Towards Zero (2025) s01e02 Episode Script

1
I beg pardon of the court. I admit
I was unfaithful to my wife.
Camilla has invited me to Gull's Point.
You want me to spend our honeymoon
with your ex-wife?
- This will be your room, Mr
- Macdonald.
And you've come here together.
I hope this isn't some kind of
unfinished business.
- M-Mary? - Thomas.
- Best not to mention our friendship.
How dare you come here,
when I expressly forbade it.
I will have Mr Treves here
Why have a husband,
when you can have a lawyer?
What's your pleasure, sir?
If you stop talking, I won't have
to tell you that I'm a policeman.
You've got the black dog on you.
The Devil's got your soul.
WAVES CRASHING
PANTING
COUGHING AND SPLUTTERING
You You don't tell a s-
A soul! You don't tell a SOUL!
WOMAN SCREAMS
Thank you.
Still here, Tufty?
How's business? You know,
Thomas is a rubber man.
Gaskets and gum boots
and tubing and tyres
I know you're mocking me, Nevile.
Daresay it'd bounce
right off you.
Don't talk to Thomas like that.
You barely know him.
I know all about Thomas, Audrey.
Nevile told me everything.
Nevile, tell your wife
to apologise to Thomas.
Don't
Please don't put me in the middle.
- You will apologise to Thomas.
- Stop it!
Tufty, I apologise.
Old habits.
Still in love with Audrey?
COUGHS
BELL RINGS
You'll come back for lunch.
Well, we were going to have
a picnic on the beach.
You will have it here with me, or
am I to spend the whole day alone?
No, of course not.
Who's for a swim?
No, thank you, Nevile.
I don't intend on drowning today.
HE CHUCKLES
- You said there were rip currents.
- Oh, no, it's perfectly safe.
I'll race you to the rock and back.
Why do you have to make everything
a competition?
It makes life interesting.
No, my darling husband,
that is what I'm for.
I'll say!
SHE LAUGHS
Is that interesting?
What about this?
SHE GIGGLES
Sylvia! Sylvia!
Be careful! Don't do that! Sylvia!
Damned Mr Treves!
I knew I'd be made the nanny.
Well Do you love her?
Audrey. Is that why you're here?
I did, once.
She had a sort of gravity,
- she pulled you to her.
- Yes, I know, Thomas.
Whatever I felt for her died long ago.
Why does Nevile call you a liar?
Thomas?
Please, Mary, please
don't, please don't
Sylvia!
Race you to the rock and back.
- No.
- Watch me thrash her.
I need a drink.
SUDDEN HEAVY BREATHING
I lost my footing.
Drinking.
- Idiot.
- Lucky idiot.
A young girl from the hotel
raised the alarm.
Aspirin?
No broken bones, no internal injuries.
Sit up.
Up you go.
I've seen something
like this once before.
If you enter the water right
..on a calm night,
it's possible.
The plantation is ruined.
Leaf blight and floods.
I It's It's too much,
it's too much for any man.
I need money.
A lot of money.
Please, Aunt Camilla, please help me.
Help me
..or
Or? Or?!
I will go to the press and tell them
everything I know about Nevile.
Everything you know about Nevile?
That there was a tragic accident,
and a boy died,
and Nevile stood up and owned it?
But it wasn't an accident.
It wasn't! I know it wasn't!
This is why I sent you away,
because you would keep
picking at the wound.
And here you are, still drawing blood.
Will it bring Peter back?
If you must settle your score
with Nevile, do it like a man!
But leave Peter James in peace.
Get out of my sight, go on!
DOOR SLAMS
Where the hell is Nevile?
Oh, there they are.
INDISTINCT CHATTER
Sorry, we swam too far. Took ages.
We had to walk back.
I want to go dancing.
You promised to take me to Easterhead.
Yes, let's. Let's go dancing!
Sylvia, you can come too.
She'll go spare.
CHATTER AND LAUGHTER
We must be back in time for lunch,
or she'll flay us alive.
BELL RINGS
I'll go.
No, no, she doesn't
know you Mr Macdonald.
I'm Mr Nevile's man. I can fetch
and carry for her too, can't I?
Here's a little trick for you.
RINGING CONTINUES
RINGING STOPS
KNOCK AT DOOR
Barrett, get me in my chair. I need
air, it's suffocating in here.
Who are you?
Macdonald, ma'am, Mr Nevile's man.
Where's Barrett?
- No, I don't want to!
- You'll feel better for it.
Where were you before Nevile?
Summerbridge, Ma'am.
Summerbridge?
I don't know them personally.
Good people.
Then, why did you leave?
Answer me!
WAVES CRASHING
DANCE MUSIC PLAYS
Woo!
Dance with me.
