"Excuse me." "Constable Morse." "I loved your singing." "Dorothea Frazil." "Oxford Mail." "We met briefly on the Tremlett case." "Oh, I remember you, of course." "It's a good angle:" ""The Singing Detective"." "It's better than the one I've got presently." "I've no wish to see my name in the papers, Miss Frazil." "Covering for the local arts correspondent is never going to win me the Pulitzer." "Just give me a quote." "I'll see there's something in it for you." "Any such recompense would leave us both open to charges of bribery and corruption." "If you'll excuse me." "Good evening." "Good luck with your story." "Constable!" "I'll be off, then, Aunt." "Phillip will be in tomorrow to see if there's anything you need." "Will he have time?" "With the recital?" "He's working very hard." "But coming to see you is always good for him." "So..." "How is he?" "Can you get a tarp over the timber?" "I'm breaking my neck for a jimmy." "What's the matter with her?" "I told you." "She's just not feeling right." "Don't go." "Please." "She's my mother, Lionel." "I do love you, Evie." "Fancy a pint?" "If you're buying." "No, it's an emergency job." "Just come in." "Some old girl's sprung a leak." "I can't exactly leave her in the lurch, can I?" "Yeah." "Quick as I can, promise." "Love you too." "Watch ya." "Morse." "This way, sir." "Yardman was doing his rounds about five." "Saw the wagon door open and thought he'd take a look." "How often does he check on the rolling stock?" "Start, middle and finish of his turn most nights." "But this end, I think, not so much." "These are all out of service." "Waiting on being broken up." " This it?" " Sir." "Doctor DeBryn." "Inspector." "No need to ask after cause, I shouldn't have thought." "Ligature strangulation." "Almost textbook." "As to the time..." "Three pink elephants, two pink elephants, one pink elephant." "Some time between nine and midnight." "She's an earring missing." "I've a contingent of cadets coming down to search." "Got a name for her?" "Evelyn Balfour." "Um..." "She works behind the bar at Cowley Bingo." "Husband last saw her last night about seven o'clock when she left to visit her sick mother." "Wasn't he worried when she didn't come back?" "There was a possibility she may stay overnight." "She told her husband her mother was ill." "Her mother's been spoken to." "Nothing wrong with her." "What's that in her mouth?" "A handkerchief." "Embroidered with the letter..." "D." "Hardly the most romantic spot for a bit of how's-your-father." "Private." "It's got that going for it." "Beggars can't, I suppose." "We're going to take the husband." "You can do her work." "Just the facts." "Don't need confusing with any "theories"." "Then you're back to the nick and resume general duties." "Right?" "All was well with you and Mrs Balfour?" "No arguments?" "No." "Never a cross word, eh?" "Did you go out last night?" "No." "Just had my tea." "Got the children bathed and put to bed." "I was catching up on my returns." "You're an insurance agent." "That right?" "Mutual and Provident." "What's that?" "Door-to-door?" "Collecting payments." "Mrs Balfour often go out alone of an evening?" "Only to see her mother." "She's not been in the best of health lately." "Shingles." "Oh." "How long's that been going on then?" "Couple of months." "Other than that, Mrs Balfour was more of a home-bird, was she?" "Oh, yes." "She sometimes had a late turn at the bingo, depending on the rota." "But otherwise..." "Nice." "We just had it done." "Couple of months back." "Evelyn had been on for one." "A pal of hers at work had a matching suite put in at Christmas." "You know what they're like." "Mrs Balfour looks to have been carrying on with someone, sir." "Romantically?" "Common knowledge at the bingo hall where she worked, according to Morse." "Morse?" "I thought he'd been returned to general duties." "That's right, sir." "He has." "He just happened to be in early when the report came through." "Amongst the first on the scene." "Does the husband know about the... infidelity?" "Not the impression he's giving." "Trying to protect her reputation perhaps." "Or his own." "No man likes to be thought a cuckold." "Doesn't look as though he's got it in him." "The fancy man, most likely." "Just a matter of finding him then." "Hm?" "You got that car theft written up yet?" "How's about you stick to general duties and let the rough boys deal with the grown-up stuff?" "Why did he leave the door open?" "If it wasn't open she could have lay in there for days before being discovered." "Panicked, hasn't he, once he's done her." "Fled the scene and forgot to shut it after him." "It's reckless." "Don't you think?" "He made a mistake." "Or he wanted us to find her." "I don't hear you typing." "Car theft." "Oh!" "Police!" "Open the door!" "Hello!" "Police!" "Did you close that door?" "Police." "Was that you?" "No, sir." ""Oon back-ee-o ankera"." "Un bacio ancora." "All right." "So what's it mean?" ""One kiss more." Italian." "Un bacio ancora is Otello's last line in Verdi's opera." "So what?" "He sings it having strangled his wife in a fit of jealousy." "He believes she's given a handkerchief to another officer as a sign of her affections." "And?" "His wife's name is Desdemona." "The handkerchief stuffed in Evelyn Balfour's