return to Due South: season 2 episode 16 "The Duel"
The Duel
air date May 2, 1996
Scene 1
Fraser and Vecchio are on their way into a county jail or similar.
VECCHIO: This won't take long. The guy will tell the parole board he wants out, the arresting officer—that's me—will tell them that he's an animal, then they'll put him back in for another year.
FRASER: Well, if it's a foregone conclusion, why go through the exercise?
VECCHIO: 'Cause this is a democracy. [He puts his phone on the security desk and signs a clipboard.]
FRASER: What's making you so edgy today?
VECCHIO: What are you talking about, edgy? That's me. I always got edge.
FRASER: It's not every day you check your cell phone instead of your gun. [He signs the clipboard himself while Vecchio takes his phone back and puts his gun on the table.] Thank you kindly.
Vecchio's track record when predicting how long legal proceedings will take (and how they'll end up) is not the best, is it? Also, the suggestion that the trappings of democracy are just pro forma is extremely uncomfortable and on the nose, and yet again I am wondering why we have to love a cop show.
Scene 2
Vecchio is sitting at a table with the prosecutor in a parole hearing. Also present are the parole board (a White woman, a Black woman, and a man with a beard) to their left and the incarcerated person and his attorney to their right. A couple of COs are standing guard, and Fraser is sitting on a windowsill, observing.
COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE: While incarcerated, my client, Mr. Carver, earned a PhD in chemistry—oh, and a master's in, ah, mechanical engineering—from Northwestern University. [He goes on talking about Carver's accomplishments, but the focus shifts to our heroes. Carver is glaring at Vecchio.] He, uh, wrote a computer program that teaches science to elementary school students, and this program changed at least twenty-four schools in the Chicago area.
VECCHIO: [over his shoulder to Fraser] This is one sick dude.
FRASER: [quietly] I'm sure he is.
VECCHIO: [over his shoulder to Fraser] You can tell he's bad news just by looking at him.
FRASER: [quietly] Well, actually, Ray, I think he seems presentable.
VECCHIO: [over his shoulder to Fraser] Then how do you know he's bad news?
FRASER: [quietly] Because you said he was bad news.
COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE: Ah, Mr. Carver also helped to reorganize the prison library. Now he gets full marks at every evaluation as a well-behaved, model prisoner. Now, if the word rehabilitation does not apply to my client, then I think maybe we should just remove it from the dictionary.
VECCHIO: Charles Carver is a vicious predator who should not be put back on the street.
WHITE WOMAN ON THE PAROLE BOARD: Predator? His records show only one arrest and conviction for arson.
VECCHIO: He's lived with a series of women —
COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE: Hardly a crime.
VECCHIO: — one of whom is missing and the other who is dead. Now, we've never nailed this turkey for any of those, but —
COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE: Excuse me, but Detective Vecchio is completely out of line. My client has never been accused of, never mind arrested for, any other crime.
PROSECUTOR: Detective Vecchio, as the arresting officer, has spent time with this prisoner.
COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENSE: Which produced no further charges. Look, are we going to start incarcerating people based on groundless accusations?
CARVER: I would like a chance to show Detective Vecchio that I've learned a great deal while in prison, and that he greatly underestimates this . . . turkey.
One of the parole board members stamps the paperwork: PAROLE GRANTED.
This is a rare instance of "X, never mind Y" being used in the correct order, and I appreciate the defense attorney for getting it right.
I love Fraser for saying he knows Carver is bad news because Vecchio said so. But I don't know why I love that; it's definitely got the ACAB odor about it, and it's not really Fraser's style, is it.
Scene 3
The prosecutor is at home in a very nice apartment. She shrugs out of her bathrobe and steps into the shower. She gets her hair wet, soaps up the loofah, scrubs down. While she's rinsing her hair, something hangs down and bumps into her. She turns around, sees the thing, and screams. It is a turkey wing.
There's a lot too much woman-taking-a-shower and soft-focus saxophone music here for my taste. There wasn't even this much nudity when the first Mackenzie King was getting ready for her date with Fraser. For my money, we could have had a montage of woman-alone-in-her-apartment stuff instead of spending so much time with her in the shower and still been properly horrified by the turkey falling on her head while she has shampoo in her eyes.
Credits roll.
Paul Gross
David Marciano
Beau Starr
Tony Craig
Catherine Bruhier
(plus Lincoln the dog)
Ramona Milano, Colm Feore, Lisa Houle, Anthony Sherwood, Dave Nichols, Katayoun Amini
Scene 4
Vecchio and Fraser are driving through the city; they park up and get out of the car.
FRASER: Thanks for driving me by here, Ray. Apparently, there was a special request that someone from the Canadian Consulate pay a visit.
VECCHIO: To a building that hasn't been built yet?
FRASER: That wasn't mentioned, no. [They are looking at a wall made of a couple of boards of masonite with a big sign on them reading "The Future Home of The Hampshire Building CONSTRUCTION STARTS SOON!!!!"]
VECCHIO: Who made the request?
FRASER: I don't know. Perhaps it was some kind of miscommunication. [Vecchio's phone rings.]
VECCHIO: Vecchio. . . . Yeah, all right, I'm all over it. [hangs up] Well, I just got a call. Building up the street.
Scene 5
Fraser and Vecchio are being let into a very nice apartment by a housekeeper whom we'll just call Mrs. MacGuffin because why not?
MRS. MACGUFFIN: Inside. I'll make more tea.
FRASER: Thank you kindly.
VECCHIO: Hey, Maddie, what's going on?
PROSECUTOR (MADDIE): [wrapped up in her bathrobe, hair still wet, drinking what is probably hot tea from a mug] Hey.
VECCHIO: We got a call to this address on a six-thirty-four-point-two?
MADDIE: Yeah. In the bathroom. [Vecchio heads for the bathroom. Fraser nods politely; Maddie doesn't know him.] Hi.
FRASER: Hi. Excuse us. [He calls to Vecchio.] Ray, what exactly is a six-thirty-four-point-two?
VECCHIO: [from the bathroom] Turkey in the shower?
MADDIE: [feeling a little silly now, but] I didn't see it. It seemed like it sort of grabbed me, and I sort of freaked.
FRASER: Understandably.
Vecchio brings the turkey out and puts it on the table.
VECCHIO: All right, Maddie. If you don't mind, we're going to have to ask you a few questions. [He opens his notebook.] Is there anybody in your life who's a practical joker?
MADDIE: No.
VECCHIO: Any weirdos or creeps that have a crush on you?
MADDIE: The hours that I work, it's pretty much no guys.
VECCHIO: Well, Benny, I guess you're going to want to lick it.
FRASER: Why is that, Ray?
VECCHIO: To see where it came from.
FRASER: Well, it's obvious it came from a supermarket. It's a standard frozen turkey. Self-basting. [He is putting on a latex glove.]
VECCHIO: Yeah. Looks like we're not going to get any fingerprints off it.
FRASER: I think that's unlikely.
VECCHIO: [looking at the door] No obvious signs of forced entry. You know, Maddie, I'm going to have a team come down to take a look around, if you don't mind.
MADDIE: Yeah.
FRASER: [shining his penlight up the turkey] I get sent to this neighborhood by an inauthentic call. Coincidentally, you receive a call that sends you to a nearby apartment, which coincidentally belongs to an assistant state's attorney who attended a parole hearing during which, coincidentally, you called the prisoner a turkey.
VECCHIO: Carver.
FRASER: Mm. [He puts down the light and reaches into the cavity.]
MADDIE: So we can arrest him.
VECCHIO: For what? Assault with poultry?
FRASER: [pulling something out of the turkey] Very heavy giblets. [He unwraps it.]
VECCHIO: Toy bus.
FRASER: Line twenty-eight.
VECCHIO: That's the Kenwood bus. . . . Maddie, don't be alone today. [He rushes out.]
FRASER: Thank you kindly.
He leaves the glove and the turkey but takes the bus.
