Sherlock..........Who?

The Final Problem Part Three

MYCROFT: I will not be manipulated like this.

SHERLOCK: Fine. John?

(He turns to him, offering him the rifle. Mycroft bites his lip and turns his head away.)

SHERLOCK (more firmly): John?

(John has been looking at Mycroft but now turns and takes the rifle.)

JOHN: Yeah, I think I've seen one of these. It's a buffalo gun. (He raises the rifle and aims it towards the floor at the other end of the room, looking into the telescopic sight.) I'd say nineteen forties, old-fashioned sight, no crosshairs.

(Sherlock takes back the rifle and looks down at the photos.)

SHERLOCK: Glasses, glasses. (He points to the first photograph.) Nathan wears glasses. Evans was shot from three hundred metres.

(Brief cut-away to Nathan's hands – as evidenced by the corduroy jacket – raising the rifle in front of him and moving his finger towards the trigger. In the small room Sherlock raises the rifle and aims it towards the opposite wall as if he's about to fire it.)

SHERLOCK: Kickback from a gun with this calibre ...

(Cut-away to Nathan holding the rifle to the firing position and pulling the trigger. As it fires, the gun jolts backwards towards his face and the sight smashes into the right lens of his glasses and shatters it.)

SHERLOCK (lowering the gun): ... would be massive.

(He bends down and puts his finger onto the photo of Nathan, tapping it a couple of times.)

SHERLOCK: No cuts, no scarring. Not Nathan, then. (He turns the photo over.) Who's next?

(He moves his fingers across to the next picture.)

MYCROFT (sarcastically): Well done, Doctor Watson. How useful you are.

(John looks up at him.)

MYCROFT: Do you have a suspicion we're being made to compete?

JENNY (stepping towards him): No, we're not competing. There's a plane in the air that's gonna crash, so what we're doing is actually trying to save a little girl. Today we have to be soldiers, Mycroft, soldiers ...

(Sherlock, who had been looking at the remaining photographs, lifts his head to watch John. John's voice, while still fairly low, becomes more firm.)

JOHN: ... and that means to hell with what happens to us.

(Sherlock lowers his head again while John walks away towards the other end of the table. Mycroft raises his eyebrows briefly.)

MYCROFT (sounding genuine): Your priorities do you credit.

JENNY(angrily, turning back to face him): No, my priorities just got a woman killed.

EURUS (from the screen): Now, as I understand it, Sherlock, you try to repress your emotions to refine your reasoning. I'd like to see how that works, so, if you don't mind, I'm going to apply some context to your deductions.

(There's a noise from behind the boys and they turn to look. Outside the window three men drop into view, each suspended from a rope attached to a harness. The ropes tighten and the men are left dangling in mid-air, each behind one of the three panes of glass. Their hands are bound in front of them with rope and white scarves are tied around their mouths. Each man has a large card hung around his neck with string. The cards flutter in the wind as the men struggle against their bonds.)