Part
One
[Spaceship]
(The planet surface is dry and cracked under a red
sky. The spherical spaceship sits on three legs, looking very out of
place.)
JAGAROTH [OC]: Twenty soneds to warp thrust.
SCAROTH: Confirmed.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Thrust against planet's surface set to power three.
SCAROTH: Negative. Power three too severe.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Scaroth, it must be power three. It must be.
SCAROTH: Warp thrust from planet's surface is untested. At power three
it is suicide. Advised.
(The pilot is covered in little green worms for skin, and has one eye
high in its face.)
JAGAROTH [OC]: Ten soneds to warp thrust.
SCAROTH: Advise!
JAGAROTH [OC]: The Jagaroth are in your hands. Without secondary
engines we must use our main warp thrust. You know this, Scaroth. It is
our only hope. You are our only hope.
SCAROTH: And I am the only one directly in warp field. I know the
dangers.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Three, two, one.
SCAROTH: What will happen if
JAGAROTH [OC]: Full power!
(The centre of the spaceship starts to spin, then it begins to lift off
from the dead planet. The three landing legs tuck themselves in.
Suddenly, space seems to warp within the spaceship.)
JAGAROTH [OC]: Help us, Scaroth! Help us! The fate of the Jagaroth is
with you! Help us! Scaroth, you are our only hope! Our only hope! Help
us! Scaroth! Scaroth! The Jagaroth! The Jagaroth!
(KaBOOM goes the spaceship.)
[Eiffel Tower]
(Yes, really. Who is on location outside the
United Kingdom in the springtime with the trees in full blossom. The
Doctor and Romana are surveying Paris from the top of Le Tour d'Eiffel.
For some bizarre reason, Romana has chosen to dress in a schoolgirl
uniform complete with gymslip and boater.)
DOCTOR: Nice, isn't it?
ROMANA: Yes, marvellous.
DOCTOR: Marvellous. Absolutely.
ROMANA: Absolutely marvellous.
DOCTOR: Well, I think it's marvellous.
ROMANA: So do I. Though it's not quite as you described it.
DOCTOR: Really? How did I describe it?
ROMANA: You said it was nice.
DOCTOR: It's the only place in the world where one can relax entirely.
ROMANA: Mmm. That bouquet.
DOCTOR: What Paris has, it has an ethos, a life. It has
ROMANA: A bouquet?
DOCTOR: A spirit all of its own. Like a wine, It has
ROMANA: A bouquet.
DOCTOR: It has a bouquet. Yes. Like a good wine. You have to choose one
of the vintage years, of course.
ROMANA: What year is this?
DOCTOR: Ah well, yes. It's 1979 actually. More of a table wine, shall
we say. Ha! The randomiser's a useful device but it lacks true
discrimination. Should we sip it and see?
ROMANA: Oh, I'd be delighted. Shall we take the lift or fly?
DOCTOR: Let's not be ostentatious.
ROMANA: All right. Let's fly then.
DOCTOR: That would look silly. We'll take the lift. Come on.
[Paris Metro - Dupleix]
(On the train.)
ROMANA: Where are we going?
DOCTOR: Are you talking philosophically or geographically?
ROMANA: Philosophically.
DOCTOR: Then we're going to lunch. I know a little place that does a
wonderful bouillabaisse. Do you like bouillabaisse?
ROMANA: Mmm, bouillabaisse, yum-yum.
(They get off at Boissiere metro station and run across the road. They
walk down besides a set of large railings which have a poster on them -
25 Janvier - 31 Mai, 1979, 3 millions d'années d'adventure humaines, le
cnrs et la prehistoire. Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle - and on
to Petit Pont and the Notre Dame brasserie. Meanwhile, in a posh house
at 47 Rue Vielle du Temple, with carved gorgons heads on the doors -)
[Laboratory]
(Down in the basement, a man in a lab coat and
thick accent pleads with his elegant employer. Everyone say Hi to
Julian
Glover.)
KERENSKY: But I can proceed no further, Count. Research costs money. If
you want results, we must have the money.
SCARLIONI: I assure you, Professor, money is no problem.
KERENSKY: So you tell me, Count Scarlioni. So you tell me everyday.
Money is no problem. Look, what you want me to do about these equipment
invoices? Write no problem on them and send them back?
SCARLIONI: Will a million francs ease the immediate cash-flow
situation?
(He hands over a wad of Francs Nouveau. We are still over 20 years from
the Euro, remember.)
KERENSKY: Yes, Count. That will help admirably. But I will shortly need
a great deal more.
SCARLIONI: Yes, of course, Professor, of course. Nothing must stand in
the way of the work.
(A black clad man with a white beard enters.)
HERMANN: Your Excellency?
SCARLIONI: Ah, Hermann. That Gainsborough didn't fetch enough. I think
we'll have to sell one of the Bibles.
HERMANN: Sir?
SCARLIONI: Yes, the Gutenberg.
HERMANN: May I suggest we tread more carefully, sir? It would not be in
our best interest to draw too much attention to ourselves. Another rash
of priceless treasures on the market could
SCARLIONI: Yes, I know, Hermann. I know. Just sell it discreetly.
HERMANN: Discreetly, sir? Sell a Gutenberg Bible discreetly?
SCARLIONI: Well, as discreetly as possible. Just do it, will you?
HERMANN: Yes, sir. Of course, sir.
(Hermann leaves.)
SCARLIONI: Good, Professor. Excellent. I hope we are now ready to start
the next test on the equipment?
KERENSKY: Two minutes, Count. Just two minutes.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
(The Doctor cuts the pages on a paperback book by
Rigaud. Something Sur La France de Demain. He riffles through the pages
and puts it down. Romana is doing a crossword puzzle.)
DOCTOR: Hmm.
ROMANA: Any good?
DOCTOR: Not bad. A bit boring in the middle. Don't move. You might
spoil a priceless work of art.
ROMANA: What?
DOCTOR: That man over there. Don't look!
ROMANA: What's he doing?
DOCTOR: Shush.
ROMANA: (sotto) What's he doing?
DOCTOR: He's sketching you.
ROMANA: Is he?
(Romana turns round with a big smile and knocks over the remains of the
bottle of red wine they are drinking. The artist throws down his
pencil, stands up and tears the page out of his sketch book, crumpling
it and throwing it onto the floor before he leaves.)
DOCTOR: I told you not to look.
ROMANA: I just wanted to see.
DOCTOR: Well, it's too late. He's gone now.
ROMANA: Pity. I wonder what he thought I looked like?
DOCTOR: Well, he threw it down there. Let's have a look.
(The world shimmies and then suddenly the artist is sitting in his
chair again.)
ROMANA: What's he doing?
DOCTOR: Shush!
ROMANA: (sotto) What's he doing?
DOCTOR: He's sketching you.
ROMANA: Is he?
(Again, Romana turns, the artist screws up the picture, throws it down
and leaves.)
DOCTOR: I told you not to look.
ROMANA: I just wanted to see.
DOCTOR: Well, it's too late. He's gone now.
ROMANA: Pity. I wonder what he thought I looked like.
DOCTOR: Well, he threw it down there. Let's have a look.
(The world shimmies again.)
ROMANA: What's going on?
DOCTOR: I don't know. It's as if time jumped a groove for a second.
ROMANA: Let's have a look.
(She picks up the paper, and the Doctor takes it from her.)
DOCTOR: For a portrait of a Time Lady, that's not at all a bad
likeness.
(It's a cracked clock face at ten to two, wearing a straw boater.)
ROMANA: That's extraordinary.
DOCTOR: Yes, isn't it.
ROMANA: I wonder why he did it like that? The face of the clock is
fractured.
DOCTOR: Ha. Almost like a crack in time. A crack in time.
ROMANA: Let's sit outside.
[Laboratory]
(Kerensky switches off his bizarre machine with the
three laser-like tips pointing at
a pedestal.)
KERENSKY: Time, Count. It will take time.
SCARLIONI: Time, time, time. Nevertheless, a very impressive, if
flawed, demonstration. I'm relying upon you to make very fast progress
now, Professor. The fate of many people is in our hands.
KERENSKY: The world will have much to thank you for.
SCARLIONI: It will indeed Professor. It will indeed. How soon before we
can start the next tests?
KERENSKY: The next one, Count? Well
SCARLIONI: I want to see it today.
KERENSKY: Today, Count?
SCARLIONI: Yes, today.
KERENSKY: Count, I think this is wonderful work, but I do not
understand this obsessive urgency.
SCARLIONI: Time, Professor. It is all a matter of time.
[Outside the Brasserie]
(With Notre Dame in the background, just to show
off.)
DOCTOR: I think there's a matter with time. Didn't you feel anything?
ROMANA: Mmm, just a twinge. I didn't like it.
DOCTOR: Yes. It must be because I've crossed the time fields so often.
No one there seemed to notice anything. You and I exist in a special
relationship to time, you know. Perpetual outsiders.
ROMANA: Don't be so portentous.
DOCTOR: Hmm? What do you make of that, then?
ROMANA: Well, at least on Gallifrey we can capture a good likeness.
Computers can draw.
DOCTOR: What? Computer pictures? You sit in Paris and talk of computer
pictures? Listen, I'll take you somewhere and show you some real
paintings painted by real people.
ROMANA: What about the time slip?
DOCTOR: Never mind about the time slip. We're on holiday. Come on!
[Outside the Louvre]
(We get a series of shots of the Doctor and Romana
going through Paris, until we arrive at -)
DOCTOR: There we are, the Louvre. One of the greatest art galleries in
the whole galaxy.
ROMANA: Nonsense! What about the Academia Stellaris on Sirius Five?
DOCTOR: What? Oh no. No, no.
ROMANA: Or the Solariun Pinaquotheque at Strikian?
DOCTOR: Oh, no, no.
ROMANA: Or the Braxiatel Collection?
DOCTOR: No, no, no, no, no, no. This is the gallery. The only gallery
in the known universe which a picture like
[Louvre - Salle des Etats]
(In front of a small, dingy head and shoulders
painting of a Renaissance woman.)
DOCTOR: The Mona Lisa.
ROMANA: It's quite good.
