CHARACTERS
| In the Elevator: |
COLONEL DIGBY THROCKMORTON...... | ......a 704-year-old whopper-teller |
| NORMAN C. BINSLEY...... | ......a failed accountant |
| MRS. HILDA LIPPE...... | ......a screaming woman |
| DOUGLAS WIVERTONSON III...... | ......bankrupt rabbit-breeder |
| In the Story: |
|
| FRED BULLEN...... | ......a burglar |
| JOSH BULLEN...... | ......an apprentice burglar |
| HECTOR FLOOGE-SNIPPIT...... | ......toffee-nosed house owner |
| CONSTABLE BLOOMSBURIED...... | ......a dedicated policeman |
| GRANNY DWINDLEY...... | ......Josh's Granny |
| LUCIANO VON ALLEYYOWLER...... | ......a singing cat |
| DOREEN HUDSPITH...... | ......a horrible Geordie girl, aged 10 |
| MR. HUDSPITH...... | ......Doreen's Grandad |
| MICKEY MOOKEY...... | ......you'll know him when you see him |
| DENNIS BLINT...... | ......a bad boy |
| CHESTER EVANS...... | ......an innocent bad boy |
| MILLIE WHOPPERINGTON-ARKLE...... | ......a bad girl who likes horses |
| HUW...... | ......the horriblest boy in Wales |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS...... | ......a librarian |
| THE MAP MAKER...... | ......a map maker lost in his work |
| SCENE 1 |
Int. Elevator |
| GRAMS/FX | 1950s-ISH 'GOING SHOPPING' MUSIC |
| THROCKMORTON: | (IN A HURRY, EXTRA FAST) I never go shopping, you know...I usually send my horse. He completely ignores my shopping-lists, always brings back the wrong things. I have three rooms full of saddles at home...a saddle for each of my 704 birthdays! And all those toasters he buys from that man in the betting-shop! But today my horse is running in the Grand National - he'll hate me saying this, but he hasn't a chance - so I'm doing the shopping myself. For some odd reason I've bought another saddle. I'm wrestling with it in one of those stupid elevators. (EFFORT OF THROCKMORTON LIFTING SADDLE) |
| SPOT/FX | THE TINKLE OF STIRRUPS |
| ...and there's nowhere near enough room for it. |
|
| SCENE 2 | Int. Elevator |
| FX/GRAMS | ACOUSTIC OF MOVING ELEVATOR. HERB ALPERT IS PROVIDING MUZAK |
| NORMAN: | Here, watch where you're sticking that saddle! |
| THROCKMORTON: | Dreadfully sorry. |
| SPOT | CLATTER AND BUMP OF THROCKMORTON MOVING HIS SADDLE |
| MRS. LIPPE: | Ooooh! |
| THROCKMORTON: | Do excuse me, madam. |
| MR. WIVERTONSON: | (A TINY, IRRITATING VOICE) Careful with that whopping-great saddle! It's up against all the buttons! |
| FX | A FIZZ, A CLANK, A BIGGER CLANK, A BOING, THE WHIZZZZZSHT OF THE ELEVATOR STICKING BETWEEN FLOORS. THE MUZAK DIES WITH A SLOW GROAN. THEN CONTINUES STRANGLED |
| MRS. LIPPE: | The lift's stopped!!! Stopped!!! We're stuck! Arrrrhhhhhhh! |
| NORMAN: | We'll die! They'll never get us out! (HE WEEPS) |
| MR. WIVERTONSON: | (TEETH CHATTERING) I saw it in a film once. These people were in a lift and the cable snapped and when they opened the door after it hit the bottom there was nothing but warm marmalade bubbling on the floor. (WHIMPERS) |
| THROCKMORTON: | (NO-NONSENSE, TAKING CHARGE MILITARILY) I am Colonel Digby Throckmorton. I am 704-years0old. I was born in the year 1297 in what today is Tunbridge Wells. I have served my country in 4,621 wars and I assure you, madam and sirs, that the authorities will shortly engineer our release from this sickly conveyance. Perhaps, while we are waiting, I might tell you all a story. |
| FX | THREATENING CREAK OF ELEVATOR |
| MRS. LIPPE: | We'll never hear the end!!!! We'll all be marmalade, any minute!!! |
| THROCKMORTON: | Piffle-and-squeak! (PONDERS) Mmmmm....mmmmm... yes, I know! I'll tell you about my great-great-great-great-great-great-great- great-great-great-great-great-great-great nephew, Joshua Bullen....an absolutely monstrous boy! |
| NORMAN: | Does he have long tentacles and eat tractors? |
| THROCKMORTON: | Pardon? |
| NORMAN: | I heard about a boy in Swindon like that. |
| THROCKMORTON: | Look, I'm telling this story, not you! No, he hasn't a single tentacle and has hardly ever eaten a tractor. He is a perfectly normal boy! Except...well: he does have freckles. In my regiment in Kuala Lumpur I once shot a man for having freckles. But apart from the freckles and the burglaries Josh was perfectly normal. Did I say he was a burglar? Truth be told his father was the burglar. He just took Josh along to help, to climb through bathroom windows, that sort of thing. |
| SCENE 3 | Int. Room |
| FX/SPOT | INTERIOR ACOUSTIC. A POKY ROOM. BIG BULLEN AND JOSH ARE EATING THEIR DINNER. CLINK OF PLATES. THEY BOTH EAT NOISILY AND TALK WITH THEIR MOUTHS FULL. |
| JOSH HAS THE VOICE OF A 10-YEAR-OLD MICHAEL CAINE. BULLEN THE VOICE OF A RECENTLY-HANGED MASS-MURDERER GARLING WITH GRAVEL |
|
