The Riddle of the Sphinx Inside No. 9

This programme contains some strong language and contains scenes

which some viewers may find disturbing.

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Whaa! Argh!

What's going on? Who are you?

Oh, for God's sake, you scared the living crap out of me then! Jesus!

-Are you all right?

-Oh, I just need to sit down for a second.

Oh, shit! Oh!

Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you.

That's all right. Oh, you haven't got a towel, have you?

Um...yes.

Thanks. It's wetter than a nun's cucumber out there tonight.

Thanks. Can you, um...can you put the gun down, please?

Of course. It's not loaded,

it was just a prop from a student production of The Seagull.

Can I ask what you're doing in my rooms?

I presume you didn't break in for a towel.

Well, I-I didn't break in. Well, not technically.

My boyfriend told me all professors keep a key above their glory hole,

so I sort of just let myself in.

It was a stupid thing to do. I'm...I'm so sorry.

And you are?

Nina. Nina...Noonah.

Nina Noonah.

Well, not really, obviously, but I don't want to get in any trouble.

You're...you're not going to call the police, are you?

It's all right, Miss Noonah, my bark is worse than my bite.

Just tell me why you're here.

It's just Simon, my boyfriend, he studies at King's College

and he's properly clever.

He's got a bike and scarf and all the Harry Potter shit.

And he's sort of obsessed with doing the crossword.

And I don't mean the quick ones you get

with a picture of Vanessa Feltz in the middle in Chat magazine,

I mean, the cryptic.

I see.

And I try to help him sometimes

and I-I look at the clues and I feel like such a div

because I can't make head nor tail of them.

They may as well be written in Chinese!

In Mandarin, yes. And you're a student also?

Oh, God, no! No. I, er...I work at Greggs.

I'm what you call, um...emotionally intelligent.

Ah. Well, sadly, that won't help you with the cryptic.

Sorry.

Yeah, tell me about it.

Anyway, Simon reckons you're the Sphinx, or something.

-Do you write the crossword in the student paper?

-That's correct.

Crossword-setters traditionally use a pseudonym, a made-up name.

-What, like Nina Noonah?

-Yes.

And I am know as the Sphinx.

THUNDERCLAP

It's not exactly a secret, especially here on campus.

Anyway, I just thought that if I could maybe see the answers to this week's crossword,

then I could sit with Simon and be, like,

"Ooh, 18-down, do you think that's Parachute?"

And he'd be like, "Yeah. "Wow, you're so clever, and..."

It was only meant to be a joke. I'm really sorry.

No, no, no, I quite understand.

We all crave approbation on some level.

Tell me, what does your boyfriend study, Miss Noonah?

-Architecture.

-Architecture?

Well, I teach.

Yeah, I know. I didn't think you were a student.

Simon says you teach Classics.

Is that, like, Gone With The Wind and Pretty Woman and that?

I teach wild creature without hospital building.

-Sorry, what?

-I teach...

wild creature...

without hospital building.

-12 letters.

-Oh! It's a clue!

Yes. Not a very good one, I admit, since you put me on the spot.

So...a cryptic clue always offers up two means of solution.

The beginning or the end of the sentence

gives you the definition of the word.

Much as you might get in a standard vanilla crossword.

And the rest of the clue is the wordplay, if you like,

-which is a kind of riddle.

-Like on Catchphrase?

Er...yes, in a manner of speaking.

So, here we have a 12-letter word, meaning "I teach", or "building".

Now, here we have the word "wild",

which is what we refer to as an anagram-indicator.

It suggests the letters can be jumbled up and rearranged.

So anything such as "upset", "excited", "insane".

-Mashed up!

-Yes, if you like.

-Wankered!

-That type of thing.

It's telling us to mix up the letters.

So if we take the words "I teach" and "creature"

and make them "wild", we might come up with a solution.

OK, but that's too many letters.

Yes, very good. We're two letters over.

So we look here, "without hospital".

Now, in terms of letters, what could "hospital" be?

-H?

-Yeah, but we need two letters, remember.

If you were to have an accident, if I'd shot you here in the dark...

What, with an empty gun? Good luck.

But if I had, you'd head straight for which department?

-A&E?

-Excellent!

