THE TALONS OF WENG-CHIANG

BY: ROBERT HOLMES

Part One

Original Air Date: 26 February 1977
Running time: 24:44

JAGO: Mister Chang. Wonderful, wonderful. Words fail me, sir. Words quite fail me.

CHANG: You are most generous.

JAGO: Have I ever, in my thirty years in the halls, seen such a dazzling display of lustrous legerdemain? So many feats of superlative, supernatural skill? The answer must be never, sir. Never.

SIN: Honourable master is kind to bestow praise on humble Chang's miserable, unworthy head.

JAGO: Dashed clever, the way you work the little fellow. Wires in the sleeves, I dare say. But I'll not pry, Mister Chang. The secrets of the artistes are sacrosanct.

BULLER (OOV.): Hey, you!

JAGO: What the deuce?

BULLER: Where's my Emma? What have you done with her?

JAGO: You've got no right to burst in here.

BULLER: Out of my way! It's him I want.

CHANG: Your Emma?

BULLER: She come in here last night and nobody ain't seen her since.

JAGO: I'll have the fellow ejected.

BULLER: Now I'm asking you, mister, what's happened to her?

JAGO: Call the stage hands, Freddy.

CHANG: It's all right, Mister Jago. Please, come with me.

JAGO: Courteous coves, these Chinese. I'd have propelled him onto the pavement with a punt up the posterior.

CHANG: Your wife?

BULLER: Emma Buller. And don't deny she was here, cos I saw her with my own eyes.

CHANG: Many ladies come to theatre. Why should you think

BULLER: Not round the side door, they don't. Now, look. I was passing in my cab and I saw her plain, and I know it was you she was calling on. She's been acting q*eer ever since you put the 'fluence on her last week, so don't try coming the innocent, Mister. I want to know where she is or I'm calling the law. Clear?

CHANG: Your wife came on stage?

BULLER: Last week. Levitated her, you did. She's not been the same since. It's done something to her reason, I shouldn't wonder. And she was here last night.

CHANG: Not to see me.

BULLER: Don't come the cod. She's disappeared. Nobody's seen her, not since she come here last night, so what about it, eh?

CHANG: In my country we have saying. Man who goes too quickly may step in bear trap.

BULLER: Right, I'm getting the Peelers.

LEELA: These clothes are ridiculous. Why must I wear them?

DOCTOR (OOV.): Because you can't go walking around Victorian London in skins. You'll frighten the horses.

DOCTOR: Anyway, we don't want to be conspicuous, do we?

LEELA: A swamp creature. That was it's att*ck cry.

DOCTOR: Oh no, it was a ship on the river. Excellent. It means we can't be far away.

LEELA: From where?

DOCTOR: From where we're going.

LEELA: Doctor, you make me wear strange clothes, you tell me nothing. You are trying to annoy me.

DOCTOR: I'm trying to teach you, Leela. Surely you'd like to see how your ancestors enjoyed themselves? Splendid. That's why I'm taking you to the theatre. Li H'sen Chang. Hmm, pity. I'd rather hoped we'd catch Little Tich. Never mind. If we hurry we'll just catch the second house.

JAGO: You'd better get your tail pinned on. Linens up in five minutes. Casey, have you got the oopizootics coming on?

CASEY: Mister Jago, I've seen it. I've seen it again!

JAGO: Be quiet. I told you before.

CASEY: Horrible, horrible it was, Mister Jago. A great skull coming at me out of the dark.

JAGO: Damme, you don't want to bankrupt me, Casey. Keep your voice down. Threadbare in Carey Street I'll be if people get the notion there's anything wrong with this theatre.

CASEY: Chains clanking, nine foot tall.

JAGO: You've been drinking.

CASEY: Not a drop, sir.

JAGO: Well, it's time you started.

JAGO: Now pull yourself together, man.

CASEY: I ain't never going down that cellar again. There I was, fixing the trap, when this apparition rose out of the ground in front of me. Hideous, it was. Hideous.

JAGO: That's enough.

JAGO: It's your imagination.

CASEY: Never.