| JOSH: | Dad? Dad? We going out tonight, are we? Eh? |
| BULLEN: | Shut up, Bullen's kid! Eat yer kidneys! |
| JOSH: | We is, isn't wees? |
| BULLEN: | Shut up, Bullen's kid. Eat yer liver! |
| JOSH: | I knows when you're thinking about a burglarizing. I can see the house wot you're thinking about burglarizing in the fog of your glass eye. |
| BULLEN: | Shutuuuuuurppppppppppp, Bullen's kid. |
| JOSH: | Where are we going? West End? Hampstead? |
| BULLEN: | (CHUCKLES DEVILISHLY) Here, Bullen's kid, hold my eye for me. |
| FX | A SUCKING PLOP AS THE EYE COMES OUT. HE ROLLS IT ACROSS THE TABLE |
| BULLEN: | Look inside the eye, son. Can yerh see the house what wees gwan to do over tonight? |
| JOSH: | I sees it! I sees it! A big white house behind a high wall. |
| BULLEN: | Can yerh sees inside, son? Through the winders. |
| JOSH: | Paintings of fat women with no clothes on. Bet one's got a safe behind her, eh, Dad?... and I sees a tremendacious sideboard-thingy full of silver cups and dishes. |
| BULLEN: | (SUDDENLY ANGRY) Eat yer beans, Bullen's kid! Or I'll shove the lot up yerh nose! (BENEVOLENT AGAIN) Heh-heh-heh. For breakfast tomorrar yerh can eat yer beans off a silver plate. (BARKS) Here! Gis moy eye back! |
| SCENE 4 | Ext. House |
| GRAMS/FX | FAINT HERB ALPERT ELEVATOR MUZAK DURING THROCKMORTON'S NARRATION. |
| THROCKMORTON: | So Josh and his father went out that night to burglarize a house. They wore striped pullovers, false beards, little black masks and carried bags with SWAG written on them in big black letters. |
| FX | CRASH OF JOSH FALLING THROUGH A WINDOW, KNOCKING BOTTLE OF COSMETICS ALL OVER A BATHROOM, AND A SPLASH OF HIM FALLING INTO THE TOILET. |
| FX | EXTERIOR ACOUSTIC. SILENCE. OWL HOOTS, DISTANT PEEP OF TRAFFIC AND FARAWAY LONDON |
| BULLEN: | (HUSHED) You all right, Bullen's kid? |
| JOSH: | (FROM INSIDE, CALLS HUSHED) I fell straight into the toilet. (SLOSH OF TOILET WATER) |
| BULLEN: | Heh-heh-heh. Hurry up and open the front door for your old Dad. |
| FX/SPOT | SOUND OF BULLEN HURRYING AROUND TO THE FRONT OF THE HOUSE ON A GRAVEL PATH. HE SOFTLY SINGS 'BY THE LIGHT OF THE SILVERY MOON' |
| BULLEN: | (TO HIMSELF) Hurry up, Bullen's kid! Hurry up! |
| FX/SPOT | A CLICK AS THE FRONT DOOR OPENS |
| JOSH: | (A RASPING WHISPER) Dad! Hurry on in, Dad! |
| BULLEN: | (HURRYING IN) Well done, boy. |
| FX | DOOR CLICKS SHUT BEHIND THEM. ABSOLUTE SILENCE |
| SCENE 5 | Int. House |
| JOSH: | (IN NORMAL VOICE) The cups are through here... |
| BULLEN: | Shhhhhh! |
| JOSH: | (SHHHHHH-ED) ...I reckons the safe's in the room with the books, behind a picture of a fat lady having a bath. |
| BULLEN: | (HUSHED) You get the cups, Bullen's kid. I'll look behind the fat lady. |
| SPOT | JOSH WALKS OFF. HIS FOOTSTEPS CREAK LOUDLY |
| BULLEN: | (CALLING HIM BACK WITH A RASP) Here...here...can you see the combination of the safe in me eye? |
| JOSH: | (LOOKING CAREFULLY) Sorry, Dad...Yeah! - it's there, very faint though. 42 left, 61 right, 11 left, 5 right. |
| BULLEN: | Good boy. (MUTTERS AS HE GOES) 42 left, 61 right... |
| JOSH: | Good luck, Dad. |
| BULLEN: | Fill them sacks, kid! |
| SPOT | WE GO WITH BULLEN, HIS FOOTSTEPS CREAKING INTO THE ROOM WITH THE SAFE. HE GRUNTS WICKEDLY |
| BULLEN: | (CLOSE, INTIMATE, FLATTERING HIMSELF) I's not just a common burglar, I's a master safecrakka, that's wot. Where is she, now, that nice fat safe fulla dosh, wot I've come to safecrack? Hello, darling. Yooooo...You's hidin behind this rotten picture, isn't yer... (GRUNTS AS HE PULLS AT PICTURE, IT CREAKS SOFTLY OPEN, HE SIGHS LONGINGLY) Arhhhh, looka that! Whopping great whopper of a safe, big as a fridge! What were them numbers again? (WE HEAR THE CLICKING TURN OF THE SAFE'S COMBINATION DIAL) 42 left......61 right....11 left....5 right. (HEAVE OF EFFORT FROM BULLEN AND HEAVY CREAK FROM THE SAFE) Corrrrrrrrrr! Luvly dosh! (WITH AWE) Enough ter buy all the chicken legs in the world! |
| SPOT/FX | CLATTER OF JOSH RUNNING IN DRAGGING A SWAG-BAG FULL OF SILVER CUPS |
| JOSH: | (A HUSHED SHOUT) Dad! Dad! Someone's coming down the stairs! |
| BULLEN: | Shut yerh clatter! |
| SPOT/FX | JUST THEIR BREATHING, THEN...A ROTTWEILER'S GROWL |
| JOSH: | Dad, it's one of them Rottenweileralsatiandouberhounds. |
| BULLEN: | I sees it. And the other one behind it. And the four more in the doorway... Wot luvly toothypegs they've got. |
| FX | A HOUND GROWLS |
| BULLEN: | When I say the word, Bullen's kid...scarper. Take this dosh with yer and go and stay with yer Granny in Gateshead. |
| JOSH: | (TEARFULLY) What about you, Dad? |
| BULLEN: | (BARKS) Do as yerh told!!!!!! |
| FX/SPOT | BULLEN'S BARK SETS THE ROTTWEILERS BARKING. HE SHOUTS ABOVE THE BARKING |