They can't arrest Carver for this, but they can probably question him, don't you think? (On a whim, I googled "Chicago police 634.2" and found this incident reporting guide, on which there is nothing by that number. But it was revised in 2018, so maybe in 1996 there really was a 634.2, who knows.)
Scene 6
Fraser and Vecchio are zooming across town in the car. The red light is on the dash.
VECCHIO: It started with a young woman named Katie Banks. We found her body under a bridge. She'd been living with Carver. She bought him a car, a stereo, and a computer with her family money. And then he shacked up with a woman fifteen years older. She ended up dead, but after putting Carver in her will.
FRASER: Well, what was the cause of death?
VECCHIO: Accidental. At least that's all we could show. This guy is cruel, gets inside their heads.
FRASER: So you think it's possible that he drove her to kill herself, then made it look like an accident?
VECCHIO: It's possible. Then within weeks he found Helen Harris. Now, Ms. Harris was willing to talk to us about the physical and psychological abuse, but she disappeared. And then we got lucky. A building burned down that he had an interest in? And I scoured the scene, and I found the heel of a shoe that matched one that I found at his townhouse.
FRASER: So he slipped up?
VECCHIO: The only time. Now, we couldn't get him for what he did to those women, but we were able to put him away for a few years. He was furious, screaming it was a bum rap. Made him nuts that he got caught. . . . Here's our bus.
They jump out of the car and get the bus just as it's starting to pull away. Fraser tips his hat to the driver.
FRASER: Kenwood?
DRIVER: You got it.
CARVER: [watching through binoculars] Nice move.
Fraser and Vecchio walk back down the bus aisle looking for seats. Carver flips a switch on a remote controller and blows the brake line on the bus; which the driver notices the next time he goes to slow down.
DRIVER: What the . . .?
The driver toggles his emergency stop switch, but nothing happens. The passengers are concerned. Then Carver flips another switch and the bus speeds up.
DRIVER: Hey!
VECCHIO: No brakes?
DRIVER: No, and the accelerator — it's stuck. Everybody hang on!
The driver does a mad swerve around a car at a red light. The person he avoided rear-ending sighs in relief. Horns blare as he barrels through the intersection. Passengers are screaming.
FRASER: All right, Ray, you know this area?
VECCHIO: Yeah.
FRASER: Okay, we need to find somewhere nice and soft to land in.
VECCHIO: In the middle of the city?
FRASER: Think, ah, goose down or shaving cream.
VECCHIO: Shaving cream? You think somebody's going to have a pile of shaving cream —
FRASER: No, Ray —
VECCHIO: — piled up somewhere in the middle of a city?
FRASER: No, Ray, we're brainstorming. [to the driver] Do you have a city map?
DRIVER: There.
Fraser grabs the map. The driver keeps dodging traffic. People keep screaming.
FRASER: All right, I've got it here. Ah, E-four.
VECCHIO: Okay, we're going to be coming up into some serious traffic and then a dead end.
FRASER: Yeah, I see it. Grandin Road. Okay, think, um — keech!
VECCHIO: Sawdust.
FRASER: Water. Lake Michigan.
DRIVER: Hold on!
The bus does some fancy slalom driving, finishing with a sharp left turn to get under an overpass.
FRASER: Well done, sir.
DRIVER: Thank you. Now what are we going to do when we get to the lake?
FRASER: Keep going.
The bus plows through a sign for the 57th St. Beach, trundles across the beachfront, and plows into the water, where it stops. Vecchio opens the side door and starts helping people as they hurry out.
VECCHIO: Okay, take your time. Easy. Watch the water. Easy, that's it. [He recognizes someone.] Laurie?
LAURIE: Ray! [They step to the side.]
VECCHIO: How are you?
LAURIE: I'm all right, I'm all right.
VECCHIO: Hey, Benny. [Fraser has hopped down and is helping people off the bus.] I'd like you to meet my first partner, Laurie Zaylor.
LAURIE: Hi.
VECCHIO: Jeez, I haven't seen you since you quit the force.
LAURIE: Yeah, well, I've pretty much stayed away from all the old places. The point was a calmer lifestyle, less excitement. Heh.
FRASER: Do you ride this bus every day?
LAURIE: Every day.
FRASER: At the same time?
LAURIE: Yeah. [Fraser looks meaningfully at Vecchio, whose phone rings.]
VECCHIO: Vecchio.
CARVER: How did you do, Detective? Did you figure it out by yourself, or did you get help?
VECCHIO: You've blown it this time.
CARVER: Blown it? No, Detective. Blowing it is for next time.
Water is not at all a soft surface, but it will stop a bus, so our heroes should be glad they're just on a bus whose brake line has been cut and whose accelerator is jammed, rather than on a bus carrying a bomb rigged to go off if its speed falls below 55 mph as was the case in Speed (1994), which someone had evidently seen not long before they wrote this episode. Anyway, I can't quite tell what Fraser says right before Vecchio says "sawdust". "Keech" (which some of the internet dictionaries have told me is a lump of fat rolled up by a butcher, like, the meat-processing equivalent of mine slag, I guess)? "Quiche" (which, why would there be a heap of quiche they could drive into in the middle of a city—but why would there be a heap of keech either, or of shaving cream or sawdust, for that matter)?
So Laurie here is Vecchio's first partner and is no longer with the police. I am very interested by her, so my guess is we'll never see her again.
Scene 7
Fraser and Vecchio are in an apartment building.
FRASER: Well, I'm not saying I won't accompany you, Ray. I mean, obviously, I am accompanying you. I'm just suggesting that you act with restraint, not out of pure emotion.
VECCHIO: If I was acting out of pure emotion, I would just kill the guy. So anything you see short of that is a model of restraint.
FRASER: I'll remember that.
Vecchio knocks on the door; Carver answers.
CARVER: Detective Vecchio. Well —
VECCHIO: [shoving into the apartment] Violating your parole? Within hours of being let out? How smart is that? [backing the guy up into his living room] Endangering the lives of thirty individuals and then calling up to take credit for it? How smart is that? [backing him right into an armchair] And since you have to register with the parole officer, and we're going to know where you are every minute of every day, how smart is that?
FRASER: Ray? [Fraser is standing next to a bewildered teenager.]
VECCHIO: What's he done to you?
GIRL: He's tutoring me in chemistry.
CARVER: Pure torture for some.
FRASER: [points to a blackboard] It's Avogadro's number, Ray. It's standard in any high school chemistry class.
CARVER: [rising] I don't believe I've had the pleasure.
FRASER: [going to shake his hand] Constable Benton Fraser, Royal Canadian —
CARVER: — Mounted Police. Yes, I know. I love the Mounties.
FRASER: Well, thank you.
VECCHIO: Don't be thanking him.
FRASER: Sorry.
CARVER: There must be some logical explanation for why you're going around on duty with a Chicago policeman.
FRASER: Curious, possibly. But logical? No.
CARVER: A refreshing openness. A quality local law enforcement is sorely lacking. I was arrested and convicted for a crime I didn't commit.
FRASER: There was physical evidence.
CARVER: False evidence. Could I have been as stupid as they suggest?
FRASER: You know, Mr. Carver, even the brightest light bulbs burn out.
CARVER: Indeed. But is it not possible that your friend here crossed the line and framed an innocent man?
VECCHIO: That's enough, Carver.
CARVER: I hope so. And unless the Chicago Police Department has a problem with the teaching of high school science, Shannon and I have a great deal of material to get through.
VECCHIO: [pushes him back into his chair] Save it for someone who cares.
Okay, Fraser, stop flirting with the bad guy, willya.