DOCTOR: Quite good? That's one of the great treasures of the universe
and you say quite good?
ROMANA: The world, Doctor, the world.
DOCTOR: What are you talking about?
ROMANA: Not the universe in public, Doctor. It only calls attention.
DOCTOR: I don't care. It's one of the great treasures of the universe!
ROMANA: Shush!
DOCTOR: I don't care. Let them gawp, let them gape. What do I care.
(A man in a beige raincoat seems out of place here. He moves to stand
behind the genuinely aristocratic Catherine Schell, freshly escaped from Space
1999.)
ROMANA: Why hasn't she got any eyebrows?
DOCTOR: What? Is that all you can say? No eyebrows? We're talking about
the Mona Lisa. It's the Mona
GUIDE [OC]: And here, ladies and gentlemen, we have possibly the most
famous painting in this gallery.
DOCTOR: Good heavens, you're right. She hasn't got any eyebrows. Do you
know, I never noticed that before.
(The lady guide arrives with her tour group.)
GUIDE: La Giaconda, painted by Leonardo da Vinci, 1452 1519. Ahem.
Excuse me, Monsieur?
DOCTOR: Yes? What is it?
GUIDE: Oh, could you please move along?
DOCTOR: What?
GUIDE: Other people wish to enjoy this picture.
ROMANA: What did she say?
DOCTOR: She said
(Time shimmies again.)
GUIDE: Mona Lisa, La Giaconda, painted by Leonardo da Vinci, 1452 1519.
Ahem. Excuse me, Monsieur? Could you please move along. Other people
wish to enjoy this picture.
(Time shimmies and both the Doctor and Romana stagger.)
DOCTOR: Excuse me.
(The Doctor gets to the bench in the middle of the room before
collapsing into Catherine's lap. She rolls him onto the floor as she
gets up and moves away from the centre of attention. The man in the
raincoat takes charge and picks the Doctor up again.)
DUGGAN: All right, stand back. Stand back, everybody, stand back. Are
you all right, sir?
DOCTOR: Yes. I just dented my head on your gun, that's all.
DUGGAN: What on Earth?
ROMANA: Don't take any notice of him. He's just having one of his funny
turns.
DOCTOR: One of my funny turns? The whole world took a funny turn.
ROMANA: Come one, Doctor.
(Romana helps the Doctor to leave. Duggan waits a moment, then follows.
Catherine nods to a man in a black felt hat who had been standing near
the Mona Lisa all the time.)
[Laboratory]
(Once again, the machine has been working.)
SCARLIONI: Excellent, Professor, excellent.
KERENSKY: An unfortunate side effect.
SCARLIONI: Not at all, Professor. The work progresses well. Now I want
you to find a way to vastly increase the time span.
KERENSKY: I'm not certain, Count. You see, Einstein says that
SCARLIONI: I'm not paying Einstein, Professor. I'm paying you. Now,
continue with the work.
KERENSKY: You are stretching me to the limit, Count.
SCARLIONI: Only thus is true progress ever made. You, as a scientist,
should be the first to appreciate that.
KERENSKY: Oh, I do, Count, I do. I appreciate many things. I appreciate
walks in the country, I appreciate sleep, regular meals.
SCARLIONI: Hermann.
HERMANN: Yes, Excellency?
SCARLIONI: Would you please prepare for the Professor half a dozen
escargot au beurre followed by an entrecote
bordelaise with haricots vert and pommes sautees served directly here
to the laboratory.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
SCARLIONI: Oh, and a bottle of Chambertin. My own.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
SCARLIONI: Better make that half a bottle. Wouldn't want to interfere
with the work, would we, Professor?
KERENSKY: Count, I would really like to get some sleep.
SCARLIONI: Hermann, cancel the wine. Bring the vitamin pill. I shall be
upstairs. We must press forward.
[Outside the Brasserie]
(Duggan follows the Doctor and Romana along
various streets and down to the walkway by the river. Somehow they
manage to get to the other side and finally end up back at the Notre
Dame Brasserie where a waiter give them a menu.)
DOCTOR: Merci.
ROMANA: Doctor, you realise we're being followed?
DOCTOR: Yes, all the way from the Louvre by that idiot with the gun.
ROMANA: You did notice.
DOCTOR: Well, of course I noticed.
ROMANA: Well, what do you think he wants?
DOCTOR: Look in your pocket. Other pocket.
(Romana takes out a large green bangle. Catherine Schell was wearing
that in the Louvre.)
ROMANA: What's this?
DOCTOR: The woman I bumped into was wearing it.
ROMANA: And you stole it from her?
DOCTOR: Look at it.
ROMANA: It's a micromeson scanner.
DOCTOR: That's right. She was using it to get a complete report on all
the alarm systems around the Mona Lisa.
ROMANA: You mean she's trying to steal it?
DOCTOR: It is very a pretty painting.
ROMANA: It's a very sophisticated device for a level five civilisation.
DOCTOR: That? That's never the product of Earth's civilisation.
ROMANA: Do you mean an alien's trying to steal the Mona Lisa?
DOCTOR: It is a very pretty painting. Romana?
ROMANA: Yes?
DOCTOR: You know, I think something very funny is going on. You
remember that man who was following us?
ROMANA: Yes.
DOCTOR: Well, he's standing behind me poking a gun in my back.
DUGGAN: All right, you two. Into the cafe.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
DOCTOR: Patron, three glasses of water. Make them
doubles.
(With hands raised, the Doctor and Romana walk to their original table
and sit down.)
[Drawing room]
(Scarlioni is drinking Crème de Menthe while
Catherine is pacing, long cigarette holder in hand.)
SCARLIONI: And then?
COUNTESS: Then I had this fool of a detective followed.
SCARLIONI: Why?
COUNTESS: Reasons.
SCARLIONI: Oh, please don't play games.
COUNTESS: What else have I been doing all these years?
SCARLIONI: Following instructions. Go on.
COUNTESS: Well, this detective, Duggan, he annoyed me. He stopped
watching the painting and he started watching me.
SCARLIONI: Oh, showing a glimmering of intelligence at last. Perhaps we
should deal with him. No. He's too stupid to bother us seriously.
COUNTESS: Only then something else happened in front of the painting.
SCARLIONI: Yes?
COUNTESS: Well, this tall man I'd never seen before, he fainted.
SCARLIONI: You are getting jumpy. Probably overcome by your charms.
COUNTESS: Only that as he fell, he somehow managed to get the bracelet
off my wrist.
SCARLIONI: What! And you let him?
COUNTESS: Well, I had no choice. There was rush and confusion. It was
well organised, I'm sure.
SCARLIONI: That bracelet
COUNTESS: We'll get it back. The matter is in hand even now.
SCARLIONI: I trust you will be
COUNTESS: Discreet? Of course.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
(No one seems to mind that two black-hatted men now
have Duggan, the Doctor and Romana at pistol-point.)
DOCTOR: What bracelet?
(Romana hands it to the Doctor, who slips it onto the barrel of the
nearest pistol. The gunmen back away and leave.)
ROMANA: Are you all right?
DOCTOR: Yes, I'm just relaxing and enjoying Paris.
DUGGAN: All right, that's enough. Very cleverly staged, but you don't
fool me.
DOCTOR: What are you talking about?
DUGGAN: Your men who were in here just now.
DOCTOR: My men? Those thugs?
DUGGAN: Your thugs.
DOCTOR: Are you suggesting those men were in my employ?
DUGGAN: Yes.
DOCTOR: I don't know if you noticed but he was pointing a gun at me.
Anyone in my employ who behaved like that, I'd sack him on the spot.
DUGGAN: Except that I know you arranged for them to hold you up as a
bluff. You're trying to put me on a false scent.
DOCTOR: You're English, aren't you?
DUGGAN: Yes.
DOCTOR: Patron? I thought I ordered three glasses of water.
PATRON: Monsieur.
DUGGAN: Listen
DOCTOR: Doctor.
(The glasses of water arrive.)
DUGGAN: What's Scarlioni's angle?
DOCTOR: Scarlioni's angle? Never heard of it. Have you ever heard of
Scarlioni's angle?
ROMANA: No, I was never any good at geometry.
DOCTOR: Who's Scarlioni?
DUGGAN: Count Scarlioni.
DOCTOR: What?
DUGGAN: Everyone on Earth's heard of Count Scarlioni.
DOCTOR: Ah, well, we've only just landed on Earth.
DUGGAN: Right, fine, that's it. I give up! You're crazy!
(Duggan gets up to leave.)
DOCTOR: Crazy enough to want to steal the Mona Lisa?
(Duggan returns to the table.)
DOCTOR: Or at least be interested in someone who might want to steal
the Mona Lisa.
[Drawing room]
(The black hats have delivered the bracelet.)
SCARLIONI: Good. Thank you, you may go.
(The black hats leave.)
SCARLIONI: But not good enough. Kill them.
HERMANN: The detective and his friends, Excellency?
SCARLIONI: No, Hermann, those two fools.
HERMANN: With pleasure, Excellency.
(Hermann leaves.)
SCARLIONI: So, one was interested in you and the painting, and the
other in this bracelet.
COUNTESS: Yes.
SCARLIONI: I should like to meet them.
COUNTESS: Of course. Just tell Hermann.
SCARLIONI: No, my dear. You tell Hermann.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
DUGGAN: So, you can imagine the furore.
ROMANA: The what?
DUGGAN: Furore. The whole art word in an uproar.
ROMANA: Oh, furore.
DUGGAN: Masterpieces that have apparently been missing over the
centuries are just turning up all over the place.
DOCTOR: All fakes, of course.
DUGGAN: They've got to be, haven't they? Haven't they?
ROMANA: Are they?
DUGGAN: They're very, very good ones. They stand up to every scientific
test.
DOCTOR: Really? What, and the only connection in this is the Count?
DUGGAN: Yes.
DOCTOR: So?
DUGGAN: Nothing dirty can be proved, though. He's clean. Absolutely
clean. So clean he stinks.
DOCTOR: He isn't clean any more. The Countess has the bracelet.
DUGGAN: What's that bracelet worth?
DOCTOR: Well, it depends on what you want to do with it. Uh oh.
DUGGAN: What? (More black hats have arrived.)
