Find the Lady

At a concert in a club by the sea, a performance by a new wave band headed by Toola is interrupted
when Gary Molecombe, alias "The Mole", interrupts one of the numbers. Gary was asked to leave the
band, and believes that their manager, Kenrick, murdered his girlfriend Chrissie.

Kenrick, who witnesses Gary's outburst, instructs two of his thugs to throw the ex-band member from
the pier, where he is found by the police the next morning and put into custody.

Toola phones a DJ friend at Radio West and asks if Eddie can help her. Meeting her in the club,
Toola explains Gary's departure from the band, and his fixation with proving that Kenrick murdered
Chrissie.

Eddie attempts to speak to Gary as he is released from custody, but the young guitarist runs.
Tracing him to a tatoo shop, Eddie learns that Gary lives above the premises, but can be found in a
café. In the café, Gary tells Eddie that Chrissie was Kenrick's girlfriend, but she was also seeing
him, and that was the cause of her death.

Chrissie was a beauty queen. Eddie visits the caravan which serves as the base for the local
beauty queen contest and the manager - who is acting under Kenrick's instruction - tells the private
ear that Chrissie was untrustworthy. She is, apparently, in London.

Kenrick is similarly unhelpful, telling Eddie that he doesn't care where the girl is.

A visit to Gary's brother, PC Bryan Molecombe, is of little use to Eddie. Bryan believes that Gary is
deluded, and siffering from schizophrenia.

Following Kenrick's men to the barred gates leading to a cave system, Gary makes his way
through to a laboratory which produces LSD in tablet form. Taking this pills as evidence, he
attempts to call Eddie. Kenrick's men catch Gary, who is later found dead, of an overdose, at his
flat.

A photographer appears at Radio West - in response to an on air request - offering a photograph of
Chrissie which he says was taken only a few days earlier. Erica is convinced that the photograph is a
fake, the fashions dating it by at least a year.

Discovering the LSD laboratory, Eddie rushes to the airport, where Kenrick is watching Toola's band
board a flight to Hamburg, much against their wishes, but in accordance with a clause in their
contract. When he arrives, Eddie explains that a massive amount of LSD is being smuggled in the
band's luggage.

Kenrick attempts to escape in Eddie's car, but Eddie jumps onto the bonnet and holds on
determinedly, whilst Bryan forces the car to stop, using his police motorcycle. Kenrick is arrested,
and it is revealed that he did indeed kill Chrissie in a fit of jealousy.

Eddie wishes Toola well, and leaves as she and her band perform to an eager crowd.

Largely leaving Bristol behind for the seaside, "Find the
Lady" fuses the usual "thriller" aspects of "Shoestring"
with the fashions and sounds of new wave music. In a
sense, this succeeds - Toola's band works within the
episode, Toyah's burning performance conveying the
sense of a young artist trying to attempt something
radical against a sleepy, seaside backdrop. Several
minutes of screen time are devoted to Toyah's
performance of three songs, and these numbers
manage not to intrude on the flow of the plot.
Christopher Biggins supplies a performance as a
seaside entrepreneur with criminal tendencies whose
nastiness is ill concealed. With a wry interlude in a
tattoo parlour, and a brief car chase at the conclusion,
"Find the Lady" was filmed last and would have formed
an excellent final episode for series one. As
transmitted, around three quarters through the series,
it stands as a diversionary case for Eddie, temporarily
removing him from his usual Bristol background.

Good things about this, the final episode to be filmed for Series One, include Marek Kanievska's
direction, the seaside setting which adds atmosphere to this subdued tale of the disappearance of
a beauty queen, Toyah Willcox's appearance as Toola, and some fine character acting by
Christopher Biggins as dubious entertainment impresario Kenrick & the late Gary Holton as the
tragic, misunderstood 'Mole'.

However, the regulars are very much in the background in this episode (even Eddie), and the ending
seems rushed. The conclusion, when Kenrick realises the game's up and drives Eddie's car down
an airport runway - with Eddie clinging on to the bonnet! - is a little fanciful.

"FIND THE LADY" even dispenses with the usual closing credits in favour of Toyah's, or Toola's,
band playing the song 'Danced'.

Not without merit certainly but it's not surprising it didn't finish up as the last broadcast episode of
the series - it's not really that representative, nor is it a very upbeat note to conclude on.