It is vaguely disappointing to me that we already know Carver was behind the turkey and the bus, because it could have been interesting to have an actual mystery to solve, right? Like what if we as the viewer had been coached to think Carver had been here with his chemistry student the whole time so he couldn't possibly be behind this? The first thing would have to have not been a turkey, I guess, because that makes it clear it was him from the jump. But what makes this episode better than the last time I was annoyed that we already knew whodunnit is (a) our heroes already know also—this isn't being treated as a mystery at all—and (b) Colm Feore as Carver is just really, really good. (I've seen this guy in at least half a dozen plays and he is never not brilliant. I know for sure I've seen him as Mercutio, as Oberon, as Frank Ford in Merry Wives, as Cassius; I think he must have been the pirate king the last time I saw The Pirates of Penzance at Stratford? Obviously not super memorable, but he'll have been fun to watch, anyway; you can tell from this episode that if you give him an inch he'll have all the scenery between his teeth and you won't even have seen how he got it in there. As Jack Worthing in The Importance of Being Earnest, a play I simply adore. And as Cyrano de Bergerac in a production I will rave about to anyone who will sit still long enough. You may also recognize him from The West Wing s2e9 "Galileo," where he corners CJ on the roof of the Kennedy Center and asks if she didn't hire him because he never called her after they went out that one time, but that's not the best role to remember him in. Cyrano Cyrano Cyrano.)
Avogadro's number is indeed a thing that would be taught in any high school chemistry curriculum. It is apparently useful for discussing the fact that the number of atoms in a quantity of a substance remains the same even if you change its volume, pressure, or temperature (changing any one of which will necessarily change the other two). When I was in high school, it was 6.02 x 1023, which is what's on Carver's blackboard, but apparently in 2019 they changed it to 6.02214076 x 1023, which is a slightly larger incomprehensibly large number. (Apparently you can change fundamental laws of matter? idk, this feels like that time the state of Alabama tried to legislate that π = 3, though I guess it's actually the opposite of that.)
Scene 8
Vecchio is back at the police station.
WELSH: So we're raiding chemistry classes now, huh, Vecchio? Trying to combat this vicious epidemic of people trying to improve their minds in the city of Chicago?
VECCHIO: That wasn't the purpose, sir.
WELSH: Oh, good, so there was a reason for you to upset this law-abiding North Side student.
VECCHIO: This guy's dirty, Lieutenant. He's out of control. He's gonna hurt somebody.
WELSH: I think it's time to check around, see who is out of control.
VECCHIO: All right. Fine. Let's put a watch on him.
WELSH: All right. I'll put a team on it. But. You've got to nail him for something a little more serious than giving too much homework.
How does Welsh know this happened? People are always calling him to fill him in on what Vecchio has been up to?
Scene 9
Huey and a dude we've never seen before are sitting in the car watching Carver's house. The evening-time saxophone music is playing again. Across town in the car, Fraser answers Vecchio's phone.
FRASER: Detective Vecchio's mobile office.
CARVER: He available? [Fraser hands Vecchio the phone.]
VECCHIO: Yeah?
CARVER: A full-bore Carver stakeout. I'm impressed, Detective. [He appears to be in a very well equipped communications studio.]
VECCHIO: Don't be.
CARVER: This will make for a very solid Carver alibi, now, won't it?
VECCHIO: Depends on what you're planning.
CARVER: You're in your car, aren't you, Detective? I'm surprised you'd let your timing get out of adjustment like that.
VECCHIO: Make your move, pal. Let's get this overwith tonight.
CARVER: Good night socks, good night clocks, good night room, and good night moon.
The moon is full.
Carver's got the order of good nights all wrong. It's "Good night room. Good night moon. Good night cow jumping over the moon —" (and it did always bother me that they rhymed moon with moon, but what can you do) "— Good night light and the red balloon. Good night bears; good night chairs. Good night kittens and good night mittens. Good night clocks and good night socks." And so on. But I think this scene shows why it is so dangerous that they never say good night to the telephone. If they had, would Carver be able to terrorize Vecchio in this manner now?
Scene 10
In the morning, a guy is hucking newspapers out of the back of a pickup truck. He passes the Vecchios' house (which we can tell because Ray's car is in the driveway). The phone rings.
VECCHIO: Yeah?
CARVER: When you drive your car this morning, you'll find the timing improved. Oh, and a couple of those belts and hoses were shot, so it just made sense to replace them. Basic stuff. Simple maintenance. You should keep on top of this, Detective.
Vecchio slams the phone down. Carver eats a spoonful of yogurt. Vecchio goes out to the car in his jammies and slippers and bathrobe. He pops the hood and has a look at the engine and doesn't see anything amiss. When he goes back inside, the phone is ringing again.
VECCHIO: What?
CARVER: You aren't even going to say thank you? Did you notice also the car had been detailed?
VECCHIO: You can kiss your parole goodbye, Carver.
CARVER: Is it against the law to do something nice for someone? Do you want the old hoses put back? And the timing made bad again? Do you like dirt on the car?
Vecchio slams the phone down again and goes upstairs.
This is clearly the same house the Vecchios were living in in "Victoria's Secret," but I think it's the first time we've seen the exterior, isn't it? And it's not at all the outside of the same house they were living in in "Pizzas and Promises."
Vecchio is much less upset than I'd have expected him to be given what happened the last time someone he didn't like messed with his car. (Also, I can't say for sure, but he may be able to ding Carver for harassment, no?)
Scene 11
Maddie the Prosecutor brings someone to meet Fraser in an interrogation room.
MADDIE: Constable Fraser, Frank Greco is visiting us from the state's attorney's office. He specializes in police officer–related misconduct. So he'd like to ask you a couple of questions about Detective Vecchio.
FRASER: Detective Vecchio is a fine officer. I have never worked with better. [He turns to Maddie.] You know how committed he is.
GRECO: We all know how committed he is. That's what I need to learn more about.
FRASER: Is that a problem?
GRECO: He seems to be taking the Carver case very personally.
FRASER: Well, Carver has made it very personal.
GRECO: What's your assessment of Detective Vecchio's current frame of mind?
FRASER: I — I'm sorry, I, um . . . Detective Vecchio is my colleague and my friend.
GRECO: Yes?
FRASER: As a consequence, I really can't participate in this.
GRECO: That's your election.
FRASER: Yes, I know. And I elect not to participate. Thank you. [He nods to them both and goes out into the squad room, where he runs into Huey.] Have you seen Detective Vecchio?
HUEY: Nope. Haven't seen him, but feel free to have a seat at his desk.
FRASER: Good. Thank you.
There is a large drink cup on Vecchio's desk; Fraser sees something floating in it. It is a toy boat.
VECCHIO: What is it with you guys? Let that bozo slip right by you. [He reaches Fraser.] What's that?
FRASER: It was on your desk.
VECCHIO: Put it down. [Fraser puts the boat down. Vecchio gets something heavy out of his desk drawer, smashes the boat, and puts the heavy thing away. Maddie and Greco see this happen and are not thrilled.] No more games.
FRASER: [picking up a fragment; Huey comes by and is also concerned] Ray, do you know anyone with a boat called Bookem?
VECCHIO: Yeah. Will Kelly. He was here before Welsh. Retired to fish up on the river. He was my first supervisor. [realizes what this means] Huey, call the sheriff up there. Let's go.
Vecchio and Fraser split. Huey sits down at Vecchio's desk to call the sheriff.
What does Huey mean, "feel free to have a seat at his desk," like Fraser is new here or something? That felt strange to me. More importantly, though, what happened to the Fraser who always does his duty and expects, nay, requires his colleagues to do the same? I'm not saying I don't appreciate his refusal to answer this dude's questions, but I am saying I don't understand it. First "I know this guy is bad news because you said so, Ray," and now this.
Put another way: This is the first time since we've known Fraser that being a loyal friend has been more important than being a police officer.
Scene 12
Vecchio and Fraser and Diefenbaker are driving on a country road.
VECCHIO: Will Kelly was — he was the best. Everybody looked up to him. He was like . . . I don't know, imagine your dad.
FRASER: I understand.
VECCHIO: For some reason, he thought I could do this job, that I could be really good at it. It's because of him I made detective when I did.
FRASER: I've heard his name mentioned.
