Original subtitles

Why not? Why should I?

Because give me a reason why not. Give me a reason why. Because subconsciously

you want to. Sub what?

Subconsciously. Have you been practicing big words in the mirror? I read it. You

can read?

It was in the story. Batman goes to the psychiatrist.

Spike, I am not going out with you.

Why? Because I'm busy. I've got all this work to do for tomorrow.

Tomorrow? Why do I have to worry about tomorrow?

Because I intend to be there. Yeah, but you don't have to be there today.

What's your trouble, Linda? You live every day a day in advance.

What, you mean I should live like there's no tomorrow and be wrong every

morning? No, just live like you'll live forever. Then you'll only be wrong once.

Spike, watch my lips.

Hear my words.

Read my semaphore.

Feel my braille. I am not going out with you.

You mean even though subconsciously... I do not subconsciously want to go out

with you. Are you denying you dream about me?

I don't dream about you. Of course you do. I do not. I bet you do.

I don't. I can prove it. How?

Watch.

to startle you?

No, no, I'm fine.

I knew he wouldn't know a word like subconsciously. What?

Nothing. Am I late for school?

It's Saturday.

Oh, yeah. Look, I'm sorry to wake you, love, but there's someone downstairs for

you, a boy.

A boy? He's very insistent. I told him you'd go to sleep.

Spike. He didn't give a name.

Rough looking, but cute.

Well, I'm not sure about cute.

Neither am I. Look, I put him in the kitchen. It doesn't seem right to leave

downstairs and outside if he's a friend of yours. Don't I have a longer dressing

gown? That is your longer dressing gown.

It's nearly to your feet.

Yes, but I go all the way to my feet.

How do I look?

Fine.

That worth?

Well, yes.

Good.

Mike, I don't know what you think you're doing, but who are you?

Damn birds.

Find yourself a desk, get a pen and some paper. I want the whole thing written

down. I've already told you. Look, if we're going to do this at all, we're

to do it my way.

Desk, pen, paper.

I was going to tell you you were late, but then my life started flashing in

front of me. Kenny, I want a meeting with you, Sarah and Billy and find out

anyone here was at the school judo club last night.

Do I get to ask why?

There's no law against asking, but I'm considering it.

Oh, and Kenny...

Next time I want to print my address in the paper, please tell me it was a

really stupid idea.

Then duck.

Sure thing.

Spike! Hit!

Min.

Min.

Is he?

Just paperwork.

I want you to get me the headmaster's home phone number.

His name's Winters. He lives in Carver Street.

Read and enjoy. Don't peek at the end.

By the way,

I want to try a word with you. Wouldn't have to be yes, would it? A new word.

That'd be new.

Subconsciously. Don't tell me.

It's something you catch from a dirty towel.

Has anyone ever told you you've got a wonderful vocabulary?

I always knew that.

Just could never put it into words.

I guess I always knew.

Subconsciously. Hit.

Hit.

Billy, are you busy right now?

Yeah.

No. Linda. Not now, Tiddler. Billy, I want you to get into the school records

and find out all you can on Bobby Tweed.

All done. How do we get into somebody's school records?

Remember Colin persuaded the school to put their records on computer?

Yeah. Remember Billy helped them set up their system?

Yeah. We kind of left the back door open.

You're kidding.

And you've got to improve on your maths.

Do something about those birds.

Linda, listen, can I talk to you about Spike?

Why not? Spike always does.

Yeah, but do you know he's having trouble at home?

No. What?

Well, I don't know. He won't say.

But he's really upset about it.

Doesn't show.

Yeah, well, you know Spike. He's all mouth to hide behind, especially when

you're around.

Listen, I was wondering. It's his birthday on Friday. No one knows, but it

And there's this group coming to town he'd really like to see. It's the

Dreadnoughts at the Pavilion on Friday.

Are you suggesting I go with him?

A date?

Well, it would really cheer him up.

No way, Tiddler.

Oh, you're all heart, Dave.

Last night at the school judo club, £30 was stolen from the cash box.

