Ruth Evershed
"What's going on?" Lucas asks the moment he steps onto the Grid, responding to the Red Flash.
"Terror attack on central London," Ruth briefs him on the move towards her station while looking for a file on her tablet. She appreciates not having to cart around a huge number of paper files any longer, since MI-5 went paperless, but sometimes it's bloody infuriatingly hard to find what she's looking for. "Three fatalities so far, two of them police, one a child. Many injured. Bomb was left in a white van right in front of the Science Museum. No one's claimed responsibility as yet."
"Any witnesses? Reliable witnesses?"
"Tariq's working on CCTV and Dimitri's liaising with the police."
"Thanks," Lucas says and walks on, heading for Harry's office.
There is chaos on the Grid, controlled chaos, but still. She hates it when it's like this – too many people, too much activity, especially when someone invariably interrupts her every five seconds.
She sits herself down at her computer. She can't abide the bloody tablet, without a keyboard and mouse. She doesn't know how Tariq does it, but she finds it too bloody difficult to work quickly. She slips her headphones on to help her concentrate and she's soon lost in her work, until the inevitable next interruption.
It's maddeningly frustrating how little chatter there is about this event. Relevant chatter at any rate. It's even more maddening that they don't have a single lead on the culprits.
She's called into Harry's office to share what she has, but it's depressingly little at this stage and she has to bear the brunt of Harry's frustration. He hates it when they have nothing and, as the boss, has the luxury of showing his displeasure. She doesn't believe it works at all as a management style, but she suspects Harry's goal isn't to motivate anyway. He's just venting, which is entirely counter-productive, in her opinion, for all concerned. Not that she can do or say anything about it. Not the way things stand between them at the moment. Bloody infuriating man.
It's Tariq who gets their first breakthrough.
"I've found her!" he says, rushing into Harry's office without knocking.
"Found whom?" This is Harry sounding strained.
"A witness. She saw the bomber. In fact, she tried to stop him. Her name's Ruth Galloway. Dr Ruth Galloway, from the University of North Norfolk."
"A doctor? Good."
"Actually she's an archaeologist, but she's worked as a consultant attached to the Serious Crimes Unit of the Norfolk Police. That's how I found her so quickly."
"Good work, Tariq. Any idea where she is now?"
"St Mary's."
"I'll have Dimitri pick her up," says Lucas and turns, striding out of the room.
After that, everyone is dismissed and she makes her way back to her station, relieved to be away from the bear that is Harry Pearce when an attack is successfully carried out in London. He's not always like this, of course, but when London is targeted and they fail to stop an attack, he takes it personally and becomes irascible and impossible, and if it can be helped at all, far better avoided.
"Ruth?"
She looks up to find Harry nearing her station. "Yes?"
"I need you to interview Dr Galloway."
"Harry, I'm in the middle of..." She tails off at the look on his face. Clearly now is not the time to argue. When is it ever? She wonders sometimes if the reason they never made it as a couple is her need to exert her independence and deny him the one thing within her power to do so. "Why me?"
"I suspect she'll warm to you and we need her to cooperate. We need a face to work with."
"Fine," she sighs in defeat. In truth, she does trust Harry's judgement in this and she could honestly use a bit of a break from the computer; she's going cross-eyed over here.
"Good. When Dimitri brings her in, take her to one of the rooms on the third floor." He pauses, then says, "In fact, I might join you," but before she can question this decision he's walked away again.
Join her? Why join her? Puzzling, infuriating man!
It doesn't take long for Dimitri to ring up and tell her the Doctor is here. She almost asks him if he's brought his Tardis too, but quickly checks the impulse, saying, "Thank you," instead and gathering her things to make her way down to the third floor.
"Dr Galloway," Ruth smiles warmly in welcome, taking in the woman before her. She has intelligent blue eyes, shoulder length chestnut hair and a serious face. "I'm sorry to keep you waiting. We're quite busy here as you can imagine."
"Mummy, I want to go home." This is said by a little girl who looks to be about five.
"In a little while, Kate," her mother replies, then turns to Ruth. "Will this take long, do you think? Only it's been a long day for her and I'd like to take her home."
"Of course," Ruth replies, "I'll get right to the point. Please have a seat." She waits for Dr Galloway to settle herself and prop her daughter on her lap before sitting beside them.
"Hello," she says to the little girl. "I'm Ruth. What's your name?"
"Kate," she replies. "My mummy's name's Ruth."
"I know," Ruth smiles. "I guess that's kind of special, meeting someone who has the same name. Do you know anyone else called Kate?"
"No," she shakes her head.
"Do you like to draw?"
"Yes."
"Here," she replies, passing Kate her notebook and pen. "How about you draw something with my special pen here while mummy and I talk for a bit?"
"Okay." And just like that, Kate is satisfied. If only the rest of the world was as easy, particularly Harry bloody Pearce when they're in the middle of a crisis.
"Thank you," Dr Galloway murmurs.
Ruth just smiles. "She's adorable. How old is she?"
"She's six."
They both watch Kate for a few moments in silence before Ruth feels she has to press on.
"I understand that you were at the museum when..." she pauses, searching for the right word.
"Yes," she nods. "It was horrible."
"I can imagine."
"Were many people... killed?" Ruth sees her glance uneasily down at her daughter, but the little girl seems oblivious of their conversation, concentrating hard on her picture.
"We have four confirmed fatalities so far," Ruth confesses, feeling the need to gain this woman's trust, "but there were many injured too. We have CCTV from the area and it appears that you might be the only person who saw the driver's face. Do you have any recollection of that, Dr Galloway? Is there any chance you could work with an artist to create his likeness? It would be a tremendous help."
"It happened so quickly," she replies. "I'm not sure I'll be of much use. The police officer was calling after him, but he didn't seem to hear, so I touched his arm to get his attention, but the look he gave me..." She shudders at the recollection. "I knew something was wrong, so I grabbed Kate and ran away from the van as fast as I could. We'd been walking towards it. If I hadn't stopped him, Kate..." She tails off, unable to complete the sentence.
Ruth gives her a moment to compose herself. She wants to touch her, offer her some comfort, but she suspects it wouldn't be welcome right now. "It doesn't have to be perfect. We just need something to work with. We have no CCTV images of his face, you see."
"I'm happy to try," she says.
"Excellent. Then I'll-" but she doesn't get to finish her sentence as the door opens to reveal Harry.
"Sorry to interrupt," he says gruffly.
"Harry," Ruth replies, standing. "I was just about to take Dr Galloway upstairs. She has agreed to work with a forensic artist."
"That's good," Harry replies. "Your help is of great value to us, Dr Galloway."
"I'm happy to do what I can," she replies. "All those children at the hospital..." She shakes her head sadly. "The people who were killed... Where any of them children?"
Ruth glances at Harry before nodding. "I'm afraid two of them were. The other two were police officers."
"I've finished my picture," Kate declares suddenly.
"Have you?" Ruth smiles. "May I see it?"
"Yes. It's a cat."
"A cat! I love cats!"
"I have a cat and a dog," Kate says.
"I have a cat too. His name is Harold. He's very old. I don't have a dog though. Do they get on well, your cat and your dog?"
"My cat lives with us, but my dog lives with my daddy. His name is Bruno." Ruth isn't sure if that's the dog's name or her dad's.
"And what's your cat's name?"
But before Kate can answer, there is a commotion outside the room. Harry frowns and opens the door to investigate.
"Let me go! You have my daughter and I demand to see her," a man's furious voice carries into the room.