| BULLEN: | SCARPER, KID!!!! SCARPER!!!!!! |
| FX/SPOT | SOUND OF JOSH SCARPERING, THE FRONT DOOR FLUNG WIDE AS HE ESCAPES ACROSS THE GRAVEL PATH INTO THE NIGHT |
| BULLEN: | (HURRYING AFTER) Run like the wind, Bullen's kid! (BARKING SURROUNDS HIM) Good doggies...Good doggies....Arhhhhh, gerrrofffffff!!! Gerooofffffffff! |
| FX/SPOT | HOUNDS WOOFING AND JUMPING ON BULLEN. THEY PULL HIM DOWN WITH A WHUMP. HE STRUGGLES, BUT THEY HAVE HIM HELD BETWEEN THEIR GROWLING JAWS |
| BULLEN: | (PINNED DOWN, IN RESIGNATION) I always hated Rottenweileralsatiandouberhounds. |
| OWNER OF HOUSE: | (WANDERING IN, TOFFEE-NOSED) I say, what's all this bother? Oh, is this a burglar? |
| BULLEN: | (IN DESPAIR) Yeah. |
| FX | A ROTTENWEILERALSATIANDOUBERHOUND WOOFS IN THE AFFIRMATIVE |
| SCENE 6 | Ext. House |
| THROCKMORTON: | (FROM ELEVATOR, WITH HERB ALPERT FAINTLY MUZAK-ING) So it was that Josh's burglarizing parent was caught in the act of burglarizing and handed over to the police. |
| POLICEMAN: | You are a very bad man, Mr. Bullen, a very, very bad man. |
| BULLEN: | (IN DESPAIR) Yeah, I know. |
| THROCKMORTON: | Josh, meanwhile, with a bagful of money, enough to buy all the chicken legs in the world, took the overnight coach to Gateshead, which is somewhere in the North of England, apparently. Snowflakes danced in the air and sudden gusts of icy wind blew them in people's faces, smacking them like frozen custard pies. Josh found his Granny's house in a dark alleyway full of dustbins. A blind cat was singing the French national anthem on the step.... |
| FX/SPOT | A SNATCH OF THE CAT'S SINGING IN BACKGROUND. JOSH'S KNOCK ON THE DOOR, THE DOOR OPENS |
| GRANNY: | (A FRAIL OLD GEORDIE WOMAN) Not today thank you. |
| JOSH: | It's me. |
| GRANNY: | No thank you. I'm 84. |
| JOSH: | It's me! Josh! |
| SPOT | JOSH STEPS IN AND STEPS ON THE CAT |
| JOSH: | Oooops, sorry! |
| FX | IT DESISTS ITS SINGING AND YOWLS IN PAIN, IT YOWLS INTO THE DUSTBINS |
| GRANNY: | Mind you don't stand on the cat, it's French. |
| SCENE 7 | Int. |
| JOSH READS A LETTER TO HIS DAD. JOSH IS A BAD READER, HE JUMPS ON A WORD AT A TIME BREATHLESSLY... |
|
| JOSH: | Dead Dad, Well here's your kid in this miserable rotten place. Granny's okay, except she throws coal at me if she sees me picking my nose... and she makes me eat this puky soup of hers with hair floating on the top and claws scratching on the bottom. She keeps saying that if I'm not good someone called Mickey Mookey |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS IN THE DISTANCE |
| will come in the night and take me away. Social worker, I expect. But I ain't done much wrong so far, except I strangled a singing cat and threw it in a dustbin...but it came alive again anyway... |
|
| FX | CAT SINGING IN DUSTBIN |
| .......I've gone through all the houses around here but there isn't nuffink worth burglarizing. I did get some medals from off an old geezer's mantelpiece but they're not worth much. |
|
| FX | BRIEFLY BREAKS OFF HIS LETTER-WRITING TO OPEN THE WINDOW AND THROW A BOOT AT THE CAT. THE BOOT CLATTERS NOISILY ON THE DUSTBIN. SILENCE FROM THE CAT. |
| JOSH: | That Judge was a triple-stinking-pig, Dad, for sentencing you to five years. (BECOMING INCREASINGLY UPSET) Don't worry about me, though, Dad. Granny's given me an okay bedroom with a dead tree outside. I can climb down it if the plods come. By the time you gets out I'll have done so many burglarizing jobs I'll be a millionaire, never mind wot we've got stashed away already. (WITH A SAD BLANKNESS) Yours faithfully, Bullen's kid. |
| SCENE 8 | Ext. |
| DOREEN: | (A NASTY CHILDISH IRRITATING WHINE) Hello. |
| JOSH: | (CALLING FROM A HEIGHT, BRUSQUE) Hello. |
| DOREEN: | What you doing climbing up that drainpipe for? |
| SPOT | JOSH JUMPS DOWN, HIS FEET CRUNCH ON THE GRITTY BACK STREET |
| JOSH: | Wasn't climbing up. I was climbing down. |
| DOREEN: | What you climbing down that drainpipe for, then? |
| JOSH: | Practising for Mount Everest. |
| DOREEN: | Oh, yeah. |
| JOSH: | Yeah. My Dad's going to take me up when he gets out....when he gets back from his latest expedition in the Himmeylayerers, I mean. |
| DOREEN: | Your Dad a mountain-climber-upper, is he? |
| JOSH: | Yeah. |
| DOREEN: | You the lad staying with Granny Dwindley in number 21? |
| JOSH: | (SUSPICIOUSLY) Yeah. |
| DOREEN: | (A TONGUE-OUT TAUNT) Your Dad's a burglar, so there! He's in clink! |
| JOSH: | It's not true! |
| DOREEN: | Is! |
| JOSH: | Isn't! That's the other lad, the one I shares a room with. Not me. |
| DOREEN: | (DUPED) Oh, I see. (AFTER AN ENORMOUS SNIFF, COQUETTISHLY) I'm Doreen, by the way. |