VECCHIO: They still quote him today. "A good cop is never wet and never hungry." "Interrogation is a contact sport." [Fraser raises his eyebrows a bit.] And "all suspects are guilty of something."
CARVER: [listening in from his communications center] Let me write that down.
The line reading on "He was like . . . I don't know, imagine your dad" is nice, knowing as we do that Vecchio had a terrible relationship with his actual dad; no wonder he looked up to his first supervisor as a father figure. I sure don't love Kelly's aphorisms, though.
Scene 13
Vecchio and Fraser rock up at a Winnebago and are greeted by a local sheriff's deputy.
DEPUTY: Detective Vecchio? Vince Corey.
VECCHIO: [shakes his hand, introduces Fraser] Yeah, how you doing? Benton Fraser.
DEPUTY (COREY): Hey, that's a smart color for hunting season. Wish I could get everybody else to take the same precautions.
FRASER: Thank you.
VECCHIO: Where's Kelly?
COREY: Look, I've walked all around this area. Everything seems to be in order.
FRASER: Where's his boat? It's a rough day to be on the water.
COREY: Sure is.
They look up and down the riverbank and find the wreckage of a boat.
VECCHIO: Kelly's boat! Call for help! [Corey rushes off to call for help.]
FRASER: Wait, if the current brought this in, then — upstream.
Fraser and Vecchio rush up the riverbank, leaving the fragment of hull with Bookem painted on it.
That sheriff would be a lot more convincing with his everybody-should-wear-red if he himself were not wearing brown in the middle of the woods. I'm just saying.
Scene 14
Fraser and Vecchio are looking in the woods upstream for Kelly. Diefenbaker barks; he's found him.
VECCHIO: Will!
Kelly is lying unconscious. Later, they've got him back to his trailer and he's wrapped up in a blanket and drinking something hot.
COREY: You got here at the right time, Constable.
FRASER: Thank you.
COREY: It's a good thing you brought this fellow along, Ray. He knew right where to look.
FRASER: I'm sure Detective Vecchio would have made the same determination.
KELLY: The engine just blew. Must have been a spark in the fuel system, or —
VECCHIO: Or a bomb.
KELLY: A bomb?
VECCHIO: Yeah. You remember Charles Carver? We took him down when you were my supervisor?
KELLY: Yeah, we sent him up for, uh —
VECCHIO: Arson. But we could have had him on those other charges, too. Fraud, possibly homicide.
KELLY: I certainly remember you felt that way, Ray.
VECCHIO: Well, he's out on parole. He's going after anybody who had anything to do with his case. Seems he wants the world to think he was framed.
KELLY: [reassuring] You had him, didn't you, Ray.
I, too, am sure Detective Vecchio would have made the same determination. It doesn't take a rocket surgeon to work out that something washing up in a strong current has come from upstream.
Scene 15
Francesca answers the door when the bell rings. A delivery man is holding a floral arrangement in front of his face.
FRANCESCA: Hello.
CARVER: [moving the flowers out of his face; cheery-cheery delivery guy vibe] Francesca Vecchio?
FRANCESCA: Oh, they're beautiful!
CARVER: From Ray.
FRANCESCA: Ray remembered my birthday? You've gotta be kidding! [She starts to take the vase from him, but he holds onto it.]
CARVER: Is there somewhere you'd like me to put these?
FRANCESCA: Uh, sure. [lets him in]
CARVER: How 'bout here?
FRANCESCA: Ah, no, let me just grab a trivet. [She rushes off, leaving Carver with the vase and flowers and a toddler in a stroller. The kid gurgles; Carver glares at her but puts his shiny smile back on as Francesca returns.] God, they're fabulous.
CARVER: Well, he must know how lucky he is to have such a pretty girl.
FRANCESCA: Ah, no. Ray — Ray's my brother.
CARVER: Then the flowers from your husband can't be far behind.
FRANCESCA: I'm not married.
CARVER: So the little one's . . .?
FRANCESCA: My sister's. I don't have kids.
CARVER: Ahh. What a darling face. You take her out for a breath of air?
FRANCESCA: Yeah, well, her mom's gonna take her down to see the clown by the lake if it doesn't get too cold.
CARVER: Well, let's hope the weather holds. Bye now.
FRANCESCA: [waving her niece's hand] Say bye. Bye.
You see how phishing works, don't you? Small talk sinks ships! Or something like that.
This child is more than one year old but less than two, and it's May 1996, which means she was born some time between let's say the fall of 1994 and the summer of 1995, which . . . can work out? If she was born in like September of 1994 and Maria was relatively recently postpartum (and had got her figure back with a quickness) or she was born in like May of 1995 and Maria was sort of just barely pregnant and not showing yet in "They Eat Horses" and recently post-partum in that scene in "Victoria's Secret" where they were all heading out on vacation, which was the last time we saw her. The rest of Maria and Tony's children continue to be a mystery, but this one is not impossible! I don't know why this is the first time we've heard about her, if she lives in the house with All The Vecchios, but that's a separate issue. . . . Where is Maria, though? Maybe resting, and Francesca is babysitting. But why is the baby in a stroller by the front door if she's not going out with Aunt Francesca but waiting for mom to take her to see the clown by the lake?
Scene 16
Vecchio and Fraser and Diefenbaker are pulling out from Kelly's place.
FRASER: Ray, stop.
Vecchio stops the car; Fraser reaches into the mailbox and pulls out a dollhouse stroller.
VECCHIO: Ah, you gotta be kidding me. There's gotta be a hundred thousand of those in Chicago. [His phone rings.] Vecchio.
FRANCESCA: Ray, what got into you? That was so incredibly sweet.
VECCHIO: What are you talking about?
FRANCESCA: The flowers you sent.
VECCHIO: [He and Fraser rush back to the car.] Frannie, get everybody in. Ma, Maria, the kids. We're on our way.
FRANCESCA: Maria's out with the baby.
VECCHIO: [hangs up the phone, burns rubber] It's not people related to the bust that he's after. It's people related to me.
They hurtle back to the city and drive up to the park where there is indeed a clown by the lake, who is making balloon animals.
CLOWN: [letting a balloon fly across a picnic table] That's that one. [Kids laugh. Fraser and Vecchio are looking for Maria and the baby.] What's the magic word, boys and girls? That's right! Here we go! One, two, three! Here we go. [Fraser and Vecchio are running around looking for the stroller with the bomb in it.] Looks like a doggie. Do you like the doggie?
Adults are starting to realize something is up. Fraser and Vecchio are pulling canopies back on strollers to see if Vecchio's niece is in them.
FRASER: Excuse me.
SOMEONE: Can I help you?
SOMEONE ELSE: Get away from him. Get away from those children!
VECCHIO: Excuse me.
FRASER: Sorry about that.
SOMEONE ELSE: Hey! Get away from here!
Diefenbaker is sniffing at an empty stroller. Fraser goes over, has a look at it, and takes it and runs.
SOMEONE: Hey!
SOMEONE ELSE: Hey! Where are you going with that?
SOMEONE: Hey, hey!
Fraser runs onto a footbridge over a pond with the stroller. Vecchio and Diefenbaker follow him. He hurls the stroller into the water. The clown and the kids and the parents can't really believe what they're seeing. Then from under the water the stroller explodes. The adults gasp. The clown tries to do a "hey, how about that!" and keep the kids happy. Smaller children start to cry.
Okay I am upset by the crying babies, because this scene did not require real babies to be scared to come off. I am also a big fan of the clown instinctively trying to make the exploding stroller (safely under the water) part of his act so the kids he's entertaining don't worry. I am also completely sympathetic to the parents wondering what the hell is going on with two guys running up and pawing at all their strollers and looking at all their kids with no explanation (they didn't have time to explain, but the parents at the park didn't know that) and then grabbing a stroller and running off with it. I can even get behind Vecchio not knowing which stroller among dozens is the one that belongs to his sister; even actual parents of stroller-riding children have to put ribbons and things on the damn handlebars to designate which stroller is whose, so Vecchio is excused. What I don't understand is all the looking around and why as soon as they got within earshot of the clown show Vecchio didn't shout "MARIA?!" and find her that way. (Even assuming the actress who plays Maria was not available, a little shouting wouldn't have gone amiss. We don't have to see her for Fraser to find the relevant stroller.)
