Episode 294, scene 2.
17:45
Courtroom of Judge Irwin A. Chester. Present are Elliot Carson,
Dr. Michael Rossi, Betty Anderson, Norman Harrington, Rodney
Harrington, Leslie Harrington, and Martin Peyton. The Bailiff,
court clerk, and stenographer are also present.
JC: Mr. Cord, you may proceed with your interrogation.
SC: You saw Ann on the bluff?
HC: Yes.
SC: Did you speak with her?
HC: Yes.
SC: What was your purpose in coming to the bluff that afternoon, Mrs.
Cord?
HC: I had to see Ann again. I had to talk to her.
SC: Why?
HC: Because when she left the house she was so upset, I was afraid
she might do something foolish
SC: So the compassionate mother went after her, to be by her side.
Weren't you a little late?
JF: Objection, your honor.
JC: Sustained. Mr. Cord.
SC: Where did you find Ann when you went to the bluff?
HC: She was standing out near the edge looking down at the sea. She
seemed to be in sort of a trace. She kept moving closer and
closer to the edge. Then some ground gave way under her feet and
I was afraid she was going to fall.
SC: Or jump?
HC: Yes.
JF: Objection. Counselor is leading the witness.
SC: What happened after you thought she was going to fall.
HC: Well, I called out to her. it seemed to startle her.
HC: Oh, Steven, I know what you are thinking, but she didn't fall then.
SC: She didn't fall then?
HC: She didn't fall at all. She was pushed
[Hannah stands and points at Lee Webber.]
HC: He pushed her.
[Points at Lee Webber]
LW: That's a lie. I didn't push anybody.
[Gavel many times.]
JC: Sit down, Mr. Webber.
[Gavel twice.]
HC: Lee Webber pushed Ann off the bluff. I saw him do it.
JC: Mr. Cord. Mr. Cord. Do you care to continue?
SC: In view of this provocative testimony, your honor, I'd like to ask
permission for a greater latitude in the phrasing of my questions.
JF: Your honor, I would like to point out that the court has bent over
backwards to be lenient already.
SC: I appreciate the understanding the court has shown so far, but I
feel this witness has conveniently invented this last bit of
testimony as an effort to conceal the truth about her daughter's
death.
JC: Mr. Cord, I am going to grant your plea. But I have not forgotten
it was necessary to find you in contempt, once, during these
proceedings.
SC: Yes, sir.
JC: Proceed, gentlemen.
SC: Thank you, your honor.
SC: You said you saw Lee Webber push Ann Howard off the bluff?
HC: I did, Steven. I swear.
SC: Oaths aren't necessary. You've already taken one. When did you
see Lee push Ann?
HC: After I had finished talking with her, I started to leave. And then I
heard the sound of his motorcycle coming.
SC: How did you know it was Lee Webber's?
HC: Well, I didn't until I saw him on it.
SC: Where were you when you saw him approaching?
HC: I was on the road a little way past the house.
SC: Where was Ann?
HC: She was still on the bluff.
SC: And what did you do when you saw Mr. Webber approaching?
HC: Well, I stepped off the road and hid behind some trees.
SC: To your knowledge, did the defendant see you?
HC: I don't think so. At least he kept right on coming.
SC: What did you do?
HC: I didn't know what to do. I was frightened.
SC: Frightened of what?
HC: The sound of that motorcycle bearing down on me on that lonely
road and that look on his face. I just waited until I heard the
motor stop and then I started back toward the house. I started
running and then I saw them. They were out near the bluff. He
was moving toward her making wild threatening gestures. And she
was moving away from him pleading with him but he kept coming.
And he forced her nearer and nearer the edge. He pushed her.
There was a scream. She was gone.
SC: That's all very interesting, Mrs. Cord. You say Lee Webber
stalked Ann Howard? That he was making wild and threatening
gestures? And she was backing up and pleading? What were you
doing all this time, Mrs. Cord?
HC: Oh, Steven I was paralyzed. I wanted to move but I couldn't. I
just stood and watched.
SC: You just watched? Well, that's very odd. You testified that you
came back to see Ann a second time because you were afraid for her
safety. And now you tell me you just watched as your own daughter
was pushed off the cliff?
HC: It's true.
SC: Well that's very interesting and very remeniscent. The defendant's
brother Christopher Webber testified that he was in the vicinity
of the bluff also. And he said that he just stood by and listened.
Very interesting. Especially since his testimony was run on the
front page of the Clarion. Now it doesn't take much to change the
verb from "I heard" to "I saw," does it? Did you read Christopher
Webber's testimony on the front page of the Clarion?
