Marble bear clock
The marble bear clock stands as one of the most striking and lethal objects in the carefully staged murder sequence on Indian Island. It is first described as an enormous block of white marble shaped like a bear, a piece of modern sculpture in which a clock is inset, sitting on the mantelpiece of Vera Claythorne's bedroom. The room itself is a perfect modern bedroom decorated throughout in the modern style, with off-white rugs on gleaming parquet floors, faintly tinted walls, and a long mirror surrounded by lights. The mantelpiece is bare of ornaments save for this single massive piece, which dominates the space. Above it, in a gleaming chromium frame, hangs a big square of parchment bearing the nursery rhyme "Ten Little Indian Boys," the very poem that will dictate the order and method of the murders. The clock thus sits at the intersection of domestic modernity and the macabre game that U. N. Owen has devised, a functional object that will be transformed into an instrument of death.
Appearance and Placement
The clock is introduced as part of the room's decor when Vera first enters her bedroom after arriving on the island. It is described as an enormous block of white marble shaped like a bear, a piece of modern sculpture in which a clock is inset. The mantelpiece is bare of ornaments save for this single piece, making it the focal point of the room's aesthetic. The clock's presence is noted again during dinner when the guests discover that the center of the round table holds a circular glass stand with ten little china figures, the "Ten Little Indian Boys" of the nursery rhyme. Vera immediately connects the rhyme to her bedroom, exclaiming that the rhyme is framed and hung up over the mantelpiece in her room. The clock thus becomes part of the larger pattern of the rhyme's influence, a decorative object that will later be repurposed as a weapon.
Role in the Murder Sequence
The marble bear clock becomes the murder weapon used to kill ex-Inspector William Henry Blore. The murder occurs on the morning of August 11th, after the storm has passed and the survivors have begun to hope for rescue. Blore, having gone alone to the house to fetch lunch, is found spread-eagled on the stone terrace on the east side of the house, his head crushed and mangled by the great block of white marble. Vera, looking up from the terrace, identifies the window above as her own bedroom window and recognizes the object that killed him: "it's the clock from my mantelpiece... it was shaped like a bear." The murder follows the pattern of the nursery rhyme's sixth verse: "Six little Indian boys playing with a hive; A bumblebee stung one and then there were five" — but the actual method used for Blore is the seventh verse: "Three little Indian boys walking in the Zoo; A big bear hugged one and then there were two." The murderer, Lawrence John Wargrave, has adapted the rhyme's imagery to the available objects, using the bear-shaped clock to fulfill the prophecy.
Thematic Significance
The marble bear clock exemplifies the murderer's method of using everyday objects as instruments of death, transforming the domestic space into a killing ground. Like the red oilsilk curtain and the grey knitting wool used to costume Wargrave's fake corpse, the clock is a mundane object that becomes charged with lethal significance. Its transformation from decorative sculpture to murder weapon mirrors the larger theme of the novel: that ordinary people, when placed under extreme pressure, can become capable of extraordinary violence. The clock's bear shape, which Vera recalls with horror, ties the murder directly to the nursery rhyme's imagery, demonstrating the murderer's obsessive adherence to the poem's pattern. The object thus serves as both a physical weapon and a symbolic link between the childish rhyme and the adult horror of the killings, a reminder that the game of "Ten Little Indian Boys" has been played to its bloody conclusion.
