S05E18-Holmes Bell Watson dock

"Dead Man's Tale"
◀️ The Ballad of Lady Frances Elementary intertitle High Heat ▶️  Transcript Script icon

Season: Five — Episode: 18
Director: Alex Chapple — Writer: Tamara Jaron — Aired: March 26, 2017 — Viewers (millions): 5.16
Summary: Holmes and Watson investigate a case which involves a legendary pirate and his rumored treasure. All while the two struggle with their relationship with Shinwell.


Elementary intertitle Episode Cast
Main Cast


Am I the only one keeping an eye out for the lost Ark of the Covenant?
Detective Bell
At The Brownstone, having discovered that Shinwell was responsible for killing his close friend and fellow SBK gang member Jameel Clark, Holmes commiserates with Watson. However, Watson doubts the word of Jameel's brother, Damon Clark, who Holmes confronted over his testimony on the murder twelve years before. Holmes asks Watson to meet Detective Guzman, who will be taking a fresh statement from Damon. At a storage facility, Xavier wins an auction for the contents of a unit whose owner failed to make the payments on. Discovering many valuables items, he also finds a withered male corpse in a storage locker. Meeting Detective Bell at the scene, they discover a stab wound by a sword killed the man. The items in the unit are labelled with their owner's names and the phone number of the Manhattan Public Administrator's Office (MPAO).

S05E18-Xavier Midnight Ranger
Midnight Ranger Number One.
Calling the MPAO, the corpse is identified as Travis Unger and his partner, Mr. Salas, is brought to the 11th Precinct. Knowing the purpose of his office is to collect items from the deceased who have no will, they accuse Salas of robbery and murder. Salas says Unger committed the thefts but he accepted money from him. Showing that he was on a cruise when Unger disappeared, Salas indicates that before Unger vanished, he left a message that he'd found something that would make them rich. Figuring Unger absconded with the treasure, which Salas has no details on, the last person Unger was collecting from was a Milton Barker. At the MPAO's warehouse, Bell and Holmes open a large crate and find an 18th century sea chest belonging to one of Milton's ancestors, Emerson Barker. Seeing from the chest's contents that Emerson was a ship's captain, Holmes discovers that his captain's log is missing.

S05E18-Bell Holmes warehouse
So, how do you open this?
With Guzman, Watson listens to Damon's statement that twelve years before, he heard Shinwell and Jameel in the kitchen and then heard gunshots. Hearing the front door shut, he left his bedroom and found Jameel dead. Looking out the window, he saw Shinwell toss a gun into a garbage can. Retrieving the gun, he intended to shoot Shinwell at his brother's funeral, but couldn't. Shinwell then went to prison and Damon had to wait until recently, when Shinwell was released, before he could make an attempt. He admits to committing a drive-by shooting on Shinwell in which he missed hitting him, and then threw the gun into the East River. Returning to the Brownstone, Watson tells Holmes that she's now convinced of Shinwell's guilt but that Guzman believes that Shinwell won't be charged.

S05E18-Guzman Watson question
I guess I'm no killer. But Shinwell sure is.
Showing Watson that Emerson Barker's log books are publicly displayed, he's found that Emerson wrote his logs well after the events recorded in them happened. He's also found that gaps in the logs correspond with reported pirate attacks and believes that Emerson was both a trader and pirate known as "Black Peter." Positing that Emerson's pirate log recorded the location of treasure from a raided ship, Unger was killed over the log. After more research, at the precinct, they show Captain Gregson that Emerson's log may detail the location of a sunken treasure. Bell reports that one of Unger's last credit card transactions was at a bar near docks favored by marine salvagers and after visiting the bar, Lars Vestergaard is identified as a salvager who met with Unger the day before his disappeared.

S05E18-Log book on wall
He and his crew led a double life.
Meeting Lars at a dock, he confirms their suspicions but says he didn't kill Unger as he already knew the location of the treasure ship, the Santa Leticia. Showing them that a year before he met Unger, he'd done research in Seville, Spain and found the ship's location, he provides a salvage title from the Admiralty Courts. However, after securing investors for the salvage, someone beat him to the ship's treasure, which was video recorded. Providing the names of his investors, he suggests that whoever beat him to the treasure killed for the log. Leaving Lars, Bell arranges for satellite footage that will identify the ship that found the Santa Leticia's treasure. At Shinwell's apartment, Holmes is unsuccessful getting Shinwell to confess to Jameel's murder. Indicating that he'll help him, Shinwell says Jameel was like a brother and that he didn't kill him.

