The Complete Inspector Morse

by David Bishop

  The inspector is persuaded to join a party at the women’s hostel but chooses orange juice over a can of Leopard Lager.

  UNLUCKY IN LOVE: Morse disparages female clerics, but is taken with Emma Pickford, who is attractive and approachable. As soon as he meets her Morse instantly smoothes a hand over his thinning hair, trying to look his best. Later in the story Emma says she never knows whether to be pleased or alarmed when Morse appears. He says he’s only pleased to see her. The inspector invites her out for dinner.

  Morse is heartily embarrassed when Emma sends him a bunch of roses at the station. They get on very well during dinner. Next morning he has an unusual spring in his step. Did the inspector make love with Emma? It is never explicitly stated but seems likely. When the case is over, she apologises for lying to him.

  LEWIS’ KITH AND KIN: Lewis likes his women a bit plump. His wife has joined a slimming class, despite Lewis’ protestations. She is going to ban him from having fish and chips in the house. The sergeant has to baby-sit while his wife goes to a slimming club promotional event for new members. His mother-in-law is not available to look after the children. That night he takes his son and daughter along to collect his wife after the slimming promotion.

  SOPHOCLES DID DO IT: Morse accuses Mandeville of having Victoria’s room ransacked.

  ONE FOR THE MORGUE: Victoria Hazlett dies of a cardiac arrest after she takes a combination of painkillers, communion wine and a prototype slimming drug.

  MURDERS: none. BODY COUNT: one.

  CRYPTIC CROSSWORDS: Morse works on the Times crossword while waiting to invite Emma to dinner.

  QUOTE-UNQUOTE: Morse describes female clerics as muscular Girl Guides just before meeting the very attractive Emma. ‘Dib dib dib, sir,’ Lewis comments wryly.

  The inspector is scathing to Mandeville: ‘I doubt your God would have much truck with the likes of me. At least, I hope he wouldn’t.’

  A nun is unimpressed by Morse’s threats to compel her to help him: ‘Oh, you ridiculous man! Of course you couldn’t. I answer to a much higher authority than the Thames Valley Police.’

  The inspector is offered beer or orange juice. The poor quality of the canned lager makes him utter five truly astounding words: ‘I’ll have the orange juice.’

  SOUNDTRACK: Dinah Newberry is seen singing the Mozart aria ‘Laudate Dominum’ from the Vesperae Solennes de Confessore during the title sequence. An orchestral recording of the same piece is heard several times during the story. Beethoven’s String Quartet No 7 in F Major is heard as Morse is driving through Oxford early in the case. Mendelssohn’s ‘Venetian Gondola Song’ (Opus 19, No 6 in G Minor) plays while Morse and Emma have dinner. Bach’s ‘Well Tempered Clavichord’ (Book II, Prelude No 14) is heard when Morse finally tracks down Boyd.

  BEHIND THE CRIME SCENES: Maureen Bennett gets her first screen credit in this story as Val Lewis, the sergeant’s wife, but she still doesn’t get any dialogue.

  IDENTITY PARADE: Zoë Wanamaker has appeared in films, television and the theatre. She starred in the BBC sitcom My Family and was BAFTA-nominated for her role in the first Prime Suspect with Helen Mirren. Peggy Mount steals her one scene, appearing as a belligerent nun. The veteran actress was best-known for her roles in sitcoms like George and the Dragon and The Larkins. Maggie O’Neill subsequently starred in Peak Practice (after Kevin Whately had left the show), before appearing in the first four series of the BAFTA-winning drama series Shameless.

  RATINGS: 14.97 million.

  THE VERDICT: ‘Fat Chance’ gives us a murder case without a murder. The only death is accidental and the villains of the piece all escape meaningful prosecution. Alma Cullen’s story focuses on two issues – women being ordained as priests and the pressure placed on people to conform to a fashionable body shape. From these she draws an intriguing tale with a rare romantic interlude for Morse. There are plenty of delightful character moments, but the central mystery lets this story down.

  The show’s pacing is often leisurely, but here it is verging on the glacial. Even Morse comments on the fact that he and Lewis don’t seem to be getting anywhere. The absence of a killer removes any sense of jeopardy, making the case seem rather inconsequential.

  WHO KILLED HARRY FIELD?

  ‘Beware all thieves and imitators of other people’s labour and talents, of laying your audacious hands upon our work.’ A failed artist is murdered and his body concealed for a week. The trail leads Morse and Lewis to a decades-old case of forgery.

