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Friday 31 August 2012

Village Observations

     Around the ‘free sea’ of the piazza the citizens parade round and round, the brass band plays as the musicians ride round in two open top taxis. A Town crier stands up in one of the taxis and rings his hand bell loudly.
The citizens cheer, but the cheering comes only from the public address system, the citizens themselves do not look at all like cheering, oh they parade around waving flags and twirl their open colourful umbrellas and parasols, yet the expression on the face of every citizen there is a look of bland expressionless, unfeeling and robotic like they go through the motions of Carnival.

    Number 2 actually played all six records on a record player in his office of the green dome. The sixth record came to an end at 11:42 am, each record had the playing time of 33 minutes 40 seconds which multiplied six times makes the whole playing time of 3 hours 40 minutes which in turn gives us the actual time Number 2 and the shopkeeper-Number 12 began listening to the records at 8:02am.
So knowing the time that number 2 began playing the first of the six records 8:02am, and seeing the ‘weasel’ of a shopkeeper-Number 12 scampering off to see Number 2, with records and Tally Ho under his arm soon after Number 6 left the general store. We can judge that the general store opened early for custom, sometime in fact before 7:30am.

    Number 6 captured a Pigeon with the aid of a wooden box and part of a ham sandwich as to lure the bird in the box. Having done so, Number 6 then attaches a piece of paper to the Pigeon via the ring upon one of its legs, the piece of paper containing and encrypted message. Where Number 6 thought it to be a homing pigeon or not did not in the end matter as it was already at its home, and in any case Number 6 wanted the pigeon caught because he wanted Number 2 to receive the encrypted message.

Be seeing you

Teabreak Teaser

 
   "Don't worry, you did your best. I'll stress it in my report."
 
          But who exactly was Nadia going to report to?

BCNU

Exhibition of Arts And Crafts

    A watercolour in the style of surrealism.


BcNu

‘Replication: The Act Of Making A Replica Of An Original Item’

    Number 6 “it’s not the same!”
    Number 2 “Same?”
    Number 6 “You’ve changed things, little things. This rubbish is not mine, this should be guilt not silver.”
    Number 2 “I shouldn’t try that line with him if I were you, Number 6 has a very strong sense of territory, you won’t shake him on his possessions.”
    And so what of the prisoner’s personal possessions, the furniture, pictures, prints, paintings, ornaments, fixture and fittings of ‘6 private’ and No 1 Buckingham place?
It could have been the case that once the abduction of the prisoner the removal men moved in, stripped out the entire contents of the lounge of the prisoner’s home, packed everything up and transported it to the village just in time to fit out the lounge of ‘6 private’ just in time for the prisoner’s arrival.
Well it could have happened like that, but it would have been a bit of a tight schedule with all that packing and unpacking, not to mention the transportation all the way to the village from London.
    And then of course there is ‘Many Happy Returns’ and the prisoner escape’s from the village, and as soon as Number 6 sets sail aboard his raft the entire contents of the lounge of ‘6 private’ has to be packed up and shipped back to London and fitted out in No 1 Buckingham Place ready for Mrs Butterworth to take up residence in time for the return of the previous tenant.
But of course if that isn’t enough, after the Prisoner has been fed, washed, shaved and attired out properly he leaves Mrs Butterworth and drives off in her lotus seven, leant to him on condition that he fixes that nasty overheating, and he must forget to come back, she might even bake him a birthday cake.
    Of course the prisoner doesn’t come back and Mrs Butterworth knows that he will not becoming back as she stands there on the pavement waving the prisoner off on his way. Mrs Butterworth then vacates No 1 Buckingham Place as soon as the prisoner has left, the removal men move in yet again, strip everything out of the lounge, pack it all up and transport it all back to the village in readiness for the prisoner’s happy return.
    Then again this whole procedure has to be repeated in ‘Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling’, well of course that’s quite ridiculous to try and carry out that kind of operation, it would be a complete waste of time and man hours, not to mention a great deal of work all for nothing.
    Much better to have a huge, vast warehouse somewhere close to the village, stocked with every conceivable item one might wish for, and for items that could not be found and purchased, then craftsmen of every kind would be on hand to replicate any individual piece of pottery, furniture, metal work, figurines, statuettes, pictures painting, prints, carpets, rugs anything and everything. There would also be countless fixtures and fitting from every country and every style ready to fit out any cottage ready for a new arrival.
    Any work need to be carried out on any particular cottage in readiness for any particular new arrival is carried out at night when the entire residents of the village were asleep, and well in advance of any such new arrival. This would entail interior structural alterations inside a cottage, painting and decorating and totally fitting out to make it a real ‘home from home’ cottage for any new arrival, an exact replica of their own home of course.
   But then only one room of any cottage can be fitted out as an exact replica of a room found in a resident’s former home, from which they have been abducted and in which they will wake up in here in the village.
   Well we can hardly replicate full sized houses now can we, think of the time and man power it would take, say to replicate the entire house of No 1 Buckingham Place, it just couldn’t be done, certainly not in the confines of the village, that is why only the lounge of No 1 Buckingham Place was ever replicated in ‘6 private’ anything more would be clearly impossible.
    Concerning the matter of replicated items, in ‘Hammer into Anvil’ there is a fight scene between Number 6 and Number 14 which takes in ‘6 private’, and during the fight many items are bashed into and over turned, items which after wards will need replacing, or replicated. Not forgetting of course the structural damage to both the railings and French window through which number 6 throws number 14, taking the railings of the balcony with him!
    As regarding the lounge of No 1 Buckingham Place replicated in ‘6 private’, it is not an exact replication of the original, there are certain subtle differences. Like the small window above the couch upon which the prisoner first awakens in his new ‘home from home’, the French window leading out onto a small balcony and the door of the lounge which in No 1 Buckingham Place opens into the hallway, but in the Village is actually the door to the cottage ‘6 private.’
Also whilst Mrs Butterworth is in residence at No 1 Buckingham Place she has made on or two subtle changes, her deceased husband photograph upon the mantle piece for one.
     And quite obviously she didn’t like the gold coloured screen to the left of the door as you look at it, because it isn’t there, however when number 6 in the guise or body of the Colonel returns to his London home in ‘Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling’ the gold coloured screen has been replaced, yet the heavy wood carving above the couch where upon the prisoner awoke, has been replaced with a framed oriental, possibly Japanese, piece of work, the edge of which can be seen in the picture above. But it seems that someone has slipped up and has replaced the oils painting and two prints not with the three caricatures, but by three water colour paintings!
Also on the back wall of the lounge there are three colour prints of caricatures of past notable figures of their time, removed by Mrs Butterworth and replace with an elaborately framed oil painting of a dancer and two indistinguishable prints to give the lounge that feminine touch, rather than the masculine one of its former resident. Yet she kept the heavy wood carving, which she must obviously have liked.