S05E18-At docks
Somebody else ended up with Black Peter's logbook.
At the precinct, Gregson and Watson meet with Farhan Al-Asmari, the owner of the Sea Unicorn. Cheerfully admitting to taking the Santa Leticia's treasure and having the log, he denies killing Unger. Showing that he is extremely wealthy and treasure hunts for the historical value of the artefacts, he obtained the log for only $25,000 on the Dark Web from a user known as "Kashgar." At the Brownstone, Watson has Mason locate Kashgar on the Dark Web and giving the user a video to open that sends them his IP address, they're able to identify the user as John Neligan. Searching for Neligan's criminal record, they discover numerous drug dealing convictions. An ESU team assaults Neligan's home but he denies knowing anything about Kashgar or a log. However, his teenage daughter Hope admits to Bell that she is Kashgar.

S05E18-Watson Mason Holmes
Mason embedded a Trojan horse in the video.
At the precinct, Hope details that she's a middleman who sets up sales of antiques for those that don't know how to do Dark Web transactions. Never handling the items or meeting the sellers, she arranged for the sale of the log directly to Farhan and the seller allowed her to keep the entire $25,000 sale amount. Puzzled, Holmes posits that someone set out to ruin Lars Vestergaard and after speaking to him, he names one of his investors, Clarence Jarman. At the precinct, Jarman admits to losing money investing in Lars' salvages and to punching him at the opera. Claiming to be a changed man after undergoing anger management treatment and performing international charity work, he says he and Lars had settled their differences. As a result, Lars entertained him and others clients on his ship when men from a boat with a custom pirate flag damaged his ship. He suggests the pirates were trying to ruin Lars, especially as they attacked his ship several other times.

S05E18-Clarence Drummond
Instead of crossbones, there were two scuba snorkels.
At the Brownstone, while the owner of the shop who made the custom pirate flag looks up the customer information, Watson's discovered that Holmes made a recording of his conversation with Shinwell. Questioning the timing of Holmes wanting to have Shinwell imprisoned when he's working as an informant to bring down his former gang SBK, Holmes believes that Shinwell may kill again which he thinks they'd be partly responsible for. Finding the custom pirate flag was made for a marine archaeologist, Bell, Holmes and Watson her office near a dock and accuse her of Unger's murder and selling the log to Farhan to ruin Lars' business. Admitting to the attacks on Lars' ship, claiming his salvages desecrate sunken ships, she denies killing anyone. Learning the treasure came from the Santa Leticia, she claims there was no treasure on it and that the Seville archives didn't indicate it had any gold.

S05E18-With Archaeologist
Mr. Al-Asmari pulled up millions in gold.
Told that gold was found on the ship, and that Black Peter's log provided the information, she suggests that Lars wouldn't have made a salvage claim and lined up investors unless he was sure there was treasure on it. Excusing himself, Holmes makes a phone call and then tells Bell and Watson that Lars stood to make more money if there was no treasure on the Santa Leticia. Called to the precinct, Lars is incredulous when told that he arranged to salvage a ship he thought had no treasure. Having called Jarman, who provided a complete list of the Santa Leticia's investors, he's told that he oversold shares in the treasure, $15M in investment in total. If any treasure was found, he'd owe ten times its value. Since the contract with the investors was written so they'd receive nothing if there was no treasure, he stood to profit if the salvage was a bust.

S05E18-Vestergaard finale
There was evidence of gold aboard the Santa Leticia.
However, when Unger showed him Black Peter's log with details of the Santa Leticia's treasure, he knew that he faced ruin if his salvage succeeded. Killing Unger with an antique sword at the storage unit, he stole the log and arranged for its sale to Farhan, ensuring his salvage would fail. Showing Lars a picture of himself with a sword, Lars says he lost it. Bell tells him they've obtained Coast Guard records of his ship's transponder data that shows he took his ship out the night Unger disappeared. Lars is asked what he thinks divers will find at the spot his ship stopped at that night. Walking home from a support group meeting, Holmes is ambushed by Shinwell who smashes a bottle over his head. Saying that SBK lied to him that Jameel was a traitor and manipulated him into the shooting, he vows to bring SBK down. Kicking Holmes several times, Shinwell warns him that anyone who gets in his way will get hurt.

S05E18-Shinwell beats Holmes
SBK kills dozens of people a year. Their drugs ruin thousands of lives.



"It's not like I haven't exposed you to the occasional killer."
―Holmes to Watson


Elementary Season Five Episodes
Folie a DeuxWorth Several CitiesRender, and Then Seize HerHenny Penny the Sky Is FallingTo Catch a Predator PredatorIll TidingsBang Bang Shoot ChuteHow the Sausage Is MadeIt Serves You Right to SufferPick Your PoisonBe My GuestCrowned Clown, Downtown BrownOver a BarrelRekt in Real LifeWrong Side of the RoadFidelityThe Ballad of Lady FrancesDead Man's TaleHigh HeatThe Art of Sleights and DeceptionFly Into a Rage, Make a Bad LandingMoving TargetsScrambledHurt Me, Hurt You

Elementary season five poster

Season OneSeason TwoSeason ThreeSeason FourSeason FiveSeason SixSeason Seven