I nearly drink a dram of poison

A Dram of Poison
by Charlotte Armstrong

Armstrong's 1956 domestic thriller starts out as a Pygmalion story: Kenneth Gibson is a middle-aged bachelor and poetry professor at a humble California college. He's a sensitive guy, and when he attends the funeral of an addled and elderly colleague, he is bothered to see that the man's daughter, in her early 30s, is friendless, ill, and dispirited. Her curmudgeon father has left her with no money, no skills, and no confidence. After Kenneth gets to know her more, he proposes to marry her as "an arrangement," so he can help her regain her health and so she can make a home for him. They are both clear that this is not a love match, but when they move to a little cottage and Rosemary gets well again, romance seems to be in bloom.

However, a car accident throws Kenneth into the hospital--Rosemary, the driver, is largely unhurt, but a bit unhinged--and Kenneth asks his sister, Ethel, a career woman nearing 50, to come and help out.

At first we like Ethel a lot. She's a no-nonsense, take-charge kind of person, just the kind of Eve-Arden-type woman friend who could broaden Rosemary's circle of friends and be a role model for her. But Ethel has always lived alone, is set in her ways, has definite opinions, and imposes her own regime on the household in ways that the convalescent Kenneth, who is left with a bum leg, and fragile Rosemary seem unable to fight.

Ethel is suspicious of the "foreign" Mrs. Violette, the housekeeper who comes in once a week to help the Gibsons. Rosemary begins to talk of getting a job and not being a "parasite," clearly an idea Ethel has put in her head. Ethel pokes what seems like gentle fun at Kenneth for adopting his wife like a "stray" and noticing that Rosemary seems quite fond of the dishy widower neighbor, Paul Townsend, who is much younger than Kenneth. As Ethel blithely sows these poisonous seeds of doubt, she points out how comfy it would be if Rosemary, restored to health, found a man her own age and Ethel and Kenneth could live together in a little apartment into their old age.

Kenneth becomes so despondent by Ethel's cheerful administered put-downs that he decides to heisting a bottle of poison and end it all. The problem is that Kenneth hides the poison in a small olive oil bottle and, before he can drink it, loses it on a bus.

The police are notified. Rosemary and Paul Townsend pack Kenneth into the car to try to retrace his steps. Along the way, a bus driver, a young nurse, a society matron, and an artist, all of whom were on the bus, join the hunt. With Ethel away at work and unaware of the drama, these interesting minor characters begin to restore some perspective for Kenneth and Rosemary.

The search section of book--roughly the entire second half--takes on an almost farcical tone that is at odds with the much more subtly limned first half of the novel, and, sadly, as a thriller, this makes the book flop. I imagined a more prolonged sequence in which the three Gibsons continued their unspoken struggle to control events, at least one of them ending up as fertilizer for Rosemary's garden.

But I think I understand why Armstrong couldn't bear to kill off Ethel or Rosemary. Ethel is solid, homely, self-sufficient, wrapped up in her career, and her comfortable success makes her feel she can dictate how others should live. She is the 1956 version of the woman who has "leaned in" and gone overboard. Rosemary, on the other hand, is thin, hesitant, and has always lived in the shadow of her overbearing father. She is the 1956 cautionary tale about what happens when women are devalued and seen solely as conveniences. Flawed as the novel is, Armstrong, as a wife, mother, and career woman herself, seems to want to underscore the balance both women need in their lives. She wants to save them both. So she does.