Be seeing you

The Therapy Zone

Checkmate
Profiles 

Number 2
Male
Height…. 5 feet 10 inches {approx}
Weight…. 150 lbs {approx}
Hair…….. Black            
Age…….. 40 {approx}
Nationality… English speaking
Chief Administrator
Chairman of the village
Slight of build.
Wears a signet ring on the little finger of his left hand.
Village attire, plain black double breasted blazer, grey polo neck jersey, fawn trousers, deck shoes, old school scarf and carries a furled umbrella shooting stick.
Has a bony, Hawke like nose.
   This is a smooth and at times cold Number 2, with a laid back attitude. Not a hand’s on interrogator as some of those who have gone before him, more just as an administrator of the village.
     He appears to have no assistant or at least we never see him conversing with such, unlike many before him.
    Again, as we have seen on countless occasions, Number 2 wearing the “Old School Scarf” and carrying about him the furled umbrella shooting stick. Is this regalia somehow a surreal symbol of his power, as in a “Rod of Empire” or “Wand of Office’.
   He seems to know little of what takes place within the Hospital, regarding the Doctors experiments. For example, he did not know of the experiment which was about to be carried out on Number 8.
Not the most knowledgeable of the Number 2’s, he was unsure of Pavlov’s experiments were with dogs or was it rats!
He does, like so many before him, see Number 6 as being far too valuable to them to allow the doctor to carry out a leucotomy on the subject. At the same time of wanting to see Number 6 happy, he does threaten him, ‘They do have ways, if you drive us to them’.
He is well spoken, well mannered and quite obviously well bred.
Full of charm but yet capable of applying {or have someone else apply} whatever degree of force or rehabilitation required to bring anyone back into line.
He never once flinches at watching what is being done the Rook-Number 58.
    “In society one must learn to conform” he tells Number 6 coldly.
He is a man who will use his own disciplined methods to exact power over those who would conspire against the village.
    His self control and discipline is demonstrated when alone in his office, he is a black belt in Karate.
A shrewd adversary for anyone to meet and that includes Number 6.
    What he was before he was brought to the Village remains to be seen. A collage professor perhaps or a lecturer maybe, if so that would account for the old school scarf.
   Number 2 seems to have little to do with Number 6, certainly he makes no move to gain the secret of the prisoner’s resignation. But he does take Number 6 to the Hospital to see the Rook because he can’t have him worrying! Or is there an ulterior motive, to show Number 6 exactly what ‘they’ are capable of?
   Laid back Number 2 may appear, but he does have the authority and the village under his control and having the command of voice when needed and the respect of his subordinates.
    Not only that but he appears to have a certain respect for number 6, but also disappointed “I should have thought that you” would have devised something a little more original’ at Number 6 ordering that he be tied up.
    Does he see the village as a chessboard? When asked what will happen to the others by Number 6, he replies “They’ll be back tomorrow, on the chessboard.”
But will they, what action would number 2 be expected to take against such a group of escapees? ‘Rehabilitation’ at the very least.
    However in the case of the attempted escape by Number 6 and his confederates, it was the Rook-Number 58 who pulled his bacon out of the fire this time round.
    At being informed by the supervisor that the searchlight crew in the Tower had been attack, he told the supervisor that he would be right over. When he hadn’t arrived at the Control Room, becauseNnumber 6 had had him tied up, the supervisor had taken no action. This was probably due to the fact that the Rook had arrived at the Green Dome and released him, he would them have informed the supervisor, instructing him to take no action.
   So with the attempted escape thwarted, why is it that this number 2 was replaced? Well of course we see only a fraction of that which takes place in the Village. No doubt this Number 2 survived and remained Number 2/chairman of the Village a while longer.