We don't know for sure how they knew which park to go to, but it's safe to assume they called Francesca back from the car to get more details about what "out with the baby" actually meant. (And we'll have to live with the fact that the lake by which the clown is performing is apparently not Lake Michigan, because footbridge? Whatever. It's a park with a water feature. Okay.)
Scene 17
Vecchio and Francesca are seeing the family off in the car.
VECCHIO: All right, good, the phone works. Now, listen, don't call me, all right? Ma, don't call me. I'll check in with you every hour, all right? All right? Be careful.
FRANCESCA: Bye.
The car drives off.
VECCHIO: You should be with them.
FRANCESCA: I can't leave work, Ray.
VECCHIO: Well, you can't stay here, either.
That car is very well shot so we can see almost nobody in it. The glare off the windshield makes it nearly impossible to see the driver, but we can assume it's Tony; everyone else is in the depths of the station wagon (and silent!) except one little girl waving from the rear driver's side window, which may be the same girl from that heading-out-on-vacation scene in "Victoria's Secret," why not.
In other news: Francesca has a job?!
Scene 18
Fraser is on his way home. At the end of his hallway, he smells something and hears Tchaikovsky's piano concerto no. 1. When he goes inside, Francesca is in his kitchen, taking a pan out of the oven in front of a red gingham window curtain I don't remember seeing before.
FRANCESCA: Welcome home, Benton. I hope you like lasagna. [Fraser looks around the apartment. There is a floral quilt on his bed, a lamp with a floral shade on his nightstand, and lace curtains in the windows. Diefenbaker is sitting on the bed grumbling. Francesca takes Fraser's hat and sets it down.] So, how was your day? [She scrambles to take off her oven mitts and smooth her hair.]
FRASER: [looking like he's stepped into the Twilight Zone] Fine, thank you.
FRANCESCA: Well, why don't you come over here and wash up? [One of those shoe organizer bags is hanging from the back of Fraser's apartment door. Francesca guides him to the kitchen sink. His kitchen cabinets are decorated with a wooden daisy and a wooden duck. He looks shell-shocked.] Go ahead.
A side cabinet in Fraser's kitchen is covered with bottles of nail polish and a can of hair spray. Diefenbaker grumbles again.
Oh boy.
Scene 19
Vecchio is sitting at a bar in a restaurant glaring at where Carver is sitting at a table. A waiter puts a plate in front of Vecchio. He picks up his burger, but before he takes a bite, he puts it down and takes a toy fire truck out of it. He looks over at Carver, who does a teeny tiny smile. Vecchio leaves the restaurant.
I hope Vecchio paid for that dinner when he ordered it, is what I hope, because even if you don't eat, you can't just leave a restaurant without paying.
Scene 20
Francesca and Fraser are sitting at the table in his apartment, which has a tablecloth over it now.
FRANCESCA: You know, it's going to take me a while to get it just how you like it.
FRASER: It's delicious.
FRANCESCA: You haven't tried it yet.
FRASER: Oh. [He has a giant floral napkin tucked into his collar. He takes a bite of lasagna.] Mm.
FRANCESCA: Really?
FRASER: [nods reassuringly] Mm.
FRANCESCA: You know, 'cause I just think it's very important that we be honest with each other right from the start.
FRASER: It's perfect.
FRANCESCA: Oh, good. You know, you're always honest, I know that. But you're always polite too, so sometimes I can't know if you're being honest or, you know, you're being polite. If I babble too much, you have to tell me.
FRASER: No, no, no. No, I mean, yes. I mean, yes, I will — but no — keep talking.
FRANCESCA: Okay. [She closes her phone.] So, um, what are we gonna talk about tonight?
FRASER: Anything you'd like.
FRANCESCA: When I'm with my friends — my girlfriends — we talk about, you know, skin care products and things like that, but, uh . . .
FRASER: That sounds interesting.
FRANCESCA: No. I read enough magazines to know that, ah, you know, with each guy you, you talk about what he's interested in.
FRASER: I see.
FRANCESCA: So, umm . . . how 'bout that Iditarod, huh?
FRASER: Which Iditarod?
Oh no. Oh, Francesca, no. Sweetie, no, you are allowed and even encouraged to have your own interests! God, I want to round up all the magazines she and everyone else was reading in the 90s and The Rules and whatever all else and just papier-maché the crap out of something with them and then beat it with sticks.
Sigh. Okay. The Iditarod is an annual dogsled race from Anchorage to Nome, so what Francesca has defaulted to is "How 'bout that not-at-all local sporting event," which is vaguely funny, except see above re: having her own interests.
Scene 21
The electrical panel in the basement of Fraser's building starts to spark and then starts to smoke. With the evening-is-here saxophone music playing again, Vecchio is driving across town and calling from the car.
VECCHIO: Come on, Frannie, pick up. Fraser, why don't you have a phone?
Why indeed doesn't Fraser have a phone.
Scene 22
Francesca and Fraser are still having dinner.
FRANCESCA: This is so nice. So different from home. I mean, we're halfway through dinner and you haven't even yelled once yet.
FRASER: Well, no.
FRANCESCA: I could really get used to this politeness stuff. You know, sometimes I think it would actually be better if married people treated each other like strangers.
FRASER: Well, that may be. But it doesn't follow, therefore, that strangers would be better off if they treated each other as if they were married.
FRANCESCA: I love it when you're logical.
FRASER: You're pretty much going to like anything that I say, aren't you?
FRANCESCA: Anything.
Fraser is so sympathetic when he says "Well, no," which is lovely. And then when he says "You're going to like anything I say," is everyone in creation saying "yes, Fraser, YES, this has been true THE WHOLE TIME YOU HAVE KNOWN THIS WOMAN, thank you for joining us" or is it just me?
Scene 23
Vecchio is still driving intently across town. The fuse box in Fraser's building is still sparking and smoking and catching fire. Francesca and Fraser are still having dinner.
FRANCESCA: You know, Frase, since skin care products are an area that I'm familiar with, I did manage to get rid of that, ah, harsh Mountie-issue soap you were using.
FRASER: I didn't realize it was harsh.
FRANCESCA: Oh, yeah. In our climate, that really dries out your skin.
FRASER: Really?
FRANCESCA: Yeah. I mean, you have to end up buying, like, two different kinds of moisturizers to compensate for the dryness and the pollution in the air, and then you —
FRASER: I smell something burning.
FRANCESCA: Oh, my God, the pears Hélène. [She rushes to the kitchen.]
FRASER: No, it's not that. [The lights are flickering.] Downstairs.
Fraser, Francesca, and Diefenbaker rush into the hallway where neighbors are already panicking.
SOMEONE IN OR NEAR THE ELEVATOR: The elevator's stuck.
FRASER: I'll have you out in a second.
The fuse box is now burning nicely. Fraser grabs the fire extinguisher and puts it out, then flips a couple of breakers. Vecchio arrives as he is doing this.
VECCHIO: I called it in.
FRANCESCA: Hey. [She shows them a miniature pair of sneakers, like a Christmas ornament, that was apparently hanging near the breaker box.]
VECCHIO: You're leaving town.
It's not clear what Vecchio thinks the sneakers have to do with Francesca, but getting her out of town for her own safety doesn't seem like the dumbest idea he's ever had, does it. Although I don't see why any of Fraser's other neighbors couldn't notice the fuse box smoking before he did or deploy the fire extinguisher themselves. There's a lot of learned helplessness in that building, isn't there? And I'm surprised anyone would get in the elevator after what happened the last time something went wrong with the elevator—frankly I'm surprised the elevator even works. (Probably Fraser hired someone to fix it.)
