Page 213 - SHERLOCK transcripts

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DUSK. THE MOORS. As night begins to fall, Henry leads Sherlock and John across the rocks
towards Dewer’s Hollow. All three of them have flashlights to light the uneven ground below
their feet. Foxes scream repeatedly in the distance. By the time they reach the woods it is
almost full dark and it becomes even darker when they head into the trees. John, bringing up
the rear, hears rustling to his right and turns around to look. The other two don’t notice and
continue onwards while John walks cautiously towards the sound he heard. He shines his torch
into the bushes as an owl shrieks overhead, but he can see nothing. Raising his head he sees a
light repeatedly winking on and off at the top of a hillside a fair distance away. He looks around
to alert his friend.
JOHN: Sher...
(It’s only then that he realises that the other two have disappeared out of sight. He shines his
flashlight in the direction they went but there’s no sign of them. He looks back to the light on
the hillside, which is still intermittently flashing, and gets his notebook out of his pocket
because he has recognised that the flashes are Morse code. He starts to write down the letters
while speaking them aloud.)
JOHN (softly): U ... M ... Q ... R ... A.
(The light stops flashing. John looks down at his notebook.)
JOHN (in a whisper): U, M, Q, R, A. (He tries it as a word.) Umqra?
(Shaking his head, he looks up to the hillside again but no more light comes from it. Shutting
the notebook, he heads off in the direction of the other two.)
JOHN (whispering): Sherlock ...
(Henry and Sherlock are a long way ahead and Henry’s torch shows that they’re at the edge of
the minefield with its fencing and warning signs. They make their way along the edge of the
fencing while John trails a long way behind them, still whispering his friend’s name repeatedly.)
JOHN: Sherlock ... Sherlock ...
(Up ahead, Sherlock breaks the silence.)
SHERLOCK: Met a friend of yours.
HENRY: What?
SHERLOCK: Doctor Frankland.
HENRY: Oh, right. Bob, yeah.
SHERLOCK: Seems pretty concerned about you.
HENRY: He’s a worrier, bless him. He’s been very kind to me since I came back.
SHERLOCK: He knew your father.
HENRY: Yeah.
SHERLOCK: But he works at Baskerville. Didn’t your dad have a problem with that?
HENRY: Well, mates are mates, aren’t they? I mean, look at you and John.
SHERLOCK: What about us?
HENRY: Well, I mean, he’s a pretty straightforward bloke, and you ...
(Glancing back at Sherlock’s grim expression, he decides not to follow that line.)
HENRY: They agreed never to talk about work, Uncle Bob and my dad.
(He stops and turns to his left. As Sherlock stops and looks at him, Henry nods in the direction
he’s looking.)
HENRY (unhappily): Dewer’s Hollow.
(Sherlock turns and looks at the steep drop in the land that leads down into a misty dark
valley.)
(Some distance behind them, John is still following their trail.)
JOHN (whispering): Sherlock ...
(As he progresses onwards, he hears an eerie metallic thrumming sound. He stops and aims his
flashlight in the direction of the sound, then goes to move onwards just as the thrum sounds
again. The sound continues to repeat, now interspersed with a short metallic ping. John walks
slowly towards the sound, then quietly chuckles when he sees a rusty metal container, possibly
an oil drum, which is lying in the undergrowth. Water is dripping from the tree above it and
causing the thrums and pings as it strikes the drum. Just as John looks at it and sighs with
relief, something massive flashes past behind him. John spins and looks but it’s already gone,
but a couple of seconds later an anguished howl sounds in the distance. John turns and begins
to hurry to find the others.)
(Sherlock is heading down into the Hollow, being careful to keep his balance on the steep
slippery ground. Henry follows him down more slowly. Sherlock reaches the bottom and shines
his torch around, finding giant paw prints all around the area. Some distance away, John is now
running to get to the others. Another long anguished howl rings out. Still halfway down the

Transcripts by Ariane DeVere (arianedevere@livejournal.com)