Happy Valley Page #3

Season #1 Episode #3

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CUT TO:

20 INT. DISCOVERY. EVENING 7. 17.51 20

SHAFIQ’s next to CATHERINE in the Discovery. CATHERINE’s

driving.

CATHERINE:

She’d seen a white tranny with a

light out, she was gonna

(she gets on radio again)

Bravo November four-five. Had she

just P.N.C.d a white transit van?

RADIO:

She’d put in a request, but not

given the registration.

HAPPY VALLEY. EPISODE THREE. BY SALLY WAINWRIGHT 12.

CATHERINE:

I want the helicopter up now -now

NOW - looking for a white transit

van.

CATHERINE realises she lost it there for a second, she reins

it in.

SHAFIQ:

(for CATHERINE’s ears

only)

Why would she do that? Put in a

request but not give the

registration?

CATHERINE doesn’t know, but clearly something’s gone very

badly wrong.

CUT TO:

21 EXT. SCAMMONDEN ROAD. EVENING 7. 17.52 21

We see KIRSTEN’s face in the gloom. The only illumination is

from the rear lights of her patrol car and the revolving bar

lights. She’s dead, no question. Silence. Gloom across the

moor as the light continues to fade. We become aware of

headlights. The sound of the two vehicles approaching at

speed. Blue lights, headlights. The Discovery is in front. It

slows up as it approaches the scene.

CUT TO:

22 INT/EXT. DISCOVERY/STREET. EVENING 7. 17.53 22

CATHERINE and SHAFIQ can see what’s in the road: someone in

uniform, dead. They both freeze. Just for a second.

SHAFIQ:

(a whisper)

That isn’t Kirsten.

CATHERINE:

Pass me the

‘Torch’. She’s pointing at the glove compartment. SHAFIQ

passes it. CATHERINE gets out of the Discovery. SHAFIQ feels

too wobbly to move for another few seconds.

CUT TO:

23 EXT. SCAMMONDEN ROAD. EVENING 7. 17.54 23

TWIGGY’s pulled up behind the Discovery. He gets out but is

reluctant to move forward; he’s as nervous as SHAFIQ.

HAPPY VALLEY. EPISODE THREE. BY SALLY WAINWRIGHT 13.

And in truth, CATHERINE is. But she’s the most senior person

here, she has to take control.

TWIGGY:

What is there?

CATHERINE heads over to KIRSTEN, horrified, mesmerised by the

sight. She’s horrified not least because she knows KIRSTEN

could still be alive. CATHERINE gets down on the ground right

next to KIRSTEN’s face. She’s barely recognisable, blood

coming from her mouth, nose and ears.

CATHERINE:

(gently)

Kirsten?

KIRSTEN’s so utterly, obviously dead. CATHERINE feels her

neck for a pulse.

SHAFIQ:

(he’s nearly in tears, and

daren’t come closer)

Sarg! What’s happening?

TWIGGY moves closer: he’s older, wiser. But doesn’t move any

closer than he needs to; he knows there’s nothing he can do

that CATHERINE can’t. CATHERINE continues to feel for a

pulse. Painful seconds pass. CATHERINE realises there isn’t a

pulse, and there was never likely to be one, the state

KIRSTEN’s in. CATHERINE touches KIRSTEN’s face tenderly. She

wants to cry, she wants to kiss her. She wants to wrap her up

and keep her warm, but she knows it’s pointless (and harmful

to what is essentially now a murder scene). Moments pass then

she stands up; she’s on auto-pilot. She goes over to SHAFIQ

and TWIGGY.

CATHERINE:

We need to close the road.

SHAFIQ:

Is she...?

The word ‘dead’ won’t come out. CATHERINE resists the urge to

snap:
“What am I? A doctor?”: she doesn’t want to give in to

any emotions, she needs to stay in police mode. She gets on

her radio.

CATHERINE:

Bravo November Four-five to

control, she’s dead - I think she’s

[dead]

(her voice fails, she has

to try again)

She’s been run over, she’s - we

need the on-call D.I., we need CSI,

we need the CIU, we need H-MIT, we

need the whole circus here.

(MORE)

HAPPY VALLEY. EPISODE THREE. BY SALLY WAINWRIGHT 14.

CATHERINE (CONT'D)

(she goes and opens the

back of the Discovery and

takes out the tape she

needs to make an inner

cordon around the body)

Shaf, take the Landy down as far as

Wheatcroft Lane and park broadside.

Nobody comes through. Twiggy, same

up at the top.

(she speaks to the radio)

Control. Did you get me that

helicopter?

RADIO:

Helicopter’s airborne and on route.

TWIGGY and SHAFIQ haven’t moved.

CATHERINE:

Move it, come on, close this road.

We’re preserving evidence now.

TWIGGY has to give poor stunned SHAFIQ a nudge. They set off

in their respective vehicles, we see the distant blue lights

of the ambulance approaching. For a few moments, CATHERINE’s

alone with dead KIRSTEN. She goes and shines her torch in the

road around KIRSTEN. She sees red glass from broken rear

lights. She goes and crouches down beside KIRSTEN again,

stares at her, mesmerised and horrified. We hear the

helicopter. It gets louder and louder.

CUT TO:

24 INT. CATHERINE’S HOUSE, LIVING ROOM. NIGHT 7. 23.30 24

Later. CATHERINE - still in half uniform - is sitting staring

at the fire. CLARE - in her dressing gown - is sitting with

her. Silence.

CATHERINE:

I had to give her a bit of a

talking to. Yesterday morning. I

said, “I’m not your mother. You’re

a police officer, nobody bullies

you”. So she’d be out to prove

something. She said, “This is all I

wanted to do, all my life, and I’m

sh*t at it”, and I should’ve said

“No you’re not. You’re fantastic,

you’re lovely”, but I didn’t. I

just let her dwell on it, so she’d

be thinking I’d be thinking she was

sh*t at it, and I didn’t, I don’t

think that, she wasn’t.

HAPPY VALLEY. EPISODE THREE. BY SALLY WAINWRIGHT 15.

CLARE doesn’t know what to say; nothing seems big enough. She

knows just how badly CATHERINE’ll be taking this, and all she

can do is listen.

CUT TO:

25 EXT. SCAMMONDEN ROAD. NIGHT 7. 20.30 25

We’re back earlier in the evening. The whole circus has

arrived:
a helicopter’s chopping around overheard.

CATHERINE’s cordoned off the area around KIRSTEN’s body and

KIRSTEN’s patrol car. A CSI tent’s been put up over KIRSTEN.

Arc lights on the top of a couple of police Range Rovers

illuminate the whole scene, there’s a camera on a tripod in

the road, someone else is filming the road with a hand-held

camera, the place is busy with flourescent-jacketed CSI

officers, CID officers, Collision Investigation Branch

officers, H-MIT officers. The DISTRICT COMMANDER - PRAVEEN

BADAL (a Chief Superintendant) comes over to CATHERINE, who

is just stuffing her flourescent jacket into a CSI bag which

a CSI officer is holding open for her. She’s got smudges of

blood on her face, she’s shivering. PRAVEEN is being blunt to

be kind

PRAVEEN:

Catherine. Go home. You’ve done all

you can.

CATHERINE:

Who’s telling the next of kin? Sir.

You?

PRAVEEN:

Yes, that’s

...what normally happens.

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