(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets but one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions....Guy Noir, Private Eye.
GK: It was February and the chill fingers of winter worked their way under your coat and under your underwear -- it was like getting a physical from a dead man. The windows of my office had a thin sheet of ice on the inside -- if you were a spider, you could've played hockey. And the worst of it was -- I was out of coffee. My coffeemaker had died. (COFFEEMAKER PERC LIKE COUGHS) Two pigeons huddled outside my window. (PIGEONS SHIVERING) -- Pigeons who I always set out a little coffee for. -- I'm out. (PIGEON REPLY) -- I'm out of coffee today. No coffee. (PIGEON DESPAIR) -- Try the Dorothy Day Center.
A massage therapist had taken the office down the hall, a tall skinny dame named Shoshana Satori, and I went down there to see if she had coffee.
SS (ETHEREAL, FLAT): Namaste. Shantih. Shantih. Anti anti eye over. Ollie ollie infrees. May the light of the sacred punamani fill your world -- east, west, north, south, up, down, Inward -- Ommmmm.
GK: Thanks. You have any coffee around here to warm a guy up?
SS: Cold is from within. When your chakras are aligned, you will be filled with warmth.
GK: I take it you have no coffee, Miss Satori?
SS: I have a wonderful incredible narcissus tea.
GK: Not for me, thanks. (BRIDGE) I went back to the office and called up Danny's Deli.
TK (WENDELL, ON PHONE): You have reached Danny's Deli. Please leave a message at the tone. (BEEP)
GK: Wendell, it's me, Guy, so don't pretend to be a recording, okay? I'm a detective. I know your voice.
TK (WENDELL, ON PHONE): If you are satisfied with your message, press 8 for normal delivery.
GK: You want me to deliver a message, I'll come over there and pop you one in the beezer, Wendell. I want a big carafe of coffee and while you're at it, gimme a corned beef on rye, no mayo, extra mustard, hold the lettuce. And coffee. You hear me, Wendell? You hear me? (BEEP) -- It was hard to get that masseuse out of my mind. (PHONE RING) Yeah, Noir here.
TR: Mr. Noir, it's Charlie down here in Acme Picture Framing -- say, I was framing your Ph.D degree from Harvard --
GK: Yes, just the black frame, no glass, thank you.
TR: Right -- anyway, I was noticing that in one place it says you got a Ph.D in hermeneutics and in another place it says it was in emetics.
GK: Well, just never mind that --
TR: Hermeneutics, as I'm sure you know, is the study of interpretation of written texts. Whereas emetics are things that induce vomiting.
GK: I don't see the contradiction.
TR: It just seems like a mistake.
GK: Then you don't know hermeneutics. Some of it induces vomiting and some doesn't.
TR: Also, I couldn't help but notice that "Harvard" was spelled with an "e" -- so do you want us to go ahead with it?
GK: You're a picture framer, not a copyeditor. Just do your job.
TR: And you got the Ph.D in 1891?
GK: Nineteen-eighty-one.
TR: You want us to correct it?
GK: Sure. You don't use white-out, do you?
TR: No, we'll make it so nobody notices. How about Harvard?
GK: That's not H-a-r-v-e-r-d?
TR: No, sir.
GK: How do you know?
TR: I graduated from there.
GK: English major?
TR: How'd you know?
GK: Just fix it so it looks good. -- You don't have any coffee down there, do you?
TR: No, I gave up coffee for Lent.
GK: Good luck with that. (BRIDGE) I could smell those aromatic oils from down the hall. A hint of eucalyptus that reminded me of a stretch of highway on the California coast where I drove years ago with a beautiful woman who was hitchhiking and only going as far as Stinson Beach which wasn't nearly as far as I wanted to go. (ROMANTIC PIANO UNDER, CAR SHIFTING UP, THEN DOWN, CORNERING)
SS: You're from Minnesota, aren't you.
GK: I don't feel we are defined by geography.
SS: I can tell by your coffee. I can see right through it. Thin coffee. To me, that says Minnesota.
GK: Oh.
SS: I think of Minnesota men as being sort of -- I don't know -- deliberate. Men who're good at shoveling and maybe not so good at -- you know --
GK: You don't think so?
SS: Here's my stop here. Thanks for the ride.
GK: How long you going to be here in Stinson Beach?
SS: I don't know.
GK: I could give you a ride back. Or -- if you wanted to head up the coast --
SS: I'm supposed to meet some friends for coffee.
GK: Oh. I could wait. I have no other plans.
SS: Oh. I do.
GK: I mean, you -- ...
SS: I know. But I do.
(KNOCKS, MUSIC STOPS)
GK: Yeah. Come in.
TK: (WENDELL) Hi, Mr. Noir. Sorry if I'm interrupting.
GK: That's all right. Just remembering something.
TK (WENDELL): Something happy, I hope?
GK: I wish. You got my coffee, Wendell?
TK (WENDELL): Oh boy. I knew I was missing something. Listen, I lost the paper with your order written on it and I brought you a cup of celery drink.
GK: Celery drink!!!!
TK (WENDELL): It's good. We sell a lot of it. And -- did you order the grilled mushroom sandwich on pita bread with couscous and chopped endive? With avocadoes?
GK: Wendell, I'm not a couscous mushroom sort of guy. I'm a corned-beef guy.
TK (WENDELL): We're out of corned beef.
GK: How can a deli be out of corned beef? That's like the drugstore running out of cigarettes.
TK (WENDELL): We just don't sell that much of it anymore.
GK: If you're out of it, then of course you don't sell much of it.
TK (WENDELL): Nobody's eating corned beef now.
