MINSK, BELARUS. In a prison visitors’ room, Sherlock – wearing the Coat with a fur collar attached – is sitting at one of the many tables in the room. Sitting on the other side of the table is Barry ‘Bezza’ Berwick, a young Englishman who is wearing an orange jumpsuit and who is obviously a prisoner. With the exception of a uniformed guard who stands some distance away, they are the only people in the room. It’s very cold in the room, as signified by the steam coming from their breath as they speak. Sherlock sounds bored.

SHERLOCK: Just tell me what happened, from the beginning.

BERWICK: We’d been to a bar – a nice place – and, er, I got chattin’ with one of the waitresses, and Karen weren’t ’appy with that, so ... when we get back to the ’otel, we end up havin’ a bit of a ding-dong, don’t we?

(Sherlock sighs out a deliberate and noisy breath.)

BERWICK: She was always gettin’ at me, sayin’ I weren’t a real man.

SHERLOCK: Wasn’t a real man.

BERWICK: What?

SHERLOCK: It’s not “weren’t”; it’s “wasn’t”.

BERWICK: Oh.

SHERLOCK: Go on.

BERWICK: Well, then I dunno how it happened, but suddenly there’s a knife in my hands. And, you know, me old man was a butcher, so I know how to handle knives.

(Sherlock’s gaze lowers to look at Barry’s hands which are resting on the table.)

BERWICK: He learned us how to cut up a beast.

SHERLOCK: “Taught.”

BERWICK (starting to get angry): What?

SHERLOCK: Taught you how to cut up a beast.

BERWICK: Yeah, well, then-then I done it.

SHERLOCK: “Did it.”

BERWICK (losing his temper): Did it! Stabbed her ... (he repeatedly slams his hand down on the table) ... over and over and over, and I looked down and she weren’t ...

(Sighing out a loud breath through his nose, Sherlock turns his head away. Getting control of his temper, Barry immediately corrects himself.)

BERWICK: ... wasn’t movin’ no more.

(Sherlock, who had just turned his head back towards Barry, now turns it away again with an annoyed look.)

BERWICK: ... any more.

(He lets out a shaky breath and lowers his head.)

BERWICK (softly): You’ve gotta help me. I dunno how it happened, but it was an accident. I swear.

(Sherlock gets to his feet and starts to walk away. Barry calls after him frantically.)

BERWICK: You’ve gotta help me, Mr. Holmes!

(Sherlock stops.)

BERWICK: Everyone says you’re the best. Without you, I’ll get hung for this.

(Sherlock looks over his shoulder at the young man.)

SHERLOCK: No, no, no, Mr. Berwick, not at all.

(He looks away thoughtfully for a second.)

SHERLOCK: Hanged, yes.

(He quirks a smile at the man, then turns and walks away.)

Opening titles.

221B BAKER STREET. Two gunshots ring out. The camera pans across the living room and shows Sherlock lying slumped in his armchair with his head resting on the low back of the chair. He closes his eyes briefly, then opens them and gazes up towards the ceiling. Downstairs, the front door opens. Sherlock turns his head to look towards the sofa, and we now see that he is sprawled low in the chair with his legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. He is wearing sleepwear and a blue dressing gown and his feet are bare. Above the sofa, a smiley face has been spray-painted on the wallpaper using a can of the yellow paint which was so frequently used in the “Blind Banker” case. The can is standing on the coffee table in front of the sofa. As the downstairs door closes again Sherlock sighs, turns his head to the front again and then raises his left hand which is holding a pistol. He points the pistol towards the smiley face and – without even looking in that direction – fires two shots at it. A close-up reveals that there are already two bullet holes in the wall where the two eyes had been sprayed, and the two new bullets have impacted the curve of the smile. Sherlock turns his head to look at the face and fires a third shot which either misses the smile or was deliberately aimed to form a ‘nose’ for the face. As he fires a fourth time, John comes running up the stairs with his fingers in his ears. He stops on the landing, lowers his hands and yells at his flatmate.

JOHN: What the hell are you doing?

SHERLOCK (sulkily): Bored.

JOHN (more quietly, squinting at him in disbelief): What?

SHERLOCK (loudly): Bored!

(He springs up out of the chair. John immediately recoils and covers his ears with his hands.)

JOHN: No ...

(Sherlock switches the pistol to his right hand and turns towards the smiley face, firing at it again. He then swings his arm around his back, twists slightly to his right and fires at the wall again from behind his back.)

SHERLOCK (angrily): Bored! Bored!

(As he brings his arm back around, John hurries into the room and Sherlock continues to glare at the smiley face but allows John to snatch the pistol from his hand. John quickly slides the clip out of the gun as Sherlock walks towards the sofa.)

SHERLOCK (sulkily): Don’t know what’s got into the criminal classes. Good job I’m not one of them.

(John locks the pistol away in a small safe on the dining table, and now straightens up.)

JOHN: So you take it out on the wall.

SHERLOCK (running his fingers along the painted smile): Ah, the wall had it coming.

(He turns sideways and dramatically flops down onto the sofa on his back, his head landing on a cushion at one end and his feet digging into the arm of the sofa at the end nearest the windows.)

JOHN (taking his coat off): What about that Russian case?

(Sherlock pushes with his feet to shove himself further along the sofa and into a slightly more upright position, and then starts kneading the arm of the sofa with his toes. Your transcriber decides that you really don’t need the rest of this transcript any time soon, and puts those few seconds on repeat play for the next several hours before finally getting back to work with a seraphic – if slightly glazed – look on her face.)

SHERLOCK: Belarus. Open and shut domestic murder. Not worth my time.

JOHN (sarcastically): Ah, shame(!)

(He walks into the kitchen and throws his arms up in despair at the mess on the table which greets him. He heads towards the fridge.)

JOHN: Anything in? I’m starving.

(He opens the fridge door.)

JOHN: Oh, f…

(He immediately slams it shut again, unable to believe what he just saw inside. He slumps against the door for a moment, his head lowered, then he straightens up and opens the fridge door again. On the shelf inside is a man’s head, cut off at the neck. He stares at it for a couple of seconds, then quietly closes the door again.)

JOHN: It’s a head.

(He turns and calls out.)

JOHN: A severed head!

SHERLOCK: Just tea for me, thanks.

JOHN (walking back into the living room): No, there’s a head in the fridge.

SHERLOCK (calmly): Yes.

JOHN: A bloody head!

SHERLOCK (stroppily): Well, where else was I supposed to put it?

(He looks round at John.)

SHERLOCK: You don’t mind, do you?

(John holds his hands out despairingly and looks back towards the fridge.)

SHERLOCK: I got it from Bart’s morgue.

(John buries his head in one hand.)

SHERLOCK: I’m measuring the coagulation of saliva after death.

(He waves his hand vaguely in the direction of a nearby laptop.)

SHERLOCK: I see you’ve written up the taxi driver case.

JOHN (throwing one last glance at the fridge): Uh, yes.

(He walks over to Sherlock’s armchair and sits down.)

SHERLOCK: “A Study in Pink.” Nice(!)

JOHN: Well, you know, pink lady, pink case, pink phone – there was a lot of pink. Did you like it?

(Even as John has been speaking, Sherlock has picked up a magazine from the coffee table and he now flips it open and addresses his answer to the pages.)

SHERLOCK: Erm, no.

JOHN: Why not? I thought you’d be flattered.

SHERLOCK (lowering the magazine and glaring at him): Flattered? (He raises his index fingers and narrates a section of the blog.) “Sherlock sees through everything and everyone in seconds. What’s incredible, though, is how spectacularly ignorant he is about some things.”

JOHN: Now hang on a minute. I didn’t mean that in a ...

SHERLOCK (interrupting): Oh, you meant “spectacularly ignorant” in a nice way(!) Look, it doesn’t matter to me who’s Prime Minister ...

JOHN (quietly): I know ...

SHERLOCK: ... or who’s sleeping with who ...

JOHN (softly): Whether the Earth goes round the Sun ...

SHERLOCK: Not that again. It’s not important.

JOHN: Not impor…

(He shifts his position in the chair to face Sherlock.)

JOHN: It’s primary school stuff. How can you not know that?

SHERLOCK (pressing the heels of his palms to his eyes): Well, if I ever did, I’ve deleted it.

JOHN: “Deleted it”?

SHERLOCK (swinging his legs around to the floor and sitting up to face John): Listen. (He points to his head with one finger.) This is my hard drive, and it only makes sense to put things in there that are useful ... really useful.

(He grimaces.)

SHERLOCK: Ordinary people fill their heads with all kinds of rubbish, and that makes it hard to get at the stuff that matters. Do you see?

(John looks at him for a moment, trying to bite his lip but then can’t contain himself.)

JOHN: But it’s the solar system!

(Sherlock briefly buries his head in his hands.)

SHERLOCK: Oh, hell! What does that matter?!

(He looks at John in frustration.)

SHERLOCK: So we go round the Sun! If we went round the Moon, or round and round the garden like a teddy bear, it wouldn’t make any difference. All that matters to me is the work. Without that, my brain rots.

(He ruffles his hair with both hands, then glares at John.)

SHERLOCK: Put that in your blog. Or better still, stop inflicting your opinions on the world.

(Petulantly shoving the magazine across the coffee table, he lies down on the sofa again, turning over with his back to John and pulling his dressing gown around him while curling up into a ball. John looks away and purses his lips. The front door downstairs opens and closes. John stands up and walks towards the living room door.)

SHERLOCK (looking over his shoulder): Where are you going?

JOHN (tightly, putting his jacket on): Out. I need some air.

(He heads for the stairs, which Mrs Hudson is just coming up.)

