Page 299 - SHERLOCK transcripts

298

(He walks over to the dining table and picks up a woollen bobble hat which has earflaps [It’s an
ear hat, John!] and a dangly woollen pom pom hanging from each flap.)
SHERLOCK: Client left this while I was out. What d’you reckon?
(He tosses it to his brother.)
MYCROFT (catching it): I’m busy.
SHERLOCK: Oh, go on. It’s been an age.
(Mycroft lifts the hat to his nose and sniffs, then looks across to Sherlock.)
MYCROFT: I always win.
SHERLOCK: Which is why you can’t resist.
MYCROFT (quick fire): I find nothing irresistible in the hat of a well-travelled anxious
sentimental unfit creature of habit with appalling halitosis ...
(He stops when he notices Sherlock’s widening smile.)
MYCROFT: Damn.
(He throws the hat back to Sherlock.)
SHERLOCK: Isolated, too, don’t you think?
MYCROFT: Why would he be isolated?
SHERLOCK: “He”?
MYCROFT: Obviously.
SHERLOCK: Why? Size of the hat?
MYCROFT: Don’t be silly. Some women have large heads too.
(Sherlock flinches slightly, possibly at Mycroft’s insult to his intelligence.)
MYCROFT: No – he’s recently had his hair cut. You can see the little hairs adhering to the
perspiration stains on the inside.
(Sherlock looks down at the hat, pouting slightly.)
SHERLOCK: Some women have short hair, too.
MYCROFT: Balance of probability.
SHERLOCK: Not that you’ve ever spoken to a woman with short hair – or, you know, a woman.
MYCROFT: Stains show he’s out of condition, and he’s sentimental because the hat has been
repaired three, four ...
SHERLOCK: Five times. (He throws the hat back to his brother.) Very neatly. (Quick fire) The
cost of the repairs exceeds the cost of the hat, so he's mawkishly attached to it, but it’s more
than that. One, perhaps two, patches would indicate sentimentality, but five? Five’s excessive
behaviour. Obsessive compulsive.
MYCROFT: Hardly. Your client left it behind. What sort of an obsessive compulsive would do
that?
(He throws the hat back to Sherlock, who grabs it with an exasperated grimace.)
MYCROFT: The earlier patches are extensively sun-bleached, so he’s worn it abroad – in Peru.
SHERLOCK: Peru?
MYCROFT: This is a chullo – the classic headgear of the Andes. It’s made of alpaca.
SHERLOCK (smirking): No.
MYCROFT: No?
SHERLOCK: Icelandic sheep wool. Similar, but very distinctive if you know what you’re looking
for. I’ve written a blog on the varying tensile strengths of different natural fibres.
MRS HUDSON (coming back into the room with a teapot): I’m sure there’s a crying need for
that.
(Sherlock pauses for a moment, then turns back to his brother.)
SHERLOCK: You said he was anxious.
MYCROFT: The bobble on the left side has been badly chewed, which shows he’s a man of a
nervous disposition but ...
SHERLOCK (talking over him): ... but also a creature of habit because he hasn’t chewed the
bobble on the right.
MYCROFT: Precisely.
(Sherlock lifts the hat and sniffs it before lowering it again, grimacing.)
SHERLOCK: Brief sniff of the offending bobble tells us everything we need to know about the
state of his breath.
(He turns away.)
SHERLOCK (sarcastically): Brilliant(!)
MYCROFT: Elementary.
SHERLOCK: But you’ve missed his isolation.
MYCROFT: I don’t see it.
SHERLOCK: Plain as day.

Transcripts by Ariane DeVere (arianedevere@livejournal.com)