JAGO: A cat or something must be trapped down there making noises. Tell you what I'll do, Casey. I'll come down with you this evening, as soon as the house is clear, and we'll have a good look round. Now how's that?

CASEY: It was no cat, Mister Jago. I seen it!

JAGO: Please, Casey, remember, mum's the word.

LEELA: This is a big village.

DOCTOR: Yes.

LEELA: What's the name of the tribe here?

DOCTOR: Cockneys.

LEELA: The sound of death!

DOCTOR: You stay here.

DOCTOR: Excuse me, can I help you?

QUICK (OOV.): Hold you there.

QUICK: Now then, what's all this?

LEELA: Touch me and I'll break your arm.

QUICK: Now don't be foolish, miss.

DOCTOR: Good evening.

LEELA: Keep back, Doctor. Blue guards!

DOCTOR: Good evening, Constable.

QUICK: Good evening, sir. You know this young female, sir?

DOCTOR: Oh yes, yes. We were att*cked by this little man and four other little men.

QUICK: When I got here, sir, he was being strangled with his own pigtail, sir.

DOCTOR: Really? Girlish enthusiasm, officer?

QUICK: You might call it that, sir. I call it making an affray. I must ask you to come down the station with me.

CHANG: Please to see, ladies and gentlemen, subject now in state of deep hypnosis.

AUDIENCE: Oh!

SIN: She asleep.

CHANG: She not asleep, Mister Sin.

SIN: She been slugging type of toddy.

CHANG: I will prove young lady not asleep.

SIN: She's lying on metal bar.

CHANG: Not lying on metal bar.

SIN: I've seen it done before.

CHANG: I will prove young lady not lying on metal bar.

SIN: She's held up by wires.

CHANG: Enough.

SIN: You can't fool me.

CHANG: Silence!

SIN: Don't touch me! Help! Police! m*rder!

CHANG: You see? No wires, Mister Sin. I will now demonstrate art of levitation raising most beautiful lady high above own topknot.

KYLE: Name, sir?

DOCTOR: Doctor. Leela.

KYLE: Place of residence, sir?

LEELA: We've only just arrived here.

DOCTOR: We're on our way to the theatre, do you see.

KYLE: Your home address will do for the moment, sir. You do have a permanent address, sir?

DOCTOR: No, Sergeant. We're travellers.

KYLE: I see. Persons of no fixed abode.

DOCTOR: No, no, no, no. We do have an abode. It's called a TARDIS.

KYLE: A TARDIS.

DOCTOR: But it's not fixed.

KYLE: I can give you and the young lady a fixed abode, sir. Quite easily.

DOCTOR: Flat footed imbecile.

KYLE: What was that, sir?

DOCTOR: It was nothing complementary. Get on with it, Sergeant.

KYLE: Now look, sir. We've got our hands full here, all these girls going missing in the manor, so if you'd just oblige us by answering any questions we'll get on a lot better. And a lot quicker.

DOCTOR: Sergeant, all this is irrelevant. I've come here to lay evidence.

KYLE: We'll come to that in good time.

DOCTOR: We'll come to that now, Sergeant. We've just prevented a kidnapping, a robbery or even a m*rder. My friend here caught one of the attackers. Let's come to it now, shall we?

KYLE: We've only your word as to what he did, Doctor.

DOCTOR: Tell him. Tell him.

LEELA: The man they were carrying was d*ad. He had been s*ab through the heart!

KYLE: Really, Miss. And how can you be sure of that?

LEELA: I am a warrior of the Sevateem. I know the different sounds of death. Now put our prisoner to the t*rture!

KYLE: Well, if that don't take the biscuit. t*rture, eh? This isn't the Dark Ages, you know.

LEELA: Make him talk.

KYLE: He's a Chinese, if you hadn't noticed. We get a lot of those in here, Limehouse being so close. Him jaw-jaw plenty by and by, eh, Johnny? I've sent for an interpreter.

DOCTOR: That won't be necessary. I speak Mandarin, Cantonese, all the dialects.

KYLE: Oh yes?