Our man Bobby was seen coming out of the room where the cash box was kept.

He was seen in the changing room stashing money in his anorak.

He was searched later and found with exactly £30 on him.

If I give up, who did it?

Not Bobby, according to Bobby.

He says everyone who saw him was lying and the money was given to him by his

gran. What does his gran say about that?

Want to ask her?

She's 93 and thinks her cat's Napoleon.

Maybe we should check if her cat is Napoleon.

Roughly all girls as bad as Bobby's telling you. I phoned her. She is.

She mentioned her cat on the phone.

She said it was her cat speaking.

Wait a minute. I don't follow this. So a guy steals some money and then denies

it. Why was he denying it to you in your kitchen?

He thought maybe the paper could help him. Help him? He wants the Gazette to

a private investigation.

What? You're joking.

I'm not. And neither is he.

Billy, what did you get on his record?

Practically nothing.

He only transferred to the school two months ago.

But there was one kind of funny thing.

He lives in Sherrington.

That means going to Norbridge High costs him two train journeys a day.

So why come to Norbridge?

I'm still looking.

We're not going to do this, are we?

Investigate? We don't have much choice.

No choice?

Bobby didn't go home last night. He was terrified his father would dump him.

So terrified he's not planning to go home at all.

Unless someone agrees to help him.

And that someone happens to be us.

We can't do this. This isn't our thing. For all we know, the guy did steal that

money. And he's not asking us to say he didn't, just to investigate.

It's not an unreasonable request.

And if we turn it down, we'll be partly responsible for him not being home

tonight. Well, I just want you to know he sounds pretty guilty to me.

Actually, he's not. What? He's not guilty.

He couldn't have done it.

There's a little detail that makes that impossible.

I'm not going to tell you when you can't walk, run or wiggle your fingers.

You've got to have something to make yourself interesting.

Kenny, what do you think?

Well, people sound too reasonable to have opinions.

But I don't know about that.

Guilty. Innocent.

OK, you've both convinced me. You're on the story together.

Together?

Prostitution and defence.

I'm a great fan of the legal system.

And now I've got to go and tell someone about this who I don't think is going to

be too thrilled.

018.

That it?

Yeah, it's winters in Carver Street. Wish me luck.

By the way, Spike, are you feeling okay?

Me? Yeah.

Good. Great.

Well, hang in there, all right?

What's the matter with her?

She's having some trouble at home, didn't you know?

Trouble? Yeah, she's really upset about it. Listen, okay, it's her birthday on

Friday. It's strictly confidential.

But there's this man coming to town that she'd really like to see.

Linda, I've finished the drawing for the centre spread.

What do you think?

Julie, that's beautiful.

We really are going to have to do something about those birds.

Sorry to interrupt your lunch break, Mr Prescott.

Any bunch of kids who can talk a runaway pupil back into school and talk the

headmaster into letting them investigate have got to be worth helping.

I hear the headmaster wasn't too pleased about us getting involved.

I heard that, too, and I was four rooms away.

Anyway, Sarah, I'll save you a lot of time.

Bobby Tweed told that money. I saw him.

Now, the cash box started here.

I brought it with me at the beginning of the evening, just in case any of the

kids had forgotten their bus fare.

I had to be very careful about that. I had to make sure they can all get home.

But nobody had, so he just sticks the box into a corner.

Then about five o 'clock he calls a break and tells us that he's got to make

this phone call.

So I took the cash box with me and left it in the equipment room. Then I went to

the office to use the phone.

He just left us talking and hanging about. It would have been pretty easy

anyone to slip out without being noticed.

As I came out of the office and back down the corridor, I saw Bobby running

of the equipment room with money in his hand.

I've just been out to the corridor, heading back to the gym.

I saw Bobby come running out of the equipment room with the money in his

For a moment, I thought he was coming at me.

Then he died straight into the changing room.

I chased after him, but by the time I caught up, he was back in the gym, as if

he'd never been out of it.

And he'd managed to hide the money.