mouth was embroidered with the initial D." "You're kidding?" "We're not really giving this any weight, are we?" "Interesting, don't you think?" "Maybe." "But that could've been written up on the door years ago." "More likely we're looking for a bloke called Dave, than some bint called Desdemona." "If this is some fancy man she had on the go, it'll have been a spur of the moment thing." "Exactly." "He's hardly going to hang about writing all that on the door, then sliding it out of view where nobody could find it, is he?" "It was found." "Sir?" "It's not as if anybody normal would think to look there, is it?" "Thursday." "Where's this?" "Morse." "Deceased is one Grace Agnes Madison." "11th of the fourth, 1896." "Widowed." "Found by her niece, Faye." "Just gone half-past ten this morning." "Pathologist been notified?" "He's on his way." "But she was in general good health according to the niece." "Oh." "She's outside if you wanted a word." "Mrs Madison was your aunt, is that right?" "Married to my father's older brother." "Uncle Cedric." "He's deceased, I understand." "Yes." "He died in '62." "Aunt Grace returned to England the following year." "From where?" "India." "She was born in Witney, but she grew up and lived most of her life there, which is where she met Uncle Cedric." "When did you see her last?" "Erm..." "Yesterday." "Aunt Grace was all the family we had left." "One or other of us tried to look in every day, just to see if there was anything she needed." "One or the other of whom?" "Erm..." "My brother." "Phillip." "Today was his turn - but he's presently rehearsing for a piano recital." "She seemed in good health when you saw her last?" "Yes." "Pottering about the conservatory as usual." "Aunt Grace was a botanist of some note." "She'd written several books on the flora of the subcontinent." "Doctor." "Morse." "Anything?" "By anything, I presume you mean, anything suspicious?" "No obvious signs of violence." "All I can tell you for now is that she died sometime between four and seven o'clock yesterday afternoon." "I'd be grateful if you get the contents of the teapot taken away for analysis." "The teapot?" "People do die of natural causes, Morse." "Think someone bumped her off for the inheritance?" "I think the table's set for two, and her guest hasn't touched their tea." "Hm." "If that's the stuff the chimps drink, I'm a Chinaman." "Mrs Madison had an appointment in her diary with a Mister Nimmo at 4pm yesterday." "There was a letter from him." "Dated Tuesday last." "Some sort of journalist." "Wanted to write about her gardening." "She was a botanist of some repute, apparently." "One day I'll send you out for a routine enquiry and it'll turn out to be just that." "But I won't hold my breath." "You'd find something suspicious in a saint's sock drawer." "I didn't know you spoke Italian." "More under my hat than nits." "We came up through Italy after North Africa." "Landed at Reggio." "Then on to Cassino." "Got a match on a thumbprint off Mrs Balfour's handbag, sir." "Roy Adamson." "Three months suspended for receiving, some nine years back." "Runs a builder's yard out towards Headington." "Looks like Othello's in the clear." "Right." "Fetch the car round." "Mrs Madison's niece know anything about this Nimmo character?" "No, sir." "See if you can run him down." "Find out what he was doing there." "What about this builder?" "The Balfours had a bathroom suite installed a few months back." "Round about the time she was "visiting her sick mother"." "Let's just say I'd be very surprised if it wasn't Roy Adamson's building firm that was doing the work." "Oh." "Good afternoon." "City Police." "I'm looking for a Mister Nimmo." "I believe he lives at number 8." "I've never seen him." "How long have you lived here?" "Nearly three years." "Oh." "Well, thank you for your help." "Heard him, though." "You've heard him?" "Music blaring out till all hours." "I've written to the landlord." "Not that it's made no difference." "What kind of music?" "Classical." "You know, bloody awful stuff." "Singing." "Well, caterwauling." "Thank you." "Yeah, we did some work for Mister Balfour." "There you go." "A bathroom suite." "Pink." "A few months back." "What did you make of 'em?" "I didn't make anything of 'em." "Just customers." "Nice enough." "Seen 'em recently?" "No." "Not since the job finished." "You sure about that?" "Pretty sure." "See, the thing is, Roy..." "We found Mrs Balfour strangled yesterday." "And your fingerprints have turned up on her handbag." "Anything you'd like to tell me about that?" "That's you." "Go on, in you get." "He's admitted carrying on with her." "Not that he had much choice." "Sergeant Jakes found an earring in the footwell of a works' truck." "A match?" "Took her up Boar's Hill, he says." "Car park." "Brings her back after by Osney, where he found her." "Alive and well, presumably." "Call for you, sir." "Dr DeBryn." "The "sudden" this morning." "Pending toxicological results," "I consulted a colleague from the Botanic Gardens." "He identified the leaves in the teapot as having come from Datura stramonium." "Datura?" "A weed." "Also known as the Thorn Apple, or Devil's Snare." "Poisonous?" "Oh, highly toxic." "The seed pods in particular." "I took the liberty." "Been used for centuries