"I'm sorry." "Were you praying?" "I heard the words "Oh, God" several times." "Duncan, please..." "A chap could come to a very sticky end if he did something silly." "Duncan!" "We all have to learn to deal with rejection." " Bye, Fliss." " No!" "Tell me you never loved me." "You can't." "Felicity..." "I never loved you." "Neville is happy with me." "That should make you happy, too." " You're insane!" " I think you forgot something." "You never mentioned your sister." "Hello, Chester." "How are you?" "Hewie Harper," " the legendary blind jazz musician..." " Right." " Oh!" " Oh!" " .. isn't blind." " It's me." "Kitty." " You coming or not?" " What have you found?" "Fell out the killer's pocket, you reckon, in the struggle?" "Yes, police?" "A woman's been murdered." "14 Gallows Gate." "As God is my lord and judge, that's him." "If you'd just tell us his name, please." "I'm sorry, Inspector, she's made a mistake, I'm afraid." "That man couldn't possibly have murdered Felicity." "Oh?" "What makes you so sure?" "Because that man's Duncan Proctor." "He killed himself three weeks ago, jumping out of a window." ""DANSE MACABRE" BY SAINT SAËNS)" "I'm sorry, Miss Sallinger, there are a lot of names here." "I just need to separate them all in my head." "Felicity Vale was in bed with this chap Neville?" "And when Duncan walked in and found them together..." "I mean, he was just ga-ga about Fliss." "Ga-ga all told." "God knows how much he'd drunk that night." "He just opened a window and..." "OK." "We'll leave it there for tonight." "Obviously, I'll need more from both of you." "For now, we'll organise a couple of cars to run you home." "You see to that." "You two haven't got to be anywhere special, have you?" "Er, look..." "We've already told you everything we..." "But I don't think we got a formal statement down, did we?" "If you just pop next door with WPC Hicks for a moment..." ".. while I get your version down in here." "What do you mean, "version"?" "I don't very much like the implication..." "Madeline..." "Magellan." "How are we spelling that surname?" "Oh, hang on." "Of course." "It'll be on here, won't it?" ""Scales of Injustice"." ""An exposé of ten shamefully inept criminal prosecutions compiled by... "" "One G, two Ls." "This is unreal." "What am I, Joseph K?" "You realise this is completely illegal when I haven't been charged?" "Look..." "I need to go to the toilet." "But..." "You're not going to give him the key?" "!" "You're not serious?" "You know what?" "This is bordering on date rape." "Before you touch anything, I demand to see your fingernails!" "So, just to get my bearings again here... when we arrived, the front door was bolted on the inside... wasn't it?" "Back door locked." "Windows all locked." "And the only people inside the house, apart from the victim, were you and your friend Lassie in there." "Oh, what...?" "We both strangled her, then rang you up so you'd come and arrest us" "Hang on." "Not too fast." ""We both strangled... "" "Oh, very good." "Why was it, do you suppose, you weren't nominated at the British Comedy Awards?" "Come on." "Wakey-wakey." "Hello?" "Uh!" "Not funny, Jonathan Creek... in any respect." "Oh, God." "I was being strangled by a giant badger." "What time is it?" "Practically time to go to bed." "We didn't get in till gone seven." "Those bastards." "Wait till I get the chance to make them sweat." "How come when I stay at your place, I get the sofa, and when you stay here, I still get the sofa?" "Because you're being terribly chivalrous and gentlemanly, and very solicitous of my welfare." "Don't I get any food?" "So, logically, there are only two possibilities here, basically." "Number one, Kitty got it wrong and she didn't see this Duncan Proctor, just someone who looked a bit like him." "Or two, it was him, and he isn't really dead." "Except his chums were there when he threw himself out of that window." " Is that what she said?" " That's what she said." " Where do you keep your salt?" " That cupboard." "Top shelf, right at the back... there's a leaflet explaining why it's bad for you." "All right..." "Evidence." "Wish I'd made a list now, but no doubt you can remember it all, Mr Photographic Memory." "That pipe under the washbasin." "Duncan Proctor was a pipe-smoker." "You'll say it could have been put there deliberately." " It WAS put there deliberately." " Because?" "If it had fallen from a pocket, the loose ash would have spilled out." "Hang on." "This doesn't make sense, does it?" "Why frame a man who's dead?" "Why did he take her stockings off after he killed her and throw them in that bin?" "How do you work that out?" "You said three had been washed." "The other two she was obviously