Pears Hélène are pears poached in vanilla syrup and served with vanilla ice cream and covered with a hot chocolate sauce or hot fudge, which sounds so good I'm not even going to wonder why Francesca would be poaching pears in the oven rather than on top of the stove.
Scene 24
Welsh is looking at some paperwork with someone in the squad room. Vecchio interrupts him.
VECCHIO: Excuse me, lieutenant.
WELSH: [to the paperwork person] Thank you.
VECCHIO: [showing him a couple of evidence bags] Okay, we found these and this. A sophisticated incendiary device.
WELSH: Vecchio, it was a fire. Let arson handle it. [He goes to his office, where Elaine is looking at a file.] What'd you find?
ELAINE: Everything you asked for.
WELSH: And?
ELAINE: Well, when you read these old Carver files, it really seems that the prosecution's case was pretty thin.
Elaine the civilian aide doing some analysis, huh? I like it.
Scene 25
Fraser is at Prosecutor Maddie's apartment.
MADDIE: There was no record of any previous criminal activity. Um, it was a very tenuous motive.
FRASER: And yet, the jury found him guilty.
MADDIE: Well, it all came down to that missing heel from Carver's shoe that Ray found at the scene. I mean, that and the intensity of Ray's testimony.
FRASER: And Ray found the heel after the arson investigators had been over the scene?
MADDIE: Yes. But we were able to explain that because the investigators had been called away. I mean, they hadn't really completed their investigation. So it was possible that they could have missed it.
FRASER: You don't sound entirely convinced.
MADDIE: He's your friend.
FRASER: Yes.
MADDIE: You work with him?
FRASER: Yes.
MADDIE: Well, did you ever see him knock down a door without a warrant? Rough up a suspect a little too much?
FRASER: Are you suggesting he stepped over the line?
MADDIE: I don't know, Benton. I, I just remember that he was so worked up over this case. At the time it just seemed like a situation of someone going the extra mile. You know, real crackerjack police work.
Fraser considers this.
I've seen Vecchio knock down a door without a warrant and I've seen him rough up a suspect a little too much.
Scene 26
Vecchio's ex-wife comes into the squad room.
ELAINE: Hey, Angie!
ANGE: Hi, Elaine.
ELAINE: Are you here to see Ray?
ANGE: [uncomfortable] No.
She goes ahead to wherever she's meeting whomever she is there to see. Vecchio sees her, too, and watches her cross the room without coming to talk to him.
Nice reaction work from Marciano here, not feeling great about Angie being there.
Scene 27
Fraser and Laurie are heading to a table in a restaurant.
LAURIE: Is this place all right? I wasn't sure when you said you wanted to talk —
FRASER: No, it seems perfectly fine.
LAURIE: Good. [They sit at a booth.] You know, we could have a drink. It doesn't have to be just business.
FRASER: No, no. [straightening his lanyard] Um, ah, yes. I mean, uh — well, actually, the fact of the matter is, I, I do have some questions I'd like to ask you.
LAURIE: About Ray.
FRASER: Yes, about Ray. You were Ray's partner when you left the force, weren't you?
LAURIE: I was sick of police work. The lousy hours, bad food, the scuzzy people that you meet.
FRASER: Such as Charles Carver?
LAURIE: Yeah, he was one of the scuzziest.
FRASER: And you left shortly after the Carver case, didn't you? Now, was that because of Carver, or was it because of Ray?
LAURIE: Ray was pretty intense back then. That put a lot of people off, but I liked him. He really cared.
FRASER: I mean, you cared as well, obviously. You were partners. You went back to the crime scene and found the heel that matched Carver's shoe.
LAURIE: Actually, I didn't. We had put in an eighteen-hour day, we were off the clock, and Kelly sent me home to crash. Ray went back to have one last look around.
FRASER: So Ray was all alone when he found the heel?
She nods. Fraser absorbs this data point.
Some nice reaction work in this scene, too, when Laurie says "About Ray." in a way that makes it clear she has just realized there is nothing about this meeting that is in any way a date. (And from there on she's all business, which, good for her.)
Scene 28
Fraser and Vecchio and Diefenbaker are in the car driving across down.
VECCHIO: Carver didn't just study chemistry in stir. Condition of parole, we have access to his living quarters. The guys found that.
FRASER: Clippings of the cases you worked on. Page from your high school yearbook. "Most Likely To Wind Up Behind Bars." Oh, that's not you, that's Vincenzo.
VECCHIO: Yeah. He's got a book on me, but that still doesn't explain why he's always one step ahead of us. He seems to know just what we're thinking and where we're going.
FRASER: And yet we haven't revealed anything to him.
They both look around the inside of the car. Vecchio pulls over and starts feeling under the steering column; he pulls out a bug and slaps it onto the dashboard.
VECCHIO: From the night he took my car. [His phone is already ringing. He answers it.] Vecchio.
CARVER: I would have thought you would have figured out there was a bug in your car before this.
VECCHIO: Carver.
CARVER: Don't get off your game, Detective. You'll make this too easy. And that won't be any fun at all.
FRASER: Ask him how the heel on his shoe came loose.
VECCHIO: How —
CARVER: The heel on my shoe wasn't loose.
VECCHIO: He says it wasn't loose.
FRASER: He heard the question.
VECCHIO: [hangs up the phone] There's another bug.
They both keep looking around the car. In his communications center, Carver smiles.
I'm a little less satisfied with this as a way to show there's another bug because I have never in my life met a telephone, wired or cellular, that wouldn't pick up the voice of someone sitting as close to the speaker as Fraser is sitting to Vecchio. But sure.
Scene 29
Huey and Elaine have come to talk to Will Kelly.
HUEY: Lieutenant Kelly? [Kelly nods.] Detective Huey. Elaine Besbriss.
ELAINE: Hi. We'd like to ask you a few questions.
KELLY: Come on inside.
Elaine, the civilian aide, doing investigative work. On the one hand (the hand that loves Elaine), huzzah! On the other hand (the hand that is concerned about police procedure and wishing our heroes didn't do whatever they damn pleased just because they're our heroes), hmm. (I mean, at least she's actually employed by the police department in question; likewise, at least Fraser is actually a sworn law enforcement officer. Neither of these things is true of some anthropology grad students I could name.)
Scene 30
Vecchio and Fraser are up to their elbows in searching the Riviera for Carver's other bug.
FRASER: It has to have been close enough to the passenger compartment so he could have heard us.
VECCHIO: Without being drowned out by the engine noise.
Vecchio finds something under the dashboard; it is not a bug but a red matchbox car. It has been smushed.
FRASER: What's this, another toy?
VECCHIO: No, not just a toy. It's a nineteen-seventy-one Buick Riviera. It's my car.
FRASER: It's not your car, Ray. Your car's green.
VECCHIO: Yeah, well, maybe he couldn't find a green one. It's still obvious. He's saying I'm going to have an accident.
FRASER: Well, possibly. But look at the way this has been crushed, flattened almost, as though someone had stepped on it.
VECCHIO: Right?
FRASER: Well, very few accidents cause this, where a vehicle is flattened from the top. There are a lot of accidents you could cause, but to cause this would be extremely difficult.
VECCHIO: So what are you saying? He's not threatening an accident?
FRASER: I don't know.
VECCHIO: [sits down in the driver's seat, unhappy] You know, Benny? Puzzles and riddles — I was never good at any of this stuff.
FRASER: What are you saying, Ray? You solve puzzles all the time.
VECCHIO: Yeah, not like this. This is, uh, this is like those problems in school. You know, those logic problems where, where a train leaves Dayton at two p.m. traveling sixty miles an hour and another train leaves Akron at one p.m. traveling at forty miles an hour. At what time do they intersect? The only answer I ever could come up was "I don't care!"
FRASER: It's a fine answer. You're doing fine, Ray.
VECCHIO: No, I'm not doing fine. You know, he's — he's wreaking havoc, he's blowing up bombs, he's lighting fires, and I'm not even this close to stopping him.
FRASER: Ray, no one has been hurt.
