We open with Judith being consoled by Trask about her victimization, and find out that she is blessedly ignorant of the fact that Dirk forced her to murder Rachel. She is just trusting as all getout and totally relying on the smarm Gregory. Hm, makes me wonder if there’s some connection with smart women being bitten by vamps, and they’re going completely unperceptive and downright stupid afterward. Any takers?
Tim is an idiot, bursting into Collinwood that way, even if he thinks he has the upper hand. There’s serious irony in Trask’s line “it’s easy to accuse, Timothy but harder to prove.” Isn’t that just the kind of circumstantial evidence he has against Tim? Nothing but HIS word that it’s not a natural death. I doubt the Collinsport coroner (probably the local GP to boot) has anything even resembling what would be the period equivalent of a tox screen.
Poor Judith, she still has enough brains and fairness to completely analyze Tim’s story and compare it to her memories of coming back to the house. She knows, and can’t pretend she doesn’t know, that Tim is telling the truth about the period she doesn’t remember. JB did a great job with this scene. And there’s Gregory lurking like a spider to pick up the pieces. Ohh we see just how evil Trask is in this scene, as the audience knows what Judith does not – that Trask put Tim under the same kind of spell to kill his wife. What a lovely look at hypocrisy at its finest. Its not Judith’s fault because she was under a spell, yet Tim is fully to blame though he was under a similar spell. I think Trask overplayed his hand going after Tim so gung ho, apparently for no reason other than revenge. If it had been brushed off as natural causes in a woman of a certain age, it all would have gone away very quietly – and ironically, would have kept a lot of future events from happening (probably including Tim’s introducing to Collinsport one Amanda
Harris.)
You do see in these scenes the beginnings of the calculating, on the make Tim Shaw that we see later. Nice job by Don Briscoe. Yet, in retrospect, you wonder how much of the operator was there under the surface, such as the way he fit in with the Trasks to the point where he was going to marry Charity.
Hmm where have I heard Trask’s argument before? YOU didn’t kill her, Dirk did. Sounds like a replay of Beth and Quentin about the werewolf. Notice that neither Judith nor Quentin bought it – both KNEW (even the self absorbed irresponsible Quentin) that in the long run they were the ones responsible. Very skilled manipulator there, he turns her fear of the gallows into hurting HIM if she died. Wait, did he say Sheriff DRUMMOND? Anyone know if that was really the guy’s name or a blooper?
And into this mess comes Carl, babbling about how Edward should have stopped in mid staking to ask Dirk about Pansy. Self absorption runs rampant in this family, doesn’t it. He does show he has brains about some things, and an inconvenient curiosity on the same level as Quentin’s. Judith wants Rachel buried right away, Carl thinks this sounds weird and won’t let it go. Once again, as with at Quentin’s coffin, we see under the jolly joker mask that Carl can be quite a determined and ruthless character. (I'm reminded of Clau-clau-claudius again).
And, with a musical cue, we see Tim meet the shade of Pansy Faye. But it seems he’s not the droid she’s looking for.
Ugh is it not creepy to watch Trask doing the service for Rachel? Surely the last person on earth SHE’D want to have done it. Pretty sparcely attended too, wonder if that was deliberate staging or the 5 castmembers rule again? No Edward, Charity, teachers from the school, or house servants from Collinwood (Q missing too, but he’d probably have ducked it anyway). Not even pallbearers or gravediggers, it seems to be implied that Carl and Tim did all that themselves.
Ok, now Pansy's music is starting to bug me. NO one questions music from a gramophone in either the Old House or the cemetery. Is it supposed to be a clue they’re ignoring that it’s a spook? Or did the production people just not think to have her sing the music a capella?
And we have a fadeout as Carl finally realizes that music in the graveyard means a dead Pansy.
Jeannie