Magpie Murders, Episode 5

The opening returns to Alan's writing class, where an unwelcome question about his work earns a student's place in his fiction. Brent the gardener is another portrait with a spiteful origin. In the village investigation, Whiteley's past comes to light: he is a former thief living under a changed name. The brooch did not come from an innocent market purchase, but from Brent.

Brent says he found pieces of silver near the lake after the break-in. Pünd has the lake searched, and the rest of the missing collection is recovered. Throwing away valuable objects makes little sense if profit was the burglar's aim. The apparent theft begins to look like cover for a different search inside Pye Hall.

At Mary's cottage, Pünd and Fraser find a notebook recording the village's secrets. Her sewing room also contains a dog's collar and overlooks the lake. The notebook points towards Clarissa as the author of the Dingle Dell threat. Her typewriter helps support the connection. She acknowledges the letter, but insists the outcome has at least saved the meadow from development.

Pünd also asks the vicar about Mary's funeral and the words of his sermon. Lady Pye's affair supplies another secret recorded by the housekeeper. She says she telephoned Mary on the morning of the fatal fall. Leaving Pye Hall, Pünd tells Fraser that Lady Pye caused Mary's death, an assertion whose precise meaning must wait for the final explanation.

Susan returns to Abbey Grange after James remembers the manuscript that disappeared during Claire's visit. Claire finally admits taking it and burning it, furious at Alan's caricature of her. She did not finish reading it first. The loss is painful because Susan has reached the right person without recovering the thing she needs. Claire's account also reveals how she helped Alan with police contacts and received little gratitude.

The photograph of Andreas and Alan on the tower drives Susan to confront Andreas at school. He admits visiting Alan to ask for investment in the Cretan hotel. His explanation involves a lie about his movements, but a different purpose from the one Susan fears. Alan initially resisted, then agreed after learning of Andreas's relationship with Susan. The pictured gesture was gratitude, not an attack. Susan remains wounded by the secrecy and uneasy about Alan's motives for the loan. The apparent answer has exposed a concealed arrangement without yet explaining who killed the writer.

The two investigations have both exposed a deception, but neither deception alone supplies the murderer’s name.

• The book photographs Alan with his neighbour, not Andreas.
• The television Claire burns a manuscript she has stolen.
• Brent’s writing-class counterpart is created for the adaptation.

The altered photograph changes the emotional direction of Susan’s enquiry. A visual clue now bears on the person she might leave London with, placing the investigation and their plans for Crete under pressure at the same time. The writing-class material also dramatises the path from a real encounter to a fictional insult. Viewers see the act of borrowing, rather than only being told that it has happened.