Dr. Dawson Quotes in The Great Mouse Detective (1986)

[last lines]

Dr. Dawson: [voice over] From that time on, Basil and I were a close team. We had many cases together, but I'll always look back on that first with the most fondness; my introduction to Basil of Baker Street, the great mouse detective.

Dr. Dawson: Dash it all, Basil! The Queen's in danger, Olivia's counting on us, we're about to be horribly "splatted" and all you can do is lie there feeling sorry for yourself. Well, I know you can save us, but if you've given up then why don't we just set it off now and be done with it?

Basil: [feebly] He he. "Set it off now." Set if off... now?

[triumphantly]

Basil: Ha ha! Yes! We'll set the trap off now!

Basil: [Regarding Fidget's note] Offhand I can deduce very little, Only that the words are written with a broad-tip quill pen that has spattered, twice; that the paper is of native Mongolia manufacture, no watermark; and has

[smacks his lips against the paper]

Basil: been gummed, if I'm very much in error...

[smells paper]

Basil: ...by a bat who has been drinking Rodent's Delight, a cheap brandy served only in the seediests pubs.

Dr. Dawson: Hmm. Amazing.

Basil: Oh, not really, doctor. We still don't know where it came from. Perhaps a closer inspection will tell us something.

[Looks at note under microscope]

Basil: Coal dust, clearly of the type used in sewer lamps.

[Takes note and sets it on fire]

Dr. Dawson: Basil!

Basil: Shh. Don't speak.

[He grinds the ashes in a crucible and pours them into a beaker]

Basil: Excuse me, Doctor.

[Takes beaker and a bottle of liquid]

Basil: Steady hand...

[pours a drop into beaker and sets it at the other end of a pipe; he boils a liquid on the other end, watching as it goes through the pipe]

Basil: Come on, come on. Good, bad, bad, good. Come on, come on, come on.

[Liquid finally reaches beaker; chemical explodes]

Basil: Aha! We've done it, old fellow! This chemical reaction could only be triggered by the paper's extreme saturation with distilation of sodium chloride.

Dr. Dawson: Salt water? Great Scott.

Basil: It proves beyond a shadow of a doubt, this note came from the riverfront area.

[Pins a map of the river on the wall]

Dr. Dawson: Now, steady on, Basil...

Basil: No, it's elementary, Dawson. We simply look for a seedy pub at the only spot...

[Pins dart on map]

Basil: ...where the sewer connects with the riverfront.

Dr. Dawson: Well, it's time I was on my way too.

Basil: But... umm... but I thought...

Dr. Dawson: Well, the case is over, and perhaps... well perhaps it's best I found my own living quarters.

Basil: But...

[Knock on door]

Basil: Oh, now who could that be?

[Dawson opens door; a lady mouse is standing there]

Lady Mouse: Is this the home of the famous Basil of Baker Street?

Dr. Dawson: Indeed it is, miss. You look as if you're in some kind of trouble.

Lady Mouse: Oh, I am. I am.

Dr. Dawson: Then you have come to precisely the right place.

Basil: Ah, allow me to introduce my trusted associate Dr. Dawson, with whom I do all of my cases. Isn't that right, doctor?

Dr. Dawson: Oh? Why, yes. By all means.

Basil: As you can see, Dawson, this young lady is from the Hampstead district, and is troubled about the mysterious disappearance of an emerald ring in the third finger of her right hand. Now, tell me the story, and pray, be precise.

Olivia Flaversham: Now will you please listen to me? My daddy's gone, and I'm all alone.

Basil: Young lady, this is a most inopportune time.

[Resumes playing violin]

Basil: Surely your mother knows where he is.

Olivia Flaversham: I... I don't have a mother.

Basil: [Stops playing with a screech] Well, um... then perhaps... See here! I simply have no time for lost fathers.

Olivia Flaversham: I didn't lose him. He was taken by a bat.

Basil: Did you say... bat?

Olivia Flaversham: Yes.

Basil: Did he have a crippled wing?

Olivia Flaversham: I don't know, but he had a peg leg.

Basil: Ha!