JOHN: ’Scuse me, Mrs ...

MRS HUDSON: Oh, sorry, love!

JOHN: Sorry.

(Angrily, Sherlock turns his face away again, pulling the cushion under his head nearer to the back of the sofa and curling up even tighter. Mrs Hudson chuckles at John as he passes her but then turns and looks at him in concern as he hurries down the stairs. She comes to the living room door and knocks.)

MRS HUDSON: Ooh-ooh!

(Sherlock stretches his legs out straight and turns his head enough to acknowledge her existence, but then looks away again. Mrs Hudson carries a couple of shopping bags into the kitchen.)

MRS HUDSON: Have you two had a little domestic?

(Flailing to get himself upright, Sherlock stands up off the sofa and takes the shortest route to his destination, walking over the coffee table and going to the left-hand window just as the downstairs door opens and closes.)

MRS HUDSON: Ooh, it’s a bit nippy out there. He should have wrapped himself up a bit more.

(Sherlock watches as John crosses the street and heads in the general direction of away.)

SHERLOCK: Look at that, Mrs Hudson. (He scans the street.) Quiet, calm, peaceful. (He grimaces and drags in a long breath.) Isn’t it hateful?

(Mrs Hudson has unloaded some items from her shopping bags and now brandishes a receipt at Sherlock before putting it down on the kitchen table.)

MRS HUDSON: Oh, I’m sure something’ll turn up, Sherlock. A nice murder – that’ll cheer you up.

(She chuckles slightly as she carries her bags towards the living room door.)

SHERLOCK (wistfully): Can’t come too soon.

MRS HUDSON (stopping as she spots the damaged wall): Hey. What’ve you done to my bloody wall?!

(Sherlock quirks a smile and turns around to admire his handiwork.)

MRS HUDSON (angrily): I’m putting this on your rent, young man!

(She storms off down the stairs. Sherlock – who has magically relocated without moving and is now in the middle of the room standing just in front of the dining table – grins over-dramatically at the bullet-riddled smiley face, then sighs and turns his head to the front just as a massive explosion goes off in the street behind him. The windows blow in and the blast hurls him forward and to the floor. As the scene fades to black, he groans ...

... and his groan morphs into a groan coming from John, who is just waking up the next morning in the living room of Sarah Sawyer’s flat. Sitting up on the sofa with his shirt unbuttoned, he has apparently slept on said sofa and he is grimacing and trying to un-crick his neck. Sarah walks in, wearing a dressing gown.

SARAH: Morning!

JOHN: Oh, mor… (He turns to look at her but grimaces again and grabs at his neck in pain.) Morning.

SARAH: See? Told you you should’ve gone with the lilo.

JOHN (still rubbing his neck): No, no, no, it’s fine. I-I slept fine. It’s very kind of you.

(Sarah has been scanning the sofa as he spoke and has now spotted what she was looking for. She reaches behind John’s back to pick up the remote control for the TV, then sits on the arm of the sofa and turns the telly on.)

SARAH: Well, maybe next time I’ll let you kip at the end of my bed, you know.

(She looks at him suggestively, then turns her head towards the TV screen.)

JOHN (also looking at the screen): What about the time after that?

(She looks at him and grins briefly. John turns his head towards her but doesn’t meet her eyes.)

NEWSREADER (on the TV): Experts are hailing it as the artistic find of the century.

(The news item is showing a photo of the Hickman Art Gallery, with a headline at the bottom of the screen saying “The Lost Vermeer”.)

NEWSREADER (on the TV): The last time ...

SARAH (putting the remote down): So, d’you want some breakfast?

JOHN: Love some.

SARAH: Yeah, well you’d better make it yourself, ’cause I’m gonna have a shower!

NEWSREADER (on the TV): ... it fetched over twenty million pounds.

(John watches as Sarah smiles at him sassily before leaving the room. He chuckles silently and starts doing up the buttons on his shirt.)

NEWSREADER (on the TV): This one is anticipated to do even better. Back now to our main story. There’s been a massive explosion in central London.

(John looks at the TV screen and his face fills with shock as the picture changes to show live footage of a road where brickwork is scattered all over the pavement, and police cordons have been set up to keep people out. The headline at the bottom of the screen reads, “House destroyed on Baker St”.)

NEWSREADER (on the TV): As yet, there are no reports of any casualties, and the police are unable to say if there is any suspicion of terrorist involvement.

(John is already on his feet and he hurries around the sofa to grab his jacket before turning towards the door and calling out.)

JOHN: Sarah!

(He stops and looks at the TV screen briefly.)

NEWSREADER (on the TV): Police have issued an emergency number for friends and relatives ...

JOHN: Sarah!

(He heads towards the front door, not even waiting for Sarah to reply to him.)

JOHN: Sorry – I’ve got to run.

BAKER STREET. John comes around the corner of the street almost opposite the flat, then stops briefly and stares. Continuing onwards, he heads towards the police cordon and makes his way through the small crowd of gawking onlookers.

JOHN: ’Scuse me, can I get through? ’Scuse me.

(He approaches one of the police officers who is stopping the crowd from getting closer.)

JOHN: Can I go through?

(He points towards 221 and the police officer lets him through. John walks into the main scene of devastation where bricks and dust are scattered all over the road and pavement. A fire engine is still on the scene and fire hoses are lying in the road waiting to be reeled back in. The windows and shop fronts of the buildings either side of Speedy’s have been boarded up; Speedy’s itself was protected by its metal roll-down screen. John stops and stares at the building directly opposite the café. The front of the ground and first floor has been completely blown out by the explosion and the rooms inside are exposed to the air. John turns and hurries towards 221, where the first floor windows have also been boarded up. A police officer standing outside Speedy’s moves to intercept him but John explains.)

JOHN: I live over there.

(The officer steps aside and John unlocks the door and goes inside. He races up the stairs.)

JOHN: Sherlock. Sherlock!

(As he hurries into the living room, his eye is drawn to the boarded-up windows, then to his armchair, but his gaze quickly turns to Sherlock’s chair where Sherlock, now dressed and wearing The Purple Shirt of SexTM under his jacket, is apparently uninjured and is intermittently plucking the strings of the violin he is holding on his chest while he glares petulantly towards John’s chair.)

SHERLOCK (looking up at his flatmate): John.

(The reason for Sherlock’s annoyance – his brother Mycroft, who is sitting in John’s chair – glances round at John.)

JOHN (to Sherlock): I saw it on the telly. Are you okay?

SHERLOCK: Hmm? What? (He looks around at the mess of broken glass and scattered paperwork as if he has forgotten it – which he probably has.) Oh, yeah. Fine. Gas leak, apparently.

(He turns his attention back to his brother, who stares at him pointedly as Sherlock plucks his violin strings again.)

SHERLOCK: I can’t.

MYCROFT: “Can’t”?

SHERLOCK: The stuff I’ve got on is just too big. I can’t spare the time.

(John looks across to him in disbelief.)

MYCROFT: Never mind your usual trivia. This is of national importance.

SHERLOCK (sulkily flicking his fingers across the strings): How’s the diet?

MYCROFT (refusing to rise to the implied insult): Fine. Perhaps you can get through to him, John.

JOHN (who has walked nearer to the windows to investigate the damage): What?

MYCROFT: I’m afraid my brother can be very intransigent.

SHERLOCK: If you’re so keen, why don’t you investigate it?

MYCROFT: No-no-no-no-no. I can’t possibly be away from the office for any length of time – not with the Korean elections so ...

(He tails off as John turns towards him in surprise and Sherlock raises his head from looking at his violin.)

MYCROFT: Well, you don’t need to know about that, do you?

(He smiles humourlessly in a clear message to forget what he just said.)

MYCROFT: Besides, a case like this – it requires ... (he grimaces in distaste) ... legwork.

(Sherlock mis-plucks one of his strings, an irritated look on his face. He turns to John, who is absently rubbing the back of his neck with one hand.)

SHERLOCK: How’s Sarah, John? How was the lilo?

MYCROFT (consulting his pocket watch and not even looking at John): Sofa, Sherlock. It was the sofa.

(Sherlock briefly looks John up and down.)

SHERLOCK: Oh yes, of course.

JOHN (incredulously): How ...? Oh, never mind.

(He sits down on the coffee table. Mycroft smiles across at him.)

MYCROFT: Sherlock’s business seems to be booming since you and he became ... pals.

(Sherlock throws him a dark look.)

MYCROFT (to John): What’s he like to live with? Hellish, I imagine.

JOHN: I’m never bored.

MYCROFT (smiling condescendingly): Good! That’s good, isn’t it?

(Again Sherlock glares at him. Mycroft stands up as Sherlock picks up his bow and whips one end through the air in front of him. Picking up a folder which he had put on the table beside him, Mycroft steps forward and offers the folder to his brother but Sherlock just looks back at him stubbornly. Grimacing and poking his tongue into the corner of his mouth, Mycroft turns and offers the folder to John instead.)

MYCROFT: Andrew West, known as Westie to his friends.

(Looking startled, John takes the folder.)

MYCROFT: A civil servant, found dead on the tracks at Battersea Station this morning with his head smashed in.

(Cutaway shot to a Tube guard walking along the railway line in the early morning. The beam from his flashlight picks out the body of a young man lying just beside the tracks.)

JOHN: Jumped in front of a train?

MYCROFT: Seems the logical assumption.

JOHN (quirking a brief smile): But ...?

MYCROFT: “But”?

JOHN: Well, you wouldn’t be here if it was just an accident.

(Sherlock, who is now applying rosin to the bow with a small cloth, smirks noisily.)

MYCROFT: The M.O.D. is working on a new missile defence system – the Bruce-Partington Programme, it’s called.