wearing." " Why obviously?" " Her shoes were next to her on the floor." "A pair of tight-fitting boots." "There's no way they fell off." "They were deliberately removed there in the bathroom." " Would you wear those boots on bare feet?" " All right, but the word "why" springs to mind." "It's got an echo of something I just can't access." "What the hell does that remind you of?" "Oh, it'll come when it's ready." "What are your plans for today?" "My plans?" "OUR plans." "What do you think?" "Going back to Gallows Gate." "To find out how a woman could be murdered by a ghost." "You've seen everything there is to see." "I've had three journalists here already." "My hairdryer's just exploded, so it's not the best time..." "No problem." "Jonathan's brilliant with anything electrical, aren't you?" "So, she was here first, then, Felicity?" " You'd been sharing how long?" " Coming up to two years." "Ironically, I thought it'd be safer out here from crime, burglaries." "Well, you've been on the receiving end." "You know London." "I never dreamt..." "What did she do, then, exactly?" "Some sort of graphic designer?" "She was a cartoonist." "Animation work." "Have you seen that advert for soup with the mushrooms jumping into a pot?" "You're kidding?" "Are you an artist, as well?" "Me?" "Can't draw a circle round a penny." "Osteopathy is my line of work." "I have a little practice in town, off the Charing Cross Road." "Last night was a bit of a late one." "If I'd got back half an hour earlier..." "Oh, this is ridiculous!" " Problem?" " The tape's gone from the answerphone." "Yes, I noticed that last night." "No, I mean the second one." "I put another tape in this morning to replace the one that went missing." "Now that's gone, as well." "How in the name of God did that...?" "Oh, great." "We back in action?" "I did my best." "This party you all went to at Duncan's house, where did you say it was?" "Northumberland." "The other end of the earth, it felt like." " He lived there on his own?" " Had no family, as far as I know." "He'd been in the Army a while, had friends still serving, but he never saw it as a career." "And when he met Felicity, he just fell hopelessly in love?" "I don't think Duncan loved Fliss." "She wasn't easy to love." "She wasn't easy to understand at all." "He was obsessed with her, which is quite another thing." "That's why he did it, I'm sure, when he found out about Neville - to punish her." "Of course, a week later, Neville had already found someone else." " Oriental lady?" " That's right." "He'd told Fliss it was all over." "She just couldn't deal with it." "I mean, it demolished her completely." "So... how did he do it?" " Sorry?" " Duncan." "How could he have jumped to his death in full view of everyone, and then come back to commit a murder?" "How can he possibly be alive?" " Well, he can't, can he?" " Yet he is." " What do you mean?" " I thought that was why you both..." " You mean you don't know?" " Know what?" "The police rang just before you arrived." "Those boots Felicity was wearing that she bought only three days ago," "Duncan's fingerprints were all over them." "Oh!" "Oh, I don't know what to say!" "One word would do it." ""Yes. "" "Evening." "Neville Bruce, is it?" "We haven't met." "Madeline Magellan." "I hope you don't mind." "I rang your secretary." "She was incredibly helpful." "Very nice telephone manner." "I'd hang on to her." "Tell me if I'm interrupting anything." "I just need a word about Felicity Vale, who I understand you were heavily involved with before, um..." "You know, obviously, that she was found dead last night." "I've told the police everything I know." "Who are you?" "I'm a professional investigator for the deceased's life assurance company." "Any information you have could help speed up the processing of her family's claim." "I was wondering, for instance, when you last actually saw Miss Vale alive?" "It would have been a couple of days ago." "She came to my house, rather hysterical." "I had to be blunt with her about how things stood." "I don't know if they told you, but a witness saw the murder take place." " In fact, she's identified the killer..." " As Duncan Proctor, which speaks volumes about her reliability." " Well, she's looked at a lot of photos..." " Forgive me, but I was there when he jumped." "I saw him on the ground." "No human being could walk away from that." "The man is dead." "I'm sorry, she's mistaken." "She could be mistaken, Mr Bruce, but how do we explain the fingerprints?" " Fingerprints?" " His prints were all over her shoes." "And the door handles." "Everywhere." "It's all been checked." "I think I'll have the roast salmon mousse and artichoke