(MEREDITH looks at ELSA, who smiles triumphantly)
But all that doesn’t matter—what does matter is that I know now what made my mother behave so oddly at her trial.
(MISS WILLIAMS sits on the sofa at the left end)
I know what she was trying to hide. (She crosses above the stool to Justin) And I know just why she wiped those fingerprints off the bottle. Justin, do you know what I mean?
JUSTIN. I’m not quite sure.
CARLA. There’s only one person Caroline would have tried to shield—(she turns to Angela) you.
ANGELA. (sitting up) Me?
CARLA. (crossing to Angela) Yes. It’s all so clear. You’d played tricks on Amyas, you were angry with him—vindictive because you blamed him for sending you to school.
ANGELA. He was quite right.
CARLA. But you didn’t think so at the time. You were angry. It was you who went and fetched a bottle of beer for him, although it was my mother who took it to him. And, remember, you’d tampered with his beer once before. (She moves above the stool and kneels upon it) When Caroline found him dead with the beer bottle and glass beside him, all that flashed into her mind.
ANGELA. She thought I’d murdered him?
CARLA. She didn’t think you meant to. She thought you’d just played a trick, that you meant to make him sick, but that you had miscalculated the dose. Whatever you’d done, you’d killed him and she had to save you from the consequences. Oh, don’t you see, it all fits in? The way she got you hustled off to Switzerland, the pains she took to keep you from hearing about the arrest and the trial.
ANGELA. She must have been mad.
CARLA. She had a guilt complex about you, because of what she’d done to you as a child. So, in her way, she paid her debt.
ELSA. (rising and crossing below the stool to Angela) So, it was you.
ANGELA. Don’t be absurd. Of course it wasn’t. Do you mean to say you believe this ridiculous story?
CARLA. Caroline believed it.
JUSTIN. Yes, Caroline believed it. It explains so much.
ANGELA. (rising and crossing below the stool to Carla) And you, Carla? Do you believe it?
CARLA. (after a pause) No.
ANGELA. Ah! (She moves to the sofa and sits on it at the right end)
CARLA. But then, there’s no other solution.
(ELSA sits in the armchair L)
JUSTIN. Oh, yes, I think there might be. (He rises and crosses to LC) Tell me, Miss Williams, would it be natural or likely for Amyas Crale to have helped Angela by packing her clothes for her?
MISS WILLIAMS. Certainly not. He’d never dream of doing such a thing.
JUSTIN. And yet you, Mr. Philip Blake, overheard Amyas Crale say, “I’ll see to her packing.” I think you were wrong.
PHILIP. Now look here, Fogg, have you got the nerve to insinuate that I was lying?
(The LIGHTS dim to BLACK-OUT)
JUSTIN. I’m not insinuating anything. But let me remind you that the picture we now have is built up from remembered conversations.
(The spotlight comes up on Justin down L)
Memory is the only thread that hangs this picture together—it is a fragile thread and uncertain. I suggest one conversation we’ve heard about went quite differently. Let’s suppose it went something like this.
(The spotlight fades and after a moment the LIGHTS come up to reveal the house and terrace as it was sixteen years previously. CAROLINE is seated in the armchair R, and AMYAS is about to open the door up C to go out. Instead he turns towards Caroline)
AMYAS. I’ve told you, Caroline, I don’t want to discuss this.
CAROLINE. You didn’t want a scene until you’d finished your picture. That’s it, isn’t it?
(AMYAS crosses and leans over Caroline)
Oh, I understand you very well.
(AMYAS is about to kiss her)
(She rises quickly and crosses to L) And what you’re doing is monstrous. You’re going to treat this girl the same way as you’ve treated all the others. You were in love with her, but you’re not now. All you want is to string her along so that you can finish that picture.
AMYAS. (smiling) All right, then. That picture matters.
CAROLINE. So does she.
AMYAS. She’ll get over it.
CAROLINE. (partly pleading) Oh, you! You’ve got to tell her. Now—today. You can’t go on like this, it’s too cruel.
AMYAS. (crossing to Caroline) All right, I’ll send her packing. But the picture . . .
CAROLINE. Damn the picture! You and your women. You don’t deserve to live.
AMYAS. Caroline. (He tries to embrace her)
CAROLINE. I mean it. No, don’t touch me. (She crosses down R) It’s too cruel—it’s too cruel.
AMYAS. Caroline!
