Morning brings a murder and doubt
- A sheriff's questions and a deadly nut pick
- Lies, blackmail and a wide circle of suspects
- The will and the black seal
- Five cent stamps and a hidden code
- Three suspects and a hand in the dark
- A trap is laid in the sickroom
- How Lincoln builds the puzzle
Who’s who
- Miriam WardA trained nurse with a hidden Russian past, new to Washington, who wants to clear her name after the murder of her patient.
- Guy TrenholmThe county sheriff, a big, plain-spoken former soldier with a sharp mind, who wants to find Paul Abbott's killer.
- Betty CarterPaul Abbott's beautiful, proud fiancée, who denies a midnight visit to the lodge and guards a secret of her own.
- Alan MasonPaul's cousin and a newspaper reporter, quick tempered and loyal, who is oddly restless as the case goes on.
- Doctor RobertsPaul's physician and old friend, a gray-haired, courteous man who takes charge of the sickroom and the nursing arrangements.
- Mrs. NashBetty's sharp, wealthy aunt, who falls ill at the lodge and watches everyone with bright black eyes.
- Doctor Alexander NashMrs. Nash's husband, a smooth Canadian clergyman who performs a midnight wedding ceremony at the sickbed and then says he cannot recall it.
- CorbinThe lodge's sullen caretaker, who spies on guests and sells what he finds.
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- Audiobook
- 7 h 6 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 11 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
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- Large print hardcover
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The Thirteenth Letter
by Natalie Sumner Lincoln · 1924
A nurse sees a stranger married at a dying man's bedside, then wakes to find her patient stabbed in the back.
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In short
The Thirteenth Letter is a murder mystery by Natalie Sumner Lincoln, set in the early 1920s among the well-off families of Washington and the snowbound country of southern Maryland. It opens on a stormy night at a remote hunting lodge, where a newly arrived nurse watches a strange midnight wedding at the bedside of a sick man.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A wedding at midnight in the snow
The story begins in a snowstorm at Abbott's Lodge, a converted farmhouse used as a hunting lodge about twenty miles from Washington. Doctor Roberts leaves a newly arrived nurse, Miriam Ward, in charge of his patient, the architect Paul Abbott. Abbott is a war veteran in poor health who has withdrawn from the world and lives with a caretaker, Corbin, and his wife, Martha.
Abbott is feverish and keeps asking whether Betty has come. Betty Carter is his fiancée, though Roberts doubts the engagement still stands. Around one in the morning the doorbell rings. Miriam lets in a proud young woman in a fur coat and a clergyman who gives his name as Doctor Nash.
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What is The Thirteenth Letter about?
It is a murder mystery set in Maryland in the early 1920s. A nurse arrives to care for a sick man at a remote lodge and finds him dead, and a sheriff and the nurse follow a trail of clues to a hidden code.
What is the stamp code in The Thirteenth Letter?
Each letter from Canada carries five one-cent stamps with tiny cuts at the edges. Counted against the stamp's fifty-two perforations, the cuts spell out hidden words, so that ordinary letters about farming secretly carry messages.
Who is Miriam Ward?
She is a trained nurse from New York who is sent to look after Paul Abbott. She has a painful past in Russia, and she becomes the sheriff's closest helper as he works to solve the crime.
The author
Natalie Sumner Lincoln
1881–1935 · American crime writer
Natalie Sumner Lincoln was an American crime writer who lived in Washington, D.C. She was born there in 1881 and died in 1935. She wrote mystery novels in the early twentieth century. Her books include The Trevor Case, The Thirteenth Letter, and The Red Seal.
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