DOCTOR: Yes. Ne how ma? Ni chi mao cora (and so on)

KYLE: Yeah, very remarkable, I'm sure, Doctor, but since you're a party to the case, it isn't proper.

KYLE: Now what? That come from the river.

WOMAN: Look, there it is, guv. See? Look.

QUICK: Hurry with that boat hook.

WOMAN: It's a floater, all right. You've got it, guv.

WOMAN: On my oath, you wouldn't want that served with onions. Never seen anything like it in all my puff. Oh, make an 'orse sick, that would.

KYLE: Good of you to come so prompt, sir.

CHANG: Not at all, Sergeant. I'm always happy to be of service to the police. What can I do for you this time?

KYLE: A complaint against this man, sir. The lady and gentleman here swear they saw him, in concert with others not in custody, carrying what appeared to be a body, sir.

CHANG: Indeed.

KYLE: A European body as I understand them, sir.

CHANG: What happened to the others?

LEELA: They got away. I caught this one.

CHANG: You caught him? Remarkable.

DOCTOR: Don't I know you?

CHANG: I think not.

DOCTOR: Yes, I've seen you somewhere before.

CHANG: I understand we all look the same.

DOCTOR: Are you Chinese? Yes, that's it. We must have. No, I haven't been in China for four hundred years.

CHANG: Are you taking this matter seriously, Sergeant?

KYLE: We are, sir. Will you question the man, sir?

CHANG: Very well.

CHANG: Can I have paper and pencil, please, Sergeant?

KYLE: Certainly, sir.

DOCTOR: Got it! Li H'sen Chang.

CHANG: What?

DOCTOR: The Master of Magic and Mesmerism. Show us a trick.

DOCTOR: Very good. Very good.

KYLE: I think he's d*ad, sir.

DOCTOR: How did you do it?

CHANG: I did nothing. What are you suggesting.

DOCTOR: Scorpion venom.

KYLE: Scorpion venom?

DOCTOR: Highly concentrated scorpion venom. It k*lled him almost instantly.

DOCTOR: The Tong of the Black Scorpion.

KYLE: Don't know that one, sir.

DOCTOR: One of the most dangerous politico-criminal organisations in the world. Wouldn't you agree, Li H'sen Chang?

CHANG: You seem remarkably well-informed, Doctor. Alas, I know nothing of these matters. Most regrettable incident. Goodnight, Sergeant.

KYLE: Thank you, sir.

CHANG: I'm sure we shall meet again.

LEELA: Yes.

CHANG: Perhaps under more pleasant circumstances.

KYLE: Well, I don't know what to do about this lot.

DOCTOR: Then I'll tell you what to do, Sergeant. Organise a post-mortem. I want an analysis of the organs.

KYLE: You want what, sir?

DOCTOR: Well naturally I'm going to help. If the Tong of the Black Scorpion's here in London, you're going to need all the help you can get. Now cut along and do as I say. Now!

KYLE: Yes, sir.

CHANG: Faster, man, faster.

JAGO: Twinkle, twinkle, out in front.

CASEY: Eh?

JAGO: Gallery lights still burning.

CASEY: I'll just go and see to them now, Mister Jago.

JAGO: Everyone gone?

CASEY: Aye, just locked up, sir.

JAGO: I hope those girls go straight home to their digs.

CASEY: Oh, that they will, sir, with all this in the papers. Nine are missing now, you know.

JAGO: Nine. There was some fellow in here earlier blaming Chang of all people for some girl's disappearance.

CASEY: Just vanished off the streets, they have. Mostly in this area, too. What do you think's happened to them, Mister Jago?

JAGO: Nothing good, Casey, nothing good. That's a stone certainty.

CASEY: Oh, it says in the paper how it could be jolly Jack at work again.

JAGO: Jolly Jack?

CASEY: The Ripper, Mister Jago.

JAGO: The horrendous hyperbole of Grub Street, Casey.

CASEY: Eh?

JAGO: Newspaper gossip. They're probably just stony and scarpered. Cut along now. I'll wait for you here.