WAVES CRASHING
PANICKED BREATHING
Please don't do that again.
Will you?
I'm Sylvia.
What, erm
What were you doing on the beach
in the middle of the night?
Well, I get bored in bed.
And Mr Treves sleeps
like the dead, so
Mr Treves?
He's my guardian.
Right.
The The point is, erm, Sylvia,
you're young, you need sleep.
Well, I'm a delinquent.
You're Well, I don't think
you're a delinquent.
And I should know.
I've I've met a few.
I'm an orphan.
Orphans are difficult
and don't belong anywhere.
LADY TRESSILIAN: - Mr
Treves, let us discuss the will.
If they must pursue
their pleasures elsewhere
Then, we shall conduct some business.
Nevile
He has money, youth, fame,
but what he really wants
is the country seat.
Perhaps I shall leave him
everything but.
MR TREVES CHUCKLES
Audrey,
Mary,
whining for their independence.
As for Thomas Royde and
his feeble attempt at blackmail
Blackmail?
Ah Peter.
Peter James.
Let us not speak of it.
We will not speak of it
CUTLERY CLATTERING
Barrett! Stop that!
- Oh
- Take it away, take it all away!
Left me with a brood of vipers.
I think by now, you know
I'm not the man you were hoping for.
Hm-hm
But I'm not despicable.
You could have told me, Thomas.
I thought we were friends.
But you don't want anyone
to know about that, do you?
INDISTINCT CHATTER IN FRENCH
I don't want to hear!
You summoned me?
Naturally, I've been informed.
You lost your footing.
Not every day one meets
a living miracle.
No, not
Not a miracle, no. Just, erm
Just bloody lucky.
Or unlucky.
Are you disturbed, Inspector,
in the mind?
I should have died, erm,
a thousand deaths.
All those bullets, all those shells.
And seemingly, not one of them
was for me.
Death doesn't seem to want you.
HE CHUCKLES
You've got to go on living.
You've got to.
No matter what the rage,
no matter what the blackness.
You've got to go on.
I saw him go down.
Matthew.
I saw the yacht founder.
At this window, I watched it sink.
The sea decides.
It's a terrible thing,
to be angry with the dead.
What were you angry about?
Me ♪
And my ♪
Shadow ♪
Strolling down the ♪
Avenue ♪
Me ♪
And my ♪
Shadow ♪
Not a soul ♪
To tell our troubles to ♪
And when it's 12 ♪
O'clock ♪
I want to go.
I want to go now.
MUSIC CONTINUES
We are hours late.
She's going to murder us.
KNOCK AT DOOR
Send them away, Frederick.
I will not see them.
Lady Tressilian is not to
be disturbed, Nevile.
She is reconsidering her will.
Er, let me
Let me speak to her, Treves
Not this time, Nevile.
- We should never have gone.
- Don't you dare blame me for this.
It was your idea, Lucky.
You made me come here.
You said it would be all right.
Just you and me,
you said, free of her
Her.
You know, I'll say this for Audrey.
She'd never be so vulgar
as to make a fuss.
She would swallow it or leave.
I am not going anywhere,
I am Mrs Strange.
Yes, you are.
RATTLING
Lady Tressilian is
indisposed this evening,
after a painful and disappointing day.
DOORBELL RINGS
Excuse me.
Everyone, this is Mr Louis Morel.
Please.
Oh, he's staying at the hotel.
Do you remember?
This afternoon?
I danced with your wife?
You don't remember?
Oh, no, of course.
No, you were with someone else.
Who is this man?
He's my guest, Nevile.
Mr Morel, you are welcome.
Good evening.
I like a good detective story.
But, you know,
they begin in the wrong place.
They begin with the murder.
No, no. The murder is the end.
The story begins long before -
years before -
..when the murder is seeded.
Someone, laying a trap,
drawing us towards zero itself.
MUSIC PLAYS
Mr Morel, I owe you
the rest of our dance.
Nevile, you can dance
with your other wife.
Good luck to you, Mr Morel.
You can throw her away,
just like that?
Come on, Nevile, Audrey?
Or is this not your song?
Come on, Nevile, dance!
Dance with your wife!
Dance with your fucking queen!
- Magnificent when drunk.
- Mmm
I'll dance with you, Audrey,
if he won't.
Kay
Right, you need to sleep it off,
now Now!
Hey!
- You're hurting her.
- What's it to you? Who the hell are you?
No Nobody, he's nobody, Nevile.
Yeah, I'm nobody.
I'm the "nobody" she left for you.
For this.
I see.
Where is it? My compact, my
My little gold My gold compact.
Where is it?
Where did you last have it?
In my room, I suppose.
I'm going to help her look for it
and you're not going to say a word.
Dance Dance with your boyfriend.
Go, then! Go!