DOCTOR: I think we're being invited to leave.
[Drawing room]
(Four o'clock. Hermann enters.)
HERMANN: You rang, my lady?
COUNTESS: Yes, Hermann. Where's the Count?
HERMANN: Down in the laboratory, my lady.
COUNTESS: With that Professor again.
HERMANN: No, my lady. Professor Kerensky is resting in his room.
COUNTESS: Oh. Thank you, Hermann.
[Outside the Laboratory]
(The door is locked.)
COUNTESS: Carlos? Carlos?
[Laboratory]
(Count Scarlioni stands in front of a mirror on a
filing cabinet.)
COUNTESS [OC]: Carlos?
(Scarlioni takes hold of the middle of his face and pulls. A latex mask
comes off to reveal a skin covered in worms, and once central eye. It's
the alien from the spaceship!)
Part Two
[Drawing room]
(Hermann enters.)
HERMANN: Excuse me, my lady. The people you wished to speak to are
here.
COUNTESS: Good, Hermann. Show them in.
HERMANN: Yes, my lady.
(The Countess closes up a Chinese Puzzle box. The Doctor is pushed into
the room by Hermann, at gun point. He falls onto the carpet. Romana and
Duggan walk in unaided)
DOCTOR: I say, what a wonderful butler. He's so violent. Hello, I'm
called the Doctor. That's Romana, that's Duggan. You must be the
Countess Scarlioni and this is clearly a delightful Louis Quinze chair.
May I sit in it? I say, haven't they worn well? Thank you, Hermann,
that'll be all.
COUNTESS: Doctor, you're being very pleasant with me.
DOCTOR: Well, I'm a very pleasant fellow.
COUNTESS: But I didn't invite you here for social reasons.
DOCTOR: Yes, I could see that the moment you didn't invite me to have a
drink. Well, I will have a drink now you come to mention it. Yes, do
come in, everybody.
(The Doctor gets up and goes to the decanter and glasses on a side
table and pours.)
DOCTOR: Romana, sit down over there. Duggan. Now, Duggan, you sit
there. Do sit down if you want to, Count. Oh, all right. Now, isn't
this nice?
COUNTESS: The only reason you were brought here was to explain exactly
why you stole my bracelet.
DOCTOR: Ah, well, it's my job, you see. I'm a thief. And this is
Romana, she's my accomplice. And this is Duggan. He's the detective
who's been kind enough to catch me. That's his job. You see, our two
lines of work dovetail beautifully.
COUNTESS: Very interesting.
DOCTOR: Yes.
COUNTESS: I was rather under the impression that Mister Duggan was
following me.
DOCTOR: Ah. Well, you're a beautiful woman, probably, and Duggan was
trying to summon up the courage to ask you out to dinner, weren't you,
Duggan?
COUNTESS: Who sent you?
DOCTOR: Who sent me what?
COUNTESS: Doctor, the more you try to convince me that you're a fool,
the more I'm likely to think otherwise. Now, it would only be the work
of a moment to have you killed.
DOCTOR: What?
COUNTESS: Put it down.
(Romana has picked up the box.)
ROMANA: It's one of those isn't it?
COUNTESS: Yes, it's a very rare and precious Chinese puzzle box. You
won't be able to open it so put it down.
(Romana opens it and takes out the green bracelet.)
ROMANA: Oh, look.
SCARLIONI: Yes. Very pretty, isn't it.
ROMANA: Very. Where's it from?
SCARLIONI: From? It's not from anywhere. It's mine.
(Scarlioni takes the bracelet from Romana.)
COUNTESS: My dear, these are the people who stole it from me at the
Louvre.
DOCTOR: Hello there.
SCARLIONI: How very curious. Two thieves enter the Louvre gallery and
come out with a bracelet. Couldn't you think of anything more
interesting to steal?
DOCTOR: Well, I just thought it was awfully pretty and a terribly
unusual design. Of course, it would have been much nicer to have stolen
one of the pictures, but I've tried that before and all sorts of alarms
go off which disturbs the concentration.
SCARLIONI: Yes, it would. So you stole the bracelet simply because it's
pretty?
DOCTOR: Yes. Well, I think it is. Don't you?
SCARLIONI: Yes.
COUNTESS: My dear, I don't think he's as stupid as he seems.
SCARLIONI: My dear, nobody could be as stupid as he seems.
DOCTOR: Oh.
SCARLIONI: This interview is at an end.
DOCTOR: Good. Well, we'll be off. A quick stagger up the Champs
Elysees, perhaps a bite at Maxims. What do you think, Romana?
ROMANA: Maxims
SCARLIONI: I think a rather better idea would be if Hermann were to
lock you into the cellar. I should hate to lose contact with such
fascinating people.
(Hermann moves forward, and Duggan picks up the chair he was sitting in
to hit him with it.)
DOCTOR: Ah. Duggan, what are you doing? For heavens sake, that's a
Louis Quinze.
DUGGAN: But you're not going to let them lock us up
DOCTOR: Just behave like a civilised guest. I do beg your pardon,
Count.
SCARLIONI: Thank you.
DOCTOR: Now, Hermann, if you'd just be kind enough to show us to our
cellar, we'd be terribly grateful. Do come along, my good chap.
(Hermann escorts the Doctor, Romana and Duggan out at gunpoint.)
SCARLIONI: You really should be more careful with your trinkets, my
dear. After all, we do have a Mona Lisa to steal.
[Laboratory]
DOCTOR: How long's the Chateau been here, Hermann?
HERMANN: Long enough.
DOCTOR: Really, that long? Restored four or five hundred years ago?
HERMANN: May have been.
DOCTOR: Very stimulating, very stimulating. And this would be the
cellar, would it?
HERMANN: Doctor, your boring conversation does not interest me.
DOCTOR: Really. Good Lord, a laboratory. Are you locking us into a
laboratory?
HERMANN: In here.
DOCTOR: Oh, I'd much rather stay out here. This looks so interesting.
(The Doctor has a good look at the time slip apparatus.)
HERMANN: In here, I said.
[Cellar]
(Our trio are bustled into a small side room with
a lamp on a packing crate in the middle. Hermann throws a box of
matches to the Doctor.)
HERMANN: You may light it if you wish.
ROMANA: How long's this thing going to last us?
HERMANN: Two hours, maybe three.
DOCTOR: What happens after that?
HERMANN: After that, you won't need any light.
(Hermann leaves, locking the door. It has a large barred grill in it.
The noise of the computers in the lab is quite loud.)
DUGGAN: What do you think you're playing at?
DOCTOR: Shush. Light the lamp.
DUGGAN: There's only one match.
DOCTOR: Then get it right.
DUGGAN: You tell me to get it right? We could have escaped at least
twice if you hadn't
DOCTOR: Exactly, exactly. What's the point of coming all the way here
just to escape immediately? What we do is, we stay here.
DUGGAN: Yes?
DOCTOR: Let them think they've got us safe.
DUGGAN: Yes?
(The Doctor produces his sonic screwdriver.)
DOCTOR: Then we escape. Light the lamp. Come on.
(There are lots of packing cases in this cobwebby undercroft space. The
Doctor tries his sonic screwdriver on the door.)
DUGGAN: Well?
DOCTOR: It's not working.
DUGGAN: Oh, you and your stupid ideas.
(Duggan hits the door lock with the screwdriver.)
DOCTOR: Don't!
DUGGAN: Well, what else use is it?
DOCTOR: It was useful against the Daleks on Skaro.
DUGGAN: What?
DOCTOR: Oh, you wouldn't remember. Never mind.
DUGGAN: That's all I need. Locked in a cellar, no way out, and two
raving lunatics for company.
(The screwdriver whirrs into life.)
DOCTOR: It's working. Would you like to stay on as my scientific
advisor?
ROMANA: Doctor?
DOCTOR: Yes?
ROMANA: The horizontal length of the stairs is about six metres, isn't
it?
DOCTOR: Yes, I suppose so. Why?
ROMANA: Well, this room runs alongside the stairs, and it's only two
point seven three metres in length.
DOCTOR: That's fascinating. Shall we look at the lab first?
[Laboratory]
(The Doctor pushes the cellar door open.)
DUGGAN: Right, let's get out of here.
DOCTOR: No. There are bound to be a couple of guards at the top of the
stairs.
DUGGAN: Exactly. I'm about ready to thump somebody.
DOCTOR: I want to look at the lab first.
DUGGAN: What use is looking at the lab?
DOCTOR: In the last few hours I've been thumped, threatened, abducted
and imprisoned. I've found a piece of equipment which is not of Earth
technology and I've been through two time slips. I think this lab might
have something to do with it.
DUGGAN: Cut that stuff out, will you? What about the Mona Lisa?
DOCTOR: What about it?
DUGGAN: Do you reckon the Count and Countess are out to steal it?
(Romana carries some equipment into the cellar.)
DOCTOR: Yes.
DUGGAN: I don't know about you, but I'm going to stop them.
DOCTOR: They're not going to steal it at five o'clock in the afternoon,
are they?
DUGGAN: Why not?
DOCTOR: Because the Louvre is still open.
DUGGAN: Oh, yes.
DOCTOR: Now, while we're here, why don't you and I find out how they're
going to steal it and why. Or are you just in it for the thumping?
DUGGAN: I'm in it mainly to protect the interests of the art dealers
who employ
DOCTOR: I know, but mainly for the thumping. What do you think Romana's
up to?
DUGGAN: I don't know.
DOCTOR: Nor do I. Looks intriguing, don't you think?
DUGGAN: I don't care. I'm going.
DOCTOR: What?
(Duggan starts up the stairs but the door at the top opens and
Professor Kerensky enters, comes down and goes into another area out of
sight. He returns wearing his glasses and goes to the time slip
apparatus. The Doctor and Duggan watch from behind a pillars, while
Romana is inside the cellar. Kerensky then gets an egg from a cabinet
and places it in the middle of the apparatus. He checks some notes
while the Doctor stops Duggan from attacking him, then starts up the
apparatus. In the glow of the beams, the egg hatches and the chick
grows into a chicken in mere seconds.)
DOCTOR: Which came first, the chicken or the egg?
