A Call from the Dead (1997) by Carey Harrison, starring John Shrapnel

Added: 2026-05-26

[00:00:00]First up, this is great. It's a one-off play in which one man's fear of being buried alive becomes a horrific tale of terror and claustrophobia.

[00:00:09]The excellent John Shrapnel stars in an atmospheric chiller, a call from the dead. Whose tariff, would you believe, costs you even though it's them that's made the call. It's typical.

[00:00:29]A Call from the Dead by Carrie Harrison.

[00:00:40]Oh, for God's sake.

[00:00:43]>> [sighs] >> Hello.

[00:00:47]Please.

[00:00:48]>> All right. All right. Just hang on.

[00:00:55]Yes.

[00:00:57]Yes, Elmo here. Who is this?

[00:01:00]Oh, thank God. Dr. Elmo. Yes.

[00:01:03]Who is this? Please, don't hang up.

[00:01:04]Please, don't hang up. Whatever you do.

[00:01:06]I understand. Just tell me who you are. It's Stephen.

[00:01:12]Stephen Warburton.

[00:01:14]Oh, thank God you're there. Thank you.

[00:01:16]Stephen, it's the middle of the night.

[00:01:18]Just tell me what the matter is. I'm in a coffin.

[00:01:24]You're where?

[00:01:26]My coffin. My coffin.

[00:01:28]I'm inside a coffin. It's locked in.

[00:01:30]It's tight and I can hardly breathe.

[00:01:31]>> Stephen.

[00:01:32]Stephen, listen to me. Stephen.

[00:01:35]You're not in a coffin. Do you understand? You're not in a coffin.

[00:01:39]You're speaking to me on a telephone.

[00:01:42]Now, lift up your hand.

[00:01:46]You doing what I say?

[00:01:48]Lift your hand up in the air.

[00:01:51]What can you feel?

[00:01:52]>> I feel silk. I'm in a bloody coffin. Don't you Don't you This is a mobile phone.

[00:02:00]It's what I asked for. I asked to be buried with a mobile phone.

[00:02:04]What? Oh, please, for God's sake, get me out of here.

[00:02:07]>> Steven, the most charitable thing I can suppose at this instant is that you're hallucinating.

[00:02:13]Believe me, you're not in a coffin.

[00:02:16]And furthermore, you haven't been my patient for at least a year now. And if you found another therapist, I would suggest you phone him.

[00:02:23]If you haven't found another therapist, and most particularly if you're not hallucinating, but simply trying to get my attention, this is a most improper way to try and re-establish a patient-doctor relationship.

[00:02:36]>> Please, please, I'm not hallucinating.

[00:02:39]Hold on a moment, Steven.

[00:02:41]I'm sorry, darling.

[00:02:43]Don't take this next door.

[00:02:45]Who is it? It's a patient.

[00:02:47]Ex-patient, Steven Warburton. Why has he got our number?

[00:02:51]>> Suicidal tendencies. Oh, God.

[00:02:56]Now look, Steven, just hold on a moment, would you mind? I'm I'm in the bedroom.

[00:03:00]Can I speak to your wife? No, you cannot speak to my wife. Help me.

[00:03:04]I've tried everyone and no one answers.

[00:03:06]I tried the police and they hung up on me, the bastards.

[00:03:08]>> Are you surprised?

[00:03:10]Steven, if you remember, as your therapist, I was paid to listen with the utmost sympathy to your fears of confinement, your claustrophobia.

[00:03:17]>> That's it.

[00:03:17]I told you this would happen, didn't I?

[00:03:19]And you wouldn't believe me.

[00:03:20]>> And I tried.

[00:03:22]What are you doing? I'm just closing the bedroom door so my wife can get some sleep.

[00:03:28]I tried to persuade you to look at the possible origins of your obsession.

[00:03:32]>> Oh, God. Steven, listen to me. You're not dead. You are not in your coffin.

[00:03:36]I'm in Sub Brandon's in the graveyard.

[00:03:39]Oh, please, please, come and get me out.

[00:03:41]Please, can't you hear? I'm in a tiny space. Can't you hear it?

[00:03:46]I'm running out of air.