Dr. Dawson: I say, do you know him?

Basil: Know him? That bat, one Fidget by name, is in the employ of the very fiend that was the target of my experiment! The horror of my every waking moment. The nefarious Professor Ratigan!

Dr. Dawson: Ratigan?

Basil: He's a genius, Dawson. A genius twisted for evil. The Napoleon of crime!

Dr. Dawson: As bad as all that, eh?

Basil: Worse! For years I've tried to capture him, and I've come close, so very close, but each time he's narrowly evaded my grasp! Not a corner of London is safe while Ratigan is at large. There's no evil scheme he wouldn't concoct. No depravity he wouldn't commit. Who knows what dastardly scheme that villian may be plotting even as we speak.

Dr. Dawson: [Voice over] It was the eve of our beloved Queen's Diamond Jubilee, and the year Her Majesty's government came to the very brink of disaster. She... But I'm getting ahead of myself. My name is Doctor David Q. Dawson, most recently of the Queen's 66th regiment. I had just returned to London after a lenghty service in Afghanistan, and was looking for a place to stay, preferably dry. Little did I know that my life was about to change forever.

Basil: Remember, Dawson, we're low-life ruffians.

Dr. Dawson: Well, I was until that...

Basil: Shh!

Dr. Dawson: Scoundrel's quite gone.

Basil: But not for long, Miss Flamhammer!

Olivia Flaversham: Flaversham!

Basil: Whatever.

Basil: Miss Flamchester!

Olivia Flaversham, Dr. Dawson: Flaversham!

Basil: Whatever.

Olivia Flaversham: Goodbye, Basil.

[sniffles]

Olivia Flaversham: I... I'll never forget you.

Basil: Nor I you, Miss... Miss Flangerhanger.

Dr. Dawson: [chuckles] Whatever.

Dr. Dawson: You're... despicable!

Ratigan: Hehe... Yes.

Basil: Dawson, these drinks have been... drugged!

[Dawson has drunken his mug of drugged beer]

Dr. Dawson: [drunkenly] Has a rather nice bite to it...

Dr. Dawson: How the deuce did you know I was a doctor?

Basil: A surgeon to be exact. Just returned from military duty in Afghanistan. Am I right?

Dr. Dawson: Why, ha, ha, yes. Major David Q. Dawson. But how could you possibly...?

Basil: Quite simple, really. You've sewn your torn cuff together with a Lambert stich, which, of course, only a surgeon uses. And the thread is a unique form of cat-gut, easily distinguished by its peculiar pungency, found only in the Afghan provinces.

Dr. Dawson: Amazing!

Basil: Actually, it's elementary, my dear Dawson.

[Ratigan has ridiculed Basil]

Dr. Dawson: You fiend!

Ratigan: Sorry, chubby. You should have chosen your friends more carefully.

Basil: [pointing to a pinhole in a glass on the toy shop window] Aha! Here is our friend's entrance.

Dr. Dawson: Bu-But, Basil, how could he fit in through such a tiny...?

Basil: Observe, Doctor.

[plugs Dawson's finger on the hole; as he pulls it away, the glass slides open]

Dr. Dawson: Basil, you astound me!

Dr. Dawson: Oh, my! Upon my word. I've never seen so many toys.

Basil: Behind any of which could lurk a blood-thirsty assassin! So, please, Doctor, be very careful.

Dr. Dawson: What-what-what did he mean an engagement at Buckingham Palace?

Basil: Haven't you figured it out yet, Doctor? The Queen's in danger and the empire is doomed.

Dr. Dawson: [Alarmed] The Queen?

Bar Maid: What'll you have?

Dr. Dawson: I'll have a dry sherry, with, oh, perhaps a twist of...

Basil: Two pints for me and my shipmate. Oh, by the way. We just got into port. We're looking for an old friend of mine. Maybe you know him. Goes by the name... of Ratigan!

[Everyone at the bar gasps and turn to Basil]

Bar Maid: I... never heard of him.

[first lines]

Dr. Dawson: I wish you had more boys like Roddy to send us, Sir Thomas.