KERENSKY: Who are you?
DOCTOR: Me?
KERENSKY: Yes, who are you? What are you doing here?
DOCTOR: Me? I'm the Doctor. What you're doing is terribly interesting,
but you've got it wrong.
[Drawing room]
SCARLIONI: A truly remarkable piece of equipment,
I hope you'll agree. It makes the impossible, possible.
(The equipment is a box with a rectangular light on the front,
semicircular grills sticking out of the sides and a switch on the top.)
SCARLIONI: Perhaps the Professor should see it. I should like him to
know that while he is no doubt a genius, the man he is working for is
altogether more clever.
HERMANN: Without question, sir. Shall I go and fetch the Professor,
Excellency?
SCARLIONI: Yes. Ah, no. No, I would not disturb the work. Besides, I
don't think our Professor would be very amused. Are we ready?
HERMANN: Yes, Excellency.
SCARLIONI: Then let us begin.
[Laboratory]
KERENSKY: Wrong? What are you talking about?
DOCTOR: Well, you're tinkering with time. That's always a bad idea
unless you know what you're doing.
KERENSKY: I know what I'm doing. I am the foremost authority on
temporal theory in the whole world.
DOCTOR: The whole world?
KERENSKY: Yes.
DOCTOR: Well, that's a very small place when you consider the size of
the universe.
KERENSKY: Ah, but who can?
DOCTOR: Oh, some can. And if you can't, you shouldn't tinker with time.
KERENSKY: But you saw it work. The greatest achievement of the human
race. A cellular accelerator. You saw it! An egg developed into a
chicken in thirty seconds. With a large one, I can turn a calf into a
cow in even less time. It will be the end of famine in the world.
DOCTOR: It'll be the end of you, if you're not careful, never mind the
cow. Look.
(The skeletal remains of the chicken collapse into a heap.)
KERENSKY: Well, there are a few technical problems.
DOCTOR: A few technical problems! No, no, no. The whole principle
you're working on is wrong. You can stretch time backwards or forwards
within that bubble, but you can't break into it or out of it. It's true
you have created a different time continuum, but it's totally
incompatible with ours.
KERENSKY: Ah. I don't know what you mean.
DOCTOR: Have you tried this?
(The Doctor reverses a control on the wall. The bones reassemble into a
chicken which then shrinks back into its egg.)
DOCTOR: That's a more interesting effect, don't you think? Did you know
when you built that it could do something like that?
KERENSKY: No. What did you do?
DOCTOR: What do you mean, what did I do? I just reversed the polarity.
This is very expensive equipment, isn't it?
KERENSKY: Oh, very expensive. The Count is very generous. A true
philanthropist. I do not ask too many questions.
DOCTOR: Well, you'd. What's your name?
KERENSKY: Kerensky.
DOCTOR: Kerensky?
KERENSKY: Theodore Nikolai Kerensky.
DOCTOR: Theodore Nikolai Kerensky, a scientist's job is to ask
questions. You should
(The egg has regressed to something else - a creature with one eye and
skin like lots of worms. Then it vanishes completely. Duggan hits
Kerensky on the back of the head.)
DOCTOR: Theodore. Theo. Kerensky! He's fainted.
DUGGAN: No, I hit him. Now, can we stop wondering about conjuring
tricks with chickens and get out of this place?
DOCTOR: Yes, that's your philosophy, isn't it. If it moves, hit it.
He's going to be all right. If you do that one more time, Duggan, I'm
going to take very, very severe measures.
DUGGAN: Yeah? Like what?
DOCTOR: I'm going to ask you not to.
ROMANA [OC]: Doctor?
DOCTOR: Yes?
ROMANA: I was right.
DOCTOR: About what?
ROMANA: Those measurements. There's another room behind the wall,
bricked up.
DUGGAN: Is it important?
DOCTOR: Let's look.
[Cellar]
(The Doctor peers at the wall.)
DOCTOR: Very impressive.
ROMANA: The brickwork's very old.
DOCTOR: Yes, four to five hundred years.
DUGGAN: In which case it can wait another hour or two while we sort
these guys out.
DOCTOR: No, no, no. In my view, a room that's been bricked up for four
or five hundred years is urgently overdue for an airing.
DUGGAN: Come on, let's get out of here. We've got the Mona Lisa to
worry about.
DOCTOR: Duggan.
[Drawing room]
(It looks like the Louvre at night, but is really
projected from the box the Count has made.)
SCARLIONI: So, there is the problem. A box constructed of steel and
plate glass, but merely a physical barrier to protect the painting from
attack. We cut through the glass with the aid of our sonic knife.
(Hermann does so. Henchmen stick handles on and take the glass away.
Four red vertical lights appear in the gap.)
SCARLIONI: Now wait. We now come to the second and far more interesting
line of defence. The laser beams. Interrupt them, and every alarm in
Paris will go off instantly. To get through them, we must alter the
refractive index of the very air itself. Hermann.
HERMANN: Sir.
(Herman switches on a second device and the laser beams bend sharply to
the left.)
SCARLIONI: A prismatic beam now deflects the beams and the picture is
accessible.
(The Count applauds as the henchmen remove the painting from the wall.
Then he removes the bracelet from the projector and the room returns to
its normal appearance.)
SCARLIONI: A useful little device. Wear it always.
COUNTESS: My dear, you must be a genius.
SCARLIONI: Let's just say I come from a family of geniuses. Tonight,
enough of rehearsals. Tonight, the real thing!
[Cellar]
(The Doctor is chipping away at the old mortar in
the wall.)
ROMANA: Why do you suppose the Count's got all this equipment, Doctor?
DOCTOR: He seems to be financing some dangerous experiment with time.
The professor, of course, thinks he's breeding chickens.
DUGGAN: Stealing the Mona Lisa to pay for chickens?
ROMANA: Yes, but who'd want to buy the Mona Lisa? You can hardly show
it if it's known to be stolen.
DUGGAN: There are at least seven people in my address book who'd pay
millions for that picture for their private collection.
ROMANA: But no one could even know they'd got it!
DUGGAN: It would be an expensive gloat, but they'd buy it.
ROMANA: How are we going to move this last bit?
DOCTOR: I think I'm going to need some machinery.
DUGGAN: I've got all the machinery I need.
DOCTOR: Eh?
DUGGAN: Stand back.
(Duggan takes a short run and slams his shoulder into the loosened
brickwork. A couple of good kicks too, and he's through.)
[Secret room]
(The Doctor hands him their lamp and joins him.
There is a series of wooden doors on the wall.)
ROMANA: What are they, Doctor?
DOCTOR: I don't know.
DUGGAN: They've been here a long time. Get on with it.
(The Doctor opens one of the doors to reveal a familiar painting.)
DOCTOR: It's the Mona Lisa.
DUGGAN: Must be a fake.
DOCTOR: I don't know what's hanging in the Louvre, but this is the
genuine article.
DUGGAN: What?
(The Doctor opens the door below. Another Mona Lisa. To the side,
another, below that, another. In total he uncovers six paintings.)
DUGGAN: They must be fakes.
DOCTOR: The brushwork's Leonardo's.
DUGGAN: How can you tell?
DOCTOR: It's as characteristic as a signature. The pigment, too.
DUGGAN: On all of them?
DOCTOR: Every one. What I don't understand is why a man who's got six
Mona Lisas wants to go to all the trouble of stealing a seventh.
DUGGAN: Come on, Doctor, I've just told you. There are seven people who
would buy the Mona Lisa in secret, but nobody's going to buy the Mona
Lisa when it's hanging in the Louvre!
ROMANA: Of course. They'd each have to think they were buying the
stolen one.
DUGGAN: Right.
DOCTOR: I wouldn't make a very good criminal, would I?
SCARLIONI: No. Good criminals don't get caught. I see you've found some
of my pictures. Rather good, aren't they? By the end of this evening, I
shall have a seventh.
DOCTOR: Can I ask you where you got these?
SCARLIONI: No.
DOCTOR: Right. Or how you knew they were here?
SCARLIONI: No.
DOCTOR: They've been bricked up a long time.
SCARLIONI: Yes.
DOCTOR: I like concise answers.
SCARLIONI: Good. I came down to find Kerensky.
DOCTOR: Oh?
SCARLIONI: But he doesn't seem to be able to speak to me.
DOCTOR: Oh.
SCARLIONI: Can you throw any light on that?
DOCTOR: No.
DUGGAN: I can.
(He throws the lamp at the Count then thumps him and takes his gun.)
DOCTOR: Duggan! Duggan, why is it that every time I start to talk to
someone, you knock him unconscious?
DUGGAN: I didn't expect him to go down that easy.
DOCTOR: Well, if you don't understand heads, you shouldn't go about
hitting them.
DUGGAN: Well, what else would you suggest?
DOCTOR: Duggan! Your job is to stop his men from stealing the Mona
Lisa. The other Mona Lisa.
[Corridor]
(The Doctor leads Romana and Duggan quietly out
through the cellar and laboratory, and up the stairs into the main
house. Duggan manages to cause a noise, then he spots a gun barrel
pointing through a display of foliage plants. He picks up a vase,
dashes over and smashes it over the head of the Countess.)
DUGGAN: Sorry, my lady.
DOCTOR: I should think so, too. That was a Ming vase, second dynasty.
Absolutely priceless.
DUGGAN: Come on, we've got to get to the Louvre.
DOCTOR: No, you have. Romana, you look after him. I've got to go meet
an Italian. Middle-aged Italian. In fact, late middle-aged.
Renaissance. Come on.
[Denise Rene Gallery]
(In the Boulevard St Germain, the Doctor uses his
screwdriver to open a pair of magnetically locked glass doors and walks
through the gallery, pausing only to straighten a picture on the wall.
He opens the Tardis door.)
DOCTOR: Hello, K9. You all right?
(The Tardis dematerialises.)
[Leonardo's studio]
(The Tardis materialises in 1505, in a wonderfully
cluttered room. It is daylight, and a bird is singing in a cage by the
window. What looks like a reverse image of Battle with Horses is on an
easel nearby, and what might be Madonna with a flower on a chair near
the Tardis.)