(He looks at Sherlock as John starts flicking through the folder.)

MYCROFT: The plans for it were on a memory stick.

(John sniggers quietly.)

JOHN: That wasn’t very clever.

(Sherlock smiles in agreement.)

MYCROFT (to John): It’s not the only copy.

JOHN: Oh.

MYCROFT: But it is secret. And missing.

JOHN: Top secret?

MYCROFT: Very. We think West must have taken the memory stick. We can’t possibly risk it falling into the wrong hands.

(He turns back to his brother.)

MYCROFT: You’ve got to find those plans, Sherlock. Don’t make me order you.

(Breathing in sharply through his nose, Sherlock raises his violin to his shoulder, ready to play. He looks calmly at his brother.)

SHERLOCK: I’d like to see you try.

MYCROFT (leaning down to him a little in an attempt to look more threatening): Think it over.

(Sherlock stares back at him, unimpressed. Mycroft turns and walks over to John, offering him his hand to shake.)

MYCROFT: Goodbye, John.

(Politely, John stands as he shakes his hand. Mycroft smiles at him creepily.)

MYCROFT: See you very soon.

(John tries not to look nervous. As Mycroft heads back towards the chair to pick up his coat, Sherlock begins to repeatedly play a short irritating sequence of notes. John frowns across to him but Sherlock continues to play until Mycroft has left the room and is on the stairs. Grimacing in the direction of his brother’s back, Sherlock finishes his playing and lowers the violin, still looking annoyed. John sits back down on the coffee table and waits until Mycroft has reached the ground floor and is out of earshot before he speaks.)

JOHN: Why’d you lie?

(Sherlock looks across to him as the front door bangs shut.)

JOHN: You’ve got nothing on – not a single case. That’s why the wall took a pounding. Why did you tell your brother you were busy?

SHERLOCK (shrugging): Why shouldn’t I?

JOHN: Oh! (He nods.) Oh, I see.

(Sherlock’s eyes drift in his direction but he doesn’t actually look at him.)

JOHN: Sibling rivalry. Now we’re getting somewhere.

(Sherlock turns and opens his mouth but before he can deny everything his phone starts to ring. He irritably whips his bow down again, puts it on the seat beside him and fishes his phone out of his jacket pocket.)

SHERLOCK (into phone): Sherlock Holmes.

(He listens for a moment, then his expression intensifies.)

SHERLOCK: Of course. How could I refuse?

(Standing up and switching off the phone as he puts his violin onto the seat, he heads for the door.)

SHERLOCK: Lestrade. I’ve been summoned. Coming?

JOHN: If you want me to.

SHERLOCK: Of course.

(Picking up his Coat, he turns back to him.)

SHERLOCK: I’d be lost without my blogger.

After a taxi ride during which, bizarrely, Sherlock has briefly changed into a white shirt [and your transcriber smacks the editors], the boys arrive at New Scotland Yard and are following Detective Inspector Lestrade across the general office as he leads them towards his office.

LESTRADE: You like the funny cases, don’t you? The surprising ones.

SHERLOCK: Obviously.

LESTRADE: You’ve love this. That explosion ...

SHERLOCK (briefly exchanging glares with Detective Sergeant Donovan as he walks past her desk): Gas leak, yes?

LESTRADE: No.

SHERLOCK: No?

LESTRADE: No. Made to look like one.

JOHN: What?

(By now they’re in Lestrade’s office and Sherlock stops and stares down at a white envelope lying on the desk.)

LESTRADE: Hardly anything left of the place except a strong box – a very strong box and inside it was this.

(He points to what Sherlock’s looking at.)

SHERLOCK: You haven’t opened it?

LESTRADE: It’s addressed to you, isn’t it?

(Sherlock reaches towards the envelope.)

LESTRADE: We’ve X-rayed it. It’s not booby-trapped.

SHERLOCK (hesitating slightly): How reassuring(!)

(He picks up the envelope and takes it across the room to another table which has an anglepoise lamp on it. Holding the envelope up close to the bulb he examines both sides carefully. On the front in elegant handwriting are the words “Sherlock Holmes”.)

SHERLOCK: Nice stationery. Bohemian.

LESTRADE: What?

SHERLOCK: From the Czech Republic. No fingerprints?

LESTRADE: No.

SHERLOCK (looking closely at the writing): She used a fountain pen. A Parker Duofold – iridium nib.

JOHN: “She”?

SHERLOCK: Obviously.

JOHN (struggling not to sigh): Obviously(!)

(Sherlock picks up a letter opener from the desk and carefully slits the envelope open. He looks inside and his mouth opens a little in surprise as he reaches in and takes out a pink iPhone.)

JOHN (shocked): But that’s – that’s the phone, the pink phone.

LESTRADE: What, from the Study in Pink?

SHERLOCK: Well, obviously it’s not the same phone but it’s supposed to look like ...

(He stops as he realises what Lestrade just said. He turns to face him. Sally has come into the room to put some files down on a desk near the door.)

SHERLOCK: The Study in Pink? You read his blog?

LESTRADE: Course I read his blog! We all do. D’you really not know that the Earth goes round the Sun?

(Sally sniggers loudly. Sherlock, who is taking off his gloves, glares at her as John purses his lips in embarrassment. Sally leaves the room and Sherlock turns his concentration back to the phone.)

SHERLOCK: It isn’t the same phone. This one’s brand new.

(He’s looking at the connection sockets, none of which have scratches around them.)

SHERLOCK: Someone’s gone to a lot of trouble to make it look like the same phone, which means your blog has a far wider readership.

(He throws an accusatory look at John, who does his best to ignore it. Sherlock switches the phone on and immediately gets a voice alert.)

VOICE ALERT: You have one new message.

(The message plays but there is no voice – just the unmistakeable sound of the Greenwich Time Signal. However, while the “Greenwich pips” – as they’re more generally called – consist of five short pips and one longer tone, this recording has only four short pips and the longer one. Strangely, nobody ever comments on this.)

JOHN: Is that it?

SHERLOCK: No. That’s not it.

(A photograph has also been uploaded to the phone. He opens it and Lestrade comes across to look over his shoulder. The picture is of an unfurnished room with a fireplace on one wall. The wallpaper is peeling and there’s a tall mirror propped up in one corner. A smaller mirror – the type which is usually hung up above a fireplace – is standing on the mantelpiece.)

LESTRADE: What the hell are we supposed to make of that? An estate agent’s photo and the bloody Greenwich pips!

SHERLOCK (gazing thoughtfully into the distance): It’s a warning.

JOHN: A warning?

SHERLOCK: Some secret societies used to send dried melon seeds, orange pips, things like that. Five pips. They’re warning us it’s gonna happen again.

(He briefly looks down at the photo again, then brandishes the phone at the others as he starts to leave the office.)

SHERLOCK: And I’ve seen this place before.

JOHN (following him): H-hang on. What’s gonna happen again?

SHERLOCK (turning back and raising his hands dramatically): Boom!

(He heads off with John behind him. Lestrade grabs his coat and hurries after them.)

BAKER STREET. A taxi pulls up outside 221 and Sherlock, John and Lestrade get out. Sherlock unlocks the front door and leads the way inside, bypassing the stairs and heading along the corridor towards Mrs Hudson’s front door. Just as he reaches it he stops and turns to the left where there is another door which must lead to a basement flat. Numbers and letters stuck on the door read, “221c”. Sherlock turns his head and calls out loudly towards his landlady’s front door.

SHERLOCK: Mrs Hudson!

Shortly afterwards, Mrs Hudson opens the front door of 221A and hands Sherlock a set of keys. Sherlock has been examining the padlock attached to the other door and now takes the keys and begins to unlock it.

MRS HUDSON: You had a look, didn’t you, Sherlock, when you first came to see about your flat.

SHERLOCK (looking closely at the door’s keyhole): The door’s been opened recently.

MRS HUDSON: No, can’t be. That’s the only key.

(Pulling the padlock off, Sherlock selects another key and puts it into the keyhole.)

MRS HUDSON: I can’t get anyone interested in this flat. It’s the damp, I expect. That’s the curse of basements.

(Sherlock turns the key and pulls the door open. He immediately goes inside and John and Lestrade follow, taking little or no notice of Mrs H as she continues rambling on.)

MRS HUDSON: I had a place once when I was first married. Black mould all up the walls ...

(She trails to a halt as Lestrade closes the door behind him. She turns and heads back into her own flat.)

MRS HUDSON (exasperated): Oh! Men!

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, Sherlock slowly pushes open the door to the living room and walks inside, followed by the other two. The room looks exactly as it did in the photograph on the phone with one exception: there is a pair of trainers placed neatly in the middle of the floor, their toes pointed towards the door. John stops and looks at them before stating the bleedin’ obvious.

JOHN: Shoes.

(Sherlock starts to walk towards them but John holds out a cautionary hand towards him.)

JOHN: He’s a bomber, remember.

(Sherlock stops for a moment, then continues slowly towards the trainers. He crouches down, then puts his hands on the floor and leans forward. Lowering his body down he moves closer to the shoes and, just as his nose is almost touching them, a phone rings. Sherlock jumps, closes his eyes momentarily and then stands up, pulls off his glove and takes the pink iPhone from his coat pocket and looks at the caller I.D. It reads, “NUMBER BLOCKED”. He pauses for a second, then answers the phone.)

SHERLOCK (softly): Hello?

(A female voice draws in a shaky breath before speaking tearfully.)

WOMAN’s VOICE: H-hello ... sexy.

(John and Lestrade exchange a puzzled look as the woman sobs.)

SHERLOCK: Who’s this?