  Number 6
   Is out and about in the Village, always on the lookout for something, this time watching as the white membranic mass of the village guardian passes by in the street and is suddenly taken by the attitude of a man with a stick. Everyone else in the street is perfectly still, but not this man. So intrigued he is, that Number 6 follows this man Number 14 to the lawn where a huge chessboard has been laid out.
   Number is asked if he plays chess and ends up as the white Queens pawn.
   He questions the white Queen-Number 8 but she evades his questions.
   He asks her who is Number 1, but receives no answer.
   He doesn’t believe what ‘they’ tell him and that escape is not possible for  chessmen, but not for him.
   He is told by Number 14 {the chess champion} that he plays a “fine game.” Number 6 was only a pawn, making just one move on the board. So this remark can only be directed to the way he plays ‘The Game’ against the village.
   Number 6 learns a very important lesson from Number 14, how to distinguish between the blacks and the whites. By their dispositions, by the move they make, you soon find out who’s for or against you.
   It’s simple psychology, the way it is in life, you judge by attitudes. So Number 6 comes up with a plan to discover who are the prisoner’s and who the warder’s, this by detecting their subconscious arrogance. The Guardians pose as prisoners but none of them would be intimidated by him, only prisoners would obey him. This then is the first step in a plan for a daring escape attempt, but no plan can succeed without first knowing who he can rely on.
    He virtually frightens the living daylights out of the Rook as he questions him, in that well trained authoritative voice of his, convincing the Rook that he is one of them! So Number 6 takes control of this little venture
   His confederates are; the Rook-Number 58, Number 14 {the chess champion}, the Shopkeeper-Number 19, the painter-Number 42 {so Roland Walter Dutton is no more, or has had a change of Number} and a few other non entities. And number 6 has complete control over them, he makes all the decisions, gives them orders, tells them what to do. He dominates them and has an air of authority about him which matches any to be found in the village.
    This in much the same way as one would in a school gang, when one person dominates all the members of that gang.
    Number 6 appears to be a goat amongst so many sheep!
   On a personal note, during a word association test at the Hospital it is discovered that number 6 drank at “The Hope & Anchor’ his local public house he used to drink at.
    He can be rather reckless, taking too many risks on behalf of others. He tells the Rook “to let me worry about that.” But when it came to having to take a risk on number 8, he declined to do so ‘not me’ he tells Number 8.
   He also has an independent mind.
  It is suggested by Number 14, that Number 6 must be new here, as in time most of us join the enemy against ourselves. But number 6 has been in the Village for many months now.
   He enjoys a certain rapport with Number 2.
   He readily joins Number 2 in a visit to the Hospital in order to see the Rook.    
   Through concern, or does Number 6 have an ulterior motive?
   His psychiatric report finds positive abnormality, that he has a total disregard for his personal safety and a negative reaction to pain, which would take superhuman will power, this together with aggressive tendencies.
    When nervous or agitated his left hand gets a nervous twitch.
    He has a peculiar style of running all his own.
    He can be a cruel man, he does not let Number 8 down gently, he tells her that she’s when told that she loves him.
    He keeps women at arms length, but cannot help but be effected by the tears shed by a woman, even though he says that a slight drizzle wont wash away his doubts!
    He still doesn’t trust women, he has been betrayed by women before, Number 9, Nadia, Alison and Mrs Butterworth to name but three. So he Number 8’s offer to help him with his escape plan, as he rejects her love for him. And he certainly cannot see them being happy together.
     He is cruel towards Number 8, but at the same time shows kindness towards her after he has made her cry.
    He wants to know who put her up to it, for her to so suddenly latch onto him like that.
   Each night a maid usually comes to ‘6 Private’ in order to make him his nightly cup of hot chocolate in order to help him sleep. However this time it is Number 8 who makes his cup of hot chocolate for him, which he likes ‘yes nice chocolate’ and ‘a kind thought’, but the end result is the same, a sound night’s sleep for Number 6.
   One curious observation is that there is not one single woman amongst his confederates, he tells the Rook ‘let’s find our reliable men’.
And when alerting his chosen men on the day of their planned escape, he uses a coded phrase; “Tonight at moonset, Rook to Queens Pawn 6 check.” this so as not to alert the guardians.
    But exactly how reliable is Number 6? Can ‘they’ his fellow confederate trust him?
He has not had any real feelings for anyone in the village, perhaps he sees his confederates as a means to an end, his eventual escape.
   Down on the beach when he finds the abandoned lilo, he had two choices, to paddle out on the lilo in the hope of being picked up by the ship, or to return to the Green Dome and his men, he chose the former. It is a decision which would seal his fate and cost him his freedom. Was this an error in judgement? He had plenty of time, he could have returned to his men in the Green Dome, thus preventing the situation which was developing there. He would have been in time to prevent the Rook from convincing the others that Number 6 was not in fact one of them, a guardian, thus preventing the release of Number 2, with plenty of time remaining to bring the ship in. But instead he set out to bring the ship in himself, an act which resulted in him over powering the crew okay, but found him struggling with a lock ships wheel!
Then once the Village Guardian appeared on the scene, and the vessel taken under remote control, Number 6 had no choice but to accept the inevitable, his return to the village.
   This was a good idea by Number 6 but he only had himself to blame for its failure, the decision he made at the end together with his air of authority over the Rook and the others. Number 6 failed his own test when Rook applied that test to him!

