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Hetty Wainthropp Investigates Season 1 Episodes
Season 1 Episode Guide
6 Episodes 1996 - 1996
Episode 1
The Bearded Lady
Tue, Jan 2, 199674 mins
Sextegenarian Hetty Wainthropp lives alone with her husband Robert but is frustrated that she is three years short of a pension for herself. When she catches Geoffrey, a young teenage runaway shoplifting, she tries to rehabilitate him by making him her assistant in her fledgling detective agency, a role she feels she was born to play. She suspects a young homeless couple have been cashing the pension checks of an elderly woman whom they say is too ill to do it herself. Armed with her first case, she enlists Geoff's help in discovering the woman is dead from a fractured skull inside her apartment... locked from the outside. When an inquest rules it an accident the detective duo pursue the matter despite interference from a mysterious outside source.
Episode 2
Eye Witness
49 mins
While birdwatching, Malcolm Stone sees a blond beauty murdered and sent over a cliff in a car. The killer sees him, captures him and tries to convince him he would not be believed (especially as the killer is a police officer). Malcolm escapes from him and then is recaptured. The Stones contact Hetty to find him, explaining Malcolm is deaf and mute but can lipread well. The officer holds him captive, treating him well but tied up; one of his children sees a light in the barn where he is holding Malcolm. Hetty gets cooperation from the local police, including the sergeant that killed Lynn Horrocks who is called in to assist her. When the sergeant's children accidentally set the barn on fire, the true mettle of the officer is revealed.
Episode 3
Fingers
49 mins
While on holiday in Italy, Hetty is hired by the owners of a hotel, a boy's parents who have been receiving fingers with notes demanding ransom. They believe it is the Mafia. Hetty discovers Gianni has run up gambling debts which have been mysteriously paid; she is suspicious of his roommate. Gianni's sister brings the ransom but is informed his body has been found--with its eyes (and little fingers) missing. Geoffrey, Hetty's young associate, traces Gianni's roommate to a mortuary, and she deduces it is part of a scheme to provide body parts for transplants.
Episode 4
Widdershins
49 mins
Hetty's husband Robert gets news that his boyhood hero (Uncle Albert) has committed suicide. Unable to believe it, he persuades Hetty to go with him to Readsby to investigate, leaving Geoffrey to house-sit. A nutty neighbour (Loony Lotty), a book on witchcraft, a missing gold medal and "a smell of death in the village" are part of the mystery Hetty must solve. On Walpurgis Night, she interrupts a Satanic sacrifice ... or is it? Who is behind the death of Uncle Albert; was it suicide after all?
Episode 5
A High Profile
49 mins
A worried mother of a missing schizophrenic son, who is off his medication, hires Hetty to find him. One of his pen pals shares a poem he wrote; the mother fires Hetty and pursues a clue from the poem herself. Her husband, the stepfather, agrees to continue paying Hetty to find Michael. Tracing him to the place where he was happy as a child, knowing he is now delusional and depressed, Hetty and his mother try to find Michael before he crashes.
Episode 6
Safe as Houses
50 mins
A troubled teenage mother abandons her baby at a railway station, and Hetty is hired to find her. Chrissie's foster mother, who turns out to be Hetty's music-hall partner when they were young, explains that Chrissie might be setting fires (which is her real reason for seeking help). To make ends meet, Robert gets a job at a market and Geoffrey lets a photographer use him to enter a contest. Two pictures: one taken at a fire of a man in drag, and one of a grave, prompt Geoffrey to disguise himself - blonde wig, heels and all - to confront the arsonist. A hefty reward was offered for sussing the culprit and Hetty succeeds. After she receives the check, the old soft-shoe routine resurfaces.
