Page 466 - SHERLOCK transcripts

465

doorway behind them and sees a suspended gong to one side. Picking up its mallet, he strikes
the gong loudly. The figures stop chanting and turn to face him.)
HOLMES (hanging up the mallet): Sorry. I could never resist a gong. (He turns to the
gathering.) Or a touch of the dramatic.
MRS WATSON: Never have guessed(!)
HOLMES (walking forward): Though it seems you share my enthusiasm in that regard.
(He walks through the middle of the crowd. The figures stand silently in even rows either side of
him.)
HOLMES: Excellent.
(Mary throws a nervous glance at her husband, who is staring around the chapel in awe.)
HOLMES: Superlative theatre. I applaud the spectacle.
(He smiles, turns back and walks slowly towards the doorway.)
HOLMES: Emelia Ricoletti shot herself, then apparently returned from the grave and killed her
husband. So, how was it done? Let’s take the events in order.
(Flashback to Emelia standing on the balcony, firing into the street below while people run away
and duck for cover.)
HOLMES (voiceover): Mrs Ricoletti gets everyone’s attention in very efficient fashion.
BRIDE (in flashback): You!
(She continues to fire.)
BRIDE: You?! (Softly) Or me?
(Lowering the left-hand pistol, she turns the gun in her right hand towards herself and opens
her mouth wide.)
HOLMES (voiceover): She places one of the revolvers in her mouth while actually firing the
other into the ground.
(Emelia fires the lowered left-hand pistol.)
HOLMES (voiceover): An accomplice sprays the curtains with blood ...
(Inside the room, a figure – out of focus so we can’t see him or her clearly – sprays blood onto
the net curtains behind Emelia’s head.)
HOLMES (voiceover): ... and thus her apparent suicide is witnessed by the frightened crowd
below.
(Emelia falls backwards and crashes to the carpet inside the room. Lying on her back next to
her is another woman, her eyes closed. She is dressed in an identical wedding dress to Emelia’s
and her face has been given the same make-up. Emelia stands up.)
HOLMES (voiceover): A substitute corpse bearing a strong resemblance to Mrs Ricoletti takes
her place and is later transported to the morgue. A grubby little suicide of little interest to
Scotland Yard.
(As Emelia walks away, several people pick up the body and carry it a few feet to the right,
placing it in the position where Emelia landed.)
HOLMES (voiceover): Meanwhile the real Mrs Ricoletti slips away.
(Emelia, now wearing everyday clothes – though she has not fixed her lurid and smeared
lipstick – pulls the net veil on her hat over her face and leaves the house, walking off down the
street.)
HOLMES (voiceover for the first sentence): Now comes the really clever part. Mrs Ricoletti
persuaded a cab driver – someone who knew her – to intercept her husband outside his
favourite opium den. The perfect stage for a perfect drama.
(In flashback, Emelia – back in the wedding dress with the veil over her face – points the
shotgun at her husband.)
RICOLETTI: Who are you? What do you want?
(Emelia lifts her veil with one hand and smiles at her husband. He stares in disbelief.)
RICOLETTI: Emelia?!
(She fires, then lowers the veil and turns away.)
MAN (offscreen): Help!
HOLMES (voiceover): A perfect positive identification.
(PC Rance turns and stares at the Bride.)
MAN (offscreen): Murder! Murder!
HOLMES (voiceover): The late Mrs Ricoletti has returned from the grave ...
(The bloodstained back of her head can be clearly seen by the police officer.)
HOLMES (voiceover): ... and with a little skilled make-up and you have nothing less than the
wrath of a vengeful ghost.
(Emelia walks away into the fog and disappears from view. Further down the street, she stops
on top of a manhole cover and stomps the heel of her boot against it twice. In the drain

Transcripts by Ariane DeVere (arianedevere@livejournal.com)