TR (ANNC): A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets. But one man is trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions: Guy Noir, Private Eye.

(THEME)

GK: It was June, and summer had finally come to the frozen tundra and my landlady Doris accosted me one morning as I left for work----

SS (DORIS): Hey, Noir. Remember when you told me that you could move to a higher-class apartment?

GK: Yeah.

SS (DORIS): Well, now you have. 'Cause I'm raising your rent.

GK: What?? Doris ---- you can't do it. The plumbing is on the fritz, the elevator is out of order.

SS (DORIS): The plumber is coming on Monday.

GK: He's been coming on Monday for the past six months.

SS (DORIS): As for the elevator, now you got a built-in Stairmaster. Five flights of it. It's good for you.

(BRIDGE)

GK: Fifteen bucks more per week. So when I was offered a job in upstate New York, at Camp Canandaigua, I took it. It was a camp where parents from the city send their kids so they can have the experience of being in a place where adults are not watching them every moment. It was an expensive camp, and the camp management was somewhat suspect in my mind ----- the camp director wore a black pinstripe suit and dark glasses and drove a white Cadillac.....

TR (RICO): Get the kiddoes into the dining hall, Noir, and me and Ginger are heading into town, okay?

SS: Hey, Ricky, why can't I go down by the lake, huh? I want to go swimming.

TR (RICO): Listen, doll, we're goin to the Hi-D-Ho Club.

Remember?

SS: But I don't want to go to the Hi-D-Ho club, Ricky. I want to go to devotions.

TR (RICO): Oh geeze. I forgot. I'm supposed to do devotions. Wouldja do it for me, Noir? Around the campfire?

GK: You want me to do devotions?

TR (RICO): Yeah.

GK: What do you want I should tell them?

TR (RICO): Tell em to be straight and always do the right thing.

GK: Uh huh.

TR (RICO): And never squeal on your pals. (STING)

GK: Every morning (BUGLE REVEILLE) I woke up at 6 a.m. and went to the flag-raising ceremony (VOICES MURMIRING: I PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE TO THE FLAG) and then to breakfast (GLOPS & GLORPS) which was porridge, and gulped a cup of coffee (GULPING) and made my way past the stable (HORSES), and the archery range (ARCHERY), to the arts and crafts building where I helped the campers braid plastic strips into useful lanyards.

SS (TEEN GIRL): Can you help me with this, Mr. Noir? I'm doing a double helix out of blue and green with yellow in the center. But I'm having a problem with the stitch-----

GK: How about just your basic brown anyard? Like this one----

SS (TEEN GIRL): Did you make that one?----

GK: Yes.

SS (TEEN): I don't think you're doing that right---- it's all twisted.

GK: There's all sorts of ways to make a lanyard, Brittney.

SS (TEEN): I'm Lindsay. She's Brittney. ----

GK: It's a conceptual lanyard. Sort of free-form.

SS (TEEN): That is so weird.

GK: It's an interpretation of a lanyard.

SS (TEEN): Aren't you kind of old to be a counselor? I mean, you're like really really old, like forty or something.

GK: That's the nicest thing anybody said to me all day, Lindsay. (BRIDGE) The staff lounge was where we counselors hung out. And when you met the counselors, you wondered if the kids' parents had done their research.

HM (SINGS):

I hate kids,

And I wish they'd disappear.

Hate canoeing

And I wish I wasn't here----

And I've come back from camping feeling cold and sad and wet

And I cannot wait to smoke a cigarette.

TR (HIGH TIGHT): So what do you do?

GK: Me? I'm the lanyard guy.

TR: Oh. I work in the kitchen. Have to stay inside cause I'm allergic to mosquito bites.

GK: That's got to be a problem up here in the woods.

TR: It is. One mosquito bite and my head swells up the size of a basketball. (MOSQUITO) Oh boy. There's one now. Big one. (MOSQUITO, TR FIGHTING) They can smell fear, you know. (MOSQUITO, TR FIGHTING, THEN BIG SPRAY OF PROPELLANT) There. Got him.

GK: Wow, that's a lot of pesticide.

TR: That lanyard of yours is all wrong, by the way. You're supposed to go over the top, over the top on the other side-see?

GK: Over the top.

TR: And over the top.

GK: Okay. Thanks.

(BRIDGE)

HM: (DEEP) I used to think there was something wrong with me that I didn't like children, but this summer I've found all sorts of new reasons. They are so self-centered. I mean --- what about my needs? I need someone to talk to. You can't talk to ten-year-olds? It just ain't gonna happen.

(BRIDGE)

GK: Days dragged on. Every day the same. From morning reveille (SFX) to Taps (SFX) and the food was dreadful (GLOPS GLORPS) and the camp director was never around.

TR (RICO): Me and Ginger are taking off for a few days, going to Vegas, so you watch over things, okay? And don't let em put so much milk on the cereal in the morning. It's a waste of money.

GK: And the counselors sank into depression, day after day.

HM (SINGS):

Hello Toilet

Can I sit here for awhile?

I hate children.

They just make me so hostile.

I've been cleaning up their mess and wipe their little noses

And I think they're giving me a psychosis.

(BRIDGE)

GK: That was the night a big storm came up. (LOW BASS OMINOSO) The sky was black and it got darker and darker, and I couldn't find Danny and I went out in the woods (OWL) and ----- Danny! (ECHO) Danny! (ECHO) ----- and I walked under a big tree and then I felt something sharp in my back (STING)----

SS: Hi there.

GK: What???? Whoa. Sorry. Surprised me. Who are you?

SS: I think you know.

GK: Why----- you've got a big hook at the end of your arm.

SS: Yes.

GK: What happened?

SS: I used to be a camper here. Years ago. And the counselors talked and talked. They talked my arm off. And so I walk through the woods looking for camp counselors and I stab them with my hook. (EVIL LAUGHTER)

GK: I see.

SS: You---- are a counselor. Aren't you?

GK: What makes you think so?

SS: That lanyard around your neck.

GK: That was made for me by my child. My child who is at camp.

SS: A child would make a much better lanyard than that.

GK: Well, he's a differently abled child. He has a lanyard syndrome.

SS: You're lying.

GK: No. No. (ECHO) No! No! (STING) And I ran and I ran straight into quicksand. (SINKING IN QUICKSAND, STRUGGLING). Help. Help. HELP. (REVERB) Help.

(DREAM CHORDS)

SS (DORIS): Mr. Noir? Wake up. Noir?

GK: Huh---- what? Who's there----

SS (DORIS): It's me, Guy. Doris. Pay up, ya big welsher.

GK: What happened to your hook?

SS (DORIS): You want the hook, I'll give you the hook. Pay up. How was camp? Look at you. Covered with bug bites. Some bugs can give you hallucinations, you know.

GK: Listen, Doris---- I was running through the woods and a woman with a hook was after me and I went into quicksand and I lost my checkbook----- I'll pay you tomorrow.

(THEME)

TR (ANNC): A dark night in a city that knows how to keep its secrets. But one man is trying to find the answers to life's persistent questions. Guy Noir, Private Eye.

(THEME OUT)