DOCTOR: Leonardo? Leonardo? Ah, that Renaissance sunshine. Leonardo?
The paintings went down very well. Everybody loved them. Last Supper,
Mona Lisa. You remember the Mona Lisa? That dreadful woman with no
eyebrows who wouldn't sit still, eh? Your idea for the helicopter took
a bit longer to catch on, but as I say, these things take time.
(A foil tip touches the Doctor's cheek.)
SOLDIER: You.
DOCTOR: Me?
SOLDIER: Who are you? What are you doing here?
DOCTOR: Ah, well, I just dropped by to see Leonardo, actually. Is he
about?
SOLDIER: Nobody's allowed to see Leonardo.
DOCTOR: Really?
SOLDIER: He's engaged on important work for Captain Tancredi.
DOCTOR: Captain Tancredi?
SOLDIER: Do you know him?
DOCTOR: No.
SOLDIER: He'll want to question you.
DOCTOR: Well, I'll want to question him, so we can both have a little
chat, can't we.
SOLDIER: He'll be here instantly.
(The outside door opens, and a figure is silhouetted against the
daylight.)
DOCTOR: You. What are you doing here?
(The figure moves forward into the light. He looks exactly like Count
Scarlioni with but with longer hair.)
TANCREDI: I think that is exactly the question I ought to be asking
you, Doctor.
Part Three
[Louvre - Salle des Etats]
(Romana and Duggan are using torches to find their
way the dark art gallery.)
ROMANA: I thought the Louvre was meant to be well-guarded.
DUGGAN: It is. It just looks as though every alarm in the place has
been immobilised. A fantastic feat.
ROMANA: The Count's got some clever technology here as well.
(They find a guard sprawled on the floor.)
DUGGAN: There's another alarm been immobilised.
ROMANA: You've got a pretty cynical attitude to life, haven't you,
Duggan.
DUGGAN: Well, when you've been around as long as I have. How old are
you, anyway?
ROMANA: Hundred and twenty five.
DUGGAN: What?
ROMANA: It's gone!
(Four laser beams shine where the portrait of La Giaconda ought to be.)
DUGGAN: The system around it should be absolutely impregnable. It can't
be turned off!
ROMANA: Well, someone seems to have managed it somehow.
DUGGAN: But the only way that you can get into that painting is to
(He touches a laser beam. The alarm goes off.)
DUGGAN: Hells bells!
ROMANA: That's what it sounds like. Let's go!
DUGGAN: Split up. We'll meet back at the cafe.
ROMANA: But how do you suggest we get out?
DUGGAN: See that window?
ROMANA: Yes.
(Breaking glass as Duggan jumps through it.)
[Secret room]
(Professor Kerensky goes exploring the cellar and
into the walled up area beyond.)
KERENSKY: Mona Lisas.
(Then he notices the Count, still unconscious on the floor. He feels
for a pulse, then touches his forehead. The Count stirs.)
SCARLIONI: Doctor, will you explain to me exactly how you come to be in
Paris 1979 and
[Leonardo's studio]
TANCREDI: Florence 1505. I am waiting, Doctor.
DOCTOR: Well, I do flit about a bit, you know.
TANCREDI: Through time?
DOCTOR: Yes, I suppose so.
TANCREDI: How, precisely?
DOCTOR: I don't know. I don't seem to be able to help myself. There I
am, just walking along minding my own business and pop! I'm on a
different planet or even a different time. But enough of my problems.
What are you doing here?
TANCREDI: I will tell you. The knowledge will be of little use to you,
since you will shortly die. I am the last of the Jagaroth. I am also
the saviour of the Jagaroth.
DOCTOR: Well, I mean, if you're the last of them, there can't be that
many about to save, can there? Jagaroth?
TANCREDI: You've heard of us.
DOCTOR: Jagaroth. I think it was on one of my trips. Yes, you all
destroyed yourself in some massive war. Wait, when.
TANCREDI: Four hundred million years I think is the figure you're
looking for.
DOCTOR: Is it really? How time passes. So what are you doing here?
TANCREDI: Surviving. The prime motive of all species. We were not all
destroyed. A few of us escaped in a crippled spacecraft and made
planetfall in this world in its primeval time. We found it
uninhabitable.
DOCTOR: Yes, well, four hundred million years ago it would have been a
bit of a shambles. No life to tidy it up. No life.
TANCREDI: We tried to leave but the ship disintegrated. I was
fractured. Splinters of my being are scattered in time. All identical,
none complete. I am not satisfied with your explanation. How do you
travel through time?
DOCTOR: Well, as I was saying
TANCREDI: What is that box?
DOCTOR: What box?
(Tancredi points over his shoulder to the Tardis, part hidden behind a
draped curtain.)
TANCREDI: That box.
DOCTOR: That box? I don't know. I've never seen that box in my life.
Ah!
(He has spotted a portrait of a lady.)
DOCTOR: The original, I presume? Completed in 1503 and it's now what,
1505, and you're getting the old boy to do you another six, yes, which
you then brick up in a cellar in Paris for Scarlioni to find in four
hundred and seventy four time. That's a very nice piece of capital
investment.
TANCREDI: I can see that you are a dangerously clever man, Doctor. I
think it's time we conducted this conversation somewhat more formally.
DOCTOR: Oh, thank you.
TANCREDI: Hold him here while I collect the instruments of torture. If
he wags his tongue, confiscate it.
DOCTOR: How can I talk if you confiscate my
TANCREDI: You can write, can't you?
DOCTOR: Yes.
(Tancredi leaves the soldier holding the Doctor at swordpoint.)
DOCTOR: He's mad, isn't he? Must be a tough job humouring him. You
don't believe all that, do you?
SOLDIER: What?
DOCTOR: Well, Jagaroth spaceships. Isn't it. Isn't it?
SOLDIER: I'm paid simply to fight.
DOCTOR: Yes, well, I mean, quite honestly, when you think about all
that Jagaroth spaceship.
SOLDIER: When you work for the Borgias, you believe anything.
DOCTOR: The Borgias? Yes, yes, I see your point.
SOLDIER: As I said, I'm paid to fight.
DOCTOR: Yes. As I said, I see your point.
(The Doctor takes a little Polaroid camera out of his pocket. The
soldier backs off a little, worried.)
DOCTOR: No, no, it's all right, all right. Come on now. Smile. You can
do it. There you are.
(Flash!)
DOCTOR: There we are. Here we are, look.
(The Doctor holds up a photograph of the soldier.)
DOCTOR: Isn't that nice? Isn't that nice?
(The soldier leans it for a closer look and the Doctor knocks him out
with a nice uppercut to the jaw, catches him and puts him in the chair.
Then he gets a felt tip pen from his pocket and goes to a set of six
blank wooden panels to write This Is A Fake on them. He puts the last
one face down then goes to the desk by the window to write a note.)
DOCTOR [OC]: Dear Leo. Sorry to have missed you. Hope you're well.
Sorry about the mess on the panels. Just paint over, there's a good
chap. See you earlier. Love, the Doctor.
(The Doctor holds a mirror to the note to make sure he's done it
properly in Leonardo's famous reverse writing. He turns round to
discover Tancredi has returned.)
TANCREDI: Just about to pop off through time again, Doctor? How very
discourteous when I'd gone to all the trouble of fetching the
thumbscrews.
[Secret room]
SCARLIONI: Kerensky.
KERENSKY: Yes?
SCARLIONI: Where am I?
KERENSKY: In Paris, of course.
SCARLIONI: Paris.
KERENSKY: Yes.
SCARLIONI: A dream. Perhaps a dream.
KERENSKY: Who, who are you?
SCARLIONI: I am who I am, Kerensky. I am the one who pays you to work.
Now, to it. Time is short.
KERENSKY: But your face.
SCARLIONI: Do you pick a quarrel with my face, Kerensky? Beware I do
not pick a quarrel with yours. I may choose instruments somewhat
sharper than words.
KERENSKY: Who are the Jagaroth?
SCARLIONI: So, no dream. The Jagaroth. You serve the Jagaroth. Now
work!
KERENSKY: It's the Jagaroth who need all the chickens, is it?
(Scarlioni laughs.)
SCARLIONI: The chickens! You never cease to amaze me, that such a giant
intellect could live in such a tiny mind.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Scaroth!
SCARLIONI: I must think. I must have time to think.
KERENSKY: What have you been making me work for? I thought we were
working to feed the human race.
SCARLIONI: The human race. We are working for a far greater purpose, on
a scale you could not conceive. The fate of the Jagaroth is in my
hands, and you will work for my purpose willingly or unwillingly.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
(Romana breaks in to the dark cafe quietly through
the front. Duggan smashes a pane of glass to open the back door. They
meet by the bar.)
DUGGAN: I thought these places were meant to be open all night.
ROMANA: You should go into partnership with a glazier. You'd have a
truly symbiotic working relationship.
DUGGAN: What?
ROMANA: I'm just pointing out that you break a lot of glass.
DUGGAN: You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs.
(He pours her a glass of red wine, opening the bottle by breaking the
neck against the counter.)
ROMANA: If you wanted an omelette, I'd expect to find a pile of broken
crockery, a cooker in flames and an unconscious chef.
DUGGAN: Listen, I get results.
ROMANA: Do you? The Count's got the Mona Lisa.
DUGGAN: Yeah, all seven of them. You know what I don't understand?
ROMANA: I expect so.
DUGGAN: There are seven potential buyers and exactly seven Mona Lisas.
ROMANA: Yes.
DUGGAN: Yet six of them have been sitting bricked up for centuries.
ROMANA: What, buyers?
DUGGAN: No, Mona Lisas. How did the Count know where they were? How did
he know where to get them?
ROMANA: Taxes the mind, doesn't it.
[Laboratory]
(The Count throws some papers on the workbench.)
SCARLIONI: You will now see the true end product of your labours. This
is what you will now produce for me. Look at it.
KERENSKY: But Count, this machine is precisely the reverse of what we,
of what I have been working on.
SCARLIONI: But you will agree that the research you have done under my
guidance points equally well in either direction.
KERENSKY: Yes, yes, it does. It means increasing the very effect I was
trying to eliminate.
SCARLIONI: Precisely.