Number 8 –The White Queen
Female
Height…. 5feet 4 inches {approx}
Weight….120 lbs {approx}
Hair……..  Black
Age…….. Mid forties {approx}
Nationality….  English speaking, but has an air of being born in another country, perhaps India.
Slight of build.
Village attire, a black and white hat, black and white stripped jersey, white slacks, deck shoes and colourful stripped cape.
Beach attire, black swim suit, pale yellow and white hat, yellow poncho.
Night attire, of salmon pink eastern style dress.
    Nadia was a previous Number 8, now we have met with a new number 8, the white queen.
   This is a woman who offers her help to Number 6 in order to help him with his plan to escape, if it’s a good one she’ll escape with him. She has often helped other people with their plans, but none of them have ever succeeded, that’s why she is still here.    But it would be good experience for Number 6, at least she could tell him what not to try. One day she would betray number 6 to save him from his own folly, not that she would be able to help herself, not even when it comes to love.
    Number 8 has often helped other people with their plans, this would suggest that she never came up with an escape plan of her own and that she latched on to others in order to try and escape the village, unable as she was to carry out a plan of her own!
   So how long has this woman been in the Village? Quite some time would be the answer, as she has often helped other people with their escape plans, which curiously all failed, because of her involvement one might say. A betrayer of her fellow prisoner’s, well that us what she is being used for here, and who is to say she has not been used in much the same way before?
   Under hypnosis number 8 is in love with Number 6, she has a locket about her neck which she is told he gave to her. Mostly she is happy, except when Number 6 rejects her love for him with his cruel attitude towards her.
    But even Number 8 betrays the man she loves, even though she does it without knowing, with the hot chocolate which she so kindly makes for Number 6.
    She is an eager woman and totally believable as a love struck victim, because that is what she is….. a victim of a doctors experiment.
     Number 8 maybe eager, but she is also annoying and infuriating at the same time, never far away and always there.
    What possible reason could there be for having this poor woman brought to the Village? What position of a secret nature had she once held?
   Any such secret information that she possibly had, she would have given up long ago.
     Number 8 does not appear to be of strong resistance, but then perhaps like so many, she joined the enemy against herself!
It is difficult to know this woman, as for most of the time she is under hypnosis and therefore we do not get to see this woman’s true character, merely a glimpse at the beginning. Before she would have helped Number 6 in his attempt to escape, but later she tells him that they could be happy together, together in the Village?
   Women have tried to betray Number 6 before and some have succeeded, Nadia, Number 58, Alison, Mrs Butterworth for example, and they did it through their own free will. This woman would have no choice in the matter, having no free will of her own!
   But unlike most women in the village, there are just a few who one can truly feel sympathy towards, Number 8 is one such women. She is so happy when number 6 tells eventually tells her in his cottage that he likes her. She tells him that he is so good to her, she thanks him when she asks if she may see him again. Even though he’s here all the time!
    She is blatantly used as an expendable pawn against Number 6, in this regard there is a certain amount of compassion for this poor deluded soul, even though she is under hypnosis.
     This woman who feels so much love for a man who cruelly rejects her and the love she feels towards Number 6, who has no feeling for her what’s so ever. Indeed she is rejected at every turn, no matter how hard she tries.
How number 8 must have been feeling inside, only someone who themselves have been so cruelly rejected would know.
   Yet at night time Number 8 goes round to ‘6 Private’ and busies herself making number 6 his nightly cup of hot chocolate, instead of a maid. A kind thought on her part no doubt, but the result is the same.
    Number 8 would be unaware that she was actually drugging Number 6, as much in that she was unaware that she was under hypnosis and that her love for Number 6 is nothing more than hypnotic suggestion. But how would she feel once brought out of hypnosis? Would she remember anything? It is highly probable that she wouldn’t.
Poor number 8, a prisoner of the village and a prisoner of both love and rejection.

