0:00 Torn from the last page of a rare book of Persian poetry was a single phrase: Tamam Shud.0:11 It means “it is finished.” Last week, chasing the shadow of Jack the Ripper, we were hunting a ghost defined only by his monstrous acts.0:29 This file is different.0:32 This is about a man defined by nothing at all.0:38 The call comes in on December 1st, 1948.0:44 A man, dead on Somerton Beach near Adelaide, Australia.0:51 He’s propped up against the sea wall, head resting back.0:58 Looks like he’s sleeping.1:01 He’s dressed impeccably — a suit, a tie, polished shoes.1:09 No wallet.1:10 No identification.1:13 All the tags on his clothing have been meticulously snipped off.1:21 The coroner gets him on the table and finds… almost nothing.1:29 No wounds, no signs of a struggle.1:33 Just acute, hemorrhagic gastritis and congestion in his lungs, liver, and brain.1:44 The official cause is heart failure, but the pathologist suspects poison.1:53 A poison so sophisticated, it breaks down in the body leaving no trace.2:03 This isn't a drifter.2:06 This is a man who was intentionally erased.2:11 Two months go by.2:14 The trail is ice cold.2:16 Then, a break.2:18 A brown suitcase, checked into the Adelaide railway station cloakroom the day before the body was found.2:32 Inside, more clothes with the tags cut out.2:38 But there’s one name, T.2:41 Keane, on a tie.2:43 A laundry bag is marked Keane.2:47 A singlet has Kean, without the E.2:51 The police search every record.2:55 No missing person named Keane matches the description.3:03 It's another dead end.3:05 A deliberate misdirection.3:09 But there's also a spool of orange Barbour-brand thread.3:16 The kind used for heavy-duty repairs.3:21 It’s not sold in Australia.3:25 It’s the same thread used to repair a tear in the pocket of the dead man’s trousers.3:36 He carried his own tools for erasure.3:41 And then, the file lands back on my desk with a new slip of paper inside.3:50 A tiny, rolled-up note found in a hidden fob pocket sewn inside the dead man's trousers.4:02 It’s the paper I told you about.4:06 Tamam Shud.4:07 A nationwide search begins for the book it was torn from.4:15 A doctor comes forward.4:18 He says on the night of the discovery, someone threw a copy of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam into his car.4:32 And in the back of that book, the last page is torn out.4:39 But there’s something else.4:43 Faint pencil markings.4:46 Five lines of capital letters.4:50 A code.4:51 It's never been broken.4:54 And below the code… a phone number.4:58 The number belongs to a nurse who lived just a short walk from Somerton Beach.5:09 Her name was Jessica Thomson, but she went by Jestyn.5:15 When the police show her a plaster cast of the dead man’s face, she nearly faints.5:26 She denies knowing him.5:29 But she’s visibly terrified.5:33 Years later, her daughter would claim her mother knew exactly who he was, that she spoke Russian but wouldn't say where she learned it, and that she was a spy.5:54 Jestyn admitted she gave a copy of that same book, the Rubaiyat, to a man named Alfred Boxall during the war.6:08 For a moment, we think the case is closed.6:14 The Somerton Man is Alfred Boxall.6:18 But he isn't.6:20 The police find Boxall.6:23 He's alive.6:25 And he has his copy of the Rubaiyat, with Jestyn's inscription still inside.6:35 So what does it all add up to?6:38 You have two identical books.6:42 A secret code.6:44 An untraceable poison.6:47 A mystery woman who might be a spy.6:52 It’s a perfect Cold War thriller.6:56 We’ve seen this pattern in the files of defectors and double agents.7:05 But there’s another pattern here, too.7:10 A book of romantic poetry.7:13 A man found near the home of a former lover who denies him.7:21 Is this a story of espionage… or a story of a broken heart?7:29 The evidence fits both frames perfectly, and so fits neither.7:37 The clues don't solve the mystery.7:41 The clues ARE the mystery.7:45 For over seventy years, the file remains open on this man who was either so important his death had to be a state secret, or so alone he simply vanished from the world by choice.8:08 He succeeded.8:10 Tamam Shud.8:12 It is finished.
