SHADWELL
I’ve prepared the ledger. The men need paying, your honour. It’s hard times for witchfinders in today’s degenerate age.
He makes to slide it across, but Crowley makes a gesture: not necessary. Shadwell nods. The accounts vanish into Shadwell’s mac.
CROWLEY
No need. Two hundred and fifty pounds. I’ll drop off the money for you on Saturday.
SHADWELL
In cash, in an envelope. We don’t take plastic.
CROWLEY
You astonish me.
Hold on Shadwell’s accounts book.
SHADWELL
So.
CROWLEY
There’s a village called Tadfield, in Oxfordshire. Send your best people down there. I’m looking for a boy. He’s about eleven. I don’t have anything more than that. But . . . Look for anything strange.
SHADWELL
This boy. He’s a witch?
CROWLEY
Possibly. We’ll have to find him first, won’t we?
SHADWELL
My best operatives. That would be, Witchfinder Lieutenant Table, and . . .
But Crowley’s already on his way out.
CROWLEY
Call me if you find anything.
325INT. JASMINE COTTAGE – DAY
Adam and Anathema are in her kitchen. She’s pouring them both lemonade.
ANATHEMA
All of my family have had occult powers, going all the way back. We can find ley lines.
ADAM
Right. What’s ley lines?
ANATHEMA
Invisible lines of force linking places of power.
ADAM
Amazin’, there bein’ all these invisible lines of force around and me not seeing ’em.
ANATHEMA
And we can see auras.
ADAM
And they are . . .?
ANATHEMA
A sort of coloured force field around someone. Everyone’s got one. I can look at its strength and colour and tell you how you’re feeling.
ADAM
That’s brilliant. Why don’t they teach us about them at school?
ANATHEMA
School is a repressive tool of the state.
ADAM
Oh. So what colour’s my aura then?
Anathema squints. We look at Adam in ANATHEMA VISION, but no aura manifests about him.
ANATHEMA
I . . . Adam, I can’t see your aura.
ADAM
You said everybody’s got one.
ANATHEMA
I don’t know, hon. It’s an art, not a science. You’re in great shape.
ADAM
So what else don’t they teach us at school?
A hasty montage, as Anathema starts to explain things to him, but we leave out all the explanations because we do not have time so we just fast forward through the conversation and cut in on significant words in her explanation. All the time she is talking, Adam is RAPT.
ANATHEMA
Clubbing baby seals. // they are cutting down the rainforests so you can get cheap hamburgers. // don’t get me started on global warming. // genetically modified food // whales have huge brains and we are hunting them for no reason// nuclear power stations . . .
And time is flowing again, as Adam interrupts her.
ADAM
Nuclear power stations are rubbish!
ANATHEMA
Yes! They are!
ADAM
We went to see one on a school trip. Nothing was bubbling and there wasn’t any green smoke and there weren’t anyone wearing those space suits. It was so dull.
ANATHEMA
Well, yes. But we need to get rid of them.
ADAM
Serve them right for not bubbling.
Anathema notices the time . . .
ANATHEMA
Adam, I have to get back to work. But if you’re interested in any of this stuff, I’ve got some old magazines here. I mean, you don’t have to read them . . .
She looks around, finds the stack of New Aquarian magazines. One step up from fanzines, the covers have things like CHARLES FORT, GENIUS OF THE UNEXPLAINED and THE MYSTERIES OF THE TIBETAN SECRET MASTERS and WHERE IS LOST ATLANTIS? on them.
ADAM
Wicked!
326EXT. JASMINE COTTAGE LANE – DAY
Adam is walking home, with his stack of ancient magazines, and his dog following happily at his heels.
GOD (V.O.)
It might have helped Anathema to understand what was going on, if she understood the very simple reason why she couldn’t see Adam’s aura.
And now we FREEZE on Adam, then rapidly PULL BACK from him. PULL BACK from the lane to the world from above, the town, the county, England . . .
GOD (V.O.)
It’s for the same reason that people in Times Square can’t see America.
And now we have pulled back far enough to see the curvature of the Earth. And there’s a pulsing, multicoloured light around Oxfordshire that centres on Adam.
327EXT. ANGELIC SKYSCRAPER – EARLY EVENING
The sun is setting, glinting off the skyscraper.
328INT. ANGELIC SKYSCRAPER – EARLY EVENING
The room of angels in slick suits. There are four of them, male and female, and of all skin shades, but they are all upper class angels. Aziraphale is there to talk to them. He’s nervous. The senior angel is Gabriel – slick, buff, good-looking.
GABRIEL
So, Aziraphale. We got your message. You’ve got something big. Lay it on us.
AZIRAPHALE
I’m sorry?
URIEL
What’s happening?