by the Indians and Chinese as a treatment for asthma." "But the line between a medicinal and a lethal dose is very thin indeed." "Contains atropine and scopolamine." "The "truth" drug." "That's right." "Taken in overdose, symptoms include severe hallucinations, seizures." "All leading, step by jolly step, to blindness, coma and an eventual "how do you do" from St Peter." "If one goes in for that sort of thing." "What do you make to it?" "Mrs Madison." "Money?" "With only a niece and nephew living, I'd expect they stand to inherit." "What about your Mister Nimmo?" "No-one's seen him around his flat." "But a neighbour said he had music blaring till all hours." "Opera, by the sound of it." "The entire lease on his lodgings is conducted through a solicitor." "They're running down a cheque." "Should be able to get a more reliable address from his bank." "A weed, Dr DeBryn said." "Not likely to be something she'd have been cultivating, is it?" "I wouldn't have thought so." "There's something about Datura I can't quite put my finger on." "At least the Balfour case looks like it's going to run to form." "The builder?" "Has he confessed?" "Not yet." "I'm letting him sweat for the minute." "I'll have another go after lunch." "Speaking of which..." "Now, let's see." "What have I got to look forward to?" "Luncheon meat." "Remind me never to spend Christmas at your house." ""Ici..." "loin du monde reel."" "They're the last words sung by Lakme, sir." "Whom?" "Lakme, sir." "An Indian princess." "The heroine of an opera by Delibes." "According to Morse, sir, this Lakme girl kills herself by eating leaves from the Datura plant." "The same as was used to poison Grace Madison." "Makes it two, sir." "What makes two?" "Two deaths, sir." "With a connection to opera." "There was a phrase from..." "What is it?" "Otello, sir." "By Giuseppe Verdi." "Chalked on the door of the goods wagon where we found Evelyn Balfour." ""One kiss more." His last words, Morse says." "You mean Shakespeare's Othello?" "The blackamoor?" "That's him, sir, yes." "Evelyn Balfour was strangled, sir, like Desdemona, Othello's wife." "A handkerchief was stuffed in her mouth, embroidered with the initial D." "I thought we had someone for the Balfour killing." "All right, Morse." "As you were." "Opera?" "Good God!" "A man would have to be some sort of raving lunatic to go to such lengths." "If he is a lunatic, sir, I'd have to say he's a very clever one." "If you have no objection," "I'd like to second Morse from General Duties for the duration." "Is that necessary?" "Specialist knowledge, sir - it comes to this sort of thing." "Very well." "But for the duration of the inquiry only." "I don't want him getting ideas." "That's kind of what I'm counting on." "Sir." "Usual time in the morning, is it?" "No, you're all right." "Morse can fetch me." "You're off General Duties till further notice." "8.15 sharp." "All right?" "Morse." "Hello?" "Hello?" "Seen this?" "Late Edition." "How the hell have they come by that?" ""Reliable sources", I expect." "Are you serious?" "Put it this way, matey." "For a bloke who puts it away the way he does," "Jakes is never anything less than flush, is he?" "Anyroad." "Get 'em in, then." "I thought we might have a go through the Fitton's." "You'll never get your Sergeant's, otherwise." "I was gonna push off, if it's all the same." "It's your round." "I'll owe you one." "Right." "I don't suppose your aunt might have mentioned this Mr Nimmo to your brother?" "She may." "But, if she did, he never told me." "I'd er..." "I'd like to speak with him." "I'm afraid he's very busy at the moment." "Of course." "At his convenience." "Well, good night." "I'm sorry to have troubled you, Miss Madison." "Uh..." "Dad!" "Well, don't stand on ceremony." "It's probably best if I wait in the car." "It's probably best if you just do as you're told." "You've come in, then." "I'm impressed." "Most of Pop's it takes at least six months." "That lump is my brother Sam." "You want a cuppa?" "No, I'm fine, thanks, Miss Thursday." "Miss Thursday!" "She gets enough of that down the bank." "Start calling her it at home and she'll get airs." "That's Joan, love." "It's one of Dad's, Mum." "I didn't think he was from the pools." "Sit yourself down." "He won't be a tick." "So." "What do they call you, then?" "Morse." "Morse?" "Morse what?" "Morse Code." "Dit-dit-dah!" "You still here, Joan?" "Morning, sir." "I thought it was twenty-past, your bus." "I'm just going." "Sam, fetch the bins out before you go to work." "Don't leave it to your mother." "Right." "We're off." "Here, let's have a look at you." "Come home safe." "There, then, you'll do, Fred." "It went well this morning?" "You haven't said." "I don't want to talk about it." "But it's helping." "Phillip?" "What did that policeman want last night?" "I told you." "He's investigating what happened to Aunt Grace." "Why did he come to the house?" "I don't like people coming to the house." "He was asking about someone called Nimmo - a journalist of some sort." "Yeah?" "The bank's come through with an address for Mr Nimmo, sir." "Some place called Drover's Rest." "Good." "Thursday, this is Dr Daniel Cronyn." "Dr Cronyn, Detective Inspector Thursday." "How do you do?" "Dr Cronyn is a psychiatrist in private