| JOSH: | Oh, yeah. |
| DOREEN: | Here, what's all them things dangling on your jacket? |
| JOSH: | Medals, awarded to me after the Battle of Waterloo. |
| SPOT | TINKLE OF MEDALS |
| DOREEN: | Never! |
| JOSH: | Pinned on by Napoleon himself. |
| DOREEN: | Wasn't he on the other side? |
| JOSH: | Yeah, that's right. I played the first half on their side. Second half I played for our lot. |
| DOREEN: | Wait on, I think my Grandad's got some medals like that. D'yer think he were at the Battle of Waterloo? He never said. (ALREADY ON HER WAY) I'll go and ask. |
| SCENE 9 | Ext. |
| SPOT | AN ANGRY DOOR-KNOCKING |
| SPOT | DOOR OPENS |
| GRANNY: | Not today thank you. |
| DOREEN'S GRANDAD: | (A HUGE OLD GEORDIE, BARKS) WHERE IS HE? |
| GRANNY: | No thank you. I'm 84. |
| DOREEN'S GRANDAD: | I BEAT NAPOLEON BLACK-AND-BLUE TO GET THEM MEDALS AND I WANT THEM BACK! |
| DOREEN: | (EXPLAINS CALMLY) Your lad's nicked my Grandad's medals, Gran Dwindley. |
| GRANNY: | He hasn't, has he? |
| DOREEN'S GRANDAD: | AYE!!!! AND IF I DOESSENT GET THEM BACK THIS MINUTE I'LL BE OUT HERE AT TEA-TIME WITH ME BAZOOKA!!! |
| DOREEN: | Don't fret, Grandad, you'll get them back. |
| DOREEN'S GRANDAD: | BETTER HAD, AN' ALL!!!! |
| SCENE 10 | Int. Room |
| JOSH: | Dead Dad, I have a girlfriend. She's very horrible but she'll be good practice for when I get better ones when I'm older... |
| SPOT | FROM JOSH'S ROOM WE HEAR GRANNY STOMPING LOUDLY UP THE STAIRS |
| GRANNY: | (SHOUTING ANGRILY UP THE STAIRS) Josh! Josh! Josh! |
| SPOT | THE DOOR BURSTS OPEN |
| GRANNY: | Where are they!?! Where've yer got them hid!?! |
| JOSH: | What? |
| GRANNY: | You know. |
| JOSH: | No. |
| GRANNY: | He's coming back with his bazooka. |
| JOSH: | Who is? |
| GRANNY: | Right! You've asked for it! |
| FX | A WORRIED MEEEEOW FROM THE CAT |
| JOSH: | What you doing? |
| GRANNY: | I'm going to hit you with this cat until you tell me where Mr. Hudspith's medals are. |
| FX | A WHUMP. "OW!" FROM JOSH. "MEE-OWWWW!!!" FROM THE CAT |
| JOSH: | I never nicked nuffink, honest!!!! |
| FX | A WHUMP. "OW!!!" FROM JOSH. A MORE PAINED "MEE-OWWWW!!!" FROM THE CAT |
| JOSH: | Wasn't me!!! Wasn't!!! |
| GRANNY: | (WHILE HITTING) Thief! Thief! Where are they! |
| FX | SEVERAL MORE WHUMPS, OWS AND MEEE-OWWWS |
| JOSH: | (THROUGH THE WHUMPING) All right! All right! Here they are! |
| SPOT | DRAWER OPENS, BRIEF RIFLE IN DRAWER, TINKLE OF MEDALS AS JOSH FINDS THEM AND AS GRANNY SNATCHES THEM. THE CAT COMPLAINS OF A HEADACHE WITH A WEAK MEEEOW |
| GRANNY: | You've had it, bonny lad. Mickey Mookey'll come for yer now, for sure. Don't say I didn't warn yer! |
| JOSH: | (DEFIANTLY) Who's this Mickey Mookey, then? |
| GRANNY: | You'll soon find out. With rotten apples like yer Dad it's the plods that comes. But for young lads like you...(A SINISTER WHISPER) ...it's Mickey Mookey. |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS; IT QUACKS EVERY TIME "MICKEY MOOKEY" IS MENTIONED |
| GRANNY: | (CALLS IN A SLIGHTLY POSHER VOICE) Mr. Hudspith, it's quite all right, I've found your medals for you...it were all a mistake! (ON HER WAY, BARKS BACK INTO ROOM) And no more whippet-and-leek soup for you, either. |
| SPOT | DOOR SLAMS |
| JOSH: | (SHOUTS ANGRILY AFTER, SOUNDING LIKE HIS FATHER) I don't want none of yer filthy soup, you old witch! I ain't frightened of no boogeyman, neither! |
| FX | THE CAT BEGINS SINGING |
| JOSH: | (A SEVERE WARNING, LOW GROWL) Sherrrrrrrrtup... |
| SCENE 11 | Int. Room |
| THROCKMORTON: | (VERY CLOSE, WHISPERS HUSHED, PORTENTOUSLY) That night, very late, by a dim light, in a room full of slanting shadows, Josh was sitting on his bed sticking a knife into a piggy-bank he'd stolen, trying to get the coins out. |
| SPOT | WE HEAR HIM DOING THIS, MUTTERING CURSES |
| MICKEY MOOKEY SPEAKS WITH A VOICE LIKE A RAZOR SHAVING A PIG. AT THE END OF EVERY SECOND WORD HE HISSES LIKE A DRIP OF WATER HITTING A HOTPLATE |
|
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Josh...ua... Josh...ua. |
| JOSH: | Is that you, you stupid French cat? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (AFTER AN EVIL CHUCKLE) I am the furthest thing from a cat, Joshua. |
| JOSH: | (HE HAS GUESSED WHO IT IS, A TREMBLE IN HIS VOICE) Who is it, then? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | You know who it is that I am. Everybody knows me when they see me. |
| JOSH: | (BRAVELY BUT SCARED-TO-BITS) But I can't see you. You're hiding behind the wardrobe. |
| FX | A CREAK AS MICKEY MOOKEY STEPS OUT |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Can you see me now? |