HC: Yes.
SC: Thank you.
SC: Now there are some other things I'd like to know. Like what the
concerned mother did after her daughter fell over a hundred feet
to her death.
SC: Did you run to the base of the cliff and see if there was still
some life left in her? Did you take your daughter in your arms
and weep over her. Did you inform anyone what you had witnessed?
Did you make any immediate effort to see that this man that you now
accuse of murder was brought to justice for what you say you saw
him do?
HC: No.
SC: Why didn't you come forward then? Why now?
HC: I don't know. I don't know.
SC: You're lying, aren't you?
HC: No.
SC: Your whole life has been a lie.
HC: No. No.
MP: That will be all. I can not allow this to continue.
[Gavel]
MP: The attorney for the defense has just demeaned not only the
witness but the very existence of the Peyton family.
JC: Mr. Peyton, you will take your seat.
MP: There is no law. No due process of law that permits character
assassination in the guise of interrogation.
MP: The name of this county if Peyton. Then name of this town is Peyton.
The name of the mill that supports this town is Peyton. This is a
Peyton world.
JC: Mr. Peyton.
MP: I have been patient. Remarkably patient. But I could not hold my
tongue.
JC: Bailiff, will you excort Mr. Peyton out of the courtroom, please.
[Bailiff walks over to Peyton.]
B: Mr. Peyton.
MP: I realize that I am out of order, your honor. But Mrs. Cord and I
have been together many, many years. She is an old and trusted
employee. She is an old and trusted friend.
[Peyton returns to his seat.]
JC: Bailiff, you may step aside.
[Bailiff steps.]
JC: Mr. Cord, you may continue.
SC: I asked you why you didn't bring this story forward.
Lee Webber didn't push Ann off, did he?
HC: Oh, Steven, I . . .
SC: She threw herself off the bluff and you drove her to it.
HC: Ann didn't kill herself. I didn't drive her to do anything like
that.
SC: Really, when you went to the bluff and saw Ann standing at the edge.
HC: Steven, I told you.
SC: Did she jump?
HC: No.
SC: Did you push her?
HC: No.
SC: Why did you go after her?
HC: Because I couldn't stand it any longer. I had to tell her. I had
to tell her because I thought then whe would understand and she
would help me so I wouldn't have to lose you. I had to tell her, I
wasn't her mother.
[Dramatic music.]
I never had any children.
[Dramatic music.]
SC: You never?
HC: I'm not your mother.
[Dramatic music.]
SC: Who is Ann's mother? Who is my mother?
HC: Catherine Peyton.
[Dramatic music.]
[Gavel five times.]
[Gavel eleven more times.]
[Break for Commercial] 9:11
SC: Catherine Peyton . . .
HC: Yes.
SC: . . . was Ann's mother, and mine?
HC: Yes, Steven.
[Dramatic music.]
SC: How could you tell her this? How could you justify this fantastic
masquerade?
HC: I couldn't. When she asked me why I had left her father, I told her
it was over an affair.
"An affair, you said. You left your husband over a simple
affair?"
As if it were my fault, not Brian's, but mine.
SC: And then you told her?
HC: Not all of it. Just enough to try to make her understand what it
was like to watch a husband destroy a marriage over an infatuation
with a spoiled willful school girl with a pretty face.
SC: Were they in love?
HC: [Laughing] In love? Catherine Peyton in love? I don't think she
was ever in love in her life. She never loved anyone but
herself.
SC: Then, what was the nature of their relationship?
HC: The nature of their relationship was that Catherine Peyton always
took what she wanted. She wanted my husband. And when the time
came for her to pay for it, there was her father and his checkbook.
HC: Steven, what do you think Brian Cord lived on all those years?
SC: Are you telling me that he received financial help from Martin
Peyton?
HC: Call it what it was. Blackmail.
SC: Did you tell Ann that her father had been a blackmailer?
HC: She insisted on knowing the truth. I couldn't hide it. So Brian
Cord got his price for keeping silent, a regular check, and a good
one. And Catherine married Leslie Harrington and spent the rest
of her life queening it over Peyton Place as though none of this
had ever happened.
SC: So her father was a blackmailer who had been involved with
Catherine Peyton. But you let her leave the house still believing
you were her mother?
HC: Yes.
SC: Why?
HC: Because I realized I had already gone too far.
SC: You had gone just as far as you had wanted to.
HC: I was afraid Mr. Peyton might hear me.
SC: He might have overheard you at any time, from the beginning. You
did this as coldly and deliberately as anything you have done in
your entire life.