hearts." "Thanks." "So, any background you can give me, really, on this young lady." "I'll try not to be too indelicate, but it could impact upon the crime." "During the period you were having sex together, did she ever talk in her sleep, can you remember?" "About other lovers?" "Or at a critical moment, for instance, accidentally scream someone else's name?" "Oh, it's like travelling back to the Stone Age coming here." "I mean, this is the pits, Jonathan!" "It hasn't even got an S!" " The S has completely snapped off!" " Try not to use it, then." "It's the most common letter in the English language!" "No, it's not." "E is the most common." "S is the 8th most common," "After E, T, A, O, N, R and I." "Oh, you'd have to know that, wouldn't you?" "Useless piece of information." "Not useless at all if you're trying to crack a cipher." "Funnily enough, I'm not cracking a cipher at this precise moment." "I'm not actually cracking anything very much." "I've got a murder committed by a dead man in a house he couldn't have got out of, involving a girl found horribly "trangled"" "with her "hoe" and "tocking" removed in the "downtair" cloakroom!" "Oh, have you ever heard of silence?" "!" "I'm trying to achieve a level of abstract thought here, trying to prise this... whatever it is out of my memory." "What is it?" "Let me have a go." "I told you, I can't put it into words." "It's purely intuitive." "It's just a feeling." "It won't come into focus till it's ready." "I thought perhaps that image might have triggered it, but..." " I could put them on." " The point is, they've been taken off!" "Yes, this is the home of Cro-Magnon Man." "Can I help?" "Clare!" "You're kidding?" "She's had another tape stolen from the answering machine." "What?" "You put a third one in, and when you got back that..." "If someone was trying to find a message, but didn't know which tape it was on..." "It depends what you mean by progress." "To be honest, we were both just saying, the only way we're going to solve this, basically, is to actually go up there..." " weren't we?" " Yes, I suppo..." "Up where?" "Northumberland?" "!" "Have you any idea how long this will take?" "I've got the route sorted." "Five hours, max." " And the rest, with your navigation." " Look..." "Anyway, I wonder how the police are faring at the cottage?" " I don't envy them that job one bit." " What job?" "I gave Detective Inspector Barrison a ring this morning before we left." "That business about the answering machine?" "Of course, there was something I completely forgot to tell him." "I saw one of those tapes floating in the lavatory, and I accidentally knocked the handle and flushed it away." "Probably a vital piece of evidence." "Yes, all right." "Haven't you ever seen a cesspit before?" "Let's get searching." ""Was that the turning?" "Definitely. "" ""You saw a sign for the 6342?" "Yes, definitely." "As God is my judge. "" " Which is why we ended up in Gateshead." " I was sure it said 6342." "How can Hadrian's Wall run north to south?" "The Romans divided the country lengthwise?" " Two and a half hours we lost." " Will you give over moaning?" "!" " I've forgotten what we're looking for." " A Victorian phone box." "There it is." "First left and we're there." "This was completely open." "Fliss nearly went in." "His name's not been added yet." "What do you reckon?" "Get a shovel and see?" "Yes, thank you, Dr Van Helsing." "Perhaps if we look round first." "Can you imagine anyone rattling around on their own in a place this size?" "It's immoral." "You say he took it over when he came out of uniform?" "And his old Army pals, whatever their names were..." " Ben and Buster." " .. were both at this party?" " What do you know about them?" " I avoided knowing them." "They're still serving." "They'll be back overseas somewhere by..." "What's he doing?" "The breaststroke?" "When you saw him on the ground, can you show me how he was lying?" "Yes, it was just here." "His head was over the edge." "No, a bit more..." "Yeah." "Yeah, about like that, I'd say." " Roughly." " Still some blood where he landed." " Let me see." " Something very wrong there," " wouldn't you say?" " Would I?" "Didn't you ever watch "Quincy"?" "Felicity's birthday present to Duncan." "I don't think he was exactly overwhelmed." "You want to get that seen to by a qualified osteopath." "What do you think?" "Give him a quick seeing to?" " I could have a look..." " Yes, thanks all the same." "Anything that involves turning my skeleton inside out, I get twitchy." "Oh, just get your kit off!" "Right." "Are you sure?" "Nothing." "OK." "And that's for the whole night and the morning." "The 21st and the 22nd?" "All right." "That's great." "Thanks