  UK TX: 13 March 1991

  SCREENPLAY: Geoffrey Case, based on characters created by Colin Dexter

  DIRECTOR: Colin Gregg

  CAST: Geraldine James (Helen Field), Freddie Jones (Harry Field Senior), John Castle (Tony Doyle), Nicola Cowper (Jane Marriott), Ronald Pickup (Ian Matthews), Trevor Byfield (Harry Field), Steven Payne (Sergeant Taylor), Andy Mulligan (Gordon Collins), Helena Lymbery (barmaid), Sean Cranitch (patrolman), David Belcher (landlord), Philip Locke (Freddie Mortimer), Veronica Lang (Julia), Vania Vilers (Paul Eirl), Jeremy Clyde (Roger McMill), Dicken Ashworth (George Drummond), Anna Patrick (Eirl’s secretary), Stephen Grothgar (Carl), Brian Lipson (McCabe)

  STORYLINE: Painter Harry Field drinks whisky in his studio while priming a canvas. Tony Doyle drives to the studio but doesn’t go in. Later Jane Marriott arrives on foot, carrying a painting. She throws the picture at Harry, along with a fistful of bank notes. He rides off into the night on his motorcycle. His wife Helen visits the studio. Harry has slashed a portrait of her. She throws acid at another of his paintings in retaliation.

  Several days later, Harry’s body is discovered in a dry riverbed, beneath a bridge. There is no identification on the corpse. It rained over the weekend but the body is dry – it was clearly kept somewhere else, then dumped. Lewis wants to have a quiet word with Morse. The inspector finds a copy of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act on Lewis’ desk, better known as the PACE regulations.

  The sergeant discovers Harry’s identity from keys found on the copse. The dead man owned a Vincent Black Shadow motorcycle. The detectives visit Harry’s studio. Nearly all the nude paintings feature the same female model.

  The inspector talks to Helen, Harry’s widow, who says her husband trained to be a painter but made his living from cleaning and restoration work. Helen says she got a call from Harry on Thursday, but the forensic report suggests he had already been dead four days by then. Harry’s motorcycle is found at a pub.

  Lewis says he wants to apply for promotion, even if it means going back into uniform at the traffic division. The detectives go to Harry’s wake. A friend of the dead man recalls going with Harry to a wine festival at Cahors in France.

  Morse finds a Latin motto on the back of a landscape Harry was painting and traces it to an old Oxford family. The house is now owned by a Frenchman, Paul Eirl. The same house is depicted in the painting. The estate is a short walk from the pub where Harry’s motorcycle was found. The detectives visit the estate; Lewis knows the security guard. The house and estate are for sale at £8.2 million. Eirl only uses the property twice a year and denies knowing Harry.

  Lewis notices an Oxford landmark in one of Harry’s paintings. He uses the picture to find the dead man’s model, Jane Marriott. Art history lecturer Ian Matthews tells Morse that Eirl is talking of donating two million pounds to finance a new chair at Oxford University. He also tells Morse about the art collection put together by Eirl’s father – it’s reputed to be the finest group of Renaissance paintings never seen. Rumour has it some of the pictures were acquired by dubious means during the Second World War. The collection includes the only known portrait of Bellini by Dürer, recognised as such when cleaned 40 years ago. Eirl is planning to lease the collection to Britain for ten years, at a cost of five million pounds.

  Jane met Harry through Doyle, but she denies knowing Eirl – as does Harry’s father. Eirl’s home in France is less than 20 miles from where Harry went to the wine festival. Harry’s father also denies knowing anyone c
alled Eirl.

  Harry had been given £18,000, and the detectives think it came from Eirl. Meanwhile, a mysterious fire destroys a shed on Eirl’s estate. Morse suspects Harry’s body was stored in the shed and decides to get a warrant to question Eirl and his staff. But that night Eirl is murdered on his estate. A spike severed his spinal column.

  One of Eirl’s cars had been disinfected inside. A single phone call was made from the car to Eirl’s house. Morse believes Eirl had Harry call to leave a message for Helen – but the call actually went to a tape recorder. This was played to Helen’s answering machine four days later, to create an alibi for Eirl. Harry’s body was transported in the car, which was scrubbed out afterwards. Lewis says they’ll never be able to prove it.

  Helen had an affair with Doyle. Harry took her portrait to the studio and slashed the canvas; Doyle went to recover it but lost his nerve.

  Morse interviews Harry’s father. He and another artist forged the Dürer paintings in the Eirl collection in 1946, while restoring pictures for Eirl’s father. Harry was hired by Eirl to clean up the paintings. Harry Senior murdered Eirl because he believed his son was slain for threatening to expose the fakes.

