7cb1d79195 A man whom Steed was to escort to New York disappears, before re-surfacing at the Adelphi Park Retirement Home. Then his neighbour turns up there. All the residents at the home are extremely wealthy and have named their next of kinbeneficiaries to avoid death duties. Mrs. Gale gets a jobassistant matron there to discover what is going on. &quot;The Undertakers&quot; was more successfulthe blueprint for a Mrs. Peel episode, since its poorly done filmed inserts bring down a storyline that held up beautifully until the end. The eccentric Howard Goorney, back from &quot;Girl on the Trapeze,&quot; heads up The Undertakers, while Canadian actor Lee Patterson, star of the recently cancelled American TV series SURFSIDE 6, makes one of his last appearances on British television, playing Lomax, the main villain at a rest home where only millionaires are welcome. Patrick Holt, previously seen in &quot;Intercrime,&quot; is shot dead by The Undertakers, and the grieving widow (Jan Holden, &quot;Dial a Deadly Number&quot;) immediately dallies with the crooked Lomax, only to have their carefully laid plans upset by the untimely arrival of her stepdaughter (Mandy Miller), wondering about the sudden disappearance of her father. The villains are both efficient and amusing, another sign of things to come. Steed is due to escort a scientist on a trip to the United States but when he turns up at his house his wife tells Steed that he has retired and is no longer seeing anybody. The man is apparently now at the Adelphi Park retirement home; when Steed goes there he is informed that only relatives are allowed to visit. Steed and Cathy investigate and discover an ingenious plan; the widows of wealthy men are employing the services of &#39;The Undertakers&#39; to avoid exorbitant death duties which would see the tax man take eighty percent of their late husbands&#39; estates. If their husbands sign over their estates before they die and live a further five years their widows get every penny if they don&#39;t last five years then The Undertakers arrange for an actor to take their place at Adelphi Park for the required time and if the wife can&#39;t wait for her husband to die The Undertakers can solve that problem too.<br/><br/>This episode is a fine hint of things to comethe series starts to move from state backed espionage to somewhat eccentric schemes by an organisation to help or target a certain group of people. Given the high death duties it isn&#39;t too implausible to think that some people might try to find a way to avoid them even if the method shown here is far-fetched in a way we&#39;d expect from The Avengers. The guest cast goes a solid job; particularly Lally Bowersthe slightly batty Mrs. Renter; Lee Patterson, who plays an unpleasant American and Mandy Miller who plays the daughter of one of the men who are meant to be in Adelphi Park. As wella fun main story there are some enjoyable exchanges between Patrick Macnee and Honor BlackmanSteed and Cathy; the opening where Cathy ignores Steed and cleans an L1A1 rifle while he talks about going to New York and for once he is the one getting irritated. Overall another good episode.
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