practice." "He's made a particular study of these kind of deranged individuals." "You might benefit from his professional opinion." "The perpetrator of these crimes clearly exhibits a profoundly disturbed psyche." "Indeed." "I'm sure I'm not telling you anything you don't know." "What may be less obvious to you, perhaps, is that he will also be highly functioning." "Which, I regret to say, will make him very difficult to apprehend." "But not impossible?" "Such cases are few and far between over here, but my colleagues in the United States believe this kind of killer is something of a coming trend." "A trend?" "Indeed." "Within the last ten years we've had the Starkweather case, the bodies in the swamp at Fairvale and DeSalvo in Boston." "What's he after?" "What's behind him?" "Impossible to say." "Other than he conforms to the triad personality of Narcissism, Machiavellianism and Psychopathy posited by McDonald a couple of years back," "I'd expect him to be highly intelligent." "Though this may not necessarily be reflected in academic achievements." "How old?" "Mid-20s to mid-30s. 40 at a push." "There's no possibility this could be the end of it?" "Gentlemen, you're confronting a mind... unconstrained by notions of guilt... regret, right and wrong... good and evil." "So far as he's concerned, we're just... prey." "Prey?" "In his eyes." "Kine... reared to slaughter." "We'll stop him." "How?" "You think you're going to appeal to his nobler instincts, his better angels?" "He doesn't have any." "The only thing I can tell you with absolute certainty... is he will kill again." "Good afternoon." "Afternoon." "We're looking for Drover's Rest." "Some sort of farm, I believe." "Slaughteryard." "Old Ben Nimmo's place." "Mr Nimmo wouldn't be a journalist, then?" "Not unless he writes about pet food." "I see." "Could you point us in the right direction?" "What d'you want with Old Ben, then?" "Police business." "City Police." "Are we far?" "You've come past the turning about two mile." "Well, thank you, Mr...?" "Oakshott." "Lemuel." "You won't find him there." "Gone away." "I haven't seen him since Ada died, his wife." "Gone to his boy, maybe." "Canada." "Mr Nimmo?" "Take it down." "You go up there, I'll go down here." "It's from Aida, sir." "Radames' final aria." "Just before he's entombed alive." "Cement mixer in the yard, wasn't there?" "That looks new." "We've had a patrol round this flat leased in Nimmo's name, the one you went to." "Nothing there but a record player and a stack of LPs." "It's not been occupied so far as the lads can tell." "I didn't think it would've been." "Look sharp, then, Morse." "It's the competition." "Somebody with even more crackpot ideas than you." "Buried alive?" "Nothing quite so quick, I'm afraid." "This was immurement." "Walling up." "Cause of death would have been more likely dehydration than asphyxia." "How long?" "For some days." "My God!" "Then as the organs of the body began to fail... delirium... madness." "One can only pray his heart gave out first." "Would you excuse me?" "There's wickedness in this, Morse." "I can understand gain, jealousy, revenge, even." "But killing just for the sheer hell of it?" "That's something new." "Hello, Oxford Mail." "How can I help you?" "What's this?" "Found on the victim, sir." "It's from The Mikado, KoKo's song." ""As someday it may happen that a victim might be found"." "I suppose he thinks that's funny." "It's also known as The List Song, sir." "List?" "KoKo was the Lord High Executioner to the Mikado." "He read a list of society offenders he said he was going to execute." "The chorus runs," ""He's got 'em on the list and they'll none of 'em be missed"" "Our three victims, presumably." "How many more has he got in mind?" "That's what worries me." "Something you should see, sir." "Through here." "You too, Morse." "Looks like you've got an admirer." "There was a musical score stuffed in Mr Nimmo's pockets." "The List Song, apparently." "Doctor?" "No." "For a moment, I..." "But it can't be." "I'm just..." "There was a... a patient." "I met him in the early '50s, when I was working at Bellevue Sanatorium under Dr Elias." "He'd have been about 20 then." "Who would?" "A young man called..." "Miller." "Keith Miller." "He was some sort of musical child prodigy." "Quite brilliant, by all accounts." "But on the morning of his 15th birthday, he took an axe from the woodshed and... buried it in the back of his mother's skull." "What happened to him?" ""Guilty but insane"." "He was sentenced to be detained at His Majesty's Pleasure." "What makes you think he's connected?" "When he was in therapy, he described horribly violent, murderous fantasies - what he would and wouldn't like to do to various members of staff who'd rubbed him up the wrong way." "It was a pet phrase of his." ""I've got a little list."" "Where is he now?" "I seem to remember a colleague saying he'd been released, cured... about five or six years ago." "The point is... he was an Oxford boy." "Bad ju-ju, Thursday." "Yes, sir." "Get to the bottom of it and quick." "I'm relying on you." "Morse!" "You're off General Duties because I'm told this is your area." "See you prove yourself useful." "Sir." "All right, Morse?" "Why has he got my picture on the wall?" "It just tickled his fancy." "I