Crooked House

Episode 1

The Wainscoting

Ben, a young teacher, finds an antique door-knocker in his garden and takes it to the local museum, whose curator explains that it is from a Tudor mansion, now demolished, called Geap Manor, whose original owner, Sir Roger Widdowson, was accused of Satanism in his efforts to produce an heir but died childless. In the eighteenth century the house is bought by a greedy parvenu called Bloxham, who has made his money at the expense of others and is accused by his late business partner's widow of driving her husband to his death. Bloxham hears noises in the wainscoting of the house and believes that they are made by mice but the wood is, in fact, the same wood that was used to build the gallows at Tyburn in London, where criminals were hung, and Bloxham's actions have been criminal, and he will be made to pay for them.