The Doctor/Psychiatrist –Number 22
Female
Height…. 5 feet 8 inches {approx}
Weight….130 lbs {approx}
Hair……..Grey
Age…….. 45 {approx]
Nationality…. English speaking
Slight of build.
Village attire, white coat, grey polo neck jersey, white shoes and a skirt under her uniform.
    This doctor is as the doctor from “Dance of the Dead”, the only difference is that she is an unfeeling, heartless female, both cold and calculating, who is only too ready to carry out her next experiment on her next unsuspecting victim. She would be only too willing to find out the breaking point of number 6 and enjoy doing it.
    On Number 6 she suggests a leucotomy, to knock out the centres of the brain, in order to cure Number 6 of his aggressive tendencies!
   As any doctor before her, she is not averse to carrying out any form of experiment, the patients care not at the top of her list of priorities.
   She is well informed regarding the experiments involving implants in the brains of Dolphins in connection with submarine detection. She feels nothing for her patients, and looks upon them as though they were animals. Like her predecessor she would be right at home in a Concentration Camp, or working at Porton Down research establishment. Is that where this good doctor was recruited from, an experimental research facility?
    To be recruited to the village, would have been a dream come true, free as she is to experiment as she sees fit, on any subject, except Number 6.
    Conditioning, therapy and rehabilitation are just words to this doctor, by which any degree of medical interference with a human being is justified.
One such experiment of rehabilitation is carried out on the Rook, dehydrated and not given water until he learns to obey.
   Worse is carried out on Number 8, hypnotism, telling this poor woman that she loves number 6 {the man on the screen} and that he loves her and has given her a locket which she must always wear next to her heart. This in connection with an experiment to help control in detecting anyone who is going to attempt to escape, the subject is Number 6.
    Around the neck of Number 8 is a locket, inside the locket a reaction transmitter. It picks up number 8’s emotions and relates them to control, all in pulse rates. Number 8 will dote on number 6, follow him around like a dog.
    When he’s in sight she will sigh.
    When she sees him her pulses will quicken.
    If she thinks she is about to lose him, if he attempts to escape, she will be frantic and her emotions will send an alarm to control. Once they have a full record for analysis they will be able to program her into the alarm system.
    They even use her to make Number 6 his nightly cup of hot chocolate!
   One can only imagine that after this experiment, the doctor had Number 8 brought out from hypnosis. To have Number 8 left in such a position would have been most cruel.
   You could imagine a doctor of her calibre, gaining access to experimental research documentation from the Nazi death camps and using such material for further such
experiments of the type.

Supervisor – Number 56
Male
Height…. 5 feet 11 inches {approx}
Weight….175 lbs {approx}
Hair……..Greying
Age……..50’s {approx}
Nationality…. English speaking
Village attire, a plain black blazer, olive green polo neck jersey, dark trousers and deck shoes.
   This man has a very casual manner, much in the same way as his superior number 2, and runs the control room in much the same way. Not as menacing as other supervisors we have encountered.
    He appears to have an assistant, Number 249.
    Nothing appears to rattle this man, not until the doctors latest gadget packs up that is. But even then he is quick to point out that he wouldn’t have wanted to be in her shoes if they’d lost Number 6 and Number 8.
    So he’s quick to pass the buck!
    He has no fear of Number 2 and isn’t afraid to disturb his superior when the occasion arises, even when ordered not too!
   Supervisor of the control room he maybe, but seeing that he reports every little thing to Number 2, it seems that he cannot make a decision of his own. Perhaps he cannot be trusted to do so, hence his casual manner, free of any such responsibilities.
   But if that is so, how did he become supervisor of the control room?
   Certainly he is not as authoritative as the supervisors before him, perhaps this is due to his somewhat casual manner.
    This man could be an interim supervisor like two others before him, in both “The Schizoid Man” and “Dance of the Dead”, or simply working his shift. Only this supervisor works both day and night time shifts!
    This supervisor whilst operating camera 34 during the search for Number 8, failed to notice that the view of the panning camera had altered slightly, as the Rook worked to remove the camera from its mounting, the camera was tilted forward, the lens of the camera pointing down. This would have been reflected in the view seen upon the wall screen in the control room and should have alerted the supervisor of the fact that someone was meddling with the camera itself.
   He reported direct to Number 2 that the two man searchlight crew in the tower had been attacked. Number 2 told the supervisor that he would be right over.
    When number 2 failed to arrive at the control room, why didn’t the supervisor react to this and send security over to the Green Dome?

Checkmate continued next time

Be seeing you

Thursday 30 August 2012

Pictorial Prisoner

  There he is, old Potter left out in the cold for his failure to protect Colonel Hawke-Englishe. Here he's a shoe-shine boy, and making a few shillings on the side, more when Mister X hands him a pound note. But just a minute.......what's this? How it is possible for a man to turn up with muddy shoes on a dry day, in the middle of a high street? A stab at dry humour? Perhaps, but as Potter might say "ridiculous!" Yet it's strange that this chap turns up with muddy shoes, just when Potter is feeling pleased with himself and the pound note he clutches in his hand. It's always appeared to me as a deliberate action to bring Potter down again, rather than a humourous one.

I'll be seeing you

This week I Am Mostly Watching The Cube!