wouldn't read too much into it." "He's just trying to get us rattled." "It's working." "Then, don't let it." "I need you thinking straight." "It was delivered around 11." ""?" ": 3" " OCP: 0."" "That's us, I suppose, Oxford City Police." "Three-nil to the Opera Phantom." "That was rather my reading of it." "There's been another one?" "Actually, Miss Frazil, I'd urge you in the strongest possible terms not to make this communication known to the public." "As a favour." "This person we're after is clearly working to some sort of plan." "I'd hope by your agreeing not to publish, we might derail whatever scheme he's got in mind or delay it, at least." "24 hours." "After that..." "Pray that's enough." "Morse." "I heard it." "Put your sandals on, then." "Every..." "Good..." "Boy..." "Deserves Favours." "I've spoken to Bellevue, sir." "Seems there was a fire there, three years ago, destroyed several wings of the sanatorium, together with the records office." "Surely if this happened locally...?" "Nothing on our files, sir." "I've put in a request to County." "Sir..." "Ah!" "Our resident expert." "Opera!" "I don't think the killer's choosing his victims at random." "There may be a pattern." "A pattern?" "To the killings." "I can't be sure, but..." "Every Good Boy Deserves Favour." "Every what?" "It's a mnemonic for remembering the notes on a treble clef." "Every Good Boy Deserves Favour " "EGBDF." "Evelyn, Grace, Ben." "That it?" "So the next one will start with a D." "Debbie?" "Debbie?" "Debbie!" "Debbie!" "Debbie Snow, sir." "Six years old." "Taken from the street outside her house." "Description's been circulated to all cars and foot patrols." "It's him." "We can't say that." "Just because her name begins with a D. There's more than that, sir." "The translator from Lonsdale identified the score sent to Miss Frazil as Snegurochka by Rimsky-Korsakov." "Snegurochka is Russian for Snowmaiden." "Somebody dies, presumably." "The Snowmaiden herself." "She melts at dawn." "As the sun rises." "Something stuffed down in the toe, according to Uniform." ""No alibi err badly." What the hell does that mean?" "Maybe he's saying we've made a mistake, sir." "One of the people we've seen in relation to the other killings." "Someone without an alibi, or..." ""Near by Libra idol"?" "Some kind of direction, perhaps?" "He's setting us a test." "What sort of test?" "It's a game." "Solve the puzzle, save the child." ""Near by Libra idol"?" "Libra is the Scales, sir." "Justice, maybe?" "The idol could be a statue by the Law Courts." "Think you can you crack it?" "I can try." "Try?" "You need to do more than try." "All right, Jakes." "That'll do." "Meant to be the expert, isn't he?" "Laughing-boy's pin-up." "I said, that'll do." "I'm thinking of the kiddie, sir." "Us turning on each other's going to help find her, is it?" "Exactly what he wants." "It's Morse these messages are meant for, sir." "We all know that." "He's seen his picture in the paper." "One bloody misfit talking to another." "About your business, Sergeant." "He's right." "If I can't crack this..." "It's not all on you, Morse, whatever Sergeant Jakes says." "The Snowmaiden melts, sir... at dawn." "However he intends to bring that about, by fire..." "We've less than 12 hours to find her." "Then we'd better get a move on." "Morse." "Where is she?" ""Libra idol."" "Fool!" "Hello, sir." "Detective Constable Morse." "City Police." "I'd like to know if anyone's requested the score for The Snow Maiden." "Rimsky-Korsakov." "Is that the Western Score?" "Mm." "Give me a moment." "Yes, indeed, it was brought up from the stacks on the 17th of last month for Mr Miller." "Miller?" "Keith Miller?" "That's right." "Is he a regular reader?" "This last year, yes, indeed." "As a matter of fact, a fresh set of scores have just been delivered to him." "He's here now?" "He arrived not quarter of an hour ago." "Close the library." "I beg your pardon?" "I need you to seal the building." "Doors." "Windows." "Fire escape." "I don't have the authority." "I'm a police officer." "That's all the authority you need." "A child's life stands in the balance." "Please." "Miss Crane, will you and Miss Thornhill close the library?" "Close it, Mr Straker?" "Ssh." "Quickly and quietly, if you please." "What about the readers?" "They're to remain inside." "He's from the police." "Step lively, now." "Ah..." "He's gone." "He was sitting there." "The man who was sitting here, did you see where he went?" "This way." "Is there a way out from here?" "Not up there, no." "And you won't get him if he's gone down into the stacks." "There's five storeys underground." "The corridors go for miles." "What about exits?" "The bicycle chain." "A pulley railway under the Broad." "Call 999." "Tell them DC Morse from Cowley Station needs immediate assistance at the Bodleian." "Police." "Leave." "Now." "Argh!" "Morse?" "Morse?" "Did you see him?" "Which way did he go?" "See who?" "Him!" "The suspect!" "You all right, matey?" "Huh?" "Your shirt..." "Over here, man down!" "All right, mate." "You're OK, matey." "Don't just stand there, get some help!" "All right, matey." "Ring the station." "Right." "Morse, I am going to put some pressure on this, all right?" "I know, mate, I know." "I know." "Not too deep." "Thankfully." "But