Page 239 - SHERLOCK transcripts

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SHERLOCK: Bow Street Runners: missed everything.
JOHN: Pressing case, is it?(!)
SHERLOCK: They’re all pressing ’til they’re solved.

At the White Tower in the Tower of London, tourists are passing through a metal detector on
their way to see the Crown Jewels. A security man gives some items back to a tourist.
SECURITY MAN: Put this in your bag, please.
(Jim walks through the detector which beeps an alarm.)
SECURITY MAN: Excuse me, sir.
(Still chewing on his gum, Jim stops and steps back again.)
SECURITY MAN: Any metal objects – keys, mobile phones?
(Smiling apologetically, Jim takes his phone out of his pocket and puts it into the tray.)
SECURITY MAN: You can go through.
(Jim steps through the detector again, which stays silent this time. The security man slides the
tray across and Jim takes the phone again.)
SECURITY MAN: Thank you.
(Jim walks on and enters the room. He stops at the large display case in the middle of the room
and looks at the throne inside the case. On the throne is a red velvet cushion with an ornate
crown resting on it. An equally ornate orb is balanced on one arm of the throne and a sceptre
rests across the other arm. As other tourists walk around the case, Jim takes a pair of
earphones from his pocket and pokes them into his ears. Bending his head from side to side to
crack his neck, he lifts his phone and switches it on, then closes his eyes in bliss, still rolling his
head on his neck and spreading his arms either side of him and then slowly beginning to lower
them as the Overture to Rossini’s “The Thieving Magpie” begins to play.
In the nearby surveillance room, one of the two men watching the security footage from all
around the Tower turns to his colleague.)
SURVEILLANCE MAN 1: Fancy a cuppa, then, mate?
SURVEILLANCE MAN 2: Yeah, why not?
(The first man stands up and walks away.)

BANK OF ENGLAND 11:00
A man brings a tray containing a cup and saucer and a milk jug into the office of the bank’s
Director.
BANK DIRECTOR (looking at his computer screen): Gilts at seven; Dutch telecoms in freefall.
Thank you, Harvey.
(Harvey puts down the tray onto the table and leaves the room again.)

PENTONVILLE PRISON 11:00
The prison’s governor, with an enormous “Keep calm and carry on” mug full of tea on his desk,
slams a file down onto his desk while several warders sit or stand nearby.
PRISON GOVERNOR: What do you say: refuse them all parole and bring back the rope(!) Let’s
begin.

At the Tower, Jim finishes lowering his arms and then lifts up the phone and scrolls through the
app icons on it. He pushes aside the one that has a cartoon of a prisoner with striped prison
clothes and standing behind bars, scrolls past the one of a piggy bank with the English flag on
it, and selects the one with a crown on it. The icon of the crown unfolds like a padlock being
unlocked and digital code begins to stream out into the air, and in the surveillance room alarms
begin to beep in warning as some of the TV screens go blank. An automated voice plays into the
White Tower.
VOICE (repeatedly): This is an emergency. Please leave the building.
(The tourists start to hurry out of the room. A security guard walks over to Jim, perhaps
assuming that he can’t hear the alarm through his earphones, and puts a hand onto his
shoulder to attract his attention.)
SECURITY GUARD: Sir, I’m gonna have to ask you to leave.
(Jim turns and sprays something into his face and he immediately collapses. The security door
closes and locks, and Jim takes off his cap and smoothes out his hair. In the surveillance room,
the man slams down the cups of tea he was bringing back, grabs a phone and starts to dial.)

At Scotland Yard, Sally Donovan hurries across the office and opens the door to Greg’s office.
DONOVAN: Sir, there’s been a break-in.

Transcripts by Ariane DeVere (arianedevere@livejournal.com)