AZIRAPHALE
Well. Okay. So. It’s about the Antichrist.
URIEL
Yes?
AZIRAPHALE
I think that, um. Well, it’s not impossible, considering all the alternatives, that the, the other side, might have lost track of him.
MICHAEL
The other side?
Aziraphale points downward.
GABRIEL
Lost track of him? He’s the son of the US ambassador. He’s under constant observation..
MICHAEL
The other side are currently transporting him to the plains of Megiddo. Apparently, that’s the traditional starting point.
GABRIEL
Middle Eastern unrest. Everything else follows. Four Horsemen ride out. Last great battle between Heaven and Hell.
AZIRAPHALE
Yes. Well, it’s possible that the demon Crowley . . . He’s a wiley adversary. Keeps me on my toes, I can tell you. But the um, American ambassador’s son, well, it may have been a ruse . . .
SANDALPHON
A ruse?
AZIRAPHALE
And the actual Antichrist might be, um, somewhere else.
GABRIEL
Where?
AZIRAPHALE
Not sure. I mean . . . I could find out. I have my agents. Dedicated team who could investigate the possibility. Hypothetically speaking, if this were the case . . .
URIEL
It wouldn’t change anything, Aziraphale.
GABRIEL
There was war in Heaven, long before the Earth was created. Crowley and the rest of them were cast out. But things were never really settled.
AZIRAPHALE
No. Right. I suppose they weren’t. But there doesn’t have to be another war, does there?
MICHAEL
When your cause is just you do not hesitate to smite the foe, Aziraphale.
SANDALPHON
We all look forward to a good foe-smiting.
Much as we’ve enjoyed your hypotheticals, Aziraphale, I’m afraid we have things to get back to. The Earth isn’t going to just end itself, you know.
AZIRAPHALE
No. Yes. Right. Sorry.
329INT. LIFT – EARLY EVENING
Aziraphale is in one of those lifts that go down the side of build
ings, with glass walls, so he can look out on all of London as he goes down.
He looks miserable.
330INT. ANGELIC SKYSCRAPER – EARLY EVENING
The senior angels.
GABRIEL
What did you think of that then?
URIEL
That’s an angel who has been down there too long.
SANDALPHON
I don’t trust him.
GABRIEL
Hypotheticals, indeed.
331EXT. JASMINE COTTAGE – DAY
We can see the sign on the cottage.
332INT. JASMINE COTTAGE BEDROOM – DAY
Anathema’s bedroom: the walls are covered with paper notes, and these are connected to a map of the area by wool and thumbtacks. There are magical symbols, notes and all sorts.
The map is Tadfield and surrounding area.
333EXT. TADFELD VILLAGE GREEN – DAY
Anathema is walking through the village green, holding a map. She’s looking at the map. Crossing off sections. She has a small pendulum which she’s holding above the map — it seems to be swinging oddly.
We can see a few cheerful village types — A MILKMAN, a COURTING COUPLE, an OLD LADY AND HER GRANDSON. She smiles and nods at them.
Then we see them for a moment in ANATHEMA VISION: each of the people has an aura, a human-shaped coloured glow, around them. The milkman is violet, the courting couple both blue, the old lady green, and her grandson yellow.
R.P. TYLER and his dog SHUTZI go past. His aura is an angry red.
Anathema blinks and normal vision returns.
TYLER
R. P. Tyler. Neighbourhood watch. I couldn’t help but notice, young person, that you have a map. Casing the joint, are we?
ANATHEMA
What?
TYLER
We don’t need your kind here.
ANATHEMA
I’m renting Jasmine Cottage.
TYLER
Oh good lord, you’re an American tourist. Sorry. Thought you were a person of interest.
ANATHEMA
I am. Listen. Eleven years ago, something came to this village. Some kind of beast, or creature. If you’re neighbourhood watch, maybe you noticed.
TYLER
Tadfield is a perfectly respectable village. If you’re going to come here and smoke your fatty spliffers and bimble off to woo-woo land, I suggest you do it elsewhere. Like back in America.
ANATHEMA
Fatty spliffers?
But he has stomped off.
334INT. MADAME TRACY’S FLAT – DAY
We hear a phone ringing. For the first time we get to look around Madame Tracy’s place. The sitting room is all set for a seance. She’s walking around, putting her seance things away – the crystal ball, the occult candles and so on, and in their place she’s putting pink love candles.
She’s making a slightly occult sitting room into a love den. She could have two-sided paintings, with scary Victorian black and white spirit photographs on one side, and with sexy young women, or even sexy Madame Tracy paintings, on the other, and turn them over.
She’s made-up, but her hair is still in rollers, and she’s dressed for sexy times, but with a kimono over it.
