# Captain Muller — Short Fiction character guide

> Captain Muller in Short Fiction by P. G. Wodehouse.

**Role:** supporting

**Also known as:** Muller

**First appearance:** 0000-when-papa-swore-in-hindustani

## Snapshot

A dull-eyed boarding-house captain whose composure shatters when a dead roommate's harmonica is unwrapped before him.

## Who they are

Captain Muller shared a room with the late Captain Gunner at Mrs. Pickett's boarding house, and his haunted reaction to a small harmonica memento exposes him to the assembled guests. As Mrs. Pickett methodically reconstructs the murder — poison, a cat, and Gunner's fatal habit of playing the instrument — Muller's waxen cheeks and gripping fingers betray a guilt he cannot hide. He is the silent center of the story's drawing-room unmasking, the man whose nerves give the detective and the reader their answer.

## In the story

### [I](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se/chapters/i)

Roommate of the deceased; absent, having spent the night at Portsmouth.

### [III](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se/chapters/iii)

Gunner's roommate, a big silent man who was away on the night of the murder and provides little information.

### [VII](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se/chapters/vii)

Guest at the dinner; becomes increasingly agitated upon receiving the harmonica and ultimately confesses to murdering Captain Gunner.

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se/characters/captain_muller
- Book: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se
- All characters: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/short_fiction_42_se/characters