The Talking Doll

Julie Brent is having a bad year. Her business has been damaged by fire, her husband Alfie, a fence of long standing, is dead, and now the people who really own the place are offering her a deal, on their terms, take it or leave it. Julie's answer is to play them off against the police, keeping Watt and his team at arm's length while she hunts for some bargaining power of her own.

Wanda Ventham gives Julie a stubborn, wary intelligence that keeps the whole episode on its toes. She is the kind of widow the task force recognises: far from innocent, and no pushover. Michael Hawkins' James Ramsgill and George Pravda's Francis Dale represent the people doing the pushing, with Antony Carrick's Bradley and Anton Phillips' Shaw hovering at the edges, and the negotiations have the sour, careful quality of a sale nobody wants to attend. Even the van driver has a part to play, courtesy of Robert Oates. There is a whole world in the phrase "the people who really own it", and the episode lets it stay half-lit. Julie's wariness is well earned, and the script gives Ventham the room to show the cost of it in every careful answer she gives.

The police keep a steady presence throughout. Frank Windsor's Watt, David Lloyd Meredith's Evans, Nigel Humphreys' Dodds and Malcolm Rennie's Perry are never quite out of frame, and the point is made without shouting: whatever deal Julie makes, she will make it under official eyes.

Robert Barr and Elwyn Jones wrote it, Andrew Morgan directed. The title, The Talking Doll, is a puzzle the available plot summary declines to answer, which is part of the charm. But what the episode does give you is a woman fighting for what she built in a world where the men holding the money have all the cards. It is a small, bitter story, and Ventham carries it beautifully.