Dagger of the Mind story

columbo1971e2x04 · 1972-11-26

When Sir Roger Haversham realizes that actors Nicholas Frame and his wife, Lillian Stanhope, have manipulated him into backing their theater production, he confronts the couple, and is accidentally killed during the ensuing scuffle. The pair cover up the killing by stuffing the body into a trunk, taking it home to his estate, and staging an apparent fall down the stairs. Columbo is visiting London to study British police techniques as the guest of Scotland Yard Detective Chief Superintendent William Durk, who is called to investigate the incident. Miss Dudley, an attractive young understudy Frame has his eye on, is intensely disliked by Stanhope. Haversham's butler covers for the couple but later tries to blackmail them and is murdered by Frame. The theater doorman comes into possession of the dead man's umbrella, which becomes vital to the resolution of the case. Final clue/twist: Columbo engineers a situation whereby, before witnesses, they search the dead man’s closed umbrella, on exhibit in a wax museum, for a pearl from Lillian Stanhope's broken necklace. According to Columbo this could only have gotten there during the killing. When the umbrella is opened and a pearl is revealed, the increasingly unstable Frame starts babbling, and Stanhope, now overwhelmed, confesses to how they killed Sir Roger. (Columbo had, however, used his childhood marble-playing skills to shoot the pearl into the umbrella moments before it was opened.) The first of several episodes to feature locations outside the United States, it was filmed in both London and Hollywood. Although scenes with Wilfrid Hyde- White were set in London, due to the actor's tax problems all his character's scenes were filmed in California. Directed by: Richard Quine. Story by: Richard Levinson, William Link, Jackson Gillis.