WOMAN’s VOICE (tearfully): I’ve ... sent you ... a little puzzle ... just to say hi.

SHERLOCK: Who’s talking? Why are you crying?

WOMAN’s VOICE (shakily and full of tears): I-I’m not ... crying ... I’m typing ...

(We now see that the woman on the other end of the line is sitting in the driver’s seat of a car holding a phone to her ear with one shaking hand and holding a pager in the other hand. Her face is covered with tears and she looks terrified as she reads from the pager.)

WOMAN: ... and this ... stupid ... bitch ... is reading it out.

(She sobs again. Sherlock gazes into the distance thoughtfully.)

SHERLOCK (softly): The curtain rises.

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK: Nothing.

JOHN: No, what did you mean?

SHERLOCK (half turning his head towards him): I’ve been expecting this for some time.

WOMAN: Twelve hours to solve ... my puzzle, Sherlock ...

(We now see that the car is in a car park. People are going about their everyday business, unaware that a large explosive device is strapped to the woman’s chest. A red laser point travels over the device and her neck, suggesting that a sniper is aiming at her from some distance away.)

WOMAN: ... or I’m going ... to be ... so naughty.

(The phone goes dead and the woman looks down at the bomb and the laser light, and sobs in despair.)

ST BARTHOLOMEW’S HOSPITAL. Sherlock has brought the trainers to a lab and is putting on a pair of latex gloves as he looks closely at them. He picks them up, examines the laces carefully and peers at the shoes from all directions, then digs out mud from the treads in the soles and puts it into a dish. Putting the shoes down again, he looks at them thoughtfully.

Later, he is sitting at a bench looking into a microscope as, beside him, a computer screen shows that a scanner of some sort is running tests. John is wandering up and down on the other side of the bench.

JOHN: So, who d’you suppose it was?

(A phone trills a text alert.)

SHERLOCK (absently, not reacting to the alert): Hmm?

JOHN: The woman on the phone – the crying woman.

SHERLOCK: Oh, she doesn’t matter. She’s just a hostage. No lead there.

JOHN (exasperated): For God’s sake, I wasn’t thinking about leads.

SHERLOCK: You’re not going to be much use to her.

(He glances across to the scanner as it continues throwing up “NO MATCH” results, then looks back into the microscope.)

JOHN: Are-are they trying to trace it, trace the call?

SHERLOCK: The bomber’s too smart for that.

(The same phone as before trills another text alert.)

SHERLOCK: Pass me my phone.

(John looks around the room.)

JOHN: Where is it?

SHERLOCK: Jacket.

(John straightens up slowly, his entire body going rigid in disbelief and his eyes broadcasting the message “I am going to kill him.” Turning to his right, he marches stiffly around the table, slams one hand onto Sherlock’s shoulder and roughly pulls his jacket open with the other as he starts to rummage in his inside pocket.)

SHERLOCK (angrily, still not looking up): Careful.

(John just about holds onto his temper and pulls the phone out and looks at it.)

JOHN: Text from your brother.

SHERLOCK: Delete it.

JOHN: Delete it?

SHERLOCK: Missile plans are out of the country now. Nothing we can do about it.

(John looks at the message again, which reads:

RE: BRUCE-PARTINGTON PLANS

Any progress on Andrew

West’s death?

Mycroft

JOHN: Well, Mycroft thinks there is. He’s texted you eight times. Must be important.

(Sherlock raises his head in exasperation.)

SHERLOCK: Then why didn’t he cancel his dental appointment?

JOHN (sighing tiredly): His what?

SHERLOCK: Mycroft never texts if he can talk. Look, Andrew West stole the missile plans, tried to sell them, got his head smashed in for his pains. End of story. The only mystery is this: why is my brother so determined to bore me when somebody else is being so delightfully interesting?

(He looks back into the microscope again.)

JOHN (switching the phone off): Try and remember there’s a woman here who might die.

SHERLOCK: What for?

(He looks up at John.)

SHERLOCK: This hospital’s full of people dying, Doctor. Why don’t you go and cry by their bedside and see what good it does them?

(John looks away in disbelief. Unmoved, Sherlock looks back into the microscope but just then the computer beeps a result.)

SHERLOCK (delighted): Ah!

(He looks across to the screen which is flashing “SEARCH COMPLETE”. At the same moment Molly Hooper comes in the door.)

MOLLY: Any luck?

SHERLOCK (triumphantly): Oh, yes!

(As Molly comes over to look at the screen, a man in his thirties, wearing slacks and a T-shirt, comes in the door and then stops apologetically.)

JIM: Oh, sorry. I didn’t ...

MOLLY: Jim! Hi!

(Jim makes as if to leave the room but Molly stops him.)

MOLLY: Come in! Come in!

(Sherlock looks over at her briefly, running his eyes down her body and apparently making an instant deduction, then looks back into the microscope. Molly makes introductions as Jim closes the door and walks over to her.)

MOLLY: Jim, this is Sherlock Holmes.

JIM: Ah!

(John turns towards them, and Molly looks at him blankly.)

MOLLY (apologetically): And, uh ... sorry.

JOHN: John Watson. Hi.

JIM: Hi.

(His eyes are locked on Sherlock’s back as he gazes at him admiringly. He speaks in a casual London accent.)

JIM: So you’re Sherlock Holmes. Molly’s told me all about you. You on one of your cases?

(He walks closer to Sherlock, forcing John to step out of his way.)

MOLLY: Jim works in I.T. upstairs. That’s how we met. Office romance.

(She and Jim giggle. Sherlock glances briefly round at Jim before returning to look into the ’scope.)

SHERLOCK: Gay.

(Molly’s smile fades.)

MOLLY: Sorry, what?

(Sherlock raises his head as he realises what he’s just done.)

SHERLOCK: Nothing. (He smiles round falsely at Jim.) Um, hey.

JIM (smiling admiringly at him): Hey.

(Lowering his hand, he knocks a metal dish off the edge of the table and scrambles to pick it up.)

JIM (giggling nervously): Sorry! Sorry!

(John turns away, face-palming, as Sherlock looks in irritation while Jim puts the dish back on the table and then scratches his arm as he wanders back towards Molly.)

JIM: Well, I’d better be off. I’ll see you at the Fox, ’bout six-ish?

MOLLY: Yeah!

(He stops beside her, putting a hand on her back, and looks back towards Sherlock.)

JIM: ’Bye.

MOLLY (softly): ’Bye.

JIM (to Sherlock): It was nice to meet you.

(Sherlock ignores him as Jim gazes at him wistfully. John breaks the embarrassing silence.)

JOHN: You too.

(Jim blinks at him, looking awkward, then turns and leaves the room. Molly waits until the door closes then turns to Sherlock.)

MOLLY: What d’you mean, gay? We’re together.

SHERLOCK (looking across to her): And domestic bliss must suit you, Molly. You’ve put on three pounds since I last saw you.

MOLLY: Two and a half.

SHERLOCK: Nuh, three.

JOHN: Sherlock ...

MOLLY (angrily): He’s not gay. Why d’you have to spoil ...? He’s not.

SHERLOCK (snorting): With that level of personal grooming?

JOHN: Because he puts a bit of product in his hair? I put product in my hair.

SHERLOCK: You wash your hair. There’s a difference. No-no – tinted eyelashes; clear signs of taurine cream around the frown lines; those tired clubber’s eyes. Then there’s his underwear.

MOLLY: His underwear?

SHERLOCK: Visible above the waistline – very visible; very particular brand.

(He reaches for the metal dish.)

SHERLOCK: That, plus the extremely suggestive fact that he just left his number under this dish here ... (he shows her the card that Jim left under the dish) ... and I’d say you’d better break it off now and save yourself the pain.

(Molly stares at him for a moment, then turns and runs out of the room. Sherlock looks surprised at her reaction.)

JOHN: Charming. Well done.

SHERLOCK: Just saving her time. Isn’t that kinder?

JOHN: “Kinder”? No, no, Sherlock. That wasn’t kind.

(Looking fed up with the conversation, Sherlock puts Jim’s card down and then reaches over and moves one of the trainers on the desk closer to John.)

SHERLOCK: Go on, then.

JOHN: Mmm?

SHERLOCK: You know what I do. Off you go.

(He sits back and folds his arms expectantly. John makes incoherent negative noises and looks at his watch.)

JOHN: No.

SHERLOCK: Go on.

JOHN: I’m not gonna stand here so you can humiliate me while I try and disseminate ...

SHERLOCK (interrupting): An outside eye, a second opinion. It’s very useful to me.

JOHN: Yeah, right(!)

SHERLOCK: Really.

(John turns back to him and the two of them have intense eyesex for several seconds. Eventually John nods unhappily because eyesex is all he’s going to get for the time being.)

JOHN: Fine.

(Clearing his throat, he picks up the shoe and looks at it and its partner lying on the table.)

JOHN: I dunno – they’re just a pair of shoes. (He immediately corrects himself.) Trainers.

SHERLOCK: Good.

(He looks away and picks up his phone as John continues looking at the trainers.)

JOHN: Umm ... they’re in good nick. I’d say they were pretty new ... except the sole has been well-worn, so the owner must have had them for a while.

(Sherlock, who had started to look frustrated when John said they were new, breathes out a silent sigh of relief that his friend isn’t that stupid.)

JOHN: Uh, they’re very eighties – probably one of those retro designs.

SHERLOCK: You’re on sparkling form. What else?

JOHN: Well, they’re quite big, so a man’s.

SHERLOCK: But ...?

JOHN (looking at the insides of both shoes and the blue smudges at the sides): But there’s traces of a name inside in felt-tip. Adults don’t write their names inside their shoes, so these belonged to a kid.

