'Riverdale' recap: 'Chapter Twenty-Six: The Tell-Tale Heart'

This time on Riverdale Betty helps her family cover up a murder and Archie faces more pressure from Adams about Hiram.

Previously on Riverdale, Archie uncovered a plot against the Lodge’s and told Hiram. Later that night, the man who plotted against them was murdered. Meanwhile, Betty and Jughead got back together after uncovering Hiram’s plot against the Serpents and finding the statue head. When Betty came home from Jughead’s, she found her mother frantically cleaning blood off the floor beside a dead body.

“The Tell-Tale Heart” begins immediately following the previous episode, with Betty watching with horror as her mother mops up blood beside a dead body. Betty questions Alice, who says the man tried to hurt her and Chic. Betty starts calling the police, but Alice stops her daughter. While Alice assures Betty it was self-defense, she says the police will take Chic away. Betty offers to help, but Alice tells her not to get involved. Seconds later, Hal calls Betty and says he is coming over to pick up some of his stuff. Alice accepts Betty’s help and the two work on cleaning up the mess, while Chic sits nearby, possibly in shock.

Meanwhile, Adams grills Archie about Hiram and Papa Poutine’s death. Archie continues to deny Hiram’s involvement.

Hal comes to the house and finds Alice and Betty in the kitchen. He notices the bleach smell and notes their weird behavior. Later he returns to Penelope and shares his suspicions that his family is hiding something.

Later in her room, Betty gets a call from Jughead telling her he loves her, but her mom arrives and says it is time to go so she merely says she will see him at school. Alice and Betty drive into the woods and discuss the dead man. They stick the man’s body in a sewer tunnel where Alice used to play in as a child.

FP comes home and talks to Jughead about going to see Mayor McCoy and tell her about Hiram and the statue head. He looks at Jughead and realizes the statue head is gone.

At the Lodge’s, the family discusses what to do about the statue head. Hiram takes it to mean a war from the Serpents. Veronica says they should try to negotiate before any violence occurs.

Betty and Alice arrive home and begin to clean anything the dead man may have touched. Betty even wipes down apples that Alice says the man did not touch.

When Betty wakes in the morning, she goes downstairs to find her mother and brother acting like nothing is wrong. As Betty pours her cereal, she continues to remember the night before and drops her cereal when someone knocks on the door. Betty opens the door to find Jughead, who wants them to walk to school together.

As the couple walks towards Riverdale High, Jughead asks to talk about the previous night. He shares his fears that their moment the night before was bad or she thought they moved too fast. Betty quickly easies his worries, saying everything was great. She mentions there was family drama at home and assures him it will be fine.

Veronica and Archie are also walking to school together. She asks him if they need to talk more about her father’s business, but says he is good. She lets him know that there will be trouble between her and Jughead.

In the Riverdale High student lounge, Veronica attempts to smooth things over with Jughead. He agrees to have a sit down with Hiram at the trailer park. Kevin comes in and tells them all there is a murder in town. Betty and Archie immediately ask who and where. Kevin reveals the body is at a hotel, which means it is Papa Poutine.

Moments later, Betty rushes to the bathroom and hurls. Cheryl sees her and offers to help, but Betty continues to say she is fine. In a classroom, Veronica rambles to Archie about the death and wonders if her father is the murderer. Archie claims Hiram is not responsible and insists he is a good person.

Jughead goes to question Mayor McCoy. He accuses her of accepting donation money from the Lodge’s for land deals and tells her to admit it to the people of Riverdale.

Archie meets with Adams, who gives him money, reassuring him that it is normal practices for information. He suggests Archie question Hiram directly about the Papa Poutine’s death.

Archie meets with Hiram and asks about the death. Hiram claims he is as upset as anyone, but that Papa Poutine had many enemies given his gambling and affairs. Archie then says he really came for Veronica and mentions she wondered if Hiram was involved with the death. He asks Hiram to speak to Veronica and clear the situation up.

Betty goes back into the woods where the dead body is and touches everything, learning nothing from television shows apparently. The man’s phone rings and instead of running away, Betty takes the phone, looking at the missed calls. She covers the body and leaves.

Betty arrives home to see her mother and Chic playing Clue, which is a funny nod to the episode. Betty locks herself in her room and looks through the man’s phone, coping down information as she remembers the night before.

Before heading to meet with Jughead and FP, Hiram tells Veronica that Archie came to visit. He says she can ask him anything and responds in the negative when she asks if he killed Papa Poutine.

Betty confronts Chic about the shady man, saying he was Chic’s drug dealer. Alice is upset that Betty went back and wonders about someone tracking the phone. Betty says she wanted to make sure the body was truly hidden and she already turned off the GPS. Chic starts to tear up and Betty lays into him, saying they are not buying the fake waterworks. Alice takes her aside and the two fight. The scene turns to Chic, who is smirking at his family fighting.

Archie meets with Adams again and says he asked Hiram and believes he is innocent. He tells Adams what Hiram said about Papa Poutine's issues with another man, Lenny. Adams says he will investigate.

