Plot

Louise Gordon believes husband George is having an affair and will not allow him into her room. Only cousin Vicky Braxton and nurse Nora Mae Quincey may see Louise. When Louise dies of arsenic poisoning, Nora Mae is charged with murder.

George Gordon receives a phone call from his girlfriend Charlotte Lynch which is overhead by his wife Louise on the extension in her bedroom. George is upset at the call saying Louise may overhear it and that letters from Charlotte are missing which he believes his wife has confiscated. After the call Louise confronts George who accidentally knocks her down the stairs when she slaps him. She fully recovers from the fall but refuses to leave her room only allowing her elderly nurse's aide Nora Mae Quincey and her cousin Vicky Braxton in her room. She won't divorce George but decides to leave her money to a medical center plus a $350 monthly stipend to Vicky. George asks Nora Mae to give Louise some pills to sedate her but Nora Mae thinking they are poison consults Perry who tells her not to use the pills. None the less the next morning Louise dies of arsenic poisoning with Nora Mae accused because of jewelry she "borrowed" from Louise. Perry starts out thinking that George is the real killer as this is his second wife with money to die.—Anonymous

George Gordon (Edward Norris) is nervous when he gets a call from his inamorata Charlotte Lynch (Fay Spain). He fears his wife Louise (Susan Dorn) has found Charlotte's letters to him, and she might even be listening in on another phone. He's right, and Louise confronts him about the affair, trying to slap him. They struggle, and she tumbles down the stairs. A month after getting out of the hospital, she's crippled and won't leave her bedroom. George pleads with Louise's cousin and companion Vicky Braxton (Mary LaRoche) to ask Louise to see him. As Louise leaves, he's stunned to see the new maid - it's Charlotte, working under the name Martha Baxter. He thinks it's too risky for her to be there, but soon they're kissing.

Vicky passes on George's request, but Louise is adamant that she'll see no one but Vicky and Nora Mae Quincey (Lenore Shanewise), the practical nurse. Louise thinks George tried to kill her, and she also suspects him of taking some of her jewelry to give to his girlfriend. Due to her religious beliefs, she can't divorce George, but she can cut him out of her will, leaving everything to the Wayne Medical Foundation. She reassures Vicky that she won't change the $350 monthly stipend left to her in the existing will.

George peeks into Nora Mae's room and sees her playing a bizarre amalgam of chess and checkers, her "opponent" being an empty chair. She also responds to the imaginary companion's admiration for the jewelry she's wearing. Having seen enough, George closes the door and knocks. Before answering the door, Nora Mae puts away her chess set and hides the rings and bracelet with it. George tells her he talked to a doctor who gave him some new pills to help Louise. She tells him the only thing she ever gives Louise is a tonic Dr. Williams (Charles Lane) in some milk and honey. George gives her the pills anyway.

When Perry arrives at his office, Nora Mae is waiting for him. She reported her suspicions that George's pills are poisoned to the police, but they were too busy to help. Perry takes one pill to have analyzed and Nora Mae negotiates a $5 consulting fee. Once she leaves, Della remarks that the jewelry Nora Mae was wearing made her fingers look practically on fire. Perry agrees that they looked expensive, and says there's more to Nora Mae than meets the eye. When Nora gets home, George confronts her about the jewelry and insists that she give Louise those pills. Later, George is again spying on her as she puts the pills into the milk and takes it into Louise's room.

Vicky is in bed when she gets called over the intercom by a distressed Louise. She calls in Dr. Williams, who begins to treat her but soon declares that it's too late. Soon, Homicide is combing over the place, and with George's help have found Nora Mae's chess set, with hidden jewelry. Lt. Tragg confronts her about it, and she says that she couldn't resist borrowing (albeit without asking) what she was sure was just inexpensive costume jewelry. Tragg estimates its value at around $25,000 (a figure Burger would raise to $40,000).

In Perry's office, Paul reports that the pill Perry gave him was just a sedative. Louise was killed by arsenic in the milk. George's first wife, Grace Gordon, died of a heart attack induced by food poisoning. She left George $53,000, which he lost in a business venture. Since his second marriage, he's living on handouts from Louise. In jail, Nora Mae explains that she put the pills in the milk, took it into Louise's room, waited for George to leave, went to the kitchen, poured that milk down the sink and replaced with with a new milk/honey/tonic concoction. She tells Perry to try not to worry.

In court, Dr. Williams testifies about testing the milk for arsenic. He also mentions that while Grace's tumble down stairs left her crippled, it did not reduce her life expectancy. In cross-examination, he notes that the honey in the milk would have masked the sweet taste of arsenic. Tragg discusses the thorough search he made of the home. He identifies a bottle of poison found in the kitchen and says that Nora Mae's fingerprints were on it. Under cross-examination, he admits that the poison was next to various household cleaners that Nora Mae would have naturally handled when performing her duty of keeping Louise's room clean.

George testifies that he wanted Louise to take a sedative so he could search her room for the letters. After he saw Nora Mae take the drugged milk into Louise's room, he checked several times, but she was always awake. He also says that Nora Mae was eager to put the pills in the milk. On cross, he claims not to know a Charlotte and that the letters were from a Mary Smith who moved to Texas a couple of months ago. Perry brings up George's first wife, and gets him to admit that Louise left an estate of around a million dollars. Perry requests an autopsy of Grace Gordon, but Burger's next witness, Dr. Meecham (Charles Davis), testifies that this has already occurred. No arsenic was found. It was impossible to check for cyanide, because the body had been embalmed before the autopsy. (Formaldehyde in embalming fluid destroys cyanide.)

During a recess, following a request from Perry, Vicky produces the missing letters, including Charlotte's signed photo, saying she found them taped to the back of the mirror in Louise's room. They recognize Charlotte as Martha the maid. Vicky explains that while Louise would have of course seen the photo, she never had the opportunity to recognize "Martha" because only Vicky and Nora Mae were allowed to enter Louise's room. Back in court, she repeats all this on the stand, and admits she was careless in not checking out the phony maid's references, because the household was desperate for help. Perry counters that she had the letters all along and hired Charlotte intentionally, to involve George. She wanted to frame him, because if convicted he'd be barred from inheriting and the money (under Louise's earlier will, still in effect) would go to Vicky as nearest living relative. She confesses, saying that Louise constantly wore her wealth like a badge and treated Vicky as nothing but a poor relative.

Later, Perry explains to Della and Nora Mae that he knew Vicky had the letters all along. The claim of finding them behind the mirror had to be a lie, because if Tragg says he's done a thorough search, you know it was extremely thorough. Nora Mae again negotiates her fee and pays Perry $25 for defending her.