[00:03:48]I'll go crazy if you hang up.

[00:03:50]>> You You not go crazy, Steven, and you won't suffocate.

[00:03:53]>> you, I'm in a coffin at St. Brendan's Cripplegate.

[00:03:58]Stephen, how would somebody know if they were in a coffin where that coffin was? Hmm?

[00:04:06]And why on earth would you be in Cripplegate? You live in Chiswick.

[00:04:09]Because my parents were buried in Cripplegate and there's a space reserved for me.

[00:04:14]>> All right.

[00:04:15]All right, Stephen.

[00:04:18]Now, if you want to resume treatment with me, be so good as to phone my office in the morning and we'll talk about it. All right? No, don't hang up. Stephen, I'm hanging up. Don't hang up. Don't We'll talk in the morning. I'm going to die in here. In the morning, Stephen, after 9:00. Get some rest. Good night.

[00:04:36]Dear God.

[00:04:40]Did you talk him out of it?

[00:04:42]>> Oh, you're still awake.

[00:04:44]God, I'm sorry.

[00:04:47]Did I do what?

[00:04:49]Talk him out of killing himself.

[00:04:52]No, he wasn't suicidal this time.

[00:04:55]No, too late for that.

[00:04:57]Claims he's already dead. What?

[00:04:59]He says he's talking to me from his coffin by mobile phone.

[00:05:04]Well, that's original.

[00:05:05]>> Yes, that's what I thought.

[00:05:07]Does he always sleep in his coffin, this um Stephen Stephen Warburton.

[00:05:13]He said he was trapped in it.

[00:05:15]Buried at St. Brendan's Cripplegate to be exact.

[00:05:19]>> My God.

[00:05:21]Well, did he sound frightened?

[00:05:23]>> Yes, very.

[00:05:25]You see, he came to me originally because of acute claustrophobia. Mhm.

[00:05:29]Fears of being buried alive.

[00:05:31]Very morbid, Mr. Warburton.

[00:05:33]Long history of sexual unease.

[00:05:38]I actually went and looked up what Freud said about claustrophobia.

[00:05:41]Wasn't very helpful.

[00:05:44]Said it was either a manifestation of compulsive promiscuity or a morbid fear of promiscuity.

[00:05:50]Typical Sigmund having it both ways.

[00:05:53]Neither diagnosis seemed to fit Stephen Warburton, who, if the truth be told, simply wasn't as promiscuous as he'd like to have been.

[00:06:01]Poor chap.

[00:06:05]Edward, you don't suppose he really might be in his coffin?

[00:06:11]I mean, suppose he is Has indeed been buried alive by some hideous error?

[00:06:17]But with a mobile phone just in case?

[00:06:19]>> Well, By coincidence, as it were, given that he's a claustrophobic in the first place? Yes. I mean, it's possible, isn't it? Well, it's possible, Martha.

[00:06:30]You mean like paranoids who really are being persecuted?

[00:06:33]>> Mhm. Oh, well, it's possible. Yeah.

[00:06:38][ __ ] It'll be Stephen again.

[00:06:40]I'm afraid I'm not answering, Martha.

[00:06:46]>> [sighs] >> Do you like a cup of tea? Oh, no, thanks.

[00:06:51]Oh, come to bed soon.

[00:06:55]Poor Stephen.

[00:06:58]He was one of those maddeningly argumentative patients.

[00:07:03]Always on his guard.

[00:07:08]Do you know something?

[00:07:10]I hate your bloody grandfather clock.

[00:07:15]Why? The way it chimes, where it ticks.

[00:07:19]Why do you want us to be aware of time when we're here? Time ticking past, money on the clock. Are you aware of it?

[00:07:27]Don't you think other people are?

[00:07:31]To the same degree, would you suppose?

[00:07:35]Dr. Elmore, I'm not mentally ill. I'm not sick.

[00:07:40]I'm a sane man afflicted by a real fear.

[00:07:42]Are you saying that you can't help me unless I'm sick?

[00:07:46]It's not a matter of sick or well, sane or insane, any more than it's a matter of your fear being unreal.

[00:07:54]All fears are real.

