Mystery Party!

Jen's got a new man, and even though I hadn't actually met David until 3 days ago, he's already doing a great job of scoring points with the Friends. (As we all know, a girl doesn't come solo...you get the added benefit of scrutiny from all her gal pals.) Namely, he's taken my advice on buying a bike, he got me a nice bunch of lemongrass (hard to come by), and best of all, he invited me (and all my friends) to a party. Whee! I immediately forwarded the invitation to the Fed list, and 7 of us ended up making it.

David is a free-lance writer, and apparently, he had written a 22-character Western mystery party that needed to be tested. Each person is assigned a character with a back-story, and has to figure out the answer to a mystery by the end of the night. Further, we were supposed to act and dress the part. So on Sunday night, we all descended on David's (uber cool) loft apartment, adorned with cowboy hats, large belt buckles, plaid shirts and peacock feathers (for Goldie Flapper). I stepped inside to discover we were inside the Sidewinder Saloon, with a motley cast of characters. These included personalities like Georgia Peach (Jen), the demure Southern belle, Earl Deep (Ali), the courteous stagecoach robber, and Becky Cartwright (Britton), the quick-witted bookworm whose favorite book is "Little Women." Ali asked to see my watch, so without hesitation, I showed him how it worked and passed it over for examination. Much to my dismay, he thanked me profusely and then pocketed it!

My character was Malcolm Blackwell, a girl whose real name was "Mary Ann," who was a rider for the Pony Express. She took on the position in order to make money to buy medicine for her sick Pa, and was a fearless rider, light and wiry. It was crucial that I not reveal my true identity, or else I would lose my job. To look the part, I found a $2 cowboy hat at a thrift store, along with a brown vest. I ended up forgetting the hat at home, but luckily, someone brought an extra hat along, and I was thrilled to snag that one.

By the end of the night, I had to figure out who had stolen Swiftheel, a quarterhorse that I intended to buy. To help supplement the information pool, there were 31 clue cards scattered around the apartment. While everyone else was milling about the living room, I decided to sweep through the back of the apartment, and single-handedly cleaned out the laundry room and Goldie's Room. I probably had a dozen clue cards, which turned out to be problematic, because I had no way of discreetly reading them all at once. It's a good thing there were multiple copies of some of the clues, so the information wasn't completely lost in my vest pockets.

Eventually, I was able to trade a treasure map for information on the identity of the horse thief. Armed with evidence of tar footprints outside the saloon and a photograph of Swiftheel "disguised" with a large tar spot, I confronted Tuco Delgado and he confessed to stealing the horse. Meanwhile, 3 people armed with guns ganged up to confront the piano player on the whereabouts of the gold stash, and the Albuquerque Kid (Chris) shot the guy who killed his father. I was particularly tickled by Jen's mystery, which was to figure out the ingredients in a recipe. She held a clue card titled "Gumbo" with sheet music on it, and the notes spelled out "Add a dace [a type of fish], add cabbage, beef aged a decade, a bad egg." Brilliant; I'm impressed that David was able to come up with four foods using only the first 7 letters of the alphabet!

At the evening's conclusion, we gathered around to see if we'd correctly solved our mysteries. Most people had, and depending on whether you were right, your character's story had two possible endings. I was correct in pinpointing Delgado, so I successfully bought Swiftheel and had a long, fruitful career as a Pony Express Rider. Had I been mistaken, my horse would have broken down from exhaustion outside of town, and I would have been attacked by wolves. Oy!

And in the future, if there's another mystery party that needs to be tested, I will be all over that like white on rice.