for your help, then." "Bye." "Oh." "Where is it, then?" " Where's what?" " Sorry, I thought I heard a baby up here, screaming its head off." "OK, three out of the four local funeral directors haven't heard of him." "The other one, I couldn't get hold of." "Local rag, nothing in the obit columns." "But most importantly, the hospital have no record of any Duncan Proctor - no admissions - no call-outs, even - to this address on the night in question." "The ambulance came and took him away." "We all saw it." "What you see isn't always what's happening." "What you all saw that night, I've got a horrible feeling, was a very brilliantly conceived hoax." "Here we go." "How it was done." "I know how I'd have done it, but from what I've seen out there..." " Sh!" " What?" " You hear that?" " What?" "The front door just opened." "There!" "It closed again." "How can you hear that up here?" "Shh!" "There's someone moving about now in the hall." " Better go and have a look, then." " OK." " Why me?" " Because you're the man." "I don't think you'll find any badgers in there, will you, Mr Creek?" "What if they draw a blank?" "When they draw a blank, they'll fill it all in again." "Duncan Proctor's body is no more at the bottom of that grave than that answer tape was in her sewage tank." "My God." "You mean the killer must have somehow realised and got there before you and fished it out?" "I don't think they'll be buying your next book, any of them." "There's only so much crap a man can wade through." "So... do you know this lover's leap thing was a set-up?" "A dead man's not going to be suspected of murder." "What we in our flat-footed ignorance are still trying to figure out is how the hell he faked it." "Someone said you work for a magician." "How uncannily appropriate." "Well, I've had a sniff round..." " given it a bit of thought." " Go on." "Three people saw him jump, everyone saw him on the ground, but nobody saw him land." "In between was a gap of maybe eight seconds, when they did the clever bit." " They?" " He couldn't do it on his own." "He needed at least two accomplices - one up top and one below." " Buster and Ben." " Whatever their names were." "His two chums from the Lancers." "Look how it stands up." "Duncan's got this total mind-numbing crush on Felicity." "He knows she's screwing Neville." "He decides to teach 'em both a lesson." "It's the sort of sick joke three drunken soldiers would dream up between them." "They just go for it, like a military exercise." "Leaping off the second floor balcony is no big deal if there's something to catch you at the bottom." "You dug yourself a big hole with a tightly sprung net inside, rigged up the camouflage frame covered in turf, which slides across in seconds, so you can't see the join." "As per the plan, one of them rushes in as he's about to jump... so if the other two get to the balcony too quickly, he can hold them back." "During which time, Duncan's out of the net and into position." "The hole's disappeared and so has his friend, making sure he's first on the scene to pronounce him dead and wave everyone else away." "Half an hour later, he's whisked off in an ambulance." "It could have been a couple of locals who were in on it." "It could have been pukka ambulance drivers paid to keep their mouths shut." "The main thing is, his body's gone, and no one asks any questions." "They've put it all right again afterwards, obviously." "Although you can see a slight camber where the level's a bit off." "And, of course, there was the dummy blood on the patio, carefully deposited just before he fell to look fresh." "Problem is, you can see from the scalloped edges around the splash marks, they'd been dropped from a height of several feet." "And you don't normally start bleeding before you hit the ground." "These two squaddies are serving abroad somewhere, did I hear?" "But their house in Maida Vale could..." "My God, I've just had a thought." "Well, he's got to be hiding somewhere." "What the hell do you want?" "You can't do this!" "Ah!" "What have I done?" "Kitty, Kitty, Kitty." "Come on." "Er, Inspector..." "So, that's it?" "You're finished with her?" "She can go back to Scotland?" "Mr Klaus, we've barely started with her." "As long as Proctor exercises his right to silence, she's the only case we've got." " Fingerprints alone won't do it." " Inspector..." "You can't know how deeply traumatised this experience has left my sister." " She can't sleep." " There's many a night I can't sleep." "No, no." "You don't understand the full horror of the situation." "She can't sleep... alone." "Three o'clock in the morning, like something from the nightmare world of M.R. James, as the duvet is lifted