SS: 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 the middle of June, and I was watching the pigeons
messing around on the window ledge (SFX), doing the hoochiekoochie,
getting all sweet on each other (SFX) ---- I'd think that
over if I were you----- you really intending to raise babies on a
little window ledge 12 stories up in the air? (SFX) you're crazy --
-- I sort of wish I were----- no love in my life and I'd been trying
to avoid the woman I found on the Beautiful Losers website.
FN LADY (PHONE): I want to see you. I just felt like we're
made for each other. Totally. You and me. I never felt this way
before about somebody I'd never met.
GK: I'm sorry.
FN LADY: You're a Leo, I'm a Leo. We both love pad Thai and
Richard Widmark movies. We're both single. What more do you
need?
GK: I don't love his movies all that much.
FN LADY: I get the feeling you don't want to see me.
GK: Listen. Maybe when I get back from St. Louis. Okay?
(STING, BRIDGE) I was on my way to St. Louis on account of a
message someone left on my voice mail. The day before.
SS (PHONE): Mr. Noir, it's Louisa in St. Louis. I need you to
help me find my father.
GK: It touched me. A young woman looking for her dad. I
listened to it over and over.
SS (PHONE): I need you to help me find my father.
GK: I imagined she'd been adopted or maybe the old man had
skipped out when she was little and now she needed him. I
decided I'd take the casae for no fee and I got myself a ticket to
St. Louis aboard Eliot Airline, an old St. Louis airline founded by
the family of T.S. Eliot the poet who was from there. (BING
BONG)
SS: Welcome to Eliot Air. I am your flight attendant, Nicole. I
feel a very strange sense of unease about today's flight. I never
liked flying. If you want to know the truth, I am afraid. Please
don't talk to me. I need to be alone. (BING BONG)
TR: This is your pilot T.L. Eliot speaking. We are leaving here to
find a way that may not exist to take us to what we do not know
and find what we can never possess. But where we are is not
where we can be and so we must go now. Our estimated time of
arrival....is the day before yesterday. (JET TAKE-OFF,
BRIDGE)
GK: So anyway I got to St. Louis and I called Louise and she
said she'd meet me at a bar called Happy Landings not far from
the airport---- (DOOR JINGLE, OPEN. FOOTSTEPS) The bar
was empty. I walked in.
TR: Yeah, how you doing?
GK: Not bad. How about a beer?
TR: What you want? A Bud? We got Schlafly's. Cathedral.
Kirkwood. Griesedieck. Crown Valley. Schoendienst.
GK: That sounds good.
TR: Schoendienst?
GK: Sure. Schoendienst.
TR: You want a red Schoendienst or a pale amber?
GK: Red.
TR: Coming right up. (BEER TAP, POUR)
FN: Good choice, Schoendienst.
GK: Oh. Didn't see you there in the shadows. Hi. Noir's the
name.
FN: Stanley Shermerding. You can call me Ding.
GK: You from here?
FN: Wouldn't want to be from anywhere else.
GK: You a chess player?
FN: Naw. That's someone else's board. I used to play chess and
then I played a computer and got beat. But then I beat the
computer at kick boxing, so I was even.
GK: Oh. Somebody gave you quite a shiner though.
FN: Got that at church this morning. Woman ahead of me stood
up and her dress was stuck in her crack so I pulled it out. She
turned and glared at me so I figured she wanted it back in.
That's when she smacked me.
GK: What line of work you in?
FN: Novelties.
GK: What's that?
FN: This. (LAMB) See? You put it in your pocket and when you
press on it. (LAMB)
GK: People buy these?
FN: Yeah. Here. Put it in your pocket.
GK: Why?
FN: Give it a try. (LAMB)
GK: So what's going on in St. Louis?
FN: People enjoying life ---- that's about it ---- the zoo is still
free ---- the Gateway Arch is as beautiful as it ever was. People
are crazy about the Cards. Good place to live. Not all that easy
to get to know people but once you do they're friends forever.
Where you from?
GK: Upriver. St. Paul.
FN: You don't sound like it.
GK: Moved there from New York.
FN: For a woman?
GK: Yeah. Long time ago.
FN: She dropped you, huh?
GK: Yeah.
FN: You ever get a new one?
GK: Oh, there've been women who wanted to know me and I
spared them the disappointment.
FN: Yeah, me too. I tried marriage a couple times but I got tired
of being wrong about everything, y'know? I didn't say a word for
about a year and a half. Didn't want to interrupt her.
TR: Hey. You want to know about marriage, ask me, I'm a
bartender. Lot of unhappiness out there. Half of all marriages end
in divorce. And the other half fight it out to the bitter end.
GK: Lot of guys hustling home right now on the Interstate, like
drones, knowing that if they walk in five minutes late, the little
lady is going to say,
FN, TR: Where in the world have you been? Why didn't you
call?
GK: You knew we were having the Hooples over for dinner
tonight.
TR (JIMMY): Right. (DOOR OPEN, JINGLE, CLOSE.
FOOTSTEPS)
SS: Hi. Are you Mr. Noir?
FN: No. He is.
GK: Hi. You must be Louise. What can I do for you?
SS: You're a private eye?
GK: Right. So you need help finding someone?
SS: My mother used to be a friend of yours.
GK: Oh yeah?---
SS: Karen Olson? --- She was an actress--- I think she met you in
New York and then you followed her back to Minnesota.
GK: I remember. How is she?
SS: She's good. She just retired from teaching.
GK: Retired? Really....
SS: She taught theater.
GK: Sure. I knew she moved down here, I didn't know about
teaching. That's nice. Who'd she marry?
SS: She didn't.
GK: Oh.
SS: Yeah-----
GK: So you're adopted?
SS: No. I was born in 1988. Six months after she moved here. Six
months after you and she broke up.
GK: I never knew that.
TR: And now you do.
GK: You're kidding.
SS: I'm not.
GK: You're not kidding. Why didn't she tell me?
SS: She didn't want to bother you.
GK: Oh.
SS: She thought she could bring me up just fine herself. And she
did.
GK: And you're my daughter.
SS: She told me not to tell you but I thought you should know.
So here I am.
TR: You thought you were going to have to track somebody
down and it turns out to be you.
FN: Lucky for her she doesn't resemble you at all.
TR: Well, she's sort of got his nose.
FN: Her chin is sort of like his except she's just got one of them.
GK: Well, I am stunned. What do you do, Louise?
SS: I'm a teacher.
GK: What grade you teach?
SS: It's a non-structured school. No grades. No tests.
TR: Personally, I like the old fashioned school. Where the kids
have to raise their hands before they hit the teacher.
GK: Good for you. Pleasure to meet you.
SS: You sure?
GK: Yeah.
GK: So how's your mom?
SS: Fine. I brought a picture of her. Recognize her?
GK: Yeah. Sort of. She gained some weight.
SS: Yeah.
GK: She ever talk much about me?
SS: No, not really. She's not that into the past.
GK: I know. I remember. Well, tell her "hi" for me. So you got a
boyfriend?
SS: I did. But I broke up with him. He was sort of a comedian.
Fun to be with but not so good for the long haul. You know?
GK: Yeah. I know.
SS: I want somebody who's going to stick around.
GK: Good thinking. Well, keep in touch.
SS: You want me to?
GK: Of course.
SS: Goodbye. Dad. Can I give you a hug?
GK: Okay.
SS: I love you. (LAMB) What's that?
GK: A gift. For you. When you need me, just squeeze. (LAMB)
(THEME)
TR: A dark night in a city that keeps its secrets, where one guy
is still trying to find the answers...Guy Noir, Private Eye.
(MUSIC OUT)