    It's a psychological horror film, it's Prisoneresque. And you thought 'the Prisoner' was difficult to understand!  Six, strangers awaken from their daily lives to find themselves trapped in a surreal prison - a seemingly endless maze of interlocking cubical chambers armed with lethal booby traps. None of these people knows why or how they were imprisoned, or even why.... But it soon emerges that each of them has a skill that could contribute to their escape.
 
   Who created this diabolical maze, and why? There are unanswered questions on every side, whilst personality conflicts and struggles for power emerge as the tension rises. But one thing is crystal clear: Unless they can learn to co-operate to work out the secrets of this deadly trap, none of them has very long to live....

Be seeing you - either diced, sliced, or cubed!

Caught On Camera

    Ordinary people going about their everyday lives. Little do they know, like the woman passing by the window of 'Lady M Dress Shop,' in Borehamwood high street, perhaps undecided whether or not the dummy in the window is real or not. But little realising that she has just appeared, even briefly, in an episode of 'the Prisoner!'

BCNU

Points of Note

    I was thinking the other day about that nasty over heating which Mrs. Butterworth was experiencing with her Lotus 7 in traffic, and I mentioned this to a mate of mine who told me how easy it was to rectify the trouble...... take that number plate off the grill, its obstructing air flow to cool the engine!                          
    Then of course there was that moment during 'Hammer Into Anvil' when during an interrogation session with Number 6, he pulled out that sword from his "sword shooting stick" and waving the tip of the blade in front of Number 6's eyes duly proded Number 6's forehead with the tip of the blade, you can actually see the indentation it made. "Ah you react!" said Number 2 with a sense of satisfaction. Well who bloody wouldn't, I ask you!
    In 'Arrival' No.6 asks the electrician, who has come to replace the busted loud speaker, why he drives those things.... the tractor, a bit slow! "In an emergency we walk" the electrician tells Number 6. Mind you, even though those little tractors are a bit slow, their mighty powerful machines. I saw one in 'Dance of the Dead'  pulling a trailer with three maids aboard, and they were going up hill. And have you noticed those taxis, Austin Mini-Mokes they are, and the drives, all be it females, are not that much different to those cabbies in London. Well the Prisoner was at the electronic free information board when this taxi pulls up.

"Where to sir?" the female oriental driver asks.
"Take me to the nearest town" the Prisoner requests.
"Oh we're only the local service" the driver replies.
"Take me as far as you can" says the Prisoner.
    Well the driver certainly does that, up road, down street. Up and back the same way twice, and the longest way round to get back where you started! But at least it didn't cost him anything, and the viewer did get a grand tour of the village. But in 'Feer for All' the taxi ride was somewhat different as Number 6 was being interviewed by the reporter Number 113. For as the interview had commenced, the taxi slowly drove along the street down towards the Town Hall passing buildings on the left. Yet as the interview progresses the taxi can be seen passing those very same buildings a second time. Well that street isn't very long down to the Town Hall, and the taxi would have arrived before the interview had been concluded otherwise.

Be seeing you

The Therapy Zone

Dance of the Dead
Profiles  Continued

Supervisor – Number 22
Female
Height….5 feet 4 inches {approx}
Weight….110 lbs {approx}
Hair……..black {Japanese style bun}
Age……..late twenties {approx}
Nationality… English speaking
Village attire, an olive green polo neck jersey, black slacks and deck shoes.
Wear’s the fancy dress costume of “Cleopatra”, for Carnival.
   Here then is the first female supervisor, but still attired in the usual costume/uniform, except for the double breasted blazer.
    She is one to stick to the rules, telling Number 240 abruptly, ‘that’s no way to report!’, when the observer telephones Number 2 direct.
    Then later, when asked by the observer ‘if she should watch number 34 instead’, she takes great delight in telling Number 240 that he’s dead and that it’s none of our business. This indicates that this supervisor knows her place and probably doesn’t care anyway.
    Again an interim supervisor, filling in probably again as the shift roster requires.
And then again when the observer says that she got to know him {Number 34} quite well, the supervisor takes more delight in telling the observer that “he” didn’t know her!