Me and Keith were in the gym, and where we were standing, we could just see into

the changing room.

And we saw Bobby come belting him from the corridor and stuff some money in his

bag. Then he comes strolling into the gym, as if nothing had happened.

I checked the cash box, and there was 30 pounds missing.

Three tenners.

So I stopped everything, got the kids back into their street clothes and

searched the whole place and everyone in it.

Sure enough, there was £30 in Bobby's bag.

In tenners.

So Prescott faced him with the fact that he'd stolen the money and Bobby just

took off into the night and nobody saw him again until he turned up in Linda's

kitchen. That's pretty conclusive, I'd say.

I found the reason Bobby goes to Norwich High.

Yeah? Yeah, he kicks out of every stall in Sherrington.

Really? What for?

He's been having a difficult adolescence.

You know, fighting, stealing, protection rackets, setting the school on fire.

So not exactly young person of the year, then? Well, he's not the type of guy a

nice girl would take home to meet mother, unless mother was recruiting

for a major terrorist organisation.

I think that rather puts a lid on it.

It does rather.

Proves he's just the kind of guy to do this.

Proves he still lived in Sherrington and couldn't have done it. What?

What's Sherrington got to do with anything?

Think about it, Sarah.

You'll get it eventually.

Oh, you're not still on about your little detail, are you? Billy, he was

four different people.

Mr Prescott, Ian Brown, Keith Evans and Gerry Hardy.

Yeah, strange that.

I'll have to think about it.

Do you have to go now?

No. On your way out, could you get my dad to bring me some coffee?

Oh, sure, right.

Great talking to you, Billy.

Why not? Why should I?

Well, give me a reason why not. Give me a reason why.

Because we both know that you want to go out with me. I do not. So why did you

buy the tickets?

What tickets?

For my birthday treat at the pavilion.

I didn't buy any tickets.

Hey, what are you doing?

How do you explain these?

Who says they're anything to do with you?

Titler. Oh, the killer.

So, what do you think?

I arrive at your house about six o 'clock. You'll still be up there

I'll have to chat to your parents.

That means I have to look at the baby photos.

What about clothes? What do you think? What about them?

Well, I think you should wear some, otherwise your parents are going to

I'm a bit forward.

This is a real dream come true for you, isn't it, Spike?

Well, I don't know about that.

I've thought about it.

Are you denying you've dreamt about it?

I wouldn't say dreamt exactly.

I can prove it. Oh, yeah?

Now, watch.

Damn!

Why am I doing this?

What you're looking at is an actual size representation of two of the school

corridors. I'd remember the walls this taller.

The doors to the school office, the gym and the equipment room on the corner

between them. Terrific. Draw me the rest of the school. I won't bother coming in

tomorrow. Now, Prescott was on his way back from the office when he saw Bobby

run out of the equipment room.

Chased after him, but by the time he caught up, Bobby had managed to hide the

money, right?

Seems to me, if Bobby had time to stick the money in his bag and stroll into the

gym... Must have had a good start on Prescott in the first place.

Kenny and Fraz tried it.

Show how much of a start he'd have needed.

That was the distance between them when Prescott claims to have recognised

Bobby. Fraz, can you see Kenny from over there?

Is that you, Kenny? I don't know, I'm too far away.

It was after school.

The corridor would only be partly lit.

Halfway down, there's a pair of fire doors.

Glass panelled. Wired glass.

And Bobby, or whoever it was, would have been wearing the same judo kits every

other kid that night.

There's no way Prescott could have been sure.

But he was.

Oh, yeah?

Then why, when he found the money missing, did he search everyone?

Prescott wasn't the only one to see him.

Ian Brown, Keith Evans, Gerry Hardy. Never mind them. Could Prescott have

recognised Bobby?

Yes.

Danny?

We did another little reconstruction at the school.

Can you recognise Bobby in that photograph?

Yeah, I think so.

That's interesting, because it's Kenny.

Linda.

Yes, what is it?

Hi. Hi, Spike.

So how are you?

Fine. You?

Fine.

