The Mistress is dead - again - and everyone is suspect. Detective Rupe Godfrey, new to the police force, has his hands full and his patience tested as he questions the servants in this wealthy English manor.
First up is the maid, Claudia, who claims innocence because she "had to go to the loo." And it wasn't just any trip; it lasted about an hour and three quarters. Something about the spinach pie served at dinner. Something about every time cook serves the spinach pie, Claudia winds up in the loo - and the mistress winds up dead.
Next to be questioned, of course, is the butler, Philip Rounder, who claims he didn't do it because he spent the evening consigned to the privy. This is not to be confused with the loo, as it's on the other end of the premises.
He, too, blames the spinach pie, but then, he notes, when the cook Stash Brindley serves up a meal, it's lucky that there are any survivors at all.
Perhaps, Rupe suggests, it is the spinach that's the suspect, so he brings in the cook to question him about the recipe and his possible role in the death of the mistress. Stash, though filthy, disgusting, and low class, is certainly not about to reveal his prized recipe, and even more so, the secret ingredient that gives it its special flavor that makes people eat a lot more of it than is healthy.
Is Stash somehow involved in this "murder by spinach?" Is he in collusion with the master of the house? Everyone has a reason for wanting the mistress out of the way, including Stash, who was most annoyed at her constantly nagging him for hot cocoa at 3 AM.
And what of the master? Is he in on this at all? Well of course not, he protests, since he was involved in an affair with Petunia Wildflower, the gardner-slash-chauffer, at the very moment of his wife's wrenching death. "Of course I didn't know she was dead," he says, "Or I'd have enjoyed it a heck of a lot more." Petunia, a brazen hussy from New York who "has the passion you just can't find in a woman of class," has a problem of incriminating someone each and every time she opens her mouth.
But it's too late for the perpetrator of this dastardly deed to get away unscathed. Rupe has done some digging of his own and discovered that the lady of the house was indeed extremely allergic to the exact mix of ingredients that go into the spinach pie - and, that some members of the household knew this in advance.
Much more comedy than mystery, Recipe For Murder has fun with the stereotypes of the traditional English murder mystery.
The play is published by Brooklyn Publishers, who has available a slightly re-written version of the first conversation between Rupe and Claudia for schools involved in competitive drama, however, the playwright still retains any rights of production.