a clean cut like that'll be a bugger to knit." "It's far better gashing yourself on something jagged." "I'll bear that in mind next time I chase a lunatic under the Bodleian." "What led you there?" "An anagram." "Well, double anagram." ""No alibi err badly." "Near by libra idol."" "Both phrases use the same letters." "Bodleian Library." "Cheers!" "Your health, surely!" "It's going to be tight and quite tender for the next few days." "So... bed rest." "And my finest Broderie Anglaise notwithstanding, don't exert yourself overmuch." "The girl's still missing." "I've got to get back." "Morse..." "If he'd decided to stab and not to slash," "I'd presently be getting more acquainted with your anatomy than either of us might care for." "Soon as not be heaving your tripes into a tray, if it's all the same." "Not just yet at least." "Uniform recovered this lot from a bin on Catte Street by the library." "Another one of those score things here." ""Some coppers have no brains." "All coppers are bastards."" "I want it back, clean, starched and pressed." "You sure you're fit for duty?" "Yeah." "It looks much worse than it feels." "What did I miss?" "The Ice Cream Man's been found." "He thinks - only thinks, mind - he saw a girl answering Debbie's description talking to a man." "Beard." "Glasses." "Walking stick." "It's a Modus Bocardo syllogism." "A category of logical argument." "Two propositions, one major, one minor, and the "therefore" symbol is the clue." ""Some coppers have no brains." "All coppers are bastards." "Therefore some bastards have no brains."" "It has to be more than that." "He has to give us a sporting chance." "Else, where's the fun in it?" "Well, whatever it means, as an exercise in bamboozling the police, it's brilliant." "I doubt Debbie Snow would see it that way." "It really matters to you, doesn't it?" "Finding this girl." "I mean, it matters to me." "Don't get me wrong." "But with you it's..." "Why did you become a policeman?" "We're not here to talk about me." "If you've nothing else to add..." "In my experience, a policeman's need to save people is typically born of a need to save one person." "Who couldn't you save, Constable Morse?" "Good night, Doctor." "The girl is "materiel" in whatever diabolical game he's playing." "The real object here is to prove whose intellect is the greater." "So far, it's..." "You admire him." "Respect, perhaps." "His ability." "His singularity of purpose." "Which is?" "He lives to kill." "He eats." "He sleeps." "He kills." "That's all he does." "With no more sympathy for his victims than you would feel in taking a paper to a wasp." "Then why didn't he kill me?" "Because it suits him to have you alive." "We're not going to make it." "Are we?" "Bocardo." "Bocardo Prison..." "Morse." "The riddle the killer set was a Bocardo syllogism." "Bocardo?" "That's the key." "The word Bocardo, not the syllogism." "I knew there was a Bocardo connection to Oxford but I couldn't place it until I passed the Memorial on the Broad." "The Martyrs' memorial?" "Prior to being burnt at the stake, all three were in the Bocardo Prison." "In Oxford?" "Never heard of it." "It used to stand here by St Michael at the North Gate." "The Martyrs' cell door is on display in the Church Tower." "Right?" "Yes, sir." "Get it open." "Oh..." "You're going to be all right." "Thank you." "Bye-bye." "When was this?" "Over." "Morse?" "Oh, no thanks." "Come on, matey." "A full belly and a few hours' kip, you'll be right as nine-pence." "It was too easy." "Not how I heard it." "It doesn't make any sense." "Not if he's playing by the rules." "The Snow Maiden..." "She melts." "Melts?" "Oh." "You think he meant to burn her then, or...?" "Debbie Snow was never in any real danger." "There were air holes in the casket." "No, he was just playing with us." "Out." "What worries me is why." "Cronyn?" "Given the condition of the corpus, there's not a great deal I can tell you." "Beyond, of course, that life is extinct." "Who found the body?" "Phillip Madison, sir, and his sister Faye turned up for a nine o'clock session with the doctor and, well..." "I'd advise you to stand well clear, Inspector." "Until we can get it safely stoppered." "Acid?" "Aqua regia by the smell." "Royal water." "Nitro-hydrochloric acid." "Hence the state of him." "From the green tinge, the container was sealed with a brass bung." "Acid would've eaten through that in about an hour." "And poured out onto his head." "Melted." "Like the Snow Maiden." "It wasn't Debbie, it was Daniel." "Daniel Cronyn." "EGBD." "Then we need to find whoever F is before the killer does." "How long had your brother been seeing Dr Cronyn?" "Four months." "Phillip is... rather highly strung." "The artistic temperament, I suppose." "We lost our parents, you see." "Quite young." "Phillip took it worst, of course, being the eldest." "He suffers dreadfully with his nerves." "I'd had a bad attack." "Yesterday evening." "I telephoned Dr Cronyn and made an appointment for first thing this morning." "When I arrived, the door was on the latch." "I went in and..." "Well, you saw what I found." "He's a recital coming up, you said." "Indeed." "Tomorrow." "Will he be in a fit state for that?" "This will be his first recital from memory." "But he's determined to go ahead." "For