KERENSKY: But the scale of this is fantastic. Count, what you are
trying to do, this is monstrous beyond imagining.
SCARLIONI: But you will do it.
KERENSKY: No! A thousand times no.
SCARLIONI: What?
KERENSKY: Even if I wanted to, I could not.
SCARLIONI: Oh? Why is that?
KERENSKY: Equipment on this scale, power on this scale, it would cost
millions and millions. Even you, Count, could not afford such things.
HERMANN [OC]: Excellency!
(Hermann hurries down the stairs with a large parcel wrapped in brown
cloth.)
HERMANN: Excellency! The Mona Lisa is no longer in the Louvre!
SCARLIONI: Ha ha! Excellent, Hermann, excellent.
(They unwrap the painting.)
HERMANN: The moment the news breaks, sir, each of our seven buyers will
be ready.
SCARLIONI: And how much money will this bring us, Hermann?
HERMANN: About a hundred million dollars, sir.
SCARLIONI: Continue with your work, Professor. Enjoy it, or you will
die.
[Leonardo's studio]
(The Doctor's thumbs are in the thumbscrews, and
the soldier is about to turn the screw down when the Doctor cries out.)
TANCREDI: I haven't started yet.
DOCTOR: I know, it's just his hands are cold.
TANCREDI: So sensitive. I think we're in for a little treat.
DOCTOR: All this is totally unnecessary.
TANCREDI: You make it necessary. You will not tell me the truth.
DOCTOR: I've changed my mind. If there's one thing I can't stand, it's
being tortured by someone with cold hands. What is it you want to know?
TANCREDI: Excellent. I want to know how you travel through time.
DOCTOR: It's simple. I'm a Time Lord.
TANCREDI: And the girl? The truth.
DOCTOR: Well.
TANCREDI: Time is running out, Doctor.
DOCTOR: What do you mean, time's running out. It's only 1505.
(The soldier reaches for the thumbscrews.)
DOCTOR: All right, all right. I'll tell you. There is one thing I'd
like to know is how do you communicate across time with the other
splinters of yourself?
TANCREDI: I am asking the questions.
[Drawing room]
(Scarlioni is staring at himself in the mirror and
touching his face.)
COUNTESS: Why do you still worry, my dear? We've done it! We have the
Mona Lisa. Think of the wealth that will be ours.
SCARLIONI: The wealth is not everything.
COUNTESS: Of course. The achievement. Yes, the achievement.
SCARLIONI: Achievement? You talk to me of achievement because I steal
the Mona Lisa? Can you imagine how a man might feel who has caused the
pyramids to be built, the heavens to be mapped, invented the first
wheel, shown the true use of fire, brought up a whole race from nothing
to save his own race?
COUNTESS: What are you talking about? No one can achieve everything.
SCARLIONI: I do not ask for everything. I ask for but a single life and
the life of my people.
COUNTESS: Are you feeling all right, my dear?
JAGAROTH [OC]: Scaroth.
SCARLIONI: Yes.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Scaroth.
SCARLIONI: I'm feeling quite well. Please leave us.
COUNTESS: Us?
SCARLIONI: Me. Leave me.
JAGAROTH [OC]: Scaroth! Scaroth.
COUNTESS: Are you sure there's nothing I can do?
SCARLIONI: Go. Go!
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth.
SCARLIONI: Scaroth.
[Leonardo's studio]
(Tancredi is also having trouble with the voices
in his head.)
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth. Scaroth.
DOCTOR: Are you all right?
TANCREDI: Continue. The interface of the time continuums is unstable, I
know that. Tell me, tell me something useful.
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth!
TANCREDI: Wait!
DOCTOR: Right-o.
TANCREDI: No, not you. Continue, Doctor.
(With the soldier distracted by his Captain's behaviour, the Doctor
unlaces his thumbs from the screws with his teeth.)
SCAROTH: Scaroth!
TANCREDI: A moment!
DOCTOR: Is he often like this?
SOLDIER: I'm not paid to notice.
(Tancredi rolls his eyes and sways a lot. The Doctor fastens the
thumbscrews onto the soldier's sword and runs into the Tardis.)
TANCREDI: Yes, I know.
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth!
SOLDIER: Captain!
TANCREDI: I know. Leave us.
SOLDIER: Us?
TANCREDI: Me. Leave me!
SOLDIER: Sir.
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth!
TANCREDI: I'm coming. Yes.
SCAROTH [OC]: Scaroth! We are here. Together we are Scaroth. I am
Scaroth.
(We get an overlay of an Egyptian with a Jagaroth, then other races.)
SCAROTH [OC]: Me, together in one. The Jagaroth live through me.
Together we have pushed this puny race of humans, shaped their paltry
destiny to meet our ends. Soon we shall be. The centuries that divide
me shall be undone. The centuries that divide me shall be undone.
TANCREDI: The centuries that divide me shall be undone!
[Tardis]
(The Doctor watches him on the scanner.)
TANCREDI [on scanner]: The centuries that divide me shall be undone.
[Leonardo's studio]
TANCREDI: Undone!
(The Tardis dematerialises.)
[Drawing room]
SCARLIONI: So, the Doctor has the secret. The
Doctor and the girl.
[Denise Rene gallery]
(The Tardis returns to the Rive Gauche.)
DOCTOR: The centuries that divide me shall be undone. I don't like the
sound of that.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
(It is day, and the cafe is open. Romana drinks
coffee while Duggan sleeps at the next table.)
ROMANA: Your coffee'll get cold.
(Duggan leaps up and draws his pistol, knocking the coffee cup and
saucer to the floor.)
DUGGAN: What?
ROMANA: Here, have some coffee.
DUGGAN: That's it.
ROMANA: What?
DUGGAN: I'm washed up. I'm sent to Paris to find out if anything odd is
happening in the art world and what happens? The Mona Lisa gets stolen
under my nose. Odd, isn't in it.
ROMANA: I'm going to leave a note for the Doctor. I really think we
should go and get it back, don't you?
DUGGAN: Yeah, but which one? I've seen seven. What am I going to see
today, half a dozen Eiffel Towers lying about?
ROMANA: The real Mona Lisa. The original.
DUGGAN: Well, how do you account for the others?
ROMANA: Well, perhaps you're right. Perhaps Scarlioni has discovered a
way to travel in time. Yes, perhaps he went back in time, had a chat to
Leonardo, got him to rustle up another six, came forward in time, stole
the one in the Louvre, and now sells all seven at enormous profit.
Sound reasonable?
DUGGAN: I used to do divorce investigations. It was never like this.
ROMANA: There's only one flaw in that line of reasoning as far as I can
see.
DUGGAN: There is?
ROMANA: That equipment of Kerensky's wouldn't work effectively as a
time machine.
DUGGAN: It wouldn't.
ROMANA: You can have two adjacent time continuums running at different
rates.
DUGGAN: You can.
ROMANA: But without a field interface stabiliser, you can't cross from
one to the other.
DUGGAN: You can't.
ROMANA: I'm just guessing. Come on, let's get back to the chateau where
at least you can thump somebody.
[Outside the Louvre]
(The Doctor runs up to two gendarmes on the front
steps of the closed museum.)
DOCTOR: Well, what news?
GENDARME: Sir, it is very grave. The picture of the Mona Lisa has been
stolen.
DOCTOR: What?
(They escort him inside.)
[Louvre - Salle des Etats]
(The Gendarmerie are dusting for fingerprints and
suchlike. The Doctor taps the lady guide on the shoulder, making her
jump.)
DOCTOR: Excuse me. Ah, it's you. Did you notice two people trying to
stop that painting from being stolen last night?
GUIDE: Excuse me, monsieur?
DOCTOR: Two people. One was a pretty girl and a young man, fair hair.
He was always hitting. Shush. Were they here?
GUIDE: No, monsieur, no. But I think you should speak to the police.
DOCTOR: Shush. No time. I've got the human race to think about. Shush.
The human race.
[Notre Dame Brasserie]
(The news of the theft is on the television by the
bar, along with a potted history of the painting.)
TV: The stolen picture, probably the most famous in the world, was
painted in 1503 by Leonardo da Vinci and is of the wife of Francesco.
CUSTOMER: I'll see you.
DOCTOR: Patron, you remember those two people I was in here with
yesterday? We kept being held up and attacked. Smashing things. You
don't happen to know where they went, do you? No. They can't have been
mad enough to go back to the chateau.
(Le Patron hands the Doctor Romana's note.)
DOCTOR: Thank you. (reads) Dear Doctor, gone back to the chateau. Thank
you.
[Drawing room]
(Hermann has Duggan and Romana at gunpoint.)
HERMANN: As soon as the alarm sounded, Excellency. He was halfway
through the window and she was outside. I thought you might wish to
speak to them so I called off the dogs. They cannot be professionals.
SCARLIONI: My dear, it was not necessary for you to enter my house by,
we could hardly call it stealth. You had only to knock on the door.
I've been very anxious to renew our acquaintance. In fact, I was almost
on the point of sending out a search party.
DUGGAN: Listen, Scarlioni.
SCARLIONI: I'm speaking to the young lady. You have some knowledge
which could be very useful to me.
DUGGAN: You'd better not touch her, Scarlioni.
SCARLIONI: Oh, do be quiet.
ROMANA: I'll look after myself, thank you.
SCARLIONI: Please, do sit down. Oh.
(Scarlioni gestures Romana to put her hands down. Hermann gestures with
his gun for Duggan to put his up again.)
SCARLIONI: Now I understand you have some highly specialised knowledge
which could be of immense service to me.
ROMANA: Who, me?
SCARLIONI: I'm speaking of temporal engineering. I am told that you are
a considerable authority on time travel.
ROMANA: Well, I don't know who could have given you that idea.
SCARLIONI: Your friend the Doctor let it slip.
ROMANA: The Doctor? But he's in er
SCARLIONI: Yes, Florence, sixteenth century. That's where I, we met
him.
DUGGAN: Can anyone join in this conversation or do you need a
certificate?
SCARLIONI: If he interrupts again, Hermann, kill him.
HERMANN: Sir.
SCARLIONI: Perhaps you'd care to come downstairs and examine the
equipment in more detail?