[00:07:57]This house, this room, might be destroyed an instant from now by a falling aircraft, say.

[00:08:03]It's a legitimate fear, could happen.

[00:08:06]Such things have happened.

[00:08:08]But to experience that fear recurrently, intensely, has a further meaning of its own.

[00:08:16]And an origin more potent and more mysterious than logic. And you're quite certain that this origin lies in the past, not in the future?

[00:08:26]You're quite sure no one could foresee their own death and be haunted by it?

[00:08:32]I'm sure of nothing, Stephen.

[00:08:35]I only know how to minister to fears that originate in the past.

[00:08:39]And I would ask you to consider that possibility in your own case.

[00:08:48]Amen.

[00:08:51]Uh Saint Saint Saint Saint Barnabas, Bartholomew, Benedict, Borromeus.

[00:09:00]Ah, yeah.

[00:09:09]Yep. Oh, um so sorry. I'm Look, I'm sorry to phone you at this hour of the night. I found your number in the book.

[00:09:15]>> That's quite all right. What can I do for you?

[00:09:18]Well, it's rather >> I never sleep. At least not a lot and not at night. I was right by the phone.

[00:09:23]People know that. They often call me in the wee hours. Neville Barbers is the name, Vicar of Saint Brendan's. Um but you probably figured that out. Or do I know you?

[00:09:30]>> I No, in fact >> thought not. Well, fire away. Um Reverend, I >> Nev. Sorry? Everyone calls me Neville.

[00:09:38]Rev Neville, you see?

[00:09:39]Go ahead. Don't let me interrupt. Uh well, it's it's um this.

[00:09:44]Neville, I wonder if you can tell me whether by any chance you recently buried a man by the name of Stephen Warburton. Yep.

[00:09:53]Uh I'm I'm sorry. You did You did?

[00:09:56]Yep. Friday.

[00:09:58]Oh, no.

[00:10:01]Oh God almighty. Problem? Was he a friend of yours? Uh he was a patient. Um I'm I'm I'm I'm a doctor. Oh my God.

[00:10:10]Look, you're not going to believe this, Reverend but Neville.

[00:10:13]but he's well, he's still alive. What?

[00:10:16]I've just had a call from him.

[00:10:18]A phone call. He He said He was pretty hysterical. He said said he was in a coffin on a mobile phone. No, no, no, no, hold on. If this is a joke, No joke, I swear it.

[00:10:29]Look, my name's Elmore. Edward Elmore, clinical psychologist. Look, tell me how to get there. I can be there in 10 minutes, 15 at the outside.

[00:10:36]>> No, no, no, no, hold on. Look, don't you understand the man is dying? He's desperate. He's suffocating.

[00:10:40]>> yes, all right, but what I'm trying to say is shouldn't we call the police? I mean, surely that's the first He's already tried that. They didn't believe him.

[00:10:46]>> Well, they'd believe you, wouldn't they?

[00:10:48]If you are who you say you are.

[00:10:49]>> Look, Neville, listen to me.

[00:10:52]Unless you want yourself, your name, and your parish all over the tabloids tomorrow morning, "Oops, sorry, thought you were dead," says Rev Neville, unless that's the kind of publicity you want, I strongly suggest you tell nobody and meet me in 10 minutes by the churchyard with whatever picks or shovels you can lay your hands on.

[00:11:07]>> But my dear man, you you can't go around like Birkenhead digging up anyone you want. LOOK HERE, YOU need Home Office permission to exhume a corpse. We're not going to exhume a corpse. We dig, we lift the coffin lid, he climbs out of his own accord. We're not exhuming anyone. Now, give me some directions, FOR GOD'S SWEET SAKE.

[00:11:32]Quarter to.

[00:11:34]Five. minutes left, eh doctor?

[00:11:38]That's right.

[00:11:40]>> [snorts] >> Do you find the rest of your day falling into these neat 50-minute slices?

[00:11:46]Do you give your wife 50-minute slices?

[00:11:50]Do you give your wife 50 minutes every evening and then almost involuntarily yearn for change of face?

[00:11:57]Stephen, you sure you want to spend these 5 minutes discussing the pattern of my life?

[00:12:05]Oh, look.