We follow her into the hall, where she picks up the ancient payphone on the wall.
335INT. MADAME TRACY’S FLAT HALLWAY – DAY
If we are cutting backwards and forwards, Aziraphale is now back in his bookshop.
MADAME TRACY
(sexy voice)
Hello.
AZIRAPHALE
Witchfinder Sergeant Shadwell, please. Or, um, one of his officers.
MADAME TRACY
(posh voice)
Ay shall endeavour to see if he is availi-able.
(knocks)
Coo-ee, Mr Shadwell.
Madame Tracy knocks on Shadwell’s door, and opens it. Through the open door, Newt is sitting cutting out articles . . .
Hello, Newton.
NEWT
Hello, Madame Tracy.
Shadwell comes stomping up the stairs.
SHADWELL
Awa’ wi’ ye, harlot.
MADAME TRACY
A gentleman on the telephone for you. He sounds ever so refined. And I’ll be getting us a nice bit of liver for Sunday.
SHADWELL
I’d sooner sup wi’ the Devil.
MADAME TRACY
So if you’d let me have the plates back from last week, there’s a love.
Shadwell ignores this and grabs the phone. Cut between Aziraphale in the bookshop and Shadwell.
AZIRAPHALE
Sergeant Shadwell. This is You Know Who.
SHADWELL
Who?
AZIRAPHALE
Me. Your, um, sponsor. Listen, do you have any men free? I need them to poke about a bit.
SHADWELL
Poke, eh? And where exactly do you want them poking?
AZIRAPHALE
Tadfield. It’s a little town in Oxfordshire. There’s a boy I need placed under observation. I need to know where he is at all times. I’ll give you his address.
SHADWELL
I’ll put a squad of my best men onto it.
AZIRAPHALE
Oh. Good. Thank you so much. So . . . How is Witchfinder Colonel Green? Is his leg any better?
SHADWELL
Clearing up nicely.
AZIRAPHALE
And I should have said Witchfinder Major Milkbottle. I was so sorry to hear about his untimely end. I sent flowers.
SHADWELL
Aye. The flowers were appreciated. And so was the extra twenty pounds you sent for the family. He was a brave man.
AZIRAPHALE
I was flabbergasted when you told me how he died.
SHADWELL
Aye. A brave man. I’ll be by the bookshop next week to collect your annual dues, then. And the expenses for the keeping an eye on the young man.
AZIRAPHALE
Squad of best men to Tadfield, dear boy, and keep them there until I give you orders. Now, the boy is called Adam Young, and his address is four, Hogback Lane, Tadfield. You’ve got that?
He writes it down on a notepad, by the phone.
SHADWELL
Absolutely, your honour. Tadfield it is.
AZIRAPHALE
Right. Pip-pip. Let me know when your men are in position.
He puts down the phone.
SHADWELL
‘Pip-pip’! Great southern pansy.
336INT. SHADWELL’S FLAT – DAY
Newt is sitting cutting articles out of newspapers in Shadwell’s unpleasant flat. He coughs. The air is thick. Tries to open a window. Fails.
He looks at the ancient hat of Thou-Shalt-not-Commit-Adultery Pulsifer in its glass case, and reads the label. Looks puzzled.
He looks at Shadwell’s accounts book, filled with fictitious witchfinders . . .
Now a COMPLEX COMPUTER GRAPHIC of the Witchfinder Army organisational chart. People appear on it, multiply as they are named. The first few have different faces, and then they start looking identical. Beside each soldier we see how much they get paid. It appears to mostly be about a shilling, although the top officers are paid as much as three pounds a week.
GOD(V.O.)
Strictly speaking, Shadwell doesn’t run the Witchfinder Army. According to Shadwell’s pay ledgers it is run by Witchfinder General Smith. Under him are Witchfinder Colonels Green and Jones, and Witchfinder Majors Jackson, Robinson, and Smith (no relation). Then there are Witchfinder Majors Saucepan, Tin, Milkbottle (deceased), and Cupboard, because Shadwell’s limited imagination had been beginning to struggle at this point. And Witchfinder Captains Smith, Smith, Smith, and Smythe and Ditto. And five hundred Witchfinder Privates and Corporals and Sergeants. Most of them are called Smith, but this doesn’t matter because neither Crowley nor Aziraphale has ever bothered to read that far.
The hundreds of people on the organisational cha
rt have started to vanish, leaving only drawings of Sergeant Shadwell and Witchfinder Private Newton Pulsifer.
GOD (V.O.)
Crowley and Aziraphale simply hand over the pay. After all, both lots put together only come to around £500 a year.
TIME RESTARTS.
Shadwell has entered.
SHADWELL
Find any witches yet, Witchfinder Private Pulsifer?