Who killed Mr. Green, and Why?

Question

One sun-shining day in London,
Twelve people attended a party.
They didn't know who was coming,
But they hoped the time would be hearty.

Four husbands and wives were attending,
Each one of two boys and two girls;
The total attendees was fourteen,
Including the maid and butler.

Six rooms and the roof were the places,
One poolroom, two kitchen, three dining;
The library, the lounge, and the hall,
Which led to the ballroom quite shining.

From the ballroom it wrapped right around,
The house was a truly great circle;
The house was a diamond and round,
Free fun for the girl who liked purple.

The woman in green was a lizard,
The man in red was a bear;
The girl in white a chameleon,
The boy in blue on a dare.

Then when the clock struck midnight,
An hour for each of them there;
Then a scream was heard in the poolroom,
A splash cut the silence in air.

Four of them played in the lounge,
Two boys and their curious dads;
Each of them were their each alibi;
They assumed for each of the lads.

The ballroom was really quite active,
For five were in there on the floor;
Ms. Blue and Ms. White and Ms. Green;
The butler was there by the door.

Ms. Bear was dripping from head to toe,
But she had come in from the rain;
Her husband was not really missing,
In a wheelchair in quite a great pain.

The maid in the kitchen was cooking,
The girls with her learning their trade;
All startled when they heard the screaming,
Wet footsteps were heard by the maid.

Who was the lizard man's killer?
And why did they kill him right there?
Who was the culprit and killer,
And the reason for such a despair?

Dear everyone, thank you for your wonderful answers. However, no one has gotten the answer yet! I hope to hear some wonderful new answers and hopefully someone can get it in 2022!

HINT! Think outside the box! (It's just an expression) One person got extremely close. But overthought it. I've been away for a long time, the lockdowns really put me through the ringer. Hope someone can get the answer this year!

Answer: I wrote this riddle in 2019, and considering it is 2024, I will give the answer, but in a spoiler. Just in case I don't live to tell the tale one day, like Mr. Green.

It was the host! The proof this was my original answer is in my response in the comments section to Elpharya on Feb 7, 2019, who asked if there was a host to this party.

Answer 1

Ok, that is a really wild guess, but let's see how it goes.

Could it be

The "party" is actually a pool/billiard game?

My reasoning

There is 12 guests, 2 employees and 1 mysterious host. That makes the 15 balls in full rack.
We all assumes that husbands, wives and children have all the same color, but the ones that are explicid confirmed are:
- Mr and Ms Green/Lizard - Those would be balls 6 and 14
- Mr and Ms Red/Bear - Those would be balls 3 and 11
- A girl who like purple - either ball 4 or 12
- Ms Blue and a boy in blue (notice there is no mention of husband/dad's color) - balls 2 and 10
- Ms White and a girl in white - Oops. There aren't two white balls in the game, right?
Well, according to Wikipedia, in English billiards (the "party" is in London), there used to be two White balls, but these days they replace one for a yellow one, so they could be balls 1 and 9? Maybe? That would be what the line about the girl being a chameleon is referencing.
So, the remaining balls are the other people, that don't have a color explecity stated. The host would be ball 8. The maid and the butler would be one of the remaining pairs and so on.

About the house

Diamond is a brand of tables.
The six rooms (Poolroom, Kitchen*, Dining*, Library, Lounge and Hall) would be the holes, wraping around the "ballroom", which is the cloth part.
3 balls felt in the kitchen's hole
4 balls felt in the Lounge's hole
The butler is at the door because he's almost falling into one of the holes

Now here is the tricky part:

The 5th "person" in the ballroom is the cue ball.
The location of the two Reds and the host doesn't matter, because they where pocked by the losing player (let it be P1).
P2 had already pocketed the 7 previous balls. When he pocked one the Green Ball into the poolroom, he won the game. That's why everyone else is still alive, but Mr Green was killed when he got pocked.

Answer 2

I have a guess about what is happening. I'm pretty sure about who did it, but there is a flaw in my whole story. There are some workarounds, but they feel kinda week. Maybe someone else can use my thoughts to came up with the full story.

My theory started with this hint:

HINT Mr. Green is not the 5th person in the ballroom

Led me to think that

One of the woman in the ballroom, Ms. Blue, Ms. White or Ms. Green, is pregnant

Then user @Elpharya called atention to

The verse "Free fun for the girl who liked purple", and that purple is blue + red

So, with those two being true, i believe that

Ms Blue and Mr Red had a long-running affair. One of the girls is their daughter, and another one is coming

But wait!

Isn't Mr Red in a wheelchair and in pain? How is he walking around having babies?