[00:12:06]>> [snorts] >> I really don't think we're getting anywhere, do you?

[00:12:11]You seem to think, although you won't say it, you won't come out and say it, that my fear of ending trapped and suffocating somewhere is to do with a metaphorical cupboard in which I have trapped myself, out of which I refuse to come, and that my real terror isn't being trapped inside, it's coming out.

[00:12:37]That's what you think. And is it? No.

[00:12:40]No.

[00:12:42]I mean, there might be all kinds of sexual drives hidden away inside of me, inside of all of us. I dare say there's a rampaging polymorphous pervert hidden in the meekest of us. Wouldn't you?

[00:12:51]Wouldn't I say so?

[00:12:53]Yes. Yes, I would.

[00:12:55]Well, then.

[00:12:58]Well, then what?

[00:13:00]Then we're all in a cupboard of one kind or another. Certainly. Only um not all of us feel trapped in it.

[00:13:10]And those who do should perhaps think about coming out of it.

[00:13:16]As the saying is, the way out is through the door.

[00:13:24]Are you making a pass at me, doctor?

[00:13:28]No.

[00:13:31]And furthermore, I'm afraid our time's up for today.

[00:13:33]No. No, look. Look. Look. Look. There's There's 2 minutes left. Please. Just 2 minutes. Please.

[00:13:39]>> Steven, would you do something for me?

[00:13:42]>> What?

[00:13:43]What?

[00:13:45]Before our next session, which I believe is on Tuesday at the same time, would you think about why it is that only when our encounter is at ending, when there's almost no time left, no, if you will, left, that you discover an overwhelming need to participate, to contribute, having, if I may say so, spent the previous 48 minutes buggering about?

[00:14:09]>> There's still a minute left.

[00:14:12]>> [sighs] >> Very well.

[00:14:17]Tell me what you feel.

[00:14:19]What you're feeling now? Frantic.

[00:14:22]Because right now there is something I want to tell you, and you won't listen because of the clock.

[00:14:27]That's enough to make anyone frantic.

[00:14:29]But you see, it's not so bad. I know I'm going to live. I'll get another chance.

[00:14:34]But when I wake up in the middle of the night and think of coal miners who died buried alive, waiting to die, nothing to think, or or people drowning, or in earthquakes, or buried under a building, or tied to a stake with the tide rising, or or trapped somewhere. Trapped somewhere with the water rising.

[00:14:51]People have died these deaths. That's what's so awful. Steven. What?

[00:14:55]I don't think you've ever understood how literal it is for me, or what it's really like to picture these things.

[00:15:03]It's not like your bloody cupboard, YOUR STUPID BLOODY erotic cupboard.

[00:15:08]It's about breathing and thinking and when there's nothing left to do BUT DIE.

[00:15:13]>> STEVEN.

[00:15:13]>> DON'T SHUT ME UP. 10 SECONDS LEFT.

[00:15:16]NOTHING TO THINK. NO THOUGHTS. NOTHING TO DO BUT DIE. 5 SECONDS. 4.

[00:15:21]>> THE ONLY COMFORT IS THAT YOU WILL DIE.

[00:15:23]YOU MUST DIE. IT WILL END.

[00:15:25]>> STEPHEN, LOOK.

[00:15:27]>> [gasps] >> Look at the clock.

[00:15:30]You see, you've outrun time.

[00:15:34]But it's all right.

[00:15:37]You see, life doesn't end at 10 minutes to the hour.

[00:15:41]>> [panting] >> You remember the chess match against death in Bergman's Seventh Seal?

[00:15:50]Yes.

[00:15:51]Well, like Bergman's chess player, we can't outfox the reaper.

[00:15:57]Not even by saving up our words to fling at him when the 11th hour comes.

[00:16:04]You have to live now.

[00:16:08]There's nothing for it.

[00:16:11]Yes.

[00:16:12]Are you there? Don't hang up. Stephen, I'm on my way. It's all right. I've spoken to the rev to the vicar at St. Brendan's, and I'm in the car now on my way to him.

[00:16:23]Be with you in a matter of minutes. I can't breathe. Yes, you can. You can just hold on a little longer. Take it easy now. We're on our way. Do you hear me?