(CAROLINE exits down R. The LIGHTS dim to black-out. The spotlight comes up on Justin down L)
JUSTIN. Yes, that’s how that conversation went. Caroline pleaded, but not for herself. Philip Blake didn’t hear Amyas say, “I’ll see to her packing”—what he in fact heard was the voice of a dying man struggling to say, “I’ll send her packing.”
(The spotlight fades on Justin. The LIGHTS come up. Everyone is back in the same positions as they were before the BLACK-OUT)
A phrase he’d no doubt used before of other mistresses, but this time he spoke of you—(he turns to Elsa) didn’t he, Lady Melksham? The shock of that conversation was terrific, wasn’t it? And straight away you acted. You’d seen Caroline take that phial of conine the day before. You found it at once when you went upstairs for a pullover. You handled it carefully, filled an eye-dropper from it, came down again, and when Amyas asked you for beer, you poured it into the glass, added the conine, and brought the beer to him. You resumed your pose. You watched him as he drank. Watched him feel the first twinges, the stiffness of the limbs, and the slow paralysis of the speech. You sat there and watched him die. (He gestures to the portrait) That’s the portrait of a woman who watched the man she loved die.
(ELSA rises quickly and stands looking at the portrait)
And the man who painted it didn’t know what was happening to him. But it’s there, you know—in the eyes.
ELSA. (in a hard voice) He deserved to die. (She looks at Justin) You’re a clever man, Mr. Fogg. (She moves to the door up C and opens it) But there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it.
(ELSA exits up C. There is a stunned silence, then gradually everyone starts to speak together. CARLA goes on to the terrace and stands below the bench)
PHILIP. There—there must be something we can do.
MEREDITH. I can’t believe it, I simply can’t believe it.
ANGELA. (rising) It stares one in the face—how blind we’ve been.
PHILIP. What can we do, Fogg—what the hell can we do?
JUSTIN. In law, I’m afraid, nothing.
PHILIP. Nothing—what do you mean—nothing? (He goes to the door up C) Why the woman practically admitted . . . I’m not so sure you’re right about that.
(PHILIP exits up C)
ANGELA. (moving to the door up C) It’s ridiculous, but true.
(ANGELA exits up C)
MISS WILLIAMS. (moving to the door up C) It’s incredible, it’s incredible! I can’t believe it.
(MISS WILLIAMS exits up C. PHILIP re-enters up C)
PHILIP. (to Justin) I’m not so sure you’re right about that. I’ll get my fellow on to it in the morning.
(PHILIP exits up C)
MEREDITH. (moving to the door up C) Elsa of all people, it seems absolutely impossible. Caroline’s dead, Amyas is dead, there’s no one to bear witness—(he turns in the doorway) is there?
(MEREDITH shakes his head and exits up C. The babel dies down. CARLA sits on the upstage end of the bench. JUSTIN looks out of the french windows for a moment at Carla, then goes on to the terrace.)
JUSTIN. What do you want done, Carla?
CARLA. (quietly) Nothing. She’s been sentenced already, hasn’t she?
>
JUSTIN. (puzzled) Sentenced?
CARLA. To life imprisonment—inside herself. (She looks at him) Thank you.
JUSTIN. (crossing above the bench to L; embarrassed) You’ll go back to Canada, now, and get married. There’s no legal proof, of course, but we can satisfy your Jeff. (He crosses below Carla to C and looks at his notes)
CARLA. We don’t need to satisfy him. I’m not going to marry him. I’ve already told him so.
JUSTIN. (looking up) But—why?
CARLA. (thoughtfully) I think I’ve—well—grown out of him. And I’m not going back to Canada. After all, I do belong here.
JUSTIN. You may be—lonely.
CARLA. (with a mischievous smile) Not if I marry an English husband. (Gravely) Now, if I could induce you to fall in love with me . . .
JUSTIN. (turning to her) Induce me? Why the devil do you think I’ve done all this?
CARLA. (rising) You’ve been mixing me up with my mother. But I’m Amyas’ daughter, too. I’ve got a lot of the devil in me. I want you to be in love with me.
JUSTIN. Don’t worry. (He smiles, moves to her and takes her in his arms)
CARLA. (laughing) I don’t.
(They kiss. MEREDITH enters up C)
MEREDITH. (as he enters) May I suggest a drink at my house before . . . (He realizes the room is empty, goes to the french windows and looks out) Oh! (He smiles) My word!