Observer –Number 240
Female
Height….5 feet 4 inches {approx}
Weight….115 lbs {approx}
Hair……..dark blonde
Age……..late twenties {approx}
Nationality… Unknown it is possible that she was born in the village, English speaking
Village attire, a dark green jersey, light brown slacks, flat shoes, a white peeked cap and brown cape.
And for Carnival, the fancy dress costume of “Little Bo-peep”, and being an observer, always knows where to find her sheep!
   Reputed to be one of ‘their’ best observers, but yet twice she manages to lose number 6 when scanning ‘6 private’ and the entire village, she looked everywhere and still she could not fine him!
    But as an observer she cannot get involved with “life” in the village. She said that she got to know Number 34 quite well, but then she clearly didn’t know that 34 had a radio! And of course ‘he’ didn’t know ‘her’ did he? All the same, she was sad at being told of number 34’s death.
    Any relationship with this young lady can only be one sided, she will know all about “you”, but you will never get to know “her”.
                    “Observers of life should never get involved”
   And then the question of trust, comes to mind. Any breach of the “Rules” would be reported.
    This citizen has been fully indoctrinated in the ways of the village, it is not beyond the realms of possibly that Number 240 was born in the village. That way indoctrination would begin at a very early age.
   She is outwardly cold and unfeeling, caring little or nothing for her fellow citizen. But she knows that she has a “duty” to everyone.
    Accusing Number 6 of having no values, and that he wants to spoil things. Telling him that he is a wicked man, and won’t be helped. She sees him as being confused, but not there are treatments for people like him, she tells Number 6 quite coldly.
Perhaps in time, Number 240 would make an excellent Number 2, carry on like she is and promotion will soon follow!
   Those values of course being different from hers, and the thing she does not want spoiling, is of course the village itself!
    And as this is the second occasion upon where the possibility of a citizen being born in the village, then it goes without saying that there must possibly be a Nursery somewhere in the village.
    When questioned by Number 6, the words of a village ‘edicts’ roll off her tongue with remarkable ease and without thinking;
 “Question’s are a burden to others, answer’s a prison for oneself”.
“Of the people, by the people, for the people.”
    Also number 240 has a very close relationship with Number 2, in the way that she is let off lightly when reporting to Number 2 that she has lost number 6, not once but on two separate occasions, and in the way 240 feels that she can report direct to number
She is also a most loyal citizen, seeing that it is improper to listen to a radio.
    As Prosecutor at the trial of the Prisoner, she accuses Number 6 of making a positive effort against the community and maliciously breaking “The Rules”, by acquiring a radio. Certainly she is no innocent, trying to persuade the court to pass the severest possible sentence.
    But then as the sentence of death is passed by the judges, her feelings do finally get the better of her. She rises to her feet and cries out against the sentence, ‘No, stop it!’
Obviously Number 240 sees the sentence as too severe! It is possible that she has secretly cultivated feelings forNnumber 6.
   In the end Number 240 is no longer Number 6’s observer, to use Number 2’s adage one last time, “observers of life should never get involved”. There was the danger that she was becoming too closely involved with her subject, Number 6.
Perhaps if Number 240 let go a little, she just might one day, start to act like a human being. But then that would mean having to fight years of village indoctrination, something which I feel she is not up to doing.

The Maid – Number 54
Female
Height….5 feet 6 inches {approx}
Weight…120lbs {approx}
Hair……..black put up in a bun, later in a pony tail.
Age……..mid twenties {approx}
Nationality… English speaking
Village attire, a fancy dress costume, a Baroque dress, with Ostrich feathers in her hair, is her costume for Carnival. Only later to change into the usual maid’s uniform of, black dress with lace apron, white sailors cap and flat shoes and her hair now in a pony tail.
    As she has been given something special for tonight’s ball, the fancy dress costume of Queen Elizabeth 1st, with curly ginger hair wig.
Both the Baroque gown and Queen Elizabeth costume suites the maid, as she enjoys wearing elaborate and glamorous dresses.
    As the maid says, ‘a woman is always impatient to wear a new dress’. Hence the fact that she is not wearing her maids outfit at the beginning.
  She is young, quite flirtatious and most attractive. She tells Number 6 that ‘they will get along’. Indeed she seems the type of girl who would get on with everybody!
   She like many before her, seems well suited to life here in the village.
     But when she sees number 6 giving the black village cat an ashtray of cream, we soon see the harsher, stricter side to her nature.
    “You’re not allowed animals, it’s a rule” she tells Number 6 unsmiling.
It was perhaps this disciplined side of Number 54’s nature which saw her appointed as a second of the three judges, for the trial of the prisoner. But even then she was the only judge to state that The Prisoner has his rights, when the Prisoner wanted the court to call a character witness. So perhaps there is still an element of humanity left in this woman.

The Maid – Number 21
Female
Height….5 feet 3 inches {approx}
Weight…125 lbs {approx}
Hair……. Light brown
Age……. Sixties {approx}
Nationality… English speaking
Village attire, a black dress, white apron, white sailors hat and flat shoes.
We have seen one of number 6’s personal maids, and now it appears that we see another! And she being a former waitress at the Café in ‘Arrival.’
She seems best suited for retirement into the old people’s home, but no doubt likes to keep active, seeing retirement as the end of things.
She makes Number 6 his nightly cup of hot chocolate, something to help him sleep!
She also gives a strange form of village salute, very casual.

Medic - Number 21
Male
Height….5 feet 10 inches {approx}
Weight….150 lbs {approx}
Hair……..black
Age…….mid fifties {approx}
Nationality…Unknown
Village attire, a white coat, grey polo neck jersey, grey trousers and white shoes.
Brown tortoise shell rimmed spectacles.
Thin of stature.

Number 39
Female
Height….5 feet 2 inches {approx}
Weight….160 lbs {approx}
Hair…….silver grey
Age…….60 {approx}
Nationality…Unknown
Build short and stout.
Village attire, a white coat, grey polo neck jersey, and a skirt underneath, with white shoes, and wear’s glasses, possibly long sighted.
    Such medics are as responsible for their actions as much as the doctor is. We have seen that the patients are cared for at the hospital, but also that interrogations are carried out there. And now much worse is confirmed, experiments are being carried out upon certain citizens in order to gain the knowledge in their heads. And when they go too far, people like Dutton end up a brainwashed imbecile. We have seen evidence of this previously, with members of the town council.