SHERLOCK (looking at him proudly): Excellent. What else?

JOHN: Uh ... (he looks again at the shoe he’s holding, then puts it down) ... that’s it.

SHERLOCK: That’s it?

(John nods.)

JOHN: How did I do?

SHERLOCK: Well, John; really well.

(He pauses momentarily.)

SHERLOCK: I mean, you missed almost everything of importance, but, um, you know ...

(He lifts his hand and slowly rotates his wrist to turn his palm up, his expression full of sarcasm. With a look of frustration, John picks up the trainer and gives it to him. Sherlock looks at it closely as he goes into deduction mode.)

SHERLOCK: The owner loved these. Scrubbed them clean, whitened them where they got discoloured. Changed the laces three ... no, four times.

(John puts his hands on the desk and lowers his head in despair.)

SHERLOCK: Even so, there are traces of his flaky skin where his fingers have come into contact with them, so he suffered from eczema. Shoes are well-worn, more so on the inside, which means the owner had weak arches. British-made, twenty years old.

JOHN (straightening up): Twenty years?

SHERLOCK: They’re not retro – they’re original.

(He shows John an image on his phone.)

SHERLOCK: Limited edition: two blue stripes, nineteen eighty-nine.

JOHN: But there’s still mud on them. They look new.

SHERLOCK (looking at the trainer thoughtfully): Someone’s kept them that way. Quite a bit of mud caked on the soles. Analysis shows it’s from Sussex, with London mud overlaying it.

JOHN: How do you know?

SHERLOCK (nodding towards the computer screen): Pollen. Clear as a map reference to me.

(Two dots are flashing on a map of Britain, one around the borders of East and West Sussex and the other to the south-east of London.)

SHERLOCK: South of the river, too. So, the kid who owned these trainers came to London from Sussex twenty years ago and left them behind.

JOHN: So what happened to him?

SHERLOCK: Something bad.

(He looks up at John.)

SHERLOCK: He loved those shoes, remember. He’d never leave them filthy. Wouldn’t leave them go unless he had to. So: a child with big feet gets ...

(He trails off, staring ahead of himself.)

SHERLOCK (softly): Oh.

(John looks across the lab, trying to see what his friend is looking at.)

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK (softly): Carl Powers.

JOHN: Sorry, who?

SHERLOCK (still staring into the distance): Carl Powers, John.

JOHN: What is it?

SHERLOCK: It’s where I began.

Later, the boys are in the back of a taxi.

SHERLOCK: Nineteen eighty-nine, a young kid – champion swimmer – came up from Brighton for a school sports tournament; drowned in the pool. Tragic accident.

(He shows John the front page of a newspaper on his phone.)

SHERLOCK: You wouldn’t remember it. Why should you?

JOHN: But you remember.

SHERLOCK: Yes.

JOHN: Something fishy about it?

SHERLOCK: Nobody thought so – nobody except me. I was only a kid myself. I read about it in the papers.

JOHN: Started young, didn’t you?

SHERLOCK: The boy, Carl Powers, had some kind of fit in the water, but by the time they got him out it was too late. But there was something wrong; something I couldn’t get out of my head.

JOHN: What?

SHERLOCK: His shoes.

JOHN: What about them?

SHERLOCK: They weren’t there. I made a fuss; I tried to get the police interested, but nobody seemed to think it was important. He’d left all the rest of his clothes in his locker, but there was no sign of his shoes ...

(He leans down and picks up a bag containing the trainers.)

SHERLOCK: ... until now.

SIX HOURS TO GO. As Sherlock sits in the back of the taxi holding the pink phone and lost in thought, the woman who rang him earlier sits in her car crying in despair.

221B. Sherlock has shut himself in the kitchen and is sitting at the table with the trainers nearby – still in the bag – while he looks through photographs and printouts of newspaper reports of Carl Powers’ death from 1989. In the living room, on the other side of the closed doors, John is pacing back and forth and finally stops and slides one of the doors open.

JOHN: Can I help?

(Sherlock doesn’t react to him at all.)

JOHN: I want to help. There’s only five hours left.

(His phone sounds a text alert. He gets the phone from his trouser pocket and looks at the message. It reads:

Any developments?

Mycroft Holmes

JOHN: It’s your brother. He’s texting me now.

(He frowns.)

JOHN: How does he know my number?

SHERLOCK (thoughtfully): Must be a root canal.

(Putting his phone away, John comes into the kitchen.)

JOHN: Look, he did say ‘national importance’.

(Sherlock snorts, not looking up from his research.)

SHERLOCK: How quaint.

JOHN: What is?

SHERLOCK: You are. Queen and country.

JOHN (sternly): You can’t just ignore it.

SHERLOCK: I’m not ignoring it. Putting my best man onto it right now.

JOHN: Right. Good.

(He folds his arms and nods in satisfaction, then looks at Sherlock in puzzlement.)

JOHN: Who’s that?

Some time later John, wearing a jacket and tie, is sitting in a chair opposite a desk in a large, rather intimidating office. He looks anxiously at his watch as if he has been waiting there for some time. The door opens and Mycroft walks in, reading a report.

MYCROFT: John. How nice. I was hoping you wouldn’t be long.

(John politely stands up as Mycroft walks across to the desk, still looking at the report.)

MYCROFT: How can I help you?

(He walks straight past John and puts the report down on the desk, imperiously waving a hand in John’s direction to signify that he can sit down again.)

JOHN: Thank you. (He sits.) Um, well, I was wanting to ... um, your brother sent me to collect more facts about the stolen plans, the missile plans.

(Mycroft looks over his shoulder and smiles at him.)

MYCROFT: Did he?

JOHN: Yes.

(He smiles back a little nervously as Mycroft turns towards him and leans back against the desk.)

JOHN: He’s investigating now.

(Mycroft put his hand to the right side of his mouth as if he is in pain.)

JOHN: He’s, er, investigating away.

(Lowering his hand again, Mycroft smiles as if he doesn’t believe a word of it.)

JOHN: Um, I just wondered what else you can tell me about the dead man.

MYCROFT: Uh, twenty-seven; a clerk at Vauxhall Cross – er, MI6. He was involved in the Bruce-Partington Programme in a minor capacity. Security checks A-OK; no known terrorist affiliations or sympathies ...

(Cutaway flashback to Andrew West sitting on a sofa with a young blonde woman. She snuggles into his shoulder, unaware that he is looking very worried.)

MYCROFT: Last seen by his fiancée at ten thirty yesterday evening.

(In the flashback, West is now standing at the window looking out into the night.)

WESTIE: Lucy, love, I’ve gotta go out. I’ve gotta see someone.

(He hurries out of the room. Lucy calls after him.)

LUCY: Westie!

(Brief flashback of Westie’s dead body lying beside the railway track.)

JOHN: Right. He was found at Battersea, yes? So he got on the train.

MYCROFT: No.

JOHN: What?

MYCROFT: He had an Oyster card ...

(Grimacing, he raises his hand to his mouth again. John frowns as he begins to realise that Sherlock may have been right about Mycroft having had a root canal filling to one of his teeth.)

MYCROFT: ... but it hadn’t been used.

JOHN: Must have bought a ticket.

MYCROFT (lowering his hand): There was no ticket on the body.

JOHN: Then ...

MYCROFT: Then how did he end up with a bashed-in brain on the tracks at Battersea? That is the question – the one I was rather hoping Sherlock would provide an answer to. How’s he getting on?

JOHN: He-he’s fine, yes. Oh, and-and it is going ... very well. It’s, um, you know – he’s completely focussed on it.

(He grins at Mycroft unconvincingly.)

THREE HOURS TO GO. Darkness has fallen and the woman still sits in the car and sobs.

221B. Sherlock has moved to the side table in the kitchen and is looking into his microscope. Mrs Hudson comes in through the kitchen door with a tray containing a couple of mugs. As she puts them on the kitchen table, Sherlock looks up.

SHERLOCK: Poison.

MRS HUDSON: What you going on about?

(Sherlock slams his hands down on the side table.)

SHERLOCK: Clostridium botulinum!

(Mrs Hudson cringes and flees the kitchen. Sherlock looks round at John as he comes in from the living room.)

SHERLOCK: It’s one of the deadliest poisons on the planet!

(John looks at him blankly.)

SHERLOCK: Carl Powers!

JOHN: Oh, wait, are you saying he was murdered?

(Sherlock stands up and walks over to where he has hung up the laces from the trainers.)

SHERLOCK: Remember the shoelaces?

JOHN: Mmm.

SHERLOCK: The boy suffered from eczema. It’d be the easiest thing in the world to introduce the poison into his medication. Two hours later he comes up to London, the poison takes effect, paralyses the muscles and he drowns.

JOHN: What – how-how come the autopsy didn’t pick that up?

SHERLOCK: It’s virtually undetectable. Nobody would have been looking for it.

(He has walked around the table to where his computer notebook is lying. The page is open at the Forum of his own website, The Science of Deduction and he now begins to type into the message box:

FOUND. Pair of trainers belonging to Carl Powers (1978-1989).

SHERLOCK (straightening up to point to the laces): But there were still tiny traces of it left inside the trainers from where he put the cream on his feet.

(He bends down and continues to type:

Botulinum toxin still present. Apply 221b Baker St.

He sends the message and straightens up.)

SHERLOCK: That’s why they had to go.

JOHN: So how do we let the bomber know ...

SHERLOCK: Get his attention ...

JOHN: Mmm-hmm.

SHERLOCK (looking at his watch): ... stop the clock.

JOHN: The killer kept the shoes all these years.

SHERLOCK: Yes. (He looks at John.) Meaning ...