GK: The reason they don't is that you don't have any.
TK (WENDELL): Mushrooms are better for you. Especially a guy your age.
GK: What does that mean, "a guy your age." What're you trying to say, Wendell?
TK (WENDELL): I'm saying that you've been a loyal customer of Danny's for forty years, that's what.
GK: And you were 17 at the time and look at you -- still a delivery boy.
TK (WENDELL): Puberty turned out to be a very long journey for me.
GK: And you know why? Not enough coffee. (BRIDGE) So I went down to the coffeeshop. Beans Up Your Nose.
SS: Hey, what can I get you?
GK: Gimme the Redeye, okay?
SS: One redeye coming up -- you want sprinkles with that?
GK: No.
SS: How about hinkles? Or dinkles?
GK: No hinkles or dinkles either. Just a redeye.
SS: We've got a special on dinkles.
GK: Don't want any.
SS: How about pinkles or tinkles?
GK: Coffee.
SS: Whipped cream on that?
GK: No.
SS: How about truffles? Or ruffles?
GK: Just coffee.
SS: Okay, okay. We have a special on biscotti.
GK: Okay, a biscotti.
SS: We have ricotta biscotti, the Pavarotti, the summa cum laude.
GK: I'll skip the biscotti. Could you please just make me a coffee?
SS: A redeye, right?
GK: Yes.
SS: Or a pink eye?
GK: Redeye.
SS: (OFF) One redeye coffee! (TK REPEATS, OFF)
That's five twenty-five.
GK: Five twenty-five for a cup of coffee. Oh well. (GK HUMS TO HIMSELF)
TR (LOUD, ON CELL): Yeah, I'm at the coffee shop. I'm in line. -- No, it's fine. It's okay. (VOICE) Yeah, I'm going there from here. (VOICE) What? (VOICE) Right. The penguin joke. (VOICE) Of course I remember it. -- (VOICE) Okay. You bet-
GK: Sir, would you mind?
SS: May I help you, sir?
TR (LOUD): Hang on a second-there's some jerk here trying to tell me what to do.
GK: I don't want to hear your conversation.
TR (LOUD): What business is it of yours? Beat it.
GK: I can't beat it, I'm waiting for my coffee.
SS: May I help you?
TR (LOUD): Me? I'd like a double latte with sprinkles and whipped cream.
GK: I'm just asking you to lower your voice or take it outside- You're giving me a headache.
TR (LOUD): You LOOK like a headache.
SS: You want hinkles or dinkles with that?
TR (LOUD): (VOICE) I don't know, some old duffer with food stains on his tie, who thinks he's the hall monitor or something. (VOICE).
SS: You want hinkles or dinkles?
TR (LOUD): Huh?
GK: She said do you want hinkles or dinkles.
TR (LOUD): I wasn't talking to you. (VOICE) Right, right. Just getting to it. Anyway, there were these two penguins standing on an ice shelf. One was named Harry and the other was Oscar. Or maybe it was an ice floe. Part of an iceberg. Two penguins. Harry and Oscar. I guess this would've been in Antarctica. Probably. You've seen penguins, right? Little guys with flippers. Black and white. Anyway, these two penguins are standing on the ice floe or iceberg in what I assume was probably Antarctica, though of course it could've been a zoo. I've seen penguins in a zoo. Standing around, molting. They weren't all that happy to be there, but there they were. Anyway, it doesn't matter. These two penguins, Oscar and Henry, are standing around and talking about this and that, you know, the weather and so forth, and where the best fishing spots are, and talking about the kids, and -- did I say Henry? I meant Harry. Harry and Oscar.
GK: ALL RIGHT! TELL THE JOKE!!!
TR: And one penguin says, "You look like you're wearing a tuxedo." And the other penguin says, "What makes you think I'm not?"
GK: Yes? And?
TR: "You look like you're wearing a tuxedo." "What makes you think I'm not?"
GK: That's the joke?
SS: Here's your redeye.
TR: Kind of takes a minute for it to sink it, doesn't it --
SS: Double latte with sprinkles, hinkles and dinkles coming up.
GK: You call that a joke????
TR (LOUD): Just because you don't get it, doesn't mean it isn't funny. (VOICE) I come in here for a cup of coffee and this big galoot comes up and gets in my face--
SS: You want whipped cream with that?
GK: Put a lid on it, you jerk.
TR (LOUD): I think you're the jerk here, you jerk. Yeah, whipped cream.
GK: Last time I saw a mouth like yours, it had a hook in it. You must've been conceived at home because that's where most accidents happen. And when you were born, the doctor took one look at you and slapped your mama.
TR: Okay, that's it. Now you're in trouble. You just insulted my mama. (BIG SLAP)
GK: You want whipped cream -- here's whipped cream, pal. (AEROSOL, LONG BIG SQUORT) There. And a handful of hinkles. (SPLAT) And some dinkles. (SPLORT) And here's a big noogie for a bonus --
SS: Look out for your coffee, sir -- (CRASH, SPLASH)
GK: My coffee.
SS: Sorry. You want another?
GK: How much is it?
SS: Five twenty-five.
GK: Even with no hinkles or dinkles?
SS: Five twenty-five.
GK: (LOOKING THROUGH PALMFUL OF SMALL CHANGE) I've got a dollar -- two dollars -- two-fifty -- two sixty-five. What can I get for two sixty-five?
SS: How about a cup of peppermint tea?
GK: Oh boy.
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets. But high above the quiet streets on the 12th floor of the Acme Building, one man is still trying to find the answers to life's persistent questionsï¾ Guy Noir, Private Eye.
(MUSIC OUT)