A Cup for the Winner

An American client wants his family property found, and the job takes Bulman out of his usual orbit. The request sounds simple enough, the way all requests sound simple when they are made long distance. But tracking the property down turns out to involve the usual mix of paperwork and deception, with the added pleasure of doing it somewhere the locals do not owe him anything. The mystery has the shape of a treasure hunt, which suits a show that likes its puzzles portable.

Murray Smith wrote it, David Carson directed, and the episode uses the change of scene as a holiday for the regulars. Bulman is a man who works better when he is underestimated, and abroad he is underestimated with enthusiasm. Don Henderson keeps him unhurried, the same man in a different room, and the shift of scenery suits the character's habit of noticing things while everyone else is busy being elsewhere. Siobhan Redmond's Lucy McGinty provides the grounding as ever, the fixed point the episode returns to between excursions.

The title belongs to the sporting world, which is a fair description of international property work as played on television: a competition with a prize, and a loser who does not know the game is on until it is over. The hunt for the family property has that shape, and the episode enjoys the chase.

It is a lighter outing than most, closer to a travel piece with a mystery attached, and there is no harm in that. Even the best partnerships need a change of scenery now and then, and this one handles the change gracefully. The client gets his answer, the case gets closed, and Bulman gets a stamp in a passport he will pretend not to have enjoyed. The episode never strains for effect, which is its best quality.