VECCHIO: Not yet. You know, it's like I'm playing this weird game and I don't even know the rules.
FRASER: You're figuring them out.
VECCHIO: Yeah. But he's got me completely figured out. I'm not up to this, Benny.
This is a nice scene for Marciano; he does a great job showing us a Vecchio who's afraid he might be in over his head. So I'm just going to be businesslike about a couple of things:
- Dayton and Akron are not connected by railroad, but they're 195 miles apart on the interstate, so if there were trains, a train leaving Akron at 1:00 p.m. doing 40mph will have traveled 40 miles by the time the train leaves Dayton at 2:00 p.m. doing 60mph; so they're 155 miles apart at 2:00 p.m., 55 miles apart at 3:00 p.m., and five miles apart at 3:30, which means they'd meet at 3:33 p.m., 122 miles southwest of Akron.
- I think Fraser is being inappropriately cavalier about the possible effects Carver's attacks on Vecchio might have had on the kids at the park, the people on the bus, and his neighbors who were stuck in the elevator—to say nothing of Will Kelly, who actually was actually hurt. Perhaps by "no one has been hurt" he means "no one has been hurt in any long-term physical way" or "no one has been killed." But I'm sorry to hear he thinks no harm has been done.
- Apparently when they find the toy car they just go ahead and stop looking for the other bug?
And then I will be not at all businesslike about one more thing: So the Riviera was a '71 in season 1 and a '72 in "One Good Man" and now it's back to being a '71 again? DOES THIS SHOW HAVE NO BIBLE?!
Scene 31
Welsh has some people in his office. He sticks his head out into the squad room.
WELSH: Vecchio. I need to see you. [Vecchio and Fraser start toward the office.] Alone. [Fraser stays outside. Vecchio goes in but doesn't close the door.] You know Frank Greco from the state's attorney's office?
GRECO: How do you do?
WELSH: And of course you know our friends from Internal Affairs. Frank investigates officer malfeasance.
VECCHIO: I don't believe this.
WELSH: Ray, it's — this isn't easy for me.
GRECO: This isn't about now, Detective. This is about eight years ago. The original Charles Carver bust.
VECCHIO: What about it?
GRECO: It's looking bad, Vecchio. The shoe with the missing heel hadn't been worn without the heel as it would have been if someone were running from the scene of a crime. So the heel was removed from the shoe when it was indoors. The evidence was planted.
VECCHIO: You're just discovering this now?
GRECO: We've been asking some questions that should have been asked then but weren't in the rush to judgment. And we've been talking to some people that should have been talked to then but weren't.
VECCHIO: Like who?
GRECO: Other investigators. Attorneys.
VECCHIO: [gets it] My ex-wife. [Welsh nods.] Look, don't you guys see what's happening here? He's doing this. He's got you focusing on the old case so that you're distracted and you slow down. We gotta move on this thing now.
GRECO: This time, Detective, we're not going to be rushed into making a mistake.
"You're just discovering this now" isn't a great way for Vecchio to react to the news that the evidence was planted. Maybe a little incredulity about the assertion itself wouldn't go amiss.
Scene 32
Fraser is sitting in Will Kelly's Winnebago watching Kelly tie a lure.
KELLY: You see, Constable, when you're angling for the big one, you need determination and you need patience. Ray had determination.
FRASER: And what about patience?
KELLY: Patience wasn't his long suit. Look, you gotta understand, Carver was dirty.
FRASER: Dirty enough so a policeman would want to plant evidence? The arson investigators had combed that scene.
KELLY: They didn't look under every charred timber.
FRASER: So the heel was hidden?
KELLY: It wasn't that well hidden. Ray found it. And we sent away a very bad guy. More than that, nobody needs to know.
These are close enough closeups that I am once again appreciating the makeup and wardrobe departments' work on Fraser but also, this time, beginning to doubt that that old man's hair is really his. Anyone else think Kelly's grey hair is a rug?
Scene 33
Vecchio is still in Welsh's office talking to Greco, but it looks like the guys from IA are gone. Welsh closes the door.
GRECO: [reading from a file] Detective Vecchio, you were still with your ex-wife at the time of Carver's arrest, huh?
VECCHIO: Yeah.
GRECO: Ah, she said she saw the heel — ah, what turned out to be the heel of Carver's shoe — at your home.
VECCHIO: She might have.
GRECO: You had it at your home?
VECCHIO: Look, I had it on my possession from the time I left that crime scene until I booked it in at the station.
WELSH: And you stopped there right about lunchtime, right?
VECCHIO: Yeah.
WELSH: Something that you were in the habit of doing.
VECCHIO: No.
GRECO: Would you say you had done it often, occasionally, rarely?
VECCHIO: I'd never done it before. Look, me and my wife, we were having some problems, okay? Our marriage wasn't going too well. We had a fight that morning, and I just stopped home around lunchtime just to smooth things over.
GRECO: So is it fair to say, Detective Vecchio, that you were emotionally upset at the time?
This scene's nice reaction is from Welsh, who gives a good "wtf" face when Vecchio says "No," which tells me what he meant was "I try to help you out, feeding you lines like 'you were in the habit of stopping home in the middle of the day,' and this is what you give me?!" Nice work, Starr.
Scene 34
Ange is coming through the station and sees Vecchio.
ANGE: Hey.
VECCHIO: Hey.
ANGE: Listen, is it going to be okay?
VECCHIO: Well, at this point, we don't know.
ANGE: I'm sorry, Ray. They were asking me questions. I had to tell them.
VECCHIO: You did right.
ANGE: Oh, man. Listen, I told them I thought you were more committed to catching bad guys than anyone I know on the force.
VECCHIO: [pleased] You told them that?
ANGE: Yeah, I did. Shouldn't I have?
VECCHIO: No, it's not that. It's, uh — they think that maybe I was too committed. They think I planted evidence.
ANGE: Yeah, the heel of the shoe.
VECCHIO: Yeah.
ANGE: Listen, Ray, God, every cop in the district wanted that squirrel off the streets. I mean, he was creepy. He was doing weird things. But — you know, it seemed like — you know, if you could do something that could get him off the street that wasn't going to hurt anyone, that that wouldn't be a bad thing.
VECCHIO: What are you saying, Ange? That I planted the heel?
ANGE: Well, it's kinda weird, Ray. A guy that careful leaving a heel like that? And you're coming home carrying it in your pocket?
VECCHIO: Do you really think I would do something like that?
ANGE: I think you wanted him off the streets. I think you were right.
VECCHIO: [stalks off] Take it easy, Ange.
ANGE: Great.
Is the whole reason we needed Ange in "One Good Man" to set up her presence in this episode? Is she Chekov's Ex?
Are Welsh and Fraser (and Francesca, probably) the only people in this whole episode who don't think Vecchio would have planted evidence?
Scene 35
Fraser gets home. Diefenbaker doesn't seem to be there.
FRASER: Dief?
Nothing. Fraser sees a tuft of dog hair stuck in a snag on the wall. He looks further into the apartment and finds another tuft of dog hair clinging to the arm of a chair. He's puzzled and displeased. He goes back out into the hall to see if there's something he missed on the way in. He finds a loop of twine and looks at it for a moment. He licks the frayed end; he sniffs the thing he had just licked; he stands up, looking very suspicious; he keels over backwards.
The music cue when Fraser first finds the twine reminds me very strongly of "Victoria's Secret," which I suppose is appropriate because we're being encouraged to believe that Carver has done something to Diefenbaker; the way the music goes wibbly-wobbly when Fraser stands up is a nice heads-up that in fact something is happening to him.
Scene 36
Vecchio goes back into the squad room. He sees something on his desk, looks around, doesn't see anything out of order, sits down at his desk, opens the box. It's a matchbox hearse. He discovers that the back door opens; out slides a tin Mountie. Huey comes over.
HUEY: Another one? [Vecchio shows him the Mountie figure and starts pulling his own hair.] I'll call the Consulate.
VECCHIO: He won't be there.
