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

The Final Problem Part Three

MYCROFT: Oh, dear God.

EURUS: Two of the Garridebs work here as orderlies, so getting the third along really wasn't too difficult.

(Our boys walk towards the window, staring out of it.)

EURUS: Once you bring in your verdict, let me know and justice will be done.

(We now see that the signs around the struggling men's necks have their names on them.)

SHERLOCK: Justice?

JOHN: What will you do with them?

EURUS: Early release.

(Sherlock's eyes lower towards the water below the men. He turns away from the window.)

SHERLOCK: You'll drop them into the sea.

EURUS: Sink, or swim.

JOHN (angrily, turning to look at the screen): They're tied up!

EURUS: Exactly! Now there is context.

(Sherlock lays the rifle on the table and bends to the photos, resting his hands on the glass at either side.)

EURUS: Please, continue with your deductions. I'm now focussing on the difference to your mental capacity a specified consequence can make.

MYCROFT (angrily): Why should we bother?

(John glances back to the men outside the window.)

MYCROFT: What if we're disinclined to play your games, little sister?

(Eurus chuckles, not very humorously.)

EURUS: I have – if you remember – provided you with some motivation.

(There's a click on the speaker.)

GIRL's VOICE (frightened): We're going through the clouds, like cotton wool.

(Mycroft clasps his hands behind his head, lowering it in frustration. Sherlock, who had been bent over the table looking closely at the photographs, straightens up and closes his eyes as he speaks.)

SHERLOCK: Oh. That's nice. Try to tell me more about the plane.

GIRL: Why won't my mummy wake up?

(The speaker clicks again. The image of water has been pouring down the screen at the end of the room but now Eurus reappears. Sherlock lowers his head and moves his fingers across the photographs on the table.)

SHERLOCK (softly, intensely): So it's got to be one of the other two.

(He turns and looks at the men outside the window.)

SHERLOCK (louder): Now, Howard.

(He walks closer and stares at the man on the left who has that name card around his neck.)

SHERLOCK (quick fire): Howard's a lifelong drunk. Pallor of his skin, terminal gin blossoms on his red nose ... (he zooms in on the man's face and then lowers his gaze to his hands) ... and – terror notwithstanding – a bad case of the DTs.

(Cut-away of Howard raising the rifle in front of him and cocking it with his thumb. As he moves his finger towards the trigger, his hand is shaking. The camera closes in on his face which twitches as he tries to squint into the telescopic sight. He fires the rifle and the bullet flies in slow motion towards a man in a white T-shirt – presumably Evans – but misses and goes past his head by quite a distance.)