It's not there.
It must be downstairs somewhere.
Audrey
..kiss me.
Do you see now?
What they are, these people?
HEAVY BREATHING
Kay, don't
Don't
Nevile
You'll want a divorce.
But you won't get one from me.
I'll kill you first!
And her!
I'll see you both dead!
BELL RINGS
- Leave.
- Enough Enough!
Ah!
Hector, remove Mr Morel.
BELL RINGS
C'est bon, c'est bon
- Nevile?
- Yes.
- All right.
- Now I see it all.
Having your cake and eating it,
is that it?
- Oh
- Like some witless playboy.
Is that what you are,
your father's son?
No. You know how I've loved her,
my entire life.
She's a part of me.
She She IS me.
Kay is your wife now.
Audrey will leave tomorrow,
and you will do whatever you must
to make things right with Kay.
Yes, Aunt.
DOOR CLOSES
You bastard! You bastard! You shit!
You fucking shit!
Kay! Let me in!
BANGS ON DOOR
Please, just let me talk to you.
Open the door!
Kay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry
MUFFLED SPEECH
BANGING ON DOOR
Kay!
I was out of my mind
Kay!
BANGING ON DOOR
Kay!
Vipers
Sleeping draught, Mrs Strange.
I'll make her some lavender tea.
Leave it to me.
Then, perhaps,
we can all have some peace.
Kay's locked me out.
I don't know what I was thinking,
Bee.
Lying to myself.
Poor Aunt Camilla, she
She's really not well enough
for all this mayhem.
I'll just go up and see she's all right.
I think I'll, er
I'll go to Easterhead.
Drown my sorrows.
Goodnight, Bee.
Goodnight, Mr Nevile.
KNOCK AT DOOR
Barrett, come in.
Come and sit with me for a moment.
CAR ENGINE REVS
Bed.
- Morning. - Morning.
- Morning
Where's Barrett?
Mrs Barrett?
Mrs Barrett!
Oh, God
Oh
Oh, you're alive
Mrs Barrett! Mrs Barrett!
DISTANT SCREAM
Jesus
If I'd have killed anyone
last night, it would have been you.
Mrs Barrett, sir, her senna brew
was laced with a good hit of something -
most likely, this. Veronal.
Someone drugged
Lady Tressilian's housekeeper
to keep her out of the way.
Two blows to the head
with a blunt object.
Doctor puts time of death somewhere
between midnight and two o'clock.
No forced entry, no robbery,
all windows and doors are locked.
Lady Tressilian's bell, sir.
The bell wire runs from her room
up to Mrs Barrett's room,
then down to the hall,
and from there to here.
It's disabled at all three points.
So that no-one would hear her
upstairs or downstairs.
Well, then, why drug the housekeeper?
What about the other servants?
The valet, Macdonald,
he's new to the house.
Mrs Barrett, Mr Hurstall, old faithfuls.
And Hurstall said
there was a fight last night.
Who was fighting?
Nevile Strange, Audrey
and Kay Strange, and one guest,
a Mr Louis Morel.
- Frenchman, staying at the hotel.
- Find him.
Hold Macdonald upstairs with the others.
And look into the staff.
Sir.
Macdonald.
You have the will, Mr Treves?
We'll stay here now at the house.
I'm the closest thing to family
they have now.
They will need me.
It won't help you,
I'm afraid, Inspector.
I'd like to see it, Mr Treves.
They each get their little pot
of gold, doesn't narrow things down.
It doesn't give you the Point Zero.
The Point Zero?
Every murder has its moment of origin,
its Point Zero.
We call that motive.
It's deeper than that.
A wound. A festering wound.
HE CHUCKLES
A family secret?
Hmm
Do you want us to find
her killer, Mr Treves?
Inspector, I have protected
her interests for 30 years.
I've held secrets she's buried,
in order to honour her dearest wish,
to hold this family together.
I'll see the will, Mr Treves.
Thomas Royde, Inspector,
came here, uninvited,
against her will, with one thought -
blackmail.
First you obstruct me,
now you direct me.
The will, Mr Treves.
Thank you.
It seems she was in the middle
of rewriting it.
You didn't mention that, Mr Treves.
"Mr Strange gets the house",
she's put a line through that
The wife is still named
as Audrey Strange, crossed out,
and you've pencilled
Kay Strange instead,
Mr Treves.
A decent inheritance for you, Mr Royde.
A very generous legacy for you,
Miss Aldin.
Mr Strange
You're now head of the household, so
You first.
There was a fight last night.
A personal matter. Not relevant.
The fight, Mr Strange?
It would appear that
I'm still in love with my ex-wife.
I was so sure
I'd recovered from her. But no.
Wild for her.
Still.
And then she's screaming,
"I'll see you both dead."