So if we remove "A" and "E" from "creature"

ie "creature without hospital",

and mix it up with "I teach", then we get an anagram of 12 letters

-meaning "building", which is...?

-Sorry, what?

-Architecture!

-THUNDERCLAP

See? Not so hard, was it?

Is that in this week's crossword, then?

No, no, no, no. I haven't parsed it properly.

I buried the anagram-indicator in the fodder, but, er...

it was simply an illustration.

What, in Pictionary, you can draw it?

No.

No, I was...

I was just showing off.

Trying to give you some insight.

I'm sorry.

OK, then, Professor.

Sorry I woke you.

It's Nigel.

Nina.

Huh!

(Bye.)

If you like, I can show you the clues to tomorrow's crossword,

see if any of them make sense.

-You'd teach me?

-Yes.

I teach wild creature?

It's not quite Pygmalion, but, er...I can give you some pointers.

Here.

Have a look.

The answers all go in this grid.

Have a look at one-across and I'll make us some tea.

"To wound and wander destitute. (4, 3, 3.)"

So, is this another nanagram?

Mm, possibly. Look for a verb or an adjective that suggests movement.

-Wander?

-Bingo!

So, how many of these have you done?

Crosswords? Four or five hundred.

Wow! You must have a very devious mind.

It has been said.

The Sphinx is a mythical creature of Greek legend.

A woman's head on a lion's body.

She guarded the gates of the ancient city of Thebes.

Any traveller wishing to pass through had first to solve her riddle.

If they failed the test, she would kill them

by means of asphyxiation and then...eat the remains.

THUNDERCLAP

-No pressure, then(!)

-KETTLE WHISTLES

She was devious and deadly.

Perfect for a cryptic crossword-setter.

-"Down-and-out, meaning destitute."

-Excellent!

By Jove, she's got it!

Well, put it up on the grid.

THUNDERCLAP

Is that what all the cups are for?

-Sorry?

-In the cabinet.

Ah, yes. The Cambridge Cruciverbalist Club, the CCC.

Much like the KKK, only slightly less benevolent.

Oh. Is this...is this your wife?

Monica, yes.

Does she do the crossword?

She did. She died last year.

Oh. Sorry. Did you have kids?

No, no.

There is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall.

Well, you've certainly won a lot.

It's not exactly the boat race, though, is it?

How do you mean?

Well, you can't beat someone at a crossword, can you?

I don't know, competitive solving can be quite combative, believe me.

Blood has been spilt.

Metaphorically, of course.

What's black and white and red all over?

The Cambridge crossword competition.

Or a nun chewing a razorblade.

Or a penguin with sunburn.

Oh, I've got one, but it's quite rude, though.

I teach Catullus, dear, I'm hardly a prude.

What's long and hard and full of seamen? A submarine.

-THEY CHUCKLE

-Very good.

-And what's pink and hard in the mornings? The...

-A cock?

..Financial Times' crossword.

Have a look at, um...two-down.

"This cover sounds like a 50 Cent song."

Is that, like, a cover version?

"Sounds like" indicates a homophone.

Do you know what a homophone is?

Is it an app for gays, like Grinder?

No. It's two words which sound the same,

but which are spelt differently, like "their" and "there".

-Where?

-Think of a four-letter word meaning "to cover",

which sounds like a type of song. Beginning with W?

-Wrap!

-Correct! That's two in two minutes!

You'll be challenging for the Cup before long.

And, of course, one-down,

"Indian national product of French-Italian agreement",

is simply "of" in French,

followed by an Italian form of agreement,

making "Desi" a person from India.

Why do you use such difficult words?

Every word is chosen for its letters, Nina.

For example, have a look at 18-across.

18-across. "Tory leader on board for English flower."

-So that's a five-letter word for Tory leader.

-Or...?

English flower? Er...poppy!

-No.

-Daisy?

Don't guess, Nina, dear. Deduct!

And don't take anything for granted.

Now...what could "Tory leader" be?

-Boris?

-No. Look at the word!

-T.

-That's right!

The leader of Tory is T.

So put T on to a four-letter word for "board"...

-Er...plank!

-Four letters.

-Er...wood. T-wood!

A board has more than one meaning, remember.

-Fed up?

-No.

-Cardboard? Snowboard?

-What kind of board do you pay?

The exam board!