JOHN: He’s our bomber.

(The pink phone rings on the side table. Sherlock hurries over to it and switches it on. In the car park, the woman sobs in anguish as she reads out the latest message from the pager.)

WOMAN: Well done, you. Come and get me.

SHERLOCK (loudly and clearly): Where are you? Tell us where you are.

Some time later the woman stares anxiously out of the car window as members of a bomb disposal team, dressed in protective padded clothing, make their way towards the car.

MORNING. New Scotland Yard. The boys are in Lestrade’s office, Sherlock standing at the window with his hands raised in front of his mouth and his fingers tapping together. John is sitting opposite Lestrade at his desk.

LESTRADE: She lives in Cornwall. Two men broke in wearing masks, forced her to drive to the car park and decked her out in enough explosives to take down a house.

(He looks up at Sherlock as he walks over to the desk.)

LESTRADE: Told her to phone you. She had to read out from this pager.

(He puts the pager onto the desk in front of John, who picks it up to look at it.)

SHERLOCK: And if she deviated by one word, the sniper would set her off.

JOHN: Or if you hadn’t solved the case.

SHERLOCK (walking back to the window and speaking softly, as if to himself): Oh. Elegant.

(John raises his head and sighs in exasperation.)

JOHN: “Elegant”?

LESTRADE: But what was the point? Why would anyone do this?

SHERLOCK: Oh – I can’t be the only person in the world that gets bored.

(He flashes back in his mind to shooting holes in the wall a couple of days ago.)

(Just then the pink phone beeps a message alert. John turns round to him as he activates the phone.)

VOICE ALERT: You have one new message.

(As Sherlock walks towards Lestrade’s desk, the phone sounds the Greenwich pips again, but this time there are three short pips and one long one.)

JOHN: Four pips.

SHERLOCK: First test passed, it would seem. Here’s the second.

(He shows a new photograph to the others. It’s a close-up of a car with its driver’s door open and the number plate clearly visible. John and Lestrade get up to take a closer look, and outside in the main office a phone rings.)

SHERLOCK: It’s abandoned, wouldn’t you say?

LESTRADE: I’ll see if it’s been reported.

(As he picks up his phone, Sergeant Donovan comes to the office holding another phone.)

DONOVAN: Freak, it’s for you.

(Sherlock walks over to the door and takes the phone from her. John sits down again and Sherlock walks out into the general office and raises the phone to his ear.)

SHERLOCK: Hello?

(The frightened voice of a young man comes over the phone.)

YOUNG MAN: It’s okay that you’ve gone to the police.

SHERLOCK: Who is this? Is this you again?

YOUNG MAN: But don’t rely on them.

(In Lestrade’s office, John looks round and sits up as he sees the look on Sherlock’s face.)

YOUNG MAN: Clever you, guessing about Carl Powers.

(We get a glimpse of the young man standing somewhere in a busy street, reading from a pager.)

YOUNG MAN: I never liked him.

(Sherlock looks round sharply at this. We see that the man is wearing a zipped-up jacket with wires sticking out from the bottom. The man fights his tears as he continues to read.)

YOUNG MAN: Carl laughed at me, so I stopped him laughing.

(John comes out of the office and walks closer to Sherlock, looking at him in concern.)

SHERLOCK (into phone): And you’ve stolen another voice, I presume.

YOUNG MAN: This is about you and me.

(A bus noisily drives past him.)

SHERLOCK: Who are you?

(More traffic goes past.)

SHERLOCK: What’s that noise?

(The man looks down at the pager, still struggling not to weep.)

YOUNG MAN: The sounds of life, Sherlock.

(Finally we get a clear view of where the man is. He is standing on a large traffic island at Piccadilly Circus. Pedestrians are walking past him, taking no notice of a distressed tearful man, as is the wont of Londoners [I’m allowed to criticise – I’m a Londoner myself!])

YOUNG MAN (reading from the pager): But don’t worry ...

(He looks down in tearful horror as he sees a red laser point on his jacket.)

YOUNG MAN: ... I can soon fix that.

(He cries briefly, then continues to read the pager message.)

YOUNG MAN: You solved my last puzzle in nine hours. This time you have eight.

(In the office, Lestrade is talking into the phone.)

LESTRADE: Okay ... Great.

(Putting the phone down, he heads towards the door.)

LESTRADE: We’ve found it.

(Sherlock’s phone has gone dead. He turns and follows Lestrade.)

Close to the river, the police have arrived at a large open space where the car was found. Forensics officers in protective clothing are working on the car as Lestrade leads Sherlock towards it. John and Sally Donovan are walking along behind them.

LESTRADE (consulting some notes): The car was hired yesterday morning by an Ian Monkford. Banker of some kind; City boy. Paid in cash.

(Sherlock looks closely as they pass a woman talking with a female police officer.)

LESTRADE: Told his wife he was going away on a business trip, but he never arrived.

(As Sherlock and Lestrade reach the passenger door of the car, Sally turns to John.)

DONOVAN: You’re still hanging round him.

JOHN: Yeah, well ...

DONOVAN: Opposites attract, I suppose.

JOHN: No, we’re not ...

DONOVAN: You should get yourself a hobby – stamps, maybe. Model trains. Safer.

(She goes to stand beside Lestrade as Sherlock leans into the car to look at a large amount of blood smeared over the island between the two front seats. He opens the glove box.)

LESTRADE: Before you ask, yes, it’s Monkford’s blood. The DNA checks out.

(Sherlock finds a business card in the glove box and takes it out. Closing the lid he straightens up.)

SHERLOCK: No body.

DONOVAN: Not yet.

SHERLOCK (to Lestrade): Get a sample sent to the lab.

(Lestrade nods and Sherlock walks away. Lestrade turns to Donovan and looks at her pointedly. She stares back at him indignantly but he holds the look and she grunts in exasperation and stomps away. Sherlock walks over to the woman who was talking with the police officer.)

SHERLOCK: Mrs Monkford?

(She turns to him tearfully.)

MRS MONKFORD: Yes.

(She looks at him and John, and sighs.)

MRS MONKFORD: Sorry, but I’ve already spoken with two policemen.

JOHN: No, we’re not from the police; we’re ...

(Sherlock holds his hand out to her, his voice tearful and tremulous.)

SHERLOCK: Sherlock Holmes. Very old friend of your husband’s. We, um ...

(As she shakes his hand, he looks down as if fighting back his tears.)

SHERLOCK: ... we grew up together.

MRS MONKFORD: I’m sorry, who? I don’t think he ever mentioned you.

SHERLOCK (still tearful): Oh, he must have done. This is ... this is horrible, isn’t it?

(John looks away, trying somewhat unsuccessfully to keep his face neutral.)

SHERLOCK: I mean, I just can’t believe it. I only saw him the other day. Same old Ian – not a care in the world.

(He smiles tearfully at her.)

MRS MONKFORD: Sorry, but my husband has been depressed for months. Who are you?

SHERLOCK: Really strange that he hired a car. Why would he do that? It’s a bit suspicious, isn’t it?

(By now he has tears running down his cheeks.)

MRS MONKFORD: No, it isn’t. He forgot to renew the tax on the car, that’s all.

SHERLOCK: Oh, well, that was Ian! That was Ian all over!

MRS MONKFORD: No it wasn’t.

(Instantly Sherlock’s fake persona drops and he looks at her intensely.)

SHERLOCK: Wasn’t it? Interesting.

(He turns and walks away. She glares after him as he heads for the police tape with John following. The female police office goes over to her.)

MRS MONKFORD: Who was I talking to?

JOHN (to Sherlock as they duck under the tape): Why did you lie to her?

SHERLOCK (taking his gloves off to wipe the tears from under his eyes): People don’t like telling you things, but they love to contradict you. Past tense, did you notice?

JOHN: Sorry, what?

SHERLOCK: I referred to her husband in the past tense. She joined in. Bit premature – they’ve only just found the car.

JOHN: You think she murdered her husband?

SHERLOCK: Definitely not. That’s not a mistake a murderer would make.

JOHN: I see. No, I don’t. What am I seeing?

(As they walk past Donovan, she turns and calls out to John.)

DONOVAN: Fishing! Try fishing!

(John turns around and gives her an exasperated nod before following Sherlock again.)

JOHN: Where now?

SHERLOCK: Janus Cars.

(He hands the business card to John.)

SHERLOCK: Just found this in the glove compartment.

SIX HOURS TO GO.

JANUS CARS. Sherlock and John are in the office of the car hire company. John sits on the other side of the desk to the owner, taking notes while Sherlock looks out into the forecourt.

EWERT: Can’t see how I can help you gentlemen.

JOHN: Mr. Monkford hired the car from you yesterday.

EWERT: Yeah. Lovely motor. Mazda RX-8. Wouldn’t mind one of them myself!

(Sherlock walks over to the other side of the desk so that he’s standing beside Ewert, then points into the forecourt.)

SHERLOCK: Is that one?

(Ewert turns his head to look and Sherlock immediately looks closely at the side of the man’s neck.)

EWERT: No, they’re all Jags. Yeah, I can see you’re not a car man, eh?

(Sherlock straightens up as Ewert looks round and smiles at John.)

SHERLOCK: But, er, surely you can afford one – a Mazda, I mean?

EWERT: Yeah, it’s a fair point. But you know how it is: it’s like working in a sweetshop. Once you start picking at the liquorice allsorts, when does it all stop, eh?

(He starts scratching near the top of his left arm with his right hand. Sherlock looks at him for a moment, then turns away and heads around the room towards the other side of the desk.)

JOHN: But you didn’t know Mr. Monkford?

EWERT: No, he was just a client. Came in here and hired one of my cars. No idea what happened to him. Poor sod.