up..." "and you feel it sliding in beside you." "Oh, to wake in the night..." "to those eyes staring at you on the pillow." "For mercy's sake, Inspector, I'm appealing to you for clemency." "I'm sorry." "We need her down here." "Ah, now, I like this one." "It's got a Pentium processor, CD-ROM." "Whoo!" "Look at this." "State-of-the-art stuff, it's got an S." "You could type words like "floppy disc" instead of "floppy dic"." "Just browsing, thanks." "So, this'll be chapter four." "What do you reckon?" "A bit Perry Mason?" "Do for the time being, anyway." " Now." "Intro..." " I wonder why he won't confess?" "Proctor?" "Bit of a stupid question, isn't it?" "Why?" "He was seen throttling her to death through the window." "It'd save a lot of time and money." "It's all wrong still." "There's still too much stuff left over that doesn't fit." "Those three tapes that were stolen from her answering machine." "They found one of the blank ones at that flat, but we don't know about the others or why they were taken." "Well, there was a message he wanted to get back." "Probably one he'd left himself that proved he was still alive." "That would explain why he'd go back once, but why twice?" "To come away with a blank tape, it's obvious the message has been removed." "What if the third tape was taken by someone else... who was also trying to get hold of that message, who didn't know Proctor had already got it?" "How long does insurance take?" "!" "I'm running out of showrooms." "Of course, there's the other problem." "Why did he take her stockings off her?" "Jonathan, you've got an unnatural fixation with this stockings thing, more than is healthy." "Electric-shock therapy could be the answer." "Stick your fingers in the cigarette lighter and concentrate hard on a pair of sheer..." "What?" " What now?" " THAT'S what it reminded me of." "That's exactly it." " Bootlaces." " I beg your pardon?" "Different choice of words, in it popped." "He didn't take off her stockings, he took her stockings off her." "The police would never believe that, obviously." " That's why he's not saying anything." " About what?" "Stop talking Martian." "Come on." "We've got to go through this whole thing again, every detail," " what everyone said to you." " Why?" "So we can find out who really murdered Felicity Vale." "Sorry." "Sorry!" "I keep doing this, don't I?" "I keep interrupting your love life." "This is our senior claims investigator, Mr Creek." "We've been right back to the beginning of this case now with Miss Sallinger here, and there's some vital points we need to clarify with you and Mr Bruce." "What the hell is your game?" "Can't you wait till tomorrow, for God's sake?" " It's a quarter past midnight!" " Is it?" "You'd better put some strong coffee on, then." "Two sugars, thanks." "Three tapes were stolen from the answering machine, one after the other." "Why?" "Let's say there was a very important message on the original, which was removed from the machine on the night of the murder." "The next day, Clare puts a new tape in, a blank one, which, at some point, is also stolen." "And again, the day after that, the same thing happens." "We know that Duncan Proctor had a blank tape." "It was found at the flat by the police." "The other one had to have been taken by someone else... who was just as desperate to get hold of that message." "What?" "For God's..." "I..." "I mean..." "You...!" " What?" "!" " A young woman's lost her life, a woman you loved - or claimed to love, if only for five minutes." "We're entitled to a bit more than splutters and a blank look." "Neville?" "I just reached elastic limit, I'm sorry." "When I saw what she'd done to Kiko with her scissors..." "I picked the phone, the machine was on, I tore into her, two minutes of poison." " And threats?" " Warnings, certainly, about what would happen if I ever saw her again." "Any rate, it wasn't a tape you want lying around after she'd been found murdered." "The following day, I found a way in, grabbed the tape, hoping the message would still be on it." "Of course, it wasn't..." "But then the pressure suddenly eased when you heard that Duncan Proctor had been seen." "Even if that message did turn up, no one would suspect you." "Yes, but I..." "You're not sugges..." "She saw him do it." "He's been found alive and arrested." " Duncan strangled Felicity." " Except he didn't, actually." "Of course, neither did you." "That's why you rang her up, because you were nowhere near the cottage that night." "But there was a third person in the house who saw the whole weird and wonderful event, and I think now's the time to say, don't you..." "Clare... and tell us how you murdered her?" "We've had an interesting