Murder Mystery Play
Death at the Granby Arms (Valentine's Day Version)
John McDermott (1999)
(8,939 words - including Dramatis Personae)
3 male characters; 3 female characters
Set in an old coaching inn in the town of Leddington, this mystery features Aubrey Fox, a local businessman who has seemingly set his heart on taking over the whole town. Part of his empire is to be the recently acquired Granby Arms which hitherto had been run as a pub, but which is to be converted into a hotel. Profit is the sole purpose behind the purchase, so the threat to the livelihood of the two sisters working there is of no concern to Foxy. Beattie Cable and her sister Margaret are both employed behind the bar at the pub. Beattie has worked there for 18 years and Margaret, ten years her junior, just two.
Beattie helped to bring Margaret up after their mother had walked out on the family when Margaret was just a few months old. Despite the strong bond between the two sisters, they are quite different in character, Beattie being serious-minded and Margaret the more relaxed, with a dry sense of humour. Others who have a motive for murdering Foxy are Denis Johnson and his fiancee Carol Marshall. Denis is owed over £8,000 by Foxy for all the electrical work he has done at the Granby. Foxy's initial 'take it or leave it' offer of a paltry £500 merely fuels Denis's anger; could it be that Aubrey is deliberately trying to put Dennis out of business so that he can make yet another profitable acquisition?
Or could it be that Foxy intends to harm Denis in another way, by revealing that he is the father of fiancee Carol's three-year old son Robbie, and that he intends to take a very active role in the decision-making process connected with the child's upbringing? Carol has always told Denis that Robbie's father died in a road traffic accident. Could she bear him to discover the truth just when they had made plans for their nuptials? But, of course, the cast would not be complete without the presence of a member of the constabulary, or, at least, an ex-policeman in the form of George Walmsley, now working for Leddington Security, a firm which is now part of the burgeoning Fox empire.
And we all know, by now, that Foxy would not think twice about making the ex-copper redundant. In fact, nothing would give him greater pleasure. Sadly for him, and happily for the rest of us, he never gets the chance.
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| Music - play lengths | |
| Opening | 00:43 seconds |
| Play Out | 00:12 seconds |
| No sound effects are required for this play. | |
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