Well, of course...

He is faking his illness!

Ok, cool, but what does all that have to do with the murder? Well...

Mr Green as a "Lizard" could indicate that he is sleaky, cunning and untrustable. So, i would guess that he knows, and are blackmailing Mr Red.
Mr Red, being a "Bear", is agressive and violent, so he didn't abide to this.

As for the crime scene location:

Assuming that is indeed a room with a water pool, rather than a table of pool, i believe Mr Red wanted to get wet.
Either by footsteps or by sound (the maid did managed to hear "Wet footsteps"), people would rule him out because the wheelchair.
It is also possible that he notice her wife in the rain, and decided to frame her.

So, my guess would be:

The Killer: Mr. Red.
The Motive of the Crime: Mr. Green was blackmailing him over his affair
Why there: To confuse the investigation

But i did say there is a flaw. Here is:

In the start, they said "They didn't know who was coming".

So yeah. My scenario assumes they knew each other.

Was it a huge coincidence that a cheating husband, a cheating wife and a guy who knews that ended up in the same place?

Did they know who would be there after all? Did someone arrenged it (whats the evidence)?

Maybe the affair and the blackmail happens all in that day? I guess "the girl who liked purple" could be Ms Blue (red and blue mixed during kinky stuff), instead of a previous daughter of both.
But if they just met earlier that day, had sex and fecunded, would you count the new baby as someone in the floor of the ballroom?

Answer 3

New guess

The butler did it
Yeah, it is not excatly new, @Random Channel already said that. But the reasoning and the other responses are

I tried to keep things simple this time. No metaphors about colors and animals, just alibis and locations

First, The butler stated that he were at the door of the ballroom. But since the house is round, the poolroom is the first room and the ballroom is the last, the two are next to each other.

The butler killed Mr Green in the pool, went back to the ballroom and pretend to be at the door the whole time (more on that later). That's why he killed Mr Green right there, it was the closest. The maid heard him returning, the kitchen is in the other side of the poolroom.

Now for the motive:

There is still the 5th person on the ballroom. I propose that it is the host of the party. The butler is working for him, in every way.

Second-to-last line says "Who was the culprit and killer". I believe that's a hint for two people being involved. The host being the culprit (the one who is responsible for it and wanted Mr. Green dead) and the butler being the killer (the one who actually did it).

Going back to the butler's alibi, The host could be distracting the guests on the ballroom so they didn't notice the butler's abscence.
Now the host's motive is just speculation, but since he was in the ballromm with Ms Green, I would say that he is in love with her and wants to take Mr Green out of the picture

Answer 4

It's time for me to take a guess, everyone to the poolroom please.

(It's just speculation though)

I think the murderer was

Mr. White

The pieces we have to the claim is:

1: Mr Green was a Lizard.
2: The poolroom could have a pool instead of pool tables.
3: Nearly everyone has a perfect albi.
4: The butler was at the crime scene by the door.

Now comes the interesting part:

- There's not a single mention of Mr. White, and we only know one single thing about him: He's a chameleon (as his daughter is also one).
- He has a daughter so he can't be the pair of father-son in the lounge (the other daughter being the late Mr. Green's)
- Since Mr. White is a chameleon he can turn invisible, so it's highly probable he's the missing 5th person on the ballroom, watching everything unfold.

But... how? Why there?

Lizards can easily die due to temperature.
The weather was nice in the morning but turned rainy in the evening. I don't know about London's temperature (even the U.K. is foreign to me) but it should be quite cold, though not enough for a lizard to die.
...unless he was soaked to the core...
So Mr. White called for Mr. Green for a chat in the poolroom, but alas Mr. Green saw no sight of Mr. White.
Mr. Green called the butler to ask for Mr. White, something the latter didn't expect, so he had to act quickly. Just when the butler came in he saw how Mr. Green "accidentally fell" into the pool, dying quickly.
The butler couldn't help him. Perhaps it was too shocking? Maybe he couldn't swim? Could Mr. White be blocking him? Or perchance he actually rescued him and moved him to the ballroom but it was still futile? After all, Mr. Green was soaked and he needed to be warmed quickly.

Going forward a bit, to the final scene

The maid overheard some wet footsteps, which could be Ms. Red coming in from the rain, or the butler trying to save Mr. Green (hopping into the pool and fetching him out)
Three of the Ms. were dancing, the butler either came in to try to save Mr. Green or to relay the awful news to Ms Green.
Ms. Red, the one outside, is perfectly undestandable: Bears can go hunt in the rain after all, Mr. Red couldn't though, since he's handicapped.

