The Night Visitor

Salem holds his younger sisters Emmie and Ester responsible for his imprisonment. They testified against him during his trial for the farmhand's murder, and Ester's husband Dr. Anton Jenks was the one who accused Salem of the crime. Salem believes his family betrayed him by not believing his innocence and instead supporting the accusation that led to his confinement in the asylum.

Britt was with Salem on the night the farmhand was murdered and could have provided him with a crucial alibi. However, she chose not to come forward to defend him, effectively abandoning him when he needed her testimony most. By eliminating her, Salem removes a potential witness who could have complicated his plan and also tightens his fabricated alibi.

Salem meticulously stages each murder to point toward Anton as the culprit. He kills Emmie and arranges the scene to make it appear Anton is responsible, leveraging the existing bad blood between them. Later, after killing Ester, Salem wipes the blood-smeared axe on Anton's clothes, deliberately echoing the original accusation that pinned the farmhand's murder on Salem, creating a deliberate parallel that implicates Anton.

Anton confesses because the weight of his deception becomes unbearable. He had accused Salem of the farmhand's murder knowing he was innocent, sending an innocent man to the asylum. As the inspector closes in and the lies unravel, Anton cannot sustain the guilt any longer and reveals his crime, admitting his role in framing Salem.

Mr. Clemens was the corrupt barrister who handled Salem's trial. He was complicit in the wrongful conviction, and Salem views him as part of the system that imprisoned him unjustly. Additionally, Clemens had collaborated with Anton during the trial, making him another person in Salem's eyes who contributed to his wrongful confinement.

Salem manages to race back to his cell in the asylum before the inspector arrives, narrowly maintaining his alibi that he was confined during the murders. However, at the final moment, his alibi unravels in an unexpected twist. The specific nature of this unraveling is left ambiguous, but it throws the final truth into question, leaving uncertainty about whether Salem will be exposed or if justice will truly be served.

Anton genuinely believes he saw Salem at the scene of Emmie's murder because Salem was actually there, he committed the crime. This sighting is what fuels Anton's insistence to the inspector, creating the central conflict. However, the inspector doubts this claim because he cannot fathom how someone could escape from the seemingly impenetrable fortress-like asylum.

Despite the asylum being described as a fortress with harsh confinement and barred walls, Salem executes a cold, determined escape into the dead of winter. The summary does not detail the specific method of his escape, emphasizing instead the psychological tension, the inspector himself cannot believe such an escape is possible, which initially makes him skeptical of Anton's claim that he saw Salem.

Ester attempts to flee through the barn after speaking with the inspector in a state of panic. Realizing that Salem has returned and is targeting the family, she desperately tries to escape. However, Salem anticipated this move, traps her in the barn, and kills her, eliminating another person he holds responsible for his imprisonment.

Salem was accused of murdering a farmhand, a crime he did not admit to committing. He pleaded insanity and was confined to the asylum for two years. The identity of the actual killer remains ambiguous, Anton later confesses to his crimes, suggesting Anton may have been responsible for the farmhand's death, which would explain why he framed Salem.