A Guilty Thing Surprised: Part Two

Part two finds Wexford circling the answer without seeing it. The truth about Elizabeth Nightingale's death has been sitting in his hand for some time, which is the sort of thing that would keep most detectives up at night, and it does exactly that to him. What finally steers him onto the right path is not a dramatic confession or a lucky break but information from an old friend. The case starts to straighten out, and then Elizabeth's will arrives to tangle it all over again.

That will is the episode's real twist. Just as Wexford has a clearer picture of how she died, the legal aftermath of her life complicates everything about who benefited and who had reason to hurry her along. A will is a wonderful device for a murder story: it turns the dead woman's money into a map of everyone's resentments. Wexford now has two problems where he had one, and the second problem looks a good deal more personal than the first.

The regulars are all present and correct. George Baker's Wexford carries the burden of the near-miss, Christopher Ravenscroft's Burden stands by with the benefit of hindsight, and the Nightingale household reassembles around them: Michael Jayston's Quentin, Nigel Terry's Denys Villiers, Karen Meagher's Georgina, Ellis van Maarseveen as Katje Doorn, Padraig O'Loinsigh as Sean Lovell, David Swift's Lionel Marriott and Sandra Voe as Mrs Myrtle Cantrip, with Catherine Neilson's Elizabeth still looming over the enquiry from beyond the grave.

Ruth Rendell wrote the script herself this time, with Mary McMurray directing. The episode does the patient work of a middle chapter, rearranging what the audience thought it knew. The clue was always in Wexford's hand, and the will is the reason it mattered. Both facts will have consequences in the final part, and the hour ends with the case teetering on the edge of a proper conclusion.