The following fragment of an 'Inspector Morse' drama was sent to us in 1995, after we had announced our house move to Oxford. You will need to know only that our post-code is OX2 8AN. We should like to thank David Roseveare for entertaining (and for some while, puzzling) us over the port and walnuts!
WINTER. EARLY EVENING.
A VINTAGE CAR IS DRJVING NORTH ALONG THE WOODSTOCK ROAD.
CAR RADIO: Puer natus hodie. Noé! Noé!
(MORSE TURNS UP THE VOLUME.)
RADIO: Noé! Noé!
(LEWIS COMES TO LIFE.)
LEWIS: Eh?
MORSE: Noé, Lewis. French. Like Noel. It's a carol.
LEWIS: Yes, sir. I thought it might wake Stu.
(MORSE GLANCES AT THE BACK SEAT.)
MORSE: Not the way he's sleeping. Mind you, I don't often carry passengers as small as him.
LEWIS: It's very kind of you, sir. Helping out like this.
MORSE: Well. it is Christmas Eve. I gather he's got the leading role.
LEWIS: Leading ...? Oh, the Nativity Play. Non-speaking, you might say.
RADIO: Lullay, lulla, thou little tiny child...
MORSE: And non-crying, let's hope. Why couldn't your wife bring him?
LEWIS: She's already at the church, sir. Looking after all the school kids. Joseph, Mary, shepherds and that.
MORSE: And your lad centre stage, lying on all that hay that's littering up ow car.
LEWIS: I thought real hay would look more convincing, sir.
RADIO: Dans cette étable...
MORSE: Where's the stable?
LEWIS: Stable?
MORSE: The manger, the ox, the ass
LEWIS: Oh, the crib's already there. We haven't got an ox. More like a horse.
MORSE: A horse?
LEWIS: Yeah. That's why we're going to pick up this pantomime horse costume from these new people in North Oxford.
MORSE: Actors, are they?
LEWIS: Don't really know. We had this card from them.
(HE PULLS OUT A CHRISTMAS CARD FROM HIS POCKET.)
Oh!
MORSE: What?
LEWIS: No address, no phone number.
(THE LOWER RIGHT CORNER IS MISSING FROM THE SECOND PAGE.)
Chewed off That'll be the dog. Or maybe Stu. Eats anything, he
does.
MORSE: So where's the house?
LEWIS: They've drawn a picture on the front. Shouldn't be difficult to find. Not many around here look like that.
MORSE: It's an icon, Lewis.
LEWIS: Huh?
MORSE: A symbol. A representation of something else. Like Wagner's
leitmotifs. Or the Christmas story, come to that.
LEWIS: Like the . ..?
MORSE: Oh, never mind.
RADIO: A child was born, the angels say ...
LEWIS: Oh 'eck. Stu ate 'ay!
RADIO: ... enfolded in his mother's arms he lay
LEWIS: Enfolded in all this blinking 'ay, more like.
MORSE: That's it, Lewis!
LEWIS: What is?
MORSE: The address. You've just said it! You and the radio. You've narrowed it down to about fifteen houses in Mere Road.
LEWIS: I've narrowed it ...?
MORSE: Where's that picture?
(LEWIS SHOWS HIM THE CARD.) What do you see?
LEWIS: "Season's Gree-"
MORSE: No, the house, Lewis. What do you see?
LEWIS: Bricks below, timber above, ... windows... door... a path
MORSE: Where to?
LEW1S: To the front door.
MORSE: No, Lewis. Where does it go if you walk out of the house?
LEWIS: To the front gate?
MORSE: But it doesn't. These are just lines on paper. A figment of someone's imagination. Lines going off to infinity. Like the windows. One window at the top, more as you go down the page...
LEWIS: Just one more row, sir. Next one's a door. And bricks.
MORSE: A pattern, Lewis. That card says: here is a pattern.
LEWIS: But patterns go on and on to infinity!
MORSE: Indeed they do, Lewis. But the pattern of windows stops at the first floor.
LEWIS: Just ... three?
MORSE: Exactly. And here we are. Three, Mere Road. And here come your friends with their horse suit.
RADIO: Glory to the newborn King
MORSE: ... roar the redeemed. In excelsis Deo.
LEWIS: Sir?
MORSE: Yes, Lewis?
LEWIS: Do you realise, sir, in all this time we've been driving here, we've never had a cross word?
(BUT MORSE IS LISTENING TO THE MUSIC.)
LEWIS: Cross word. Crossword. Geddit?
(HE LAUGHS.)
(MORSE STARES AHEAD INTO THE NEW YEAR.)
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Vn. 1.0 (3/12/96)