Veronica, Hiram, Jughead and FP all sit down to talk. Hiram says he talked to McCoy and is offering to pay any back rent for the trailer park in return for peace. FP agrees and the two shake, but Hiram brings up Jughead’s article and says part of the agreement is to keep his name out of the article. Jughead says that appears to be a bribe and FP stops the deal.

Cheryl practices her archery and notices Hal leaving her house. She confronts her mother about Hal and accuses her of tearing families apart. She says she saw Betty sick the other day and wonders if this is why. Penelope insists Hal is different; he is not a client but someone she cares about.

Veronica arrives home to hear her parents and McCoy arguing about Jughead’s article and sees McCoy leave. Her parents tell her that McCoy wants them to wait until after the election to announce their plans for Southside High, but they want to do it now because of the article. Hermione says they can remove her from office under a scandal and Hiram reveals they know about her affair.

At Pop’s Betty calls numbers from the dead man’s phone. She claims to have found the phone and asks who it belonged to, but continues to get hung up on. A woman calls the phone and accuses her of being the man’s mistress, and says he should not come home. Betty then leaves Pop’s and calls Jughead.

Jughead arrives at the Cooper’s and finds Betty sitting on the front steps. She tells him what happened. Jughead says she can still call the police, but then a parking officer/guard stops and asks if they know whose car is parked across the street as there are complaints. Jughead panics and says the car is his and the woman says he will get a ticket if he does not move it shortly. He then looks to Betty to hotwire the dead man’s car.

Archie comes home to find Adams in the kitchen talking with his father. Later Fred tells him the FBI is looking into undocumented immigrants from Canada and Fred may have hired some and paid them in cash. Fred has to give them his files from the past seven years. Archie goes to confront Adams, telling him to leave Fred alone. Adams says if Archie plants a bug in Hiram’s office, he will leave the Andrews’ alone.

Cheryl confronts Hal as he is leaving her house. She tells him not to destroy his family by taking up with her “harlot” mother. She says she will not tell Betty if goes back to the Cooper’s.

Veronica visits McCoy and tells her of the plan to get her thrown out of office. She says they know about the affair with Sheriff Keller, and McCoy realizes they can destroy her career.

Meanwhile, Betty and Jughead push the car into the river in the forest and watch as it slowly sinks. Betty also throws the phone in the water and the two embrace.

The next day, McCoy gives a press conference, stepping down as Mayor of Riverdale. She cites wanting to spend more time with her family after the Black Hood. The Lodge’s watch, surprised given that they did not do anything yet. Veronica mentions their plan was cruel, and they look at her daughter. Hiram questions Veronica later and she lies, saying she did not tell McCoy about her parents' plan.

Hal knocks on the door and Chic opens, saying the others are not home. Hal pushes through, saying the house is his home. At Riverdale High, Cheryl stops Betty and tells her about Hal just as Betty gets a text from Chic.

Betty comes home to find Hal yelling at Chic about a missing family heirloom. Hal continues to berate Chic, making him shake and move away. He questions what is going on in the house and where the kitchen rug is and the lamp. Betty stops him and confronts him about his affair, saying maybe he is just accusing them of hiding something to cover up his own lies. Betty tells him to go and he does. Chic thanks her but wonders what Hal will do later on.

Archie sees his dad looking through piles of files on the kitchen table and then looks at the bug. He goes to Hiram and tells him about the FBI agent. Archie tells him about the bug, says he destroyed it and tells him about the threats to his father. He says he loves Veronica and he likes Hiram. He asks for help for his father and Hiram says he will take care of Adams, clarifying that he does not mean kill the man. Hiram says he will make some calls over the next day and fix everything.

Betty tells Alice about Hal coming over, the dead man’s car and telling Jughead. She says they need help because there are definitely things they are overlooking. They go see FP who says he will help them, not wanting them to make the same mistakes he did with Jason. FP digs a grave in the woods, puts the body in it, and fills it with lye.

At Pop’s, Alice, Jughead and Betty sit waiting for FP. He arrives and tells them he took care of the body. Alice cries and says she is sorry they all got pulled into this, but FP takes her hand and says they take care of their own. He says no one else can know and they all agree. At the same time, Chic takes a picture of the Cooper family out of an album, cuts Hal out, and smiles.

Meanwhile, Archie opens his door to find Andre, who tells him to come along to see the boss in a private location. They arrive in the woods and Archie finds out the boss is actually Hermione. She reveals Adams is actually an associate of theirs and not an FBI Agent. Archie realizes it was a test and she says he passed. Hermione then welcomes him to the Lodge family.

This was definitely an engaging episode of Riverdale. Betty held out longer than I expected before telling Jughead about the body. Adams is not an agent, which was pretty obvious. Both Archie and Betty worked to cover up murders this episode, Archie in a less literal sense, but he still lied to a man he believed to be an agent multiple times to protect his girlfriend’s father. Chic seemed to be in shock, but it still seems weird that he did not help later on with covering up the murder. Alice and Betty did everything themselves before involving the Jones family.

Riverdale airs on Wednesday’s at 8 p.m. on The CW and is now on break until March 7. A preview of the next episode is below.