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BBC Radio 4: Midweek Theatre
Broadcast: Wednesday 6th May 1970 @ 8:00 p.m.
Lawrence Onslow, now in his late fifties, has recently retired after selling off his successful gunsmith business for quite a bit of money, but his quiet retirement is short-lived. In the wee hours of the morning, Lawrence has put in a call from his home to the local Trimingham Central Police Station to report that he has just killed an intruder in his home. A tired and irritable Detective-Superintendent Haskill soon arrives to question Lawrence on what happened.
It seems Lawrence was alone in the house that evening as his wife and teenage daughter went off to their holiday bungalow in Mullhampton (about two hours away by car) earlier that afternoon. Though living in a very large home, the Onslows had no servants, but do have a daily, plus a gardener and, until a couple of months ago, a chauffeur/handyman. Just before midnight, some twenty minutes after falling asleep, Lawrence was awakened by a noise that he believed came from downstairs. Going down to investigate, he turned on the light-switch by the door as he entered the drawing room to find a man, with a scarf covering the lower part of his face, standing in front of the open safe where he kept £15,000 worth of jewelry.
After an initial scuffle which left him dazed by his desk and the burglar back at the safe, he remembered the .32 revolver he kept in the top drawer of the desk. He just got his hand on the gun when the burglar saw what he was doing and rushed him, grabbing his wrist - the one holding the gun. It went off. He had no intention of shooting him - why should he? The thief collapsed to the floor, dead from a gunshot to the chest.
Lawrence reached down and pulled the scarf from his face and was surprised that he knew the thief - it was Geoffrey Luker, their former chauffeur and handyman. Onslow fired the untruthful and unreliable 25-year-old a couple of months earlier after finding some money, about £40, missing though he could not prove Luker stole it. He's had no contact with him since.
Further questioning has left Haskill incredulous as to the answers he has received from Lawrence.
He's been told by Lawrence that the revolver he kept in the drawer was for his wife's protection because one night, when she was home alone, she was awakened by prowlers outside their house. But why keep it downstairs in the drawing room and not in her bedroom where she could get at it easily? For a man who spent all his working life manufacturing firearms, why would Lawrence leave a revolver in an accessible place without the safety catch on? Why was there no sign of forced entry and how was the thief able to open up the safe, a noted 'thief-proof' safe, so quickly? Finally, why was the thief wearing a Crintex brand of rubber gloves a size too small?
Detective-Superintendent Haskill feels the Onslows have a skeleton in their cupboard and he is determined that it shall be revealed.
With William Lucas [Detective-Superintendent Haskill, 45-years-old], Geoffrey Larder [Police Constable Fisher], Brian Kent [Lawrence Onslow, a Wealthy Man in His Late Fifties], George Woolley [Detective-Sergeant Wiggins, 55-years-old], Eileen Barry [Mrs. Warrinder, a Woman with Whom Geoffrey Luker had an Affair], Gillian Brown [PBX Operator], Peggy Hughes [Mrs. Luker, Geoffrey's Mother], and Ursula O'Leary [Janet Onslow, Lawrence's Wife].
Produced by Anthony Cornish in Birmingham
Re-broadcast on BBC Radio 4: Afternoon Theatre on Thursday 7th May 1970 @ 3:00 p.m.
Size: 41,354 kb kbps: 128 kHz: 44 Time: 44 min. 6 sec. (Mono)
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