Aunt Grace's sake." "They were close?" "Very." "She and Uncle Cedric had the raising of us." "I mean, we boarded in England most of the year, but we usually summered in Jaipur." "Just for the record, Miss Madison, where was Phillip last night?" "At home with me." "Who would do such a terrible thing?" "Let you out, then." "Small comfort, but if it's any consolation," "Dr Cronyn was already dead when the acid did its work." "So what was the cause?" "From my examination of him, he appears to have been an habitual morphine addict." "There was a syringe in his desk drawer, wasn't there?" "Morse?" "Er, yes." "Together with some ampoules of morphia." "Mm-hm." "Somebody gave him an overdose, maybe, or slipped something in the syringe that wasn't morphine." "Possible, of course." "But until I've had his blood results back..." "Time was between two and five o'clock this morning." "Anything else?" "General lack of care." "But nothing I wouldn't expect to find in any other addict." "And him a doctor of the mind." "Physician, heal thyself." "Morphine." "Access wouldn't be a problem in his line, I don't suppose." "But he didn't strike me as the type." "Did he you?" "Morse?" "Oi!" "When'd you last get any sleep?" "Pull over." "Right." "Sit yourself down through there." "I'm fine, sir." "Don't argue." "You're no good to me dead on your feet." "I'll get a brew on." "Or there's a drop of brandy if you like." "Better make it brandy." "What's this, home in the middle of the afternoon?" "I've got Morse in the other room." "What, the new boy?" "He seemed very nice, I thought." "Very polite." "Shy, though." "What's that, brandy?" "I hope you're not leading him astray." "He's been in the wars." "Lost a bit of blood." "You got any stew and dumplings you can warm through?" "I'll put something on." "It's stout you need, not brandy." "Something with a bit of iron in it." "Build his strength up." "There's a bottle at the back there." "There you go." "Ronnie?" "Ronnie Gidderton from the bank?" "I thought you said he was a bit wet." "You've scared off all the decent ones." "Come in, Morse." "Don't stand on ceremony." "Budge up, Sam." "You shouldn't have let me sleep, sir." "Looked like you could do with it." "Mrs Thursday's done you some tea." "Win, dear." "You feeling better?" "Oh, yeah." "Much." "Thanks." "What happened to you, then?" "Not at tea, Joan, thank you." "I'm only asking." "I know what you're "only"." "There's one rule in this house." "Where do we leave work?" "On the hallstand by the front door." "Right." "What can we talk about, then?" "The weather?" "Yeah, whether you're too big for a spanking." "I'd like to see you try." "You wait till I'm back from the army." "Word of advice, Morse." "Don't have children." "They'll make you old before your time." "A Miss Frazil on the blower, Pop." "After you called, I spoke to my old editor, Sid Mears." "He sent these." "He knew the Miller case?" "Perhaps." "He remembered something similar around the end of '43." "It'd stuck in his head." "Only, the family name was Gull." "They ran a coaching inn by Wolvercote." "I say "they"." "It was just Mason Gull and his mother." "Thing is, there was an American general billeted there." "This was the build up to D-Day, don't forget." "Anyway, this general had taken a bit of a shine to Mrs Gull, by all accounts, and that's what led to it." "Sid and his photographer were amongst the first out to the inn, and got those few snaps before the military police descended on the place and turfed them out." "In the end, word came down from the War Office - at the very highest level - that the story was to be spiked." "D-Day looming. "Dangerous talk costs lives", I suppose." "If his name was Gull, why would Doctor Cronyn know him as Keith Miller?" "Maybe they changed his name, buried him away in the country somewhere, and forgot about him." "In any event, Sid never came across a word on any subsequent committal or trial." "The boy just disappeared." "I won't let you down." "You never have." "Ready?" "He played a record." "Tosca." "Tosca?" "It's a penny dreadful of a plot." "Filled with murder, torture, suicide." "Right up his street, then." "At the climax, the heroine, Floria Tosca, hurls herself from the battlements of the Castel Sant'Angelo." "In summation, then, apart from method by which he means to dispose of this fifth and final victim, we know neither the where, the when, nor the whom of it." "If the killer's sticking to Morse's EGBDF pattern, sir, it's got to be someone whose name begins with an F." "It's Cronyn." "What is?" "The murderer." "It's Cronyn." "I appreciate your work on this, but I think you'll find..." "Cronyn approached us, didn't he, sir?" "Yes, but..." "He's the one had us running around looking for this Keith Miller." "But Morse!" "It's a joke, sir." "A blind." "Keith Miller doesn't exist, sir." "Rearrange the letters of his name and you get..." ""I'm the killer."" "He's been toying with us, right from the beginning... posing as Dr Cronyn." "So who is he really?" "Mason Gull, sir." "Good grief." "Then whose body did we find in Cronyn's consulting rooms?" "Are you sure this is it?" "Outside of the rooms in town, it's the only other address for a Daniel Cronyn showing on the Electoral Register." "He's been here." "Of course he