2009-12-26

Worried about Ronnie, Roxy runs across the square to the Vic. Inside she finds her sister cradling her father on the floor. Archie has an injury to the head. ‘I’m sorry’, he stutters, before dying in Ronnie’s arms. A horrified Roxy backs away. She leaves the Vic and hysterically tells the carol singers that she thinks her dad is dead. Jack enters the Vic with Roxy to see Ronnie sat on a bar stool, numb with shock. Jack feels for a pulse on Archie but finds nothing. Ronnie says she found him but did not call an ambulance because he was trying to say something, Jack says he will call the police and paramedics. PC Adams and PC Young enter the Vic and Ronnie explains she found the body. PC Adams questions Ronnie more intensely and she begins to feel the pressure. Ronnie says that she did not kill Archie but returned to see him because she was upset. She becomes more and more agitated. In the Slaters’ lounge, the Jacksons are visiting and everyone wants to know what’s happened at the Vic with Archie and Jack confirms he is dead. Outside, the carol singers toast to Bianca and Ricky who revel in happiness. In the car lot office, Ryan finds Janine and tells her that Archie is dead. She seems stunned. Janine paces the car lot office and Ryan asks if she killed him which she denies. Janine declares that she had genuine feelings for Archie. Janine heads out. Peggy returns to the Brannings’ house and pulls out the divorce papers from under her coat. As the Vic is cordoned off, the two PCs burst out of the Vic with Ronnie handcuffed, and under arrest. The residents of Albert Square watch as she is driven away.