HUEY: Then I'll go by his place.
VECCHIO: He won't be there either.
HUEY: You know where he is?
VECCHIO: No. I'm supposed to figure it out.
Vecchio has all the toy clues spread out on his desk: The shoes, the bus, the boat, the stroller, the fire engine. He pushes away the boat and the bus and the stroller and the fire engine; he's already done with them. He looks at the shoes for a moment and puts them aside, frustrated. He picks up the hearse and then sits it on top of the smashed red Riviera. He makes a connection.
I like Huey a lot in this scene. It's only a couple of lines but it's teamwork, which, huzzah.
But. Once in a blue moon, there is a split second of a shot that I wish I could get in a poster. Almost my whole life, for instance, I've had a very special place in my heart for the moment in The Princess Bride (1987) where Cary Elwes as Westley has finished hauling himself to his feet but right before he raises his sword to point it at Chris Sarandon as Prince Humperdinck. Likewise, I adore the moment in The Truman Show (1998) where Jim Carrey as Truman has run his little boat into the horizon and he's taken a moment to realize what that means and he sobs against the sky. (It's another example of a terrific performance by the back of someone's head.) In Strictly Ballroom, it's the way Paul Mercurio as Scott looks at Tara Morice as Fran after he swoops in on his knees, while he's on his way to standing up in front of her.
I feel that way about Marciano as Vecchio here. I like the whole moment, which is why I giffed it, but the real killer is the point where he looks up at the camera but before he raises his eyebrows. On my DVD it's 40:42. I swoon.
Scene 37
Vecchio drives onto a junkyard. It is full of wrecked cars. A crane is lifting some bales of compressed metal around. A forklift is lifting a car with a bumper sticker that says "NO TO DRUNK DRIVING" into a crusher. Vecchio hops out of his car.
VECCHIO: Hey, Fraser! [The "no to drunk driving" car is ruthlessly compressed.] Fraser! [Fraser is replying through a gag in his mouth.] Fraser!
FRASER: [muffled, gagged] I'm up here! Ray! [Diefenbaker barks. Vecchio sees a stack of wrecked cars.] Up here!
VECCHIO: [climbs the stack of cars to the red Riviera on top and in through the window] Hang in there, Benny. I'll have you untied in a second. [Fraser mumbles something. Vecchio removes his gag but can't reach his hands to untie them. Diefenbaker is muzzled.]
VECCHIO: You're stuck.
FRASER: Good assessment. [The forklift picks up the car.]
VECCHIO: This sucks.
FRASER: That's valid. Listen, Ray, I've come to the conclusion that that heel was planted.
VECCHIO: Not you, too.
FRASER: Yes. But the arson investigators had been all over that scene.
VECCHIO: Yeah, but not thoroughly.
FRASER: Still, they should have seen it since it wasn't entirely hidden in the debris.
VECCHIO: How do you know it wasn't entirely hidden?
FRASER: Well, I was told. All suspects are guilty of something.
VECCHIO: Kelly.
FRASER: That's right. He was the one who sent your partner Laurie home early. He was also the one who told you to go back for one last look around.
VECCHIO: I wanted Carver so bad I, I didn't question. I could have nailed him clean.
FRASER: There was no evidence, Ray.
VECCHIO: There's always evidence. I was new, Benny. I hadn't made detective. [The car is in the crusher; the top plate starts to come down.] But I can nail him now. I found Helen Harris. [The top plate stops; the forklift operator climbs out of the cab.]
FRASER: The woman Carver lived with? The one who disappeared?
VECCHIO: Yeah.
FRASER: I see.
The forklift operator comes over to them. It is Carver, of course.
CARVER: You didn't find Helen Harris.
VECCHIO: I found Helen Harris living in Maryland. She's ready to tell the whole crummy story about how you treated her and those other women.
CARVER: She's lying.
VECCHIO: I don't think so.
CARVER: Whoever you spoke to wasn't Helen Harris.
VECCHIO: Five-six, brown hair, walks with a limp, says you're a reptile.
CARVER: This is a setup. It's Kelly again, or Welsh, or — Fraser here.
VECCHIO: Sorry, pal. You shouldn't have let this one get away.
CARVER: I did not let her get away.
VECCHIO: You should have killed her.
CARVER: I did kill her.
VECCHIO: You don't know how happy I am to hear you say that.
CARVER: Okay, well, you've heard it. So what?
FRASER: What if he wasn't the only one to hear it?
VECCHIO: What if Lieutenant Welsh heard it?
Carver's smile falters a bit as a half-dozen uniformed cops pop up from positions behind other cars and aim their guns at him. Welsh strolls out with his hands in his pockets.
FRASER: And what if Assistant State's Attorneys Carnes and Greco heard it? [Maddie and Greco are walking up behind another couple-three armed officers.] It's very good, Ray.
VECCHIO: You're not the only one who knows how to plant a bug, Charlie. [A siren whoops.] You really didn't expect me to play this game by your rules, didja?
There is a tiny instant of Fraser looking behind Vecchio out the window before he says "What if he wasn't the only one to hear it" that nicely compensates for the fact that Fraser couldn't possibly have known this was Vecchio's plan. Good work! I don't know how Vecchio had the time to get Welsh and the prosecutors to come with him (or two minutes behind him, along with all these uniforms) to the junkyard, but Fraser definitely can't have known they were all there, and I extremely appreciate that they had him look around and see something that clued him in.
Scene 38
Carver is being led in handcuffs and under guard to a very non-wrecked patrol car. Fraser and Vecchio are sitting on the hood of Vecchio's green Riviera.
FRASER: You knew Carver wanted to hear you panic?
VECCHIO: Yeah.
FRASER: So you knew the car was bugged.
VECCHIO: Absolutely.
FRASER: Very clever, Ray.
VECCHIO: Ah, thank you, Benny.
FRASER: I just have one question.
VECCHIO: What's that?
FRASER: Well, I have to meet the trade minister, who's coming in by train from Waukegan tonight. Now, if the train is traveling at, say, an average of a hundred kilometers an hour —
VECCHIO: Sixty-two miles per hour.
FRASER: — point one-four — and if I'm traveling at a hundred kilometers an hour, where would the most logical place for us to intersect be? If I —
VECCHIO: Who cares? [goes to get in the car]
FRASER: It's a fine answer.
They get in the car and drive off the wrecking lot.
This is a fun little scene, except . . . we all knew the car was bugged, including Fraser, because he was there when they realized there was a second bug and he was there when they stopped looking for it. Right? Have another look at scene 30. Am I understanding that completely wrong?
If it had ended here, I would buy this episode as a series finale. I like that while Fraser does figure some stuff out, so he's not completely useless, it's Vecchio who does the detective work that actually solves the case and, crucially, rescues Fraser (who has not previously needed rescuing). That's good stuff. And wrapping it up with Vecchio continuing not to give a shit when the trains will intersect is nice. Meanwhile,
resonant points out that this episode is a nice counterpoint to the pilot: Vecchio is convinced of Carver's guilt and he can't persuade anybody else that the guy is dirty, just like Fraser with Gerrard in the pilot, but because Vecchio has support and is not forced to be the lone genius, he does get his man. (Thanks for that observation, res.)
Scene 39
Carver, in jailhouse blues, is lounging in a cell. An officer comes along and hands him a box through the bars. He opens it up and finds a matchbox prison transport van with a folded up piece of paper inside. He unfolds the paper, and it is a smiling photograph of Ray Vecchio. Carver looks around suspiciously.
At first I thought it was a matchbox ambulance, and I didn't get it; but it doesn't have the blue star of life on it, so I'm pretty sure it's a transport van. And I think what Carver is supposed to understand from Vecchio is something like "Even if I have to take you there myself." (Or, in an early-2020s meme, "Tell Carver. I want him to know it was me.")
Cumulative body count: 24
Red uniform: Not when he goes to meet Kelly on his own, and therefore not when he's drugged and abducted, but otherwise the whole episode