The Devil's Hoofprints (audio story)

The Devil's Hoofprints was the second and final story in the audio anthology The Third Doctor Adventures: Volume Eight, produced by Big Finish Productions. It was written by Robert Valentine and featured Tim Treloar as the Third Doctor, Sadie Miller as Sarah Jane Smith and Jon Culshaw as Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.
== Publisher's summary ==
Long ago, in Devon in 1855, a mysterious event occurred. Overnight, during a terrible blizzard, thousands of hoofprints appeared in the snow. The tracks led on for miles...and no-one ever identified who or what caused them.
Many years later, the Doctor, Sarah and the Brigadier have come to Devon themselves, to visit a controversial scientific establishment in the wake of a mysterious death and rumours of strange occurrences in the vicinity.
But things are just about to get much, much stranger. Because they’re about to uncover the origins of the Devil’s Hoofprints...but is this one mystery that should have remained unsolved?
== Plot ==
=== Part one ===
Two security guards investigate a sound that one believes is probably a rabbit being caught by a fox or owl and are attached by a creature, one of them being killed. A nearby experiment, coordinated by Mr Chilton, is shut down by a technician due to the sounding of the perimeter alarm, angering Mr Chilton. He picks up the telephone and hears of the tragedy outside, exciting him as he now knows that his technology works.
The Doctor and Sarah arrive outside the Dewer Tor Superconductivity Lab in the TARDIS and pick up an energy residue on the Doctor's pocket spectrometer. They walk to a nearby village and meet the Brigadier at the Wild Hunt, an inn in Exley St Michael's where he is lodging, and learn that UNIT have been called in regarding the death at the lab. Sarah asks Olive Plymtree about it; she tells them that the older folks believe that it is the Devil, but she thinks it is simply due to a dispute about the lab being built in an area known for natural beauty.
The Doctor, Sarah and the Brigadier travel by Jeep to the lab and meet with Mr Chilton, who feels like he might have once met the Doctor and knows Sarah's name. He gives them a tour of the lab, showing them where they test and develop superconductive materials at just above absolute zero, roughly the same temperature as deep space. Currently, they are experimenting on a new alloy of Mr Chilton's own devising. He changes the subject to the supposed monster who killed the security guard, claiming that it is likely a story propagated by the environmental lobby.
To prove that the death had nothing to do with the experiments, Mr Chilton invites the Doctor, Sarah and the Brigadier to stay and observe the next one from the control centre. The Doctor detects the strange particle signature on his spectrometer again and asks about the new alloy, which Mr Chilton admits is actually a coil of pure hadesium. The Brigadier's men contact him about the destruction of the perimeter fence by an invisible creature and the Doctor tells Mr Chilton to shut the experiment down. He refuses and draws a gun when the Doctor tries to do it himself, but the Brigadier wrestles with him and tells the Doctor and Sarah to go.
The Doctor and Sarah run and manage to get outside before the lockdown. They head to the TARDIS in order to return for the Brigadier, but the hadesium particles interfere with the dematerialisation circuit and prevents them from arriving in the lab. The TARDIS initiates an emergency shift and they materialise in the very same spot, but long before the lab was built; to save the Brigadier, the Doctor says that they must find the source of the particles in the past, which he finds is 9 February 1855.
As it is snowing, Sarah puts on the fur coat that the Doctor sometimes wore during his previous incarnation. The pair find a set of hoofprints leading from the Dewer Tor and are shot at by Sir Basil Hexworthy, who is hunting with his dogs and threatens to kill them if they move.
=== Part two ===
Sir Basil Hexworthy accuses the Doctor and Sarah of trespassing on his land and tells them that he will not be letting them go until they reach the end of a set of unusual footprints. The Doctor realises that the tracks are the Devil's Footprints and, once they come to an end and Sir Basil lets them go, he and Sarah leave, unaware that the creature has jumped down from the trees.
In the lab in the 1970s, Mr Chilton breaks free from the Brigadier and averts the meltdown before jumping away, refusing to give him the code to get out. The two fight and Mr Chilton leaves after the Brigadier is buried under rubble, but he emerges unharmed.
The Doctor and Sarah go to the Wild Hunt and speak with the vicar, Mr Woolsgrove, who invites them to attend his emergency sermon for the panicked villagers. Mr Woolsgrove pacifies the villagers by saying that the prints were more likely made by an escaped kangaroo than the Devil and then takes the Doctor and Sarah to the vicarage. Sarah goes to help the housekeeper, Mrs Plymtree, whilst Mr Woolsgrove agrees to try to get Sir Basil to help the Doctor.
Two men get into the house and kidnap Sarah, taking her away on horseback. The Doctor takes Mrs Plymtree's tea tray and uses it as a snowboard to follow the kidnappers; they fight outside of Hexworthy Hall where, upon entering, the Doctor finds Sarah being held captive by Mr Chilton.
=== Part three ===
Mr Chilton, who is not yet using this name but takes a shine to it, reveals that he is Thrayne of Cyntheros and wants the Doctor's spectrometer to hunt down the beast, an Icewalker, to restore his honour. Sarah accidentally smashes a window in the pantry, is warmed by the Icewalker in the snow and escapes to the vicarage where Mr Woolsgrove decides that they will round up the patrons of the Wild Hunt and the Blue Board to march on Hexworthy Hall. There, Mr Woolsgrove persuades Sir Basil to let the Doctor go, which Lord Thrayne allows as he has the spectrometer.
The Brigadier and Mr Chilton continue their cat and mouse game. Eventually, the Brigadier is able to bait and trap Mr Chilton and threatens to kill them both with a proton grenade that he had stolen from him during their fight.