But wait, why was Mr. Red hurting so much? Well...

Lizards smell very foul when dead, and bears are known to have very acute noses. That could be reason enough, or maybe he was very hungry as well, and that's why he asked (sent) his wife to go hunt, since he couldn't do so personally. The foul smell is bad enough, on a hungry stomach it's just a nightmare.

And so, in the ballroom at the end, we have:

Ms. Green
Ms. Blue
Ms. White
The butler
Mr. White, who is still so invisible he wasn't mentioned in the story at all

Answer 5

Perhaps...just maybe...could this be

A kid playing doll house? This kid would be the girl that likes purple (who stands out as the only entity that isn't "in" a colour.

The characters then are

Stuffed animals. Mr/Ms Red are literally teddy bears, and so on for the White's (chameleon), and the Greens' (Lizards) - only the blue's are not explicit.

This means that

the entire scenario is built from the girl's imagination, but she indeed could have been the killer - dropping Mr.Lizard into the pool by accident (or purpose).

Answer 6

Could the answer be

All of them?

Reasoning:

Because everyone seems to have somebody or the other covering for them, maybe everybody had a vendetta against the Lizard and killed him? I know this sounds like Agatha Christie’s novel, but it seems to be shaping up that way.

Answer 7

Mr. White would have to be the other person in the ballroom, as it says ‘the girl in white,’ so he doesn’t have a son. As it says the ‘boy in blue,’ Mr. Blue would have been in the lounge with his son. As for the other two children, one girl and one boy, Mr. Green was not in the lounge (because he was dying in the pool) so he could not be with a son. Therefore Mr. Green had a girl and Mr. Red was in the lounge with his son.

It could have been Mrs. Red/Bear, as no one saw her out in the rain and we are only taking her word for it. She could also have been the wet footsteps heard by the maid. The murderer didn’t necessarily get wet.

The butler also didn’t have an alibi. And it may still have been Mr. White.

Another theory, probably not correct, is that Mrs. Red fell in the swimming pool and said she had been out in the rain to hide her embarrassment. She could have slipped, screamed, and fallen with a splash. If that was the case, Mr. Green could have been killed anywhere. By almost anyone. We don’t know where the body was hidden. If she had been the one in the wheelchair, rather than her husband, it would definitely explain the ‘great pain.’ But how, then, did she get out of the pool?

The butler was the most likely suspect, as he is the one with the worst alibi. I’m not sure about motives, though.

Answer 8

I noticed that...

You specified there was a roof as a seventh part of the house

And...

There were only twelve people in the house at midnight because of the clock: 4 in the lounge, 3 in the kitchen, and 5 in the ballroom.

But...

There must have been at least one person in the pool room at midnight, to account for the scream and splash heard from the pool room.

Meaning...!

There were two people on the roof at midnight, and at least one of them in the pool room when the scream and splash occurred. Since Ms. Red was wet, she was on the roof in the rain, or the one who splashed in the pool.

But if this is the case...

Ms. Red was not the unmentioned person in the ballroom at midnight, with that role being filled by either Mr. Red or Mr. White, with the other being in the lounge with their son.

So this is what happened:

Ms. Red murdered Mr. Green on the roof. Then, she brought his body down to the pool to hide the fact that it was wet from the rain. When she threw his body in, she let out a scream to make it seem like she had stumbled onto the scene accidentally, in an effort to preserve her innocence.

As for motive...

As stated by @Elpharya and @HenriqueValle the presence of a purple girl indicates that there was most likely some cheating involved. For my theory to work, it would have to be Mr. Blue and Ms. Red. Mr. Green, of course, found out about the affair, and was blackmailing Ms. Red. Ms. Red may not have been aware of his presence at the party, but she most certainly took advantage of it.

Answer 9

A new guess:

Starting with what we know about the children:

There is a blue boy, white boy (as confirmed by @Riddler), a white girl and a purple girl.

Now...

Purple isn't an established colour in the riddle (there's Blue, Green, White, and Red). But, purple can be created by mixing Blue and Red, suggesting there may be some infidelity at play (assuming that saying the girl likes purple is synonymous to the girl belonging to the Purple family).

This can happen one of two ways:

Mr. Red + Ms. Blue ; Or Mr. Blue + Ms. Red

So naturally, if the spouse finds out, they would get pretty angry. When they come across their spouse, they push them into the water (or hit their head or whatever), but

They killed Mr.Green instead

Why?

They're colour-blind, specifically red-green colour-blind. So, they thought they killed their red spouse, but it was poor Mr. Green

So who killed him?