(Sherlock has reached the other side of the desk and stops.)

SHERLOCK: Nice holiday, Mr. Ewert?

EWERT: Eh?

SHERLOCK: You’ve been away, haven’t you?

EWERT: Oh, the-the ...

(He gestures towards his tanned face.)

EWERT: No, it’s, er, sunbeds, I’m afraid, yeah. Too busy to get away. My wife would love it, though – bit of sun.

SHERLOCK: Have you got any change for the cigarette machine?

EWERT: What?

SHERLOCK: Well, I noticed one on the way in and I haven’t got any change.

(He offers Ewert a bank note.)

SHERLOCK: I’m gasping.

EWERT: Um, well ...

(He reaches into his trouser pocket and takes out his wallet.)

EWERT: Hmm.

(He opens the wallet and looks inside.)

EWERT: No, sorry.

SHERLOCK: Oh well. Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Ewert.

(He turns and heads for the door.)

SHERLOCK: You’ve been very helpful. Come on, John.

(They leave the office and head back across the forecourt.)

JOHN: I-I’ve got change if you still want to, uh ...

SHERLOCK (patting his upper left arm): Nicotine patches, remember? I’m doing well.

JOHN: So what was that all about?

SHERLOCK: I needed to look inside his wallet.

JOHN: Why?

SHERLOCK: Mr. Ewert’s a liar.

ST BART’S LAB. Sherlock has a large drop of blood in a shallow glass dish. Putting it on the desk, he reaches into a small bag of equipment, opens a bottle and siphons out some liquid with a small dropper. Bending down to the dish, he squeezes out a drop of liquid onto the blood, which starts to fizz. As Sherlock straightens up, the pink phone rings. The Caller I.D. reads “BLOCKED”. He picks up the phone and answers it.

SHERLOCK: Hello?

YOUNG MAN (tearfully reading from the pager): The clue’s in the name. Janus Cars.

SHERLOCK: Why would you be giving me a clue?

YOUNG MAN: Why does anyone do anything? Because I’m bored. We were made for each other, Sherlock.

SHERLOCK (softly): Then talk to me in your own voice.

YOUNG MAN (tearfully): Patience.

(The line goes dead. Sherlock lowers the phone and looks thoughtfully into the distance for a while. Finally he looks down at the fizzing liquid in the dish, then picks up the dish and looks at it more closely. He begins to smile.)

THREE HOURS TO GO.

POLICE CAR POUND. Sherlock, John and Lestrade are standing around Monkford’s car.

SHERLOCK: How much blood was on that seat, would you say?

LESTRADE: How much? About a pint.

SHERLOCK: Not ‘about’. Exactly a pint. That was their first mistake. The blood’s definitely Ian Monkford’s but it’s been frozen.

LESTRADE: Frozen?

SHERLOCK: There are clear signs. I think Ian Monkford gave a pint of his blood some time ago and that’s what they spread on the seats.

JOHN: Who did?

SHERLOCK: Janus Cars. The clue’s in the name.

JOHN: The god with two faces.

SHERLOCK: Exactly.

JOHN: Mmm.

SHERLOCK (to Lestrade): They provide a very special service. If you’ve got any kind of a problem – money troubles, bad marriage, whatever – Janus Cars will help you disappear. Ian Monkford was up to his eyes in some kind of trouble – financial, at a guess; he’s a banker. Couldn’t see a way out. But if he were to vanish, if the car he hired was found abandoned with his blood all over the driver’s seat ...

JOHN: So where is he?

SHERLOCK (closing the car door): Columbia.

LESTRADE: Columbia?!

SHERLOCK: Mr. Ewert of Janus Cars had a twenty thousand Columbian peso note in his wallet ...

(Flashback to Sherlock seeing the note in the wallet.)

SHERLOCK: ... Quite a bit of change, too. He told us he hadn’t been abroad recently, but when I asked him about the cars, I could see his tan line clearly.

(Flashback to Sherlock pointing out the window and Ewert turning his head to look while Sherlock sees that his tan finishes at his neck.)

SHERLOCK: No-one wears a shirt on a sunbed. That, plus his arm.

LESTRADE: His arm?

SHERLOCK: Kept scratching it. Obviously irritating him, and bleeding.

(Flashback to a close-up of Ewert scratching his upper arm, and a drop of blood on his shirt sleeve.)

SHERLOCK: Why? Because he’d recently had a booster jab. Hep-B, probably. Difficult to tell at that distance. Conclusion: he’d just come back from settling Ian Monkford into his new life in Columbia. Mrs Monkford cashes in the life insurance and she splits it with Janus Cars.

JOHN: M-Mrs Monkford?

SHERLOCK: Oh yes. She’s in on it too.

(Lestrade lowers his head with a look of amazement on his face.)

SHERLOCK: Now go and arrest them, Inspector. That’s what you do best.

(He turns to John.)

SHERLOCK: We need to let our friendly bomber know that the case is solved.

(He turns and leads John away. Lestrade watches them, still reeling at all the information that he has just been given. Sherlock clenches his fists triumphantly at his sides as he goes.)

SHERLOCK: I am on fire!

221B. Sitting at the living room table in their coats – presumably because the heating still can’t be turned on nor the fire lit after the ‘gas leak’ (and because the windows are still broken and boarded up) – Sherlock types a new message onto The Science of Deduction:

Congratulations to Ian Monkford on his relocation to Columbia.

He sends the message. A few seconds later another ‘blocked’ phone call comes in on the pink phone lying on the table beside the computer. Sherlock switches the phone on.)

YOUNG MAN (tearfully, over speaker): He says you can come and fetch me. Help. Help me, please.

(Shortly afterwards, police officers are running towards the young man from all directions. In 221B, Sherlock looks up at John and smiles. And then they dun sex. *shrugs* Well, you never know.)

MORNING. The boys are sitting at a table in a café (not Speedy’s). John is tucking into a cooked breakfast and has a mug of tea in front of him while Sherlock is drumming his fingers impatiently on the table waiting for the pink phone – which is lying on the table – to ring.

SHERLOCK: Feeling better?

JOHN: Mmm. You realise we’ve hardly stopped for breath since this thing started?

(He eats another forkful of food, then looks thoughtful.)

JOHN: Has it occurred to you ...?

SHERLOCK: Probably.

JOHN: No – has it occurred to you that the bomber’s playing a game with you? The envelope; breaking into the other flat; the dead kid’s shoes – it’s all meant for you.

SHERLOCK (smiling slightly): Yes, I know.

JOHN: Is it him, then? Moriarty?

SHERLOCK: Perhaps.

(The pink phone beeps a message alert. Sherlock switches it on and it sounds two short Greenwich pips followed by the longer tone, and a photograph of a smiling middle-aged woman appears on the screen.)

SHERLOCK: That could be anybody.

JOHN: Well, it could be, yeah. Lucky for you, I’ve been more than a little unemployed.

SHERLOCK: How d’you mean?

JOHN: Lucky for you, Mrs Hudson and I watch far too much telly.

(He stands up and walks over to the counter. Smiling at the woman behind the counter, he picks up a remote control and switches on the small television hung on the wall. He switches channels a couple of times until he finds what he wants. The woman from the photograph is on the screen, partway through her make-over show. She is gesturing to someone just offscreen.)

CONNIE: Thank you, Tyra! Doesn’t she look lovely, everybody, now?

(The pink phone rings.)

CONNIE: Anyway, speaking of silk purses and sows’ ears ...

(Sherlock picks up the phone and answers it.)

SHERLOCK: Hello?

(An old woman speaks tremulously in a Yorkshire accent.)

OLD WOMAN: This one ... is a bit ... defective. Sorry.

(We see a close-up of the woman, who is wearing an earpiece.)

OLD WOMAN: She’s blind. This is ... a funny one.

(John walks back over to the table. At the old woman’s location, the camera pulls out to show that she too is strapped to a bomb. Wearing a warm dressing gown and sitting up in bed she is holding a phone to the ear which doesn’t have the earpiece in and she is staring blankly ahead of herself as she narrates the words being spoken through the earpiece.)

OLD WOMAN: I’ll give you ... twelve hours.

(Sherlock looks at John as he sits down again.)

SHERLOCK (into phone): Why are you doing this?

OLD WOMAN: I like ... to watch you ... dance.

(Even though she cannot see it, there is still a laser point from a sniper’s rifle running over her body. As she finishes speaking, she gasps and sobs in terror. Sherlock lowers the phone and shakes his head at John, then drops the phone onto the table as he turns to look at the TV.)

CONNIE (on the TV): ... and I see you’re back to your bad habits.

(As the footage continues, a voiceover replaces her voice and a news headline at the bottom of the screen reads: Make-over Queen Connie Prince dead at 48.)

NEWS READER: ... continuing into the sudden death of the popular TV personality, Connie Prince. Miss Prince, famous for her make-over programmes, was found dead two days ago by her brother in the house they shared in Hampstead ...

BART’S MORGUE. Connie Prince’s body has been laid out on a table in the morgue, with a sheet covering her and leaving only her arms and upper chest bare. Lestrade leads the boys into the room, reading from a file as he goes.

LESTRADE: Connie Prince, fifty-four. She had one of those make-over shows on the telly. Did you see it?

SHERLOCK: No.

LESTRADE: Very popular. She was going places.

SHERLOCK: Not any more. So: dead two days. According to one of her staff, Raoul de Santos, she cut her hand on a rusty nail in the garden. Nasty wound.

(He and John look at the deep cut in the webbing between her right thumb and index finger.)

SHERLOCK: Tetanus bacteria enters the bloodstream – good night Vienna.

JOHN: I suppose.