JAGO: I was right. It was blood. Blood all over the hand and wrist. How did that get there?

CASEY: Ready, Mister Jago.

JAGO: Oh, Casey. Don't ever do that to me again. If the celestial Chang caught me trying to pinch his tricks. I had an idea that his dummy was a midget dressed up, but it's just an ordinary vent's doll.

CASEY: Are we going to look down the cellar, Mister Jago?

JAGO: Of course, Casey. Of course. When I promise to do something. Determination, character. After you.

DOCTOR: They're what's known as a very dangerous bunch. Fanatical followers of an ancient Chinese god called Weng-Chiang.

LEELA: The Tong of the Black Scorpion?

DOCTOR: Yes. His followers believe that one day he'll come back and rule the world.

LEELA: So what's he like, this Weng-Chiang?

DOCTOR: Oh, very pleasant company. They say he blew poisonous fumes from his mouth and that he k*lled men with a white light that shone from his eyes.

LEELA: Magic!

DOCTOR: Superstitious rubbish. Here we are.

QUICK (OOV.): They're in there now, sir.

QUICK: Taken from the river not half an hour ago. Professor Litefoot's conducting his examination now, sir.

DOCTOR: Yes, well, our case is much more urgent.

QUICK: I wouldn't go in there if I was you, sir.

DOCTOR: Don't you worry about it. Don't you worry.

LITEFOOT: Thank you.

LITEFOOT: Who the devil are you, sir.

DOCTOR: I'm the Doctor, come to help you.

LITEFOOT: When I need anyone's help in pathology, I'll ask for it.

DOCTOR: The constable suggested a drowning case.

LITEFOOT: Fished from the river, but he wasn't drowned.

DOCTOR: By the look of those marks, an animal.

LITEFOOT: Exactly what I think, but what kind of animal leaves mutilations like those?

DOCTOR: Chisel-like incisors. A rodent?

LITEFOOT: Yes, but that's impossible. Look at the size of them.

DOCTOR: Hmm. Have you established the cause of death?

LITEFOOT: Yes, that's another curious thing. All this happened after death.

DOCTOR: Really?

LITEFOOT: He was k*lled by a Kn*fe blow to the heart.

DOCTOR: Are those his clothes?

QUICK: Yes, sir. I'm just taking them for examination.

DOCTOR: Hold that.

LITEFOOT: He was carrying no personal documents, but this indicates he was a licensed cab driver.)

LITEFOOT: Easy enough to identify the poor chap by his number.

LEELA: Doctor, those are the clothes the man we saw was wearing.

DOCTOR: What I'd like to know is, what do you think of these?

LITEFOOT: Some sort of hair.

DOCTOR: Yes. I think they're rat hairs.

LITEFOOT: Rat hairs? Do you know what you're saying, man?

DOCTOR: Yes, of course I know what I'm saying.

LITEFOOT: But they're nearly three inches long. Hairs on a rat can't be more than what, quarter of an inch?

DOCTOR: Interesting, isn't it, because I've just remembered something else about Weng-Chiang.

LEELA: What?

DOCTOR: He was the god of abundance. Yes, he made things grow. Can I borrow that?

DOCTOR: Thank you.

LEELA: Where are we going?

DOCTOR: Stay there, Leela.

DOCTOR: Were you trying to attract my attention?

DOCTOR: What's this?

LEELA: A Janis thorn.

DOCTOR: Yes. I thought I told you not to carry

LEELA: He was trying to k*ll you.

DOCTOR: Oh. Oh, well, in that case you'd better come along.

LEELA: What is it?

DOCTOR: The entrance to the sewers.

LEELA: Blood. Is this where they took the body?

DOCTOR: Yes.

LEELA: Where's it go?

DOCTOR: Into the Thames eventually. All the sewers are connected.

LEELA: What are those creatures?

DOCTOR: Rats.

LEELA: They don't look very dangerous.

DOCTOR: No, they're not. They're very cunning though. They're probably more afraid of us.
{"type": "series", "show": "Doctor Who", "episode": "14x21 - The Talons of Weng-Chiang - part 1"}