Going off the colour-blind theory, it must've been either Mr. Red or Ms. Red - which is odd because the Riddler has confirmed it's not either of them. So, instead of Ms Red going after Mr Red (or vice versa), one of the spurned spouses attacks one of the guilty party (Mr Red or Ms Red), offering two options: Ms Blue or Mr. Blue. Ms. Blue is already described as being in the ballroom, so it must be Mr. Blue

Overall:

Mr.Blue killed Mr.Green, since he mistook Mr.Green for Mr. Red, who impregnated Ms Blue (with the purple child)

---

Edit: Just a collection of questions and information we know at this point

This riddle has lots of interesting questions...

1. Where was Mr and Mrs Red at midnight?
2. Why was Mr. Green killed?
3. Where/how was Mr. Green killed?
4. Who's the fifth person in the ballroom?
5. Who invited all these people to the party?

Through different guesses and comments, we know:

Mr. Green wasn't the 5th person in the ballroom
Mr and Ms Red weren't the killers
As user @user3660570 pointed out, "Mr/Ms Blue. They have 1 boy. Mr/Ms White. They have 1 boy."
The killer isn't all of them
Mr. White likely wasn't the killer
The riddle isn't an analogy for billiards

Past Guesses:

Maybe Mr.Green wasn't killed in the poolroom like it seems. I would like to propose the possibility that he's the 5th person in the ballroom, but not on the floor, per se - but hanging from the ceiling instead. This would incriminate the whole lot of people currently in the ballroom, but I'm not sure of a motive yet.

and

It could have been either of the dads in the lounge - being curious, they touch all sorts of things in the lounge (all the knickknacks, etc). However, one of them pushes/pulls an object that turns out to be booby-trapped! the trap is connected to a crossbow (or something similar) that sets off in the poolroom, killing Mr. Green.

Answer 10

I hope my reasoning could help you in coming up with the whole story, I don't think I got it right even after reading all your comments.
A few things still doesn't add up but I would like to share my reasoning anyway.

The killer is

the girl who liked purple.

Notice that

she is mentioned when the house is painstakingly described, so maybe she lives there. When I think of the host of such a party, I imagine a middle-aged man... but why can't she be the host? Or maybe the daughter of the host?
I really liked the answer given by @HenriqueValle, yet I would like to put aside for a while the color theory. Otherwise, Mr./Mrs. Green must have some sort of relationship to Mr./Mrs. Blue according to that logic (there is no Yellow family at the party but you never know...).

Let's review who is in the lounge:

Mr. Red and Mr. Blue with their sons.
Since Mr. Green has been killed, he couldn't be the other father in the lounge, so the other boy must be Mr. Red's son. The poem says they were playing... I imagine them playing cards or chess, this way even a man in wheelchair could join too.
Yet later is said that Mr. Red was "not really missing"... so maybe he wasn't one of the people in the lounge? The poem talks about "a girl in white", that is the only statement about one of the family whose child is a girl... I still have doubts.

Theory on the murder:

I think the fifth person was the purple girl. Since the butler was 'there' when it happened, Mr. Green must have been killed in the poolroom.
If we consider death by poisoning, Mr. Green could easily have been poisoned by the girl in another room as she offered a drink, then he could have collapsed near the pool.
This way, unfortunately, the question 'Why did they kill him right there?' cannot be given a proper answer... yet I just wanted to consider a killing method less brutal.
Anyway, the house is round... so the purple girl may have escaped in the kitchen if she needed a place to hide (it is said "the girls", maybe they were 3 and not just 2). The butler was always close to the door, only witness to Mr.Green's death.

As for the motive

I can imagine an old grudge or a vengeance, but I am not sure. It is worthwhile to notice that, if the maid was as loyal as the butler, the footsteps she heard could not be linked to the purple girl or she would not have testified about them.

A few things doesn't add up...

The great pain of Mr. Red, that could be emotional more than physical.
If the poem does not lie, then Ms. Red was dripping because of the rain and not for the fall in the pool. If this is true, then, why was she outside with such a terrible weather? Was was she looking for? And who or what felt in the pool? Did the scream cause the fall in the pool or vice versa?

Such a beautiful mystery you created. Thank you!

Answer 11

Incomplete answer. English is not my native language and I'm new to how things works here. So please excuse me if I seam a bit lost.
Would like to know if I'm on the right way or far far away.

