Directed by Kevin Bray

Written by Liz W Garcia

A pregnant woman asks the police to solve the murder of her ancestor Violet Polley, who was murdered in Christmas 1929.

Tropes:

• '20s Bob Haircut: Both Violet and Ginger had one.
• Army of Lawyers: Muriel's negotiates the terms of her interview with the detectives.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: The Bartlebys were careful not to add any "crooked branches" to their family tree. Come the present day and the elderly Muriel is the last Bartleby left. She adds Rose and her descendants to the Bartleby family tree in the ending montage.
• Berserk Button: Felix loses it and murders Violet after she calls him "lowly" and accuses him of being just like Nick for trying to convince her to blackmail him.
• Big Fancy House: Miller says that Bartleby Manor can fit all the apartments that she has lived in.
• Blackmail: Felix suggested Violet to use her illegitimate baby to blackmail Nick. He ended up killing her for refusing and insulting him.
• The Casanova: Nick Bartleby in 1929 before the stock crash.
• Changeling Fantasy: Aimee's grandmother Rose was in one and she never knew. Her biological father was a millionaire, her mother wrote songs which are classics, and her upbringing was provided for by a once-famous actress.
• The Charmer: Scotty gets the museum director to let him borrow Ginger's journal by smiling at her.
• Chekhov's Gun: The golden clock that Felix claimed he got from the Bartlebys and sold to start his company is this. Turns out the clock was given to Violet and he took it from her after killing her in a rage. Many years later, Felix's grandson Daniel tracked down and bought back the clock, giving the detectives a clue.
• Children Are Tender-Hearted: Muriel, who was a small child at the time, refused to give up the golden clock from her father to sell after the 1929 stock market crash left her family broke. But then struggling Violet came and begged Muriel's older brother Nick to take in their child. Nick cruelly refused, even though Muriel knew they were still well-off enough to care for the baby. When she saw how sad and desperate Violet was, Muriel gave Violet her beloved clock to sell.
• Christmas Episode: Downplayed. The Cold Open is set on New Year's Eve and Violet was murdered on Christmas Eve the next year.
• Deathbed Confession: Felix let his grandson Daniel record his confession to Violet's murder on his deathbed. Daniel kept it a secret until the detectives came digging.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance:
  • Ginger listens to Violet's story of being inspired to come to Philadelphia by a jazz song and objects that the singer is "a negro."
  • Mickey Stein offers Violet a scotch immediately after learning she's pregnant.
• Driven to Suicide: The Bartlebys' banker jumped out of a window after the stock market crash.
• The Driver: Felix was Nick's chauffeur.
• Expy Coexistence: Carmela LeFleur is described as "a Mae West-type actress".
• Extremely Cold Case: Violet's murder is investigated 76 years after her death, becoming the team's new record old case, their only case from The Roaring '20s, and the second oldest case in the series after "Torn". Every witness except Muriel, who was a child at the time and is now an elderly recluse, is dead, implicitly by decades. This forces the detectives to rely on historical records and interviews with middle-aged grandchildren instead of living witnesses like in other episodes.
• Family Theme Naming: Violet and Rose are both flower names.
• George Washington Slept Here: Violet's boardinghouse is a museum in the present day because Susan B. Anthony lived there.
• Gold Digger: Ginger's 1929 New Year's resolution was to find a rich and handsome guy to marry.
• Grand Romantic Gesture: Nick had 300 roses sent to Violet's boardinghouse, inspiring one of her songs.
• Hidden Disdain Reveal: Felix revealed his disdain for Nick to Violet after Nick fired him. Being told he was no different from Nick caused him to fly into a rage and kill her.
• Hunting "Accident": Nick Bartleby's death in 1943 is hinted to have been a disguised suicide.
• I Love You Because I Can't Control You: Violet was the first girl to say no to Nick when he tried to sleep with her, which interested him and made him start pursuing her seriously.
• Identical Grandson: Carmela's assistant Mickey Stein and his grandson are played by the same actor.
• Immediate Self-Contradiction: Lilly tells Kite's answering machine that she can change, then immediately hangs up when he answers.
• It's Personal: Lilly agrees to take on the case when Violet's great-granddaughter, Aimee, wants the case solved to escape the misfortune the women in her family have gone through since Violet's death, talking about wanting to move on but being unable to outrun her family, something Lilly is struggling with at the moment when her estranged mother attempts to reconnect.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Carmela was a Proud Beauty and stuck-up actress who threatened Violet to stay away from Nick. Later on, though, she took pity on Violet and bought her songs so the latter could provide for her unborn child. Carmela was also the one who took baby Rose to a safe place after finding her abandoned, even making a sizable donation to the orphanage to ensure she would be taken care of.
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Nick Bartleby was quite The Casanova in the 20s, seducing women left and right with his status and good looks. He appeared to develop genuine feelings for Violet, only to dump her after she became pregnant and refused to take in her baby, as he started to lose his fortunes during the stock crash.
• Karma Houdini: Felix died rich decades before the present day.
• Little "No": Violet when Carmella tells her she's pregnant.
• Love Dodecahedron: Nick and Violet, Violet and Jeb, Nick and Carmela...
• The Makeover: Ginger gave Violet one to turn her from a farm girl into a flapper.
• Mama's Baby, Papa's Maybe: Muriel didn't believe that her brother Nick was the father of Violet’s daughter, Rose.
• "Not So Different" Remark: Being told that stooping to Blackmail made him "as bad as Bartleby" triggered Felix to fly into a murderous rage against Violet, even though the big hypocrite had just accused Violet of being like Nick for accepting the golden clock.
  Felix: I'm not like Bartleby! I'm not!
• Not What It Looks Like: Carmela found baby Rose outside the Bartleby house right after Violet asked Nick for assistance and he turned her down, so she assumed Violet had abandoned the baby. In reality, Felix had just murdered Violet and was taking her body to dispose of it elsewhere.
• Parental Favoritism: Ellen is implied to favor Christina over Lilly, as she only asks Lilly to be her maid of honor because she can't find Christina, and tells Lilly to stop lying when she points out that Christina is a fugitive.
• Posthumous Character: Everyone in the flashbacks except Muriel, who was a small child, is dead by the present day.
• Practically Different Generations: Nick and Muriel Bartleby, the former a man in his twenties, the latter a little girl.
• Rags to Riches: Felix made $75 selling the golden clock he took from Violet and used it to build a multi-million-dollar shipping company.
• Ripped from the Headlines: The episode combines the death of Marilyn Monroe with the Broadway Butterfly murders.
• The Roaring '20s: The flashback section is set in 1928-1929, this being the only episode featuring the decade in the series.
• Serial Spouse: Ellen is getting married for the fourth time.
• Shout-Out: The episode's title, "Beautiful Little Fool", is taken from a line from The Great Gatsby (which some of the plot draws inspiration from.)
• The Shut-In: Muriel in the present day, who hasn't left her family's mansion in years.
• Small Town Boredom: Violet had bigger dreams than being a pig farmer's wife in Oley Valley.
• Technology Marches On: In-Universe. One suspect, Violet's ex-boyfriend Jeb, was in California three days before her murder. While traveling from California to Philadelphia in three days is no big deal in 2006, it was impossible in 1929, thus clearing him as a suspect.
• What Happened to the Mouse?:
  • Ginger Swensen helped Violet meet Nick. She is never seen nor heard from after that. She still somehow appears to Aimee in the ending montage.
  • It's unclear if Rose, Violet's daughter and Aimee's grandmother, is alive in the present day.^note She would be younger than Muriel, who is still alive.