JF: Objection, your honor. Counsel is not here to pass judgment on
the witness, but to defend his own client against a charge of
murder.
JF: Mr. Cord.
SC: Your honor, this witness claims to have seen an alleged attack on
the bluff. I believe this is an alibi for her own actions. By
her own admission, Mrs. Cord's first conversation with the
deceased left this already unstable girl in a state of great
emotional turmoil. Now it is my purpose to show that Mrs. Cord
went after her not as she testified because she couldn't bear to
watch Ann suffer any more. But to finish what she had begun. To
avenge herself on Brian Cord and Catherine Peyton by destroying
their daughter.
JC: You may proceed, Mr. Cord.
SC: When you saw Ann again, for the last time, did you tell her you
were not her mother?
HC: Yes.
SC: Did you give her a full history of her illustrious beginning.
HC: I told her that Catherine Peyton was her mother.
SC: Under what circumstances did Catherine Peyton meet your husband?
HC: My husband was a painter. Nor a very successful one. But he got
a job teaching painting in a girls' finishing school where
Catherine went. I was the one who told him to take the job. You
see, I realized that there he would meet the kind of people who
would be able to afford to have him do their portrait.
SC: And one of those people was Catherine Peyton.
HC: She was just 17, so beautiful. You see, Catherine Peyton always
took whatever she wanted. And when she saw Brian, she wanted him,
too. Oh she was very clever. She knew how to go about it. She
commissioned him to paint her portrait as s Christmas present for
her father. And the week after Martin Peyton hung that portrait
proudly over his mantle, Catherine convinced him she was carrying
Brian's child.
SC: Did you know Mr. Peyton at the time?
HC: That was the occasion of our meeting. Martin Peyton called me to
come to his home. And he asked me questions. He wanted to know
how I had allowed this to happpen. What sort of man was my
husband. Would he make any sort of suitable husband for his
Catherine. He actually asked me that, about the man I was
married to.
SC: And what did you tell him?
HC: I said under the circumstances it seemed to me it wasn't a
question of suitability but of necessity. And that if Brian wanted
Catherine, then he could have her. I wouldn't stand in the way.
SC: Did Mr. Peyton decide against the marriage?
HC: Mr. Peyton was willing. Brian was not. He already had his fill
of miss Catherine and her tantrums. He wasn't about to marry her.
SC: Who thought of the other solution?
HC: Mr. Peyton. He told me that if I was going to divorce Brian then
I would have to think about my future. I didn't have any money or
any training. I didn't know how to support myself. So Mr. Peyton
told me that if I would allow my name to be put on the birth
record instead of Catherine, he would provide a good home for me
and a job taking care of the child.
Then there were two of you and Brian decided that he wanted the
son. But I wouldn't let him have you. I made him take the girl.
SC: Let is be shown in the record that the son refers to me, Steven
Cord.
SC: So you raised the boy purely to spite your former husband?
HC: In the beginning, maybe. But, Steven, I learned to love you.
SC: Let's say you remained faithful to your end of the bargain. You
kept Catherine's secret. You took care of her child's physical
needs. You supervised his schooling.
HC: I loved you. Brian did it for the money but you became mine. My
son.
SC: Did you tell Ann?
HC: Yes, I begged her to make you understand.
SC: Did you tell Ann that her father raised her purely as the price of
his regular check? Did you say that to her?
HC: He did in the beginning but later . . .
SC: Later you told her more. Perhaps you even reminded her that her
real mother was playing golf at the country club the day she was
accused of blinding Christopher Webber?
HC: Don't tell me about Catherine Peyton. Didn't I have to listen to
her whispering, laughing on the back stairs with my husband.
Locked into the studio with him. I wasn't allowed to enter. And
then the next year, watching her sweep down the grand staircase
all dressed in white all dewey innocenct radiance smiling at you.
While sleeping in my bedroom.
SC: Mrs. Cord, please confine yourself to what is relevant.
HC: Relevant. Is it relevant that I would have been Mrs. Martin
Peyton if it hadn't been for Catherine. She decided I wasn't fit
to marry into her family.
SC: I only want to know what you said to the deceased girl.
HC: I said to Ann. I said forgive me. Please, forgive me.
SC: And having said it you walked away and left her to die.
HC: Oh, God. Forgive me. Forgive me.
[Martin Peyton gets up and exits the courtroom.]
SC: Mrs. Cord.
[Camera zooms in for an extreme closeup of Steven.]
SC: No--further--questions.
Episode 294, scene 2 HOME