Page 447 - SHERLOCK transcripts

446

MYCROFT HOLMES: Where would be the sport in that? Will you do it, Sherlock? I can promise
you a superior distraction.
HOLMES: On one condition. Have another plum pudding.
MYCROFT HOLMES: There’s one on the way.
HOLMES (buttoning his dress coat and starting to walk away): Two years, eleven months and
four days.
(Mycroft chuckles.)
MYCROFT HOLMES: It’s getting exciting now!
(Watson realises that Holmes is leaving and stands up to follow him.)
MYCROFT HOLMES: Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock.
(He waggles his fingers at Watson as he leaves. From another door, Wilder wheels in a trolley
with a silver cover over a large plate.)
MYCROFT HOLMES: Thank you, Wilder.
WILDER: Also, Mr Melas to see you, Mr Holmes.
MYCROFT HOLMES: Ah. Give me five minutes. I have a wager to win.
(He leans forward as Wilder lifts the silver cover. There are three large plum puddings on the
plate. Mycroft looks up at Wilder.)
MYCROFT HOLMES: Better make that fifteen.
(He reaches out with an ecstatic expression on his face.)
MYCROFT HOLMES: Tick tock.
(He sinks his fingers into one of the puddings and there’s a loud squelch as he lifts it from the
plate and takes it in both hands.)

There is a brief shot of the outside of 221B, with Speedwell’s next door, and then we are in the
flat’s sitting room. Holmes and Watson are sitting in their armchairs, and an elegantly-dressed
woman sits on a dining chair opposite them.
LADY CARMICHAEL: Mr Holmes, I have come here for advice.
HOLMES: That is easily got.
LADY CARMICHAEL: And help.
HOLMES: Not always so easy.
LADY CARMICHAEL: Something has happened, Mr Holmes – something ... unusual and ...
terrifying.
HOLMES: Then you are in luck.
(She scoffs.)
LADY CARMICHAEL: ‘Luck’?
HOLMES (smiling at her): Those are my specialisms.
(He smiles across at Watson.)
HOLMES: This is really very promising.
WATSON: Holmes ...
(Holmes drops the smile and turns back to Lady Carmichael.)
HOLMES: Please do tell us what has so distressed you.
LADY CARMICHAEL: I – I thought long and hard as to what to do, but then, er, it occurred to
me that my husband was an acquaintance of your brother and that, perhaps through him ...
(She trails off. Holmes tilts his head at her enquiringly.)
LADY CARMICHAEL: The fact is, I’m not sure this comes within your purview, Mr Holmes.
HOLMES: No?
LADY CARMICHAEL: Lord help me, I think it may be a matter for a priest.
(Holmes glances across at Watson, who returns his gaze.)

FLASHBACK. In the huge dining room of their stately home, Sir Eustace Carmichael and his wife
are eating breakfast with their two school-aged children, a girl and a boy.
SIR EUSTACE: And what does your morning threaten, my dear? (He takes a drink from his
teacup.) A vigorous round of embroidering? An exhausting appointment at the milliner’s?
(His wife cuts herself a bite of food and lifts it to her mouth.)
LADY CARMICHAEL: I hope you are teasing, Eustace.
(He chuckles. A footman brings in a silver plate on which are letters and a letter opener. Sir
Eustace slits open the first envelope and looks inside. He freezes, staring at the contents in
horror.)
LADY CARMICHAEL: What is it?
(Sir Eustace doesn’t respond, his gaze still locked on what he can see inside the envelope.)
LADY CARMICHAEL: Eustace?

Transcripts by Ariane DeVere (arianedevere@livejournal.com)