The guests attending the party:
Mr/Ms Bear. Mr Bear dressed in red and in a wheelchair.
Mr/Ms Lizard. Mr Lizard murdered and Ms Lizard dressed in green.
Mr/Ms Blue. They have 1 boy.
Mr/Ms White. They have 1 boy.
(I'm using Blue and White since I don't know any better. The reason I think both families must have a boy each is because it says that 2 dads and 2 boys are playing. And given that Mr Lizard is getting killed and Mr Bear is in a wheelchair I'm just assuming that they can't play. But it may be too much of an assumption.)
2 girls that I don't know which families they belong to.
The maid and the butler.
That makes 14 people including the maid and butler.

Location of people when the murder happened
The kitchen: The maid, 2 girls
The ballroom: Ms Blue, Ms White, Ms Green(Lizard), The butler, 1 missing?
The hall: Ms Bear. Assuming that she just came in from the rain.
The lounge: Mr Blue, Mr White, 2 boys
The poolroom: Mr Green(Lizard) since he's getting killed there.
Unknown: Mr Bear

Thoughts:
1. It says that it's a sun-shining day but it's still raining. Not impossible that the weather can change though.
2. As @LogicianWithAHat said. Only 4 people are mentioned in the ballroom when the text says that there should be 5.
3. When it comes to why the murder occured in the poolroom it makes more sense to me that Mr Bear should be murdered there. Since he is in a wheelchair he probably can't swim and would therefore drown easily.
4. If you combine 1. and 3. it feels like Ms Bear could've been involved in some way if she for some reason fell into the pool during the murder.

Answer 12

I think this is it:

Ms. Red/Bear was wet from the rain, right? But wait...

Earlier you said

"One sun-shining day in London," so that makes her highly suspect.

Another Ah-ha! moment:

The pool-room was literally a room with a pool! The "splash" from "A splash cut the silence in air." was Ms. Red cleaning herself off in the pool, which she claimed was actually rainwater, even though it was sunny.

Also,

The maid heard wet footsteps - Ms. Bear rushing back to be the fifth person in the ballroom, I believe.

All of these point to the following solution:

Ms. Red is the killer

Answer 13

I've tried a lot of things, but there's only one culprit who sticks out to me. I doubt it's correct, but I'll feel foolish otherwise, so it's worth a try.

The maid claims to have been cooking, despite the murder occuring when the clock struck midnight. Also, the poolroom is next to the kitchen.

I've no idea about the motive.

Answer 14

I would like to guess

The butler

Because

It says he was by the door, and for the body to enter, the butler must have noticed if anyone else had done so.

Answer 15

Answer might be

" all of them "

Reasoning:

Because-as per given situation and information every one was trying to cover themselves and were trying get rid.

Answer 16

Well um first of all:

The first line says 'One sun-shining day in London', and Ms Bear ended up being 'covered in rain', even though there is no mention of the weather changing. Also men don't really 'scream', not sure if this was intentional or not.

Also,

Was Ms Bear pushed into the pool by the killer? The fall into the pool could have been a ploy to divert everyone's attention, so the murder could take place without anyone noticing.

This riddle is worded so trickily that I cannot gather all the information it has to give, but here are (2) theories.

First

The description of the body was never given, so he could have been wet on the dance floor as well, signifying that Ms Bear and Mr Lizardman could have both been in the same place. Its possible that she had killed him beforehand, and then diverted everyone's attention by falling in the pool? assuming this is an actual pool.

Second

Could he have killed himself? It would seem like the culprit would be more obvious if it had been someone else. The children (unless the two boys were strong enough) couldn't have actually killed him and dragged his body to the ballroom. Many of the other answers are incorrect, so this is another shot at it

Also

Was there actually a murder that took place? All that was heard was a scream and a splash, there isn't actually any details signifying he is dead, disregarding the final stanza. There isn't much evidence for this, but hey whatever

This is like 10 months late sooo hopefully you see this.

Answer 17

In terms of location, Mr white is the only unaccounted person. The butler since he was at the door, could have opened it for Ms Red Bear to come in. Why was she outside when it was raining? Maybe she went looking for husband whom she thoughy went missing but wasn't really missing... He was in the lounge area. Adding this in there could be a distraction to focus on her... Since she was wet. The riddle said she was wet because of the rain. If it was raining outside, this would be a fair explanation.

However, Mr white could have been the 5th person in the ballroom ( he didn't have a son, so not in the lounge and he definitely wasn't in the kitchen). He could have slipped out to kill Mr green or was with Mr Green at the pool room. Another theory is that Ms Ted Bear was the 5th person who left and went out to find her husband and Mr White and Mr Green could have been in the pool room from the start.

Motive: Maybe they had a heated argument and one thing led to another or a business deal gone south. Thats my story and I'm sticking to it 😊