| JOSH: | You're Mickey Mookey. |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Mickkkkkey Mookeyyyyyyyyy |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| THROCKMORTON: | Mickey Mookey... |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| ...was seven-feet-three, a long bloodless man with no flesh at all, just dry skin stretched over bone and a smile like white knuckles. He wore a faded black suit and a tall black hat with tongues of flame on the top like fire on a Christmas pudding. His eyebrows were cockroaches. Sometimes they crawled down his face and were a moustache instead. |
|
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (HE CHUCKLES EVILLY) What's that you're playing with, Mookey's kid? |
| JOSH: | Nuffink. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Where'd you klep it from, Mookey's kid? |
| JOSH: | I didn't klep it, honest, and I'm not Mookey's kid! I'm Bullen's kid! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (CHUCKLES EVILLY) Let's go, Mookey's kid. |
| JOSH: | (TERRIFIED) Go where? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | To my house. On the other side of things. |
| JOSH: | (MICKEY MOOKEY HAS HIS NOSE) Owya! Owya! |
| SCENE 12 | Int. M.M. |
| FX | A SLOW GHOSTLY HOWL, OVER AND OVER, FADING DURING THROCKMORTON'S SPEECH..... |
| THROCKMORTON: | Mickey Mookey... |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| ...grabbed Josh's nose between his bony fingers and led him into the slanting shadows. They seemed to walk straight through the wall and should have been in his Granny's room where the cat slept on her face to stop her snoring. But they weren't! They were on the other side of things, in Mickey Mookey's |
|
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| ...house. |
|
| FX/SPOT | THROCKMORTON'S VOICE ECHOES. WINGS FLAP |
| FX | THEIR FOOTSTEPS CLUNK IN THE HUGE HOUSE. THINGS SNUFFLE AND SQUEAK IN THE BACKGROUND. EVERYTHING HAS A METALLIC ECHO. |
| JOSH: | (THROUGH A BLOCKED NOSE) Owya! Owya! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Do you like my house? There's horrible things hiding everywhere, more and more getting born all the time, even horribler than last year's and they were horrible enough. (ANGRILY, TWISTING JOSH'S NOSE) How many rooms do you think I've got? How many? |
| JOSH: | (THROUGH HIS BLOCKED NOSE) Owya! Dunno! Dunno! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | HOW MANY??? |
| JOSH: | A billion-and-six! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (AS PLEASANT AS CAN BE) Wrong! A billion-and-fourteen! And every one's full of dead people, crying their heads off. And when their heads comes off, I kick them down the stairs. |
| JOSH: | (A SUDDEN DETERMINED SNAP INTO ACTION) Wot! Like this!?! |
| FX | JOSH'S KICK MAKES A SOUND LIKE SOMEONE KICKING A SKELETON. A CROCODILE-ISH CRY FROM MICKEY MOOKEY! HE FALLS DOWN THE STAIRS MAKING A SOUND LIKE THE BAG OF BONES HE IS |
| AFTER AN INSTANT'S SILENCE, SOME PART OF HIM SLOWLY DESCENDING FROM STEP TO STEP: BUMP, BUMP, BUMP. |
|
| THROCKMORTON: | Josh ran as fast as he could, looking for a way out. |
| SPOT | WE HEAR JOSH PANTING. RUNNING ON BOARDS |
| Horrible things bit his ankles. |
|
| FX | WE HEAR THEM SQUEAK NASTILY |
| Every time he opened a door Mickey Mookey (DUCK'S QUACK) was behind it and lots of miserable people crying their heads off. |
|
| FX/SPOT | A ROOM FULL OF WEEPING PEOPLE. DOOR SLAMS, WEEPING STOPS, JOSH RUNS ALONG A CORRIDOR, DOOR OPENS, WEEPING PEOPLE AGAIN, DOOR SLAMS, JOSH RUNS ALONG A CORRIDOR, DOOR OPENS, WEEPING STARTS AGAIN, JOSH OUT OF BREATH |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (SINGS SINISTERLY THE OLD MUSIC HALL SONG) Josh...ua...Josh...ua... |
| JOSH: | (OUT OF BREATH) All right...okay...I give in. You got me. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (SUDDENLY MUCH MORE REASONABLE, ALMOST HUMAN) You really are very bad, you know. |
| JOSH: | Yeah, I know. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (CHUCKLES) Worst boy I ever collected. |
| JOSH: | What happens now? Do you lock me up in a room where I can cry my head off? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Badness me, no! I've other plans for you. |
| JOSH: | O-oh! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (ALMOST SHY) If you'd like, I mean, if you've the time, would you mind being my assistant? Some of these boys are very sticky, especially their noses. I don't like to touch them. I'll pay you. |
| JOSH: | How much? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | A cockroach a day and an invisible octopus every second Thursday. You'll not do better anywhere else. |
