Gabrielle Steele (Agatha Christie: And Then There Were None)

Gabrielle Steele (Carolyn Seymour), alias Emily Brent, was the hidden villainess of the 2005 point-and-click game Agatha Christie: And Then There Were None, an adaptation of Agatha Christie's 1939 novel of the same name.

Backstory[]

Gabrielle was a famous actress, but her movie career ended when she suffered a mental breakdown while filming Last of the Borgias, causing her to take on the personality of Lillian Borgia, the character that she was portraying, and attempt to kill her leading man. Later on, Gabrielle would describe the incident as "a meeting of two minds."

Following her breakdown, she returned to England and fell in love with Edward Seton, having previously met him while starring in a play there. When he was arrested and imprisoned for murdering a chorus girl, Gabrielle fiercely believed that he was innocent and that the judge who presided over the trial, Lawrence Wargrave, had imprisoned her lover in order to assert his authority. When Edward committed suicide after three days in prison, the evil Gabrielle plotted revenge against the judge, wanting him to feel powerless and helpless as death approached and people around him died.

The actress began her plot by murdering Emily Brent, whom she had also met when returning to England, and taking over her identity. With the assistance of attorney Archibald Morris, Gabrielle found information about eight other people who had "escaped justice," bribing him into remaining silent by paying him handsomely. She then murdered the attorney once he had finished the work. Gabrielle then sent invitations to all eight of these people (Justice Lawrence Wargrave, Vera Claythorne, Philip Lombard, General John Mackenzie, Emily Caroline Brent, Dr. Edward Armstrong, Anthony Marston, William Blore, Thomas Rogers, and Ethel Rogers), asking for them to come to her mansion on Shipwreck Island; each of them was invited under some sort of pretense. Furthermore, the villainess made it appear as if "Ulrick Norman Owen" and "Una Nancy Owen" were the hosts of the house party.

Events of Agatha Christie: And Then There Were None[]

Gabrielle made her first appearance on a train that was taking her and the people she invited to Sticklehaven, a fictional town located on the southern coast of Devon in England. As she quietly knitted, General Mackenzie began falling asleep, beginning to have a nightmare about his dead wife Leslie. She merely stared at him as he snapped back awake; when he tried to apologize by saying "Beg your pardon, ma'am," Gabrielle replied with "Miss," indicating that she preferred to be addressed as "Miss Brent." After their arrival at the dock in Sticklehaven, the group boarded a boat piloted by Patrick Naracott (the game's main protagonist); his older brother Fred was feeling "under the weather" at the time, and was therefore unable to pilot the boat.

Once on the island, she exposed the group's secrets by instructing Thomas Rogers to play a pre-recorded gramophone. After that, Gabrielle began to murder her "guests" through various methods, each in a way representing the nursery rhyme "Ten Little Sailor Boys." The villainess deflected suspicions away from herself by using curare, multiple bees, and also Bellman's Universal Embrocation to make it appear that she was the fourth person to die, also ensuring that the cause of her supposed death would appear to be a severe allergic reaction to bee stings, as the real Emily Brent was allergic to bee stings. Once everyone thought she was dead, Gabrielle/Emily was able to continue perpetrating the murders undetected by anyone.

Gabrielle's villainous reveal came towards the end of the game when Patrick Narracott, Vera Claythorne, and possibly Charles Morley (who had been posing as Phillip Lombard; the real Phillip had already committed suicide out of guilt) were left alive. Patrick ran back to the mansion and discovered Gabrielle in Vera's bedroom, with the former holding the latter at gunpoint. She revealed her true identity, backstory, and also how she carried out her murderous plot. During her villainous speech, Gabrielle accused Vera for flirting with both Patrick and Phillip, a claim which Vera refuted. She then announced that she planned on killing Patrick before committing suicide with poison, leaving Vera to complete the rhyme by hanging herself, smugly stating that Vera would be arrested and hanged if she were the only person found alive on an island with ten dead bodies. Depending on the player's choice, Patrick can either throw a rock at Gabrielle and knock the gun out of her hand or allow her to shoot and kill Vera. Regardless of which option is taken, Patrick and Gabrielle engage in a brief physical altercation that ended with Patrick shoving the murderer over the railing and into the noose she had prepared for Vera, killing her.

List of victims[]

Anthony Marston (drank whiskey laced with potassium cyanide; died of asphyxiation shortly after)
Ethel Rogers (overdose of Trional; died in her sleep due to heart failure)
General John Mackenzie (back of skull bashed multiple times with a blunt instrument)
Thomas Rogers (chopped in half with an axe)
Edward Armstrong (pushed into the English Channel and subsequently drowned)
Justice Lawrence Wargrave (head bludgeoned with his own law book)
William Blore (head smashed in with a bear-shaped marble clock)
Phillip Lombard/Charles Morely (blown up by the fire if the player takes too long to get to the top of the rock)
Vera Claythorne (shot in the heart if the player either refuses to spare Vera or is simply unable to find the rock in time)