A Dickensian Dilemma

Emily Jones straps into the portable Imagination Station, which Mr. Whittaker has loaned to her friend Renee so she can learn to program it at the college. Renee has written a crime mystery set in Victorian England and wants Emily, a real detective, to test it and offer advice. Emily will play Detective Emily Jones of the London Constabulary, in a world straight out of a Charles Dickens novel, while Renee watches from outside and speaks to her in a voice only Emily can hear.

Emily materializes in the upstairs drawing room of a wealthy moneylender who has been robbed of a valuable necklace. She examines the empty display cabinet and finds one odd clue: a small screw embedded in the carpet. Then the victim himself arrives, and Emily is delighted to realize he is Jacob Marley of Marley and Scrooge, the moneylender from A Christmas Carol. Renee has filled the adventure with Dickens characters. Marley, gruff and impatient, describes the missing necklace, a gold chain covered in diamonds and rubies, and announces that he already knows the thief: his upstairs maid, Nell Trent, whose name Emily recognizes from The Old Curiosity Shop. Nell tearfully admits she carried the necklace to Wagstaff's Jewelers for cleaning, but only because Marley ordered her to, and she insists she returned it to its case. Marley demands her arrest anyway, hinting that his taxes pay Emily's salary, and Constable Crabtree, the officer assigned to Emily, quietly warns her that it is best to obey. Marley even forces Nell's little daughter Molly out of the house, so Emily has Crabtree carry the frightened girl to the children's home while her mother goes to the station.

The investigation deepens at the jeweler's shop. The receipt book confirms Nell's story, but the jeweler adds something surprising: years ago, Nell used to bring in that very same necklace, because it belonged to her. Nell then tells Emily her sad history. The necklace was her mother's, saved when her grandfather's curiosity shop closed. She married Herbert Pocket, a man of great expectations whose business failed under the crushing weight of a loan from Marley. As Nell puts it, "Herbert thought he was a godsend, but he ended up being a snake pit." After Herbert's death, Molly fell gravely ill, and desperate Nell pledged her jewelry and indentured herself as Marley's servant in exchange for Molly's treatment. She hopes to one day buy her jewelry back, so she asks Emily why she would ever risk everything by stealing.

Crabtree traces a necklace to a pawn shop, where the records show it was brought in by Bill Sikes, a notorious thug from the docks. Emily confiscates it, but Marley coolly declares it is not his necklace at all. When Sikes is dragged in, leaving Crabtree battered, Marley suddenly decides Sikes must be the thief and insists Emily question him. Sikes never actually confesses to this crime. Instead he boasts that he is a robber and a brute who has stolen from so many people he cannot remember them all, snarling, "I rob because I like it." That is enough for Marley, who considers the case closed. Emily at least persuades him to rehire Nell, though when she suggests an apology, he answers, "Don't push your luck."

Later, over tea, Nell and Molly come to thank Emily, but Molly stumbles, and Emily discovers the little girl's leg brace, worn since her illness, has been held together with string because it is missing a screw. The screw from Marley's carpet fits perfectly, and the truth spills out. Molly saw her mother weeping over the necklace that rightfully belonged to her, so she sneaked into the forbidden room, took it as a present for her mummy, and hid it under a loose floorboard in Marley's larder. Crabtree points out that since it never left the property, it was technically never stolen, but Nell despairs: Marley will still demand that someone be punished, Molly could be taken away, and they could be left destitute. Crabtree asks the detective what she is going to do.

Suddenly the adventure freezes. Renee explains that she designed it to stop right there, because she has been working with Mr. Whittaker on how to handle ethical issues, and he says learning to make right choices takes practice. Emily lays out her dilemma: she can tell the awful Marley where the necklace is and watch him wreck the lives of a sweet little girl and her mother, or she can stay silent and let a confessed criminal go to prison for a crime he did not actually commit. The story ends without an answer, as Renee repeats the constable's question: what is Emily going to do?