ROMANA: And if I refuse?
SCARLIONI: Oh, must we go into vulgar threats? Let us just say that I
shall destroy Paris, if that'll help you make up your minds.
ROMANA: And am I supposed to believe you can do that?
SCARLIONI: Well, you won't know until you've seen the equipment, will
you. Bring him.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
[Laboratory]
DUGGAN: Can he?
ROMANA: What?
DUGGAN: Destroy Paris?
ROMANA: What, with this lot?
DUGGAN: Yeah.
ROMANA: No trouble. Blast the whole city through an unstablised time
field.
DUGGAN: You don't seriously believe all this time travel nonsense, do
you?
ROMANA: Do you believe wood comes from trees?
DUGGAN: What do you mean?
ROMANA: It's just a fact of life one's brought up with.
SCARLIONI: You're beginning to appreciate the truth of my words then,
are you?
ROMANA: That you can destroy Paris? Yes.
KERENSKY: Why all this talk of destruction? What are you doing with my
work?
SCARLIONI: Professor, I shall show you. Would you care to examine the
field generator?
(Kerensky steps into the middle of the apparatus.)
SCARLIONI: You will now see, my dear, how I deal with fools.
KERENSKY: No, not that switch!
(Kerensky writhes in the time field, ages, dies and turns into a
skeleton. Scarlioni smiles.)
Part Four
[Laboratory]
(The Count turns off the time field.)
SCARLIONI: The unfortunate effect of an unstablised time field. Now, I
shall do exactly the same thing to the whole of this city unless you
reveal to me the secret of how to stabilise that field.
DUGGAN: You're mad. You're insane. You're inhuman!
SCARLIONI: Quite so. When I compare my race to yours, human, I take the
word inhuman as a great compliment.
DUGGAN: You couldn't possibly
SCARLIONI: Oh, do be quiet.
ROMANA: Count, you must have realised by now that I'm not from this
planet. Why should it worry me if you destroy Paris?
DUGGAN: What are you talking about?
SCARLIONI: You had your warning. Hermann, kill him.
ROMANA: No!
SCARLIONI: Ah, so you do care. I think you've answered your own
question. Not a very clever bluff.
ROMANA: All right, what are you trying to do?
SCARLIONI: You agree to cooperate then?
ROMANA: Just tell me what you're trying to do and I'll see.
SCARLIONI: Excellent. Hermann.
HERMANN: Sir.
SCARLIONI: Take him away. Lock him up.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
SCARLIONI: I shall keep him as an insurance policy, since it is
unfortunately not possible to kill him twice.
(Duggan and Hermann leave.)
SCARLIONI: Now, my problem is very simple. Four hundred million years
ago, the spaceship which I was piloting exploded while I was trying to
take off from the surface of this planet.
ROMANA: That was clumsy of you.
SCARLIONI: A calculated risk. The spaceship sustained considerable
damage. I was in the warp control cabin and when the explosion occurred
I was flung into the time vortex and split into twelve different parts
which lead, or have led, independent but connected lives in times in
this planet's history. Not a very satisfactory mode of existence.
ROMANA: So you want to reunite yourself, yes?
SCARLIONI: More than that. I want to go back to where my spaceship is.
Was. And stop my original self from pressing the button.
ROMANA: And you were hoping to do that with this lot?
SCARLIONI: You underestimate the problems with which I was faced. My
twelve various selves have been working throughout history to push
forward this miserably primitive race so that even this low level of
technology could be available to me now.
ROMANA: But this won't work. Put yourself in that bubble and you would
either regress back to being a baby again or go forward to old age.
SCARLIONI: I had worked out a way, but it would have taken rather too
long. Now, with your help, I shall be able to return with ease. Now,
build me a field interface stabiliser. Do it.
ROMANA: All right, I'll help you.
[Drawing room]
DOCTOR: I'd like to make an appointment with Count
Scarlioni at his earliest convenience, if you don't mind, that is.
(The Doctor backs into the room, facing a thug with a gun. He nearly
bumps into the maid.)
DOCTOR: Ah, someone in authority. I wonder, would you be kind and tell
the Count that I wait upon him, please? There's a good girl.
(The maid leaves.)
DOCTOR: The silent type, eh? I once knew a boy like you. Never said a
word, very taciturn. Well, I said to him, there's no point in talking
if you've got nothing to say. Did well in the end, though. Name of
Shakespeare. Ever read any Shakespeare? Countess?
COUNTESS: A little.
(She goes to the back of the room and tweaks the head of a statuette. A
panel in the wall slides up and she removes a leather bound volume from
the secret library.)
COUNTESS: Hamlet. The first draft.
DOCTOR: What? It's been missing for centuries.
COUNTESS: It's quite genuine, I assure you.
DOCTOR: I know. I recognise the handwriting.
COUNTESS: Shakespeare's.
DOCTOR: No, mine. He'd sprained his wrist writing sonnets. Wonderful
stuff. To be or not to be, that's the question. Whether tis nobler in
the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to
take arms against a sea of troubles and. Take arms against a sea of
troubles? That's a mixed. I told him that was a mixed metaphor and he
would insist.
COUNTESS: Oh Doctor, I'm quite convinced that you're perfectly mad.
DOCTOR: Only Nor-norwest. Nobody's perfect. If you think I'm mad
because I say I met Shakespeare, where do you think your precious Count
got that?
COUNTESS: He's a collector. He has money and contacts.
DOCTOR: Contacts? Human contacts? How much do you really know about
him, eh? I think rather less than you imagine.
[Laboratory]
(Scarlioni is watching Romana work when Hermann
runs down the stairs.)
HERMANN: Excellency!
SCARLIONI: Don't tell me. The Doctor's here.
HERMANN: Why, yes, sir. So I've only just been told by the maid.
SCARLIONI: I knew it. Bring him down here.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
[Drawing room]
DOCTOR: How long have you been married to the
Count?
COUNTESS: Long enough.
DOCTOR: Long enough. I like that. Discretion and charm. So civilised.
So terribly unhelpful.
COUNTESS: Discretion and charm. I couldn't live without it, especially
in matters concerning the Count.
DOCTOR: There is such a thing as discretion. There's also such a thing
as wilful blindness.
COUNTESS: Blind? I help him to steal the Mona Lisa, the greatest crime
in the century, and you call me blind?
DOCTOR: Yes! You see the Count as a master criminal, an art dealer, an
insanely wealthy man, and you'd like to see yourself as his consort.
But what's he doing in the cellar?
COUNTESS: Tinkering. Every man must have his hobby.
DOCTOR: Man? Are you sure of that? A man with one eye and green skin,
eh? Ransacking the art treasures of history to help him make a machine
to reunite him with his people, the Jagaroth, and you didn't notice
anything? How discreet, how charming.
HERMANN: Excuse me, my lady. Doctor, the Count is very anxious to see
you in the cellar.
DOCTOR: Think about it, Countess. Think about it.
(The Countess laughs as the men leave, then becomes very serious. She
goes back to the library and takes out another book. This one is
hollow, containing parchments which she unfolds. One is a plan for a
pyramid, the other a diagram for an Egyptian wall painting of various
gods and pharaoh. The end figure has a green blob of a head, with one
eye.)
[Laboratory]
DOCTOR: Ah, Count. Hello. I wonder if you could
spare me a moment of your time. Romana, hello, how are you? I see the
Count's roped you in as a lab assistant. What are you making for him? A
model railway? Gallifreyan egg timer? I hope you're not making a time
machine. I shall be very angry.
SCARLIONI: Doctor, how very nice to see you again. It seems like only
four hundred and seventy four since we last met.
DOCTOR: Indeed, indeed, yes. I so much prefer the weather in the early
part of the sixteenth century, don't you? Where's Duggan?
(Duggan is locked in the cellar.)
DUGGAN: Doctor, get me out of here.
DOCTOR: Ah, there you are, Duggan. Are you behaving yourself? Good,
good. Now, Count, this is what I've come to say. If you're thinking of
going back in time, you'd better forget it.
SCARLIONI: And why do you say that?
DOCTOR: Well, because I'm going to stop you.
SCARLIONI: Oh no, on the contrary, Doctor, you're going to help me.
DOCTOR: I am?
SCARLIONI: You are indeed. And if you do not, it'll be so much the
worse for you, for this young lady, and for thousands of other people I
could mention if I happened to have the Paris telephone directory on my
person.
DOCTOR: Count, that sort of blackmail won't work because I know what
the consequences will be if you get what you wanted. I can't let you
fool about with time.
SCARLIONI: What else do you ever do?
DOCTOR: Ah, well, I'm a professional. I know what I'm doing. I also
know what you're doing. Romana, put the equipment down.
ROMANA: Doctor, it's all right. He just wants to get back to his
spaceship and reunite himself.
SCARLIONI: Doctor, I think we can dispense both with your interference
and with your help. Your friend has done her work very well indeed.
DOCTOR: Count, do you realise what will happen if you try to go back to
the time before history began?
SCARLIONI: Yes. Yes, I do. And I don't care one jot. Hermann.
HERMANN: Sir.
SCARLIONI: Lock them in the cellar. They shall stay long enough to
watch my departure.
HERMANN: Yes, sir.
SCARLIONI: After that, kill them in whatever way takes your fancy.
HERMANN: Very good, sir.
SCARLIONI: I must say my farewells to the Countess.
[Drawing room]
(The Countess is waiting for him, holding a
pistol)
SCARLIONI: My dear?
COUNTESS: Close the door. Now, what are you?
SCARLIONI: I beg your pardon?
COUNTESS: What have I been living with all these years? Where are you
from and what do you want?
SCARLIONI: If I may answer those questions in reverse order, what I
want is a drink. Will you have one?
COUNTESS: Stay away! Put it down! Now, who are you?
SCARLIONI: I am Scaroth.
COUNTESS: Scaroth?
SCARLIONI: Last of the Jagaroth. It has not been difficult keeping
secrets from you, my dear. A few fur coats, a few trinkets, a little
nefarious excitement.
COUNTESS: What are the Jagaroth?
SCARLIONI: The Jagaroth. An infinitely old race and an infinitely
superior one. I shall show you what you want to know, my dear.