No. Rent! You pay to board somewhere.

So put Tory leader "T" onto "rent", it gives you...

Trent! But that...that's not a flower.

-Ah. Who said it was a flower?

-You did!

No, you said flower.

What I actually wrote was "flow-er".

Something that flows.

In this instance, an English river called the Trent.

Oh, my God, that is... That's so clever!

-Hm!

-I knew you were devious!

-Mm!

-It's very satisfying, isn't it?

-It is.

So, um...your boyfriend is reading Architecture at King's, is that correct?

-Yeah.

-Is he studying under Pugh or Fairbrother?

Er...the first one.

And how's he getting on with old Pugh?

He likes him.

Gladys Pugh.

He likes her.

You do realise that Pugh and Fairbrother

are characters from the comedy series Hi-de-Hi?

I've, er...I've not seen it.

Well, lucky you.

So, Simon, if that's his real name, isn't a student at all.

He's a muggle, just like you.

(Why did you lie?)

Because I didn't think you'd take me seriously otherwise.

Hm. Does he work in Greggs also?

Don't patronise me, Professor, I...I only want to learn.

Of course.

Nine-across!

"Degas evacuated and bathed before putting big picture in bog."

-Oh, for fuck's sake!

-Patience, Nina, dear.

Now, "Degas evacuated".

If you evacuate something, you clear it out.

So we remove the middle letters to leave "DS". With me?

"Bathed" is another word for "swam",

so "bathed before" means we put "swam" in front of "DS".

And "putting big picture in".

We need to insert another word for a big picture, a grand scheme, a...

-Plan.

-Plan! Precisely!

So we put "plan" between "swam" and "DS"

to make "swamplands", meaning "bog"! Yes?

-Er...

-Yes?

-Well, shouldn't it be "bogs"?

-Not necessarily.

-You said it has to be precise.

Yes, it is precise. Not a word wasted.

-Otherwise you'd be cheating, wouldn't you?

-I never cheat. Never!

HE COUGHS

Oh.

Have...have something to drink.

Let's, er...let's have a bash at three-down, shall we?

That should be easy.

"A disturbed setter concealed a tiny amount.

"Why, it's enough to take one's breath away."

Hm. Well, the crossword-setter is you,

so, have you concealed a tiny amount, Mr Sphinx? Maybe.

So it's "A", followed by an anagram of "Sphinx"

and "tiny amount" is "iota",

which is also the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet,

which I'm sure you know, Professor Squires.

And "why" is a homophone of the letter "Y".

Meaning...to take one's breath away.

THUNDERCLAP

It's rather prescient, don't you think?

I spotted it as soon as I saw the clues.

Some fairly easy ones this week, I thought.

A little bit vanilla for the King of the Cambridge Cruciverbalists.

"Dickens character undertakes to be a cabinet maker."

Well, that's obviously Sowerberry from Oliver Twist.

You'll be needing his services before long.

"Some smart aleck, no wit, allegedly."

Know-it-all.

But you don't know it all, do you, Prof?

You didn't know, for example, that I study Marine Biology.

And what's the porpoise of that, you might ask?

Well, for one, I could get my hands on some tetrodotoxin

from the liver of a puffer fish.

Highly toxic, as all the best sushi chefs know.

And, if consumed in, say, a cup of tea,

could lead to the gradual paralysis of the internal organs,

starting with the diaphragm.

Resulting in respiratory failure and death by three-down,

the asphyxiation of the Sphinx.

Simon was my brother.

He got to the final of the crossword competition six years ago.

And he won! He beat you fair and square!

But you challenged him on a word. Do you remember?

"Auteur" saying the first U looked more like a V.

And the committee found in your favour.

The old boys' network looking after their own.

And Simon was disqualified.

Do you know what he did?

Do you, you pathetic old man?

He went to his room and took off his belt and hung himself.

I'm afraid that's incorrect, Miss Noonah.

Pictures can be hung, people are hanged.

"He hanged himself", is the correct conjugation,

for which, of course, you have my deepest sympathy.

What the fuck?! You're supposed to be dead!

On the contrary. I am very much alive.

SHE GASPS

It's you who are dead.

Will you permit me?

22-down - "What is a frankfurter's number-one bun? Don't start."

