The Riddle of the Sphinx: Chapter 59 Summary and Analysis

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

The chapter opens with Freda's morning routine at Vanda's flat. She wakes before Vanda, makes tea on a precarious gas ring, and eats stale bread — the only food in the flat. Vanda's domestic chaos is on full display: smeared makeup, clothes draped everywhere, cigarette butts, and a lingering smell of dead rat. Freda cleans the flat and encounters strange items belonging to Joan next door — riding crops, rubber masks, and washing-line rope — which Vanda calls Joan's specials. Freda also recalls finding a man tied to a chair in the flat the previous week, gagged and belonging to Joan.

Leaving the flat, Freda spots Cherry Ames on St Martin's Lane and runs after her. Cherry has transformed into a jaded, metropolitan figure — dressed in West End clothes, smoking, and barely touching her tea at Lyons. She reveals she left the Vanbrugh and has landed a part in The Co-Optimists at the Palace, mentioning a review that called her an ingénue. Cherry gives Freda two comp tickets for the show and, before leaving, mentions that someone came to the Vanbrugh looking for Freda and Florence. She doesn't know who it was.

At the Sphinx, Ramsay is waiting for Freda. He confesses he lost £1,000 at a card game called a spieler, possibly drugged with champagne. His plan: Freda should forge a letter from his mother to her bank so he can access paperwork she keeps there. Freda is skeptical — it seems like a swizzle — but Ramsay insists it's a matter of life and death, claiming a man named Azzopardi will kill him if he doesn't comply. Freda negotiates her fee from £5 to £10 and agrees.

When Freda goes to the storeroom for tea, she finds Ramsay frozen at the door. A girl lies motionless on the floor among mops and crates. Freda believes she's dead and covers her face with her cardigan — but the girl revives, coughing and spluttering. She identifies herself as Gertie Bridges and explains that a man — a policeman, she says — dragged her into the Sphinx in the early hours, tied her up, and then returned to strangle her. She played dead, a tactic she's used before, and heard him phone the police to report a murder. He left only moments before Freda and Ramsay found her.

Nellie arrives and they leave in the Bentley, with Gertie luxuriating in the back seat. Meanwhile, Sergeant Oakes watches from outside, cursing. He had planned to frame Freda — a dead body in the Sphinx would have stopped Nellie from reopening her clubs. But now the girl is alive, and worse, there are two of them: Freda and Gertie look so alike that Oakes can't tell which is the real Freda Murgatroyd.

Frobisher arrives at the Sphinx with a constable, responding to the murder report. Nellie greets him with practiced charm, dismissing the call as a malicious prank. A search of the club turns up nothing — only a silver shoe behind the bar, which Nellie explains away as a hostess's mislaid property. Miss Kelling arrives as Frobisher is leaving.

Back at Vanda's flat, Gertie sleeps deeply in Freda's cupboard bed. When she wakes, Freda makes sugar sandwiches, and Vanda gives Gertie an old silk scarf to hide her bruises. As Gertie prepares to leave, Freda suggests they go to a show — she has free tickets for The Co-Optimists.

Key Events

Freda cleans Vanda's squalid flat and discovers Joan's special items
Freda reunites with Cherry Ames, who has joined The Co-Optimists and gives her comp tickets
Cherry reveals someone was asking for Freda and Florence at the Vanbrugh
Ramsay confesses his £1,000 gambling debt and recruits Freda for a forgery scheme
Freda and Ramsay find Gertie Bridges apparently dead in the storeroom
Gertie revives and describes being strangled by a policeman
Oakes's plan to frame Freda backfires when Gertie survives
Frobisher searches the Sphinx and finds only a silver shoe
Gertie recovers at Vanda's flat; Freda proposes attending The Co-Optimists

Character Development

Freda continues to grow bolder. She negotiates her fee with Ramsay — starting at £5, countering with £15, settling at £10 — and reflects that she is beginning to understand her worth. Her tenderness toward Gertie (stroking her forehead, covering her face) shows her capacity for care, while her practical suggestion of the theatre afterward reveals her resilience.

Cherry Ames has reinvented herself as a jaded West End performer, but the mask slips when she gives Freda the tickets and admits it really was nice to see her. Her transformation suggests the costs of ambition — the heavy makeup and strained eyes hint at what she's had to do to get her part.

Ramsay is desperate and self-pitying, blaming champagne for his gambling loss. His willingness to involve Freda in forgery — and his claim that Azzopardi will kill him — shows how far he'll go to protect himself.

Gertie Bridges is a survivor. Her ability to play dead, her matter-of-fact account of the attack, and her gallows humor make her one of the chapter's most vivid figures.

Sergeant Oakes is revealed as a calculating villain. His plan to frame Freda by planting a body in the Sphinx shows the depth of police corruption, and his confusion at seeing two Fredas sets up a mistaken-identity thread.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

Survival and resilience: Gertie's play-dead tactic and her recovery embody the chapter's central theme. Freda's own survival — from the Vanbrugh to the Sphinx to Vanda's flat — mirrors this.

Police corruption: Oakes's scheme to manufacture a murder scene implicates the police as an institution. Frobisher's search, by contrast, is honest but ineffective — he finds only a silver shoe.

Deception and false appearances: Cherry's performance as a jaded star, Nellie's serene denial of any murder, and Gertie's feigned death all involve layers of disguise. The silver shoe — a single, meaningless object — stands in for the truth that Frobisher can't quite grasp.

Forgery and fraud: Ramsay's plan to forge his mother's letter connects to the novel's broader interest in false documents and identities.

Mistaken identity: Oakes's confusion between Freda and Gertie — two peas in a pod — sets up a plot engine that will likely drive later chapters.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter is a turning point for several threads. It exposes Oakes's corruption in a way that will likely have consequences, introduces Gertie Bridges as a significant new character whose resemblance to Freda creates narrative possibilities, and deepens Freda's agency — she's no longer just surviving but negotiating, choosing, and acting. The chapter also tightens the connection between the Coker family and the police investigation, with Nellie's smooth cover-up contrasting with Frobisher's frustrated search.

Study Questions

1. How does Freda's negotiation with Ramsay demonstrate her character growth?

Freda's willingness to demand payment — and to counter his offer — shows she has moved from a passive survivor to someone who understands her own value. Her reflection that she is beginning to understand her worth marks a clear shift from her earlier position at the Vanbrugh, where she was exploited. The negotiation also establishes her as a pragmatic operator who can navigate the criminal world on her own terms.

2. What does Sergeant Oakes's plan reveal about the novel's treatment of police corruption?

Oakes's scheme — to plant a dead body in the Sphinx and frame Freda — shows that the police are not merely incompetent but actively criminal. His assumption that Maddox would approve suggests corruption reaches the highest levels. The fact that his plan backfires because Gertie survives and resembles Freda introduces an element of ironic justice, while also setting up a mistaken-identity plot that complicates his pursuit.

3. How does the silver shoe function as a symbol in this chapter?

The silver shoe is the only evidence Frobisher finds, and it's meaningless — a hostess's mislaid property. It symbolizes the gap between what the police can see and what is actually happening. Nellie's smooth explanation that the girls are always losing their shoes shows how the Coker operation absorbs and neutralizes incriminating details. The shoe is a red herring that underscores the theme of deception and the limits of official investigation.