Okay, I get it.
For those who care, the room where Stokes keeps the body has a polygonal window remarkably similar to the one via which young Jamison Collins escaped from Worthington Hall (the boarding school run by the evil Rev. Gregory Trask) in 1897 in our time band. Also, this ep. has eight (count ’em!) characters, a record for Dark Shadows and roughly analogous to a crowd scene in one of those Italian sandal epics.
Welcome, Donna Wandrey! Spoiler alert: The closing credits give us her character's name. Sheesh.
Barn rhapsodizes over Roxanne's beauty, utterly oblivious of how it might affect the OTHER red-headed woman right beside him (and not for the last time, either). Once again, he is thinking with his, um, fangs, and the consequences be damned. He practically wills Julia to examine the woman.
Roger has joined Angelique and Stokes in the drawing room, and tells them that he’s rather annoyed: Cyrus Longworth named him the executor of his will. Though he doesn’t mention the problem that Cyrus left everything to Yaeger in the event of his own death or disappearance, Roger thinks it’s going to be a real pain and wonders why Cyrus didn’t pick Quentin. Stokes reminds him, Quentin doesn’t need the fee that you’ll get out of the estate for your trouble. Roger gets insulted at the (probably true) implication that he actually needs money and leaves in a huff, taking his brandy with him. Angelique remarks, Roger and Elizabeth (brother and sister in parallel time just as in our own) live in a dream world--but not for long. She tells her father, I want you to improve your work. I still mean to destroy every one of the Collinses--except of course for Daniel. (She has finally remembered her son’s existence--or maybe it was the writers.) What exactly are you going to do? Stokes asks. Nothing, she replies. Someone else will do all the work for you, Stokes guesses. Tell me everything. There’s nothing to tell, Angelique says. I’ll simply be an innocent bystander who can’t believe all the evil that surrounds me.
Roxanne has a nearly undetectable pulse, so naturally Barn grabs her hand. Her eyes open for a moment, but it's enough for Angelique to feel that old chill coming over her. Her father/stepfather/whatever leaves Collinwood to investigate, but fortunately he has already consumed the pitcher of martinis.
Julia finally gets Barn to go, and he simply Disapparates just before Stokes arrives. Stokes finds Julia in the room and demands to know why she’s there. After a few pleasantries about how tense they are all feeling this evening, Julia figures out an answer: I was just returning to Collinwood, she says, when I had a premonition. I opened the door with a key that Angelique had given me and found the body moving its hand and with its eyes open. When Stokes doesn’t answer, she wonders, Are we going to start doubting each other, now that we should be friends? Somehow Stokes buys Julia’s story and decides to phone Angelique to make sure she’s all right. When he steps out of the room to do so, Julia heaves a big sigh and shuts her eyes in relief.
Angelique is on the phone, telling Stokes that she feels better. Maggie comes in and Ange takes the opportunity to tell her cheerfully that Quentin isn't back yet. I’ll wait up for him, Maggie decides. I once heard an old saying about how if a couple is quarreling, they shouldn’t go to bed angry. (I heard it was Mae West who said, “Don’t go to bed angry--stay up all night and argue.”) Roger arrives in time to hear this part and tells her, You shouldn’t bother waiting up for Quentin or you may never get to bed. “Alexis” promptly tells Roger to stop picking on Maggie, but Maggie tells her, Please leave me alone with Roger. I can handle him myself. After Angelique complies, he insults Maggie a bit more. She reminds him sharply, This house is mine as much as it is yours. Then she actually orders him to get out and leave her alone. ("I am Mrs. De Winter now.") Your house? I wonder--and for how long? is his parting shot.
Angelique doesn’t just go quietly to her room. Bruno is in his cottage playing the only piece he seems to know when she arrives. After he gets over how much she looks like Angelique (again), he asks, What happened when you went to the police with Cyrus’s diary? But it turns out that she’s done no such thing. Angrily he demands, Why haven’t you called the police to tell them about Quentin? After all, you were willing to pay me five thousand dollars for Cyrus’s diary. She says, Now that it’s mine, I’ll decide when and who to call. I need absolute rock-solid proof that Quentin was the murderer. Cyrus wrote only that he discovered the hatpin in the back of Angelique’s neck after she was dead--not that he actually saw Quentin or anyone else put it there. You have to call the police! Bruno insists rather too violently, gripping her arms and shaking her. Never touch me again, Angelique warns him. She makes him have a brandy, then just to show she has no hard feelings, she tells him, You’re much too young to be sitting around bored like this (i.e., with no sex life to speak of, though of course they couldn’t say that on TV in 1970) when one of the female residents at Collinwood would welcome your attentions right about now. I heard her say this afternoon how attractive she thought Bruno was and wondering why he has made himself so scarce. It takes Bruno a little while but he finally figures out she means Maggie. She is much more innocent than she seems, Angelique assures him. Oh, Bruno, she laughs, what makes you so irresistible to Quentin’s wives? Bruno considers this seriously, then replies, I don’t know. I guess we have the same taste in women. Bruno goes to Collinwood in hopes of scoring, leaving Angelique at the cottage.
At 9:10, the innocent Maggie is pleasantly surprised to see Bruno. She’s glad of his company (at first). I’m spending too much time alone here, she tells him. He tells her quite a bit about how wonderful he is (almost in so many words). I admire your self-confidence, she says ruefully. I don’t have much myself. Roger walks by the doorway and decides to listen in. He’s just in time to hear Maggie say, I don’t have any talents. Bruno replies, Not even for loving? Maggie turns toward him in surprise, and he says, Oh, yes, you do. I can see it in your eyes. You not only have a talent but you have a need for someone who appreciates it. As Bruno grabs her, Maggie hears someone at the door and calls out Quentin’s name. But it’s only Roger, who tells her, You’re lucky it wasn’t your loving husband after all. Then he strolls off, chuckling. Maggie wants Bruno to go after Roger and tell him that nothing happened, but Bruno only says, Who cares what Roger thinks? and grabs for her again. This time she really screams and backs away.
Sometime later, a disgruntled Bruno returns to the cottage to report that he has struck out. Angelique tells him (1) he moved too fast; and (2) Roger ruined things anyway, and he probably can’t wait to tell Quentin. As with the rest of his problems, Bruno immediately blames Quentin and declares that he’ll call the police if she won’t. Angelique tries to get the phone away from him, but he shoves her aside rather rudely. However, this time she smiles with satisfaction as Bruno tells the police, “I need to report a murder.”.....