| JOSH: | (INCREASINGLY DELIGHTED) I can help you just like I helped my Dad. Yeah, sounds good, Mr. Mookey. And after five years, when my Dad gets outta clink, I can go back to him, can I? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Thou canst. |
| JOSH: | Right-ho, yerh on! Let's shake on it. |
| FX/SPOT | THEY SHAKE HANDS, MICKEY MOOKEY CHUCKLES HAPPILY AND RATTLES LIKE A BAG OF BONES |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Eurgh! You're all sticky! |
| JOSH: | No I'm not!!! |
| SCENE 13 | Int. Room |
| FX | HERB ALPERT MUZAK FAINTLY IN BACKGROUND. A GRANDFATHER CLOCK TICKS..... |
| THROCKMORTON: | And so Josh became Mickey Mookey's |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| ...helper. During the day he wandered around the boogeyman's house, asking weeping people what they were crying about while stealing the loose change from their pockets. In the long boring evenings he squashed crabs on the landing, or taught a bony old parrot how to swear. When it was late and dark an invisible octopus tapped him on the shoulder and he hurried to Mickey Mookey's |
|
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| side...and they walked through the wall to collect a wicked youngster or two. |
|
| SNORING OF A WICKED BOY |
|
| JOSH: | Here, Mickey? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Yes, Mookey's kid. |
| JOSH: | How do you know who's been bad? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (SLOW AND SINISTER) I feels it in my bones. |
| FX | A DISCREET RATTLE |
| DENNIS (BAD BOY): | (SNORING PHUTTERS OUT, HE AWAKES) Who's there? |
| JOSH: | (WHISPERS TO MICKEY MOOKEY) Let me say it, go on! |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | I like to say it. |
| JOSH: | Go on. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Say it properly, then. |
| DENNIS: | I know there's someone there. Who are you? |
| JOSH: | (DOING A MICKEY MOOKEY VOICE) You know who it is that I am. |
| DENNIS: | (UTTERLY TERRIFIED) You're....Mickey Mookey! |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| MICKEY MOOKEY AND JOSH LAUGH SINISTERLY. DENNIS SCREAMS AND WAILS |
|
| SCENE 14 | Int. Room |
| JOSH'S VOICE HAS ACQUIRED A MOOKEY-ISH EDGE |
|
| JOSH: | Dear Dad, I'm enjoying working for Mickey Mookey |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| like mad. He hasn't had a single night's sleep since Queen Victoria died, so he's taking tonight off and letting me go out by myself, in his black hat and everything. When we collect a rotten kid what we usually do is lock it in a room until it cries its head off, but all billion-and-fourteen rooms are full, so what we've been doing lately is take them to the library, a whopping-ginormous spidery room with water dripping from the ceiling into buckets full of piranha fish... |
|
| FX | WE HEAR THE PLINK-PLOONK OF WATER AND THE SNAP OF PIRANHAS |
| ...and we slots the bad kiddies into the books. (LAUGHS WITH DELIGHT) We just slots them in! And there they stay, wandering through the book's story forever! I'm in the library now. Mr. Snavelthomas, the librarian, is helping me choose a book to put tonight's rotters into. Can't wait for tonight! This job's even betterer than being a burglar! |
|
| SCENE 15 | Int. M.M. |
| SPOT | JOSH, WHO BY NOW IS MORE THAN A TOUCH MOOKEY-ISH, IS DRAGGING TWO PROTESTING VICTIMS INTO THE LIBRARY |
| JOSH: | Two more for the treatment, Mr. Snavelthomas! |
| CHESTER (INNOCENT BAD BOY): | No! No! I'm innocent! I never did nowt never, honest! |
| JOSH: | That's wot they all says! |
| MILLIE (BAD GIRL): | Gerroff me, you! Gerroffff! |
| JOSH: | Mr. Snavelthomas! Get those books ready! |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS: | I have them! |
| SPOT | CLUNK OF BOOKS, PAGES BEING TURNED |
| CHESTER: | I'm innocent! I'm as pure as snow! |
| SPOT | A SCUFFLE, BOOKS KNOCKED OVER, SOME INTO BUCKETS OF PIRANHA-INFESTED WATER |
| JOSH: | Mr. Snavelthomas! Help me get him in! |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS: | (IN A DITHER) I've been dead for years! He might snap my fingers off and I'll not be able to turn the pages of my lovely books! |
| SPOT | MUFFLED SOUND AS THE PROTESTING CHESTER IS PUSHED INTO A BOOK |
| JOSH: | (PUSHING HARD) I've got him! He's going in! |
| MILLIE: | If I help you shove him can I go into a book about horses? |
| JOSH: | Yeah, okay. Give him a shove! |
| SPOT | THE GRUNTS OF JOSH AND MILLIE AS THEY PUSH, A SUDDEN COLLAPSE IN SUCCESS, THE MUFFLED PROTESTING CEASES, THE BOOK SLAMS SHUT |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (APPROACHING WITH A HUGE YAWN) I haven't been to bed for ninety years and I still can't sleep. (A SMALLER YAWN) A good collection tonight, Joshua? |