The Nurse -  Number 37
Female
Height….5 feet 6 inches {approx}
Weight….125 lbs {approx}
Hair……..blonde
Age……..mid twenties {approx}
Nationality…Unknown
Village attire, a white dress uniform and white cap of a nurse.
   Unlike the medics, the nurse is in attendance to take care of Dutton. Constantly she takes the pulse of her patient, watching her watch pinned to her white uniform.


Roland Walter Dutton – Number 42

Male
Height….5 feet 11 inches {approx}
Weight…160 lbs {approx}
Hair……..light brown
Age……..forties {approx}
Nationality….. English
Occupation…. Minor Civil Servant
Salary……….. £100 per month {approx}
Village attire, an olive green and black stripped jersey, with fawn trousers and deck shoes.
Dutton had been in the village for a couple of months.
    He knows Number 6, a once friend and colleague. Working perhaps for the same department, but not having access to the important, vital stuff. Unfortunately he is not to be believed by the good doctor-Number 40, and so he has been released into the village for 72 hours, so that he can reconsider in the peaceful atmosphere of the village. After which he will be returned to the hospital. After all, he is expendable and it will give the doctor a chance to experiment.
    How much of that time had elapsed before he met with Number 6, months in all probability. He asks Number 6 how London is, which would suggest that Dutton arrived in the village before his friend and colleague.
He is something of a cynic, believing that places never change, only people.
    Did the doctor get to finish his work on Dutton before the 72 hours were up?
    He is not a strong person as Number 6, he cannot fight them any longer, he has told them everything, there is nothing left to tell them and so has become resigned to his fate.
    The village authorities believe Dutton knows more than he is telling them, he has told them all he knows because he had no connection to the vital stuff.
A “Termination “order has been taken out on Dutton, but not by number 2 or the three judges of the court, that can only leave number 1.
In any case Roland Walter Dutton proves to be no sort of character witness at all. The treatment/experiment on him has taken its toll and which has left him brainwashed, an inanely starring imbecile. Roland Walter Dutton has ‘ceased’ to exist!

The Doctor –- Number 30

Female
Height….5 feet 2 inches {approx]
Weight…112 lbs {approx}
Hair……. medium brown
Age……..mid forties {approx}
Nationality….  English speaking
Village attire, the white coat, grey polo neck jersey, skirt and white shoes. The uniform of a doctor, but a doctor brandishing a termination order!
    She cannot be familiar with a counterpart of hers, Number 116. His/her white coat being worn by Number 6, he is neither recognised nor his identity called into question by number 30.
    This doctor, though slight of stature, a little aged, is as guilty as the doctor-Number 40, for carrying out inhumane experiments.
    Who exactly gave her that “Termination” order? It was for Number 2 and she must see it immediately! So where did she get it?
    We have seen this woman once before, when she was a member of the ‘Awards Committee’ for the ‘Arts & Crafts Exhibition.

The Town Crier – Number ?
Male
Height….5 feet 7 inches {approx}
Weight….170 lbs {approx}
Hair……..dark brown
Age……..early sixties {approx}
Nationality… English speaking
Village attire,  the costume of a “Town Crier”, Tricorne hat, scarlet tunic with black sleeves and detachable Jabot.
Later he wear’s the fancy dress costume of Emperor Nero.
  Every town once had its town crier and the village is no different. He reads out a proclamation to the citizens from the balcony of the Gloriette.
‘A proclamation. All citizens take notice that Carnival is decreed for tonight. Turn back the clock, there will be music, dancing, happiness, all at the Carnival, by order!’
So it seems that even the citizens have to be ordered to attend Carnival. And there will be music, dancing and happiness whether the citizens want it or not!

The Postman -– Number ?
Male
Height….5 feet 8 inches {approx}
Weight….220 lbs {approx}
Hair……..white
Age……..early sixties {approx}
Nationality….  English speaking
Village attire, a “Royal Mail” postman’s hat, grey jersey and grey flannel trousers and deck shoes.
So the village also has a “local postal service”. The postman wears the peeked cap of a Royal Mail postman, but why? Perhaps this is some form of village eccentricity, permitted to only the more elderly members of the community.
He even wheels about the village, a penny farthing bicycle, however it seems unlikely that the postman actually rides it.
Again this is an elderly man and as the maid, perhaps more suited to life in the old people’s home, but maybe not wanting to give up.

                                                                       The Butler
   Is seen in but three scenes, looking down from a high promontory. Then again the central Piazza. Both during Carnival parade. And at the Ball during the court scene when he offers one of the three judges at the Prisoner’s trial the black cloth!




Three Young Ladies for Carnival
   These three blonde, young, attractive ladies seem different somehow, because of the clothes and hats they are wearing. And in that they do not appear to fit in with the Village scene.



Next time Checkmate

Be seeing you