Episode 93: Strange Attraction

Wednesday, November 2, 1966

My name is Victoria Winters. Today for the first time, I am away from the ghost-ridden mansion sitting on the crest of Widow’s Hill, and my absence has created more tension than my presence ever did.

Liz receives a phone call from Mr. Garner, telling her about the list Vicki found. 

She tells Roger that Vicki is in Bangor with Burke Devlin.

She says Burke is trying to undermine the whole family. “David insists he’s his best friend, Carolyn’s halfway in love with him—and now Vicki.”

Roger wonders if Vicki and Burke could have planned this and pretended it was an accidental meeting in the restaurant. (A bit off the track here. Look to Carolyn for that.)

“Even if she talks, what could she tell him?” Roger asks.

“I should think you’d be more worried about that than me.” Liz suggests Burke might convince Vicki she was wrong about what time Roger left the house that night.

Or maybe there is something else she could tell him?

Roger says he can’t think of a thing. He asks if Liz still thinks he was involved in that tragedy. She says no, of course not. Roger wants to know why Vicki decided to stay. She says David begged her to. Roger decides to go talk to David. “I’ve always thought there was something a little wrong about David—I didn’t think he was an idiot.”

As he starts up the stairs, Carolyn, coming down, bumps into him. She says her mind was on Vicki being in Bangor with Burke. Of course, she doesn’t care what Burke does. It’s just that she saw what he tried to do to Roger and what he’s trying to do to Liz. (Just family loyalty, right, Carolyn?)

She agrees that it’s strange David begged Vicki to stay (“Almost as strange as the attraction between Vicki and Burke”—ugh, Carolyn, just, ugh).

Roger finds David drawing a picture of Mr. Malloy’s ghost—what he thinks it looks like, based on Vicki’s description. He never wanted Vicki to go as much as Roger did anyway, he says. If Vicki stays, the ghost might come back, but if she leaves, the ghost might leave too. “And I want to see it.” He thinks the ghost appeared to Vicki because she must know something about the way he died.

Somebody killed him. Somebody in Collinsport. If the ghost comes back, he might tell her who. “He might even tell her you killed him.”

Roger slaps David, who runs away. Roger runs after, calling his name.

Carolyn claims she’d be happy if she never saw Burke again. Liz says it wasn’t that long ago that she said that about Joe Haskell.

“That was different.”

“It always is.”

David comes running in and tells Liz that Roger hit him.

“David, why do you act so silly? Uncle Roger would never hit you,” Carolyn says.

“He did, I tell you, he did!”

“Yes, and I’ll do it again if you don’t stop this nonsense about ghosts.”

Liz asks Roger to leave them alone. Carolyn stays.

David says Roger was mad because he was talking about Bill Malloy’s ghost. “He hit me, really, he did, Aunt Elizabeth.”

“I think he made the whole thing,” Carolyn says, which is pretty ridiculous considering Roger just admitted it in front of her.

David says he thought Roger changed his mind, but he still hates David. (Also illogical; if he wanted to keep on good terms with Roger, accusing him of murder wasn’t the way to go.) 

It doesn’t matter, though, because David still hates him and wishes he were dead. Liz takes him up to his room to calm down.

Carolyn calls the Collinsport Inn asking for Burke. 

He’s not back yet. She declines to leave a message and hammerfists the couch.

Liz returns. She says David’s calmed down. Carolyn says she isn’t. She tells her mother that she called the inn to find out if Burke was back.

“I thought you said it didn’t make any difference to you what he did.”

“I—I wasn’t calling because of him. I wanted to see what Vicki was up to.” (Grasping at straws): “You notice she’s not back yet either.”

“Well, she said she’d be gone a couple of days; that shouldn’t be any surprise to you.”

“Oh, it isn’t. Nothing she did would be a surprise to me now.”

“Carolyn, you mustn’t jump to conclusions.”

“What other conclusion could you possibly draw?”

“Unfortunately, Burke does have business in Bangor.”

“So does Vicki,” Carolyn says venomously.

Liz asks what Carolyn means.

“She made me promise not to tell—but then, I didn’t know she was gonna get so chummy with Burke.” Carolyn tells Liz about the ledger and why Vicki went to see the Garners. (Didn’t Garner already tell her this?)

Liz says Betty Hanscomb (the butler’s daughter or niece) didn’t look anything like Vicki. She wonders why Vicki didn’t ask her.

“Would you have told her anything?”

Liz says there wasn’t much she could have told her.

Carolyn says it wasn’t a wasted trip for Vicki, as she got to spend all that time with Burke.

“Carolyn, this is becoming an obsession with you. You’ve got to forget him.”

Carolyn says she tries. One minute she’s sure she never wants to see him again, and she hates him, and the next she’s trying to get him on the phone.

Liz tells Carolyn that her father only loved the Collins money. There was a man Liz loved very much. Carolyn guess Bill Malloy, but it’s Ned Calder. She kept him dangling too long. Joe Haskell reminds her of Ned. 

Carolyn agrees that she takes Joe for granted.

Liz says, “Whatever Joe feels for you—”

“He loves me.”

“Then don’t treat it lightly. It’s far too important to be dismissed on impulse.”

Carolyn decides to call Joe. Liz warns her there might come a time when he won’t be available. Carolyn says he wasn’t available recently, when he had a date with Maggie Evans. “I don’t know if I forgive him or not.” (Are you kidding?)

“Mightn’t it be the other way around?” Liz asks.

Carolyn is so happy about her date with Joe that she hugs Roger and says, “Isn’t everything just wonderful?” (I’m surprised it never turned out that Carolyn has multiple personalities.)

Roger tells Liz she needs to get rid of Vicki. She causes tension even when she isn’t there. Roger thinks there’s a logical reason (so now he doesn’t  believe in ghosts?) for the Bill Malloy’s ghost thing. And another thing, Liz should sell the house—maybe to Burke Devlin.

Liz doesn’t plan to do that. She is going to spend the rest of her life in Collinwood.

What if he left? That’s up to him. What if he takes David with him?

“That’s an empty threat. You love money much more than you love David.”

He wants to know what’s between her and Vicki Winters.

She’s just an orphan girl Liz hired.

How does she know Burke hasn’t arranged this all, and Vicki isn’t telling him everything right now?

“I don’t know, but I do that Vicki can’t tell Burke anything that I wouldn’t tell him myself. Can you say the same?”

       Cast, In Order of Appearance

Victoria Winters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Alexandra Moltke

Elizabeth Collins Stoddard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  Joan Bennett

Roger Collins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Louis Edmonds

Carolyn Stoddard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nancy Barrett

David Collins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . David Henesy

Fashion by Ohrbach’s

Directed by John Sedwick

Written by Francis Swann