[00:16:32]Stephen.

[00:16:33]Stephen.

[00:16:35]Are you there? Can you hear me?

[00:16:37]Oh, damn this machine.

[00:16:39]Stephen.

[00:16:40]NO, GET OUT OF THE WAY. GO ON, MOVE.

[00:16:44]STEPHEN.

[00:16:45]STEPHEN.

[00:16:46]If you can hear me, just hang on.

[00:16:54]Look, look, I'm not threatening suicide.

[00:16:56]I didn't say I would do it. I'm not saying I will. All right?

[00:17:00]All I'm saying is that there are times I'd rather do it my own way and be sure that I'd never have to face that particular death.

[00:17:11]About suffocation?

[00:17:13]Yes.

[00:17:16]Stephen, do you ever think that if you ever did have to face suffocation, it would almost be a relief that it had finally happened?

[00:17:28]How long have I been coming here? W- 2 months?

[00:17:33]2 months, and that's the first intelligent thing you've said.

[00:17:37]Is it?

[00:17:39]Why on earth have you been coming back then? Well, not intelligent. That's not quite what I mean.

[00:17:45]>> [sighs] >> Insightful.

[00:17:48]The first thing you've said that shows you've got some capacity for empathy, some imagination.

[00:17:55]So, why have you been coming back to see me, Steven, if I've been so lacking in empathy?

[00:18:01]>> I'm not looking for empathy, Edward.

[00:18:04]May I call you Edward? Certainly.

[00:18:07]I'm looking for help.

[00:18:10]I'm looking for a helping hand.

[00:18:15]I'm looking for a reason not to top myself.

[00:18:23]You think I'm gay.

[00:18:26]Do you? Stop these games.

[00:18:28]No games. I have no purpose other than to let you find out what you feel.

[00:18:32]>> Stop these games. You feel something, too.

[00:18:36]Explain. Please.

[00:18:40]Won't you give me a helping hand?

[00:18:45]Not if that's what you mean, no.

[00:18:48]You'd rather I topped myself.

[00:18:51]Well, it's your life, Steven.

[00:18:53]No one can save another person.

[00:18:57]If that's what you came for, you've made a mistake.

[00:19:03]Edward Elms. Hello. Glad you came. Got your balls good? No.

[00:19:08]What's the matter? Look, I'm sorry.

[00:19:10]What's What's the matter? Come on, there's no time to waste. I I'm not sure about this. To be honest, I've been thinking I'm I'm pangs of conscience, I'm afraid, ever since I put the phone down. And now now, standing here in the sacred quiet of my own graveyard >> Never mind your conscience, Father. This man's life is at stake.

[00:19:26]>> Edward, I want to know one thing. You do believe, don't you? Believe? Believe in what? In God?

[00:19:34]For God's sake, because if we're going to desecrate holy ground >> Never Listen to me. I am an atheist. I believe in life, all right? The life right now. Never mind the hereafter.

[00:19:44]No, stop right there this minute. Oh, for goodness' sake. I am not digging up a grave with a confirmed atheist, an unbeliever.

[00:19:50]>> has belief got to do with it? This isn't going to be a religious ceremony. It's a dig to save a man drowning in earth.

[00:19:55]>> It's a violation of holy ground, Doctor.

[00:19:58]I cannot I will not.

[00:19:59]>> Then give me the damn shovel. There you go, get on with it. NO, I'M NOT LETTING you do it. No. Do you understand?

[00:20:07]Do you want to speak to him, then?

[00:20:09]What? Here's the phone. Now, you speak to the man. He's suffocating on a ton and a half of earth. He's choking to death, and we're his only chance of life. Now, you tell him that you won't save his life because you're in the company of an atheist. All right? Now, there you are. Take it and tell him.

[00:20:27]You mean he's He's there?

[00:20:30]He's listening?

[00:20:35]Stephen?

[00:20:37]Uh can you hear anything? What?

[00:20:40]Can you hear anything when you listen?

[00:20:47]Yes.

[00:20:48]Yes.

[00:20:50]He's breathing.

[00:20:51]It's faint, but he's alive.