SHERLOCK: Something’s wrong with this picture.

LESTRADE: Eh?

SHERLOCK: Can’t be as simple as it seems, otherwise the bomber wouldn’t be directing us towards it. Something’s wrong.

(He narrows his eyes as he looks down at the body, then bends closer to look along Connie’s right arm as he takes his magnifier from his pocket. There are several scratches on her upper arm which look like claw marks. He moves up to her face and notices some tiny pinpricks on her forehead just above her nose. He looks at them through the magnifier.)

SHERLOCK: John?

JOHN: Mmm.

SHERLOCK: The cut on her hand: it’s deep; would have bled a lot, right?

JOHN: Yeah.

SHERLOCK: But the wound’s clean – very clean, and fresh.

(He looks up, his eyes flickering as he thinks it through, then straightens up and clicks the magnifier closed.)

SHERLOCK: How long would the bacteria have been incubating inside her?

JOHN: Eight, ten days.

(Sherlock quirks a one-sided grin and turns to John, waiting for him to put it all together. It doesn’t take him long.)

JOHN: The cut was made later.

LESTRADE: After she was dead?

SHERLOCK: Must have been. The only question is, how did the tetanus enter the dead woman’s system?

(John looks along the body thoughtfully.)

SHERLOCK: You want to help, right?

JOHN: Of course.

SHERLOCK: Connie Prince’s background – family history, everything. Give me data.

JOHN: Right.

(He turns and leaves the room. Sherlock looks down at Connie’s body one more time, then turns and heads towards the door.)

LESTRADE: There’s something else that we haven’t thought of.

SHERLOCK (casually): Is there?

LESTRADE: Yes. Why is he doing this, the bomber?

(Sherlock stops, keeping his back to the inspector and looking a little anxious.)

LESTRADE: If this woman’s death was suspicious, why point it out?

SHERLOCK (nonchalantly, over his shoulder): Good Samaritan.

(He tries to move away but Lestrade persists.)

LESTRADE: ... who press-gangs suicide bombers?

SHERLOCK: Bad Samaritan.

LESTRADE: I’m – I’m serious, Sherlock. Listen: I’m cutting you slack here; I’m trusting you – but out there somewhere, some poor bastard’s covered in Semtex and is just waiting for you to solve the puzzle. So just tell me: what are we dealing with?

(Sherlock looks away thoughtfully, then smiles with delight.)

SHERLOCK: Something new.

EIGHT HOURS TO GO. The old woman sits quietly in her bed while the sniper – who must really love his job, considering that the woman can’t see what he’s doing – continues to keep his rifle’s laser trained on her.

SEVERAL HOURS LATER. 221B. The wall behind the sofa is covered with paperwork: maps, photographs of Connie Prince – both when she was alive and pictures taken in the morgue – photos of Carl Powers, press cuttings and various sheets of paper with notes scribbled on them. Pieces of string are pinned between some of the exhibits, linking them together. Sherlock is pacing back and forth in front of the sofa as Lestrade stands nearby.

SHERLOCK (under his breath): Connection, connection, connection. There must be a connection.

(He stops and gestures towards various spots on the display on the wall as he speaks.)

SHERLOCK: Carl Powers, killed twenty years ago. The bomber knew him; admitted that he knew him. The bomber’s iPhone was in stationery from the Czech Republic. First hostage from Cornwall; the second from London; the third from Yorkshire, judging by her accent. What’s he doing – working his way round the world? Showing off?

(The pink phone rings. He takes it from his pocket and sees that the Caller I.D. again reads “NUMBER BLOCKED”. He answers, and the old woman begins to narrate what’s being said into her earpiece.)

OLD WOMAN: You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? Joining the ... dots.

(She sobs.)

OLD WOMAN: Three hours: boom ... boom.

(She cries in terror, then the phone goes dead. Sherlock looks at Lestrade for a moment, then switches the phone off, puts it back in his pocket and raises his hands to his mouth in the prayer position, concentrating on the wall in front of him.)

KENNY PRINCE’S HOUSE. In a beautifully and elegantly decorated house, a hairless cat meows as it wanders about on a sofa. Kenny Prince, a man in his late fifties who is wearing a very fancy purple shirt which’ll never rival Sherlock’s, comes into the room. Behind him the much younger and far more dishy ‘houseboy’ Raoul stops at the doorway and gestures to John to go in.

KENNY: We’re devastated. Of course we are.

(As John walks into the living room, Kenny reaches the other side of the room and turns back, propping his arm on the mantelpiece. Looking a little uncomfortable, John sits down on the sofa beside the cat.)

RAOUL: Can I get you anything, sir?

JOHN: Er, no. No, thanks.

(Raoul looks across the room to Kenny, who smiles at him. Raoul returns the smile, then turns and leaves the room.)

KENNY: Raoul is my rock. I don’t think I could have managed.

(He looks down sadly.)

KENNY: We didn’t always see eye to eye, but my sister was very dear to me.

(The cat has climbed onto John’s lap and meows loudly in protest as he picks it up and puts it down beside him.)

JOHN: And – and to the public, Mr. Prince.

KENNY: Oh, she was adored. I’ve seen her take girls who looked like the back end of Routemasters and turn them into princesses.

(John looks down in frustration as the cat climbs into his lap again.)

KENNY: Still, it’s a relief in a way to know that she’s beyond this veil of tears.

(John is nervously holding the cat as it purrs contentedly on his lap.)

JOHN (awkwardly): Absolutely.

221B. Mrs Hudson has joined Sherlock and Lestrade and is standing between them as they face the paper-covered wall. Sherlock is talking into his own phone.

SHERLOCK: Great. ... Thank you. Thanks again.

(He turns and walks towards the fireplace, still talking into the phone. Mrs Hudson looks sadly at a photo of Connie Prince on the wall.)

MRS HUDSON: It was a real shame. I liked her. She taught you how to do your colours.

(Lestrade – who had turned and was watching Sherlock [well, who wouldn’t?] on the other side of the room – now turns back to Mrs H.)

LESTRADE: Colours?

MRS HUDSON: You know ... (she gestures down at her clothes) ... what goes best with what. I should never wear cerise, apparently. Drains me.

(Sherlock has just finished his conversation and walks back to join the others.)

LESTRADE: Who was that?

SHERLOCK (staring at the wall): Home Office.

[Good grief – he wasn’t after a posh party invite, was he?]

LESTRADE (surprised): Home Office?

SHERLOCK: Well, Home Secretary, actually. Owes me a favour.

MRS HUDSON (looking at a photo on the wall of Connie holding an award which presumably she won for her show): She was a pretty girl but she messed about with herself too much. They all do these days.

(She looks round at Lestrade.)

MRS HUDSON: People can hardly move their faces. It’s silly, isn’t it?!

(She giggles as Lestrade smiles politely. She turns to Sherlock.)

MRS HUDSON: Did you ever see her show?

SHERLOCK: Not until now.

(He turns and picks up his computer notebook and opens it. A video starts to play, showing footage of an episode of Connie’s make-over show. She is talking to her brother in the TV studio.)

CONNIE: You look pasty, love!

KENNY: Ah. (He looks at the audience.) Rained every day but one!

MRS HUDSON: That’s the brother. No love lost there, if you can believe the papers.

SHERLOCK: So I gather. I’ve just been having a very fruitful chat with people who loved this show. Fan sites – indispensible for gossip.

CONNIE (gesturing to the clothes which her brother is wearing): There’s really only one thing we can do with that ensemble, don’t you think, girls?

(She stands up and chaps her hands rhythmically as she begins to chant.)

CONNIE: Off! Off! Off! Off!

(The audience takes up the chant and the clapping. By the third, “Off!” Connie is rhythmically beating her hands quite hard onto Kenny’s back as he drops his jacket to the floor and starts to unbutton his shirt. He grimaces in pain but then turns a false smile towards the audience.)

KENNY PRINCE’S HOUSE. Kenny is still standing by the fireplace, looking thoughtfully at a framed photograph of Connie holding her TV award. John is sitting on the sofa looking down at his notebook as he talks.

JOHN: It’s more common than people think. The tetanus is in the soil, people cut themselves on rose bushes, garden forks, that sort of thing. If left un…

(He looks up in surprise as Kenny – who has walked across the room unnoticed – now plonks heavily down onto the sofa beside him and stares at him intensely.)

JOHN: …treated ...

KENNY: I don’t know what I’m going to do now.

JOHN (a little nervously): Right.

KENNY: I mean, she’s left me this place, which is lovely ...

(John looks around the living room with his eyes narrowed, apparently not agreeing with how ‘lovely’ the place might be.)

KENNY: ... but it’s not the same without her.

JOHN (fidgeting as he tries to move further away from Kenny, but unable to do so): Th-that’s why my paper wanted to get the, um, the full story straight from the horse’s mouth. You sure it’s not too soon?

KENNY: No.

JOHN: Right.

KENNY (still staring intensely at him): You fire away.

(The cat meows and trots across the carpet. John watches it as he reaches up to rub the side of his nose. As he pulls his hand away again he suddenly realises something and quickly raises his hand to his nose once more, pretending to rub it as he quietly sniffs at his fingers and looks towards the cat again. He smiles round nervously at Kenny.)

221B. Mrs Hudson has left the room but Sherlock and Lestrade are still standing in front of the wall display. Sherlock’s phone rings and he fishes it out of his jacket pocket, looks quickly at the Caller I.D. and then holds the phone to his ear.

SHERLOCK: John.

JOHN (over phone): Hi. Look, get over here quickly. I think I’m onto something. You’ll need to pick up some stuff first. You got a pen?

SHERLOCK: I’ll remember.