Wolf to the Slaughter: Part Two

Part two keeps the questions in the air and adds almost nothing in the way of answers, which is its job. Who is Ann? Who is Geoff Smith? And who wrote the letter that set Wexford off in the first place? The team is no nearer solving any of it. The episode's own logic is blunt about this: if the missing girl's body were found, things would become clearer. Where to begin?

The hour is spent gathering evidence and turning over what little of it exists. That makes for a quiet instalment, the sort that rewards attention rather than demanding it. Wexford and Burden work the edges of the case, moving among Ruby Branch, Monkey Matthews, the Kirkpatricks and Russell Cawthorne, while the central mystery sits stubbornly unresolved. There is a real pleasure in watching a police procedural refuse to rush. Most television would have handed out a confession by now; this one trusts the audience to wait.

The cast settles into its rhythm. George Baker and Christopher Ravenscroft carry the investigation between them, Carmel McSharry and Russell Hunter supply the local colour, and Kim Thomson's Linda Grover keeps turning up in the frame. Donald Hewlett's Russell Cawthorne is the newcomer to keep an eye on, with Christopher Ellison and Stephanie Fayerman as Mr and Mrs Kirkpatrick. Robert Reynolds' Mark Drayton and Louie Ramsay's Dora Wexford complete the familiar faces.

Ruth Rendell and Clive Exton share the writing credit, and John Davies directs. The pace is deliberate to the point of stubbornness, and it works. Every episode of this story has to earn its keep on its own, and this one earns it the hard way: by promising that the pieces will eventually fit, and making the viewer do the fitting. By the end you are less frustrated than intrigued, which is precisely the trick a middle chapter needs to pull.