has." "This has been his bolt hole." "Doctor Cronyn, I presume." "The real Daniel Cronyn." "He's kept him drugged on morphine." "Far enough out so that nobody could hear his screams." "Why not just kill him straightaway?" "Because the body at the consulting rooms had to be fresh." "The murder of Mrs Gull was investigated by Detective Inspector Foxley of Oxford City Police." "Two witnesses appeared for the prosecution - slaughterman Benjamin Nimmo, who had dropped by the inn for a pint of ale and found the body of Mrs Gull, and barmaid Gertrude Tate, who was there with her eight-year-old daughter Evelyn." "What's the odds Mr Balfour will confirm his wife's maiden name was Tate?" "The case was heard by His Honour Mr Justice Madison." "Gull's been killing anyone connected with the trial." "He's going after Faye Madison." "Now." "F for Faye." "She's the fifth victim." "We need to get officers to Alfredus College at once." "That's why Gull played me Tosca over the telephone." "Alfredus College is home to The Oxford Scholars Choral Association." "The choir that I sing with." "So where does Tosca come in?" "The Oxford Scholars Choral Association." "We sometimes refer to it by acronym." "TOSCA." "It's the police on the telephone for you, miss." "They said it's urgent." "The police?" "Hello." "This it?" "Reserves are on their way." "Think he'll come?" "He must know we'll be waiting for him." "Oh, he knows all right." "Then how can you be sure?" "This is his grand finale." "He's not going to miss this." "Here, sir." "Gull's got her." "If he's sticking to the opera's plot, he'll throw her from the roof." "There's a stair at each corner of the quad." "I'll wait for the reserve to arrive." "He won't get away." "Jesus!" "I've found her!" "Sergeant, follow me." "Yes, sir." "OK." "Don't worry, Miss Madison." "You're safe now." "Where's Cronyn?" "He told me not to worry and went off." "You got her." "She all right?" "No harm." "Where's Inspector Thursday?" "Scarpia." "Morse?" "Oh..." "Miss Madison isn't the final victim." "This isn't Cronyn's plan." "I've made a mistake." "F for Faye, though." "No, it's not Faye." "It's Fred." "Fred Thursday." "Well." "Here's a how d'you do." "Where is she?" "Oh, quite safe." "The proverbial sprat." "And you the mackerel." "How else do you imagine I got you up here?" "When it comes to a damsel in distress, the boys in blue can always be relied upon to act predictably." "I thought it was Tosca goes off the roof?" "In Act Three, yes." "But it's Act Two I've always had in mind." "The death of Scarpia - the corrupt and venal Chief of Police - at Tosca's hand." "I'm afraid the parts are already cast." "I've nothing against you personally." "You simply stand in place of the detective inspector whose lies put me away." "Foxley." "It should've been him up here with me today." "But he died while I was... away." "Well, what are you waiting for?" "An audience." "What else?" "Where does Morse fit into all this?" "Got to be about more than torment." "You could've killed him at the Bodleian." "Why didn't you?" "Beethoven had his Schindler." "Haydn his Griesinger." "Every great artist needs a biographer." "Someone to bear witness to his greatness and set it down for posterity." "How does it feel... to be my crowning achievement?" "Five's a good number, don't you think?" "Nice and simple." "Count 'em on one hand." "You're going to keep this up, I wouldn't mind a draw on my pipe, if it's all the same." "In lieu of a hearty breakfast." "By all means." "Oh, I've looked into the eyes of far worse than you." "People who've committed real atrocities." "And they were sane." "Next to them, you're nothing more than a third-rate freak show." "A bearded lady with glue running down her chin." "You won't goad me into recklessness, Thursday." "I'm serene." "And I'll be remembered." "A year or two." "Maybe five." "Comes to the annals of crime, you're nothing more than a footnote." "That's where you're wrong." "Ten years - less, maybe - they'll certify me cured." "I fooled them once." "I can do it again." "Timely, Morse." "Timely." "Watch your footing." "It's a bit slippy." "Here comes Spoletta." "Right on cue." "La commedia e finita!" "Scarpia dies." "You arrest me." "That's how this ends." "Not if I rewrite it." "Then you'd better be quick!" "All under control, Thursday?" "More or less, sir, yes." "Lend a hand, Strange." "You think it's the end?" "This is where it starts." "That's enough out of you." "We're the same, you and me." "We bear the same burden." "Intelligence." "To be clever is to be alone." "Forever." "I see it in you." "I know who you couldn't save, Morse." "Oh, bugger." "I broke my pipe." "Oh, bad luck." "A spare, thankfully." "Mind you, if Morse hadn't shown up..." "Yes, well..." "I imagine getting back to general duties after all this will seem like a holiday." "Hm?" "Sir." "Carry on." "I'll book him in." "How do you do it?" "Leave it at the front door." "Cos I have to." "Case like this'll tear the heart right out of a man." "Find something worth defending." "I thought I had... found something." "Music?" "I suppose music is as good as anything." "Go home, put your best record on... loud as it'll play... and with every note, you remember... that's something that the darkness couldn't take from you."