  Jane says Eirl promised to buy some of Harry’s paintings, but the French millionaire actually only wanted to buy the model. Jane had a row with Harry, calling him a pimp. She believes he rushed off to confront Eirl and got murdered.

  Lewis ultimately decides against applying for a transfer.

  THE MANY CAMEOS OF COLIN DEXTER: The author appears in academic robes among a group of dons talking with Paul Eirl in an Oxford college.

  DRINK UP, LEWIS: Helen asks the inspector if he drinks at lunchtime – plainly she doesn’t know him well. Morse drinks a pint of beer while interviewing her in a country pub. She has gin and tonic.

  Morse always goes for a drink after having his car serviced.

  Morse drinks a pint and Lewis has an orange juice while they discuss the sergeant’s quest for promotion. Later that day the inspector drinks Glenfiddich whisky in his office. He has Scotch at Harry’s wake, while Lewis sips orange juice again.

  Morse samples some white wine at the warehouse of Harry’s wine merchant.

  The detectives rendezvous at the Crooked Chimney pub. Morse has already had a pint by the time Lewis arrives. The sergeant doesn’t get to drink.

  Morse has a single malt whisky with his friend Ian Matthews.

  LEWIS’ KITH AND KIN: As the story opens the sergeant has just been to sunny Yorkshire for the weekend. Lewis says the extra money a promotion brings would help with his kids’ growing up. They seem to spend a fortune every time he turns round. Lewis used to enjoy art at school, much more than maths. The sergeant’s wife believes he would be miserable if promoted to traffic.

  ONE FOR THE MORGUE: Harry Field is murdered by Paul Eirl or one of his men. Eirl is stabbed in the spine with a spike by Harry Field Senior.

  MURDERS: two. BODY COUNT: two.

  QUOTE-UNQUOTE: A Geordie car mechanic takes offence at the inspector’s brusque manner: ‘I heard you meself, you cantankerous old bugger!’

  Morse gets all melancholy: ‘Here we are again, Lewis. Putting together the last moments of a complete stranger’s life.’

  The inspector laughs heartily at a fake Latin motto but Lewis is less impressed. ‘It’s the way you tell ’em, sir,’ the sergeant says dryly.

  Morse believes a copy of PACE on a CID sergeant’s desk means one of two things: ‘He hasn’t got enough work, or his wife wants him to be an inspector.’

  SOUNDTRACK: Composer Barrington Pheloung created a musical facsimile of Fats Waller’s classic ‘Ain’t Misbehavin’’, right down to the original’s out-of-tune notes – a forgery in a story about forgery. Mozart’s Piano Concerto No 15 (K450) plays as Morse drives towards Eirl’s house for the first time. Harry’s father listens to the final chorale of Bach’s St Matthew Passion when Lewis arrives to interview him at home.

  IDENTITY PARADE: Geraldine James is familiar from her roles in the mini-series The Jewel in the Crown, appearing opposite John Thaw in three episodes of Kavanagh QC and as Mrs Pincher in the hit sketch show Little Britain. Veteran actor Freddie Jones’ career has spanned five decades in film and television. He featured in four projects by maverick director David Lynch, including The Elephant Man and Dune.

  RATINGS: 15.24 million. A fortnight’s gap since the last episode to accommodate live football didn’t harm Morse’s audience pulling power at all.

  THE VERDICT: ‘Who Killed Harry Field?’ is among Morse’s most frustrating cases. He knows who’s responsible for the first murder but can’t prove it. He discovers a celebrated painting is actually a forgery, but it’s destroyed before he can prove it. The inspector catches the second killer, only to discover the murder was committed with the right intentions but for the wrong reason. Morse is constantly thwarted, like so many other characters in this story.

  The subplot about Lewis contemplating trying for promotion adds a fresh twist to the relationship between him and Morse, but is conveniently reversed as the episode ends. Morse’s insomnia gets even shorter shrift, being mentioned twice and then promptly forgotten. Despite these minor flaws, Geoffrey Case’s script keeps the audience guessing and the episode’s visuals are both elegant and unfussy.

  GREEKS BEARING GIFTS

  ‘Almost operatic. A Greek tragedy.’ Blackmail leads to two murders and a baby’s abduction in this tale of clashing cultures and private passions.