What's wrong?

Why should anything be wrong?

Well, you've been talking to me more than three seconds. You haven't been

sarcastic to me. How do you know?

Yeah, right.

Oh, look, I was wondering... You first.

No, you.

No, you.

Look, Spike, I was kind of... I was... I don't know how to put this.

Spike, would you like to... Linda.

We've got to do something about those birds they're picking on me.

Well, I've never heard her call that before.

Look, I've got an idea. I know these guys down at the shooting range, they

just... Colin, think preservation of wildlife.

Wildlife? Animals, Colin.

Preservation of animals?

You mean like in a freezer?

We'll talk later.

But those little Nazis are picking on me.

Yeah, well, forgiven, you shall be forgiven.

Spike, you just quoted the Bible.

Oh, sorry.

No, it's good. It's great.

That's from Matthew.

Yeah, well, he probably saw it on the same bumper sticker.

Don't joke.

I'm beginning to suspect the truth about you, Spike Thompson.

The truth?

Yeah.

Beneath all that tough talk, all the boasting about the fights you've been

really, you wouldn't hurt a fly, would you?

Yeah, when you should have seen me last night.

You were in a fight?

No, but I killed a fly.

Spike, I've been thinking about you.

About me?

About you.

Look, it's that thing that happened at the school sports day. Because I didn't

even know that was your underwear.

It's not what happened to... What?

Well, it was a mad impulse.

I was bored. Sort of flagpole and... Flagpole?

Well, it was a hot day.

I was confused. I didn't know what I was doing. I, uh... I fell.

I thought those were Betty Hunter's things.

Yeah, that's right. They were. I recognize them.

I mean... I, uh...

No, Linda, wait. Come on, please listen. Look, you're angry, and you're right.

You should be angry.

I mean that stuff with the flagpole.

It was dumb and immature and stupid.

But that was the old me. It was ages ago.

The new me doesn't find that kind of stuff funny anymore.

No way.

No how.

It's not funny at all.

Underwear on a flagpole?

No, Linda, come on. Hey, hey, look.

Look, I know this is kind of confidential information.

Well, it's a kind of special day for you on Friday, isn't it?

Well, special for you?

No, you.

For me?

Just because it's your... That is the most conceited thing I've ever heard.

Conceited? Well, that's a bit ungrateful.

Ungrateful? Why should I be grateful?

Right. Where are you going?

I'm walking out and slamming the door. Yeah, well, so am I. Well, I thought of

it first. Yeah, well, I'm nearer... I don't suppose there's any chance of you

going out on Friday night, is there?

Don't slam the...

That was a no, right?

That is interesting, because it's Kenny.

Well, then I suppose I have to agree.

I could have been mistaken.

But how do you account for the fact that three other people saw Bobby as well?

If three other people were pupils, their word wouldn't be enough on its own. But

if it had been corroborated by mine... And if your word wasn't reliable?

OK, point taken.

But it still doesn't change anything.

No.

Well, suppose no one was sure.

Suppose no one saw him at all.

I checked every kid that night.

Only one of them had £30.

And it's not as if he claimed it had been planted on him.

He said it was his.

Well, could it have been?

Well, then where did the stolen money go?

I searched everyone that night. There was only one who... Sir, can I make a

suggestion?

Did you carry on searching everyone after you found that money on Bobby?

And he did.

Not only did he carry on and search everyone, he took a note of precisely

much money everyone had.

As you can see, the only person with £30 was Bobby Tweed. The most anyone else

had was £12.

You're going to have to face it, Billy. Even without four eyewitnesses, this guy

is as guilty as sin.

Remember my little do -tail?

What, the one you wouldn't tell me about?

That means Bobby Tweed is innocent and pigs can fly.

Yeah, what about it?

It's just got bigger.

I'm glad you could make it, Mr Prescott. Ian, Keith and Gerry are already here.

Gathering of witnesses, eh?

Any particular reason? I thought we settled all this.

Oh, just a few little, um, details.

What's that?

Should be an unconscious bird.

