The Mousetrap

PHILIP. (stubbing out his cigarette) I suppose I’m bitter. (He rises, moves to R of the desk and sits on the downstage corner of it) But it seems to me that you’ve come over here with the idea in your head that your mother was an injured innocent. That isn’t so. There’s Amyas’s side of it, too. He was your father, girl, and he loved life . . .

CARLA. I know. I know all that.

PHILIP. You’ve got to see this thing as it was. Caroline was no good. (He pauses) She poisoned her husband. And what I can’t forget, and never will forget, is that I could have saved him.

CARLA. How?

PHILIP. My brother Meredith had a strange hobby. He used to fiddle about with herbs and hemlock and stuff and Caroline had stolen one of his patent brews.

CARLA. How did you know that it was she who had taken it?

PHILIP. (grimly) I knew all right. And I was fool enough to hang about waiting to talk it over with Meredith. Why I hadn’t the sense to realize that Caroline wouldn’t wait, I can’t think. She’d pinched the stuff to use—and by God, she used it at the first opportunity.

CARLA. You can’t be sure it was she who took it.

PHILIP. My dear girl, she admitted taking it. Said she’d taken it to do away with herself.

CARLA. That’s possible, isn’t it?

PHILIP. Is it? (Caustically) Well, she didn’t do away with herself.

(CARLA shakes her head. There is a silence)

(He rises and makes an effort to resume a normal manner) Have a glass of sherry? (He moves below and L of the desk to the cupboard up L, takes out a decanter of sherry and a glass and puts them on the desk) Now, I suppose I’ve upset you? (He pours a glass of sherry)

CARLA. I’ve got to find out about things.

PHILIP. (crossing and handing the glass to Carla) There was a lot of sympathy for her at the trial, of course. (He moves behind the desk) Amyas behaved badly, I’ll admit, bringing the Greer girl down to Alderbury. (He replaces the decanter in the cupboard) And she was pretty insolent to Caroline.

CARLA. Did you like her?

PHILIP. (guardedly) Young Elsa? Not particularly. (He turns to the cupboard, takes out a bottle of whisky and a glass and puts them on the desk) She wasn’t my type, damnably attractive, of course. Predatory. Grasping at everything she wanted. (He pours whisky for himself) All the same, I think she’d have suited Amyas better than Caroline did. (He replaces the bottle in the cupboard)

CARLA. Weren’t my mother and father happy together?

PHILIP. (with a laugh) They never stopped having rows. His married life would have been one long hell if it hadn’t been for the way of escape his painting gave him. (He squirts soda into his drink and sits at the desk)

CARLA. How did he meet Elsa?

PHILIP. (vaguely) Some Chelsea party or other. (He smiles) Came along to me—told me he’d met a marvellous girl—absolutely different from any girl he’d met before. Well, I’d heard that often enough. He’d fall for a girl like a ton of bricks, and a month later, when you mentioned her, he’d stare at you and wonder who the hell you were talking about. But it didn’t turn out that way with Elsa. (He raises his glass) Good luck, m’dear. (He drinks)

(CARLA sips her sherry)

CARLA. She’s married now, isn’t she?

PHILIP. (dryly) She’s run through three husbands. A test pilot who crashed himself, some explorer chap whom she got bored with. She’s married now to old Lord Melksham, a dreamy peer who writes mystical poetry. I should say she’s about had him by now. (He drinks)

CARLA. Would she have gotten tired of my father, I wonder?

PHILIP. Who knows?

CARLA. I must meet her.

PHILIP. Can’t you let things go?

CARLA. (rising and putting her glass on the desk) No, I’ve got to understand.

PHILIP. (rising) Determined, aren’t you?

CARLA. Yes, I’m a fighter. But my mother—wasn’t.

(The intercom buzzes. CARLA turns and picks up her bag)

PHILIP. Where did you get that idea? Caroline was a terrific fighter. (He presses the switch. Into the intercom) Yes?