| JOSH: | Just pushed one into a book called (PICKS IT UP TO REFER TO THE TITLE) ...The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. They'll chuck him to the lions, for sure. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (AFTER A HO-HUM YAWN, WITH GREAT DISTASTE) And what about this beastly child? |
| JOSH: | (AS POLITE AS CAN BE) In here, Miss. |
| MILLIE: | A book about horses, is it? |
| JOSH: | (PLAINLY LYING) Horses, sure. Kicking their heels in a meadow full of daisies. |
| MILLIE: | (GETTING IN) Oh, thank you! Thank you. |
| SPOT | THE BOOK SLAMS HARD ON HER FINAL "THANK-YOU". JOSH GIGGLES WICKEDLY |
| JOSH: | (TRIUMPHANT) It's not about horses at all! It's called Insects of the Amazonian Jungle. They'll be all over her, beetles and ants and stingy-buzzy-crawly things in her hair forever...forever! (HE LAUGHS WICKEDLY) |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (YAWNS) Very droll, I'm sure. (YAWNS A BIGGER YAWN, WHILE WALKING ACROSS THIN, CREAKY FLOORBOARDS) By the way, that boy in the Roman book, he was the wrong one, you went to the wrong address. |
| JOSH: | Yeek, sorry! Shall I haul him out? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (GOING AWAY) Doesn't matter. No harm done. |
| SCENE 16 | Int. M.M. |
| THROCKMORTON: | Every night for five years, 1,821 nights, Josh went out collecting wicked boys and wicked girls, dragging them by their noses into the other side of things. Sometimes Mickey Mookey (DUCK QUACKS) went with him, but mostly he did not. Mickey Mookey (DUCK QUACKS) became more and more lazy. He sat in the library playing whist with Mr. Savelthomas and every time he yawned a frog waved from the back of his throat. |
| FX | A FROG'S CROAK |
| SPOT | JOSH BRINGING A BAD BOY INTO THE LIBRARY |
| JOSH: | Only one tonight, I'm afraid. The other one was strangled by his headmaster this afternoon. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Tish-tosh. |
| JOSH: | Thissun's a real stinker, though. |
| HUW: | (A SLOW, STUPID VOICE) Hello, I'm Huw. I'm a real stinker. Horrible, I am. I wee-wee in milk. Give me milk and I'll wee-wee in it and leave it on the table for somebody to drink. Nobody's died yet. But I eats spiders to make my wee-wee more poisonous. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (DELIGHTED) Ooooh, isn't he horrible! |
| JOSH: | The very last rotter on my very last night in the job, and easily the horriblest wot I ever collected. |
| HUW: | I'm horrible, me. Horrible. |
| JOSH: | Sorry about this, Huw. No hard feelings, eh? |
| HUW: | Oooh, no. I deserve everything I gets. |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS: | (FETCHING BOOK) I've found an exceedingly boring book to lose this monster in! A Road Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland. (CHUCKLES) |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Joshua, did you just say that this is your last night on the job? |
| JOSH: | (SHOVING HUW) Go on, you, get in! |
| HUW: | Don't want to, thank you. |
| JOSH: | (SHOVING HUW) My last night, yeah. We agreed. Five years, remember. My Dad gets outta clink tomorrow. I've gotta get back to the real world. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Oooh, no. No, no, no. We can't allow that. Oh, no. |
| JOSH: | But you said! |
| (MICKEY MOOKEY CHUCKLES EVILLY) |
|
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Huw. |
| HUW: | Yes, sir? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Would you like to be my assistant? |
| HUW: | Assistant? |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | A cockroach a day and an invisible octopus every second Thursday. |
| HUW: | Sounds good to me. |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Excellent! Your first job is to put Joshua there into yonder book. |
| JOSH: | Me? No. No. (HE IS ALREADY STRUGGLING WITH HUW) I'm going home. You promised! |
| HUW: | Come-come, boyo. I'm a prop-forward. I'm much stronger than you. |
| SPOT/FX | JOSH'S HANDS GRIPPING AND WOBBLING THE TABLETOP, THE "UERRRRRRR!!!' EFFORTFUL WHINE OF HIS RESISTANCE. THE PAGES TURNING IN THE WIND, BEASTS SQUEAK, WATER DRIPS, A STORM SEEMS TO RAGE IN THE LIBRARY, MORE AND MORE FULL OF ANIMAL NOISES |
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | (CALLS ABOVE THE RACKET) Come here, Mr. Snavelthomas...give us a hand shoving him in! |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS: | All right, then. |
| FX | THE STORM RISES, CAMELS BARK, A DUCK GOES MAD, THE WIND GETS WORSE |
| HUW: | (VERY CALM AND SLOW) I'm much stronger, aren't I? Much stronger than anyone else in the whole world, I should think. |
