The Mystery of the Yellow Room

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The Mystery of the Yellow Room by Gaston Leroux
(Table of contents)		 Chapter I: In Which We Begin Not to Understand→
The Mystery of the Yellow Room: Extraordinary Adventures of Joseph Rouletabille, Reporter (in French Le mystère de la chambre jaune) is one of the first locked room mystery crime fiction novels (such that a murder or other crime is apparently committed under impossible circumstances). It is written by Gaston Leroux, first published in France in the literary supplement of L'illustration from September 1907 to November 1907, then as a one volume book in 1908.

It is the first novel starring fictional detective Joseph Rouletabille.

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The story concerns a complex and seemingly impossible crime in which the criminal appears to disappear from a locked room. Such is the mechanical and logistic complexity of the puzzle that Leroux provides the reader with detailed and precise diagrams and floorplans illustrating the scene of the crime. Further impossible problems emerge as the story progresses towards a dramatic denouement. The emphasis of the story is firmly on the intellectual challenge to the reader, who will almost certainly be hard pressed to unravel every detail of the situation.


Cover of the 1908 first edition
  1. Chapter I: In Which We Begin Not to Understand
  2. Chapter II: In Which Joseph Rouletabille Appears for the First Time
  3. Chapter III: "A Man Has Passed Like a Shadow Through the Blinds"
  4. Chapter IV: "In the Bosom of Wild Nature"
  5. Chapter V: In Which Joseph Rouletabille Makes a Remark to Monsieur Robert Darzac Which Produces Its Little Effect
  6. Chapter VI: In the Heart of the Oak Grove
  7. Chapter VII: In Which Rouletabille Sets Out on an Expedition Under the Bed
  8. Chapter VIII: The Examining Magistrate Questions Mademoiselle Stangerson
  9. Chapter IX: Reporter and Detective
  10. Chapter X: "We Shall Have to Eat Red Meat — Now"
  11. Chapter XI: In Which Frederic Larsan Explains How the Murderer Was Able to Get Out of The Yellow Room
  12. Chapter XII: Frederic Larsan's Cane
  13. Chapter XIII: "The Presbytery Has Lost Nothing of Its Charm, Nor the Garden Its Brightness"
  14. Chapter XIV: "I Expect the Assassin This Evening"
  15. Chapter XV: The Trap
  16. Chapter XVI: Strange Phenomenon of the Dissociation of Matter
  17. Chapter XVII: The Inexplicable Gallery
  18. Chapter XVIII: Rouletabille Has Drawn a Circle Between the Two Bumps on His Forehead
  19. Chapter XIX: Rouletabille Invites Me to Breakfast at the Donjon Inn
  20. Chapter XX: An Act of Mademoiselle Stangerson
  21. Chapter XXI: On the Watch
  22. Chapter XXII: The Incredible Body
  23. Chapter XXIII: The Double Scent
  24. Chapter XXIV: Rouletabille Knows the Two Halves of the Murderer
  25. Chapter XXV: Rouletabille Goes on a Journey
  26. Chapter XXVI: In Which Joseph Rouletabille Is Awaited with Impatience
  27. Chapter XXVII: In Which Joseph Rouletabille Appears in All His Glory
  28. Chapter XXVIII: In Which It Is Proved That One Does Not Always Think of Everything
  29. Chapter XXIX: The Mystery of Mademoiselle Stangerson
This translation is hosted with different licensing information than from the original text. The translation status applies to this edition.
Original:
PD-icon.svg This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published before January 1, 1923.

The author died in 1927, so this work is also in the public domain in countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 80 years or less. This work may also be in the public domain in countries and areas with longer native copyright terms that apply the rule of the shorter term to foreign works.
Translation:
PD-icon.svg This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was legally published within the United States (or the United Nations Headquarters in New York subject to Section 7 of the United States Headquarters Agreement) before 1964, and copyright was not renewed.
For Class A renewals records (books only) published between 1923 and 1963, check the Stanford Copyright Renewal Database and the Rutgers copyright renewal records.
For other renewal records of publications between 1922 - 1950 see the Pennsylvania copyright records scans.
For all records since 1978, search the U.S. Copyright Office records.

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