Sir Basil apologises to Mr Woolsgrove and Mrs Plymtree and explains that Lord Thrayne had promised him a rifle like his own to hunt in Africa. He returns the spectrometer to the Doctor, having taken it and Lord Thrayne's particle resonator which can release hadesium particles as bait for the Icewalker. The Doctor realises that Sir Basil has accidentally activated it and they begin to barricade themselves in. The Icewalker arrives.
=== Part four ===
The Doctor draws the Icewalker away from the village by flying away in Mr Woolsgrove's weather balloon with the particle resonator, followed by Sarah, Mr Woolsgrove, Mrs Plymtree and Sir Basil by wagon. Lord Thrayne shoots the Doctor down above the frozen river and fires at Sir Basil, but Mr Woolsgrove jumps in the way and is wounded. The Doctor switches off the resonator and destroys it to show the Icewalker that he means it no harm before advising it to make its home at Dewer Tor. Thrayne swears that he will accomplish his goal and the Doctor and Sarah leave in the TARDIS.
The Brigadier detonates the proton grenade, but Mr Chilton survives and goes in search of the Icewalker. The Brigadier finds him at the mercy of the creature, which listens to him due to the Doctor having asked it to go easy on him, and the Doctor and Sarah arrive. Mr Chilton is arrested, the Icewalker returns to Dewer Tor and the Brigadier goes to explain the shutdown of the lab to the Minister whilst the Doctor and Sarah wonder what made the rest of the footprints. They take to the TARDIS to the village for cream tea.
Mr Woolsgrove and Sir Basil laugh about the reports of the footprints having been made by the Devil or an escaped monkey with something on its feet. They have tea with Mrs Plymtree and agree to keep the secret of the Icewalker, whom Mrs Plymtree calls "Old Dewer".
== Cast ==
* The Doctor - Tim Treloar
* Sarah Jane Smith - Sadie Miller
* Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart - Jon Culshaw
* Chilton - Barnaby Kay
* Sir Basil Hexworthy - Robert Daws
* Reverend Mr Woolsgrove - Derek Griffiths
* Mrs Plymtree / Olive Plymtree / Technician - Carolyn Seymour
* Icewalker - Nicholas Briggs
=== Uncredited ===
* Guard 1 / Guard 2 - Derek Griffiths (BFX: The Devil's Hoofprints)
* Mother - Carolyn Seymour (BFX: The Devil's Hoofprints)
== Crew ==
* Cover Art by - Oliver Chenery
* Music and Director - Nicholas Briggs
* Executive Producers - Nicholas Briggs and Jason Haigh-Ellery
* Producer - David Richardson
* Script Editors - John Dorney and Nicholas Briggs
* Sound Design - Steve Foxon
* Writer - Robert Valentine
== Worldbuilding ==
* The Doctor has a pocket spectrometer, which he invented.
* Sarah is officially writing a piece for the Metropolitan on how South Devon is "the new Majorca".
* The Doctor claims that Sir Walter Scott is an old friend of his.
* "Dewer" is a local word for the Devil.
* Hadesium is a dangerous element not found on Earth.
* In 1855, Queen Victoria is on the throne, the Crimean War is raging and Lord Palmerston has just become Prime Minister.
* Sir Basil's firearm is a muzzle-loaded, two-groove, double rifle made by Dickson of Edinburgh.
* Reverend Woolsgrove states that the footprints have been found as far north as Coombe Tracey, which was a fictional Dartmoor village in the Sherlock Holmes story, The Hound of the Baskervilles.
* Sarah wears the Second Doctor's fur coat to keep warm in 1855.
* Sir Basil is a squire.
* Sarah mentions the Cottingley fairy photos and the predictions of Nostradamus as examples of hoaxes.
* "Panic" comes from the name of Pan, a Greek god who roamed forests and terrified people.
* The Doctor introduces himself as John Smith.
* Mr Woolsgrove mentions the nearby Exeter, Dawlish, Exmouth and Sandy Bay.
* The River Ex has frozen over in 1855.
* Mr Woolsgrove mentions how St Dunstan shod the Devil.
* Woodbury is near Exley St Michael's. Mrs Nimpton lives there and told Mrs Plymtree that Danny Plummer, the "village innocent", was set upon by a hunting party from Topsham after covering himself in goose feathers and wandering around at night.
* Mr Woolsgrove says that the tracks have gone as far north as Coombe Tracey.
* Mr Chilton asks if he is still on Earth in 1970 or 1980. The Doctor answers "around then".
* Cyntheros is the second planet of the Vel system.
* Icewalkers are fierce, solitary and territorial energy-based creatures native to the coldest parts of Cyntheros. Most are dead, although some remain in the darkling wastes of the northern magnetic ranges.
* The tribunal allowed Mr Chilton a single pulse energy rifle, twelve proton grenades and a particle resonator.
* The Brigadier says that Sandhurst was "hardly a charm school".
* Gabriel is Mr Woolsgrove's horse.
== Notes ==
* Robert Valentine's inspiration for this story came from the PG Tips 'Unexplained Mysteries of the World' tea card collection entry on the Devil's Hoofprints.https://twitter.com/MrRobValentine/status/1452174618811412480
* The Big Finish Productions Short Trip The Devil's Footprints by Penelope Faith is based on the same historical incident, although that story is set in January 1850.
== Continuity ==
* Sarah wears the Second Doctor's fur coat. (TV: The Abominable Snowmen)
== External links ==
Category:The Third Doctor Adventures audio stories
Category:Sarah Jane Smith audio stories
Category:Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart audio stories
Category:Stories set in Devon
Category:Stories set in the 1850s