Jonathan Creek

Good morning, it's GLR Breakfast on 94.9 FM...

Wha...?!

No!

Don't you dare go back to sleep, you lazy sow!

It's 8 o'clock, now come on!

You've got three seconds before the saucepan lids.

Yes! All right!

God Almighty!

Miss Magellan? My name's Stephen Claithorne.

I believe you're a collector of mysteries.

What?

Look, I'm sorry, I've only just this second woken up.

We'll likely get into all sorts of tangles

if we play questions and answers, so with your permission,

I'll just begin at the beginning.

But, before you do, if this is some tale about a missing hymn book,

then it's a bit early in the morning. - It's murder, Miss Magellan.

Cold, clinical and calculated.

And it took place last night at my home in Oxfordshire.

The midday papers will be full of it.

What they won't explain, what no one can explain,

is how the killer evaporated into thin air...

...right in front of everyone's eyes.

Some miracles you don't want to believe in.

I'll get some coffee on.

I don't know if you are familiar with the popular novelist, Emma Lazarus,

widely referred to in publishing circles as the Queen of Horror?

Did she all write those pukey stories about little towns in Arizona

where everyone gets their flesh ripped off

after the Devil has sex with a lawnmower?

My mother-in-law, for my sins.

A lady of rather florid style and ghoulish imagination.

Traits not shared by her daughter Lorna,

as sweet and sensitive a soul mate as...

I never knew Lorna's father. He died in his 30s.

When her mother remarried,

an American hairstylist named Tom Terici.

They moved to California.

We barely saw them from one year to the next.

Till one morning a couple of weeks ago,

we found ourselves with three house guests at the rectory.

Emma, Tom and this minder character of theirs...

...Mr. Drucker.

I won't say we got on like a house on fire.

For most part, I avoided her company, which wasn't hard.

My parish is small, but the demands it makes on my time are considerable.

Your god is no more a reality than the tooth fairy we believed in as children.

You'll excuse me, I have some work to catch up on.

The only gods that exist are ourselves!

We are the gods of our...

Plus my absence last night of all nights... All Hallows Eve.

I'd been summoned to the Bishop's for a little dionysus pep talk.

Lorna, her mother and stepfather

were returning home from a costume party and dance

at Mapleseas Manor about ten miles down the road.

It was just gone midnight.

How's the migraine? - Still zigging and zagging.

Like a rat's chewing on my optic nerve.

I hope your friends weren't offended we had to peel off early.

Four hours of dancing skeletons and I was just about spooked out for the...

What is it? - He's still there!

Can you believe the staying power?

It's not enough we've got this leech on our tail back home,

he follows you halfway around the world.

That's not a fan, that's a serious piece of brain damage.

Because he sends me love letters Hal, that tell me I'm a living goddess?

The poor wretch is harmless. What's he gonna do?

Serenade me to death?

Now come on.

You gonna do the honours before we all turn in?

Tom... Tom, come on.

Souvenir for the album, hm?

One more for the hell of it.

It's okay, I've got it. - Thank you.

Be sure we check every door and window tonight.

Feel my gut tells me something's brewin' out there.

Tom?

Jesus! - Drop it!

Drop it!

Bring the car to the door.

Leave the keys in the ignition.

Do it!

Get out and back away!

What in the name of God...?!

Okay, put her down!

Put her down!

The killer was trapped.

It was naturally assumed

he'd try to buy his freedom using Lorna as hostage.

But then, once the door had come down,

it all went strangely quiet.

I'm the one who phoned. I'm security here.

There's an armed man inside with a woman who's unconscious.

Are you armed?

The building was surrounded.

There was no other possible way in or out.

After 15 minutes, fearing the worst...

they re-opened the door...

...to discover, to everyone's utter amazement,

the skeleton had gone.

I needn't say what effect all this had on me

when I got back around one o'clock.

By any definition of hell, this had to be it.

Thank God Laura was okay.

Beyond that, the scale of the atrocity...

Forgive me.

I've come here, a perfect stranger, to burden you with my grief.

But on the face of it, the whole thing's insoluble.

Can a body pass through a solid stone wall

or are we all losing our minds?

Do me a favour!

I grew out of vanishing skeletons before I was in long trousers.

If you're gonna kill someone on Hallowe'en,

you'd think they'd come up with something more original than that.

He's probably not even a real vicar.

He's probably wearing rubber underwear.

Whatever you do, if he asks you to pray,

you don't kneel in front of him with your eyes closed!

Right... several intriguing features.

I thought so.

So on the basis of striking while the iron's hot,

it's probably not more than an hour's drive from your place.

I'm not at my place. I'm at Adam's.

I've had a very late night

and I've got a 50-minute TV special to go through

which is gonna take all day.

So just tell him to bugger off and stop sniffing the nail polish!

Right. No. That's... great, then.

I'm onto it now.

If anything breaks, I'll give you a bell.

I use him now and again to bounce things off.

Bit of a sad character, actually.

Ideas man to a conjuror.

Okay.

While I'm in the shower, if you fancy a nibble...

...be my guest.

Whatever time did we get back last night?

Last thing I remember, we were in that night club

watching a girl sing selections from Verdi's Nabucco

while two men from the audience removed her G-string with their teeth.

Thought you were never gonna shake the old slapper off

the way she was all over you like a rash the rest of the...

Don't judge me too harshly, Jonathan.

That was a particularly lethal brand of tequila

they were serving at the bar last night.

Hiya!

Guess what!

ATC are on 48-hour work-to-rule.

Both my flights were grounded.

It means we get our weekend back.

Are you pleased?

I'm salivating into a bucket!

Come on up, treasure.

Three hours in that sweat-box at JFK!

No, no!

Just for two seconds, Jonathan.

I...

Adam?

Where are you?

Don't I get a kiss any more?

Sweetheart, my angel-come-to-earth!

Who's in there?

I'm sorry.

I don't think you've met my creative consultant Jonathan Creek

and er... Bridget?

Who, I think you were saying, had to be leaving very shortly.

Frankly, I preferred this routine when Marcel Marceau did it.

Who is this person?

Don't be fooled by the scatty exterior.

Her track record in these matters is formidable.

Lucky there was no paint left in them at any rate.

So if I could just run back over a couple of things.

Mr. Terici, after the murderer had come in and closed the door...

That had been what, about 30 seconds

before anyone else went round the back of the building?

So that, if by any trickery, he'd managed to get out any other way...

He would have set off the sensor lights by the side of the house,

which didn't come on until one of the police officers ran in front of them.

Okay.

Mrs. Claithorne...

...I know how painful this is, but

you definitely remember nothing after you blacked out on the landing?

Nothing that happened in this garage?

No sounds or images?

Smells?

All I remember... was...

Right.

But when he grabbed you up in the bedroom,

was there anything about this person,

about his body or voice...?

He just...

That's... been very helpful.

I'm really sorry. Thanks.

This place holds too many horrors.

Come on, come on.

I'll go and put the kettle on.

completed your investigations.

Where the police dog peed on the floor.

They didn't find anything either.

Miss Magellan, right?