I'm experimenting with drugged bird seed.

This way, Mr Prescott.

I really don't see what there is to discuss.

In all honesty, there can't be any doubt that Bobby stole that money.

There's just one or two things I'm having trouble with. For heaven's sake,

He was seen by four different people. He was found with exactly £30 on him.

There's one thing.

Exactly £30?

That little detail's bothered me from the start.

Why?

It would mean the only money Bobby had on him was the money he was supposed to

have stolen, which would mean he must have arrived that night with no money at

all. So?

Where was his train fare?

The train to Sherrington cost £1 .50.

Where was the money for it?

Maybe he'd forgotten it. Mr Prescott asked if anybody had forgotten their

and nobody had.

There were three possibilities.

One, Bobby forgot he'd forgotten his money when Mr Prescott asked.

Unlikely. Two, Bobby lost his money later and it somehow didn't turn up when

place was searched.

Very unlikely.

Three, the £30 in Bobby's bag was Bobby's and was in part his train fare.

I think you'll agree that answer makes sense.

Go on.

Something else I'm having trouble with.

Bobby comes out of the equipment room, money in hand, and sees he's been

spotted. He tears off back to the gym, gambling he hasn't been recognised, and

hides the money.

Naturally. I want you to put yourself in his position, Mr Prescott.

You're standing in the changing room.

You know you mustn't be found with money on you, and you're surrounded by other

people's bags.

Would you really hide it in your own?

I suppose not.

Tell you what would be a better idea.

I've got this money to get rid of.

Except it's not 30 quid. It's three tenners.

Surely you've got at least two friends in the judo club.

You mean I give one tenner to each friend?

At the same time, paying them to help you.

And getting rid of the money.

So what we've been looking for isn't one guy with exactly 30 pounds.

But three guys with at least 10 pounds each.

We checked the list you gave us, Mr Prescott.

And do you know what was an amazing coincidence?

The three guys with at least 10 pounds each.

They're the same three guys who say they saw Bobby with the money.

Mr Prescott, that's not proof of anything.

It proves at least that Bobby didn't take the money.

Mr Prescott?

I'll talk to the headmaster in the morning.

Then I think he and I will be talking to these three gentlemen.

I think we've got it going, haven't we, guys?

None of this is proof of anything, is it, Mr Prescott?

Not really proof.

He's right, you know.

I'm afraid your son's already admitted to taking the money, Mrs Brown.

What?

Well, you see, he gave a tenner each to two of his friends so he wouldn't be

found with the £30.

That isn't true.

I'm afraid there's absolutely no doubt about it, Mrs Brown. Well, I didn't.

I didn't. I can understand how upsetting it must be for you.

It was Gerry. He took the money. He gave the tenner to Keith and me.

Ask Keith. It was Gerry.

Would you like to tell that to your mother, Ian?

Listen, Mum, I didn't.

That the last of them?

Yep, and we've boarded up the holes so they can't get back in again.

Little Nazis.

What?

Nothing.

I think I'm going to miss them.

Yeah. Maybe I'll go and see them on their way later.

Yeah. Maybe I will too.

Good.

With a tennis racket.

Oh, Linda.

Missed you at the pavilion last night.

Fantastic. I didn't see you there.

Oh, that's because I was over the back with a friend.

I heard the counter was good, though.

Well, certainly we both enjoyed it, from the more expensive seats.

Miss.

This folder you gave me on the play park story.

What about it, Julie?

Why have you doodled the word subconsciously 14 times on the back?

Oh, I was working out how to spell it.

You spelt it the same way every time.

Well, that must be it, then.

Another thing I've been meaning to ask. What?

Everyone knows you fancy him, so why don't you just go out with him?

I do not fancy Spike.

And as a matter of fact, everyone does not know I fancy him because it's an

only you could be stupid enough to have.

Then how did you know it was Spike I was talking about? What?

I didn't mention his name.

Here's the folder on the garden story. Get working.

What are you staring at? The back of this folder.

I think you just worked out how to spell spike.