| MR. SNAVELTHOMAS: | My fingers! (WEEPINGLY) My lovely fingers! All snapped off! |
| EFFORT SOUNDS OF JOSH RESISTING. SUDDENLY THEY STOP, ABRUPT SILENCE... |
|
| MICKEY MOOKEY: | Shut the book, Huw, there's a bad boy. |
| SPOT | THE BOOK SHUTS QUIETLY |
| SCENE 17 | Ext. Map |
| FX | EXTERIOR ACOUSTIC: A VAST PLAIN, SILENT AS A SHUT BOOK. JOSH SPEAKS NERVOUSLY WITH SNUFFLES, HAVING JUST PULLED HIMSELF TOGETHER AFTER A BLUB. HE IS MORE HIMSELF NOW, THE MOOKEYISHNESS IS NEARLY GONE |
| JOSH: | Dear Dad, I don't suppose you'll ever get this letter. But maybe you can see the writing in yerh glass eye, eh? Sorry I won't be there at the gates when you're released. |
| BULLEN: | (FROM FARAWAY) I sees yerh Bullen's kid! I sees yerh in me eye. |
| SPOT | JOSH'S FOOTSTEPS ON THICK PAPER |
| JOSH: | (CONTINUES HIS LETTER) I'm inside a book, a Road Atlas of Great Britain, a huge map cut into pages to make a book. I'll never get out. It's just like the real Great Britain in here, same fields, same buildings and roads, only there's lettering wherever you look and everything's made of paper. No people to speak of, just paper ones with no faces. And no sky, just another page, high up, all blurrily dark over yerh head like when you've gone asleep with a book over yerh face. I was in a blue bit to start with, the North Sea, but it wasn't the least bit wet. Then I was in a city. The letters were too big to see all at once. I thought it was West Hartlepool but now I think it was Wolverhampton. I've trudged down red roads, green roads, little white roads. A while ago I was in the middle of a field of white grass. I thought I saw a fox, a white fox running towards a glow of far-off green. I ran as fast as I could. I ran and ran. |
| JOSH: | (IN THE ATLAS, RUNNING AWAY FROM US) Foxy! Foxy! I won't hurt you! I promise! I'm good! Good! |
| SPOT | A CRY, HE FALLS OVER, GOING THROUGH THE PAPER WITH A HEAVY TEAR |
| JOSH: | (CONTINUES HIS LETTER) I tripped on a tiny black letter F and fell right through the page, and the next page, and the next. I landed on top of a black windowless church. It was just a ball with a cross on the top. |
| FX | A BELL TOLLS FRANTICALLY |
| It rolled and rolled, ringing like a bell. It rolled for miles, falling towards the edge of the page like a pinball down its a hole. I jumped off just outside Peterborough and ran after it towards the edge of the page. |
|
| FX | A BELL TOLLING TOWARDS THE DISTANCE |
| I thought it might crash and make a hole that I could escape through. But the book was tight shut. When I found the church it was a crumpled mess beside the dark, locked edge. A faceless paper congregation had poured out of it. I'm walking along the M1 now. (HIS FEET ON THE PAPER ROAD) It's so silent. I'm the only person in the whole of Great Britain! |
|
| FX | THE SUDDEN LOUD ZOOMPAST OF A CAR |
| JOSH: | What the...? A car! A car! (CHASING) Hey! Hey! Stop! (RUNNING AFTER) Please! |
| SCENE 18 | Int. Map |
| AS THROCKMORTON SPEAKS WE HEAR JOSH RUNNING, PANTING, RESTING AND SETTING OFF AGAIN ON THE PAPER ROAD |
|
| THROCKMORTON: | Josh ran along the M1 for hours and hours. He was exhausted, dizzy. Little bits of paper floated around him like snow. Then at last there it was! The car! Parked in the car-park of a huge service station. Where could the driver be? Josh opened a stiff paper door and went into a paper cafeteria. All the tables and chairs were paper. The food on the counter was paper and served on paper plates. |
| JOSH: | Good morning. |
| MAP MAKER: | (STARTLED) EUGH!!! (CALMING DOWN, FILLING HIS MOUTH WITH FOOD, THE VOICE OF A TEDIOUS CIVIL SERVANT) What a fright you gave me, Mickey. |
| JOSH: | I'm not Mickey. I'm Josh. |
| MAP MAKER: | You're Mickey Mookey. |
| FX | A DUCK QUACKS |
| JOSH: | I just worked for him, that's all. Now I look like him. I expect it'll wear off. Who are you? |
| MAP MAKER: | (ENJOYING HIS FOOD) I'm the man who drew this map. |
| JOSH: | How did you get in here? |
| MAP MAKER: | I was always getting lost in my work. This time I'm stuck for good. Go on, try a pork chop! |
| JOSH: | But...it's paper. |
| MAP MAKER: | (MOUTH FULLER THAN EVER, TEARING OF PAPER AS HE BITES) It's...mmmmm...delicious! |
| FX/SPOT | THE SOUND OF A MAN CHEWING PAPER |
| JOSH: | That's not ink you're drinking, is it? |
| MAP MAKER: | Ink, yes. Very refreshing. It wasn't you I met in the index last Thursday, between Hambledon, Bucks. and Hambledon, Hants.? |
| JOSH: | No. |
| MAP MAKER: | Someone else, then. |
| JOSH: | (EXCITED) We're not the only ones here? |
| MAP MAKER: | Oooh, no. There's dozens. All sorts. And the foxes, of course. Beautifully drawn, isn't it? |
| JOSH: | Is there maybe a way out? |