[00:20:53]>> Yes. Thank God.

[00:20:55]He probably just passed out. All right.

[00:20:57]Come on. Quick. Come on, FOR GOD'S SAKE, NEVER. OH, OH, all right.

[00:21:04]You know I I barely knew him when he was I uh oh I mean before he was >> Give me the phone. Oh, yeah.

[00:21:12]All right, Stephen.

[00:21:14]Look, Stephen, if you can hear me, we're on our way. You'll be out of there in a moment.

[00:21:19]>> Oh, but you say a moment, but there's a fair bit of digging to do, you know.

[00:21:23]Oh, oh, that's it. There. What?

[00:21:26]Where? RIGHT HERE. HERE, LOOK.

[00:21:29]BUT WHERE'S THE HEADSTONE?

[00:21:32]THERE'S NO headstone yet. All right, come on.

[00:21:38]What did he die of? I mean, supposedly, do you know?

[00:21:41]Heart, wasn't it?

[00:21:43]Well, whatever it was, it obviously didn't take.

[00:21:52]So, what you're saying is, Edward, doctor, that you're dispensing with my services.

[00:22:04]The other way around, perhaps.

[00:22:06]I'm questioning whether you have any further use of mine.

[00:22:10]It is, after all, my services that you're employing. Then how come you're firing me?

[00:22:16]>> Don't be absurd, Stephen. How can I fire you? You're my patient.

[00:22:20]But I think you should be asking yourself why it is that when I suggest you might not, after all, be benefiting from these encounters, that you see yourself as being, in your own words, fired.

[00:22:30]>> Expelled. Rejected. Stephen.

[00:22:33]Stephen.

[00:22:34]>> I'm loath to use the word should once in a therapeutic session, let alone twice, but frankly, what I think you should do, rather than continue to seek from me various kinds of satisfaction that I cannot possibly supply, >> Edward, have you listened to your own language recently? You're as contorted as a snake with indigestion. is to go out and have a shamelessly good time. Do you follow me?

[00:22:58]Where the claustrophobia is concerned, >> Ah, so you do admit it.

[00:23:02]Yes.

[00:23:03]Yes, of course. I don't think you're inventing it. I just don't think that that fear means that you're actually going to wake up in your grave. I mean, that's nonsense.

[00:23:12]Do you hear me? Please, don't send me away.

[00:23:16]Please. As I say, where claustrophobia is concerned, Sigmund Freud and I agree on one thing. Please. Please, don't send me away.

[00:23:23]>> Namely, that the best and only cure is pleasure. Don't. Please. Will you, for God's sake, get the hell out of my consulting room and go and have a good time? Because quite honestly, and I'm speaking now both privately and professionally, or unprofessionally as you wish, I don't care.

[00:23:42]I'm sick to death of you, Stephen.

[00:23:47]Help me.

[00:23:50]Stephen.

[00:23:51]Stephen, we're [laughter] here. We're right here with you.

[00:23:55]Go on, Neville. Go on, for God's sake, get the lid off. I'm trying.

[00:23:59]IT'S IT'S STUCK SOMEWHERE.

[00:24:02]>> [laughter] >> OH, NO. NO. NO. NO, IT'S COMING.

[00:24:09]AH, I've got it. I'VE GOT IT OPEN. WELL, LIFT HIM OUT, FOR GOD'S SAKE. NEVILLE.

[00:24:14]NEVILLE, WHAT'S HAPPENING?

[00:24:16]Shall I come down?

[00:24:19]No.

[00:24:20]>> [clears throat] >> No.

[00:24:22]I wouldn't do that.

[00:24:24]There's no room here. What, is is he all right? What's going on?

[00:24:27]NEVILLE, IS HE ALL RIGHT?

[00:24:30]OH, FOR GOD'S SAKE. WHAT?

[00:24:33]YOU MEAN I dug this bloody hole for nothing?

[00:24:35]>> What?

[00:24:36]What? What? He's dead.

[00:24:39]Oh, no.

[00:24:40]He can't be.

[00:24:42]Lift him out, man.

[00:24:44]Please.

[00:24:45]LOOK.