(Scarlioni pulls off the latex mask. The Countess drops the pistol in
horror.)
SCAROTH: I am Scaroth. Through me, my people will live again. I'd glad
to see you are still wearing the bracelet I designed for you, my dear.
It is, as I said, a useful device.
(Scaroth touches his signet ring and the Countess screams in agony
before falling to the floor.)
SCAROTH: Goodbye, my dear. I'm sorry you had to die. But then, in a
short while you will have ceased ever to have existed.
[Cellar]
ROMANA: If I'd know I was helping the Jagaroth.
DUGGAN: Jagaroth?
DOCTOR: Shush.
DUGGAN: What's a Jagaroth?
DOCTOR: They're not nice to know.
ROMANA: So that's why he had to go back in time. He had to reverse
history in order to save the Jagaroth race, and I've made that
possible.
DOCTOR: Yes, without the stabiliser he only had the time bubble.
DUGGAN: And he couldn't get into that. You saw what happened to the
Professor and the chicken.
ROMANA: It doesn't travel in time, it just goes forwards or backwards
in its own lifecycle. If he'd got in it he'd just have become a baby
again.
DOCTOR: What he was really trying to do was to put the whole world in
the bubble, like those tiny jumps in time when we first arrived.
ROMANA: Of course.
DOCTOR: Cracks in time. He shifted the whole world back in time for two
seconds, but what he really wanted to do was shift the whole world back
in time four hundred million years.
ROMANA: But without the stabiliser, he couldn't have been there himself
to save his ship. Yeah, but how would he get the power? It would be
fantastic.
DOCTOR: What do you think we've been chasing about for all this time?
DUGGAN: The Mona Lisas.
DOCTOR: Yes. He couldn't have sold them anyway.
DUGGAN: Why not?
DOCTOR: Well, before Leonardo painted them, I wrote These are Fakes on
the blank board with felt tip. It would show up under any x-ray.
ROMANA: Doctor, there won't be any x-rays for it to show up on if he
gets back to that ship.
DOCTOR: No, because you supplied him with the vital component he
needed.
ROMANA: Wait a minute. When I made that component, I rigged it so that
it could only go back in time for two minutes. After that, he'd be
catapulted back to his own time, here. Now he couldn't do any harm.
DOCTOR: One minute would be sufficient for him to go back in time,
contact his ship and prevent it exploding. He wouldn't then be
splintered in time and all history would be changed.
ROMANA: We must do something to stop him.
DOCTOR: I've got an idea.
ROMANA: What?
DOCTOR: We'll ask Duggan.
BOTH: Duggan?
DUGGAN: Right, stand back again.
(Duggan shoulder-charges the door and breaks it open.)
[Laboratory]
(But Scaroth is already standing in the time
machine, with a pistol pointed at them.)
SCAROTH: You now see me as I truly am.
DOCTOR: Very pretty.
SCAROTH: And you will see the culmination of my live's work.
DOCTOR: How very fulfilling for you.
SCAROTH: For thousands upon thousands of years my various splintered
selves have been working for this moment, and now, with the aid of this
device, so kindly supplied by the young lady, I shall be able to make
this equipment into a fully operational machine. I'm well aware of the
limitations you have built into it, my dear. They will not affect the
outcome. I shall return to my spaceship the moment before it exploded
and stop myself from pressing the button. You will not be able to read
the settings on the dial, Doctor. They will explode as soon as
activated.
(Scaroth switches on and puts down the pistol.)
SCAROTH: Goodbye, Doctor.
(Scaroth fades away and the machine goes bang!)
DUGGAN: Well, that's got rid of that, then. I need a drink.
DOCTOR: What? We're going on a journey.
DUGGAN: Where to?
ROMANA: Four hundred million years ago.
DUGGAN: Where?
DOCTOR: Just don't ask. Come on.
ROMANA: We haven't got the time or place coordinates, Doctor.
[Corridor]
DOCTOR: The Jagaroth will leave a faint trace
through time, but we can only follow it if we get to the Tardis in
minutes. Come on.
DUGGAN: Mad, mad. They're absolutely mad.
[Paris]
(They run down the Champs Elysees, dicing with the
French traffic, then try to hail a taxi.)
DOCTOR: Is no one interested in history?
(They keep running to the Boulevard Saint Germain.)
[Denise Rene Gallery]
(Two guest stars are doing their cameo in front of
the Tardis.)
CLEESE: To me, one of the most curious things about this piece is its
wonderful afunctionalism.
ELEANOR: Yes, I see what you mean. Divorced from its function and seen
purely as a piece of art, its structure of line and colour is curiously
counterpointed by the redundant vestiges of its function.
CLEESE: And since it has no call to be here, the art lies in the fact
that it is here.
(The Doctor unlocks the Tardis and enters, followed by Romana and
Duggan. The Tardis dematerialises.)
ELEANOR: Exquisite. Absolutely exquisite.
[400 million years BC]
(The Doctor, Romana and Duggan step out onto the
dead dry land under the angry red sky. The wind howls mournfully.)
DUGGAN: Where are we?
DOCTOR: This will be the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
(Utter rubbish, Doctor. Get your geology right.)
DUGGAN: We're standing on land.
ROMANA: He's out of his depth.
DOCTOR: Duggan, we are where I promised we'd be. Four hundred million
years back in Earth history.
ROMANA: I can see why the Jagaroth wanted to leave.
DOCTOR: Yes.
(The Doctor takes out his telescope.)
ROMANA: Where's the Count?
DOCTOR: He'll be here. Ah. There's the Jagaroth ship. The last of the
Jagaroth, a vicious, callous, war-like race. The universe won't miss
them.
[Outside the spaceship]
ROMANA: You can see why it must have exploded.
DOCTOR: Yes.
ROMANA: Its atmospheric thrust motors are disabled. The idiots'll try
to take off on warp drive.
DUGGAN: That's a spaceship!
(The Doctor dips his hand in a nearby pool and stands up with dirty
fingers.)
DOCTOR: The amniotic fluid from which all life on Earth will spring,
where the amino acids fuse to form minute cells. Cells which eventually
evolve into vegetable and animal life. You, Duggan.
(The Doctor taps some of the sludge into Duggan's hand, and throws the
rest back into the pool.)
DUGGAN: I come from that, that soup?
DOCTOR: Yes. Well, not that soup exactly. It's inert. There's no life
in it yet. It's waiting on a massive dose of radiation.
ROMANA: The Jagaroth ship.
DOCTOR: Yes. The explosion that caused Scarlioni to splinter in time
also caused the birth of the human race, and that's what's about to
happen. The birth of life itself.
DUGGAN: Here, while we watch?
DOCTOR: No, no, if we were watching we'd be in dead trouble. We've got
to stop Scaroth.
DUGGAN: Scaroth?
DOCTOR: Yes, that's his real name. If we don't stop him, the entire
human race will cease to exist instantly.
ROMANA: Doctor.
DOCTOR: Hmm?
(Scaroth has arrived.)
SCAROTH: Stop! Stop, my brothers! In the names of the lives of all of
us, stop!
DOCTOR: Scaroth. We've got to stop him.
SCAROTH: Keep out of my way. I must get to the ship.
DOCTOR: No, Scaroth, you can't.
SCAROTH: I'm in that ship. I'm in the warp control cabin. I must stop
myself pressing the button.
DOCTOR: No, Scaroth, no. You've pressed it once. You've thrown the dice
once. You don't get a second throw.
SCAROTH: But I will splinter in time again, and all my people will be
killed!
DOCTOR: No! The explosion that you in there are about to trigger off
will give birth to the human race. The moment your race kills itself,
another is born. That has happened. It will happen.
SCAROTH: What do I care of the human race? Scum! The tools of my
salvation.
DOCTOR: No, the product of your destruction. History cannot change. It
cannot!
SCAROTH: I will change it!
(So Duggan punches his lights out.)
DOCTOR: Duggan. Duggan. I think that was possibly the most important
punch in history.
(Scaroth vanishes.)
DOCTOR: His time's up. He's gone back to the chateau.
(The spaceship engines are starting up.)
ROMANA: Let's get back to the Tardis.
DUGGAN: The ship! It's about to take off!
DOCTOR: It's about to explode, you mean. Come on!
(They dash back to the Tardis and dematerialise just before the
Jagaroth ship lifts off and tucks its feet under it, and goes KaBOOM!
all over again.)
[Laboratory]
(Hermann has come down the stairs with some papers
and is looking at them when Scaroth appears in the time bubble. This is
his first sight of the true face of his master, and he picks up a large
plastic bottle from the bench.)
SCAROTH: No, Hermann, no. It's me!
(Hermann throws the bottle into the time bubble. The machine explodes
and starts a fire, then the stairs collapse.)
[Eiffel Tower]
DUGGAN: The one nearest the wall?
DOCTOR: Mmm. It was the only one that wasn't damaged in the fire.
DUGGAN: But it's a fake! You can't hang a fake Mona Lisa in the Louvre.
ROMANA: How can it be a fake if Leonardo painted it?
DUGGAN: With the words This is a Fake written under the paintwork in
felt tip.
ROMANA: It doesn't affect what it looks like.
DUGGAN: It doesn't matter what it looks like.
DOCTOR: Doesn't it? Well, some people would say that's the whole point
of painting.
DUGGAN: But they'll find out. They'll x-ray it.
DOCTOR: Serves them right. If they have to x-ray it to find out whether
it's good or not, they might as well have painting by computer.
ROMANA: Like we have at home.
DOCTOR: Mmm.
DUGGAN: Home.
DOCTOR: Mmm.
DUGGAN: Yes. Where do you two come from?
DOCTOR: From? Well, I suppose the best way to find out where you've
come from is to find out where you're going and then work backwards.
DUGGAN: Where are you going?
DOCTOR: I don't know.
ROMANA: Nor do I.
DOCTOR: Goodbye.
(The Doctor and Romana leave. Duggan goes the opposite way and stops by
a souvenir kiosk, where he purchases a postcard of the Mona Lisa. Then
he returns to the barrier to look down to the Champ du Mars where two
small figures stop and turn around, then wave.)
DOCTOR: Bye, bye, Duggan!
|