Well, if we don't start "one" or "bun" we get "neun",

which is a number, if you happen to come from Frankfurt.

And 23-down - "The origins of a species popularised savage serpents".

"Origins" telling us to take the first letters of,

"a species popularised savage", giving us the serpents.

So?

So there it is, hiding in plain sight.

I...swapped...cups.

THUNDERCLAP

Very prescient, as you say,

but the individual's urge for self-preservation is a strong one.

You bastard!

Oh, please!

No unnecessary violence.

SHE RETCHES

It's me.

Yes, she is.

Your services will soon be required.

SHE GASPS FOR BREATH

That was Dr Tyler, your personal tutor and confidant.

He's on his way over now with the vaccine.

-He told you?

-Yes.

He...he wouldn't do that.

Well, I'm afraid he felt it was his duty.

THUNDERCLAP

A brilliant student midway through a master's degree in Marine Biology,

but driven by a dark desire for revenge.

You needed his expertise to extract the poison from the poisson,

and he came straight around to tell me.

We go back a long way, Tyler and I.

Here! Let me help you.

Why...why don't you call the police?

Sorry, what was that?

Why...don't you call the police?

Well, why call the police when we can have a little bit of fun with the crossword?

It's these kind of challenges that keep one's mind active.

Let's have a crack at five-down.

"Knocked back beer and wine, then put on one French undergarment."

Any thoughts? Hm?

Well, "knocked back" is telling us to write something in reverse.

In this instance, a type of beer, "pils",

and a type of wine, "red".

Then, if we put on "one" in French, which is "un",

we get our undergarment. See?

"Un-der-slip."

Do young women still wear underslips, I wonder?

I always found it quite sexy, having an extra layer to tackle.

Made the game rather more interesting.

-HE INHALES

-Mm!

Now, if you'll excuse me, nature calls.

THUNDERCLAP

THUNDERCLAP

DOOR CREAKS OPEN

FOOTSTEPS

Charlotte?

You hang on in there, OK?

Won't be long now.

Ooh! Crossword.

"I hear American poet solved the riddle of the pseudo-hotel patron."

The American poet is Edgar Guest. Mr E Guest.

"A riddle solved" is a mystery guessed

and a "pseudo-hotel patron" is a...?

Mystery guest. Very clever.

Where have you been? You said you'd be waiting outside.

I had to go via my office to pick up some things.

A bit bloody dangerous, leaving me alone with a girl in this condition.

It was all I could do not to slip her one.

Oh, no, I don't think that would be appropriate.

I'm a red-blooded mammal, Tyler,

not like those bloody molluscs you spend half your time with.

She's still breathing, I take it?

Yes. The body can survive in this state for up to six hours.

She can still see and feel and hear everything,

she just...can't move.

It's horrible.

Yes. Well, let's not feel too sorry for her,

that's what she wanted to do to me, remember?

-Well, go on, then.

-Sorry?

Give her the antidote.

Oh, there is no antidote.

THUNDERCLAP

-What?

-For tetrodotoxin poisoning. She needs her stomach pumped.

Some aggressive airway management

and an intravenous drip as soon as possible,

otherwise she'll be dead within half an hour.

But...but you said six hours!

Only with hospital treatment.

Shit! Right, well, let's do it, then.

No.

There's something I want you to do first.

-Is that going in this week's Varsity?

-What?!

-The crossword.

-Yes.

W-W-W-What's going on? What are you doing?!

I want you to eat her.

Not all of her, of course, just a sliver.

Just enough that you can say you devoured your victim.

Jacob, what...? Have you lost your mind?!

When the Sphinx posed her riddle to the Thebans,

she strangled and ate anyone who failed to answer correctly.

That's right, isn't it? I haven't misremembered it?

Yes.

What was the riddle again?

I won't do this, Jacob.

"What creature walks on four legs in the morning,

"two at noon and three in the evening?"

It's like something out of a Christmas cracker rather than a Greek tragedy, isn't it?

And it was Oedipus who gave the correct answer - man.

He crawls as a baby,

then walks on two legs,

before needing a stick in his old age.

A bit like you, Nigel.

So...do you prefer leg or breast?

That's it, I'm calling the police.

Oh, and tell them what exactly?

That you're the victim of a student prank?