  UK TX: 20 March 1991

  SCREENPLAY: Peter Nichols, based on characters created by Colin Dexter

  DIRECTOR: Adrian Shergold

  CAST: Martin Jarvis (Randall Rees), Jan Harvey (Friday Rees), James Hazeldine (Digby Tuckerman), James Faulkner (Basilios Vasilakis), Richard Pearson (Jerome Hogg), Mike Kremastoules (Nicos Capparis), Andreas Markos (Mr Papas), Eileen Way (Mrs Papas), Stephen Holland (young husband – TV interview), Edda Sharpe (young wife – TV interview), Andrew Kazamia (Dino Papas), Eve Adam (Jocasta Georgiadis), Elvira Poulianou (Maria Capparis), Carole Ashby (Laura), Jonny Lee Miller (student), Lucy Maycock (Daisy), Emma Cunningham (Student Union official), Ian Sharp (first angler), Rosalind March (Susie Tuckerman), Rebecca Lamb (mother’s help), Sarah Bullen (Mrs Vasilakis)

  STORYLINE: Nicos Capparis waits at his flat for a visitor. He puts photos of a young baby on display. Nicos reassures his downstairs neighbours, an elderly Greek couple called Papas, who are watching a television programme hosted by Friday Rees. Nicos ushers his visitor upstairs. Mr Papas goes out for cigarettes. Nicos is murdered by his visitor. Mr Papas sees something perplexing on his way home.

  Lewis is having dinner with his wife at a Greek restaurant, the Acropolis, but service is very slow. The sergeant gets called away before the food is served. He arrives at Nicos’ flat. It transpires the dead man was a chef at the Acropolis. Nicos’ neck was broken by someone who knew what they were doing. Morse learns the Papas’ son Dino manages the Acropolis. But the inspector is stymied from learning more by the language barrier between himself and the Papas.

  At the restaurant Morse clashes with the owner, Basilios Vasilakis, who refused to let Dino leave to act as an interpreter. Dino says Nicos’ family has its own taverna in Greece. Next day, Strange remonstrates with Morse for annoying Vasilakis, a prominent member of the Greek community in Britain. The inspector secures the services of an interpreter, Jocasta Georgiadis. The Papas say the baby in the photos found in Nicos’ flat belongs to the dead man’s sister, Maria. Another photo shows a trireme, an ancient Greek war-galley.

  Morse attends a High Table dinner at an Oxford college. An old don, Jerome Hogg, suggests the inspector talk to an expert on ancient Greek maritime warfare, Randall Rees. Randall is married to TV host Friday Rees; both are at the dinner. Rees says a symposium on his specialist subject was held in Greece the previous summer. The full-scale reconstruction of a trireme was one of the event’s major triumphs.

  Lewis’ wife recorded a television programme made by
Rees about the trireme. Nicos had worked in England before, spending a summer at a hotel in Devon run by Digby Tuckerman, who has left a trail of failed businesses behind him. Nicos’ sister Maria also worked at the hotel. She arrives in England with a baby. Dino meets her at the airport. Tuckerman goes to the airport too, but misses Maria.

  The inspector asks Jocasta to keep an eye on Maria. Tuckerman wants to bring a trireme to England to decorate a historical maritime theme park he is planning to open. Vasilakis is strongly opposed to the scheme.

  Maria slips away from Jocasta, leaving her baby with the Papas family. Dino says the baby was sired by an Englishman during the symposium. Nicos discovered the man was married and thought they would pay to keep the baby a secret. The detectives watch the programme about triremes. It concludes with a dinner at the taverna run by Nicos’ family. Among those present are Nicos, Maria, Rees, Vasilakis and, in the background, Tuckerman.

  Maria’s baby is abducted from Mrs Papas outside her home. The detectives ponder who could have fathered the child, but dismiss Rees. He and Friday appeared on TV in the past, announcing they couldn’t have children.

  A fisherman discovers Maria’s body in the Cherwell. She was killed by the same method used on her brother. The inspector questions Tuckerman, who thinks Vasilakis is trying to frame him. Tuckerman drives to his rival’s home, takes a carving knife from the kitchen and tries to stab Vasilakis. But the Greek businessman disarms him. Morse arrives and has Tuckerman arrested for assault. Vasilakis and his wife were at the opera seeing Der Rosenkavalier when Maria was killed, putting them beyond suspicion.

  Morse tries to watch the trireme documentary again. Unable to control the remote, he stumbles across a broadcast of Friday’s television show. She talks about taking a self-defence class. Rees appears with her. Friday says not being able to have children has brought them even closer together.

  A forensics team finds traces of Maria’s bodily fluids and hair in Rees’ car. Morse goes to see Rees and Friday at home. Morse finds Friday with the baby. She says her husband is the father. She claims he murdered Nicos and Maria because he was terrified of being blackmailed.