afternoon with the police pathologist." "It turns out those lesions in the victim's neck contained skin cells that didn't belong to Felicity or Duncan, but funnily enough, matched exactly to some still in Jonathan's shoulders after your fingers had been digging into him yesterday afternoon." "You'll testify to the power of her grip, I think." "Rozzers'll be waiting for you at home." "I wouldn't bother going anywhere." "Duncan was seen by a witness that night, violently strangling Felicity at the kitchen window." "And yet, he did nothing of the kind." "What Kitty saw, she didn't really see at all, did she?" "Felicity was so obvious." "She didn't even have to try." "But men like it obvious, don't they?" "Men like Duncan." "In the space of three weeks, I went the distance - from idolising him, grieving for him... to despising the pair of them." "He didn't love women." "He just wanted them to love him." "When I came back that night..." "I saw him there... alive." "At first, I was too shocked to do anything." "I heard him telling her what he'd done, how he'd gone to ground at Buster's, giving her all that phoney contrition, while she just ranted and raved." "She was already in a complete state about Neville." "It only needed one more push to send her over." "And, of course, at that moment... it came." "I've had it with you, Fliss." "I've had it with your whole juvenile number." "I'd say get a life, but you don't know what that is." "I'll say it one last time, Felicity." "I don't love you." "I loathe youI" "I despise youI Now stay awayI" "And you want to know the truth?" "I was willing her on." "Oh, no." "No, no." "No, no!" "Give me those." "Open your mouth." "Open your mouth!" "Open your mouth!" "Do not swallow, for goodness' sake!" "I think she passed out for a while." "By now, he realised what he was dealing with." "He'd make her safe, then get the hell out." "So he took her into the bathroom." "And so she couldn't do any damage, he took the stockings off the radiator and the ones she was wearing." "He wasn't going to leave her any rope to hang herself with..." "literally." "And then left." "Can you kill someone out of spite?" "Maybe... because it's so ridiculously easy." "His fingerprints were everywhere." "I made sure they found his pipe." "All I had to do was wait for them to prove he was still alive." "Who was going to believe his story?" "You took the tape with Neville's message." "You didn't want the police thinking he was involved." "You wanted all the evidence to point to Duncan." "So, why did Duncan want to get that tape back, for God's sake?" "To corroborate his account of what really happened, that your message drove her to try and kill herself." "Even then, it was all going to sound pretty flimsy." "Yes, the wonderful bonus of Kitty, seeing him with his hands around her throat." "You must've thought it was meant to be." "Only problem was it brought us onto the scene." "How do you know they weren't just larking about?" "Larking about?" "!" "Quiet as a grave." "Probably miles away by now, but you never know." "Cover the front entrance, while I try the back." "I thought once you'd found it all locked up, you'd go away." "Then when I heard the window..." "There's one thing about this whole business I still don't understand." " Hmm?" " Why you swallowed all that crap about skin cells in Jonathan's shoulders." "Still, I suppose it broke the ice." "So, what made you think that I could...?" "One, I finally remember that routine of taking a prisoner's bootlaces off him so he can't hang himself, which put a completely different spin on the whole thing - what Duncan was really doing with his hands around her throat." "And, of course, the other thing was the burglary." "When they took the tapes?" "Why?" "No, Clare." "Not your burglary, my burglary." "You remember when you were showing me around the cottage?" "Ironically, I thought it would be safer from crime." "Well, you've just been on the receiving end." "You know how bad it gets in London." "It never struck me till we went over it again this afternoon." "How did you know about my being burgled?" "I certainly hadn't mentioned it." "But then I remembered." "I had." "There was only one way you could have heard me." "How do you think that burglar got into my place?" "He didn't just give up, did he?" "The bastard." " Oh!" " Oh!" "It's me." "Kitty." "And God forbid you breathe a word to a living soul." "I was told in complete confidence." "Ladies and gentlemen, the living legend that is Hewie Harper." "One, two..." "One, two, three, f..." "And keep your peepers off my naked body in future, you pervert!" "All right, come down off there, please, madam." "Get off!" "Go away!" "Go on!"