In 25 minutes, you'll have a dead girl in your rooms

in the middle of the night.

You found out who she was, she threatened you, so you killed her.

No! I'll tell them the truth. Er...I'll say it was an accident.

Well, then, how do you explain this?

You compiled this crossword two days ago.

It proves premeditation.

The know-it-all received a mystery guest at number neun

and before long, there's an asphyxiation.

What's seven-down?

"Catch a train before a poisonous bite."

Well, "catch" usually stands for "fish", I know that much.

"A train before" could be "puffer".

So, yeah, "puffer fish".

You even concealed the murder weapon.

I knew you wouldn't be able to resist.

This was just a bit of fun, I was trying to teach the girl!

You're publishing this in the student paper for everyone to see.

It's classic psychopathic behaviour.

Tomorrow morning, it'll be in every cubbyhole in Cambridge.

And on the inside back page is your confession.

And when a "down-and-out" finds the girl

"wrapped" in her "underslip" floating in the "swamplands",

well, the police won't have to look very far for the culprit, will they?

-That isn't what happened!

-No, but it could do.

A little drive out to the Fens, acquaint our brilliant student

with some of the marine life she loves so much.

You see, you're not in charge of this situation.

You can't fit it all neatly into a 15-squared grid.

This is messy and illogical and out of control.

This is my revenge, Nigel.

So sit down whilst I prepare your food!

But she's your student, for God's sake!

-SHE WHIMPERS

-No!

I think I'll take a bit off the rump.

THUNDERCLAP

THUNDERCLAP

THUNDERCLAP

Why don't you tell Nina the story?

I bet she'd like to hear it.

Keep her mind active as her body seizes up.

Jacob and I were...students here almost 30 years ago.

We roomed together for a while,

then he met Monica, a physicist from Keeble.

They were madly in love.

They were madly in love, they...married,

they even had two children, twins.

But Monica and I...we began an affair.

I didn't mean for it to end up the way it did!

I was about to begin my doctorate,

which probably would have led to a teaching post,

a room of my own, very much like this one.

But instead, I divorced my wife,

took my babies away,

to bring them up by myself, in the Brecon Beacons.

Here. I haven't seasoned it,

I didn't want to take away from the...natural flavour.

Jacob, this is...

..this is preposterous!

Eat it, or else I let the girl die and you rot in prison.

It tastes like chicken, apparently.

But, then, doesn't everything?

HE GAGS

And so, the mighty Sphinx

consumes the flesh of his conquest.

THUNDERCLAP

I always hated cryptic crosswords.

Why can't people just say what they mean, rather than trying to trick you all the time?

It's when my son started getting into them I wasn't happy.

Became obsessed with entering the stupid Cambridge crossword competition.

Perhaps he thought he could re-earn his mother's love

by beating her new husband, I don't know.

Simon was your son?

He entered the competition under a pseudonym.

You knew him as Rex.

After Oedipus Rex, the play by Sophocles.

But you cheated him out of his victory.

But that means...

Charlotte and I, we hatched our revenge plan, didn't we?

We said we would bring down that cheating Professor Squires

if it was the last thing we did.

And it may well be.

At least for her.

-She's your daughter?

-Mm.

It's crazy, isn't it, what the unhinged mind is capable of?

But she came here tonight to kill me, to poison me!

That was the plan.

So, why did you tell me about it?

Just so I'd do the crossword?

Pretty much, yes. I needed leverage.

You sacrificed your only daughter just to get at me?

Well, that's the thing, you see.

When Simon died, there was an autopsy.

Quite a thorough investigation.

It turns out they're not my kids.

They're yours.

I always suspected that affair started before you said it did.

Oh, God!

So there I was.

I'd given up everything.

My wife...

..my home, my job.

My entire life.

All for a lie.

So I'm sure you understand, Nigel, why I had to seek my revenge.

Help me get her to a hospital, please!

Oh, I think we're past that now.

Just enjoy the time you have left together.

A little present for you there, Nigel.

You know what Anton said.

Never show a gun in Act One

if you're not going to fire it by Act Five.

Otherwise people feel cheated.

Isn't your middle name Hector, by the way?

Yes.

How funny.

HE SNIFFS

DOOR CREAKS SHUT

HE SNIFFS

GUNSHOT

THUD