[00:24:46]WHERE'S THE TORCH? I'LL COME DOWN.

[00:24:48]>> NO.

[00:24:50]NO. NO.

[00:24:52]This man's been dead a a good while.

[00:24:55]He's stiff and cold.

[00:24:59]He can't be. Long dead.

[00:25:02]I've got the torch here.

[00:25:06]Now, take a look.

[00:25:11]But But he's dead.

[00:25:14]As dead as dead can be.

[00:25:17]>> No, but but But that's not Stephen.

[00:25:20]What He's But look at him, he's he's old and thin. Well, he was an old man after all.

[00:25:29]>> But but Stephen Warburton, he must have been what, 70 at least?

[00:25:33]>> No, no, no, he's nothing like as old as that. He's he's my age, younger.

[00:25:37]>> Well, he looks like a hundred now.

[00:25:39]Oh, may he rest in peace.

[00:25:40]>> understand.

[00:25:41]Stephen my Stephen Warburton He's dead, Doctor.

[00:25:48]He's dead.

[00:25:53]Then who the hell's on the end of this phone?

[00:26:03]I am.

[00:26:05]Stephen.

[00:26:06]Stephen Warburton.

[00:26:08]You've no idea what fun it's been listening to you, Edward. Listening to you going through it all.

[00:26:15]Edward?

[00:26:16]Are you there?

[00:26:19]God almighty.

[00:26:23]You poor, sad bastard.

[00:26:26]What's What's going on? Stroke of luck, that's all.

[00:26:31]I saw it in the newspaper. Chap with my name, dead. Burial at St. Brendan's, Cripplegate.

[00:26:37]And it's intriguing. Someone with the same name dying.

[00:26:40]I actually went to the service.

[00:26:46]I pretended to be a long-lost relative.

[00:26:48]But I might be, of course.

[00:26:51]And the whole thing it was oddly therapeutic, really.

[00:26:58]He was dead and I wasn't.

[00:27:02]Poor old Stephen Walton.

[00:27:06]I sat there wondering whether perhaps he'd get my fate.

[00:27:11]The one I've been dreading all these years.

[00:27:14]Whether perhaps he'd wake up in his grave instead of me.

[00:27:19]Whether I'd been dreaming his fate.

[00:27:23]A fanciful idea, but that was when the idea came to me, you see.

[00:27:29]Of phoning you.

[00:27:32]Yes.

[00:27:34]I see.

[00:27:35]I think you've been the victim of a peculiarly cruel hoax. Thank you, Neville. And I think you should prosecute.

[00:27:44]Because if you don't I jolly well will.

[00:27:48]Let me speak to the little so-and-so.

[00:27:50]So, you won't prosecute. Either of you.

[00:27:52]You'd look too stupid.

[00:27:54]Think about it.

[00:27:55]A pair of idiots rushing out with their spades and shovels digging up a corpse in the middle of the night on the say-so of a voice on the phone.

[00:28:03]You'd never live it down.

[00:28:07]Especially not you, Edward.

[00:28:10]You'd be a laughing stock, eh?

[00:28:13]So, I'll see you in the morning at your consulting rooms, right? Should we say 10:00?

[00:28:20]We'll forget about the past.

[00:28:23]Start afresh as patient and doctor.

[00:28:27]Clean slate.

[00:28:29]Perhaps even a reduced rate for an old friend.

[00:28:37]Now, what I suggest is just take a last look at the dead.

[00:28:45]I'm sure you'd like to take a peek.

[00:28:48]Go on.

[00:28:49]Look at him.

[00:28:52]That's what awaits us all.

[00:28:57]Then, put the lid back on the coffin, shovel the earth back in the hole, and go home.

[00:29:05]Go home and try and get some sleep.

[00:29:12]If you can.

[00:29:17]>> [bell] [music] >> In a call from the dead, Edward Elmore was played by John Shrapnel, and Stephen Warbeck by Nick Dunning.

[00:29:32]The Reverend Neville Barber was Christopher Scott, and Martha Elmore Carolyn Jones.

[00:29:38]A call from the dead was written by Carrie Harrison and directed by Sally Avens.

[00:31:14]>> Mhm.