MEREDITH exits up C and the LIGHTS dim to BLACK-OUT as—
the CURTAIN falls
About the Author
Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. Her books have sold more than a billion copies in English and another billion in a hundred foreign languages. She is the author of eighty crime novels and short-story collections, nineteen plays, two memoirs, and six novels written under the name Mary Westmacott.
She first tried her hand at detective fiction while working in a hospital dispensary during World War I, creating the now legendary Hercule Poirot with her debut novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles. With The Murder in the Vicarage, published in 1930, she introduced another beloved sleuth, Miss Jane Marple. Additional series characters include the husband-and-wife crime-fighting team of Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, private investigator Parker Pyne, and Scotland Yard detectives Superintendent Battle and Inspector Japp.
Many of Christie’s novels and short stories were adapted into plays, films, and television series. The Mousetrap, her most famous play of all, opened in 1952 and is the longest-running play in history. Among her best-known film adaptations are Murder on the Orient Express (1974) and Death on the Nile (1978), with Albert Finney and Peter Ustinov playing Hercule Poirot, respectively. On the small screen Poirot has been most memorably portrayed by David Suchet, and Miss Marple by Joan Hickson and subsequently Geraldine McEwan and Julia McKenzie.
Christie was first married to Archibald Christie and then to archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan, whom she accompanied on expeditions to countries that would also serve as the settings for many of her novels. In 1971 she achieved one of Britain’s highest honors when she was made a Dame of the British Empire. She died in 1976 at the age of eighty-five. Her one hundred and twentieth anniversary was celebrated around the world in 2010.
www.AgathaChristie.com
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The Agatha Christie Collection
The Man in the Brown Suit
The Secret of Chimneys
The Seven Dials Mystery
The Mysterious Mr. Quin
The Sittaford Mystery
Parker Pyne Investigates
Why Didn’t They Ask Evans?
Murder Is Easy
The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories
And Then There Were None
Towards Zero
Death Comes as the End
Sparkling Cyanide
The Witness for the Prosecution and Other Stories
Crooked House
Three Blind Mice and Other Stories
They Came to Baghdad
Destination Unknown
Ordeal by Innocence
Double Sin and Other Stories
The Pale Horse
Star over Bethlehem: Poems and Holiday Stories
Endless Night
Passenger to Frankfurt
The Golden Ball and Other Stories
The Mousetrap and Other Plays
The Harlequin Tea Set and Other Stories
The Hercule Poirot Mysteries
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
The Murder on the Links
Poirot Investigates
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Big Four
The Mystery of the Blue Train
Peril at End House
Lord Edgware Dies
Murder on the Orient Express
Three Act Tragedy
Death in the Clouds
The A.B.C. Murders
Murder in Mesopotamia
Cards on the Table
Murder in the Mews
Dumb Witness
Death on the Nile
Appointment with Death
Hercule Poirot’s Christmas
Sad Cypress
One, Two, Buckle My Shoe
Evil Under the Sun
Five Little Pigs
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Taken at the Flood
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Mrs. McGinty’s Dead
After the Funeral
Hickory Dickory Dock
Dead Man’s Folly
Cat Among the Pigeons
The Clocks
Third Girl
Hallowe’en Party
Elephants Can Remember
Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case
The Miss Marple Mysteries
The Murder at the Vicarage
The Body in the Library
The Moving Finger
A Murder Is Announced
They Do It with Mirrors
A Pocket Full of Rye
4:50 from Paddington
The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side
A Caribbean Mystery
At Bertram’s Hotel
Nemesis
Sleeping Murder
Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories
The Tommy and Tuppence Mysteries
The Secret Adversary
Partners in Crime
N or M?
By the Pricking of My Thumbs
Postern of Fate
Memoirs
An Autobiography
Come, Tell Me How You Live
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
AGATHA CHRISTIE® THE MOUSETRAP AND OTHER PLAYS™. Copyright © 1993 Agatha Christie Limited. All rights reserved.
THE MOUSETRAP AND OTHER PLAYS © 1993. Published by permission of G.P. Putnam’s Sons, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST WILLIAM MORROW TRADE PAPERBACK PUBLISHED 2012.
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Epub Edition © NOVEMBER 2012 ISBN: 9780062244031
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Agatha Christie, The Mousetrap and Other Plays
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