{"id":2286,"date":"2021-07-11T08:18:20","date_gmt":"2021-07-11T12:18:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/?p=2286"},"modified":"2024-04-07T18:33:18","modified_gmt":"2024-04-07T22:33:18","slug":"puzzle-of-the-purloined-papers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/2021\/07\/11\/puzzle-of-the-purloined-papers\/","title":{"rendered":"Puzzle of the Purloined Papers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Ian Stewart has a nice logic problem in his Casebook of Mathematical Mysteries<\/em>, which includes a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes in the form of Herlock Soames and Dr. Watsup, along with brother Spycraft and nemesis Dr. Mogiarty.<\/p>\n

\u201cAn important document was accidentally mislaid, and then stolen,\u201d Spycraft said. \u201cIt is essential to the security of the British Empire that it be recovered without delay. If it gets into the hands of our enemies, careers will be ruined and parts of the Empire may fall. Fortunately, a local constable caught a glimpse of the thief, enough to narrow it down to precisely one of four men.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cPetty thieves?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, all four are gentlemen of high repute. Admiral Arbuthnot, Bishop Burlington, Captain Charlesworth, and Doctor Dashingham.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soames sat bolt upright. \u201cMogiarty has a hand in this, then.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not following his reasoning, I asked him to explain.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll four are spies, Watsup. Working for Mogiarty.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThen … Spycraft must be engaged in counter-espionage!\u201d I cried.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes.\u201d He glanced at his brother. \u201cBut you did not hear that from me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHave these traitors been questioned?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n

Spycraft handed me a dossier, and I read it aloud for Soames\u2019s benefit. \u201cUnder interrogation Arbuthnot said \u2018Burlington did it.\u2019 Burlington said \u2018Arbuthnot is lying.\u2019 Charlesworth said \u2018It was not I.\u2019 Dashingham said \u2018Arbuthnot did it.\u2019 That is all.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot quite all. We know from another source that exactly one of them was telling the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have an informer in Mogiarty\u2019s inner circle, Spycraft?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had <\/em>an informer, Hemlock. He was garrotted with his own necktie before he could tell us the actual name. Very sad\u2014it was an Old Etonian tie, totally ruined. However, all is not lost. If we can deduce who was the thief, we can obtain a search warrant and recover the document. All four men are being watched; they will have no opportunity to pass the document to Mogiarty. But our hands are tied; we must stick to the letter of the law. Moreover, if we raid the wrong premises, Mogiarty\u2019s lawyers will publicise the mistake and cause irreparable damage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Which man was the thief?<\/em><\/p>\n

Answer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

See the Purloined Papers Puzzle<\/a> for solutions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ian Stewart has a nice logic problem in his Casebook of Mathematical Mysteries, which includes a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes in the form of Herlock Soames and Dr. Watsup, along with brother Spycraft and nemesis Dr. Mogiarty. \u201cAn important document was accidentally mislaid, and then stolen,\u201d Spycraft said. \u201cIt is essential to the security of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[207,174],"class_list":["post-2286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-puzzles-and-problems","tag-ian-stewart","tag-logic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2286","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2286"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2286\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3679,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2286\/revisions\/3679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/josmfs.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}