The Firefly Cage

The firefly cage is carved from coal, a Japanese curiosity that only a divvie would take seriously. It leads Lovejoy straight to a gang of antique thieves and the cache of loot they have stashed away, and that is really all the excuse he needs.

The episode also brings in Eric Catchpole as the new apprentice. Lovejoy and Eric soon find themselves on Eric's motorbike, chasing a lovely lady who has something they want, and the pursuit hits a pool of water in the road. The result is a thorough drenching for Jane, Lady Felsham, who had been busy unveiling a plaque at the time. So when Lovejoy rings the doorbell at Felsham Hall later, he turns up looking damp and faintly guilty. Jane takes him up to the attic, and the complicated business between the two of them starts there, among the stored furniture and whatever else the hall keeps out of sight.

Ian La Frenais and Jonathan Gash wrote it, David Reynolds directed. Ian McShane carries the show as Lovejoy, and Phyllis Logan's Lady Jane Felsham meets him at exactly the right angle. The regulars are all present: Dudley Sutton's Tinker Dill, Malcolm Tierney's Charlie Gimbert, and Chris Jury as Eric. Around them are Kim Thomson as Nicola Paige, Ronald Fraser as Drummer, Sarah Lawson as Mrs. Hepplestone, Frank Mills as Mr. Catchpole, and Cassie Stuart as Amanda.

It went out on 10 January 1986 as the first episode of the series, and it has to establish the whole world at a run, from the divvying to the draughty grandeur of Felsham Hall. As first outings go, it does its job quietly. There is a chase, an attic full of secrets, and a protagonist whose gift for reading objects is treated as the most normal thing in the world. The coal cage sets the tone for a series in which the things speak and the people lie.