The Mousetrap

JUSTIN. (crossing downL) Yes, sir, she does.

MEREDITH. Going over them will be painful—and quite unprofitable. Better let the whole thing rest. You’re young and pretty and engaged to be married and that’s all that really matters.

(JUSTIN sees CARLA searching in her bag, takes out his cigarette case and offers it to her, MEREDITH takes a snuff-box from his waistcoat pocket)

JUSTIN. (to Carla) You looking for one of these?

MEREDITH. (offering the snuff-box to Carla) Have a pinch of . . . No, I don’t suppose you do, but I’ll . . . (He offers the box to Justin) Oh, will you?

(JUSTIN declines. CARLA takes a cigarette from JUSTIN who also takes one)

CARLA. I’ve asked your brother Philip, you know. (She puts her bag on the stool)

(JUSTIN lights the cigarettes with his lighter)

MEREDITH. Oh—Philip! You wouldn’t get much from him. Philip’s a busy man. So busy making money, that he hasn’t time for anything else. If he did remember anything, he’d remember it all wrong. (He sniffs the snuff)

CARLA. (sitting on the settee at the upstage end) Then you tell me.

(JUSTIN sits on the settee at the downstage end)

MEREDITH. (guardedly) Well—you’d have to understand a bit about your father—first.

CARLA. (matter-of-fact) He had affairs with other women and made my mother very unhappy.

MEREDITH. Well—er—yes—(he sniffs) but these affairs of his weren’t really important until Elsa came along.

CARLA. He was painting her?

MEREDITH. Yes, my word—(he sniffs) I can see her now. Sitting on the terrace where she posed. Dark—er—shorts and a yellow shirt. “Portrait of a girl in a yellow shirt”, that’s what he was going to call it. It was one of the best things Amyas ever did. (He puts his snuff-box in his pocket)

CARLA. What happened to the picture?

MEREDITH. I’ve got it. I bought it with the furniture. I bought the house, too. Alderbury. It adjoins my property, you know. I didn’t want it turned into a building estate. Everything was sold by the executors and the proceeds put in trust for you. But you know that, I expect.

CARLA. I didn’t know you’d bought the house.

MEREDITH. Well, I did. It’s let to a Youth Hostel. But I keep one wing just as it was, for myself. I sold off most of the furniture . . .

CARLA. But you kept the picture. Why?

MEREDITH. (as though defending himself) I tell you, it was the best thing Amyas ever did. My word, yes! It goes to the nation when I die. (He pauses)

(CARLA stares at Meredith)

Well, I’ll try to tell you what you want to know. Amyas brought Elsa down there—ostensibly because he was painting her. She hated the pretence. She—she was so wildly in love with him and wanted to have it out with Caroline then and there. She felt in a false position. I—I understood her point of view.

CARLA. (coldly) You sound most sympathetic towards her.

MEREDITH. (horrified) Not at all. My sympathies were all with Caroline. I’d always been—well, in love with Caroline. I asked her to marry me—but she married Amyas instead. Oh, I can understand it—he was a brilliant person and very attractive to women, but he didn’t look after her the way I’d have looked after her. I remained her friend.

CARLA. And yet you believe she committed murder?

MEREDITH. She didn’t really know what she was doing. There was a terrific scene—she was overwrought . . .

CARLA. Yes?

MEREDITH. And that same afternoon she took the conine from my laboratory. But I swear there was no thought of murder in her mind when she took it—she had some idea of—of—doing away with herself.

CARLA. But as your brother Philip said, “She didn’t do away with herself.”

MEREDITH. Things always look better the next morning. And there was a lot of fuss going on, getting Angela’s things ready for school—that was Angela Warren, Caroline’s half-sister. She was a real little devil, always scrapping with someone, or playing tricks. She and Amyas were forever fighting, but he was very fond of her—and Caroline adored her.

CARLA. (quickly) After once trying to kill her?

MEREDITH. (looking at Carla; quickly) I’ve always been sure that that story was grossly exaggerated. Most children are jealous of the new baby.