Er You had words,
you and Lady Tressilian?
Er, no, no, she
She had, er, words with me.
And, er, I went drinking.
- Is he up to this?
- Inspector.
Erm, you said you went drinking.
Where did you go?
The hotel, at Easterhead.
- Thomas Royde, sir.
- Yes.
Erm, you've been accused
of blackmail, Mr Royde.
It was what I was owed,
for the devastation of my family.
What Peter was owed. Justice.
- Peter?
- Peter James.
Peter James
There was an accident
here at Gull's Point,
local boy was killed
with a bow and arrow.
15-odd years ago?
17 years. It wasn't an accident.
Nevile killed Peter on purpose.
And you witnessed it? You saw
Nevile Strange kill this boy?
You'll make a statement, Mr Royde?
Miller, find the case file
on Peter James.
It wasn't an accident, I know it wasn't!
And she sent us into exile,
the other side of the world.
That place killed my mother
and my father.
Killed them both.
And I never did anything wrong.
You used a dead boy to try
and extort money from your aunt.
What did you do when she said no?
N-n-n
M-m-m-m
Your letters to Thomas Royde,
Miss Aldin.
We found them in his room.
Of course, we have his to you.
Those are private.
Investigating a murder is almost
as brutal as the murder itself.
You've worked for Lady Tressilian
for seven years. Before that?
I cared for my father in his illness.
Nine years, I nursed him for.
Camilla took us in
for the last year of Father's life.
She saved us.
Disloyal, then,
to write to Thomas Royde.
Both of you with your grievances
and frustrations.
You desperately need independence
and Royde needs money.
Money?
Mr Royde is nearly bankrupt.
I see
I should have been here.
I never should have left her.
Why did he come back?
She watched him drown.
Terrible thing to be angry
with the dead.
What was she so angry about?
What did he do
that she couldn't forgive?
POLICEMAN: - Here!
Get Inspector Leach!
Call Inspector Leach!
They've found something.
Where is it, Cooper?
There.
Hmm
All right.
Two blows to the head
with a blunt object.
"N.S".
Nevile Strange.
The statements from Easterhead, sir.
Nevile Strange.
From around midnight, he was seen at
the hotel, drinking, playing cards.
Returned at 3am.
Mr Hurstall had to let him in.
There is a 40, 45-minute window
where he is
..unaccounted for.
He says he went out to the beach
to sober up.
Sir.
- Listen, please, sir.
- Yes, I am listening, Miller.
45 minutes, which means
It takes 80 or 90 minutes
to drive there and back,
- so Nevile Strange has an alibi.
- Yes, sir.
There's nothing, there's nothing.
Something shut Treves up like a clam.
We've got something, sir.
Mr Arthur Macdonald,
formerly of the Howarth Estate
at Summerbridge?
- Yes. That's right.
- We had this, from Summerbridge.
Arthur Macdonald, not known.
You have smuggled your way
into this house,
and now the lady of the house
has been murdered.
I've seen people hang for less.
So, who are you?
And what do you want here?
Sir.
Veronal.
I don't I don't sleep well.
I will ask you again, who are you?
Mrs Barrett has been drugged.
Lady Tressilian's bell,
disabled at three places.
You had access to all three.
Your identity is unknown.
This is your last chance.
Perhaps you'll have more to say
for yourself at a police station.
No, no, come on.
No, I don't want to go!
No, you don't understand!
Inspector!
It's to my mother.
A letter, from Lady Tressilian.
I found it when my mother died.
Your real name is Matthew Hutton,
of Langton in Yorkshire.
Your mother, Sally Fosse, worked
as a maid here at Gull's Point.
You're the illegitimate son
of Sir Matthew Tressilian.
What?!
The family secret.
The secret you guarded all these years,
now standing in front of you,
Mr Treves -
the family shame.
Sir Matthew and the maid.
She didn't watch him drown.
She let him drown.
Murdering bastard!
Yeah, yeah, I'm a bastard, bastard son.
And everyone knows a bastard
can't inherit.
So, what do I stand to gain?
Then, why come here?
I didn't
I didn't hurt her.
On my mother's soul, I didn't.
Inspector Leach
..the Point Zero
is staring you in the face.
Oh, for God's sake, Leach,
arrest the man!
He's inveigled his way into
this house! He's an impostor!
Macdonald
The man's my blood.
He was in our bedroom.
The bastard son.
She never breathed a word.
Why didn't she tell me, Treves?
She was trying to protect you,
Nevile. We were protecting you.
Leach got his man.
I'm quite satisfied of that.
Right, let's turn in.
We're all exhausted.
And I must look in on Sylvia.
Goodnight.
Goodnight.
THUNDERCLAP
MUFFLED PLEADING
THUNDERCLAP